#and like when i say this i need you to understand that i spent perhaps 12-14 hours per day for four days

[hiraethwa]

one summer day

16 chasm. where the distance becomes too much to bear

<< 15 wake-up call. | >> 17 (coming soon)

pairing: ushijima wakatoshi x reader word count: 2.6k warnings: ushi mom being a bitch <3, heartbreak, denial, running away

“i don’t know what to say to you except that it tore my heart out of my body saying goodbye to you”

you deal with the gaping hole in your chest the only way you know how to—avoiding the source of your heartbreak. 

wakatoshi finds his bentos packed on the dining table each morning without fail, with you nowhere in sight; his dinner waiting for him under the mesh food cover by the time he comes home, missing his usual dinner companion. the sweet daifukus he bought from your favorite shop for you as some sort of shitty makeup bribe sits untouched on the table. 

two weeks fly by as you both settle into your new unspoken routine. he understands the distance between you, tries his damned hardest to respect the space you needed. it takes all of his willpower not to knock on your door and beg for your forgiveness. 

so when he sees you for the first time since he broke your heart, it takes him by surprise. 

you must have gotten lost in your thoughts as you absentmindedly finish arranging the food in the bento, delicate fingers expertly pulling the ends of the furoshiki into a simple knot.

your name slips out in a shaky whisper, his voice carrying an uncharacteristic hint of nervousness. like a loyal believer seeing his faith for the first time.

you freeze like a deer in headlights. he curses himself.

“you don’t have to say anything to me.” for the first time, he rushes to fill the silence with words, hoping he didn’t scare you away. “i just wasn’t sure—” if you are real

wakatoshi watches as your shoulders start to rise and fall, as if overwhelmed with emotion. he shakes his head at himself, backtracking towards his own room to give you space. 

“i’ll be away next week for a family gathering,” he says softly, hoping you would say something, anything. he wishes you would scream and yell at him instead. anything would be a lot better than the silence that emanates from your end. 

but you don’t say a word as your fingers shakily smooth over the worn furoshiki, so he closes his door gently behind him, sliding to his knees. 

-

the stupid falcon plushie from tanabata used to sit on your bed. then in the open suitcase. now it sits in the corner of your room when you impulsively decided to not bring it to paris.

you spent two whole weeks avoiding him successfully through careful planning. the pain that came in fresh waves threatening to pull you under slowly became bearable day by day until you could breathe without it seizing your lungs. 

so you thought that perhaps, you could pretend that it never happened. unfortunately, that was delusional of you. 

the moment you heard his voice, everything came rushing back. every moment, every word from him that drove the dagger deeper into the organ keeping you alive and twisted it flooded your mind. and helplessly, you were dragged under the waves of pain welcoming you to your own version of hell.

you could only freeze, seized by your overwhelming emotions. feeling like you were thrust into the treacherous sea, yanked downwards and downwards into the unknown darkness.

so sadly that was not an option. 

secretly you were relieved to learn that he is leaving for a week, a whole week where you didn’t have to tiptoe around the apartment, afraid of running into him. 

you were tired of packing your life into a suitcase, which you expected to be a straightforward task, seeing as you only brought a few boxes with you to tokyo. but there were many choices to be made—between one winter coat and another—do you really need so many t-shirts—and they are all sending your frayed nerves into overdrive.

you opt for taking a lap around the nearby park, and surprisingly, you run into someone you recognize the moment you stepped out of the apartment complex. a familiar face from miyagi.

“is wakatoshi home?” she asks after exchanging polite pleasantries. 

“not yet, do you want to wait for him?” 

“that’s alright. care to join me for some coffee or tea?” 

you accept the invitation, curiosity winning over your better judgment. 

the tea room she chooses is surprisingly quiet in the middle of the work week. you would have thought it would be more populated considering the upscale society that it caters to.

you were “how are you doing?”

you look up from the menu, puzzled at her question. 

“men can be so careless, i know that from my own experience.” oh, so that’s where she’s going. you wonder how much she knows—how much ushijima told his mom. 

“i’m fine. thank you for your concern, ushijima-san.” you wince a little at the reminder their shared name brings you.

“good. i’m glad to hear that.” she sets her copy of the menu down on the pristine marbled table surface, gracefully waving over an attendant who takes your orders and repeats them back to you verbatim. 

her full attention returns to you, eyeing you with intensity. you aren’t sure if you made the right decision to not reject an elder’s offer. 

“are you coming to miyagi next week as well? wakatoshi never told me how many of his friends are coming to his yuino.” you blink at the word. 

yuino. the traditional engagement ceremony. 

the yawning pain in your chest stutters in confusion, but she blazes ahead, blissfully unaware—or uncaring, you realize much later—of the devastation that must be showing on your features. “it must be hard for you, knowing that wakatoshi is going to be engaged to someone else in a week.”

she gives you a look of sympathy. “i didn’t mean for you to be caught in the crossfire, y/n. it must be hard for you, i saw the way you looked at my son.” 

you blink again. it takes everything you have left to remember to breathe. 

you don’t recall anything else after that. your mind taken hostage by your memories of the past winter, of him and his mother and her. was that his future fiancee? 

of course she is. she is everything you are not, so much more than you have to offer him. 

you look down at your empty teacup, licking your lips. your tongue feels numb, as if you’ve burnt yourself drinking the tea. like icarus flying too close to the sun. 

looking at her retreating figure stepping into a car, you can’t help but wonder if she was here for you. 

-

you wonder if he ever planned to tell you that he is promised to another. 

it is an answer you will never know since you don’t give him any chances to in the four days leading up to the time he leaves for miyagi. 

the confirmation email from your college sits opened in your inbox, along with your one-way flight ticket to paris when semi comes barging into the apartment with kai, having unlocked the front door with the hidden spare key.

“eita,” you blink up at him, the haze clouding your mind clearing for the first time in days. the ghost living in the shell of your body remembering it is alive. 

“you better have an explanation for ignoring all my calls and texts for the past week.”

you cock your head to the side in confusion. the muddied feeling of hopelessness and yearning like no other in your chest swirling with every movement. the longing, missing, grieving of someone who is very much alive but no longer the same. 

everything has changed. 

oh, why does it feel like the world is ending? it must be the reason your self-preservation instincts have kicked in, blocking everything out.

“did i miss our plans for dinner?”

you try to rack your brain for the source of the suffocating emotions filling the immense void in your chest, only to be met with resistance. a gentle push keeping you away from the answers you seek. 

“that was two days ago. why haven’t you returned any of my calls or texts? did you know how worried i was? even ushijima couldn’t reach you.” semi stands above where you sit on the floor with stacks of clothes and sentimental items tucked away in the suitcases splayed open on either side of you.

ushijima. the familiar name sparks a staggering pain to life in your chest, spreading like wildfire, blazing with a light so bright, it rivals the sun itself. 

your hands tighten around yourself subconsciously at the name. 

he used to be your sun.

“what’s wrong?” semi kneels next to you, gently touching your shoulder. he exchanges a concerned look with kai at the faraway look in your eyes. 

“i don’t know, eita,” you lean into his touch, the first physical touch you felt in weeks. a reminder that you are not alone. you had forgotten. you breathe the truth as you know it—“i’m not quite sure anything is right anymore.”

“can i lean against you? just for a few minutes?” the despair in your eyes sends semi clambering to sit next to you, to provide any comfort he could to his friend. 

you take a few moments to gather your scattered thoughts, but they disperse like clouds when you reach out for them. you answer his earlier question as truthfully as you could, “i don’t know. i don’t know how to carry on, eita. how do i live with this pain that feels like my heart was ripped out of my chest?”

“what did he do?” you know who semi is referring to. after all, there is only space for him in your heart, was only ever space for him. 

“it doesn’t matter, does it? i still have to continue living.”

“right, but—”

“i don’t want to talk about him,” mentioning him feels like poison on your tongue. you scramble to find a handhold at the anger that rises in you in response. the indignation that he actually did lead you on, taking what you offered to him with love, all while knowing that he was promised to someone else. he chose her. 

neither semi nor kai feels any less cautious of your condition, the cloudiness in your eyes clearing to show a reckless sharpness that tries to redirect the pain you are feeling elsewhere. 

semi holds his hands up in surrender. “okay. that’s fine. do you want to grab supper with us? get out of the apartment for a bit?”

“yeah, sure.” you glance at the open suitcases. “i think i’m all packed up and ready to go anyway.” 

“i thought you’re not leaving for another week.” 

you wave him off. “my plans changed. my flight is leaving tomorrow.”

“and you didn’t think to tell me?” semi sounds hurt by your dismissal. 

“i—” you frown at yourself. you hadn’t thought of that. too deep in your own pain, you forgot about the people who actually cared about you. “i’m sorry. i was too wrapped up in my own pain, i forgot—”

“i’m sorry.” you withdraw from him, physically and emotionally. the sorrow in your bones inviting you back to their familiar embrace in the cold darkness, in a world accustomed to the absence of the warm sun. 

“y/n” kai’s voice brings you back to reality, as she tugs you to your feet. she gives semi a look to drop the matter, especially since it only seems to send you back to that space that snuffs the light out of your eyes. “come on, let’s get some food in you, yeah?”

you give her a smile that doesn’t quite reach your eyes, allowing them to accompany you for food one last time before you go. 

-

“when is your flight tomorrow?” semi asks you as they drop you off from your last supper with the happy couple. 

you toy with the charm on your bag, rubbing the metal absentmindedly. “why? are you going to tell him?” 

“is he not supposed to know?”

you shrug. “i don’t think he would care.”

“you know that’s not true—”

“don’t, semi. don’t tell me that. you don’t know that. i don’t know that. we both thought he felt the same way towards me as i do for him, and it sure doesn’t feel that way right now.” 

you widen your eyes in surprise as the words escape your mind. 

“do you want to talk about it?” kai asks you softly, as semi stares back at you in disbelief, mind running through the possible scenarios of what exactly happened between the two of you in the few weeks since his birthday. his birthday.

he swears under his breath. something must have happened between then and now. 

“no. just don’t tell him, okay? promise me, semi.” 

he really, really wants to strangle someone, but he begrudgingly gives you his word to not say anything to his former captain. you didn’t say anything about a certain red-haired boy, however. 

you relent. “my flight is at 4pm.” you had already told them why you had to move up your plans—a last-minute withdrawal that resulted in an invitation being extended to you for a pre-semester bootcamp that you were waitlisted for.

“was whatever happened between you two so bad that you’re not bothering to tell him that you’re leaving? despite what you had?” kai gives him a warning look to shut the fuck up.

“why don’t you ask him yourself? i mean it, semi. go ahead, ask him, and while you are at it, ask him if he planned on telling you why he is really in miyagi right now.” 

“what do you mean?” you wonder if the promised violence in his voice is meant for you or him. 

“it isn’t my place to say. but believe me when i say this, semi.” you turn to look at him in the eyes solemnly. “i am truly sorry for dropping all this on you on the last second. i was too self-absorbed to remember anything but the pain i was drowning in. you are my best friend, but i won’t make you choose between us.”

“the truth is despite everything that happened, i still love—” gods, his name is stuck in your throat. “him, but i can’t see a world where we can still be friends because of that. you know there isn’t a world where we are just friends.”

“could you let me be selfish just this once, for the sake of my sanity? when i get to paris, you will be the only one i stay in contact with.” i don’t know how to say goodbye to him.

“just so you know, i am not happy with whatever the fuck this situation is, but i will respect your wishes.”

you smile ruefully at your first friend in high school, pulling him in for a goodbye hug. “thank you, semi eita.”

kai goes next, your arms engulfing her shorter figure. “thank you for taking care of him, kai. i’m counting on you to steer him clear of bad decisions while i’m gone.” you wink at her, a poor attempt at lifting the mood. 

“i don’t know when i will be back, but you two should definitely visit me in paris sometime. stay happy for me, will you?” you say your goodbyes again for the last time in a long time. 

when you lay in bed that night, your bags all packed and rolled out to the hallway, you realize you forgot to remove the cheap glow-in-the-dark stars you pasted over the ceiling to remind you that you are no longer in miyagi. 

you had survived miyagi, but at what cost?

a/n: in my head, y/n is in disbelief and feels betrayed, yet it still makes sense why toshi would pick someone else over her </3 peak heartbreak

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[quatregats]

Having a real "*freeze frame**record scratch* oh hey it's me you might be wondering how I ended up here" kind of moment rn

[retiredteabag]

Sukuna assimilating to you

Synopsis: After discovering that Sukuna has been wide awake every time you nap together, you become embarrassed around him.

〰・♡・〰〰・♡・〰〰・♡・〰〰・♡・〰〰・♡・〰

It is a scientific fact that when we are around people we love and trust, while in a healthy relationship, the release of oxytocin makes us sleepy.

Sukuna does not need sleep. He is the king of curses, able to continuously use his technique without ever becoming exhausted. When you first suggested that his chambers were "perfect for napping", he had simply raised a brow and considered what that could possibly mean.

You are like a weak creature to him. A kitten or perhaps a rabbit. And since you are never safer than when you are in his presence, you frequently find yourself growing sleepy when you are around him.

Throughout your strange relationship with the king, something that you loved most, is that there never needs to be words exchanged between the two of you. You were both contented to sit in silence. Frequently dozing off together, or so you thought.

You caught on eventually, that he was always awake before you. That his breathing pattern never really changed. That his face never relaxed more than it would if he had simply been sitting with his eyes closed.

One morning, after having stayed the night sleeping, you mumbled to him, "How is it you're always awake before I?"

He rose a brow at you, his upper set of eyes were looking into yours, the lower staring at how you lay across his bed sheets.

"I do not know your meaning." He grumbled out.

You huffed, rolling your eyes. "You never sleep in longer than I do, one day I would like to wake up before you."

"I never sleep at all." He stated before you had even really finished your sentace.

"What?" Your breathy outburst echoed slightly in his bed chamber, "What do you mean you don't sleep?"

"I do not require such things." He turned his torso now toward you, all four eyes studying your face, you had quickly sprung up, seemingly miffed.

"So... so all this time, you've just been... laying there while I've been sleeping?"

"I suppose I have, I do not see how this matters in the slightest." "It matters because I've been... It's just been a big waste of time for you. Sukuna you should have said something." You're upset, he can tell. Your face is scrunched up, your blood is pounding in your veins. Sukuna, however, does not know what to say in this situation.

In all honesty, he figured you knew and were just including him. Did you really think he was that weak? Or could you simply not conceive of a restless existence? Whatever the answer, he had no response for you, expecting a shrug of the shoulders- you he would discover, would not so easily let go of things.

And how humiliated you were. How many HOURS had you spent sleeping with him, within his grasp, in his space for him to have been conscious the whole time? You tried thinking back, attempting to recall a time you had requested a nap when he was uninterested.

He had never uttered a word about it. Never turned you down. Sukuna was not a kind king, he rarely ever did things that were not out of necessity, and he certainly did not do things he didn't like. That, at least, was consolation. You knew he had not been suffering for your sake, but even so, it was embarrassing.

Sukuna, still, could not understand your sheepishness about the subject. He did not care to explain that time works differently for him, that his mind is not so simple as yours and does not require entertainment all the time, that he could sit still for years and not be bothered, and frequently did before you came along.

He assumed you would get over it quickly. In your time as well as his. But days passed and he rarely saw you. You took your dinner with other people of the palace and spoke with him in the most cordial manner. One night, he informed Uraume that they needed to prepare a dish suited for you, something that would entice you, and serve it to him.

He figured this would bring you crawling back to him, tail between your legs. Yet, you did not budge.

Odd.

You were wallowing. You knew it. He did not care to spend time, what? Watching you sleep? Of course, he wouldn't, but it hurt your pride, to know you had been taking up such huge chunks of time lazing about in his presence. Well, not anymore. You slept in your chamber and your chamber alone. Gone were the days of blankets on the engawa, gone were the days of resting beneath the kotatsu while laying your head in his lap, gone were the days of sharing his bed.

If ever he wished for someone to share his bed, he had a whole cast of concubines, though you knew they were never of any use to him, they were mostly just house staff with a fancy title.

The evening he finally decided enough was enough, you were in the washhouse doing laundry.

Your back was arched over a bin full of soapy water. Your hands working tirelessly on some cloth.

"Have you not circumvented me enough?" He spoke in a low and slow tone.

"Lord Sukuna." You bowed, clothing in your hands, suds up your forearms, you bent your neck as to not look at him.

"You will reply now." He raised a brow, watching your hands quietly splash in the washbin.

"Was there something you would like me to assist to?" You questioned. Your head was full of possible reasons for what the king meant by seeking you out personally.

"Do you believe that by not sleeping in my presence I would come to believe you do not require rest?" He spoke in an unserious tone, eyes unblinking.

"No, my lord." Now what was he playing at? Of course that wasn't your intention.

"Then you hide yourself from me because you no longer have time for your king, I suppose." He mused.

Oh, for heaven's sake, "No, my lord."

"I see," He bent down to look you dead in the eyes, "So, you must no longer crave my occupancy of your space. You must not desire my hand running through your hair? I suppose you have tired of staying in my chambers?" His tone remained deep but his eyes were dead serious now.

"I-" You began, but suddenly you felt the urge to cough, swallowing you tried again, "I wished not to preoccupy so much of your time."

"And you made this decision without enlightening your king."

You said nothing.

"You will eat with me tonight, you shall stay in my chambers henceforth." He rose in record speed, turning without a second glance your way, maids were staring wide-eyed at the king of curses as he halted at the entrance of the washhouse. You could not see, but there was finality in his voice.

"I wish not to waste-" You were cut off by Sukunas voice, his broad back still facing you.

"Your wishes do not interest me now, so it seems. It is my wish for you to spend your time with me." His steps resounded through the compound, your face slack.

The maids smirked, and with shocked faces, side-eyed one another. A couple entered the washhouse giving you big open-mouthed smiles, and patted your shoulder as they passed.

That night Uraume made something you would go on to beg them to make for years to come. And when Sukuna pulled you prone from your seated position on his bed, he took a firm fingertip and stroked the space between your eyes, one of his enormous hands encircling your skull and massaging your temples with his thumb and ring fingers. He traced the bridge of your nose to your forehead, the way you would stroke a cat.

Perhaps he thought this would induce drowsiness but all it did was make you feel all floaty inside at his silliness.

And for the first time since that night, you slept alongside him. Within his embrace, and when you awoke, Sukuna's eyes were closed.

[bwabys-scenarios]

Illumi stares at you often, and when I mean often, 95% of the time spent with him involves him staring at you at least a little.

His big, black eyes always seem drawn to you when you’re in his vicinity, pulling you into their dark depths. You’d think it would feel cold, considering his profession or cold personality, but looking into his eyes feels strangely warm and fills you with fuzzy feelings.

The dark haired assassin had never felt the way he felt about you before. At first he hated the way you made him feel, avoiding you at all costs. But the distance made his heart hurt, which again, is something he’s never really felt before.

If he hadn’t met you, none of this would have happened. Maybe… just maybe if he just took care of you and ended your life, that would make his heart stop racing every time he spotted you.

But he could never do it. You were full of blind spots, way too trusting, and much weaker than him, but still… he could never find the chance to kill you.

No… that’s not true. Just by walking past you alone, he could count at least 14 ways he could have swiftly ended your life within seconds, but when he moved to pull out his needles… he physically couldn’t. The needles heavy in his pocket, his heart thumping against his chest so fast that it made breathing difficult.

Killing was the only way he knew how to really interact with others. Killing them, killing for them… it’s all he really knew. So when you spotted him at a party for Hunters that he only attended so he could gather information on a target and invited him to join you for a drink… he couldn’t say no.

While the two of you talked, every little thing you did was noted down by him and stored away in his brain. The way you drilled your fingernails against the table when you were trying to remember something, the way you smiled softly when he occasionally spoke up, and even the way you breathed.

When you got up to leave, you gently patted his shoulder, saying that the two of you should ‘hang out sometime’.

And that single touch was the beginning of the end.

Just that small amount of physical contact made him feel way more drunk than the drink he’d been sipping on. The warmth of your touch reminded him of the first time he tried rum. The warm, almost scorching feeling of the liquor running down his throat almost matched the intensity of that little touch.

And he wanted more.

He had never gotten as hard as he did the night after you touched him. He found himself jerking off to pictures he found of you on your social media, imagining your pussy clenching around him instead of the touch of his hand.

As the months passed, you found yourself encountering Illumi a lot more than you had in the past. Whether it be on jobs, random bump ins at the bar or while you were shopping… it’s like you saw him everywhere these days.

Illumi felt no guilt over putting a small tracking device in your bag. After all, he killed people for a living, this was nothing.

He told himself that he was just fascinated with your ability, or perhaps even your knowledge on a specific subject. But that shouldn’t have been enough for him to be carrying you home from the bar after you had a few too many, his hands holding back your hair when you needed to vomit.

Illumi had never taken care of someone before, but when he attempted to leave you to your own devices, your hand held onto his sleeve.

“Don’t go…”

This is when he realized that he didn’t want anything you could give him that he thought. Your knowledge or your abilities meant nothing to him in the moment, what mattered is that he was curled up next to you, staring at you as you slept.

Illumi could go multiple days without sleep, so he spent the entire night just staring. Here you were, with your cheek squished against his arm, your hands clutching his shirt as you slept.

Could you ever even comprehend the things he had seen and done? Did you even understand that the man you had allowed into your bed ended other’s lives for a price?

You slept so soundly, as if you were not curled up with an experienced assassin. He couldn’t help but reach out and cup your cheek, squeezing the soft flesh between two of his nimble, pale fingers. This made to whine a bit in your sleep, but it didn’t wake you.

He was just… in awe of you. Everything you did had his heart racing. Even asleep, your actions could send him into cardiac arrest if he wasn’t careful.

As he caressed you, something he had been wanting to do for a while, his mind wandered.

What would happen if someone like him was sent to kill you? You were too trusting, too kind and naive for your own good.

He couldn’t let that happen.

That thought made him pause. For the first time in his life, he wanted to protect someone instead of use them for his personal gain. You weren’t just a means to an end or a stepping stone to his success… you were you.

And he loved you.

Love… the concept was foreign to him, but if that was the word that described what he was feeling for you… maybe he could somewhat understand the cheap romance novels he had read when bored on missions.

In the morning, you were sick again. He did his best to help you. Illumi had seen plenty of nasty things, he could handle some vomit and tears.

“Thank you, Illumi…”

He glanced to you as he put on his coat to leave. You were in your pajamas still, your face still a bit warm from embarrassment. The two of you barely knew each other, yet you had roped him into taking care of you.

“It was… no trouble.”

“B-but it was! Can’t I do anything for you to make up for it?”

He stopped, pausing by the door. “… be mine.”

The heat in your face increased tenfold. “What… did you just say?”

“I said be mine.”

Illumi was in front of you in no time, his hand was cold, but firm on your waist. “I want you, (Name).”

“Um…”

You laughed nervously, flustered. “How about a date?”

“Those terms are acceptable.”

As Illumi walked towards the car that had come to pick him up, he was already planning out how he’d bring up the prospect of marriage to his family. Of course they wouldn’t stop him, but he would prefer their approval.

Illumi opened his phone, seeing that you had texted him.

(Name): how about Sunday at 7 pm?

That was in two days. Would he be able to find a ring that suited you by then? Ah… but he really wanted to see you again as soon as possible.

Illumi: Sounds great.

He could feel himself get hard with excitement. As he looked out at the scenery passing by, he wondered if you wanted one or two kids.

‘Three or more would be best… but I’ll let her decide. She’ll be the one bearing my children after all.’

Unbeknownst to you, your entire future was being laid out for you. For the better or worse.

[aptericia]

Not proud to be here.

--

Ok, here goes draft like 5 of this fucking post. I spent 4 hours tossing and turning in bed last night thinking about this, and then this morning I found a tumblr post that really helped me understand what I was trying to say.

The post talks about how aromantic "advocates" claim that "aros don't take up resources, so there's no reason not to include them!" And if that's actually what people believe, I think I can finally articulate why it is that I feel so alienated in queer spaces.

It's because aspecs in general aren't "welcomed" by much of the queer community. We're tolerated. We perhaps get the luxury of not being contradicted on our own identities, or not being specifically kicked out of LGBTQ-only spaces, but that's the whole point: what we get out of the queer "community" is people NOT doing things, not actually doing things FOR us. And that, frankly, is not enough. We deserve conversations about us. We deserve to have others consider our feelings, even when making lighthearted jokes. We deserve varied, respectful representation in media. We deserve the active deconstruction of amatonormativity in society. We deserve to have space made for us, rather than at most being told we should "go take up more space!" ourselves.

Of course, the reality is that my being aspec is a personal matter that does not inherently affect anyone else. But the same can be said for literally any queer identity. Your being gay doesn't say anything about me, so of course I shouldn't hurt you for it, but why should I help you either? Because your happiness and comfort are important. The same goes for aspecs.

And most of the time, I don't even need anyone to make space for or expend resources on me; I can live fine in everyday, non-queer-specific places without mentioning my identity at all. But it's the queer community that claims it will make that space for me, doesn't, and then acts defensive and morally pure if I call out the hypocrisy because "we're queer too, you can't erase our identities to advocate for yours!!!!"

Again, this post isn't about specifics. I have queer friends who are incredibly thoughtful and supportive about my identity, just as I have non-queer friends who are. I find more solidarity in aspec-only communities, as well as trans/genderqueer ones, although there are still many exceptions. This post is also not about amatonormative ideology, which is extremely common from queer and non-queer people alike. This post is about the reason I've felt so betrayed by the queer community.

--

On a personal note, I remember being so excited when I started identifying as aromantic (and later asexual). Fitting myself into labels has been a lifelong struggle for me; to this day I still can't confidently say if I'm White or PoC, neurotypical or neurodivergent, abled or disabled, cisgender or not cisgender. I continue to struggle making friends because I don't fall into social cliques. To discover that I officially, certainly, was LGBTQ+ lifted a huge weight off my shoulders. And now I'm just so sad to find that despite that, I'm still stuck in the middle. I didn't get rewarded with a community. I still feel alienated from both queer and non-queer people. I know it was silly to get my hopes up when there's such vast diversity in both groups, but it really was a disappointment. Going to my first Pride parade last year was really the moment where I realized this.

[unstable-samurai]

ON REFLECTION

Naoi Rei x Male Reader

word count: 7K

The room's light struggles to reach the dark corners of the apartment as you sink into the couch, tired and a little lost. The TV is off, but the screen reflects distorted fragments of you and Rei, who sits in the opposite armchair. She’s sitting cross-legged, and the expression on her face is hard to decipher. The Hello Kitty pajamas don’t match the look she’s giving you. You've known Rei since high school, and now you've been roommates for two years, and in that time, you've seen every nuance of her emotions. But today, she seems different. She watches your fingers toy with the remote. Your head buzzing—maybe from lack of sleep, or perhaps the confusion that has become your life these past few days. Either way, the silence between you both grows heavy, and it eventually becomes unbearable.

"I'm leaving for a few days," you finally say, your voice low, dragging, almost as if you’re testing the words on your tongue before letting them go. "I need to get out of here, out of the city. Go to a friend’s place."

She doesn’t respond immediately. Instead, she runs a hand through her hair, playing with the ends as if pondering the best way to voice what’s on her mind.

"Let me guess: because of her, right?" Rei’s question is loaded with an implication you don’t want to face.

And then, she narrows her eyes... daring you to lie.

You take a deep breath, trying to gather your thoughts.

“What do you mean?"

Rei scoffs, the sound half a laugh, half frustration. "You're going to leave me here alone?" She leans forward slightly, her hands now resting on her lap. "Are you abandoning everything just because she left you?" Her tone is direct, like she’s poking at an open wound, but you know Rei never sugarcoats her words.

"Rei, you've been alone before," you respond, trying not to sound insensitive, but realizing you failed the moment the words leave your mouth. "I… I just can’t take this place anymore. This apartment, the memories…"

She raises an eyebrow, clearly unconvinced.

“The problem,” she starts, choosing her words carefully, “is that you’re going to throw away everything we planned. You’re leaving our plans behind because of that bitch.” The word comes out sharp. There’s no hesitation, no trace of guilt or regret.

"Rei, it's not that simple." You feel the need to justify yourself, to explain what you don’t fully understand. "I… I just need some time, you know? Space to think."

"Space to think?" She repeats, as if it’s a bad joke. "Think about what? About how she treated you like garbage? How she made you feel small every time you did something she didn’t like?" Her tone and gaze burn in a way that makes you flinch. "Or maybe you want to think about how she hated when we spent time together? How she made you choose between... her and me..."

You remain silent, the weight of her words crushing any response you might have had.

"Rei…" you try to start, but she cuts you off again.

“No! Now you're going to listen to me!”

She rises from the armchair, the pink pajamas swaying with the movement, and walks toward you with determined steps. “We planned to watch all the Halloween movies, remember? And it wasn’t my idea. I hate horror movies, but I was going to watch them because you wanted to. And now you’re telling me you’re not in the mood?” She stops in front of you, crossing her arms, her expression a mix of anger and hurt.

“Rei, it’s not about you, it’s about… everything.” The words seem insufficient, hollow, as if they can’t capture the chaos in your mind. “I just… need to get away for a while.”

She takes a deep breath, her hands now clenched into fists at her sides.

“You’re really blind, you know that?” she says, her voice softer now, almost a whisper. “I’ve been right here. I’ve always been here.”

You watch her, feeling a knot form in your stomach. “What do you mean by that?”

Rei doesn’t answer immediately. Instead, she lets her arms fall and, in a fluid motion, sits on your lap, so close you can feel the warmth of her body, her scent— that soft vanilla fragrance that always seems to follow her.

“I’m saying,” she begins, her hands now gently holding your face, “that you’ve never really seen me. Never noticed what I feel for you. And it seems that even now, you still don’t.”

You feel your heart race, as if you’re running a marathon without moving. “Rei, I…”

“Shh,” she interrupts, her finger touching your lips. “You don’t need to say anything. Just listen to me, okay?” She sighs. “I’ve always been here. Always. Since day one. I’ve taken care of you, helped you get back up every time she knocked you down. And I did it because… because I love you.”

The last word hangs in the air, heavy and inescapable. You feel like the ground has disappeared, like you’re falling endlessly into an abyss of uncertainties and emotions you didn’t know existed.

Rei continues, ignoring the shock on your face. “I know this might seem sudden, but… it’s not. I’ve always felt this way. I was just waiting for you to notice. But it seems you’re too blind for that.”

She leans in, your faces so close you can feel her breath against your lips. “I don’t want to be your friend, never did. I want to be more than that. I want you. And I’m not going to let you run away from me now, not after everything.”

Before you can respond, she kisses you. It’s not a gentle or hesitant kiss. It’s a kiss full of need, of desire, of years of repressed feelings finally released. And you kiss her back, because deep down, you know she’s right.

When the kiss finally ends, you both sit there in silence, just breathing, absorbing what just happened. Rei rests her forehead against yours, her eyes closed, more vulnerable than ever.

“Now do you see?”

You don’t answer. You don’t need to. Because for the first time in a long time, everything makes sense.

Memories come in waves, thick and suffocating like the warm air in the apartment that winter. It’s as if the memories from that week have been waiting for this moment to surface, forcing you to face what you’ve tried to hide for so long.

You remember when Rei got sick, a fever that seemed to burn through her, leaving her fragile and trembling. The flu came out of nowhere, turning her into a weakened version of herself, someone you almost didn’t recognize, except for the look she gave you, that spark that never completely faded, no matter how much her body was suffering.

You walked into the room that first night, the tray in your hands trembling slightly. Ginger tea with honey. Toast, because she couldn’t eat much more than that. She was curled up in a heap of blankets, the Hello Kitty pajamas that always made her seem childlike now seemed like a useless armor against the illness. You placed the tray on the bedside table and sat beside her, the mattress sinking under your weight.

“Hey, how are you feeling?” you asked, knowing the answer would be the same as always.

“Like I got hit by a truck,” she muttered, her voice raspy and trembling. She could barely keep her eyes open, but she forced herself to smile at you, because that’s what Rei did. Even when she was broken, she tried to make you feel better.

“Well, at least you’re still beautiful,” you said, trying to get a laugh out of her like you always did. You reached out to brush a strand of hair from her face, your touch soft, almost reverent.

She rolled her eyes, but the smile widened a bit. “Stop it. I look like crap and you know it.”

“No, seriously. You’re like… the sick version of Hello Kitty. The cutest, the prettiest.” You smiled, and she finally let out a weak laugh, a sound faint but full of life.

“You’re ridiculous,” she said, but there was tenderness in her voice.

During that week, daily routines became rituals between you two. Mornings were for medication and warm soups, afternoons for tea and old movies she couldn’t watch to the end without falling asleep. But the nights… the nights were different. They were the moments when everything seemed to slow down, and it was just you and Rei, together in the darkness, talking openly about anything, trying to forget she was sick, trying to make her feel normal.

“When you get better,” you said one night, as she lay on her side, looking at you with those big, tired eyes, “I’ll cook whatever you want. Anything.”

“Anything?” she asked, raising an eyebrow. Even sick, she couldn’t resist a challenge.

“Yeah. As long as it’s something I can make without burning down the kitchen,” you replied.

“Then I want… the best pasta you’ve ever made in your life,” she said, her lips curling into a smile.

“Pasta?” you repeated, as if she had just asked for something exotic.

“Yes, pasta. But it has to be special. I don’t know how, but I trust you to figure it out.” She looked at you with a confidence that made your heart ache. As if she knew you would do anything to see her smile again.

You remember how, that week, the apartment seemed to exist in its own universe. The world outside kept spinning, but in here, it was just you and Rei. You remember staying up late, listening to her breathing, holding her hot, feverish hand, waiting for the fever to finally break.

There was a moment, on one of the hardest nights, when you really thought she might get worse. The fever was high, and she was delirious, mumbling incoherent words. You held her hand, squeezing it tight, as if that could anchor her back to reality.

"Hey, I'm here," you said, your voice firm, trying not to let your anxiety spill over. "You're going to be okay. I promise."

She looked at you, her eyes filled with confusion and pain, and for the first time that week, you saw fear there. Not the fear of dying, but the fear of losing something, of losing you.

"Don't leave me," she whispered, and the vulnerability in her voice broke you in a way nothing else could.

"I'll never leave you," you replied, and in that moment, you realized how true that was.

These memories blend with the present as Rei sits on your lap, her eyes on yours, waiting for you to finally understand what she's trying to tell you. She has always been here, by your side, taking care of you, just as you took care of her. And now, with her so close, you finally understand what has always been right in front of you. The world around you seems to shrink until there's nothing left but the couch, the soft glow of the room, and the warmth of Rei's body on your lap. Time slows down, each second stretching to the point of almost breaking. Her breathing, light and steady, echoes in your ears like a persistent whisper, mixed with the sound of your own racing heartbeat. Your eyes meet, and you realize there's nowhere left to run.

Rei doesn't move. She doesn't try to force anything, just watches you, as if waiting for something. Maybe for an answer. Maybe for a sign that you've finally understood.

"What are you going to do now? Ignore this... or face it?"

There's a part of you that wants to retreat, but something stronger, something that pulls you forward. Unconsciously, your fingers move to her waist, finding the soft skin beneath the thin fabric of her pajamas.

Rei closes her eyes for a moment, as if absorbing the moment, and you feel her body relax under your touch. When she opens her eyes again, there's a sparkle there, something you've never seen before. "I love it when you touch me," she says, and there's a smile on her lips, a smile that is both a statement and a confession. "I've always loved it."

Your heart pounds in your chest, the reality of the moment finally starting to take root in you. But before you can process it, she continues, the words coming out fast, as if they've been held back for too long.

"And of course, she knew." Rei's voice is now harsher, carrying a brutal frankness. "Your ex-girlfriend, that bitch. She always knew. That's why she never liked me. Because she knew that at some point, I would take you from her. Because you were always mine, even when you didn't realize it."

You remember all the times your ex-girlfriend made passive-aggressive comments about Rei, the thinly veiled jabs, the looks of disdain. It all makes sense now, as if a piece of the puzzle has finally fallen into place. Rei leans in a little closer, her face now inches from yours. "She knew that deep down, you didn't want her. She knew you were with me the whole time, even when you were by her side. And she knew I was waiting for the right moment."

You try to say something, but the words get lost before they reach your mouth. All you can do is hold Rei a little tighter, feeling her warmth against your body, the sweet fragrance of vanilla lotion mixed with the scent of her hair.

"And now," Rei says, her voice soft, almost a whisper, "the choice is yours. I'm here. I've always been. The question is... will you finally accept my love? Or will you keep pretending you don't feel the same?"

You know there's no turning back. Not after this.

You lean in, your lips almost touching hers, and the decision has already been made before you even realize it. Because finally, you understand. All you need to do is allow yourself to feel.

"I never wanted her," you finally admit, your voice rough, as if the words had been trapped for too long. "I just didn't know that... I always wanted you."

Rei smiles, a smile that lights up the room, and before you can say anything else, she kisses you. And in that kiss, there are all the answers you've been looking for.

Because deep down, you always knew she was yours. And that you were hers.

When your lips part, you say, "Forgive my indecision, Rei."

She smiles.

"Already forgiven, silly."

So this is the moment of truth. Everything is falling apart around you, and the only thing left is this girl, Rei, looking at you with hungry eyes. She’s already made it clear that she wanted you, that she wants you. Always has. Your ex-girlfriend is just a detail now. And at this moment, it's as if every mistake, every wrong choice, was necessary to get here, with her, at the exact moment when the stars collide.

Rei is on your lap, where she’s always belonged. You kiss like you're drowning, each kiss a rescue from a lost past, and she keeps whispering between kisses, "Kiss me," "Kiss me more," as if it’s never enough, as if your lips still can’t reach what she really wants. The sound of her breath, heavy and fast, is like music, and all you want is to get lost in it, to drown in the innocence of this moment. And when you finally stop to breathe, that's when you really see her. There, so close, the adorable face, lips shining with saliva, dressed in that cute pajama that makes her look innocent. As if this were some kind of final test to see if you can resist what she’s become: the perfect girl.

"Make me yours," she asks, her voice a murmur between kisses. Every word carries a need that goes beyond the physical. It's as if she’s offering her soul, and you feel the weight of it, the gravity of this moment. It’s not just sex. It's so much more. It's mutual possession.

"You will be mine," you respond, and it’s a declaration of dominance, that you’ll have her in every way, that she will be yours and you hers, without reservations, without fear.

You feel your cock hardening, pressing against her. Rei notices, of course. She leans close to your ear, that warm breath against your skin, and confesses, whispers, with a malice that makes your blood boil, a malice that makes your heart race.

"I used to ride my pillow, imagining it was your cock." The image she paints in your mind is raw, almost cruel, because now all you want is to feel her fantasy become reality.

That’s all you needed to hear. She asks in a whining, almost childish voice if you’re going to fuck her, and you answer without any hesitation, "I will." The voice coming out of you isn’t just a reflection of arousal, it’s a promise. One you intend to fulfill with every fiber of your being.

You move to the bed, stumbling between laughter and kisses, the bodies colliding awkwardly but filled with a vital need. As you strip off your clothes, throwing everything to the floor like the world is ending, she looks at you with those eyes, almost asking for permission to be adorable. And there’s no way to resist that silent plea, that look that mixes innocence and lust in a perfect combination.

"Do you want me to keep this pajama on while you fuck me?" she asks, biting her lower lip. "Don't I look cute in it?" It's both a tease and a plea for you to want her even more. And it works.

You can only agree. "Very." The words come out almost as a moan, because at that moment, you know there’s nothing sexier than this mix of purity and perversion, this contrast that is Rei.

And then, without more words, she asks to see your cock. When you take off your underwear, the last barrier between you, her eyes widen, impressed.

"Wow..." She whispers with a mix of admiration and desire, as if she’s seeing something she’s dreamed of for so long finally become reality.

You sit on the bed and Rei kneels in front of you with the same devotion as someone kneeling for prayer. The entire room seems to shrink, every noise from the outside world suffocated by the sound of your quickened breath. She wraps her small hands around your cock, almost as if she’s holding something sacred, something she can’t rush. She drags her palm slowly along the length, exploring every vein, every contour, as if she’s trying to memorize every detail.

Her eyes are fixed on yours, a gaze that’s both sweet and wicked, an intoxicating mix that leaves you completely at her mercy. She smiles a wicked smile before tilting her head and brushing her face against your cock, as if familiarizing herself with the texture, the warmth, the weight. She’s in no hurry, and it drives you crazy. She knows what she’s doing, and you know she’s in control.

She starts with small kisses on the tip, soft, almost chaste, but each touch is charged with a sexual tension that makes you want to grab her hair and push her deeper. But you hold back. This is part of her game, and you don’t want to spoil it. She opens her mouth, letting the tip of her tongue slide slowly and provocatively along the slit at the head, her eyes never leaving yours. It's a deliberate act, one that makes every muscle in your body tense with desire.

She licks around the head of your cock, her tongue moving in lazy circles, spreading saliva until it's glistening and slippery. “I’ve always wondered what your cock feels like, always wanted to know what it tastes like…”

Rei slides her mouth down the length, taking you as deep as she can, and the warmth of her throat envelops you in a wet, pulsing grip. She holds you there for a moment, her eyes closed, savoring the feeling of having you so deep, so completely at her mercy. When she begins to move, it’s slow, dragging her lips along your cock while her hands come down to massage your balls, squeezing with just the right amount of pressure that pulls a low, husky moan from your throat.

She alternates between sucking and licking, her mouth wetting your entire length, creating a rhythm that is as erotic as it is torturous. She lets go of your cock for a second, only to lick your balls, one at a time, sucking them gently while her hand continues to slide up and down your erection.

“I want to hear you moan for me… Yeah, just like that… I love it when you moan like that…”

When she takes you into her mouth again, it’s with more pressure, like she’s hungry for more, like she needs to consume you entirely. The sound of her sucking is obscene, wet, the noise of saliva mixing with the sound of her heavy breathing. She sucks harder, the pressure increasing, each movement faster, more urgent. You can feel the heat building in the pit of your stomach, the pressure mounting as she continues, taking you deeper, moving faster.

“Fuck, Rei… you do that so well…” you manage to murmur, your voice fractured by pleasure. She responds with a muffled moan, a sound that vibrates around your cock and makes your whole body shudder. She speeds up, her gaze locked on yours, eyes gleaming with a mix of pleasure and challenge, as if she knows exactly what she’s doing to you and loves every second of it.

Finally, when she feels you’re on the brink of losing control, she slows down, releasing your cock from her mouth, but not before giving one last suck, hard enough to make your eyes roll back. She looks at you, her lips red and glistening with saliva, a thin string connecting the tip of her tongue to the head of your cock.

“I could do this all night… just to hear you moan more for me.”

She moans around your cock, the sounds vibrating through your body, each movement of her tongue sending waves of pleasure that make your muscles clench. “The taste of your cock is so, so good… way better than I imagined.” She whispers between sucks, looking at you with eyes so full of lust they seem ready to explode.

Rei stops, stands up, and you're still seated on the edge of the bed. Without breaking eye contact, she slides her hands down your chest, her nails lightly scratching the warm skin, before slowly turning around, her slender and delicate body moving with a grace unique to her.

Rei is facing away from you now, and you have the perfect view of the soft, provocative curves that drive you crazy. She positions one leg on either side of your thighs, and with one hand she pulls aside the thin fabric of her shorts, revealing the wet glisten of her pussy, while the other hand grips the base of your cock, guiding it with deliberate precision. She lowers herself slowly, the head of your cock brushing against her tight entrance, while a sigh escapes Rei's lips. She doesn’t rush; every inch is a small torture that makes you grip the bed sheets tightly, as if you need something to anchor you to reality.

When she finally sits on your cock completely, taking you all in, the sensation of being inside her, feeling the heat, the wetness, the pressure, is incredible. Rei begins to move slowly, rising and falling in a deliberate, calculated rhythm, each movement designed to give you agonizing pleasure, as if she’s relishing in testing your endurance. Her hands grip your knees for support, and with each roll of her hips, she tilts in a way that makes you sink even deeper into her, each thrust ripping a muffled groan from your lips.

“That’s it, Rei… slow… I want to feel every second…” you murmur, your voice hoarse, almost a desperate plea to prolong the torture.

She tilts her head back and lets out a low moan, filled with pleasure. “Your cock feels so good… it goes so deep in my tight little pussy…” Her words are like gasoline on the already burning fire inside you. The rhythm gradually increases, her movements become faster, more desperate, as if she’s surrendering completely to the desire that’s consuming both of you. The sound of your skin slapping against hers, the wet sound of her pussy sucking your cock, fills the room with a dirty and delicious melody. She keeps riding you, her moans turning into short screams of pleasure.

You feel the need to take control of the pace, so you grip Rei’s waist firmly and pull her up, making her lift off your cock with a frustrated moan. She turns to you, surprised, but you’re already standing, rising with clear intent. Before she can react, you pull her towards you, turning her to face the wall. Her breathing quickens as she feels your body pressed against hers, your throbbing cock against her skin, and she instinctively arches, pushing her ass out for you.

You position your cock at the entrance of her pussy again, wasting no time, and start fucking her standing up, thrusting hard, as if you want to mark every stroke. Rei lets out a sharp cry of surprise and pleasure, her hands bracing against the wall for balance as you fuck her. Your hips move in a furious rhythm, each thrust deeper than the last, each time faster, as if you’re determined to bury yourself as deep as possible inside her.

“Is this what you wanted, Rei? My cock fucking you like this? Tell me…” you whisper in her ear, nibbling on her earlobe.

“Yes! Fuck, I wanted you fucking my tight little pussy…” she responds between moans, her voice trembling with the force of each thrust. “Fuck me harder… I want to feel you all… deep inside me…”

You grab her breasts through the fabric, squeezing them firmly, feeling the delicious weight in your hands as you continue to fuck her hard. Rei’s moans turn into screams, she throws her head back, her hair sticking to her sweaty skin, her body arching as you keep pounding. The sensation of her pussy tightening around your cock, her internal muscles clenching in pure pleasure.

You pull her by the waist, feeling her tense muscles tremble under your grip, and guide her towards the bed. Rei quickly removes her shorts and gets on all fours, arching her back, showing off her dripping pussy, begging to be fucked. “Look at me… look at this pussy… it’s all yours… only yours… so fuck it, fuck it hard…” The sight alone is enough to make your head spin, your whole body screaming to take what’s yours.

Rei looks back over her shoulder, her eyes gleaming with a mix of lust and submission. “Fuck me… I need you… now,” she moans, her voice almost a whisper, but the plea is as clear as a shout.

You position your cock at her entrance, sliding slowly through her warm, pulsing opening before burying it deep in one single motion. She lets out a high-pitched moan, almost a scream, and the sound echoes through the room. Your hips start moving on instinct, your hands gripping her waist tightly, controlling each thrust, each push that drives her forward and then pulls her back for more.

“Just like that… harder… I want to feel every inch…” Rei begs, her voice broken by the moans that escape with each thrust. Her fingers dig into the sheets, her body arching with every movement, and you obey, increasing the force, the speed, until the sound of your skin slapping against hers fills the room. Her body responds to every thrust, her pussy squeezing even tighter around your cock, as if trying to keep you inside, as if she never wants to let you go.

You feel the moment approaching, the peak of pleasure that’s so close yet seems unreachable. With a hoarse groan, you grab her arms, pulling them back, pinning her under you as you continue to fuck. Rei completely surrenders, her moans turning into screams, her muscles tightening, her breath hitching as you drive her higher and higher until finally, she explodes in a powerful orgasm that makes her tremble beneath you. Her body convulses violently around your cock.

When she finally calms down, you lay her carefully on the bed. Rei looks at you with half-closed eyes, her lips parted in a smile that is both satisfied and hungry for more. You lie down beside her, but before you can relax, Rei is already moving again, climbing on top of you, sliding along your cock, swallowing you in one go, and begins to ride you with a slow, deliberate rhythm.

Her breasts bounce through the fabric with each movement, the skin of her thighs sweaty and glistening in the dim light of the room. Rei unbuttons her pajama top, and you can’t resist touching her breasts, squeezing them firmly, feeling the heat and weight in your hands. Rei tilts her head back, letting out a deep moan, almost a purr of pleasure, and you realize she's reveling in the control, in the sensation of completely owning you. "I'm going to come again... I need to come again..." she says, her eyes closed as she quickens the pace, each movement faster, more desperate.

You can feel her orgasm approaching, her pussy tightening even more around your cock, the heat and wetness increasing with each passing second. Her body moves with a frantic urgency, riding you with all her strength, as if she’s rushing towards a precipice, ready to throw herself into the abyss. And when she finally climaxes, Rei convulses on top of you, her body trembling, her muscles squeezing with an almost painful force, holding you inside her as she loses herself in pleasure.

It doesn't take long before you feel an intense heat building inside you, an unbearable pressure accumulating. Rei is still riding you, and she notices the change in you. She's moving slowly after her orgasm, her hips moving in a rhythm that teases you, rubbing her slick pussy against every inch of your cock, feeling the veins throb against her hot, wet flesh. Your eyes meet, and she smiles, a smile that mixes triumph and desire.

"You're going to come for me, aren't you?" Rei murmurs. "I want you to cover my face with your cum. I want to feel it dripping down my face, sliding into my mouth. Give me all your milk, baby."

Her words are a spark that ignites the last shred of self-control you had. In a swift movement, Rei dismounts you, kneeling beside the bed. She looks up at you, hunger in her eyes, as she firmly grips the base of your cock, her lips slowly parting, ready to devour you one last time. She slides the tip of your cock between her lips, sucking with a pressure that's both devastating and incredibly erotic, her eyes locked on yours as if daring you to hold on for just one more second.

But you can't. Not now. Her hands move with devilish skill, gliding up and down the length of your cock as her tongue desperately circles the head, licking, sucking, begging for you to drop your huge load on her.

"Come for me, baby," she whispers between sucks, her voice so full of lust that you almost explode right then and there. "Cover my face with your cum, please. I want it all, I want to feel you."

And then, just as you feel the climax explode inside you, Rei pulls your cock from her mouth, holding it inches from her face, her lips curled into a wicked smile. "That's it, come on my face, cover my face with your cum."

The first jet of cum hits her face with force, spreading across her nose and cheek, slowly dripping toward her lips. She closes her eyes, her smile widening as more jets follow, coating her skin. "That's it, baby... more... give me everything," she moans, feeling the cum drip from her eyelashes, slide down her chin, turning her face into a canvas of pure, dirty pleasure.

"Do it, mark me with your cum," Rei continues, running her fingers across her face to collect more of your cum and slowly licking them, savoring it like it’s her own addiction. "Fuck, I loved that... I loved everything, your taste, your smell, your touch, the way you make me feel so... so slutty."

Even after you've given everything, Rei still milks you with her hands, ensuring not a single drop is wasted. She licks her lips, tasting you, moaning softly as she savors every last drop. "Fuck, this is so warm, so good," she whispers, her voice drunk with pleasure, her eyes still closed as she basks in the sensation.

"Fuck… That was amazing, I loved every second, Rei," you say.

Finally, she opens her eyes and looks at you, a sweet smile on her lips. "From now on, our days will always be like this," she replies.

"I didn't know you could be so... perfect," you admit.

She gives an adorable little laugh as she responds, "You haven't seen anything yet."

—

That night was like any other. The bar, lit by neon lights that cast a bluish glow over everything, made the place seem like it was straight out of a dream. The loud music mingled with the bittersweet smell of beer and fried food. You were already on your third round of beers, maybe your fourth.

You leaned forward, elbows resting on the table, as the foam from the beer spilled over the sides of the glass you held with both hands. Beside you, Rei, always present, always reliable Rei, laughed at something one of your friends said, but the sound of her laughter felt more like a tapestry woven from nostalgia than a true response to whatever it was.

Your eyes wandered over her face. She was beautiful that night, more than usual.

"Hey, Rei," you called, half-whispering, but loud enough to be heard over the noise around you. She turned her face toward you, her brown eyes shining under the bar's light. "Have you ever noticed that... that I can talk to you about anything?"

She raised an eyebrow, curious. "Of course." Her response was simple, direct, and, in a way, exasperating. Sure, you were friends. But that wasn't what you meant, though the words weren't forming clearly in your mind.

"No, but..." You tried to think, tried to organize your muddled thoughts. "It's more than that. I can talk to you in a way I can't even with... with my girlfriend."

Her expression changed subtly, almost imperceptibly, but you noticed. She bit her lip, a gesture you'd seen before, whenever she was thinking about something she preferred not to say. "You've said that before," she replied softly, as if she were treading on dangerous ground.

"Have I?" You frowned, trying to remember, but your mind was fogged by the drink. "Ah... well, it must be because it's true."

Rei laughed, a short laugh, not very joyful.

"You're an idiot, you know that?" She shook her head, as if she were laughing at an inside joke. You were silent for a moment, trying to understand what she meant, but the alcohol wasn't helping.

"Maybe we have... a connection," you continued, stumbling over the words, "you know, like siblings."

Rei stopped laughing. The smile disappeared, and she looked at you with a seriousness that almost hurt. "It's not that," she said, her voice low, almost inaudible amid the noise around you. "It never was."

You blinked, confused. "It's not? Then... what is it?" You were genuinely puzzled. She had always been there, always by your side, always laughing at your jokes and listening to your rants. And you always thought that was true friendship, something solid and safe.

Rei sighed, and for a moment, you saw something in her eyes you'd never seen before — a kind of sadness mixed with resignation.

"It doesn't matter," she said finally, looking away, as if she could no longer bear to look at you. "Forget it."

You felt uncomfortable, as if you'd failed some test, but you didn't know what to say. Instead, you did what you always did when things got too complicated: you hugged her. It was an awkward, impulsive hug, but you felt her body relax against yours.

"I like you, Rei," you murmured, without thinking. The words slipped out before you could stop them, but it didn't feel wrong to say, "a lot." And suddenly, her arms were around your neck, and you realized, belatedly, how right that felt.

Rei smiled, a smile you couldn't quite interpret. "I like you a lot too."

And then, one of your friends called your name, something about another round of shots, and the moment dissolved. You were dragged back to the table, to the noise and chaos, and Rei sat there, watching as you walked away. When you looked back, she wasn't smiling anymore.

That night, you went home and collapsed into bed. And somehow, you forgot what happened. But Rei didn’t forget. For her, that moment was a line drawn in the sand, a line you had crossed without knowing. But she knew.

And that was what hurt the most.

—

The darkness in the room is thick, punctuated only by the faint glow of the desk lamp. Silence is never absolute, thanks to the soft sound of Rei’s breathing, a constant reminder that you’re no longer alone in this bed, or in any other aspect of your life.

Rei is nestled beside you, her tangled hair splayed across the pillow, a lazy smile stretching across her lips as she snuggles closer.

“We don’t have to sleep in separate rooms anymore, huh?” She lets out a little laugh, and you can sense her satisfaction in finally being able to say that.

You nod passively as the reality of what’s happened settles in your mind.

Rei turns her head to look at you, her eyes gleaming in the dim light. “Funny, isn’t it?” She begins, and you already know something is coming.

“What’s funny?” you ask, a part of you already knowing that the answer will make you feel like a complete fool.

She sighs, half exasperated, half amused, like she’s about to explain something obvious to a child.

“All those times I tried to get your attention… And you, completely blind.”

You turn to face her, trying to recall anything that might support what she’s saying. Her smile widens, mischievous and teasing.

“Remember that time I asked for a towel while I was in the shower? Just because I wanted you to take a peek?” She rolls her eyes and laughs. “But you? You just tossed the towel through the door and walked away.”

Your mind starts to sift through memories, moments that once seemed innocent, even mundane. You thought she was just forgetful, always leaving the towel behind. It never crossed your mind that it was intentional.

“And those short pajamas I used to wear?” Her voice had a tone of playful satisfaction. “I chose them just to see if you’d notice, if you’d at least look. And what did you do? You covered me with a blanket, worried that I might be cold.” She giggles, but you can feel the sarcasm dripping. “Cold? I wanted you to see me.”

You feel the blush rising up your neck, a mix of embarrassment and… something else. The images flood your mind: the short pajamas, the forgotten towels, and you never understood. You never realized what she was trying to tell you with those signals, and now you feel stupid.

“And when I used to jump on you out of nowhere?” She asks, laughing more vigorously. “Just to see if I could catch you off guard, make you react in some different way. And you? You’d just laugh and push me away.”

You try to speak, but the shame is almost suffocating. “I… I didn’t know,” you mumble, desperately trying to justify yourself. “I thought it was just… I don’t know, playful.”

Rei shakes her head, still smiling under a new layer of affection.

“You were so caught up in that… thing you called a relationship, that you never saw me as a real woman.”

“Rei, I…” you start, but she cuts you off, moving even closer until her nose touches yours.

“I did those things for you, you know? I turned down so many guys because of you, waiting for you to wake up.” She whispers, her voice a mix of sweetness and frustration.

“I’ll try to make it up to you… somehow. I’m sorry, Rei.”

She smiles again, but this time, it’s a different smile, a smile of victory, but also of understanding. She kisses you, a soft kiss, almost marking the end of a chapter that took too long to write.

“Idiot,” she murmurs against your lips, but the tone is affectionate. “You couldn’t have known. But now you do, and you’re not going to stay away from me anymore.”

Rei cuddles up to you, closing her eyes. And as sleep begins to pull you under, you can’t help but have one last thought, one last question: how could it have taken so long?

—

After the relationship finally solidifies, what was once just the ordinary coexistence of roommates, of best friends who share the trivialities of daily life, now transforms into something much deeper, much more intricate. Rei is no longer just the girl you split bills with and share occasional laughs, or the friend who was always there to listen to your complaints about life. She’s your girl now. And that changes everything.

The daily routine, which once seemed dull, now takes on new colors, new textures. The small details, those moments that would have gone unnoticed before, are now enveloped in a layer of raw, unfiltered intimacy. She greets you at home with an almost childlike eagerness, as if you were the sun and she, a plant hungry for light. Every time you walk through the door, there's a kiss, a hug, a heartfelt declaration of how much she missed you, even if it’s only been a few hours since you last saw each other. The way she looks at you... makes you feel like the only man on earth.

And things start heating up in ways you could never have anticipated. It’s a surprise, but one you embrace with every fiber of your being. Suddenly, she’s wearing costumes in bed, playing characters that range from a provocative nurse to a strict teacher. She dives into these roles with evident pleasure, having fun as she teases you, torturing you in ways you never imagined you’d enjoy so much.

Then there are the moments of complete spontaneity, the ones that turn any mundane situation into something memorable. Like that day in the supermarket parking lot, when she pulled you into the car, the engine still warm, the windows fogging up as she gave you a blowjob that wiped your mind clean, erasing any thought that wasn’t about her, about the moment. It’s clandestine, dirty in a way that only heightens the excitement, leaving you in a state of quiet euphoria as you tried not to moan her name right there in the backseat.

Morning sex becomes almost a sacred routine, the most intense and straightforward way to start the day. No words are needed, just the movement of bodies, the heat spreading, and the way she whispers in your ear. It’s primal, vital, as if without it, the rest of the day simply couldn’t happen.

You explore each other as if discovering yourselves for the first time. Every touch, every kiss, every sigh is a new discovery, a new layer of intimacy that you peel away together. You lose yourself in her, and she loses herself in you.

Every day is a new experience, and you let yourself go because, honestly, there’s nothing you want more than to be immersed in this whirlwind of sensations.

And Rei knows no limits when it comes to teasing you. Like that night when you went to a party with your friends. She seemed innocent, almost naive, in the floral dress that covered her down to her knees. But it was all a facade. During the party, she leaned in to whisper things in your ear, dirty things that made your whole body heat up. And in the middle of casual conversation with others, while everyone was distracted, her hand found yours, guiding it under the table to the part of her that was already wet with anticipation. She whispered for you to stay calm, not to give away what was happening, while she made you desperately wish the night would end soon.

Another time, during an innocent walk in the park, the sun shining, birds singing, the appearance of a perfect, harmless day. Rei, with that look like she wasn’t planning anything serious, led you to a more secluded spot, among the trees, away from curious eyes. "I was thinking," she began, with a gleam in her eyes that you’d learned to recognize, "I wonder if anyone’s ever done it here?" And before you could respond or even process what was happening, she was already on her knees in the grass, unbuttoning your pants.

There are also those moments when she surprises you in the middle of the night. You sleep deeply, your body exhausted from just another day, and are awakened by her soft touch, a caress that starts slow, exploring every inch of your skin, as if she wanted to memorize every detail. She has diabolical patience, letting the desire build inside you until you can no longer pretend to be asleep. And when you finally give in, when your eyes open and meet hers, she’s already watching you with a smile that promises the kind of pleasure that borders on sinful.

Another adventure she created was during a visit to your parents' house. You were there for a Sunday lunch, everyone was in the living room, talking and laughing. Rei, always cheerful and playful, behaved like the perfect girl to introduce to your family. But only you knew what was really going on. During lunch, she would gently rub her foot against your leg under the table, a constant tease that amused her.

"Hey, are you okay? You seem a bit... uncomfortable," she asked, feigning innocence, while her eyes said exactly what she was doing.

After lunch, she pulled you to a corner of the house where no one could see. "I think we need a bit of fresh air," she said, leading you to the garden. But instead of admiring the flowers, she pressed you against the brick wall of the house, her hands already unbuttoning your pants. “Let me ease your mind a little," she whispered before kneeling in the grass, and all you could do was hold onto the wall to keep from falling as she did things with her mouth that made you completely forget where you were.

You couldn’t be more satisfied to be the focus of all this seductive energy she has. And perhaps what surprises you most is how much it completes you. There’s no fear here, no doubts. Just the certainty that, finally, you’ve found what you were looking for. Someone who sees you, who cares about you, who shakes up your routine, who wants you, exactly as you are.

And that, yes, is the greatest achievement of all.

[flokali]

Hi!! I am brainrotting and cannot get it out of my mind, so I thought to share. A very simple thought.

Accolyte Zhongli. Very willing to please et cetera. But biting him? Like come on, biting a Dragon? Is it ownership? Is it playful bite? You know, the sudden urge to bite someone (or is it just me?). So biting a very willing Zhongli.

Sobbing. This will haunt me for a while.

Slight NSF_W

Thinking so many thoughts... happy belated valentines day every1 ><

Warnings: NB! Reader, yandere!Zhongli, SAGAU, implied Dom!Reader/Sub!Zhongli, unhealthy relationship dynamics, biting, soft-violence (?), possessive behavior, jealousy, ask to tag!

Dragons in Liyue are known to be loyal, fierce, and elegant; the stories always describe them as powerful beasts who are to be respected, with sincere hearts and wisdom beyond a mere mortal’s understanding.

In a way, such behaviors did translate to your acolyte, Zhongli. He was one of your oldest followers, not just in age but time serving you, over six millenia he has existed and can proudly state he’s worshiped you for most of it. You would think that the years would have mellowed him out, polished up the edges of his devotion, soothe the tempest in his heart into a much milder dribble, and yet – you knew very few of your acolytes who could rival the passion he seemed to hold towards you.

The relationship between you and all of your followers was strange, at least to you — going from a normal person to being worshiped as a God was not an easy process, much less in a world as different from your own as Teyvat was to Earth — however none were perhaps as strange as the relationship between you and Zhongli.

He is always at your side, from the moment you wake up to the moment you go to sleep. At first, his insistence on being your attendant had been met with heavy resistance from the others but his stubbornness greatly overpowered their annoyance; no matter what rotation you were in, Zhongli was always by your side.

You knew of his vessel, Morax, the large dragon that he’d used to fake his death, and you knew that “Zhongli” wasn’t his true form – you just hadn’t guessed some traits would have seeped into the other form or maybe it was simply part of his personality.

He was possessive and overprotective over you, it was like an internal struggle between submission and the need to monopolize you was constantly going on in his head, yet he refused to outwardly admit it.

“I am simply concerned for you, Your Grace.” He’d say whenever you’d bring up his overbearing nature, considering that he and the rest viewed you as an all-powerful being, you’d think he’d have more trust in your ability to protect yourself. And yet, whenever he’s allowed, he’ll always attempt to deter you from leaving his side. At some point you realized it was probably for his sake rather than your own, but by then you had grown endeared to the man and decided to allow it anyway.

Even as your most loyal follower who you spent most of your days with, Zhongli had his quirks and habits about him that simply baffled you – no matter how many days you’d spent with the former Archon, there were just things he’d do and say that’d leave you questioning all you knew about him prior.

All you really knew about him before was reduced to what had been revealed in game, from the Traveler’s perspective and the NPC’s who’d speak about him. Meeting him and interacting with him quickly let you know that his personality, at least when directed towards you, was quite different from what you had assumed from your previous observations.

An example of such discrepancies was his obsessive need to please you.

The traditional Liyue clothes you once complimented him on? Most of his wardrobe has changed to include such attires more frequently. The hair accessory you bought him once when you traveled to Fontaine? You don’t think you’ve seen him without it since. That one time you complimented him when he wore warmer tones? It seems his closet has been rid of any other color.

It was unsettling if not a bit cute, who wouldn’t be a little bit flattered to know their opinion held such weight to a man such as Morax; but it was only a matter of time before it all escalated

Somewhere, at some point, your relationship with Zhongli changed – morphing into something more complex than you would have expected. You would soon wonder if he was classified more so as a lover or some sort of concubinus than a mere helper, his role as an attendant seeming more like a guise so he could spend his time with you each day.

Fleeting touches now lasted longer, the feeling of his hot gaze on you burned stronger with every passing moment, it was a natural escalation; kisses now were no longer restrained to the hand, they now landed on your lips, your cheeks, your neck, wandering hands found their home in your waist and the small of your back.

When he told you he loved you, you knew not if he spoke as a devotee or a lover.

It was during a heated make out session that you found out his weakness to being marked and claimed, much to your surprise. He’d been quite insistent on not leaving a single mark on your person, not a hickey or bite, you guessed it must have been a preference but never asked about it either. You decided that, for the time being, you would avoid the topic until it naturally came up - and up did it come.

You had been on top of him, sitting on his lap and caressing his hair as your lips danced with one another’s, his golden eyes were shut tight in pleasure as he let you use his lips and body as you wished. His hands rested on your waist, tightly gripping at your robes and skin as he desperately clung onto your body. Soft whines left his lips periodically, his breathing was quick and you could feel his heart beating where your chests met.

You playfully decided to trail kisses across his face, at first he whined when he felt the loss of your lips on his but he soon fell quiet – other than a few moans and whimpers – as you left open mouthed kisses into his skin and down his neck.

It’s there that, in the heat of the moment, you decide to bite his neck, leaving a small hickey on his flushed skin. His reaction is immediate; his head falls backwards, his whole body heats up and you feel something stiffen below you, his face burns a bright red as a loud moan escapes his lips. His grip on you tightens, his fingers digging into your skin to a point you are certain it’ll leave a mark, and his heartbeat quickens; pleasure basically radiates off of his body the minute your teeth nib at his neck.

You stop, teeth sunken into his skin and hand tangled in his hair, his reaction so lewd and surprising you become flustered and stop dead in your tracks.

Zhongli, however, only pulls you tighter into his body, using a hand to press your face deeper into his neck, as if urging you to use more force in your bite – timidly you give in and nibble into his flesh, further deepening the imprint of your teeth in his skin. His whole body feels hot to the touch, his mind feels hazy, your soft bites into his skin send shockwaves through him.

You had no idea what you were doing to him, did you? Or else you wouldn’t have been so careless when picking the spot, but it doesn’t matter, in this moment of intense pleasure, the former Archon decides to give into delusion and believe you knew the meaning behind biting a draconic being such as himself — and in the neck of all places as well.

Old traditions dictate that a bite mark, especially in the jugular or neck, was a sign of ownership. It was often that mates would mark each other in the neck with enough force to leave scars, sinking sharp teeth into one another with ironic tenderness. It showed trust and care for the other, both to be marked and leave a mark, as it required vulnerability and care from both parties. It was a deeply intimate act, one that would be reserved to life-long partners and mates, it was a gesture of possessiveness and devotion tinted with love.

If he were to be honest, Zhongli would have thought himself to be the one to mark you instead of the other way around, it’d been something he’d often fantasized at night before your arrival, and yet, as he felt your — significantly duller teeth — bite into him he could feel his admiration and love for you grow as he became yours; even if you may not have known.

He’d always imagined himself on top of you, your naked form beneath him, as he sunk his canines into your flesh until he tasted your holy blood. He’d imagined himself cradling your pleasure stricken body while you moaned his name, a sinful sound coming from a divine being. Instead, it is himself that lays within your grasp, panting in ecstasy as he holds himself back from coming completely undone and showing a depraved side of himself even he did not know of.

If he was honest, he almost wishes you’d draw blood, sink your teeth so deep into his skin it breaks layers of flesh and leaves a deep scar that could never heal – a sign of your favoritism and ownership, one that he could proudly say was unique to him. If only you weren’t so careful with him, so scared of hurting him; he means no offense, but your current form is significantly weaker than his and he’s survived wars most have not heard of; even if you wanted to sink your nails into his skin and carve your name into his body, he thinks his strength and shear devotion to you alone would prove the pain to be nonexistent.

A gasp of your name leaves his parted lips, it’s erotic - the way his pink lips let a symphony of pleasured sounds - a wave of hormones rushing through his body, sending his brain into overdrive.

You look up at him, not having expected such a lewd reaction, but the sight of his half-lidded eyes as they burn into your own sends a hot-buzz down your spine. His cheeks are flushed, his lips bloodied as he bites them, his bare chest is heaving up and down; the expression on his face is orgasmic. His loose hair sticks to his forehead as sweat runs down his temples, clearly your gesture had taken quite an effect on him.

You slowly remove your lips from their spot, about to question his reaction - wondering if you’d perhaps crossed a line, but he stops you with a crooked smile and warm hands against the back of your head.

“It is okay, Your Grace,” he whispers, tongue darting to wet his drying lips, he guides your head back into his neck, “bite me all you want, my neck is yours for the taking.”

You giggle a bit at his eagerness, feeling his hard-on press against your ass. You playfully adjust yourself in his lap, softly nipping at his neck before biting down in a new spot.

“Ha-ah,” he moans once more, you feel him startle beneath you, “don’t be afraid to draw out blood, either… in fact, please, feel free to do so.”

He can only hope you take on the challenge, eager to flaunt your lovely bites to Neuvillette and any poor soul that even so much as thinks of questioning his position in your life.

[entitled-fangirl]

War.

Cregan Stark x wife!reader

Summary: Cregan returns back to Winterfell after the Dance of the Dragons, eager to see his wife once more.

Warnings: talks of death, fighting, blood, talk of sex

Masterlist

……………………………….

Cregan rode his horse as close to the doors of Winterfell as he possibly could, intent on getting in as fast as possible.

He had been at war for months now, almost a year, and he was ready to see his wife once more.

The nights spent by campfire in the cold would be worth every moment.

But when she was not outside waiting for him, he was confused.

He jumped from his horse, throwing the reigns to anyone who would take them and ran inside.

He was instantly met with the maester.

"Welcome back, my lord."

Cregan have a victorious smile, "Good morrow. The battle has been won. I'm curious why my wife was not awaiting my arrival? I sent a raven ahead of me."

The maester nodded, "Ah, yes. The raven. The message was received, my lord."

He completely paused, thrown off, "Then? Where is she?"

"Let us walk, my lord."

Cregan became defensive, "Where is she? I won't ask again."

"Please, walk with me."

He felt a pain in his chest but he nodded and moved alongside the maester back outside.

The maester sighed, "I was asked to be the one to tell you, and this information is not easy to tell, I'm afraid."

Cregan nodded as he took in every word fervently.

"Lady Stark found herself with child not long after you left."

He had considered this. Their last night together was a passionate one, and he often spent his nights after under the stars, imagining her swollen with his seed.

"Why did I not receive news of this?"

"I advised her against doing such a thing. You needed to remain focused on the task ahead."

He scoffed, "My wife was with child! I deserved to know!" He paused in his step with a worried gaze. "Where… where is it now? What happened to it?"

"It's a healthy boy, my lord."

Cregan let out a relieved breath, "Thank the gods. I was frightened."

The maester took a long breath in thought, "The pregnancy went quite well. She did all the right things."

"…But?"

"But…" The maester grimaced, "She was not equipped well for giving birth. We had to make a choice."

Cregan felt ringing in his ears. Like his throat had been slit from behind. No breath moved in or out of his body. "W… What?"

"I'm sorry, my lord. She did not make it."

Cregan's knees buckled and he fell to the ground.

"I understand this is hard to hear, but you have a son. An heir! You must celebrate!"

"CELEBRATE?" He roared as he looked up to the maester with teary eyes. "CELEBRATE DEATH AT MY DOORSTEP WITHOUT MY KNOWLEDGE?"

"My lord, please calm yourself."

Cregan slammed his fist into the ground, "My wife is dead." A look came over his face, "You said… You said you chose."

"Aye, my lord. We did."

"Who?" He growled. "Who exactly chose a child over my wife?"

"I made the final say. I considered listening to her pleas, but once I saw it was a boy, I knew it would be worth it."

She had tried to survive. To live.

"What did she say?" He asked lowly.

"That…" the maester paused. "Perhaps it is too soon to speak of these things."

He stood on shaky knees in anger. His voice was low and predatory, "You marred her perfect skin. You hurt her. You MURDERED HER!"

He rushed forward and threw a punch to the man's jaw, watching him fall to the ground.

But that did not stop Cregan.

He straddled the man, throwing punch and punch, "SHE'S DEAD BECAUSE OF YOU!"

Eventually, a few men pulled Cregan away despite his fighting back.

But he quickly collapsed from grief.

…

He rocked the sleeping boy back and forth in his arms, cursing every time the babe looked up at him with the same eyes as his dead mother.

He had fought endlessly for a war that wasn't his, not knowing a war had been fought in his own house without him.

…………………………….

Cregan Stark taglist: @misswynters, @cosmosnkaz, @sithapprentice, @kaniromi, @lovemesomevesey, @its-jackie-bb, @callsignwidow, @8812-342, @nyxbranwenn, @thorins-queen-of-erebor

[gay-dorito-dust]

Your gravity falls fanfics are so good!! :0 if you’re still taking requests could I request a one shot where Stan’s s/o is with him during the fight between him and ford and they get sucked into the portal instead of ford? I love your angst so much hehehe

Part two is right here

You had originally came with Stanley as support for when he confronts Ford after spending a long period of his life with no contact, no nothing to reassure his twin that he was fine and not dead in a ditch somewhere.

‘The nerve of him, living it up here and not so much as a word to his one brother, his twin no less.’ Stan muttered, his gip tightened on your hand as you both walked up to the lonely shack amidst the snowy forest, but there was something else there besides anger it was nervousness or perhaps worry that his brother didn’t contact him for one reason or another.

‘And here’s your chance to make yourself heard,’ you said as you squeezed his hand, hoping to comfort Stan during this difficult moment for him, ‘you’ve spent enough time to mull over what it is that you want to tell him, now is the time to let him know how much this has affected you and he will have to listen regardless.’

However you’ve came to realise that there was a lot more going on that Ford claims that you and Stanley weren’t aware of as his eyes shifted everywhere out of paranoia. You were still blinking your eyes after getting abruptly blinded by Ford upon first meeting, something about possession? You were certain this wasn’t how you thought you’d be meeting Stan’s twin -not in the slightest- but it was clear to you that Ford was afraid of something, what it was he wouldn’t tell only saying that he needed Stan to hide his journals, scatter them as far from each other which did nothing but annoy Stan.

You could see the clench in his jaw and his fists and were about to reach out and ground him but before you could blink, Stan and Ford were tussling over the journal across the lab as the portal thrummed with power, almost as if entertained by the fight between twins and you were left unable to do anything but watch.

‘Is that all you brought me here for! To help you hide your journals?! I bet I didn’t cross your mind not even once!’ Stanley shouted as he kept the journal close to his chest with his lighter as he managed to keep Ford where he wanted him.

‘You don’t understand Stanley! This is dangerous things you are holding in your hands!’ Ford replied, eyes firmly locked onto the journal and the flickering flame of his brother’s lighter that got too close to the journal’s pages for his liking. ‘Think about the potential threats-‘

‘Fuck that! I want my brother back!’ Stanley cuts his brother off as he grew frustrated at how his brother was - once again- not listening to him or what he had to say. ‘You could’ve called upon me any time! But you only call upon me when you want someone else to do your dirty work for you! What about what I want! My life is in ruins because of you!’ Ford lunged towards Stan and managed to knock the lighter out of his hand, grasping at the bottom half of the journal while Stanley tightened his grip on the upper half of the journal.

‘You ruined your own life and you’ll ruin y/n’s with the way that you are going!’ Ford retorts in a strained voice as he and Stanley tugged the journal in two different ways, just for Stanley to loose his grip, fall backwards and hurt himself on a hot surface that caused him to scream in pain. ‘Stanley!’ You and Ford yelled as you both went to rush to Stan’s aid, hoping he wasn’t too hurt, only for him to Punch Ford in the face and as Ford stumbled backwards he bumped into you. which then caused you to fall back into a lever of sorts; before soon finding yourself beginning to float and be drawn towards the portal with nothing to grab onto to prevent it from happening.

Freaking out you yelled, ‘STANLEY! HELP ME!’ You screamed as you found yourself getting closer and closer to the entrance of the portal, helplessly flailing out of pure panic and need to get away from it, not realising that your attempts to get away were fruitless. Your screams had dragged Ford and Stan from their fight as they could only watch in horror as half of your body was already in the portal.

‘Y/n! Baby! HOLD ON! JUST HOLD ON BABY IM COMING!’ Stanley yelled back as he frantically looked for anything he could use to rope you back to the ground, but grew frustrated when he couldn’t find not a single piece of rope or metal rod lying about, the lab was clean of any and all obstruction. ‘FORD HELP ME!’ He cried as he looked back at his twin, who was frantically looking himself for anything to get you away from the portal, just to face the same problem that frustrated Stanley. ‘I’m trying!’ He shouted over his shoulder as his guilt for bringing both you and Stan here began to weigh down on him heavily.

‘Well you’re not looking hard enough!’ Stanley barked as the fear of losing you was slowly crushing his chest, making it harder for him to breath as his mind raced with the thought of having to live a life without you, his anchor, his best friend and his beloved partner. He hated it, he didn’t want to envision it but here he was living the nightmare he swore would never come true, feeling helpless and useless as he was forced to hear your frightened sounds and not be able to do anything about it.

He didn’t even get to say the words ‘I love you’ yet as he was scared that you’d find someone better then him before he even mustered up the courage, but you never did. You stayed by his side, even if it mean moving from state to state almost every week because of him and Stanley knew he didn’t deserve you, but that didn’t necessarily mean he wanted to loose you from his life either.

Stan and Ford tired their hardest but it wasn’t enough as by the time they looked back at you, your outstretched hand was the last thing the pair saw as the portal closed, leaving them to stare at the portal in denial of their failure to rescue you. ‘Baby?’ Sanely said as he stepped forward hesitantly. ‘BABY! THIS ISNT FUNNY! COME OUT PLEASE!’ He cried louder now when the realisation began to set for him as he ran towards the lever, pulling it and pushing it in desperation of re-opening the portal in hopes of seeing you rush out and right into his arms; where he would keep you for as long as you’d allow him to.

Only for neither of those things to happen, the portal remained shut and you remained lost to whatever was on the opposite side, scared, confused and alone.

‘WHY ISNT IT WORKING!’ Stan screamed as he pushed and pulled, pushed and pulled the lever so much that Ford had to physically drag him away from it before he broke it, thus making more work for them in getting you back. ‘Stop Stanley, it’s not working!’ Ford said as he managed to stand between his twin and the lever, ‘the portal is out of power, it won’t open up unless we get the necessary materials to open it again.’

‘Then what are we doing! Let’s go get it!’ Stanley said as he was about to leave the lab but was stoped by Ford’s hand on his arm, which he shrugged off violently. ‘It’s not so easily obtained Stanley,’ Ford said as he let his hand drop to his side as Stanley glared at him, ‘we need money to get the parts needed to power the portal up. I only had enough to open it once and that took a lot of time, even with Fiddleford’s help, and without him or the necessary materials…’ Ford trailed off which didn’t help Stanley’s mood as he grew angrier at his brother’s insinuation.

‘They’re trapped on the other side forever?!’ He yelled. ‘Bullshit! I don’t believe that! I want them back now!’ Stanley then grabs Ford by the collar and brings him so that they were eye to eye. ‘Give them back or I swear to fucking god Stanford-‘

‘I can’t bring them back without the necessary materials Stanley I told you.’ Ford reaffirmed as he started at his heartbroken twin as the first signs of tears left his eyes, Ford felt Stan’s grip loosened on him until they went completely slack at his side as he fell to his knees, chin dropping to his chest as he silently wept. ‘Bring them back.’ Stanley chanted softly, ‘being them back to me, I can’t loose them. You don’t understand. They’re everything to me and now I’m nothing without them.’ Stanley whispered to the air as if someone with the power to grant his wish will hear him, but instead elected to ignore him and his pleads.

Ford, heartbroken at seeing how distraught and lifeless his brother had became, slowly knelt in front of him in silence, not knowing how to comfort him correctly as he felt himself to blame for your disappearance into the portal. He had taken away the one person who cared for Stanley in the times where his family couldn’t be bothered, someone who loved him unconditionally regardless of what he did and Ford had taken you away from him seemingly forever, so he wouldn’t be surprised if Stanley would hold a grudge against him for it.

However one thing was for certain, he’d help his brother get you back however he could, no matter how long it would take them, even if it took them thirty years to do so; it was a risk that Ford originally wasn’t willing to take but if it meant getting you back to Stanley then he’d do anything to see his brother happy again.

[netherfeildren]

Evermore

Pairing: Joel Miller x F!Reader

Summary: Joel’s your older boyfriend who your parents had a hard time approving of, but you’re engaged now and spending your first Thanksgiving with your family, and well, it’s always fun doing things you know you shouldn’t do under the roof of your childhood home.

-OR-

The Thanksgiving AU

Rating: Explicit 18+

Content Warnings: No outbreak AU; Thanksgiving AU; Devoted Joel Miller; Established Relationship; Thanksgiving is the most boyfriend holiday and it needs to be discussed; Fucking in your childhood home shenanigans; Pretty soft and sweet; Needy behavior; Older man/Younger woman; Daddy kink; Size Difference; Unprotected PIV; Creampie; Breeding Kink; Oral sex; Fluff and Smut; Praise Kink; Come eating; PWP

A/N: Was thinking yesterday that Thanksgiving is the most boyfriendy holiday, and so this seemed entirely necessary after that epiphany. I’m sick as an old dog right now, and wrote this so quickly and just for fun. Any and all mistakes are property of my NyQuil induced high, apologies and enjoy and happy holidays :]

New Year’s Eve follow up

Word Count: 4.2K

Read on AO3

Ko-fi

“You’re doing so good.”

“You think so?”

“Yeah, baby. So, so good. It’s going so well.” You drag your nails slowly up the wide expanse of his strong back, feeling the divots and bumps of his spine, the thick padding of muscles that jump and shiver at your touch. He’d donned the nice green and red plaid button down you’d bought him for tonight, and he’s a little damp at the small of his back, giving away the nerves he’s trying to keep hidden from you, but you can tell anyways, sensed them as if they’d been your own fluttering within you. More attuned to another person than maybe is normal, perhaps, but you know this man, your man, your fiance now. You understand him. 

“You think he likes me?” And his voice goes a little gruff, sheepish, words lodging in his throat as he slowly soaps your mother’s special holiday china in the warm sink water. The two of you’d been relegated to clean up duty after you’d finished the beautiful Thanksgiving meal your mother had spent days readying in preparation for your first official visit with Joel as the man you’d soon marry. No longer just the older boyfriend who your father couldn’t stand to hear about, much less bear the sight of. And the come around had been slow going, undoubtedly, tireless work on yours and your mother’s parts trying to get him to relent, to accept the man who you’d chosen to spend the rest of your life with as a good man for his daughter. 

“Yes– yes. Absolutely. You made him laugh so many times. And he was so interested when you mentioned the house.”

You feel him suck in a shaky breath and move to wrap your arms around the strong breadth of his waist, resting your cheek against him, listening to the thud, thud of his beating heart. “Christ–” He gives a tremulous laugh that you follow suit warmly, palms splaying out over his belly. “He was, wasn’t he?” 

“So interested. Please, don’t worry anymore. My mom loves you, and dad’s on his way there too, I know he is, I promise.”

“He’s just protective,” he says, shutting off the water and pulling the plug on the drain. The both of you stand there in the silence together, listening to the little tornado of water suck away the remnants of the perfect dinner you’d just had with your parents and the man you were going to marry. It really had been perfect, and you’re telling him the truth when you say you really do think your father’s coming around. He’d been apprehensive at first, more than apprehensive, perhaps, with Joel being so much older than you, twenty years to be exact. And with a teenage daughter of his own, Sarah, who was spending the holiday with her mother. 

Your mother had always been the easy going one, and she’d taken one look at Joel, the dark, silver threaded curls, the thick shoulders and sparkly, hazel eyes, the too charming smile and had immediately understood. Your father had seen all those same things and seen nothing but trouble immediately deserving of mistrust. Things had been rocky for a time, but when Joel had gotten down on one knee and asked you to spend the rest of your life with him and Sarah, when he’d broken ground on the house he was building you with his bare hands from the dirt up out by the lake, well… your father hadn’t been able to withhold his approval for much longer after that was all said and done. 

“And for good reason,” he continues, reaching for the dish towel, drying off his hands before covering yours over his stomach with his wide palms, pulling your arms tighter around him. He brings one of your hands up to his face, cupping his own mouth with it to press a kiss to the tender cove. “The man should take me out back and drag me through the mud,” he mumbles, muffled into your skin, dragging his mouth slowly from side to side, tickling your palm with his whiskers. 

You press yourself harder against him, shoving him into the edge of the counter, dizzy with the feel of your heart beating so hard against your sternum it reverberates against the ribs in his back. “No, baby. Why? Never.” You press a kiss right over the slope of his spine. 

He gives a soft laugh at the feel of your wriggling against him, trying to find friction anywhere and anyway, not very inconspicuously rubbing your breasts against his back, and he turns slowly in the circle of your arms with that humming laugh still caught in his throat, bending slightly at the knees when he wraps his own arms around your waist to pull you up and into him so that your feet are left to dangle above his own heavy boots. He nuzzles at the warm, fragrant skin beneath the edge of your jaw, a small kiss to the tender spot behind your ear, where he whispers, “‘Cause all I could think about at the goddamn table, sittin’ next to your father, was how pretty your tits look in that dress you wore for me – how much I wish I could kiss that pretty pussy to sleep tonight.” 

You whine low, desperate, needy, wrapping your arms behind his neck to press his face tightly to your throat, breath hitching at the feel of his teeth, sharp at your pulse. “Joel–”

He shakes his head slowly, a long stream of sighing breath warm against your collarbone before he says, “I know– I know, baby. I’m telling ya– your father should kill me for the things I wanna do to his little girl. For the things I do to her already.”

The visit had so far been everything you could’ve wished for, and what you’d appreciated more than anything, more than your father’s very approval of your fiance, or your mother’s happiness for you, was that Joel had found the perfect balance between being respectful, ingratiating even, while still remaining uncowed by your father. Walking into your parents home with your hand in his, a deferential kiss to your mother’s cheek, and a strong, self assured handshake for your father while he’d handed him the bottle of his favorite fine aged whiskey and a demure, I’m glad we could make this work for our girl.

Our girl, he’d said, and it had made everything that lived inside of you with his name on it, everything that was perpetually soft and wet for him, go molten. You loved him. You belonged to him. And you’d chosen him for yourself, and he was sure as hell going to make sure everyone the two of you came across knew what that choice entailed, what it meant to him. Your father had been forced into capitulation, all with the whiskey and the self assurance in Joel’s eyes, your own unbridled elation, and your mother’s giggles and blushing smiles like every other woman who’s ever met this man, unable to resist the charm of that Southern twang and the too gorgeous smile, no other recourse had been left to your poor dad. 

You think of this as you make your way on silent tiptoes through your parent’s dark, quiet home. It had been the one concession you’d not garnered from your father, the sleeping arrangements. He’d absolutely refused to allow you and Joel to share a bed under his roof, no questions asked. And no matter how much you’d pleaded and your mother had cooed and cawed and threatened him, he’d not relented. At this point, you were worried he’d not let you sleep in the same bed as Joel even after the two of you’d been married. But what your father didn’t understand, what even you yourself barely understood sometimes was that you needed Joel. You need him. No one, no one except for Joel himself understood how desperately that ran inside of you. He understood you, he always has. 

You pause as you reach the closed door of his bedroom, splaying a palm against the fine grained wood to take a settling breath, your heart beating so fast you feel it in your throat, chock full of excitement, lust, desperate yearning. To have him here, in your childhood home, where you’d been a teenager, a girl, grown into a woman, you want him so, so badly, inside of you, around you, beneath you. You can never sleep without him anymore, no comfort to be found in the too small bed of your childhood – you turn the knob and slip inside. 

The blue darkness of the guest bedroom paints his form in shadows, big under the pretty quilt your mother has adorning the bed. You can see the heavy mass of his shoulder peeking from beneath the edge of the quilt, the ratty gray t-shirt you know has a faded longhorn stretched across the front; not able to sleep naked and wrapped only in you the way he usually does when under your parents roof. You turn the lock and step carefully on tipped toes, avoiding the creaky bits in the hardwood floor you’re so familiar with after a lifetime living in this house and lift the edge of the quilt to slip into the cocoon of warmth with him. Like a living furnace, you snake your arm over his flank slowly, enjoying the shiver and jerk of his muscles as you stroke him awake. Your palm, passing over thick ridged muscles and soft belly, digging beneath to feel the wispy scratch of hair there. 

He makes a deep sound, low in his chest, legs shifting as he comes to wakefulness, and then the gruff murmur of your name being whispered into the dark, his big, callused palm coming to wrap entirely around your fist beneath his t-shirt, keeping you from slipping it inside his sleep pants. “Baby, what’re you doin’?” He slurs, voice full of sleep and slow waking lust. 

You press your pelvis into his backside, hitching your knee up and over his hip to wrap yourself around him like vines. “I need you,” you mewl, baby voice trying to get ahead of his polite refusal before he’s able to get it out. He’d told you, before the two of you’d embarked on this weekend at your parents house, that there was to be no funny business on your part. As if he didn’t know that that was your favorite kind of business where he was concerned. You press a kiss above his scapula, then open your jaw to drag your teeth against the skin warmed cotton. You rub against him, clutching and pulling at his chest and stomach, biting and kissing as much of his back as you can reach, your foot somehow finding its way into his lap so that you can feel his quickly hardening cock against the sensitive arch of your foot. 

He groans roughly. “You’re gonna get us caught, sweet girl,” he tries to protest, but wraps his hand around the little foot in his lap anyways, pressing the arch of it into that half hard erection, rubbing against it. 

“I need you– I can’t sleep without you,” you whine, and he makes a frustrated sound, turning to face you, gripping your knee as he goes to open the cradle of your hips for himself, drawing your leg over his waist so that you’re suddenly chest to chest, sipping on each other’s warm breath. With a fist in your hair he gives you a hardly believable reprimand, little girl, and presses his lips briefly to yours, quick and damp, barely there, like he can’t help himself, like he knows that if he starts he won’t be able to stop, wandering hands already slipping up the hem of your nightgown, squeezing your panty clad ass. 

“Your parents…” he tries again, the roll of his hips against yours, coupled with a hitched whine, making his objections a little laughable.

“Don’t you miss me? Don’t you love me? Don’t you want me here with you?”

“Of course– of course I do–” You twist your fingers in his curls, the first real press of your mouths, his damp upper lip slotting between both of yours so that you can give it a little suck. Then the tip of his tongue touching yours, and you’re opening all the way for him, moaning wantonly into his mouth, letting him lick and taste behind the line of your teeth. “‘Course I want you here, baby.”

“I’ll be good. I’ll be quiet,” you promise. “Please, please, Joel. Please, just–” The hand squeezing your ass slides between your legs, finds the damp plaquet of panties. Fuckin’ soaked already, needy girl. “Please, just fuck me. I’ll be so quiet, I promise.”

“Baby…”

Please, please, please. He’s always had something about him that turns you into nothing more than a wet little girl desperate for the big, big man’s attention. The impropriety of your surroundings has no bearing on this, the desperation is as present as ever, heightened even, maybe, because of the wrongness of it, because you could be caught red handed at any second if you’re not careful, not quiet enough. 

“‘Course I love you so fuckin’ much. You even need to ask?” He rubs the flat of his palm over your pussy, the tip of his middle finger finding the nub of your clit covered by the soaked wet silk to press lightly on each pass forward.

“No, Daddy. I know,” you breathe soft and secret into his mouth, watch the slight widening of his eyes as you say it. You can picture the flush suffusing his cheeks at hearing you call him so, know the effect the sound of it has on him. 

“Fucking Christ,” he murmurs, pulling you tighter against him, tilting your head back by the grip he has on your hair so that he can deepen his kiss, taste you more thoroughly. “Better be quiet while I fuck you.” He pulls back, mock frown and a note of reprimand in his voice as his fingers dip beneath the silk of your panties to find the wet, swollen mess of you already. He moans into your open mouth, your name and I love you and wet fuckin’ pussy as he starts to pet at you slowly. His fingers swirling at your clit and then moving to your opening, dipping inside just a tiny bit, giving you almost nothing, forcing a frustrated whine up your throat. “I said quiet.”

“Please, Daddy. Please,” you beg, but he returns to your clit, ignoring your whining, pinching the bundle of nerves lightly before he’s back to teasing the mouth of your cunt, dipping the tip of a single finger in shallowly to pull your wetness from you and spread it over your mound, slicking you up for him. 

“We’re gonna go nice and slow. Gonna take my pretty cunt nice and slow, and you’re gonna be good for me, aren’t you? Gonna be quiet – not get us caught, right? Say yes.”

“Yes, Daddy,” you whisper, pressing kisses all along his face and jaw and throat, needy fingers twisting in his curls, scratching at the back of his neck and the hills of his shoulders. He make an approving groan of a sound, rolling the two of you over so that you’re on your back, splayed out beneath him, and he pulls the vee of your nightgown down, bearing your breasts to him, sucking on each nipple, first hard then soft, then with teeth and tongue, slicking you in his spit, and you try and stay quiet, you really, really do, but it’s so hard not to cry out at the sight of his jaw hinging wide, seemingly trying to take the whole heavy weight of your breast into his mouth in one go. 

He always has you like he wants you more than anything else in the whole world, like he’s never wanted anything else in his whole life more than he wants you, and nothing feels better than that, nothing makes you crazier for him than the way he wants you so desperately. 

He makes his way down the length of you with kisses to your breasts, your ribs, your belly, the mound of your pelvic bone, before he’s gathering your knees together and bending them to press against your chest, pulling the lace and silk of your panties over the curve of your bottom and diving nose first into your wet cunt, taking in a deep drag of your scent and then dragging the broad, flat of his tongue from your asshole to your clit in one long, slow swipe. The groan he ends on has you almost coming on his tongue just like that, the sound so hungry it would scare someone who doesn’t want to be wanted as badly by this man as you do. And he eats your cunt like he’s angry, like he’s in love with you, like he doesn’t care if you get caught or not. Tongue plunging into your pussy, sucking on your clit, shaking his head, quick and hard, from side to side so that the obscene sound of your wetness against his mouth is all you can hear over the cacophony sounding in your ears right before you gush for him all wet and sweet and sticky, covering his tongue and beard. His lips wrap around your swollen clit again while it still pulses for him, and you have to shove your fist into your mouth, drooling around it to stifle the sound of your cries for his cock while he sucks you into a second painfully fluttery orgasm, your womb cramping hard and tight around nothing, your cunt clutching desperately at air for the cock it’s about to gladly take. The hum of his movements, of his whines and moans, don’t match his promise for nice and slow. They tell you this is going to be hard and deep and might even hurt, and that you’ll like it all the more for that. This is, after all, what you’d snuck in here for, just exactly this. 

He pulls away from your cunt with a loud, wet suck, popping your clit from his puckered mouth like a piece of too ripe, too sweet fruit, before crawling up the length of you, pulling your soaked panties and your nightgown from your body as he goes, shucking his own sweat soaked shirt over his head and kicking his pajama bottoms away. When he takes your mouth again, his face and beard are wet and sticky with your slick, all sweet sugared musk and the angry thrust of his tongue, his fingers, too hard and too tight wrapping around your jaw, grunting into your mouth as he sucks on your tongue. His burning hot cock thrusts between your wet cleft, the sound of your leaking pussy loud enough to be heard over the sound of your mingled panting breaths. You feel him grip himself, stroking once, twice, wide, blunt head bumping against slick soaked skin, before he’s notching at your cunt and shoving in, hard and fast. Not giving you a chance to think about it before he’s bumping at the mouth of your womb, a muted bruise you never tire of; his too big cock that still pinches every time, that presses in just on this side of too deep to always be comfortable, but you don’t care. The proof is in the hurt, and you need constant reminding that he’s real, that this is real. It’s your greatest pleasure, after all, the reassurance of him, of the two of you, and he never tires of giving it to you. You know that giving you the things you need and want from him, turns Joel on more than anything else.

He groans long and low into the crook of your shoulder when he bottoms out and holds there for several drawn out moments, both of you enjoying the pulse and throb of your connection. He’s so deep and you’re so wet for him, taking him so, so well, like he always tells you that you do. You’d felt, from the first moment that you’d laid eyes on him, like you’d been made for him. Put on this earth just for him to find and keep, and doing this, having each other like this, even after all the times you’ve done it, always feels like further proof of it. He grinds against you, hips shifting from side to side, tip bumping against the deepest part of you, before he’s clutching at your ass and flipping the both of you over suddenly, cock never slipping from your tight clutch when he settles you on top of him, buried to the hilt. You feel him in your stomach like this, and you tell him so, little hand coming to rest low on your belly where you’re holding him inside of you, pressing down so that the both of you can feel your connection from the inside out, groaning in tandem all wide and sparkly eyed as you look at each other. And he’s nodding his head at you as you start to shift your hips slowly, feeling the wet slide of his length, the grind of your clit against his pelvis, one hand pressing down on your belly, the other anchoring yourself on his own stomach so that you can rock yourself on him. 

He pulls one of your knees up, resting your foot flat on the bed to open you to his gaze, so that he can watch the way the thick root of his cock splits your cunt open for him to fuck up into. The two of you find your rhythm, you rolling your hips down on his upthrust, and he’s still nodding his head at you, mouthing words made of only air at you while you gasp and gulp for breath, I love you and you’re so pretty and yeah, ride that cock, baby. All you can do in return is mumble his name at him over and over again, Joel, Joel, Joel, nonsensical. Your brain doesn't work when he’s got his cock wedged this deep inside of you, it just doesn’t.

There's sweat pooling in the divots of his collarbones, the sun grizzled notch of his throat, and you fold over forward, changing the angle, deepening it, to lick up those little pools of salt, sucking on his neck until he’ll surely have incriminating bruises tomorrow. You don’t care, not even a little bit. He’s so yours in this moment, always really, but right now, Joel feels so, so incredibly yours, and you love him so much, and he’s going to be your husband one day soon and nothing else really matters besides that. 

He wraps both arms around your back, squeezes you to himself tight and starts to fuck up into you, fast, brutal, again, nothing nice and slow about it like he’d promised, and you’re forced to dig your teeth into his shoulder so hard you’re scared for a moment you’ll taste blood on your tongue. You can feel your orgasm crawling up your spine, pooling like liquid heat in your pelvis while everything goes tight and fluttery inside of you. “How mad would he be if I knocked you up right now? If I fucked his baby girl full’a my baby under his roof?” He grunts into your ear, and there’s the dip in your restraint. As much as you want to hold off and wait for him, you clench down hard around him with a sharp cry, mouthful of his skin to muffle you only barely. “Huh? What’dya think he’d say?” He continues, changing the angle so that his pelvis bumps against your clit on every punch in, balls slapping wetly against the curve of your ass while he pets at the tight ring of muscle back there, tempting you with more than you think you can take right now. “If you go all pretty and round and soft for me before our wedding.” 

You can't speak, you’re nothing but air and sticky, sweet wet in the shape of a girl made just for him. Too tight grip in your hair, and he’s jerking your face towards him, grunting into your mouth as he starts to spill inside of you, burning hot come milked out of his cock and deep into you, and he tells you again how much he loves you, tells you that you’re his pretty little wife because it’s already felt like that for so long. A marrying of your very selves despite the lack of legal nothing that means so little to the both of you when you have all this between you already. Tells you that he can’t wait to see his baby all full of his baby. 

When he’s finished pumping you filled to the brim he turns you over again, pulls out slowly so that the both of you can appreciate the sound of his heavy cock slipping wetly from your well used pussy, and when he bends to eat your mingled come out of your puffy cunt, only to then wedge your mouth open so that he can spit your fluids onto your waiting tongue, all here, taste how good we are, the only words left when it comes to this man and this thing you have between the two of you is always simply thank you. 

New Year’s Eve follow up

Netherfeildren's Masterlist

Updates Blog!

[anim-ttrpgs]

Help Save the World of TTRPGs and Their Creators.

Okay I’m being a little dramatic, but at the same time I’m pretty serious. This is a call to action, and the livelihoods of myself and lots of other people, many of them (like myself) disabled, are depending on it. This is a post about why, what you can do about it, and (perhaps least often answered) how.

This post is actually an accompaniment to another discussion by someone else. If you don’t want to listen to a 90-minute in-depth discussion of much of what I’m about to tell you, you can just keep reading. Otherwise, click here or here and listen to this either before or after you read this post. (They’re the same thing, just different sources.)

If you have ever made or reblogged posts urging people to switch from Google Chrome to Firefox, you should be willing to at least give a try to other TTRPGs besides D&D5e for much the same principle reasons. I’m not telling you you have to hate D&D5e, and I’m not telling you you have to quit D&D5e, I’m just asking you to try some other games. If you don’t like them, and you really want to go back to D&D5e, then go back to D&D5e. But how can you really know you won’t like other games if you have literally never tried them? This post is a post about why and how to try them. If you’re thinking right now that you don’t want to try them, I urge you to look below to see if any of your reasons for not wanting to try them are covered there. Because the monopoly that WotC’s D&D5e has on TTRPGs as a whole is bad for me as a game designer, and it’s bad for you as a game player. It’s even bad for you if you like D&D5e. A fuller discussion of the why and how this is the case can be found in the links above, but it isn’t fully necessary for understanding this post, it’ll just give you a better perspective on it.

If you’re a D&D5e player, I’m sure at some point or another, you’ve been told “play a different game”, and it must get frustrating without the context of why and how. This post is here to give you the why and how.

[The following paragraph has been edited because the original wording made it sound like we think all weird TTRPGs suck.]

Before that though, one more thing to get out of the way. I'm going to level with you. There’s a lot of weird games out there.

You are gonna see a lot of weird TTRPGs when you take the plunge. Many of them try to completely reinvent what a TTRPG even is, and some fail spectacularly, others really do even up doing something very interesting even if they don't end up being what a core TTRPG player wants. But not every indie RPG is a Bladefish, lots and lots of them are more 'traditional' and will feel very familiar to you, I promise. (And you might even find that you like the weird experimental bladefish type ones, these are usually ideal for one-session plays when your usual group can't play your usual game for any reason.)

You're also going to probably see a lot of very bad games, and man have I got some stories of very bad games, but for now I'm just saying to make sure you read the reviews, or go through curators (several of which will be listed below), before you buy.

Now that that is out of the way, I’m going to go down a list of concerns you may have for why not, and then explain the how.

“I don’t want to learn a whole new set of rules after I already spent so much time learning D&D5e.”

Learning a new set of rules is not going to be as hard as you think. Most other TTRPGs aren’t like that. D&D5e is far on the high end of the scale for TTRPGs being hard and time-consuming to learn and play. If you’ve only played D&D5e, it might trick you into thinking that learning any TTRPG is an overwhelmingly time-consuming task, but this is really mostly a D&D5e problem, not a TTRPG problem as a whole.

“D&D5e has all of these extra online tools to help you play it.”

So what? People have been playing TTRPGs without the help of computers for 50 years. To play a well-designed TTRPG you won’t need a computer. Yes, even if you're bad at math. There are some TTRPGs out there that barely even use math.

“I’m too invested in the narrative and characters of my group’s current ongoing D&D5e campaign to switch to something else.”

There are other games, with better design made by better people for less money, that are the same kind of game as D&D5e, that your current characters, lore, and plot will fit right into and do it better. And no, it's not just Pathfinder, there's others.

“I can’t afford to play another TTRPG.”

You probably can. If you’ve only played D&D5e, you might have been made to think that TTRPGs are a very expensive hobby. They aren’t. D&D5e is actually uniquely expensive, costing more than 3x more than the next most expensive TTRPG I can think of right now. Even on the more expensive end, other TTRPG books will cost you no more than $60, most will cost you less than $20, and a whole lot of them are just free. If you somehow still can’t afford another TTRPG, come to the A.N.I.M. TTRPG Book club mentioned below, nominate the game, and if it wins the vote we will straight up buy it for you.

(By the way, if you had any of the above concerns about trying other games besides D&D5e, that really makes it sound like you are in a textbook abusive relationship with D&D5e. This is how abusers control their partners, and how empires control their citizens, by teaching you to think that nothing could ever get any better, and even though they treat you bad, the Other will treat you even worse.)

“If I don’t play D&D5e, which TTRPG should I play?”

That’s a pretty limited question to be asking, because there will be no one TTRPG for everything. And no, D&D5e is not the one TTRPG for everything, Hasbro’s marketing team is just lying to you. (Pathfinder and PbtA are not the one system for everything either!) Do you only play one video game or only watch one movie or only read one book? When you finish watching an action movie like Mad Max, and then you want to watch a horror movie, do you just rewind Mad Max and watch it over again but this time you act scared the whole time? No, you watch a different movie. I’m asking you to give the artistic medium of TTRPGs the same respect you would give movies.

“I want to play something besides D&D5e, but my friends won’t play anything else!”

I have several answers to this.

Try showing them this post.

If that doesn’t work: Make them. Put your foot down. This works especially well if you are the DM. Tell them you won’t run another session of D&D5e until they agree to give what you want to do at least one try instead of always doing only what they want to do. This is, like, playing 101. We learned this in kindergarten. If your friend really wants to play something else, you should give their game a try, or you’re not really being a very good friend.

If that doesn’t work, find another group. This doesn’t even mean that you have to leave your existing group. A good place to start would be the A.N.I.M. TTRPG Book Club which will be mentioned and linked below. You can also go to the subreddit of any game you’re interested in and probably meet people there who have the same problem you do and want to put together a group to play something other than D&D5e. You might get along great with these people, you might not, but you won’t know until you try. Just make sure to have a robust “session zero” so everyone is on the same page. This is a good practice for any group but it is especially important for a group made of players you’ve just met.

“I only watch actual plays.”

Then watch actual plays of games that aren’t D&D5e. These podcasts struggle for the same reasons that indie RPGs struggle, because of the brand recognition and brand loyalty D&D5e has, despite their merit. I don’t watch actual plays, or else I would be able to list more of them. So, anyone who does watch actual plays, please help me out by commenting on this post with some non-D&D5e actual plays you like. And please do me a favor and don’t list actual plays that only play one non-D&D5e system, list ones that go through a variety of systems. The first one I can think of is Tiny Table.

“I can just homebrew away all the problems with D&D5e.”

Even though I want to, I’m not going to try and argue that you can’t actually homebrew away all the problems with D&D5e. Instead, I’m going to ask you why you’re buying two $50 rulebooks just to throw away half the pages. In most other good RPGs, you don’t need to change the rules to make them fun, they’re fun right out the box.

“But homebrewing D&D5e into any kind of game is fun! You can homebrew anything out of D&D5e!”

Firstly, I promise that this is not unique to D&D5e. Secondly, then you would probably have more fun homebrewing a system that gives you a better starting point for reaching your goal. Also, what if I told you that there are entire RPG systems out there that are made just for this? There are RPG systems that were designed for the purpose of being a toolbox and set of materials for you to work with to make exactly the game you want to make. Some examples are GURPS, Savage Worlds, Basic RolePlaying, Caltrop Core, and (as much as I loathe it) PbtA.

“I’m not supporting WotC’s monopoly because I pirate all the D&D5e books.”

Then you’re still not supporting the smaller developers that this monopoly is crushing, either.

Now, here’s the how. Because I promise you, there’s not just one, but probably a dozen other RPGs out there that will scratch your exact itch.

Here’s how to find them. This won’t be a comprehensive list because I’ve already been typing this for like 3 hours already. Those reading this, please go ahead and comment more to help fill out the list.

First, I’m gonna plug one of my own major projects, because it’s my post. The A.N.I.M. TTRPG Book Club. It’s a discord server that treats playing TTRPGs like a book club, with the goal of introducing members to a wide variety of games other than D&D5e. RPGs are nominated by members, then we hold a vote to decide what to read and play for a short campaign, then we repeat. There is no financial, time, or schedule investment required to join this book club, I promise it is very schedule-friendly, because we assign people to different groups based of schedule compatibility. You don’t have to play each campaign, or any campaign, you can just read along and participate in discussion that way. And if you can’t afford to buy the rulebook we’re going to be reading, we will make sure you get a PDF of it for free. That is how committed we are to getting non-D&D5e RPGs into people’s hands. Here is an invite link.

Next, there are quite a few tumblr blogs you can follow to get recommendations shown to you frequently.

@indierpgnewsletter

@indie-ttrpg-of-the-day

@theresattrpgforthat

@haveyouplayedthisttrpg

@indiepressrevolution

Plenty of podcasts, journalists, and youtubers out there do in-depth discussions of different systems regularly, a couple I can think of off the top of my head are:

Storyteller Conclave (I’m actually going to be interviewed live on this show on April 10th!)

Seth Skorkowsky

Questing Beast

The Gaming Table

Rascal News

Lastly, you can just go looking. Browse r/rpg, drivethrurpg.com, indie press revolution, and itch.io.

Now, if you really want to support me and my team specifically Eureka: Investigative Urban Fantasy, our debut TTRPG, is going to launch on Kickstarter on April 10th and we need all the help we can get. Set a reminder from the Kickstarter page through this link.

If you’re interested in a more updated and improved version of Eureka: Investigative Urban Fantasy than the free demo you got from our website, there’s plenty of ways to get one!

Subscribe to our Patreon where we frequently roll our new updates for the prerelease version!

Donate to our ko-fi and send us an email with proof that you did, and we’ll email you back with the full Eureka prerelease package with the most updated version at the time of responding! (The email address can be found if you scroll down to the bottom of our website.)

We also have merchanise.

[andreawritesit]

can i request cregan and targ reader where he gets her a wolf and its all sweet and stuff ❤️

Fandom: House of the Dragon

Pairing: Cregan Stark x Targaryen Reader

Synopsis: You had been living in the North for quite a while now but nothing felt quite as welcoming as receiving a warm bundle of joy as a present.

It was not morning yet. Or perhaps it was. Wrapped in the dark grey clouds, the sun often played hide and seek in the Northern skies. It was difficult to tell what time of the day it was. You got out of bed and immediately, the sudden chill enveloped your entire body, down to your bones. Quickly grabbing the fur blanket from the bed, you wrapped it tightly around yourself. The cold was your worst enemy, your soul was forged out of fire after all. Even after an entire month, you still couldn't understand why your mother would betroth you to a Northern lord. You were the same girl on the side of whose bed she had spent countless nights awake. As soon as the weather became colder, you'd catch a fever. Throughout your childhood and even now, in your adolescent years, Rhaenyra has been on her toes constantly because of how the cold affected you. And yet she had sent you to marry Lord Cregan Stark. Why? That's not to say that your betrothed wasn't the most respectable man you had ever met. Cregan was cold and stoic as Northerners tend to be, but he was also honorable and extremely kind to you. As soon as you had arrived at Winterfell on dragonback, he had done all he could to make sure you were comfortable. He made sure you got plenty of warm clothes and furs and despite being the lord of Winterfell, he came to your chambers every day to see if you needed anything.

You had both decided that you would marry only after the war was over. He didn't want to tie you to himself knowing very well that he could die in the war and leave you by yourself. And you didn't want to marry him so soon either because you still wanted to partake in your mother's efforts to get her throne back from the usurpers.

You walked to the window and looked outside. Everything was covered in pristine white snow. It was so different from Dragonstone and Kings Landing. Instead of the hustle and bustle of the South, there was a calming silence in the North. Soon enough, the sun's rays began to pierce through the dense clouds, casting a golden hue over the snow-covered landscape. You couldn't help but smile at the view outside. The tranquility was suddenly broken by a soft knock at the door.

"Come in", you called, walking away from the window.

The door slowly creaked open, revealing the Lord of Winterfell. His tall and imposing figure was contrasted by a warm smile on his face, a sight you had come to cherish over the past month.

"Good morning Princess. I hope I didn't disturb your rest."

You shook your head, "Not at all, my Lord. I was already up." Your eyes went to a bundle of blankets in his arms. "What brings you here so early?"

Cregan's smile widened as he walked to where you were standing. "I come bearing a gift for you, my Princess." He stepped closer, revealing a small, furry creature nestled in the crook of his arm. "I hope this will make your stay here easier. He's a wonderful companion." He removed the top blanket a little and a small head peeked out.

Your eyes widened in surprise. "A dire wolf pup?" you breathed out as you reached to gently stroke his fur. "He's so precious and small."

"One of the she-wolves gave birth to many pups this morning. When I saw this one, I knew I had to give him to you." The dire wolf pup, with its striking blue eyes and white fur, nuzzled into your touch, eliciting a soft laugh out of you. "Here, hold him", Cregan whispered as he softly passed the pup into your arms. You cradled him close and looked up at Cregan, your heart swelling with affection.

"Thank you. He's perfect."

"Much like you", he said while stroking the pup's head gently.

"Is that why you brought him to me? Because he's perfect like me? Or was there any other reason?"

Cregan let out a small chuckle at your words. "It's one of many reasons I decided to gift this one to you. You see, just minutes after being born, he was already jumping around and causing mayhem in the yard. Reminded me of you and your dragon quite a lot."

You punched his arm lightly and a laugh left your lips. The pup nuzzled your neck and you couldn't help but giggle. Cregan's gaze softened as he watched you bond with the dire wolf. "He's strong and brave, much like you," he said, his voice filled with admiration. "I thought he could be a symbol of the North's acceptance of you."

You felt a rush of gratitude and warmth, not just from the direwolf but from Cregan's thoughtful gesture. He had once again won you over, something that had happened quite a few times already.

"I know it's not easy for you to settle down here in the North. But I'm grateful that you're trying and I promise you, I will take care of you. I will make sure you won't have to miss the warmth of your home. Winterfell will be your abode one day and I hope I will become your family, someone you'll be able to trust and perhaps even love one day."

You shifted the pup into your right arm and held Cregan's hand with your left hand. "You have no idea how much you have already done for me. When I first came here, I was a scared little girl who was being separated from her family but now I feel like I was always meant to be here, with you. I can assure you that I will also do everything I can to be there for you. I am ready, to accept Winterfell as my home and you as my husband."

Cregan's expression softened, and he squeezed your hand lightly. "I'm glad to hear that," he said sincerely. "I'm glad you came here."

"Me too."

Suddenly, the pup stirred, letting out a small, contented yawn. You and Cregan both laughed softly. The moment was broken but no less sweet. "I suppose he's tired", Cregan whispered as he covered the pup with a small blanket.

"Have you named him yet, my Lord?"

He shook his head, "No. He's your companion. You should name him."

You took a long look at the white fluffy ball of fur in your arms. "I'll name him Winter," you decided, looking up at Cregan with a smile. "To remind me of the kindness and strength of the North."

"Winter it is, then," he said. "May he bring you joy and protect you always."

Your heart swelled with emotion as you held Winter close. "He already has," you replied, your gaze locked with Cregan's. "Thank you, Cregan."

In that moment, the chill of the North transformed into the warmth of new companionship and a realization that perhaps your feelings for the Northern Lord had evolved into something deeper.

[greeneyessmize]

Today's thoughts are of the youth of Penelope & Colin and how it affects their relationship, specifically: how they fight.

Penelope is maybe 20 at most. Colin is perhaps 23.

They are also a part of the upper class. This allows them essentially a longer childhood in some ways for the era. They are emotionally pretty on par with a somewhat shy and sheltered 18 year old today who has never had a relationship and a 20 year old college kid who was also a bit hiddenly shy but has dated around a bit.

This means that neither of them have ever had to compromise on a larger, but intimate, and more important scale.

They don't know how to fight from a place of common goal. This is what they have to learn together.

I am going into detail with how this affects multiple scenes, so here is a cut for everyone. :)

Pen & Colin only know fighting with siblings, parents, friends, and enemies. So they know fight against, not fight for.

Penelope specifically only knows how to fight by false retreat and full opposition.

Her false retreat is seen most clearly in her use of Lady Whistledown. This is where she cocoons herself outwardly but lets her anger fly using precisely cloaked arrows. Her LW comments on Colin's fakeness upon his return to Mayfair showed a lethal strike.

Her full opposition fights are seen in her arguments with Eloise, both over her yelling that yes she does want to be married some day and then when Eloise confronted her about being LW, and then in her fights with Colin over LW.

When she and Colin fight in the middle of the street the night before their wedding, Pen goes full opposition, even going up on the high step to put her on the same level as Colin as much as possible. She does not retreat, she does not shrink. She goes conflict blow to conflict blow with him. She apologizes but does not bend or break. There is no compromise to be found because they are fighting against, not for. As one raises their voice, the other matches. There will not be a winner, but they don't know that.

Colin's fighting styles are either full shutdown, or like Pen, full opposition.

His full opposition fight with Pen in the middle of the street shows that he also will not back down. Each thing Pen says, he counters until she loudly declares the one thing he can't refute: that she loves him.

You also see that he is unwilling to compromise in his full shutdowns. He won't even try to talk to Pen after they are married during the nights and mornings where he places himself on the settee. He doesn't know how to say what he desperately needs to express to her in any constructive way. So. He stays on the settee, as close as he can to Pen, but unable to engage with her.

When she tries to engage with him, like at the review of the wedding breakfast planning, and it is she who makes the majority of the attempts, Colin still only knows how to go full opposition and/or full shutdown. Pen tries to answer him honestly when he asks if she will end LW because she really doesn't know. But since he can't give her grace to understand her on this... It only leads to more teary eyes and more distance.

On their wedding day, their tenuous truce after the middle of the street argument is broken in their fight after the Queen's threats. Here we see Penelope go full opposition and proclaim clearly and for the first time that she is Whistledown. And then Colin ultimately reacts with full shutdown, saying he will sleep on the sofa/settee.

The morning after their wedding, Colin is teary-eyed, taking tea fully dressed on the settee where he clearly spent the night. He leaves Penelope abruptly while she is still undressed for the day, intending to leave her out of his plans for the day. He definitely saw she was upset by this. I do wonder if that gave him a bit of dark satisfaction.

When Penelope comes to Bridgerton House to inform Colin of Cressida's blackmailing, Penelope gives way when Colin focuses his full opposition towards Cressida instead of her. Granted it takes a few times of being ignored, but she doesn't yell and ultimately lets it go. You can see that it hurts her to let Colin disregard her wishes, but she still ultimately allows it until he messes it all up. In this debacle they both learned to step back from full opposition between each other.

Penelope realized that even when it does not end well, sometimes she must let Colin have his way. Colin realized that not listening to Pen is where mistakes are made. Neither of them are yelling anymore.

Then comes the day of Francesca and John's wedding. It's not until she doesn't give him the reaction he thinks he wants that morning, as he is forlornly laying on the settee... that we see a shift. She does not react with regret or sadness or pain or anger. Pen is calm, cool, collected. She says she will spare him the confined shared carriage to Bridgerton House. She breezes out of his reach while he is still processing this new development.

Colin takes an important step by going to reread all of Penelope's letters. This is something he did not do in anger. He did this so he could gain perspective. This is his realization that full shutdown is ineffective and is not doing anything he wants or needs.

Penelope also is taking a step forward. She recognizes that false retreat and cloaked attacks are only increasing her own damage. She appeals to Colin with earnestness and honesty after the wedding of Francesca & John. She and he both refrain from moving into full opposition fighting this time. They are listening to each other. Colin asks what Penelope needs from him. She answers with everything he has needed to hear. He tells her what he needs, she listens. They are looking at a common goal. She moves forward with her plan to confess to the queen.

Then after her confession to the Ton at the Butterfly Ball, Penelope does the one thing for Colin that she can think of to heal the wounds of their fighting: she offers to let him go.

This is not something either of them ever wanted. But Penelope offers it because she truly feels, that with their very little communication through this, that Colin must want freedom from her. She cannot see through the pain they have inflicted on one another.

Colin immediately recognizes that now is the moment he must say everything in his heart. He has a moment of panic, of potential loss. Through everything he has always wanted and loved Penelope. He just had no idea how to show it while he was also angry. But now he has let go of his anger, and he will deal with it better should it happen that he is angry again.

Colin does what he needs to most. He tells her everything he is feeling. They are honest with each other. They have their common goal. They won the fights together.

[bvidzsoo]

Grease and Oil

⨳Mechanic!Mingi⨳

TW: cursing, smut wrap it before you tap it

Word count: 5,6k

A/N: I don't think I'll ever let go of bleached spikey haired Mingi. It changed something in me, I'll never be the same. I have nothing to say except...why did I even write this? Song Mingi stop haunting me, thank you. It's not the best, but the best I can write lol. Feedback is very much appreciated!

            The smell of grease, oil, and gasoline weren’t something unfamiliar to me, nor were they nauseating. It was something I was used to. These were familiar scents; scents which I have started associating with home. Cars, too, were something I associated with a feeling of familiarity, of something dear to me. Walking inside my father’s car service was like a second home, a place I knew like the back of my hand. I wasn’t huge on fixing cars, but I knew a few things here and there. Despite my father’s attempts at making me a great mechanic one day, I struggled to understand the in-depth parts and mechanism of a car, therefore I settled on appreciating their beauty. Can’t say my father was too happy about it, but his concerns faded away when I found a path for myself. I applied to a college, choosing to study literature as I struggled finding anything else I liked. Perhaps creative writing was a subjected I happened to enjoy too, but I had no idea where my degree would take me one day. I had no intentions of teaching English literature, the children these days were awful and very disrespectful. My short temper would’ve surely gotten the worst of me if placed in a situation where I had to deal with rude kids. And so, I settled on reading my books and pouring my feelings out into short poems when I wasn’t at college. Or by wasting my time away at my father’s car service. It’s not like I had anything better to do—I actually did, but procrastination is my best friend. Besides, most of his employees are above the age of thirty-five, and two of them I have known since I was a little girl, they could be really fun to hang around…and it’s not like I would often stop by because my father has an employee who is barely a few years older than myself. And it’s definitely not because he is the hottest man alive I have ever seen. He’s a tall and lean guy, his posture immaculate with his shoulders always pulled back, his long legs worth envying and shoulders so broad you could hide behind them and nobody would see you. In the summer, he usually wears tight tank tops, showing off his humble muscles, biceps finer than most guy’s of his age. And his pants, which are fireproof, cling onto his body, showing off his narrow waist. This guy was a sight for sore eyes and I couldn’t blame the few ladies who would occasionally stop by, completely taken aback by this guy’s visuals. It wasn’t fair that he had a perfect body, especially when his face was good-looking too. God sometimes had favorites and Song Mingi definitely was one of them with his long nose, sharp eyes and cherry red lips, a singular mole underneath his left eye decorating his flawless skin. His personality also made him desirable and that just made him a dangerously charming and handsome human being. Perhaps my frequent visits to the service during the summer were sort of his merit too, not just the want to spend some quality time with my father as he spent little time at home. I knew he was busy; I couldn’t blame him. His service was one of the best in our little town and money didn’t just magically appear, you had to work hard for it and that’s what he did, he worked his ass off all the time. The fact that he has employed Song Mingi was just the cherry on top, the little motivation I needed to perhaps learn more about cars.

I was settled on top of my father’s working desk, tools pushed to the side, feet dangling as I watched him work on a car’s engine, getting more and more furious by the second as he couldn’t find one missing screw. I watched quietly as his phone rang again, making him sigh loudly before he straightened himself up and took the call, eyebrows furrowed. It was a hot summer day, the AC did little to nothing inside the hot service, and the use of different electrical tools only created more heat inside the spacious room. I had started fanning myself, overhearing my father make an appointment as an obnoxiously loud engine whirled past the entrance to the service, making my heart skip an excited beat. It was lunch break, and Mingi had just returned from eating his meal. He was gone by the time I had arrived; I was rather lazy this morning and thus didn’t bother getting out of bed before 12 pm. My father turned towards me as he finished his call, looking rather irritated. It wasn’t directed at me; however, I still knew a lecturing would follow because I sat on his tool desk…again.

“Get off, Y/N, I asked you so many times not to sit there,” He sighed tiredly as he headed for the exit, “I have to examine a car, are you coming to the front?”

Certainly not before I have seen Mingi, “I’ll wash my hands first, they feel slimy, meet you at the reception, dad.”

He nodded once and hurried outside, phone already ringing once again. Summer seasons were always busy, work pilling up quickly. I started fanning myself with my hands as another heatwave hit me, making me sigh. Not even a tank top and shorts were enough to stop me from sweating buckets. I pushed my hair behind my shoulders and gripped the table, about to jump off it, when the man I stayed behind for finally showed up. He walked through the open garage door, having to duck as it wasn’t raised enough for his towering height. He had his back to me as he walked inside, carrying two boxes, muscles of his arms bulging as a few guys greeted him, instructing him where to place the boxes. However, nothing could’ve prepared me for the wave of shook which rooted me to my spot. My mouth hung open as my eyes remained trained on Mingi, and I could only hope nobody noticed my shameless gaping. Three days ago, when I have stopped by last, the man’s hair reached his shoulders almost and was a faded light brown. Now, his hair was completely bleached blonde and stood up in all places, spikey. A hairstyle definitely shouldn’t have made my tummy do flips, yet I had nothing to swallow as I watched Mingi laugh with a fellow mechanic, explaining something to him animatedly. His black tank top was tucked inside his beige pants, a black belt holding it against his hips securely. A black bandana was tied to his left bicep and I licked my lips as my eyes ran over his frame, stopping for a second too long on his ass. Perhaps crawling onto the wall sounded like the most normal thing to do right now. Just as I was about to look away, the man he was talking to briefly glanced at me and Mingi suddenly turned his head, eyes falling on me. Looking away right now would mean admitting that I had been staring at him, so I forced myself to smile nonchalantly at him and blame the flush on my cheeks on the extremely hot weather—which combined with Mingi’s presence only made my body heat up even more. I didn’t want to admit it to myself, but I’d do anything to get railed by Mingi while he wore his working clothes with grease smeared on his cheek. My heart skipped a beat as a lazy smirk appeared on his lips as he took off towards me, making me gulp in panic as I straightened my posture.

“Hello, princess.” He called once he was close enough and I rolled my eyes at the nickname, acting as if I totally hated it. It did bother me at the beginning when he started calling me that, but I didn’t mind anymore. And it certainly shouldn’t have made me blush.

“Hi, Mingi.” I greeted him back, smiling as I crossed my legs and leaned forward, holding myself up by my hands. My knuckles hurt from the grip I had on the table, but I ignored that.

“What brings you here today?” He asked nonchalantly, crossing his arms in front of his chest. I didn’t want to look, but his biceps were bulging and I’m just a simple woman, “Thought you washed your car when you stopped by last time.”

Ah, yes, the good old excuse of washing my car when it didn’t need washing yet. To be fair, I had a cleaning problem so that was the main reason why I washed my car so often, Mingi being here was just another thing to motivate me to stop by more frequently.

“I did, I’m not here for that.” I admitted, clearing my throat as Mingi’s sharp eyes narrowed slightly, mischievous glint appearing in his eyes. He hummed shortly, the sound deep in his throat, reminding me how hot I found his raspy and deep voice. He had once whispered in my ear as he snuck up on me, wanting to scare me, and I swear to God, I almost reached Heaven that day.

“Are you here for me then?” The cute pout of his lips and the finger he pushed against his cheek definitely didn’t match the sultriness of his words and the look in his eyes. It made me take a deep breath as I forced myself to roll my eyes, embarrassed that he had a feeling I was only here to see him. I mean…I did wear my favorite off-shoulder top just because I knew we would see each other.

“Why the sudden change of hairstyle?” I decided to change the subject, but it only made Mingi smirk as he looked at me almost victorious, almost as if he knew I didn’t answer him because he was right. Mingi ruffled his already spikey hair with a shrug of his shoulders.

“Just wanted something new,” He answered, “besides, it’s so hot these days, my long locks only made me sweat more. I feel like a new man right now. What do you think, do I look nice?”

Nice was little said, I would’ve described him more like: hot, sexy, attractive, gorgeous, mouth-watering, “Yeah, you look nice. It suits you.”

Mingi smiled happily and bowed lightly before his phone beeped. I didn’t understand how a man like him could be so cute while looking like a Greek God. My eyebrows slightly furrowed as I watched Mingi chuckle and smile down at his phone, quickly typing something on it. Perhaps he was seeing someone? Of course, why would a man like him be single? It shouldn’t come as a surprise; I should have thought about that sooner. But then again, he never mentioned a significant other. With a sigh, I jumped off the table and dusted off my shorts, running my hands through my hair. Mingi paused, looking up at me through his long lashes. I forced a smile on my face, suddenly discouraged by my own thoughts, as I grabbed my phone off the table.

“Got to go, dad’s waiting for me.” I mumbled as Mingi’s eyes slightly narrowed, eyes swiftly running over my body. He nodded wordlessly and I turned around, taking off towards the exit.

“That top looks really nice on you.” My steps halted for a second as I looked back at him and chuckled before exiting the garage, walking towards the reception, ignoring the butterflies in my stomach at the simple compliment. I should probably download a dating app and find someone available to obsess over.

            The blaring music and blinding disco lights in the living room were becoming too much as my tipsy head swirled around like a disco ball, throat parched up and dry from the lack of water. Certainly the amount of alcohol I have had was enough for the night as I pushed people out of my way, slightly wobbling as I headed for the kitchen, desperately needing water. A super rich guy from college threw a huge ass party and invited some guys over from our college, one of them being one of my close friends. I wasn’t one to turn down a good party, and when the alcohol was free, I would certainly attend it. Seonghwa and I had teamed up and played beer-pong together, kicking Wooyoung and San’s asses, but losing to Hongjoong and Yunho. We should have known better not to challenge those two competitive monsters. All in all, the night was fun and after having lost Sooyoung to some hot guy, I hit the dancefloor with Wooyoung and San, the three of us dancing our hearts out to every song. After a while, I grew concerned and started calling Sooyoung, making my two dancing companions almost take my phone away after six missed calls. But it didn’t take long for Sooyoung to finally text me, telling me she was upstairs with a Yeosang named guy smoking some weed, and that she’d be down in no time. I rolled my eyes at the text, huffing as I handed Wooyoung my phone to take care of. My skirt had no pockets and I forgot to bring a fanny-pack, I have grown tired of holding my phone, Wooyoung’s back pocket would do the trick until Sooyoung returned and I could give my phone for her to put in her little purse. The music wasn’t as loud in the kitchen as it was in the living room and it was also less packed, which made me grateful as I walked over to the window and pushed it open, smiling contently at the cool air which hit my face. I certainly needed to cool down. I grabbed a red cup which looked relatively unused and filled it with tap water, downing it in mere seconds only to fill it up again and again until I felt satiated. I threw the cup away and leaned against the counter, holding my thumping head in my hands as I closed my eyes for a second, thinking it would help. But it only made me more nauseous and I quickly opened my eyes as I massaged my forehead, still leaning slightly over. Somebody next to me asked if I was okay and I quickly nodded, telling them that I just needed a moment to regain composure again, and I’ll be off dancing once again. However, a weirdly familiar deep voice suddenly filled the kitchen, some high-pitched giggle following straight after the ridiculous joke the guy told. My nose scrunched up at the very cheesy pickup line which followed and I snorted, unintentionally catching their attention as they didn’t stand too far away.

“Y/N?” The deep voice asked surprised and my eyebrows furrowed as I finally raised my head, smoothing down my hair as it fell in my face.

“Oh, Mingi.” I muttered just a little surprised by his presence here. I wondered how he knew about the party, however, the black-haired girl by his side was a tell-tale. She was a student at my college and she was pretty as fuck. I sighed, and unintentionally glared at her, unimpressed by her presence next to Mingi. It’s not like I knew her well to form an opinion about her, but personally, I didn’t like her that much. Especially since Mingi seemed to be here with her. My eyes fall back onto him and my brain blanched for a second, never having seen him outside of the car service up until now. Him not wearing his tight-fitting clothes was something new and I couldn’t help but let my eyes run all over his body, taking in the sight in front of me. He wore a loose-fitting white t-shirt, the front slightly tucked inside his grey ripped jeans which were baggy. He wore a black pair of convers, and a black fanny-pack was pushed around to his backside to not bother him. However, what made me take a second to process what I was seeing were his accessories. His necklaces were layered as he wore a red braided like material which sat snugly against the base of his neck, then a silver chain followed, and a silver cross which reached just bellow his collarbones. His wrists were decorated with silver chain bracelets, matching the chain around his neck and he wore various rings, some bigger than the other, his right-hand sporting four meanwhile his left three. If all of that combined with his hair wasn’t enough, his fingernails were also painted black, albeit already coming off in some spots, but still painted black. He was a sight for sore eyes and it took everything in me to not grip his arm and walk us upstairs, completely disregarding the girl he was here with.

And she just had to speak up, “Oh, you two know each other?”

“Yeah, her dad’s my boss.” Mingi answered before I could and I raised an eyebrow as the girl took me in, unexpectedly smiling at me as she placed an arm around Mingi’s shoulders. My jaw tensed subconsciously and I licked my lips as I leaned back against the counter, crossing my arms in front of my chest.

“We go to the same college,” She told Mingi, offering her hand to me, “I don’t think we’ve ever really introduced each other, though. My name is Jennie, I’m Mingi’s cousin.”

“Cousin?” My eyebrows raised as I shook Jennie’s hand, “I’m Y/N, by the way.”

“Unfortunately, yes.” Mingi playfully pushed Jennie off himself as he answered my question and Jennie just rolled her eyes.

“Whatever, giant, if I leave you alone with Y/N, will you behave?” She raised her eyebrows threateningly at Mingi and he just chuckled, raising his hands in surrender.

“I always behave.” He defended himself quickly, but sounded like he didn’t mean it at all.

“No, you don’t.” Jennie rolled her eyes then looked back at me, “I have to find my boyfriend, he’s somewhere here around, probably drunk off his ass. If Mingi bothers you, just knee him in the stomach really hard and come and find me, I’ll kick his ass for you—”

“I’m right here, you know.” Mingi rolled his eyes and ruffled Jennie’s hair, “Get lost before I chase you away.”

Jennie scoffed but walked away after she waved at me, leaving me alone with Mingi. My hostile behavior slightly dropped, but I couldn’t help look at Mingi with narrowed eyes. I knew what I heard while I was fighting the urge of throwing up. Why would anyone flirt with their cousin? That was disgusting.

“If Jennie is your cousin…why would you say a pickup line to her?” I couldn’t help but ask him accusingly. It made Mingi laugh as he stepped closer, smiling cheekily.

“Eavesdropping, weren’t you?” I opened my mouth to deny his claim, but Mingi didn’t let me, “First of, ew, that’s literally my cousin do I look like I fuck with family? And second, that pickup line was actually sent by someone whom I have been talking to, and I was just reading it to Jennie.”

“How many girls are you talking to currently?” The question tumbled past my lips before I could even think about it. I only could blame the alcohol for making me so straightforward and embarrassing.

“Wouldn’t you like to know…” Mingi chuckled and stepped closer, invading my personal space. I gulped and pressed myself harder into the counter, hands coming to grip the edge of it. A smirk appeared on Mingi’s lips as he leaned down to be eye level with me, eyes searching my face before they settled on my lips briefly. My head was spinning and perhaps I was seeing things, but his tongue poked out for a second, “You look really hot.”

I gulped and let out a quiet breath, looking down at myself. The leather skirt clung onto me like a second skin and the flower decorated corset did little to nothing to cover what I would usually hide. It was Sooyoung’s idea to dress up like this, she wore a matching set except her corset was green meanwhile mine pink.

“Uh, thanks.” I whispered and didn’t dare move as Mingi lowered his head even more, looking through his lashes as he looked me in the eyes. He’s never stood this close to me before; it only now made me realize the height difference between us. And I couldn’t help but faintly smell gasoline despite his strong cologne.

“Dressed up for someone?” He muttered and I felt a warm finger lightly trace the skin of my right arm. I gulped nervously and ignored the goosebumps on my skin.

“I didn’t know you’d be here—” I tried changing the subject, it seemed to be a habit of mine lately.

“But if you did know, would you have dressed up for me?” Mingi’s raspy voice whispered in my ear as he leaned closer, my mouth opening without a sound coming out. My tipsy brain didn’t exactly know how to function in that moment and that meant I had nothing to say. But as he pulled back, we made eye contact, and his intimidating gaze pulled an answer out of me instantly.

“Yes.” I would totally hate myself in the morning for admitting that, but I couldn’t help myself. Not when he was standing so close and saying things like that. A smirk pulled onto Mingi’s lips and suddenly his hand raised as he gripped a strand of my hair lightly and twirled it around, brushing it behind my ear. I watched him mesmerized, body slightly trembling because of different things. The opened window brought in the chill breeze and we stood close to the it; Mingi’s closeness and touch made me want to crash my lips against his, and I was fighting every fiber in my body to stop myself from doing that, thankfully not tipsy enough to lose all rationality.

“I think I know about your little secret, princess.” Mingi’s tone was playful as he suddenly cupped my cheek and tilted my head back, hovering his face over mine, eyes tracing my features slowly. I hoped my red lipstick wasn’t smudged and that it would be smudged in no time.

“What secret?” I asked confused, biting my lower lip as Mingi’s Adam’s apple bobbed up and down as he swallowed, his fingers slipping towards my nape as his thumb pushed against my cheek.

“About your little crush—” He barely whispered, eyes on my lips as my mouth parted, heart beating like crazy, “on me.”

Before I could answer him, his teeth caught my lower lip between his and he sucked on the flesh, making my face flush as I mewled, hand holding onto his waist for more stability as the counter wasn’t enough anymore. He held eye contact as he released my lip and I felt like crumbling onto my knees and giving him anything he wanted as my grip tightened on him, head pulled closer to his by the grip he had on my nape. Mingi’s lips barely brushed against mine and I tried to close the impossibly little distance between us, but he just tsked and smirked.

“Good girls eventually get what they want, princess, be a bit more patient.” I couldn’t help but groan in frustration as Mingi released me and took a step back, smirking as he swiped his thumb over my lower lip, smudging my lipstick. I threw him a glare, but he just laughed and then turned around and walked off with a cup he grabbed off from the counter. I couldn’t help but lick my lower lip, pressing a palm against my racing heart as I tapped the sweat off my forehead, needing another cup of water to cool off.

            And I didn’t even have to wait for too long. Four days after the party, my father asked me to stop by the car service because he couldn’t decide what color to choose for the tuning he was doing for one of his friend’s car. I couldn’t have been happier to stop by as I made it my personal mission to stay away from that place for as long as possible, embarrassed by what happened between Mingi and I at the party, but also because I wanted to torture him a bit too. I could only hope he yearned to see me as much as I yearned for him. My father was out, having to pick up some pieces in the nearest city, which was half an hour away, so that meant he’d be gone for approximately an hour and a half. Everyone was gone by now from the car service as working hours were over, everyone except Mingi, of course. He had to catch up on his work as he had to skip a day for some undisclosed business. And yes, Mingi should’ve been working right now on that old car nobody actually wanted to fix, but here he was, balls deep in my pussy, thrusting into me like his life depended on it. I guess he was just a simple man too, and he fell exactly into my trap as I walked through the garage door wearing my little sundress, high heels elongating my legs. It didn’t take long for Mingi to stop whatever he was doing as he dragged me to the backroom, where there were no cameras, and pushed up on the table, wasting no time in undressing himself and working up the both of us. My head was thrown back from the constant pleasure his movements brought, his length reaching places no one else has before, my right hand gripping his bare waist as I rolled my hips to meet his thrusts. Mingi was biting his lips hard, holding onto my hips as I had to hold myself up with one arm, muscle straining with each strong thrust. Perhaps I should have expected him to be vocal, but the whines he would let out every now and then only turned me on even more, dragging my own moans out of me. Grease stuck to his left cheek, just underneath his mole and his already sweaty body from working was glistening once again, smelling strongly of the substance he has been working with to clean rims of the old car.

“I bet you’ve been fantasizing about me fucking you covered in grease and all sweaty from the long day I’ve had.” My only answer was a loud moan as he hit the sweet spot which made me see stars, and for a second, all I could hear were his own pants and the table squeaking louder and louder with each thrust.

“You have no idea—” I moaned as I clenched around Mingi, mind blanching for a second as he hit that spot again, “How fucking hot you look—like this.”

My fingertips dug into his hips and Mingi suddenly leaned down, pressing my back flat against the wooden table, rotating his hips as he suddenly slowed down. My mouth opened in a gasp and my legs went around his hips, one hand tangling in his blonde spikey hair as the other went around his shoulders to anchor myself. Mingi groaned in my ear as I clenched around his length again, his thrusts painfully slow on purpose, making me try to move my hips, but he had me pinned down by his heavier body.

“Fuck, please—” My whine was muffled by his lips as he pressed them against mine, pushing his tongue past my lips as I kissed him hungrily, wanting to feel more and more of him. Our lips moved messily against each other as Mingi slightly quickened his pace, but it still wasn’t enough. My eyebrows were furrowed as it started becoming unbearable and I whined, pulling my head away and choking on my words for a second, “I’m going to fucking die if you don’t go faster.”

I couldn’t believe Mingi had the audacity to smirk as he bit my lower lip harshly, making me push his head away as he chuckled amused, fake pouting at me.

“Thought I said good girls get what they want—” He completely stilled, bringing tears into my eyes out of frustration as I gripped his nape, trying to move against him to no avail, “And you’re being rather impatient right now.”

But before I could say anything, the slightly stood up and pulled almost fully out before slamming in again, his pace relentless and thrusts sharp as he threw his head back, moaning, making me grip onto his lower arm as he hit my g-spot over and over again, making my back arch as broken moans left my lips, nails digging into his skin. I was going fucking insane as his thumb found my clit and he started rubbing circles on it, making me cry out as I felt my orgasm building up, ready to snap any second as Mingi’s moans got higher and higher, my walls clenching tightly around him, bringing him closer to the edge as well.

“Fuck.” He hissed at a particular sharp thrust, his hips almost stuttering but I managed to meet his movements, desperate for my own release as I clawed at the wooden table, back arching as the pleasure became unbearable and the knot in my stomach snapped, making me let out a high-pitched moan, only for Mingi’s lips to muffle it as his hips stuttered, his own release following mine, filling me up. My body trembled and my lungs heaved for air as I came down from the high, our lips touching with Mingi as we both panted into each other’s mouths. His scent was intoxicating and I couldn’t help but burry my head into his neck and lightly bite down on his perfect skin, making him shudder. He didn’t pull out yet and I felt him twitch slightly, making me chuckle.

“So, I’m hot when I’m all sweaty and covered in grease?” He spoke up, voice raspy, and his words made me laugh as I allowed my head to rest against the wooden table, throwing an arm over my eyes. I could feel Mingi’s smile as he pressed a kiss against the corner of my mouth, swiftly pulling out.

“I said it once, I won’t say it again.” I peeked at him as he quickly pulled up his boxers and tight pants, adjusting his tank top.

“If I knew all I had to do was change my hairstyle for you to finally let me fuck you—” Mingi shook his head as he helped me off the table, smirking when I had to lean against it for support, my legs having gone numb, “I would’ve done it a lot earlier.”

“Perhaps if you weren’t so oblivious,” I threw him a glare and pulled up my panties, adjusting my dress, “You would’ve noticed how badly I wanted you since the first time I laid eyes on you, idiot.”

Mingi laughed and threw an arm around my shoulders as he pulled me into himself, “Now that that’s out of the way…do you want to date or do you want us to just fuck?”

His question made me pause as I looked up in his eyes, biting my lower lip in thought, “You want to go out with me?”

“I sure do.” Mingi said it like it was the most obvious thing, then he jutted his chin towards mine, “What about you?”

“What do you think?” I asked with a chuckle.

“That we should go for a second round—”

“Mingi!” I pressed my palm over his mouth and threw him a little glare, “My father could be back anytime, you know. And yes, I do want to date you. Unless you’re always this annoying.”

Mingi fake laughed as he pushed my hand off his mouth, “Aren’t you just so funny?”

I stuck my tongue out at him and he tried kissing it, making me yelp and push him away, which made Mingi giggle as he placed his hands in his pockets, “So, tomorrow at six?”

“But you better shower before you come pick me up.” I pointed a finger at him as we went to leave the room.

“I thought I smelled hot—”

“You can’t smell hot, so just—” I sighed and looked at him, “Just—dress up. You—I mean, you know, you looked really good at the party. I haven’t seen you out of your work clothes before.”

“Aw, aren’t you so shy right now and stuttering all of a sudden?” He cooed and poked my cheek, “As if I wasn’t inside you—”

“Y/N, you still here?!” I heard my father’s voice shout from afar and I threw Mingi a warning look as I pushed him away. He walked towards the car he had to fix defeated, throwing me those sad puppy eyes and a pout as my father walked inside the garage.

“Hi.” I waved at him and he smiled, glancing at Mingi.

“You can fix it tomorrow too, you know?” My father said as he went to put his own utensils away. Mingi hummed but said he didn’t have much until he was done, liar. My father glanced at me and I looked away from Mingi, smiling at my father innocently. He just shook his head and threw his keys at me, making me clumsily catch them.

“Go pick up your mother, I’ll stay behind and help Mingi fix the car.” He muttered tiredly as he walked up to my soon-to-be-boyfriend, oblivious to what Mingi would soon become to him as well. Not just an employee, but perhaps a part of our family too. I jokingly saluted my father as I stopped in the doorway, turning to look at Mingi, who was already watching me.

“Goodbye, Mingi.”

“Bye, Y/N.” Mingi tried to fight the smile off his lips as I turned around and ran off with a giggle, cheeks burning suddenly with embarrassment.

Good girls eventually get what they want, don’t they?

Masterlist

[eowynstwin]

Blackbird, Fly - Two

Cowboy Gaz x mail order bride—only, not his. After exchanging letters for half a year with ranching man Hans König, you finally travel out west to marry him. It becomes clear to you that something is bothering him—perhaps it has something to do with you. previous masterlist ao3 next

Kyle Garrick—who instructs you to call him Gaz, explaining it as a nickname—drives you out of town in a two-horse wagon. The countryside is dyed in pastels by the softening light of a just-setting sun, every bit as beautiful as Hans had written when he told you about it.

Like a painting, he said. Everywhere you look could be framed in gold. I wake up every day in this land and thank God I have the fortune to live in it.

Here now, as the wagon rattles down the wheel-carved trail, you understand his words. You feel that if you brushed your fingers against the sky overhead, towering with lavender-bottomed clouds as thick and soft as cotton on the stem, that they might come away smeared in blue and pink and violet. The surrounding landscape is a cornucopia of vibrant greens, rich browns of trees and soil, and clusters of orange, yellow, and white wildflowers.

You keep looking all around you to take it in, jostling your driver beside you, but Gaz seems not to mind. At least, he doesn’t say anything.

You’ve been trying not to feel so aware of his presence, but the endeavor is impossible. He is a solid weight beside you on the driver’s seat, exuding warmth where your shoulders brush against each other, and the earthy, masculine scent of him is inescapable. Every time his elbow or knee or thigh nudges yours during the natural sway and jostle of the wagon ride, you have to keep yourself from leaping out of your skin. Ever since you stepped foot off the train, you’ve felt like a lightning rod set out in anticipation of a storm.

You ascribe it to displaced longing for your husband-to-be. You’d spent the whole journey west imagining how you’d meet, longing for the moment he took you into his arms for the first time. Gaz is a handsome man—it’s only natural that your unfulfilled anticipation would transfer onto him. Especially considering he said you were perfect.

But then said very little after that. He’d seemed—well, not friendly, but at least amicable on the train platform, so you wonder if your manners have offended somehow. He’s spent most of the drive now with his eyes ahead, partly obscured by the brim of his hat. Occasionally he glances at the letters in your hand, but otherwise does not acknowledge you.

After one such glance, your discomfort with the silence becomes too much to bear.

“I read my favorites every night,” you tell him.

If Gaz is surprised when you break the silence, he doesn’t show it. “That so,” he murmurs.

All you have is his profile, very handsome in the light. The line of his mouth is taut.

“I know it’s silly,” you continue nervously—you have a bad habit of rambling when you’re uncomfortable. Adjusting your carpetbag in your lap, you go on, “but you must understand, this is the most exciting thing that’s ever happened to me. I never expected to marry, you see.”

He grunts.

“Much less to be a mail order bride,” you say. “I always thought I would be an old maid, for lack of available suitors if nothing else. Mama and Daddy thought I ought to learn to read and write, to improve my prospects, but most folks where I’m from don’t care much about all that.”

“I see,” replies Gaz. He still does not look at you.

“Sometimes I think it even made them like me less, like I was putting on airs, being smarter than them.” You realize immediately how arrogant you must sound. “Oh, but I don’t mean any offense! I don’t mean to suggest I have ideas above my station. It’s only just that, I wondered for years and years why no one offered for me, and it was the only thing I could think of. Why would a farmer’s daughter need to read and write? And why would a wife need to, if her duty is to tend to her children and her home? So that must be why no man has ever been very interested in me.”

You realize with horror that words are pouring out of you faster than you can keep up with them. And your driver’s attention has not shifted; his eyes remain on the road.

You look at your lap, face burning. “I’m sorry, I’m just annoying you, Mr. Gaz. I’m sorry.”

Shame grips you, tight and awkward. If you’d wanted to endear yourself to this cowboy at all, you’ve already failed.

But Gaz finally says, “Most men are idiots.” You look at him; he does not look at you. “I’ve only just met you, and I like you fine.”

He says it matter-of-factly, as if no more need saying on the subject. Simple and to the point; an economy of feeling you imagine must be characteristic of men in this part of the country.

Hans was like that too, in his letters. Communicating feeling without dancing around it, with a bluntness that ends up soft in its honesty.

It eases the tension frothing poisonous in your belly. “Thank you,” you say.

You ride in silence for a stretch. A cool breeze catches the free-floating ends of your hair, rustles along in the tall grass by the wayside. The steady thump thump thump of the horse’s hooves, and the creak of tackle and leather, are the only sounds populating the air.

Home was quiet like this, too; the fields stretching endless and green beneath the sky, the silence there so blank and open that birdcall traveled for miles, and the lowing of the family milk cow sounded sometimes like the trumpet of God.

You peek again at Kyle Garrick. There’s a furrow to his brow, the kind a man gets when he’s in a mood and won’t admit it if asked.

“I’m sorry,” you say again, quietly, because he made you feel better about things, and you’ve done little more than whine.

He finally looks at you, the edges of his face lined and glowing in the evening light. Studies you, for a moment. The furrow eases.

“No,” he says, “I’m sorry, Miss. I don’t mean to be short with you. I’m afraid manners are secondary on a ranch, without a good woman nearby to remind about ‘em.”

You give him a small smile. “Have you worked for Hans very long?”

He turns his gaze back to the road. “Six or seven years, now.”

You toy with the clasp of your bag; you’re brimming with questions. “Is he really all that tall?”

“Oh, yes,” Gaz says. “Like a giant.”

“What’s he like?”

Gaz gives a great breath through pursed, full lips. “Fair, I guess. Asks a lot of us—but then most bosses out here will. Worked for his father for a few years before him, too.”

“You must be a good hand then,” you say.

“I work hard,” says Gaz. “That’s all that matters.”

“I’m sure Hans is grateful,” you reply. “He must trust you very much, to send you for me.”

The furrow returns. “He must.”

It becomes clear to you that something is bothering him, and it’s nothing you will resolve between now and when you make it to the ranch. Perhaps it has something to do with you—a new face, an unknown quantity that threatens to knock the balance of his livelihood askew.

You sigh a little. Of course, you should have expected to have to win Hans’ people over. Their loyalty to the late Mrs. König will inevitably be challenged by your arrival.

Neither of you speak again—you decide not to push what little grace Kyle Garrick has given you, and he does not volunteer any more conversation. The rest of the ride is unremarkable, leaving room for anticipation to grow in your stomach; soon the wagon crests the slope of a hill, and your destination comes into view.

Long Mask Ranch sits at the base of a range of mountain foothills, fed and watered emerald green by spring runoff. You’ve been on Hans’ land for a while now; opening up before you is the ranch proper. A collection of buildings form a semicircle around a large corral in the valley: stables, a barn, some cabins, and a large two-story gabled manor, painted white.

The sun sinks further toward the horizon as you approach, painting the world in liquid orange. Figures resolve themselves, people moving tables and chairs around, and on the manor’s front porch, observing the proceedings, stands a tall man in a rancher’s coat and hat.

Lightning suddenly bolts through you. You sit very, very still as Gaz pulls the wagon through a cast iron archway adorned with LMR at the apogee. Your heart thrums in your throat like a picked guitar string. When you finally come to a stop, the man’s head turns to toward you.

At the worst possible moment, shyness grips you. You look around, at anywhere but him, at the house, the corral, the cowboy beside you.

You startle to meet Gaz’s eyes. The expression he wears is a mask of seriousness.

“This is it,” he says.

Your voice leaves your chest trembling. “Thank you, Mr. Gaz.”

“Just Gaz is fine, Miss.”

“I couldn’t possibly,” you reply. Propriety feels like the only solid thing to cling to just now.

He looks away. The line of his mouth tightens. “Of course,” he says.

He dismounts the wagon in one smooth motion, boots hitting the packed earth hard. Out of the corner of your eye, you see the tall man start his way over to you. Gaz rounds the back of the wagon, and you give your bag to him once he’s at your side. He offers his hand to help you down.

You’re dazed as you take it, lightheaded as suddenly the present moment becomes very, very real. It’s warm, his hand; rough in all the places you expect a cowboy’s hand to be. Yet there’s something soft in the way your palms meet, how the dips and contours align with each other and fit together. You’re shaking very hard as you ease your way from the seat, gripping him tightly until your feet meet the ground, and his grip circles yours with a solidness to it in a way unlike any man has ever held you.

You meet his eyes again when he hands you your bag. Gaz gives your hand a squeeze, averts his gaze, and lets you go.

“There she is!” an accented voice announces.

You pull your gaze from Kyle Garrick and the mystery of his tension with you, and turn to face your intended husband.

Hans König has loomed large in your imagination for half a year. He’d described to you what he looked like, of course, as best he could, but you find as you look upon his face that no written word can convey what it means to meet for the first time the man you will marry. You’d fallen in love with someone formless, absent, but inscribed in other ways with enough distinction to nurture your tender feelings.

Looking upon him now, though…his appearance offers nothing to that distinction. He’s neither ugly nor handsome. As he comes to stand before you, you think he rather looks like every other middle-aged man you’ve met in your short life, although certainly much taller. You meet his eyes—pale blue, as he’d related—and the rush of love you’d expected to feel, once you knew who he was, simply does not come.

This man is a stranger to you.

You reprimand yourself immediately. He isn’t a stranger. You’ve known him for six months. His face is simply not one you have attached any love to yet; the measure of his character is contained in the stack of paper in your hands. In the promises he made to you to make your quietest dreams come true.

So you smile the way you’d dreamed you would—like watching the sun crest the horizon after a long night of darkness, seeing the bounty of the near future coming toward you. Summoning joy by making room for it to exist.

“Hello, Hans,” you say, “it’s me.”

Hans König steps forward. He looms over you truly, now, eclipsing your vision. “It is you, indeed.”

Without another word, right there in front of Gaz, Hans grips your shoulders, bends down, and kisses you on the mouth.

Your brows shoot upward. It’s the first time anyone has ever kissed you. His lips are…hard, and motionless against yours. Almost perfunctory. You are so shocked he’s done it that you don’t think to respond, and then as suddenly as it happened, it’s over. He pulls away, pats your shoulders with a little smile, and then looks at Gaz.

“Get that wagon put away and then go help the others,” says Hans to the cowboy, slinging one arm around your shoulder.

Your brows lift further. Is that all he has to say to him, for delivering you safe and sound?

Gaz doesn’t seem to share your feelings. “Yes, sir,” is all he says, even and toneless.

But he looks between you and his employer for more than just the span of a heartbeat. Eyes going from him, to you, to the arm around your shoulders. Then he meets your gaze, expression stony.

If Gaz is wary of your presence here—if you’re going to win him over—the best time to start is now. “Thank you very much for seeing me here safely,” you say. “I was so glad of your company, Mr. Gaz.”

To your dismay, his expression only tightens. Gaz looks at Hans again, then back at you.

“You’re welcome, Miss,” he says.

Then he climbs back into the wagon, gives the reins a snap, and drives away.

-

a/n: fun fact, the ranch and neighboring town are based off Valentine and Emerald Ranch from rdr2 :) the ranch layout is more like Pronghorn Ranch however.

[sadnymi]

Lovefool p2

[part one] [Mattheo riddle x reader]

Summary: Being the only girl in the group, and now stuck in the middle of nowhere with them, you found myself in a tricky situation. You had to share rooms, and Mattheo, leaving no room for negotiation, insisted that you would share with him. The problem was, there was only one bed. From uncovering feelings to heartbreak, it was a night you wouldn't forget.

Warning: angst,fluff,strong language, hints of smut .

Words:5,5k + Bonus scene.

When we arrived back home, I quickly said goodbye to the boys, avoiding eye contact with all of them. I couldn't bear to see their pity or confusion. I just wanted to escape to the solitude of my room. Once inside, I shut the door and leaned against it, finally allowing myself to break down. Tears streamed down my face as I slid to the floor, clutching my knees to my chest.

There was only one week left before returning to Hogwarts, and I knew I would have to face them—most of all, Mattheo. The thought of seeing him again made my stomach churn. During that week, I waited for him to reach out, to say something, anything, that would make sense of what happened. But he didn’t. The silence from him was deafening, and it drove me insane.

All the other boys sent me messages as usual. Even Blaise, who had been so harsh, reached out, perhaps feeling guilty for his words. But not Mattheo. He ghosted me completely, and the pain was unbearable. Every time my phone buzzed, my heart would leap with hope, only to be crushed when it wasn’t him.

I spent days replaying our time together in my mind, trying to understand what went wrong. Had I misread everything? Was I just another conquest to him? The questions tormented me, and the lack of answers made it worse.

I remember that night vividly. The way he looked at me, the tenderness in his touch, the passion in his kisses—it all felt so real. But now, it seemed like a cruel illusion, a trick my heart played on me.

I tried to distract myself by throwing myself into reading, but every word I read seemed to blur into the memory of him. I’d catch myself staring at the same page for hours, lost in thoughts of his hands on my skin, his whispered words.

By the middle of the week, the weight of his absence was unbearable. I lay in bed, clutching my phone, scrolling through old messages, and torturing myself with his silence. The boys' messages were kind and casual, but they couldn't fill the void Mattheo left.

Enzo’s messages were the most frequent, always checking in on me, making sure I was okay. “Hey, how are you holding up?” he’d text, and I’d force myself to respond with a lie. “I’m fine, thanks,” I’d write back, even though I was anything but fine.

Blaise's messages were surprisingly considerate. “Sorry about the other day. Didn’t mean to upset you,” he’d said. I couldn’t bring myself to be angry with him; he had only voiced what I feared was true.

But Mattheo? Nothing. No calls, no texts, no attempts to explain or apologize. It felt like he had erased me from his life completely.

The pain was relentless, gnawing at me day and night. I felt hollow, like a shell of the person I had been before. I missed his voice, his laughter, the way he made me feel seen and cherished. I missed him so much it hurt to breathe.

The final straw came the night before we were due to return to Hogwarts. I lay in bed, staring at the ceiling, and realized I couldn’t go on like this. I needed to confront him, to demand answers. I couldn’t start the new school year with this weight on my shoulders. I had to face him, even if it meant shattering my heart all over again.

I took a deep breath and picked up my phone, my fingers trembling as I typed out a message. “Mattheo, we need to talk. Please.” I hit send and waited, my heart pounding in my chest. Minutes felt like hours as I watched the screen, praying for a response.

But none came. The silence stretched on, suffocating me, and I knew that no matter what happened, I had to find a way to move forward. With or without him.

I boarded the train with a heavy heart, my eyes scanning the crowded platform. As soon as I found Enzo, I slid into the seat next to him, trying to muster a smile.

“Hi,” I said, glancing briefly at Mattheo, who was sitting across from us.

“Hey,” Mattheo replied, his voice neutral, his gaze avoiding mine.

Theo soon returned, his eyes lighting up when he saw me. “How have you been?” he asked.

“I’ve been okay,” I lied, forcing another smile. Before I could say more, Draco and Blaise joined us, making the compartment feel even more cramped and awkward.

“Hi,” Draco said, his voice soft, his eyes flicking between me and Mattheo. Blaise offered a similar greeting, his usual bravado toned down, as if he sensed the tension.

I tried to lose myself in my book, Emma another Jane Austen novel, hoping it would distract me from the unbearable atmosphere. But I could feel Mattheo’s eyes on me, and each glance was like a dagger to my heart. His stare was intense, and it made concentrating impossible.

“I’m going to say hi to Pansy,” I announced suddenly, grabbing my bag and book. I left the compartment quickly, not giving anyone a chance to respond.

As I walked down the corridor, I realized I couldn’t face Pansy either. She would ask questions, and I had no answers. I turned a corner, only to overhear a group of girls talking animatedly about their exploits.

“Enzo is amazing,” one girl said, giggling. “Blaise too, though he’s a bit too cocky for my taste.”

“Oh, Theo is a sweetheart,” another girl chimed in. “But Mattheo... God, he’s something else.”

My ears pricked up at his name, and I leaned closer, my heart pounding.

“What’s it like with Mattheo?” a third girl asked, her voice dripping with curiosity.

“He’s rough, but in a good way,” the first girl said, her voice lowering conspiratorially. “He barely looked at me, but I didn’t mind. It felt so good. He didn’t kiss me, though, just... did his thing and left.”

My heart pounded as I continued to listen, hiding behind the corner.

"God, I'd do anything to sleep with Mattheo again," the first girl said, her voice filled with a mix of longing and frustration. "But he doesn't sleep with the same girl twice."

"Yeah, he's got a reputation for that," another girl chimed in. "And yet, somehow, they all are so different with her you know??," she said, her tone dripping with disdain.

" Y/N right? What's so special about her anyway?" a third girl asked, her voice filled with venom.

"She's always hanging around them, like she's one of them. I can't understand how she managed to get in their group."

"I bet they all fucked her at some point," the first girl said, her voice low and conspiratorial. "Do you think they share her? She's their slut for sure."

"I know right?," another girl agreed, her laughter harsh and cruel. "I mean, how else would she keep their attention? She must be really good in bed."

"Or maybe she just does whatever they want," the third girl added. "So pathetic, really. Always trying to act like she's so special. I bet she’s just a desperate little slut."

My heart pounded as I continued to listen, hiding behind the corner.

"Yeah, spreads her legs for any of them at the drop of a hat," another girl sneered. "She's probably been passed around like a party favor."

"And they act so protective of her," the first girl said with a bitter laugh. "I can't imagine why. What do they see in her?"

"They must be playing some kind of game," the third girl suggested. "Maybe seeing who can screw her over the most."

My heart beat faster and faster, each cruel word piercing deeper. Tears blurred my vision as I stepped away from the corner, desperate to escape their venomous gossip.

The world around me seemed to blur as I walked faster, not caring where I was going, just needing to get away. I collided with a strong chest, and looking up through my tears, I saw Mattheo.

"Why are you crying? “ His voice was sharper than a knife

“Who did this to you?" He asked once more when I didn’t answer his hands gently cupped my face, his thumbs wiping away my tears.

I pulled away, my voice shaking. "I'm not talking to you," I said, the tears flowing freely. I turned to leave, but he grabbed my hand.

"Stop it. Let me go," I demanded, trying to pull free from his grip.

"Not unless I know what got you crying like that," he insisted, his eyes filled with the same loving and caring expression that had once made my heart soar.

I looked away, the pain and confusion overwhelming me. "Just go and ignore me like you have been for the past week, or whatever," I said, my voice bitter. "Pretend I don't exist. You're good at that."

His face fell, looking speechless for a moment. I didn’t wait for him to respond. I pulled away, breaking into a run until I found an empty compartment far away from everyone. I slammed the door shut and collapsed onto the seat, sobbing uncontrollably.

The cruel words of the girls echoed in my mind, mingling with the confusion and heartbreak of Mattheo's unexpected concern. Why did he have to care now, after leaving me in silence for a week?

As the train rumbled on, I curled up on the seat, hugging my knees to my chest. The weight of everything pressed down on me, and I felt utterly alone. I had no answers, only questions that seemed to multiply with each passing moment. Why had he treated me so tenderly, only to disappear? And why did it hurt so much to see that same tenderness now, when I was already so broken?

Why had Mattheo been so different with me? Cause I’m pretty sure I wasn’t imagining that night and from what I heard from those girls it seems like he’s a different person from the one they are talking about .

I had a long time trying to explain to the boys why I suddenly disappeared and never returned. They didn’t look convinced, and their probing questions made it clear they weren’t buying my excuses.

Days passed, and I tried to put some space between me and all of them. It wasn’t easy. Draco cornered me in the common room one evening, his eyes filled with concern. "Something happened," he said, his voice low and insistent. "Tell me what it is."

"I'm fine, Draco. It's just family drama," I lied, my stomach twisting with guilt.

"You’ve been skipping meals and acting different," Theo added, joining us with a frown. "This isn’t like you."

"I told you, it’s family stuff," I insisted, hating how naked I felt under their scrutiny. It was like they could see right through my facade.

"Just...let us help," Draco pleaded, but I shook my head, turning away from their worried gazes.

Over the next few days, I was in a bit of a slump. Not only did I skip meals, but I also skipped more classes than usual. If I could have, I would have skipped the whole week, but unfortunately, that wasn't an option.

I grabbed my bag and walked through the courtyard, I overheard a girl talking loudly to her friends. "She's such a slut," she sneered, and my steps faltered. "I bet she's been with every Slytherin boy."

I stopped, my blood boiling. I turned around and marched over to her, my fists clenched. "What did you say?"

The girl looked taken aback for a moment but quickly recovered. "I said you're a slut. Everyone knows it."

The rage bubbling inside me reached a boiling point. "You think you know me? You think you can talk about me like that? Here’s a newsflash for you: I don’t need your approval or your pathetic opinions.“

Before she could respond, a boy next to her smirked. “Yeah, I’d love to fuck you just like the whole Slytherin boys have. Bet you’d like that, huh?”

I stepped closer, my fists clenched at my sides. "Why don’t you come a bit closer and say that to my face?" I said, my voice trembling with rage.

The crowd that had gathered around us watched with wide eyes and open mouths. "What's wrong?" the girl taunted. "Truth hurts?"

“Do you think it makes you look strong, demeaning someone you don’t even know? Do you think you’re better than me because you can spread lies and gossip? You’re pathetic. You think I care about what you say? The only thing that matters is that I know the truth, and that scares you, doesn’t it? Because deep down, you know you’ll never be anything more than a coward hiding behind cruel words.”

The girl, emboldened by the attention, added, "Your family must be so proud of you. What a disgrace."

"Shut your mouth," I said, stepping closer, my eyes burning with anger. "I don’t care what you think of me, but if you ever talk about my family again, you’ll regret it."

She looked a bit scared but tried to stand her ground. "Or what? You'll hit me? No wonder why your dad left,""

I saw red. I lunged at her, my fist raised, but strong arms wrapped around my waist, pulling me back. "Let go!" I yelled, struggling against the hold.

"Not her, not now, love," Mattheo's voice whispered in my ear, calming yet firm. He started to pull me away from the mess, his grip gentle but unyielding.

"Mattheo, let go of me," I insisted, trying to break free.

"Not until you calm down," he replied, his eyes full of concern. "I can't let you get into trouble over this."

He guided me into an empty hallway with a balcony, a secluded spot even the ghosts avoided. I was still shaking with rage, my breathing ragged. "Who do you think you are? Don’t touch me! Stay away!" I shouted, pushing at his chest.

"Just breathe, my love," he murmured, his hands cupping my face gently, thumbs stroking my cheeks. "Breathe with me."

His touch, his voice, started to pierce through the fog of anger. I took a shaky breath, then another, my heartbeat slowly steadying.

"Look at me," he said softly, tilting my chin up so our eyes met. "Every single one who talks bad about you is going to regret it. They’re going to wish they were dead before they ever said a word."

"Why do you act like this?" I demanded, my voice trembling. "You act like you care, like you—" I faltered, trying to find the right words. "Your mixed signals are driving me crazy! You pull me closer just to walk away after."

He looked pained, his eyes searching mine for understanding, but he said nothing.

"Say something!" I pleaded, tears welling up. "Anything!"

Still, he remained silent, and the silence cut deeper than any words ever could.

Footsteps echoed down the hallway, and the rest of the boys appeared. Blaise was the first to speak, his gaze flicking between me and Mattheo. "You okay?" he asked.

I nodded, trying to swallow the lump in my throat. "Yeah, I'm fine."

Theo stepped forward, his brow furrowed. "This happened before, didn't it?"

I took a deep breath, nodding again. "Yes."

Draco crossed his arms, his expression softening. "Well, that explains why you were acting distant. You should have told us."

"I didn't know what to say," I admitted, feeling exposed and vulnerable.

Enzo's voice was gentle as he asked, "What happened before?"

I glanced at Mattheo, who was watching me with an unreadable expression. I couldn't bear his eyes on me anymore. Looking back at Enzo, I said quietly, "It was on the train."

Their eyes widened as I recounted the overheard conversation, the cruel words that had been said about me, and how it had all culminated in the confrontation just now. Mattheo's gaze never left me, and I knew what he was thinking, but I couldn't deal with it anymore.

"I'm sorry," I said, my voice breaking. "I just... I need to go to my dorm. I'll see you all tomorrow."

Enzo stepped forward, his concern evident. "I'll walk you."

I nodded, unable to look at Mattheo as I turned to leave. Enzo fell into step beside me, his presence a small comfort amidst the chaos.

The next day, as I walked into class, I was met with an unexpected wave of greetings and offers of help.

"Hey, need any notes from yesterday?" asked one girl, her smile bright and friendly.

"I saved you a seat," another girl said, gesturing to the spot next to her.

"Do you need a quill? I've got an extra," someone else offered, holding out a shiny new quill.

I looked around, confused by the sudden change in behavior. These were the same people who had ignored me or worse, whispered behind my back just a day ago. Before I could process it, a group of girls approached, all smiles and compliments.

"Your hair looks amazing today," one of them said, her tone overly enthusiastic.

"Yeah, and your shoes are so cute!" another added.

"Thanks," I muttered, bewildered by their sudden interest.

Then, the girl from yesterday's confrontation appeared, looking hesitant. She took a deep breath and stepped closer. "I'm really sorry about what I said yesterday," she began, her voice shaky. "Please forgive me. I didn't mean any of it, and I feel terrible."

I stared at her, trying to make sense of this abrupt apology. "Why are you apologizing now?" I asked, suspicion creeping into my voice.

Before she could respond, I noticed him. The boy who had made that disgusting comment about me the day before. His arm was in a sling, supported by a wooden splint, and his face was a mess of blue and purple bruises. He had a black eye, swollen nearly shut.

"I, uh, fell down the stairs," he mumbled, not meeting my gaze.

I looked between the two of them, realization dawning. My stomach churned, and I felt the sudden urge to get out of there. Grabbing my things, I bolted from the classroom, not stopping until I was far from the castle. I found myself in a hidden garden, a place where I often went to think.

I sat down on the ground, trying to calm my racing heart and catch my breath. I wasn't dumb. I knew what had really happened. I knew who was behind the sudden wave of attention, the apologies, the broken bones. It wasn't hard to piece it together.

Mattheo.

But clarity seemed a distant dream. I leaned back against the tree, closing my eyes, and tried to find a moment of calm amidst the chaos Mattheo had left in his wake.

I stayed in the garden for what felt like hours, trying to find some semblance of peace amidst the turmoil. Eventually, I knew I would have to face him, to confront what had happened and what it meant. But for now, I just needed to breathe.

I felt someone approaching and sat beside me. I looked up and met Mattheo’s eyes. He was holding a book in his hand.

I felt someone approaching and sat up, my heart pounding. When I looked up, I met Mattheo’s eyes. He was holding a book in his hand.

"I—I got this for you," he said, his voice soft.

I glanced at the book, then back at him, and took it from his hand. It was Persuasion, another Jane Austen's novels. My heart beat even faster as I muttered a thank you. Then I noticed the blood on his hands, despite his clear attempts to wash it off.

He asked, "What were you reading on the train?"

I stared at him, incredulous. "You’re seriously asking me about my books while having blood on your hands? and probably terrorized the whole school before coming here!" I shouted.

He just smirked. "Are you insane, Mattheo? Seriously, what the hell?" I yelled again.

He raised his eyebrows, a hint of a smile on his lips. "I told you they were going to regret what they said yesterday, didn't I?"

"I can take care of myself. I don’t need your help," I snapped, trying to walk away, but he grabbed my hand, pulling me back until my back hit the tree.

"I know," he said.

I rolled my eyes and looked away, trapped between his hands on either side of my face and the tree behind me. His closeness was overwhelming.

"You’re insane," I muttered.

"Well, I need to talk to you, and you left me no other choice," he said, a mischievous glint in his eyes.

I chuckled sarcastically. "You kidding me? Because as much as I remember, you were the one who left after—" I stammered, my face turning red, unable to finish the sentence.

"Yes, my love, after what?" he asked, smiling even wider.

"After I went down on you? Or when I had my finger deep inside you?" he continued, his voice low and teasing. I put my hands over his mouth, desperate to stop him.

"Oh, Lord, stop," I said, my voice a whisper. He kissed my hand, sending a jolt through me, and I pulled it away quickly, my face burning even more.

"Don’t go shy on me now, love. I’m pretty sure I kissed more intimate parts," he said, leaning closer to whisper in my ear. "I've had your taste on my tongue for weeks."

I tried to hit him in the chest, but he grabbed both my hands with one hand, pinning them above my head.

“Listen,” he said, getting more serious. “Enzo told me about what Blaise said that day.”

I shook my head. “I don’t think I really want to know another tale about you with a girl in bed.”

“Another tale?” he asked, raising his eyebrows.

I looked him in the eyes, my voice trembling with both anger and hurt. “I heard what that girl said on the train. About how good you were in bed, how you liked it rough, just did the job and left with no kisses. She wasn’t even complaining, Mattheo. She said she’d do anything to sleep with you again, but it’s too bad because you don’t sleep with the same girl twice."

“Did she now?” he said, smirking.

“Fuck you, Mattheo,” I said, trying to pull away, but his hold was too strong. “Fuck you so much. I get it. I was delusional to think it was more than a one-time thing for you because you don’t sleep with the same girl twice, you don’t—” My voice cracked, betraying my emotions.

"Did it look like a fucking one-time thing back then, Y/N?" he demanded, sharp and serious. I avoided his gaze, my anger and pain battling inside me.

"Answer," he insisted, his face inches from mine. I looked up at him, the intensity in his eyes making it hard to breathe.

"No," I admitted, my voice barely audible.

"Because it fucking wasn’t," he said. "It wasn’t a simple fuck. I was making love to you, and that freaked the shit out of me." The veins in his neck stood out as he spoke, his eyes blazing.

I blinked, trying to process his words. "So, yes," he continued, his voice lower but no less intense, "what the girl said was right. I’ve fucked other girls like that. Rough, fast, no strings attached. Just getting off and moving on. No kisses, no tenderness, just raw and dirty, didn’t look at them more than I had to.”

My breathing grew heavier as his words sank in.“So, does it look like that now?” he asked, his voice softer but still intense. I closed my eyes, overwhelmed.

“Fucking look at me Y/N,” he commanded, and I looked up at him, shaking my head.

“Every time I look at you, at those lips,” he whispered, his voice dropping lower, “all I can think about is how much I want to kiss you. How much I want to taste you. How much I want you in every way. It’s not just about fucking. It’s about you. Every part of you, that night... you were in my arms, and I managed to sleep. You have no idea how rare that is for me.”

His words sent a shiver down my spine, my body responding despite my confusion. I could feel the heat between us, the undeniable pull that had always been there.

I looked at him, standing there, rain-soaked and intense, and the tears kept falling from my eyes.

“And no, I don’t want you to be my friend,” he continued, his voice rising. “I want to hear you moaning my name. I want to have you, all of you. To kiss every inch of you. To make you smile, to see you laugh. To put your happiness above anything because nothing else matters. Nothing but you.”

His words were raw, cutting through the rain and my confusion. The sheer intensity of his confession left me breathless, my heart pounding in my chest. I could feel the pull, the magnetic force between us, stronger than ever.

“I’ve tried to stay away, to keep my distance,” he went on, his voice breaking slightly. “But every time I see you, it’s like a punch to the gut. I’m fighting a losing battle. I don’t just want you. I need you. In every way possible.”

I stood there, soaked and trembling, unable to speak. His words had stripped me bare, leaving me vulnerable and exposed. The rain continued to pour, a relentless backdrop to his declaration.

“So tell me, do you understand now?” he asked again, his voice softer.

I swallowed hard, my throat tight with emotion. The truth of his words was undeniable, resonating deep within me. I took a shaky breath, trying to steady myself, and met his gaze.

“Yes,” I whispered, my voice barely audible. “I understand.”

He reached out, gently wiping the tears from my cheeks. “I will be so good to you,” he murmured, his thumb brushing my skin. “I would do anything for you. I fucked up, and I—”

I stood on my tiptoes and pressed my lips to his, cutting him off. For a moment, he was surprised and didn’t kissed me back, I pulled back, looking him in the eye. And as if a dam had broken, he wrapped his arms around me, pulling me closer.

He leaned down, capturing my mouth in a deep, hungry kiss. His lips were soft but insistent, demanding and giving all at once. I felt his hands on my waist, lifting me effortlessly. My legs wrapped around his hips as he held me against him, the kiss growing more passionate. The rain poured down, but it didn’t matter. Nothing else.

His tongue parted my lips, and I opened to him, the taste of him intoxicating. He kissed me with a fervor that made my head spin, his hands gripping my hips, pulling me tighter against him. I could feel the hard lines of his body, the heat between us almost unbearable.

"Wait," I managed to gasp, pulling back slightly. "The book, the rain—"

"I'll get you a new one," he promised, his voice fierce, breathing heavily against my lips. His fingers tangled in my hair, pulling gently until my face tilted up to meet his gaze. Then he kissed me again, more fiercely this time, as if he couldn’t get enough.

I melted into him, my hands clinging to his shoulders as he devoured me. His lips moved over mine with a raw, desperate need, and I responded with equal fervor. The world around us disappeared, the rain, the cold, everything fading away until there was only him, only us.

After what felt like an eternity, he pulled back, his forehead resting against mine. "Come with me," he murmured, his voice a soft plea. "Let's get out of this rain."

I nodded, my heart pounding in my chest, his hand slipping into mine, and we ran through the rain. We found shelter under a nearby awning, the sudden silence after the roar of the rain almost surreal.

He looked at me, his eyes dark and intense, and I felt my breath catch in my throat. "You're soaked," he said, his voice gentle, as he brushed a strand of wet hair from my face.

"So are you," I replied, a smile tugging at my lips.

"Well, we make a pretty pair then," he teased, his hand settling on my waist.

I laughed, the sound light and carefree, a stark contrast to the storm still raging around us. "We do, don't we?"

His gaze softened, a tender smile playing on his lips. "I've never seen anyone look so beautiful soaking wet."

I rolled my eyes playfully, running a hand through his wet hair. "You're just saying that because you want to kiss me again."

He grinned, leaning in closer. "Maybe. But it's true." His lips hovered over mine, the anticipation making my heart race. "And for the record, I do want to kiss you again. Very much."

"Then what are you waiting for?" I challenged, my voice barely more than a whisper.

He didn't need any more encouragement. His lips captured mine in a kiss that was both sweet and passionate, his hand tightening on my waist, pulling me flush against him. I could feel the warmth of his body through the wet fabric of our clothes, the contrast to the chill of the rain making my skin tingle.

As the kiss deepened, his free hand slid up my back, tangling in my hair. I moaned softly against his lips, the sound making him groan in response. He pulled back slightly, his breath hot against my skin.

"You have no idea what you do to me," he murmured, his voice rough with desire. "The things I want to do to you."

My cheeks flushed, and I looked down, feeling a mix of excitement and shyness. "Like what?" I asked, my voice trembling slightly.

He tilted my chin up, forcing me to meet his gaze. "I want to make you mine in every possible way," he said, his eyes burning with intensity. "I want to hear you scream my name, to see you come apart in my arms. I want to kiss every inch of you, to make you feel things you've never felt before."

His words sent a shiver down my spine, and I bit my lip, trying to suppress the blush that was spreading across my cheeks. "You're making me blush," I whispered, my voice shaky.

He smiled, a mischievous glint in his eyes. "Good. I like it when you blush." He leaned in, his lips brushing my ear. "I like knowing I'm the one making you feel this way."

I closed my eyes, my heart pounding in my chest. His words, his touch, everything about him was overwhelming. "You're insufferable," I muttered, but there was no heat in my words, only affection.

He chuckled, the sound vibrating through me. "You love it," he teased, his lips pressing a soft kiss to my neck.

I sighed, my fingers threading through his hair as I leaned into his touch. "Yeah, I do," I admitted, my voice barely more than a whisper. "I really do."

He pulled back, his eyes searching mine. "Good," he said softly, his hand cupping my face. "Because I'm not letting you go."

I smiled, feeling a warmth spread through me that had nothing to do with the rain. "I don't want you to,".

"So, I really have done it in your Mr. Darcy way, haven't I?" he said, a mischievous glint in his eyes. "I was always jealous of him, when you talked about him like that you know?"

Before I could respond, his mouth was on my neck, kissing and sucking gently, then more insistently. I let out a soft moan, my fingers digging into his shoulders.

He pulled back slightly, his eyes gleaming with mischief. "Perfect," he said, admiring his handiwork.

I laughed, breathless and flushed. "What was that for?"

He smirked, a wicked glint in his eyes. "It's for Blaise. Since he loves to ask so much."

I rolled my eyes, unable to suppress my smile. "You know he went on a date last night, right?"

"Did he now?" Mattheo replied, his fingers trailing down my arm. "I want everyone to know you're mine."

The possessiveness in his voice sent another thrill through me. "And what if I don't want to be claimed like some trophy?" I teased, raising an eyebrow.

He pulled me closer, his lips brushing against mine. "Then I'll just have to work harder to prove I deserve you," he whispered, his breath warm against my skin.

I smiled, feeling the warmth of his words seep into me. "You've already proven that," I said softly, kissing him again. "But I wouldn't mind seeing you try."

He laughed, the sound rich and joyful. "Challenge accepted."

We stood there for a while, wrapped in each other's arms, the rain a distant memory. His hands roamed over my back, his touch sending sparks of electricity through me. I leaned into him, feeling the steady beat of his heart against my chest, and knew that this was where I belonged.

"We should get inside," I said, glancing at the castle in the distance. "Before we catch our deaths."

"Right," he agreed, but made no move to let go. "But just one more kiss."

"Just one more," I echoed, leaning up to meet his lips again.

─── ⋆⋅☆⋅⋆ ── ─── ⋆⋅☆⋅⋆ ── ─── ⋆⋅☆⋅⋆

⋆⋅☆⋅⋆ Bonus scene ⋆⋅☆⋅⋆

As we approached our usual spot, I saw Blaise, Enzo, Theo, Pansy and Draco already seated, with an unfamiliar girl sitting beside Blaise.

I caught Blaise’s curious gaze fixed on my neck. He raised an eyebrow, a knowing grin spreading across his face.

“Well, well, what do we have here?” Blaise said, his voice dripping with amusement. “Is that a hickey, Y/N?”

I felt my face heat up, and before I could muster a response, Mattheo leaned forward, his grin turning positively devilish.

“Yes, mate,” Mattheo said smoothly. “It is a hickey.”

Blaise’s eyes widened slightly before he broke into a laugh. “By whom, I wonder?”

Mattheo wrapped an arm around my shoulders, pulling me close. “By me, obviously,” he declared, his voice filled with pride. “Wanted to make sure everyone knows she’s mine.”

I blushed even deeper, but I couldn’t help the smile tugging at my lips.

Draco looked between us, his grin widening. “Well, it’s about time. I was starting to think you’d never make a move.”

Mattheo chuckled, his hand moving to rest possessively on my waist. “Trust me, I’ve made plenty of moves. Just decided it was time to make it official.”

He winked at me. “Just make sure he treats you right. If not, you know where to find me.”

Mattheo tightened his hold on me, his eyes flashing with a playful warning. “She won’t need to, because I’m going to treat her better than anyone else ever could.”

I laughed, the tension melting away as I leaned into Mattheo’s embrace. “I think I can handle him.”

"So," Pansy said, leaning forward with an impish grin. "Does this mean you're off the market, then?"

"Consider me taken," Mattheo said, his voice firm. "And very happily so."

─── ⋆⋅☆⋅⋆ ── ─── ⋆⋅☆⋅⋆ ── ─── ⋆⋅☆⋅⋆

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