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uglypastels · 1 month

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omg what about Logan being like the softest with a sensitive/shy reader. Idk in what context like maybe she’s just overwhelmed with life and kinda closed off in terms of voicing what’s wrong and you know he’s usually very stoic but he’s the BIGGEST softy. Totally not projecting btw.

YEsss Logan is such a fucking softie, no matter how hard he'd want to try and hide it. thank you for being my first request for this fandom i hope i can do it some justice 🫶 and pleeease, we love to project here so please, go right ahead.

warnings: darkness. anxiety. loneliness. alcohol. fem!reader. reader's mutation specified. mentions of past [implied toxic] relationship. so some angst but also bunch of fluff at the end. also please don't come for me if he's a bit out of character. this is my first time writing Logan so it will be trial and error.

~ X-Men Requests Open ~ Masterlist ~

It was the dead of the night. Quite literally. All around you was so quiet and dark that the rest of the world might as well have ceased to exist. All you heard was the floorboards creaking under your footsteps as slivers of moonlight illuminated your path through the corridors of the mansion. It was the rare instance that you felt at peace.

Yes, you knew almost as soon as you stepped inside the large building and saw all these mutants walking around happily and carelessly that you had found a true safe haven, and yet, months later, you still had not found your bearings. It did not help that you were not exactly in the age bracket of most of the residents here. Having the mansion double as a school meant most of the mutants were in that school-going age range, and while they were lovely (for the most part), you had no desire to befriend children. Then, those who you felt more drawn to socially, like Storm or Jean, were all apart of that special ops team, which always left them busy, if not completely absent, while away on missions.

Thus, most of your days went by in solitude. Something you had gotten used to throughout your life. Over the years it had become natural for you to simply disappear into your surroundings. Wether you wanted to or not, people simply overlooked you. In hindsight, it explained your mutation perfectly… or was that just an aftereffect of it? You had always wondered if it was one’s personality that influenced the mutation or the other way around.

Either way, for you, it all merged into one dark abyss.

By now, you had gotten a hang of all the floor plans of the giant building, especially the route between your room and the kitchens.

You hadn’t checked the clock when you got out of bed, but it must have been around 2 am, if not later. You didn’t expect anyone to be up at this ungodly hour. Especially not walking out of the dark kitchen exactly as you were coming through the threshold. The two of you bump, chest to chest, and the contact immediately made you burst out in a high-pitched scream. From the other side of the impact, you heard a muffled grunt and the sound of a blade being pulled. That was enough for your flight or fight mode to activate. You almost choked on the deep breath you took. The blade swung in your direction, but it only slashed the air where you once stood.

‘Who’s there?’ it was a male voice. Hard and deep, almost wild. In your other form, your eyes adapted much better to the dark, and so you could see him looking around himself wildly. You counted the sharp appendages in his hands— no, they were coming out of his arms— six long claw-like blades ready to impale the very first thing that’d move.

There was no doubt about it that this must have been the infamous Logan everyone around the mansion talked about. From what you had heard, he had been away for almost a year on some top-secret assignment for the Professor, but now he had apparently returned.

And what a comeback he has made, nearly stabbing you in the hallway.

‘Who’s there?’ he repeated his question louder, still looking around.

‘Just me.’ Your voice came out as the exact opposite of his, soft and weak, and you immediately regretted your words. Just me, as if he was supposed to know what that meant.

But it must have done the trick, as Logan retracted his claws. His shoulders visibly slacked at the lack of imminent danger.

‘Well, Me, you can come out of hiding. I’m not gonna hurt ya,’ he grumbled, ‘let me just turn the light on–’

‘Wait!’ You squeezed your eyes shut and let the cool air of the night brush over your bare arms. When you opened them again, all you could see was Logan’s large frame standing inside the kitchen, most likely hovering over the light switch, surprised at your sudden call.

‘Sorry, you can uhm– turn the lights on now.’ And like that, with a quiet flick, the kitchen illuminated with a soft orange glow.

Logan’s eyes were immediately on you, scanning you up and down for any sign of recognition, but you already knew there would be none. Even if he had ever seen you before, there never was.

‘Do I know you?’ he cocked his head with the question, and all you could do was shake your head.

‘I doubt it.’ No one knew you, but that didn’t feel like a smart response.

‘Care to introduce yourself, Bub?’ He leaned against the wall with the light switch, and maybe it was his overall greatness as he practically towered over you, but you felt a rush of heat fall over your face as he looked down at you in expectance. Awkwardly, you pushed out the sounds that formed your name, with a bonus of an extended hand for him to shake.

‘And you must be Logan, right?’

He confirmed your suspicion with a grunt as he took your hand, squeezed firmly, but not painfully, and shook it once. Then, silence fell between you.

Two strangers who met in a complete, nearly fatal accident. It was only to be expected you would have nothing to say to one another. But you were, after all both awake this late in the night, and that was enough to compel you to talk.

‘Couldn’t sleep?’

‘Just got back, actually.’ His eyes glanced to your side and that is when you noticed the duffel bag that lay in the corridor. Then, only when you looked back at him did you take in what he was wearing. Not the expected gym shorts or sweatpants with an old shirt. Instead, Logan was dressed in a black button-up under a dark motorcycle jacket. With that, he had a boot cut-jeans and the boots to match. From the tiny dark dotted pattern on his shoulders and the light pitter-pattering that was occurring outside, it was visible he had just come from out of the rain.

Immediately, a parade of questions entered your mind. Where had he been? Why did he come back so late? What was he doing in the kitchen? And so much more, though none of it would leave your mouth as you doubted he would talk to you about his secret mission.

‘You alright?’ His brows furrowed as he looked down at you, and you realised how you must have looked. Staring up at him with wide eyes, not saying a single thing. Another heat flare hit your cheeks.

‘Yeah, I’m fine.’

He cocked his head in an examinatory fashion. The disbelief evident in his eyes.

‘You’re new here, aren’t you?’

‘Relatively,’ you shrugged. ‘Got here a few months ago.’

‘Parents kicked you out?’ He assumed the most common backstory that comes with the residents of the mansion.

‘Not exactly,’ you kept your response short. After all, you could hardly tell a stranger you just met that your boyfriend had kicked you out of your shared apartment when he found out about your genetic abnormality. You had never been sure how he would have reacted, but the events that unfolded were even beyond your imagination. But the past was the past, and you didn’t want to dwell on it. The important part was that not a day after this conversation, you were crying in your car with nowhere to go. It was by chance that weeks after your break-up/eviction, you stumbled into some other mutants who told you about the Professor. You weren’t too sure about going to seek shelter at a school of all places, but in reality, the Academy was much more than that. Though it did give you the perfect opportunity to safely train your abilities.

That and so much more was what went through your head, but you didn’t say any of that to Logan. Why would you? He didn’t know you. He didn’t care about your problems, and you didn’t blame him for it.

On the contrary, you appreciated that he didn’t press you for more details. When you answered the way you did, he simply nodded in understanding and made his way over to the fridge. The blue glow illuminated his tense features. Strange, for a man who had been a year on the go on some secret spy adventure, you would have expected him to return at least a bit beaten up. But besides maybe some signs of a bad sleep schedule, no form of strain was visible on his face.

‘You want something?’ he looked over at you, making you realise you had been, in fact, staring and not very subtly either.

‘I’m good, thanks.’

‘Suit yourself,’ he went back to inspecting the contents of the fridge before sighing with disappointment. ‘They still don’t have anything stronger around here?’

‘Oh, if you’re looking for beer–’ you walked over to a cabinet at the other end of the kitchen. You tapped a corner, and a small code pad appeared. You tapped in the code, and the cabinet opened to reveal a fully stocked mini-bar. ‘Scott had it installed over the summer,’ you explained when you saw Logan’s confused expression.

‘Explains the babyproofing.’ He walked over, and you handed him a cool bottle of beer.

‘Well, it is a school after all.’ You held in a smile as the thought occurred to you that the kids might not have been the only ones who weren’t supposed to know about the secret compartment. The rivalry between Cyclops and the Wolverine was known all too well around the whole campus, even for newcomers such as yourself.

Logan smirked, taking his beer. You were about to offer a bottle opener, but he hit the neck of the bottle against the edge of the table and with a pop and a clink, the cap came right off.

‘Here,’ he exchanged your bottles, giving you the open one. You watched him repeat his actions with the second drink. Your eyes were still on him as he chugged down half of the beer in one go. He probably could have downed the whole thing if it wasn’t for his look down at you, most likely noticing your entranced look.

‘That staring a part of your powers, too, then?’ he commented, and the acknowledgement immediately made you turn your head in the direction of the window.

‘Sorry. I just— I tend to do that, I guess.’ You wrinkled your nose. Being on your own around so many people, you had gotten used to people watching, observing them from a distance like a show on TV that you kept on for the background noise.

‘What do you do, anyway?’ He asked bluntly, ‘I thought I had done you in good back there.’

‘You would have,’ you chuckled, remembering just how close his claws had come into contact with you. ‘It’s hard to explain. I just kind of—’ You noticed the shadow that fell over the floor from the table and lightly grazed it with the tip of your toe. With a deep breath, the world in front of you changed. Except the exact opposite was the truth. ‘Disappear.’ You finished the sentence, punctuated by your new state.

Logan’s eyes widened as you disappeared in front of his eyes. Where the shock came from, he couldn’t explain. He had encountered these sorts of mutants before. But this felt different than regular invisibility or teleportation. With his heightened senses, he could always detect those sorts of hijinks. No one ever disappeared to him. But you— as soon as you had faded away, it was as if you had completely fallen off the face of the earth. Not a single trace of you lingered behind. When you spoke, just as you had in the hallway, your voice didn’t seem to be coming from one place. It was all around him, almost like a whisper, a voice inside his own head.

With a blink of an eye, you reappeared before him. Just as you had stood there moments before.

‘There’s not really a name for this, I think; at least no one around here could come up with anything that made sense.’ Not that you had any conversations that made people interested enough to do the research. ‘But from my own understanding, I kind of become one with the shadows.’

‘And what about the light?’ he recalled your yelp when he had tried to turn on the light.

‘I merge with the dark, and so when new light sources interfere… it’s not pretty.’

Logan simply nodded as he took the last swig of his beer.

For a moment, the two of you stood there in silence, you leaning against the counter and he against the large table.

‘You’re doing it again, Bub.’ He smirked, calling out your lost stare.

‘Sorry,’ you hadn’t even realised you were doing it. You had just been looking around the room and may have, perhaps, accidentally lingered a look at his frame for a few seconds. And then you caught sight of his hands. More specifically, his knuckles. There was a faint pink glow on the skin, but besides that, you would never be able to tell that deadly claws could grow out from there. You blinked. ‘Sorry.’ You were doing it again. Quickly, you drank the rest of your beer. The bitter taste lingered in your throat, suffocating the burning questions that you wanted to ask.

‘Spill it out.’ He hit you by surprise with the command.

‘Uh–what?’

You knew there were plenty of mindreaders around, but you had not thought it was one of Logan’s abilities. ‘How did you–’

‘It’s all in your face, sweetheart. You think just ‘cause you’re quiet, you’re hard to read, don’t you.’ His assumption left you a bit stunned. It wasn’t that you had thought exactly that, but more so that you never considered that you were making any expressions that were that easy to interpret, as you never really had anyone pay that much attention to you to point it out.

‘If you want to say something, just say it.’ Logan said the corner of his lips lifted in a small smile. ‘If you’re wondering if it hurts,’ he looked down at his knuckles, ‘it hurts just as any other one-foot-long knife cutting through skin.’

‘That’s awful.’ You gasped, considering what it must be like to have such a mutation that inadvertently harmed you any time you used it.

‘You get used to it after a while.’

Another round of silence. This time, the longer it went on, the more you started thinking how you must be inconveniencing him. With the beers drank, there was little for you both to still be doing here, but also didn’t want to be rude by just up and leaving. After all, you didn’t know Logan very well.

‘You sure you’re alright?’ He asked, coming out from behind the table.

‘Yeah.’ You tried to smile but could tell it probably did not reach your eyes. Logan moved with a sense of apprehension, unsure of how to approach you. Being a year on the road, not to mention the years of solitude before he had joined the Professor’s team, had not exactly prepared him for these kinds of situations. He didn’t know the right things to do or to say. But to you, just his presence was enough. Just him being there, talking, or in this case, just seeing you, was more than you could have asked for. ‘I’m good.’

And yet, ironically, though you had actually meant it for once, you really did feel alright, but something about the situation caused tears to prickle in the corners of your eyes. Maybe it was the sleep deprivation that made you overly sensitive. Or the alcohol.

You blinked the tears away and smiled awkwardly. ‘It’s just been a long day.’ or week. Month. Year. How about your entire life?

‘Yeah, tell me about it.’ There was that quirk in his lip again, that ghost of a smile. And you couldn’t figure out if his response was just a sarcastic quip, understandably referring to his past days, which you were sure did not consist of a walk in the park. Or did he actually mean it, and he did want you to tell him more? Well, your moment of contemplation brought on another wave of silence, and the heavier it fell, the worse you felt to go back to your problems.

The sudden sound of footsteps pulled you back into your world. People must be slowly waking up; meanwhile, you hadn’t had an hour of sleep yet, and the effect of that started to hit.

‘I should— should probably go.’ You muttered, taking small steps in the direction of the door.

‘Well, the offer always stands.’ Logan followed you with his eyes, turning in his spot as you passed by him. See you around, Nightshade.’

‘What?’ the nickname caught you off-guard, stopping you in your tracks.

‘Sorry,’ Logan winced, ‘I don’t know—’ that’s what he gets for trying to be cute.

‘No, don’t apologise. I like it.’ Your smile finally found its full form. A “thank you” almost slipped past it, but you held yourself back. It felt too cheesy to get all sentimental about something as silly as a nickname. Especially since he didn’t know what it meant for you. He didn’t need to know didn’t think you’d ever belong amongst these people enough to get a moniker.

And maybe it didn’t mean anything at all, maybe he had just said it as a mindless comment on your powers. Or maybe not. Maybe he had really tried hard to put that smile on your face.

You would never know.

Unless you took that one small step. Because, of course, all you had to do was ask, just like he had told you, but maybe another time. For now, you just bid him farewell, hoping for that next opportunity to certainly come sooner than later.

the end.

thank you for reading 💗

if you enjoyed the fic, please consider reblogging and leaving a comment. or send a message via my inbox. requests are also more than welcome. 💗

#logan howlett #logan howlett fanfiction #wolverine x reader #wolverine x you #wolverine fanfiction #logan howlett x reader #x-men fanfiction #fanfiction #fanfic #angst #fluff #imagine #request #logan howlett fanfic #wolverine #wolverine fanfic #x men #x men fanfiction

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thewebcomicsreview · 1 year

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You know, it's always struck me as a little odd how little most webcomics actually attempt to adapt to their medium. There's basic strips, the old 2k era 4-square, the endless scroll of Webtoons, and a few weird experimental things like Homestuck, but most webcomics I run into tend to stubbornly stick to conventional portrait-oriented page layouts.

It's… readable, I guess, but that format doesn't seem to work very well for either desktop or mobile viewing. It wastes a lot of screen-space, and usually makes it impossible to actually view the full page without making the text too small to read.

Have you encountered any interesting webcomics that experiment with more landscape-oriented layouts? I'm kinda curious about how well that would work.

So, there's this dude Scott McCloud who wrote about comics in the 90s. His first book, Understanding Comics, is literally the book on comics, it's the one schools make kids read. This third book, Making Comics, is a pretty good practical advice guide I'd recommend, even if it's not his groundbreaking seminal work. In between those two books was one called Reinventing Comics

Reinventing Comics, written in 1993, was basically a book of predictions about how this newfangled Interweb was going to revolutionize the art of comics creation. Like a lot of early-90s stuff "Wow the internet!" stuff, it has a lot of inaccurate predictions, and thus isn't super well remembered (though, unlike a lot of early-90s predictions of the internet, it at least vaguely resembled reality).

Anyway, one of the big things from that book was the idea of the "infinite canvas".

Which was basically the idea that a comic didn't have to be constrained by the size of the screen because you could scroll it. And this was a big idea in early webcomics, you heard this phrase a lot. And you'd see infinite canvas techniques like "What if the characters are falling and the comic is really tall to sell that?"

(Read Narbonic)

Which is basically the one and only example that actually took off, because it turns out that scrolling horizontally sucks and no one really wants to do it except as a one-of gimmick (as Homestuck does). The much bigger impact of the internet was that a webcomic could be infinitely long and still reasonably expect it's readership to have read it all, but I think McCloud missed that one. So while there were a bunch of "landscape" webcomics where you scrolled horizontally, none of them took off, and even the ones that were well received are long gone.

Adams himself would make Zot!, which is a vertical scroll comic that had a bit of a gimmick with parallel story beats being literally parallel. I think he even did some branching paths, and experimented with comics that you could read in different directions or that looped back on themselves.

But then Homestuck just did that better because, as I mentioned, infinite depth ended up being a lot more impactful than infinite width. It turns out that making a comic really wide calls a lot of attention to itself and makes the comic annoying to read. And it doesn't mean you can't do it (Homestuck did it!), but it does mean it can't be the gimmick you hang your comic up on unless you've got a really good reason for doing it.

#Scott McCloud #Homestuck #“Webcomic creators should be more creative”#“What if we made the comic WIDE?”#“Wide is not a creative color”

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lakemojave · 5 months

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So for those who might not know I've been streaming this co op run of Baldur's Gate 3 with my friends--there's 4 of us, which means no room for NPCs in the overland party, but lots of space for our own silly RP. We've been coming up with a great story for these 4 so far, but we try and weave in the NPCs here and there (one of us is romancing Lae'zel, and our Dark Urge had a big interaction with Wyll). However the most insane thing thus far has been with the character we've addressed the least: Gale.

Early in the playthrough, our paladin said he had no new magic items for Gale to consume. Due to a bug, this made Gale so upset that he left the party permanently. No big deal, right? Well, soon enough that same paladin gets the ability to summon Shovel the Quasit, whom he promptly named New Gale.

Good times so far. In our 8th episode we actually took New Gale with us to the underdark quests with the Duergar and the mines and such, and despite having poor attack options and seven hit points, he rolled very well and survived nearly every combat. The same cannot be said for the rest of us that session--we had numerous speech check errors and TPKs that meant we had to reload several save states. A convenient, in universe explanation? Well, a wizard did it. THE wizard did it. New Gale can send us back in time, I guess.

So we had fun and kept the bit going until, about 2 hours in, we face off with a bunch of magma mephits in the underforge. No big deal, except they explode when they die and two of them are surrounding New Gale. Our monk, not realizing that New Gale would take lethal fall damage if thrown like 30 feet away, threw New Gale like 30 feet away, killing him instantly. Such an amazing streak ended by friendly fire.

New Gale was too good a bit to let die so easily though. The very next session, we used a hireling mechanic to summon a gnome wizard to hang around our camp, who we decided was New Gale's reincarnation. We haven't taken him into battle onscreen, but we've kept the bit up so much that his time loop powers are actually canon to our party's made up story (check out episode 12 for that, I won't spoil it here). However, recently we realized that we can put this hireling gnome in the mirror that changes your appearance and/or name. We call him whatever we want in game. So now we have this fucking guy hanging around our camp all the time and I have to stop myself from howling with laughter every single time.

#bg3 #the direct actors #new gale

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wholoveseggs · 6 months

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Heyyy gorgeous, another day another request! i was thinking about CEO human reader, she’s super rich, classy and very powerful woman. She also happens to be maybe a friend of Camille? And she catches Elijahs attention. They will meet on galas, auctions, operas etc. And he’s fascinated with her because of how composed and educated she is, they share hobbies, fashion style and so on. Aaaand one day he will pay her a visit in her office and it leads to some very smutty office sex… pretty please 🥹

Paperwork

18+ ---- {Masterlist} {Tag-List}

You approach a handsome philanthropist at a charity gala, leading to a stress-relieving meeting high above the city lights.

♡♡ Thanks for the request @msveronicag I loveeee this idea (sorry I forgot to include Cami) ♡♡

5k words - Warnings: smut, slight dom!elijah, lots of banter, little bit of choking, public(ish) sex, Elijah being the relaxed one, a whole bunch of silly business jargon...

It was a part of your job to attend these stupid functions. It didn't feel like a party, a place to unwind, it felt more like a battle ground. Where the weapons were not guns, but witty retorts and carefully calculated smiles. It was all a show.

You hated it.

But the alcohol was good, food was usually tasty, and sometimes you got lucky. Because sometimes, you meet an actual interesting person. They were few and far between, but they were there.

This gala was being held at some museum or another. You couldn't quite remember, you had only been given the information a few hours before you had to be there, and hadn't bothered reading the pamphlet. Its Grecian architecture was impressive, if not a little pretentious.

You leaned against one of the pillars leading out onto a balcony, it was an impossibly warm Louisiana evening, and the breeze was welcome. You were grateful you chose your light silk dress for the occasion, rather than the heavy, floor length gown one of your assistants had chosen for you.

You observed a man standing a short distance away, looking up at a large painting hanging high on the wall. You couldn't quite see his face, but the suit he was wearing looked expensive. You were a little bored, and he at least looked a little interesting.

You walked up behind him, careful not to step too heavily in your heels.

"I don't care much for this style, myself." You said, not looking up at the painting.

He turned his head to look at you. "Is that so?"

He was handsome, almost startlingly so. The way the light hit him made his jaw appear sharper than it likely was. His lips were full and his hair perfectly styled, not a single strand out of place. But what really drew you in were his eyes, dark brown and intense, framed by long lashes.

You smirked. "It's a bit..." You glanced up at the painting, trying to find the right word. "Stiff."

He turned to face you, his eyes wandering up and down your body, before landing on your face again. He gave you a crooked smile that made your palms sweat, oh he wasn't just handsome, he was gorgeous.

"Stiff? I don't know, I think the artist did a very good job at conveying the... passion." He said.

"Where? In the brush strokes?" You said, taking a sip of your drink.

"No." He said, and his eyes moved away from yours and towards the couple on the painting. "There."

You turned your head and looked. A nude woman, her skin pale and hair blonde, laid on her back on a bed, the red covers thrown away and onto the floor. The man, his face hidden, stood at the edge of the bed, his hands moving to grip her thighs, as though he were about to climb on top of her.

You raised your eyebrows.

"You find that passionate?" You asked, looking back at him.

He shrugged. "I do. I think he was quite enamored with her, judging by the detail put into the painting."

"She looks like she's trying to take a nap and this creep won't leave her alone." You said, and he chuckled.

"Thus, the magic of art, my dear. What is interpreted depends on the person."

"Do you often interpret napping women as passionate?" You asked, and his smile widened.

"No, I prefer passion in the form of a willing, enthusiastic partner."

You took a sip of your drink. "And how do you go about finding one of those?"

He gave you a slow smile and reached out his hand, offering it to you. "Elijah, it's a pleasure."

"Y/n." You said, putting your hand in his and shaking it, firmly.

He kept your hand in his, bringing it to his lips, a move you would usually cringe at, but with him it seemed natural. He didn't seem like the usual crowd you had to deal with at these events. His voice, his posture, everything about him was elegant and his flirting was ridiculously smooth.

"Now that we're acquainted, what say you and I go find a little passion for ourselves?" He asked, lowering his voice to a whisper.

Your eyes widened slightly, and you laughed, pulling your hand away from his.

"A little eager, are we?" You asked, giving him a playful smirk.

"I just wanted to dance with you, why? Were you thinking of something else?" He gave you a knowing smile, and it made you laugh again.

"You're charming." You said.

"And you are beautiful." He said, extending his hand to you.

He was an excellent dancer, leading you expertly across the floor, even with the quick tempo of the song, he never faltered, not once. You didn't know how, but he could anticipate your next step, as though the two of you had rehearsed this for weeks.

"I like your dress, what brand is it? Prada?" He asked, leaning in to whisper in your ear.

"Yes, how did you know?" You asked, surprised.

"I own a few vintage pieces, I'm partial to the fall 2012 line." He said, his hands on your hips, holding you close.

"Really?" You asked. "The menswear one? It was villain themed, wasn't it?"

He nodded. "You have a love for fashion, I assume?"

"It can be a great investment if you pick the right pieces. The classics are usually the safest bet."

"Oh, I agree." He said.

You smiled. "So what do you do, Elijah?"

"I'm a philanthropist," He said. "I support local artists and historical projects and such. How about you?"

"I own a commercial real estate company. It's equally boring and stressful." You said. "What I do most of the day is paperwork."

He laughed, a delightful sound, and moved one hand from your hip, to the center of your back.

"Not fond of it?" He asked.

"No, quite the opposite, actually. If I could just get rid of the meetings I'd be thrilled."

He chuckled and spun you once. "You wouldn't be the first person to say that."

"What about you Mr. Philanthropy, how do you spend your days?" You asked, falling right back in step with the music, his movements as smooth as ever.

"Oh, you know," He said, his lips hovering by your cheek. "You wouldn't believe me if I told you,"

You leaned back a little, turning your head to give him a cheeky grin.

"Oh so it's family money then, is it?" You asked, and he hummed, his eyes narrowing playfully at you.

"Something like that. Enough to afford the finer things," He said, spinning you once, your dress billowing out around you like a waterfall.

He dipped you, his grip on your waist tight, as the song came to an end. You were breathing hard as you stood up straight again, letting go of his hand.

"Thank you for the dance, Mr. Mikaelson," You said, giving him a quick bow. "It's been a pleasure,"

"May I call on you sometime?" He asked, his hand still holding yours. "For a dance that is, and perhaps dinner afterwards?"

You looked at him, considering him for a moment, before smiling.

"Perhaps, Mr. Mikaelson, perhaps."

It had been a hellish week. A buyer had fallen through on the deal, costing you a lot of money. After the announcement, several of your employees began asking questions. About profit margins, about future strategies, about the acquisition of cheaper offices and rentals. It was difficult to concentrate, what with their constant stream of questions and their low murmuring at their desks as they talked about the whole ordeal.

Your company was also in the middle of a bidding war, trying to win a lucrative contract with the city to build several apartment complexes downtown. And on top of that, you had missed a shareholder's meeting because of a flight delay, pissing off several of them and creating several more holes in the schedule.

You were up to your neck in work, stressing out about everything.

Your phone buzzed and you sighed. Elijah. He has been texting you consistently ever since the gala, inviting you for lunch, or dinner, sometimes drinks at his place, hell, even just a walk in the park. He was polite, a true gentleman, but also seemed completely unaware of the fact that you didn't really have time for this stuff.

But it wasn't like you didn't want to see him, you did. You hadn't been able to get him out of your head since the gala. He was certainly an interesting person, a quick wit, and good taste to boot, but you didn't think it was a good idea. Your relationships tended to fall apart fairly quickly, most men you dated became intimidated by your success, or found the power dynamic to be a point of contention for them. Either way, it usually wasn't fun.

But god, his lips...

And his smile, you could see the mischief behind it, it made your stomach flutter just thinking about it. The way his eyes lit up when he laughed. It was intoxicating, you just couldn't...

You opened the text.

Free for dinner tonight?

You rubbed your temple, sighing.

Sorry, can't. Too much work. :)

You put the phone aside, only to have it buzz again.

I'm really good at paperwork, some say the best. Could lend a hand,

You snorted. Oh you could totally picture him helping you, leaning over you while you sat at your desk, both of you staring down at the documents, his breath on your neck, his knee touching yours underneath the wood...

God, your hands were sweating. It was almost embarrassing.

I appreciate that, but I have it handled. Just a rough week,

Another buzz.

Surely you've earned a break? I won't keep you for long, just dinner.

You groaned and slid down your chair, feeling your face burn up just thinking about being in a restaurant with him. You knew it wouldn't be a short date, he was entirely too distracting. No, anything he wanted you to do would surely eat up multiple hours, and you didn't have that kind of time right now.

Next time, You texted, then grabbed your sticky notes, writing:

'Please let this guy dick you down,'

And sticking it on top of your to-do pile.

You read the text over and sighed. Dinner with him sounded like absolute bliss right now, it was almost painful how appealing it was. But you couldn't.

You turned back to your work, letting yourself fall back into the sea of paperwork.

Hours passed and you were still stuck at the office. Dark had descended a while ago, and the lights of the city loomed brightly behind your window. You stretched in your chair and sighed, rubbing your neck.

Your phone buzzed again and you reluctantly lifted it up, watching a notification for another text come in.

Dinner at 730 it is, I'll pick you up.

You froze, suddenly confused. Did you agree to something? It couldn't be.

You dialed his number and held the phone up to your ear, sitting back in your chair.

"I don't recall saying yes to dinner," You said as soon as the phone connected.

He laughed. It was a glorious sound. You felt lightheaded just hearing it.

"Alright, you're busy, I understand, how about I come to you?"

You heard keys in the background, he was definitely leaving. Shit.

"Elijah, no, I don't... I can't," You said, scrambling around your office, trying to make it look less... destroyed. You shoved a pile of papers under the desk, along with a few cups and an empty wine bottle.

"I'm bringing take-out and coffee. You sound like you could use the caffeine," He said, completely ignoring you.

You took a deep breath and closed your eyes, dropping back into your chair.

"I don't want you to get bored," You said, weakly.

He laughed.

"Don't worry about me, darling, I have a secret."

You blinked. "Oh? What's that?"

You could hear him getting into a car in the background, then the deep rumbling of an engine as it revved to life.

"Being with you could never bore me. Tell me your address,"

You smiled. "I'll text it to you,"

He hung up and you sunk deeper into your chair, a goofy grin plastered on your face.

You spent the next twenty minutes trying to make your office presentable, mostly just moving papers off the floor and out of sight.

When he knocked on the door, you paused for a moment, before opening it. He was wearing a button up shirt and black slacks, both looking sinfully expensive and sinfully good on him.

The take-out smelled amazing, as did he.

"Your security needs updating, at the very least you should have a keypad." He said as he handed you your meal.

"Thank you," You said, ushering him inside. "I sent everyone home for the day, no need for them to stay late because of me,"

You put the food on a small table and sat down next to him on your sofa in the corner of your office, letting out a long sigh you didn't know you were keeping inside.

"That bad, hm?" He asked.

You looked at him and immediately regretted it, he was so distractingly gorgeous. His face, his lips, fuck his eyes, they had those crinkles in the corners, and that hint of mischief, his perfect jawline, everything about him set you on fire.

You shook your head and smiled. "Yes, I'm afraid so. Thank you, by the way, I haven't had time to eat all day."

"Next time I'll take you out somewhere more pleasant than this," He said, gesturing around to the cluttered office.

Your phone rang on your desk and you got up and scrambled over to answer it, Elijah giving you a confused look.

"Yes? O-oh..." You paused, standing up and pacing around, heading towards the window, looking down at the dark city.

"How long ago?"

Elijah was listening, his eyes fixed on you, the tone of your voice, the way you held yourself. You seemed calm, but the subtle signs were all there. You were upset, no, not upset, frustrated.

"Uh-huh, yes, no, thank you,"

He wandered over to your desk, to the many papers that covered it, some were marked with red, some with black, most of them had scribbles in the margins.

"Well, what is the point of a zoning committee if they can't do their job?" You asked, your voice smooth as silk, he enjoyed hearing you speak, the slight inflections in your tone.

A yellow sticky note caught his eye and he picked it up, smiling at what it said.

‘Please let this guy dick you down.’

He chucked and held the note up to you, raising an eyebrow.

You froze and your eyes widened, a deep blush spreading across your cheeks. You cleared your throat and tried to compose yourself, but were unable to meet his gaze.

"I'll see what I can do." You muttered, feeling utterly mortified that he found your stupid note.

Elijah stood, tucking the note into his pocket and walking towards you. His hands pressing into the glass on either side of you, trapping you.

You gulped, looking up at him, completely forgetting about the person on the phone.

"I.. I'll have that information when the exchange opens in the morning,"

He leaned forward, his lips hovering by your cheek.

"Yes, I understand," You said, your voice shaking.

Elijah grinned, his hands coming down to rest on your hips, pulling you flush against him. You could feel him, all of him, his warmth, the hardness in his pants.

"Okay, I'll, uh, talk to you later, yes, thank you."

You ended the call and let out a long sigh, looking up at him. He took the phone from your hand and threw it over his shoulder, not even bothering to look and see where it landed.

"I'm going to give you some unsolicited advice," He whispered, his hands gripping your waist tightly. "So take it for what it's worth,"

You raised your eyebrows, waiting for him to say something.

"Take a break." He said, taking your hand and giving it a light squeeze, "Let me take care of you tonight, then get back to work in the morning, tomorrow. You're burnt out, you're going to make a mistake and you won't even notice."

"Your concern is noted, but unfortunately..."

"When was the last time you slept?" He asked, cutting you off. "Properly, I mean, when was the last time you were properly rested?"

"If you're about to offer up sleeping with you as a cure, Mr. Mikaelson, I assure you, it wouldn't do any good." You said.

"What makes you think I'm offering anything, other than a little relaxation?" He asked, a grin spreading across his face.

"Well, we're already pressed up against each other, and judging by the hardness I feel against my leg, you're not exactly unaffected." You said, your hand running over his chest, his skin hot under the fabric.

"I think it would do you some good, a rush of endorphins, a change of pace, it could relieve some of this tension you're carrying around," He countered.

You felt your mouth dry up at his words. A whole slew of salacious fantasies flooded into your mind as soon as they left his mouth, and you struggled to think of a snarky response.

"It's been a while for you, hasn't it?" He said, reaching down to the hem of your dress, pushing the fabric up your thighs, his fingers brushing over the skin.

You bit your lip, his eyes were glued to yours, watching every tiny reaction with great interest.

"How long?" He asked, his lips ghosting over yours.

"A gentleman doesn't ask." You whispered, a smile forming on your lips.

"I never said I was a gentleman," He whispered, his hands coming down, hooking underneath your thighs and lifting you up and pressing you against the window.

Your legs wrapped around him automatically, your arms going around his shoulders, pulling him close.

He kissed you and you melted, the warmth of his mouth and the heat of his skin was so comforting, it felt so good. You wanted to get lost in him, feel him all over, touch him, kiss him.

"See? That wasn't so hard was it?" He teased, his teeth grazing your bottom lip.

Your phone began to ring again, and you pushed on his chest, trying to move away from him. He let you go, letting your thighs slip down his body until your feet hit the floor, the phone still ringing.

"I should..."

He grabbed your hips and spun you around, pressing you into the window, his chest against your back.

"You are in a very important meeting right now and cannot come to the phone," He said softly, his hand sliding up your inner thigh, pushing the fabric of your dress up and exposing you.

You moaned as he spread your legs with his knee as he pulled your dress up over your head, the phone finally stopped ringing.

"There, now we can be undisturbed," He said, his lips on your neck, sucking and nipping at the skin. His hands kneading your breasts, tugging at your nipples through the fabric of your bra.

Your breathing was heavy and fast, the cool glass against your skin a stark contrast to his burning skin.

You arched back against him and let out a strangled moan, his hands trailing down your body and his fingers slipping beneath your underwear.

You looked down to the streets below, the street lamps flickering and the headlights whizzing past as you gave yourself over to the pleasure of his touch.

He kissed your neck as he slid his fingers into you. You inhaled sharply at the sensation, his fingers curling and stroking over that perfect spot inside you. Your hand pressed into the glass, desperately needing something to hold onto.

Your hips rolled against his fingers as he worked them over your clit, you were starting to tremble, your thighs closing around his hand, squeezing as you started to come. He groaned in approval as he watched you come undone against the window, your arm braced against the glass and a thin sheen of sweat glistening on your forehead.

"Good girl," He whispered, his arm holding your waist, his lips kissing and sucking on your neck.

He unclasped your bra, splaying his hand across your back and pressing you up against the glass, your breasts squashed against the cold window, a hot flush spreading across your chest.

His shirt was already unbuttoned, and it was quick work for him to take off his belt and slip out of his pants. You turned your head to look at him, and god, he was beautiful. There was a patch of black hair just below his belly button, trailing down into his pants, and thick dark hair lined his arms. But when your eyes dropped down, your mouth fell open, his cock was... Just as excellent as the rest of him.

"Do you like being on display for the whole city?" He asked, enjoying the way you seemed completely enraptured by him.

"No..." You said, a mischievous smile creeping onto your face. "They probably can't see me, just some shadow against the window,"

He grabbed your chin and kissed you hard, a bruising clash of teeth and tongue, driving you to madness with every breath. His other hand was already pressing you up against the window, his hips driving his cock forward and filling you up in one swift motion.

You cried out, nails scratching the window and your chest slamming up against the glass, a chill running through you as the cold pressed into your skin.

"You are so fucking gorgeous," He hissed, his hands gripping your hips hard.

"Fuck me," You demanded, pushing back against him, grinding your hips up into him, moving in a way that caused you to choke out a breathless cry, fireworks exploding behind your eyes.

"So bossy, so demanding, are you like this with everyone or am I just lucky?" He said, his eyes traveling over every inch of your body.

"Maybe I just want you to shut up and fuck me,"

He wrapped his hand around your neck, pulling you back against his chest and holding you firmly as he fucked you.

Your knees felt weak, the grip he had on your throat restricting your airways, the pleasure burning into your lungs like hot lava. It was intense, your eyes began to water and your thighs trembled. Elijah's movements slowed, his pace becoming steady and smooth, rolling his hips gently, caressing you.

"Are you alright?" He asked, pressing soft kisses on your jawline. "You're shaking,"

You gulped and smiled, nodding. "You're just really good at this,"

"It's my favorite way to relax," He said, his lips tracing your ear.

You moaned at his touch, his lips feeling so soft against your skin.

"Look at them, look at all the little ants down below," He murmured, his thrusts increasing in intensity, his hand tightening around your throat. "Anyone could look up and see you, anyone. Your assistants, shareholders, a random stranger, just an anonymous face in the crowd, and they're all going about their night and here you are, above them all,"

It was intoxicating, looking down at the brightly lit city, even from this far up, you felt so high, you could fall into it all and lose yourself in the darkness, let yourself drown in the lights.

You pushed back against him, chasing the high he offered, your breath shallow and panting. His fingers raked down your skin, scraping over the flesh of your ribs, leaving your body covered in a trail of dark marks, claiming you.

His teeth bit into the skin of your neck as he pushed you back against the window, his hands over yours, holding them against the glass. He was rough and hard with you, snapping his hips and driving you up onto the tips of your toes.

"Mr. Mikaelson..." You moaned, struggling to keep yourself standing.

He chuckled and pulled you away from the window, throwing you over his shoulder and carrying you to the sofa. You giggled and kicked your legs, but he kept a strong hold on you, carrying you over to the large leather couch and depositing you on it.

"There," He said, leaning over you and parting your legs, "more comfortable?"

"Very." You said, biting your lip as you gazed up at him.

He knelt between your legs, sliding his hands under your ass and pulling you towards him, his mouth latching onto your pussy, licking a path along the seam.

You breathed out a sigh, closing your eyes and tilting your head back, your hands reaching for him, holding onto his hair, his shoulders, whatever you could reach.

"So, tell me," He said, taking a moment to rest his chin against your thigh, "do you agree that tis is a good way to relax?"

You huffed and sat up, pushing his head back down between your legs. He laughed and got back to it, letting you pull his hair and fuck yourself on his face.

His tongue was warm and wet, his thumb rubbing you, stroking your clit in little circles, teasing you. You wriggled and writhed against him, his mouth, his hands, they drove you insane.

Just when you were about to come he pulled away, kissing his way up your body, licking your nipples, your neck, your ear, trailing soft kisses on your face until you opened your eyes and looked at him.

He kissed you hard, your thighs trembling. His cock was hard against you, pressing back inside you. You moaned into his mouth as you adjusted to the feeling of him, the sensation of being filled up.

You loved it, the way you tightened around him, pulling him closer, deeper. He was breathing hard, the corners of his mouth twitching in a smile, his gaze constantly shifting, flickering from your mouth to your eyes, down to your chest.

His hand brushed against your cheek as he leaned back and began to move, gripping your waist and holding you close, his hips rolling into yours, finding a rhythm that made your toes curl, his voice murmuring your name softly in your ear, encouraging you to let go.

He smiled as you arched off the couch and dug your fingers into his skin, holding him to you. He wanted you close, skin-to-skin, every inch of you touching him, melting together.

You opened your eyes and found yourself staring up at his face, his skin, slightly flushed, his eyes were bright and he was grinning. The sex was turning into something more intimate, an actual bond was developing between the two of you.

"I like you," you whispered, grabbing his arm and pulling him close, your lips brushing against his, "I really like you,"

"Yeah?" He said, kissing you deeply.

"Yeah," you agreed, holding his face in your hands,

"It really like you too," He said, his thrusts growing deeper, stronger, more intense. He was chasing his own release now, desperate to feel you clenching around him, moaning his name.

You gasped and clung to him, your nails digging into his skin, your head thrown back, your eyes shut tight as you rode out the waves of pleasure flowing through you, and he followed right behind you, coming with a grunt, a low, quiet sound that made your stomach flutter.

He pulled out and sat down next to you, pulling you into his arms, your back against his chest. You could feel his breath tickling your neck, his chest rising and falling against your back.

He pulled the blanket that was folded on the back of the sofa over the two of you, wrapping it around you and holding you close.

The room was quiet, silent, save for the muffled noise of the city below, the cars and the traffic, the random sounds of the distant city.

You felt relaxed, actually relaxed, like you were floating. His warm arms around you felt like a cocoon. He was watching you, his eyes tracing over your body, his fingertips featherlight against your bare skin.

"Can I pencil you in for another meeting tomorrow?" You asked with a grin, your fingers grazing along his forearms.

He pulled your sticky note out of his pocket, sticking it to your forehead, a soft rumble coming from his chest as he chuckled.

"Hmm, I don't know, do you want to make a habit of this?" He asked, his hands smoothing down the sides of your body.

"Would that be so bad?" You asked, leaning back against his chest, letting him wrap his arms around you.

"Not at all, it's what I've been wanting since I met you," He admitted, pressing a kiss to the top of your head.

"Me too, you've been on my mind constantly," You said, tilting your head back and kissing him.

"I know," he said with a cheeky smile, tapping on the note stuck to your head.

"Oh, very funny," You rolled your eyes, relaxing against him, your eyes growing heavy as the weight of the day's events caught up to you.

"Sleep, love," He whispered, pressing a kiss to the side of your head, his arms tightening around you.

"But I have so much to do," You protested, trying to sit up.

He held onto you, keeping you from moving, you didn't put up much of a fight. You wanted to stay right there.

"Work can wait until tomorrow, I have no intention of letting you go anywhere anytime soon," He said, his lips finding your temple, planting a soft kiss there.

"I can't just stay here," You said, a smile on your face as he ran his hand through your hair.

"Why not? You're the boss, you can do whatever you want," He said, nuzzling your neck.

You sighed, giving in and relaxing in his arms. It had been a while since you'd felt so content.

"Alright, maybe I can spare a few hours," You said, closing your eyes and allowing sleep to wash over you. And for the first time in a long time you fell asleep without a worry in the world.

♡♡ Tag-List ♡♡

♡ @gorgeouslydangerous ♡ @starkleila ♡ @lydia1369sworld ♡ @notleylaaa ♡ @vampiresluv ♡ @vamprium ♡ @myanmy ♡ @xflowerbombxo ♡ @maryvibess ♡ @always-and-forever-daydreaming ♡ @criminallminds ♡ @theesexystallion ♡ @rosemarypotion ♡ @spnaquakindgdom ♡ @amournoir ♡ @loving-and-dreaming ♡

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#elijah mikaelson #the originals #the vampire diaries #vampire diaries #tvdu #elijah mikaelson smut #elijah mikaelson imagine #elijah mikealson imagine #elijah mikealson #elijah mikaelson x reader #elijah mikealson x reader #tvd #the vampire diaries x you #the vampire diaries x reader #the vampire diares imagine #the vampire diaries imagine #the originals imagine

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cuubism · 2 years

Text

as funny as it is to imagine dreamling from an outsider perspective, I think dream and hob as FRIENDS is actually funnier. while dream/hob as a committed relationship might be hard for outsiders to comprehend -- "why is Dream of the Endless dating some random human?" "Why is this presumably reasonable human dating known World's Worst Boyfriend, Dream of the Endless?" -- they can rationalize it with some effort. "Well, all the ancient entities that want to fuck each other have by this point in history, and sometimes you need something new I guess????" "Morpheus IS hot and powerful so I guess you just put up with a lot of bullshit???"

But them as friends is impossible to rationalize in any other way than just "they genuinely enjoy hanging out" which must be wild for any outsiders. Cuz Dream isn't even offering Hob anything for spending time with him? He's immortal but that's Death's gift. (Other immortal entities: who would willingly do this.) And Hob hasn't like... done any tasks for Dream or anything? So why is Dream here.

A bunch of them witness Hob giving Dream some cookies he baked or something, and half of them decide they need to rescue Hob from possession because clearly that's the only explanation. Another group stages an intervention for Dream -- "what does this human possibly have on you?"

Hob is suitably offended that no one thinks Dream worthy of having any friends. ("Also, your first mistake was assuming I was reasonable.") Meanwhile, Dream is having a very dysfunctional epiphany: of COURSE there must be a catch, how can he have an actual friend? And disappears to the Dreaming for six weeks with no word, thereby proving why he's been Friendless thus far.

(And finally convincing all onlookers that this inexplicable relationship is actually real when Hob breaks down Dream's palace door like, "you forgot to take your fucking cookies for your sulking session, you self-destructive idiot.")

#the immortal community writes hob off as a lost cause after that #dream of course has been a lost cause for 3000 years #dreamling #dream of the endless #hob gadling

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asksythe · 1 year

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Hey just read your lovely hands fanfic and the concept of the blood pool being a prison for malevolent entities barred from the cycle of reincarnation is so COOL , is it a thing implied between the lines and we western audiences lack the cultural context to recognise it ?, or is it something you came up with if so can I have permission to incorporate the concept into my own fan works?

It is a cultural thing. It's not even implied in the novel. It's just outright stated. But it's one of those hundreds of tiny cultural details that probably fly over the head of the international audience.

Remember when the Wen people came back as bloody corpses to protect Wei Ying and fought back the fierce corpses riled up by the repaired Yin Hufu?

In this part, the novel describes the events following the first Sige of the Burial Mound. After the hundred cultivator houses slaughtered these defenseless elderlies, women, and children, they threw their corpses into the blood pool, thus forever barring them from reincarnation.

The phrase the novel uses is 永不超生 (lit. to never again be reborn, to be barred from the cycle of reincarnation forever). That's not a figure of speech. The novel is being literal. The Burial Mound itself is already a prison for all kinds of undead and ghost wraiths. The blood pool, by the novel descriptions, amounts to a maximum security cell. A ghost in the Burial Mound can eventually let go of their grudge/resentment and enters the afterlife/reincarnation. But anybody thrown into the blood pool doesn't have this option.

永不超生 is commonly portrayed in Chinese culture as a punishment by the authority of the underworld. That's not a judgment that a mortal is allowed to make.

The fact that the Hundred Houses carried out 永不超生 on the Wen is a detail that speaks of both their arrogance and their awareness of their guilt.

The Hundred Houses are well aware what they did to the Wen remnants is a sin. The custom of the time is, if you profess yourself to be the righteous side and slay someone seen as 'evil/villain,' it's customary to hang their corpses up for all to see.

Remember Nie Mingjue beheading Wen Xu and hanging Wen Xu's head at the gate of Uncleam Realm for all to see? NMJ is not doing that just because he has a vendetta against the Wen. He's doing that as part of ancient customs to declare to all that 'his kill is righteous,' that he doesn't need to hide it, and that Wen Xu and the Wens are villains that need to be put down.

That's the principle. Justice has no need to hide.

But not only did the Hundred Houses hide the corpses of the Wen remnants, but they also imprisoned their souls, hoping that would keep the Wen from coming back as grudge wraiths or for the karmic cycle itself to snap back for this sin.

The Hundred Houses built up the Wen remnants to be this evil army at Wei Ying's beck and call. So they need to be put down. But the truth is that they were just a bunch of elderlies, women, and children who spent all their lives being doctors (as they belong to the Qihuang branch, with their own pacifistic philosophy).

Had the Hundred Houses performed the custom and showed their supposedly righteous kill to the world, then the truth would out. That they were either liars or stupid, and that they best be prepared to repay for their transgression on both innocent Wens and on the authority of hell itself.

And that, my friend, is why the second Burial Mound Siege ended the way it did, and why the vast majority of those same cultivators left Wei Ying alone afterward. What do you think those same cultivators think when their victims break out of the supposedly unbreakable maximum security cell to save Wei Ying (another of their victims)? And then those same Wen souls entered the afterlife?

The Western vernacular for this part is: Karma is a tenacious bitch with a long memory. It doesn't matter how much they lie about their crime and act like they are righteous or how good they think they hide the proof of their deeds. Heaven and hell itself are watching.

....Sorry, I have some strong feelings about the treatment of the Wen remnants.

That is to say, feel free to incorporate it in your works.

#ask sythe #wen qing #wen remnants #wen ning #mo dao zu shi #mdzs

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maleyanderecafe · 2 days

Text

Courtin' Cowboys (Visual Novel)

Created by: Mr Fishess, jd

Genre: Horror

I know this game came out a while ago, but I finally was able to play it and man is it fun. It reminds me of a smaller scale DOL or even something like The Snake's Taken a Spouse. There are three yanders that are in this game, though it definitely follows more of a porn game logic for yanderes. I will explain that in a bit. This game has a lot of violence and sex, and is r18, so please be wary if you do play it.

The MC basically starts out staying at a town in Summerfield. They rent a motel there. The game allows you to meet people at the saloon, the store, the sheriff's office, out in the pastures and in the woods. You can also decide to leave at any point as well. There are a lot of things you can do in the game besides interact with other characters, including buying and cooking food, going fishing, foraging and catching snakes for money. You can also buy different outfits and customize your looks.

While there are many characters, we will be going over the three yanderes in the game, Dijon, Jak and Will. I'm not sure if I was able to get everything for them, but I was able to at least get all of the endings, so we'll start with that. A lot of the endings usually involve them competing with other yandere characters so we'll cover those as well.

Dijon is the farmer that lives in the pasture. When first meeting him, he will talk about how he can't tell if he's missing sheep because he can't count higher than 10. After helping him, we go hunt for his lost sheep, which has run off into the woods and then go into the farm to have sex with him (I finally get to be the dom in one of these games, heck yes). Most of his endings generally involve sleeping with another character, only for Dijon to kidnap you and bring you back to his farm, where I guess you can just leave afterwards. Each time, it seems like he believes you are like a sheep, having strayed too far from home, getting a bit more paranoid every time that you leave. He can do this upwards of about three times. After sleeping with the fourth person, Dijon will get angry and chain the MC up in the barn, before the MC is able to escape. Dijon runs after them only to hear a loud noise. Afterwards it seems Dijon kind of just continues what he's doing as if nothing has happened.

Jak is the drunk that hangs out in the bar. If you flirt with him before buying him a drink, the two of you can have sex outside in a camp. If you sleep with enough other characters, Jak will actually kill the last person you slept with before being sent to jail. From what I remember, he is also one of the main characters in the creator's other game, Lover's Trophy, though I have yet to play that game.

Will is a clown man that is found in the woods. The MC will end up trying to chase after him finding a bunch of bones set up in a way that resembles a tea party. Depending on options, Will can either end up killing the MC or growing obsessed when the two talk. We learn that he lives in the woods and wears clown makeup because he's afraid of social interactions and wants to make it easier to approach people (thus the clown makeup). We also see he's sort of the groundskeeper of the woods, burying bodies to let them be eaten clean to the bone. After talking to him and not dying, he ends up stalking the MC. During one of the other interactions when the MC is investigating a robbery, they talk to the dancer, Magnolia. If the MC brings up Will as the possible thief, Magnolia will defend Will, stating their history together as childhood friends before drifting apart. In another ending, Will is able to save the MC from the beast in the woods called the Bastard, a man who basically acts like an unkillable animal and wanders the woods. There is also an event where Will sneaks into the MC's room at night and kind of noncons them. This is a random event.

There are two competitions that occur with the yanderes in the game, one being Jak vs Dijon and the other being Dijon vs Will.

When sleeping with both Jak and Dijon, the two of them will end up attempting to kidnap the MC during the night. Upon waking up, the two will end up forcing the MC to choose one of them. Choosing Dijon ends with Jak attempting to shoot him, with the MC having the choice to push him out of the way, thus getting themselves killed. Otherwise, Dijon will be shot and Jak kidnaps the MC into the forest to noncon them. The MC can run away, causing the Bastard to come and kill Jak. Choosing Jak will cause Dijon to sadly walk away, allowing Jak to take care of the MC. Jak will end up shooting Dijon regardless and once again drag them back to camp to noncon them. Through gun play, I believe the MC can still be shot and killed, and the same bastard ending will still apply.

When interacting with both Dijon and Will, the two of them will end up the MC's room at night. The MC will wake up to the two of them talking at the end of the bed. At first it seems to be some sort of banter, the two insulting each other's ages and their weaknesses before Dijon attempts to take out a gun and kill Will. If the MC warns Will and then takes the gun, they can attempt to shoot as a warning, to which the bullet will miss and end up killing the MC instead, or they will simply threaten them and they will leave. If they don't warn Will, Dijon will end up shooting Will and dragging his dead body out, whereas if you do, Will can end up stabbing and killing Dijon.

As a whole, the game is very well put together and has a lot of features. You can basically date every character except three of them (that being the innkeeper, Mortom and the Bastard), each with it's own CGs and endings, along with various mini games, and an entire cooking and inventory system. On a technical basis, this game is done very well and it is pretty fun running around and doing a lot of these tasks. Still, as much as the individual components are very fun, I feel like there's not really any reason to do any of the mini games for the plot. You can basically ignore the entire portion of it if you are simply just seeing what the character plots would be like, which is kind of unfortunate. The cooking system is supposed to tie in with the stamina system, which is a good idea, but talking to people doesn't deplete stamina, only gathering items. In this way, it feels very disjointed from the rest of the game, as not even stuff like money is really needed to play. I think at least an easy fix for the money system would be similar to how DOL forces the player to pay Bailey, so in this game, you would be forced to pay the innkeeper money for every day that you stay there (which, you know, does make sense if you want to stay at the inn) thereby forcing you to spend time getting money and having to cook food to be able to get energy to make money. Unfortunately with the implementation that I see at least, it seems to be lacking in attempting to make a game play loop with these cool mini games. While it's not the worst thing in the world, I think it does make these minigames kind of pointless since you can basically completely ignore them.

Storywise, while I do think it's very nice that you are able to get more of a solid look at a lot of characters, I do feel like there isn't really anything satisfying for the end of a lot of them. When they are killed, there is no reaction for most of the other characters (with the exception of a handful of them). It's hard to say where certain events will happen unless you have a guide and while there is one on the fandom page, there is none on the itchio or steam page that helps you (which is unfortunate for people like me who generally rely on a walkthrough to try to get everything). I think that was the point of having a lot of characters all with their own story, but I feel like there could have been more to place more of an arc for each them.

Dijion as a yandere is mostly pretty light. He actually is probably the most harmless out of all of them considering that he only really kidnaps the player when sleeping with another character (unless it's with Jak or Will). He seems to delusionally believe that the MC is a sort of "lost sheep", which is why he keeps bringing them back to the barn. It is unfortunate that he doesn't actually end up trying to harm or even properly trap the MC (well, he tries, but they run away again, with seemingly no consequence). He does manage to kill Will in one of the endings, however, it's strange to me that he wasn't able to do so with other characters such as Jak or even any of the other characters that the MC might end up sleeping with. Still, I think I do quite like Dijion as a character, he's very puppy like, similar to a dog herder who is trying to get his sheep back. His running gag of not being able to count (especially when Will calls him out on it) is pretty funny, though I wish it was brought up more.

Jak is probably the most extreme out of the yandere characters considering that he is the most violent and most forceful of the three. When choosing between Jak and Dijon, Jak will outright shoot Dijon if the MC doesn't protect him and he can kill either Magnolia or Jade as well, sending him straight to jail as well as fighting and possibly killing the Bastard in one of the endings. I'm not sure how close he is to his counterpart in Lover's Trophy, but he is very violent in this version, with it often leading to his own detriment, like when he is killed by the Bastard after being taken when choosing between Dijon and him, or when he is jailed for killing either of the girls. He also definitely has a very intimidating presence with the game emphasizing just how tall he is and how generally strong he is. He definitely feels like he fits very well in this type of murder horror type game given his general behavior and intimidating presence.

Will as a yandere generally just stalks the player, and doesn't have nearly as many endings as Jak or Dijion. Still, I do think the scenes we do get give a bigger impression of what he's actually like. From what I've seen, although we generally don't see him in the game, it is implied that he stalks the player quite often, as we see him save the MC from the bastard and sneak into the MC's place at night. Given that he's rather aloof and is uncomfortable with most human interactions, it does make sense that we barely ever see him, only really gaining more insight from Magnolia as the two seem to be friends. I kind of wish that we had more personal encounters with him like maybe hanging out with him with his bone collection (thing), but I do think even with the little information that we do learn about him he's a pretty solid character. Plus if you talk to him wrong, he straight up kills you which is kind of entertaining.

In terms of what I mean by porn game yandere, I basically have to turn again to DOL for this. While I get it's not really fair comparing two of these games as they are going for different things, what I mean in this case is that in general, yanderes are not usually okay with their love interests sleeping with other characters. This usually results in murder of some sort or at least some sort of separation of their lover with the person that they're sleeping with. However, in games like DOL, while Kylar and Eden can get jealous or otherwise kidnap the MC, they aren't allowed to kill the other characters that they sleep with and in essence, the MC can just kind of have a poly relationship with all of the love interests if they want. While I'm not saying poly yanderes can't exist, they generally have certain specifications on how they act (at least in my opinion). Obviously for gameplay wise, if the player is not into any of the yandere characters and ends up sleeping with with by accident or on purpose, it would be a big pain if they ended up murdering or getting rid of the other characters gameplay wise, and considering both of the characters, it also doesn't seem fair to also just exclude them just because you are allowed to sleep with other characters, which is why I kind of call it porn game logic since for the sake of not making the gameplay bad for the player, I will make an exception for it in this context. Anyways, going back to Courtin' Cowboys, while unlike DOL you can have characters killed, they don't usually get that far. A good example is with Jak who is able to kill one of the characters (either Magnolia or Jade if you sleep with them) before getting captured (which is fine). Meanwhile a character like Dijon seems pretty light, having the player sleep with three different characters only leads to Dijon basically telling the player not to get lost again after being kidnapped and Dijon just...letting them go. Will also doesn't have that much yandere actions either considering that outside of the versus, protecting the MC from the bastard and the random encounter of him breaking into the inn and sleeping with you.

Still despite what kind of possible tweaks and missing things I have for Courtin' Cowboys, it is undoubtedly a fun game. There is so much in it that I probably didn't even get to see, plus every time you play you can have a different experience. The customization and general aesthetic of being a cowboy is really nice and the fact that you have all these minigames in the first place is very impressive along with the sheer amount of characters that you can date/interact with is very cool. It's a great entry into the murder sim type genre with a bunch of fun yanderes to boot. If you haven't played it yet, I would highly recommend it.

#Courtin' cowboys #male yandere #yandere #yandere boy #completed #visual novel

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doccywhomst · 4 months

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okay so i understand that daleks are one of the main brand icons of doctor who, and that they represent a certain breed of fascist thought that can never be fully stamped out, but. :/

i think im ready for the daleks to die.

daleks have been central to doctor who from the very beginning (the second ever episode, the daleks, and season 2’s the dalek invasion of earth), embodying fear, hate, imperialism, and the darker sides of our own nature - but it seems that, for a while now, their continued existence has been maintained solely by the doctor’s mercy and/or ineptitude ??? which sucks as a theme imo

a great example is remembrance of the daleks, a seventh doctor story from 1988 - yes, the one where the doctor blows up skaro. or, davros fires a device the doctor boobytrapped at skaro’s sun, which goes supernova and destroys every dalek in that region of space. it’s pretty baller. anyway! davros and a few daleks hop in an escape pod and fuck off, and the doctor just lets them. k.

(skaro’s destruction was later ‘corrected’ by widely-detested EDA author john peel in war of the daleks, which is unhyperbolically the worst book i’ve ever read, and thus disregarded! but this heretical text explains that the planet was a decoy named antalin. it’s awful yeah. i tried to warn you)

exhibit b: evolution of the daleks (2007). ten confronts dalek caan, the sole survivor of the cult of skaro, at the top of the empire state building. the daleks have just created and annihilated a slave race of pig people, and it’s horrible to watch. you get the feeling that they’ve done this millions of times all across the universe, because they canonically have. they are inherently imperialist, racist, and genocidal. the doctor knows this.

and the doctor’s response is basically “killing you would mean that I commit genocide, so let’s just hang out and have a conversation.”

dalek caan gets away.

and you’ll never guess where he goes. that’s right! he hops the time lock and grabs davros, who escaped in remembrance of the daleks!!! and they make a bunch of new dalek babies together, out of davros’ gross old flesh. it’s a tentacle fest.

so he was right. killing dalek caan would’ve been a genocide- but because he didn’t, now there are ten thousand genocides. a clear improvement!

exhibit d: victory of the daleks (2010).

after a couple of false starts, the daleks manage to make more daleks after tricking the doctor into confirming their species to open their own device (??? okay sure)- but then they trick him again with a robot scientist bomb that he failed to detect even after talking to the guy, and it’s just like…. fool the doctor once, shame on you, fool them twice? damn, you must be on the merch.

exhibit e: the witch’s familiar (2015).

the iconic ‘only other chair on skaro’ scene where twelve and davros chat on the rebuilt dalek home world - super fun, so fun i forgot how the doctor folded like a house of cards. davros, the genocidal maniac, wants to live another day to see a pretty sunrise, so the doctor *checks notes* gives him some artron energy? that can’t be right, wh- oh- oh, but it’s fine because it affects all daleks, and through some contrived science magic, they all ‘learn the concept of mercy.’ on accident.

and it changed nothing. later stories retcon this. i’m too tired to even think about resolution, revolution, or eve of the daleks right now, but those episodes only further cemented my malaise regarding the doctor’s apparent complacency.

again and again, the daleks depend on the doctor’s mercy, and they get it, and they WIN- and it feels like the moral is that they should be eliminated like an unthinking, unfeeling virus, but the doctor is just too compassionate or inept for the job. certainly not the first doctor to lose to a virus, but perhaps the first to do so willingly.

beyond a loss in revenue, i can’t imagine why the doctor couldn’t destroy the daleks, or why they wouldn’t want to - there was a point when, allegedly, “the time lord’s continuity could not survive without the daleks” (“neverland” audio), but i think the weight and relevance of that harry potter type threat has long since passed.

so… it might be time to put the daleks away, for now. sure, they can come back as a concession to the persistence of fascist ideology, but watching the doctor lose or win to fascism for seemingly arbitrary (always sentimental) reasons isn’t really satisfying. the show addresses that daleks cause untold suffering, but again and again the only obstacle to no suffering is the doctor, who can’t get their shit together! it’s killing me.

#some actual blog material for you on this fine morning #i’m not replying to anyone who doesn’t read the entire thing! after you read please feel free to disagree #an example of a satisfying conclusion would be the doctor forming an interplanetary coalition #or persuading a pre-existing one to unite and defeat the daleks #it would be brutal and difficult but i would love for good people to unite and actually SUCCEED #doctor who #classic who #seventh doctor #tenth doctor #eleventh doctor #twelfth doctor #davros #daleks

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beemynumberone · 1 month

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Thoughts about Coach Washijo’s granddaughter and the boys vball team in Shiratorizawa.

Coach Washijo’s granddaughter is really smart (the only one of her cousins who got into shiratorizawa through grades mind you)

But she doesn’t play a sport and prefers doing art

She’s in the art club

And she needs to complete a project for the school’s open house exhibition

She chose to do something on dynamic objects in everyday life

And of course, she needs a muse. Which she casually brings up in a conversation with her grandpa one day

The coach suggests that she use the vball team as a subject - they’re always bouncing around somehow, it’ll be a perfect way for her to explore movement and all that

And she’s like: why not, it’ll save her from having to work long hours in the hot sun too

The coach introduces her to the team

And thus begins her regular sit-ins during volleyball practice

And the guys start becoming super self-conscious

They’re worried they might not look “cool” enough

So for the first couple of sessions, all she sees is a bunch of guys mewling in her face, esp Goshiki - that guy looks super tensed up and slightly constipated

And their performance worsens too

So one day before the coach arrives, she plainly states to the team: “Don’t worry about looking lame or anything. I’ll paint what I see, and judging from the fact that you are already on the volleyball team, I’m sure you aren’t that lame.”

And surprisingly, that really boosts the guys’ confidence

The guys become truly focused in their game and she watches on in awe at the dedication and passion their have in honing their craft

And funnily, she has an eye for capturing fine details at first glance

So when the team does their drills, she can pinpoint what exactly they are doing wrongly and specifically what they can improve in (?)

If someone seems to be using less core strength than usual, not putting enough strength in their fingers, etc etc

It works to help the team, yknow

Also, it gives the team major whiplash to see her be so casual with their usually grouchy coach

Like once, she got the coach to pose so she could “make a sketch” for him

And she’d got the coach to make the sassiest poses everr (without any argument, btw)

”Yes, one hand on your hip, stick your hip out like this and lean your weight on this foot. Smile!”

The coach keeps the sketch btw

It’s really cute

She let the guys see the finished project before submitting it

She’d decided to bind all the paintings she’d made of the guys into a book, to be displayed on a stand at the exhibition

The guys swoon over it

And they (mainly Ushijima) get really interested in art and painting and stuff because of her

Tendou loves that she’d drawn him cute but kept his feral-ness

Ushijima doesn’t look that stone faced hallelujah

Goshiki looks determined, anyone viewing the painting can definitely feel the raw passion and eagerness radiating from him

Shirabu doesn’t look sulky (for once)

And secretly, she’d been painting a separate team portrait for the guys to keep

Which they treasure very much and hang up in the volleyball club room

Still there till now with their slogan

Irresistible force

Pictures are from Pinterest!

^The first panel is how I think Coach Washijo would view the sketch of his sassy pose (feat Ushijima, cause I didn’t have the heart to cut the 2nd panel out)

^And this is Ushijima as a mushroom

(Can you tell who my favourite Haikyuu character is yet? :3)

#Haikyuu #Haikyuu thoughts #Coach Washijo #Shiratorizawa #haikyuu fluff

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didyoulookforme · 5 months

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(not quite) sfw alphabet: cute & soft matty healy x fem reader

oh, hello hi! seems like many of you enjoyed the nsfw alphabet so i thought i would try and do the (mostly) sfw version to give lovely soft matty some sort of backstory.

again, in my dream world this bf matty is a shy romantic horny opinionated man who is mostly a sub.

nothing super unique, just mostly here for the soft matty vibes because we all deserve one of those. that and i've been in my fluffy feels these past few days.

warning: 18+, some smutty mentions. grammatical errors, typos. this doesn't really follow a timeline, so let's suspend reality here.

matty healy masterlist here

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a = affection (how affectionate are they? how do they show affection?)

towards his friends: he will give them a hug here and there, but he usually reserves those for very special occasions (eg. birthdays or record launches) or if someone is clearly upset.

towards you: he will shower you with affection whenever he can without being too overbearing in public (unless he's had too much to drink hehe. he will cling to you like a leech then.) hugs, kisses on top of your head, holding hands. he likes cute signs of affection while you're out and about. now, if you're alone, he will hold you for as long as he can. think cuddles on the couch, limbs all intertwined, your bodies melting into each other, him almost begging for you to please play with his hair because he loves the feeling of your nails against his scalp. he will listen to you ramble on about whatever happened at work, pretending like he's following along but half of the time he can't keep up because you talk 10 miles per second. he knows that your favourite flowers are tulips, so every spring he will make sure the vase on your bedside table is full of them, and if he's on tour, he'll arrange for you get a special delivery of the yellowish orange ones you love so you don't dare forget about him. not that you ever would <3

b = best friend (what would they be like as a best friend? how would the friendship start?)

lucky for you (and not in a sarcastic way), matty's been your best friend since year 9 when you became his tutor because him and numbers do not mix. you would stay with him after classes to try your best to help, but half of the time the two of you would end up getting distracted talking about random topics such as your favourite bands and gossip from school, or sneaking out to smoke (he’s the one who showed you how to do so). you found him intriguing since the beginning—you weren’t sure how someone so shy and soft spoken could be in a band and have a bunch of teenage girls lusting after him. he was quiet, sure, but very witty and funny once he got on chatting. he took an interest in you too, noticing how you’d try your best to keep the conversation going as he wasn’t an eloquent one with words. he appreciated that, your patience to actually keep him engaged and your eagerness to connect with him. even though the girls were after him and his bandmates at all times, he never really paid attention to them, thus the boys were in shock when he brought you over to practice one night. like, matthew bringing a girl to their sacred space, wtf? but handsome george did notice how matty played effortlessly and better when you were around so george would try and get you to come to practice every once in a while so they could get the best version of matthew possible.

as best friends, you were there for each other through it all (even through your arguments) because you just clicked so well. you knew everything about each other. every. single. little. thing. but as the band started to get bigger, it was difficult to find the time to hang out as he would be rather busy. you were always supportive, but you'd be lying if you didn't miss having your friend around and being able to see him whenever you pleased. it wasn't the same just seeing photos of him pop up on the internet or get texts from him whenever he could find the time. however, when we would come back, you picked up as if nothing had ever changed. and it is always hard to believe that after 15-16 years of friendship, you'd finally get over yourselves and actually try to see if you could work out romantically. which you do :)

c = cuddles (do they like to cuddle? how would they cuddle?)

"can i have a cuddle?" is probably one of the things he says the most to you. he loves loves loves to snuggle, but just with you though. he enjoys the company and the warmth of having you close to him when possible. it makes him feel safe. his favourite is when he gets to cuddle you after you wake up, just heavy limbs around each other while lazily kissing your lips. there's been times when he's been sad about something and you're not there, so george will tease him (do you need a cuddle, sweetheart?), but the good friend that he is, he will actually spend some time with him, an arm around matty's shoulders trying to cheer him up. it does the trick most of the time.

d = domestic (do they want to settle down? how are they at cooking and cleaning?)

my boy here calls in the movers (eg. george and ross) the second you accept to move in with him. matty is over the moon that he will get to wake up pressed against your naked body every morning, that he will get to see you wear his clothes when you make your daily cup of tea, that he will come home to you and mayhem cuddled on his sofa after a long day at the studio. he's been dreaming of this moment for quite a while and when it does happen, he's thankful to everything that is holy that you like him enough to deal with him on a daily basis.

which, you do have to deal with his messes because he is not the neatest person. he's not that bad but you have to pick up after him when he gets distracted because he's already probably making a slight mess elsewhere. think shirts over chairs, empty mugs on surfaces, socks by the sofa, towels on the bathroom floor, a stack of open books on the desk, etc etc. again, not bad really, just a quirk of his. however, you don't mind it at all as he's a mean cook in the kitchen. matty will treat you to a three course french gourmet dinner any evening (plus some sex as an extra dessert).

e = ending (if they had to break up with their partner, how would they do it?)

oh god... he thinks the world of you and wants you to be the happiest ever so if at some point he feels like you'd be better off without him, he'd heartbreakingly let you go, letting you know that he will always be there for you. if it were to happen, there would be endless tears and so much pain due to the loss of your relationship. but you would eventually be friends again, maybe not as close as before, but you've shared so much together to not be a part of each other's lives in some way, shape or form. ugh. too much for my heart to handle. don't make me even though i secretly love angst.

f = fiance (how do they feel about commitment? how quick would they want to get married?)

on the same vein as above, commitment often scares him but not because he's afraid of spending the rest of his life with you, but mostly because he's weary of not being enough or giving you what you deserve. he's also not really sure if he's the marriage type of guy, thinking that it's mostly a label and what would actually change if you did get married (other than having fancy rings?). but that was until that one time when you got a piece of mail and, for some reason instead of it having your surname, it had his attached to your name. this made him feel some sort of way as his heart started to race and his hands got all clammy, the name being repeated inside his head over and over again. huh. it didn't sound half bad, did it? that stayed with him for weeks on end, until one night, when you were all at a bar with friends and someone asked the both of you that annoying "do you think you'll get married?" question. you were about to answer, but were surprised when matty beat you to it, "i think i could see myself settling down." he looked at you with apprehensive eyes, knowing that he had never voiced any interest in marriage out loud and was nervous of what you'd say. but you responded with a blush on your face and a soft "yeah, maybe" while you grabbed his hand under the table and gave it a tight squeeze which he returned. <3

g = gentle (how gentle are they, both physically and emotionally?)

he's the most gentle boy you could ever imagine, you couldn't have dreamt him up even in your wildest dreams. i guess that's partly due to his shy, soft demeanour. he's always been that way as far as you can remember. well, to you at least. he can be snarky with his other close friends if deeply provoked, but it still takes a lot to get him to that point. but yes with you, he'll do everything in his power to make you feel at ease. if you're anxious or sad, he will listen to you and hold near you while you cry (and let you take out his frustrations out on him). if you're in pain, he will comfort you, wishing he could take the hurt away (and this is where period sex comes in because he knows it will make you feel better...)

h = hugs (do they like hugs? how often do they do it? what are their hugs like?)

he loves them. cannot get enough of them. each time he sees you he has to wrap his arms around you and bring you as close to him as humanly possible to breathe in your scent. BUT that's only after you started dating. prior to that, yes, he would hug you but tbh it was very hard on him as he was (very obviously) pining for you. before you were official, it would take all of his strength to not keep holding on to you but he knew that if he did it for too long, then his heart wouldn't be able to take it. this boy NEEDED YOU for him to be complete. poor matty. however, now that the both of you are an item, he hurries to wrap his arms around your waist each time he greets you, drawing soft, gentle circles on your back as he kisses the top of your head. he's a precious one.

i = i love you (how fast do they say the l-word?)

the thing is that, even before you confessed you liked each other, matty already knew he loved you so it was very difficult for him to not say it right away. you might be surprised because, well, it's shy subby matty we're talking about here, but he was actually the one who said it first a few months after you were dating. not entirely sure of the situation (as this could be a blurb on it's own because who doesn't love a fluffy 'i love you' story) but when he did say those three words, it took you a minute to realize you weren't dreaming that even sweetheart matty got very nervous and begged you to "please, say something" as he grabbed and kissed your hand. it wasn't until you finally came back to reality and the ringing in your ears stopped, that you said it back to him. and there was a lot of kissing and passionate sex after lol.

j = jealousy (how jealous do they get? what do they do when they’re jealous?)

sweet matty tries to pretend like he NEVER get jealous, but it's so darn obvious when it happens that it's actually endearing (most of the time, at least). he won't really get mad at you per se as you are not really the flirty type, but what triggers him is when other guys try to touch you in a suggestive type of way (eg. when a hand lingers on your arm for too long or someone wraps their arm around your lower back). you can tell he is jealous because his nervous tendencies become apparent, like the rapid tapping of his foot or running his hands through his hair nonstop. but if he gets really, REALLY jealous, then his small but possessive side will show, going to interrupt whatever inappropriate interaction is taking place. when this happened the first time, you were taken aback as to how suave he was when he put a hand on your ass and pulled you close to him, continuing on to interrogate the other guy who was trying to get in your pants.

an interesting time was when you (drunkenly) admitted that you once made out with ross backstage (pre-dating him). matty about went and drove to his house to give him a piece of his mind but he ended up just sitting on the couch acting all upset that one of his friends got to kiss you before him. the next day you got a text from ross "hey. is matty alright? he keeps looking at me like i just kicked a baby kitten..."

k = kisses (what are their kisses like? Where do they like to kiss you? Where do they like to be kissed?)

75% of the time they're sweet and gentle with the other 25% being needy, sloppy (in a good way), and breathtaking (literally). he's one of those that will have his sleeves over his hands as he cups your face and sweetly kisses you, cutely grinning against your lips and whispering endless i love you's. or he'll place his arms on your shoulders and wrap them around your neck, bringing you as close as possible to kiss you as if this is the last time he will ever have you, all while countless moans and whimpers spill onto your lips (<- this will usually happen when he's very very turned on).

this man loves to kiss your hands, too. he loves to kiss them as often as he can. whether it is when he firsts sees you, or when you are in a date, or when you’re holding his face.

and for him, kiss that spot under his ear where the jaw meets his neck and he will melt. every. single. time. if you do it while pulling on his hair? that's it. you will have him at your mercy to do whatever you require (not that he really needs any convincing).

l = little ones (how are they around children?)

seeing him around children is one of the most endearing yet hilarious sights ever. he treats them as if they were already adults. he'll have conversations with then about topics that no child should be discussing (eg. the film he just watched or the state of the world). but his favourite is making them listen to music he likes because he wants to be the cool uncle / friend / individual in this child's life and introduce them to good music early on.

you haven't necessarily discussed having children, but every now and then you'll catch him say "when i have a kid, they will..." or "my kid would be / do..." which makes it fairly obvious that at some point he does want to have a family of his own.

m = morning (how are mornings spent with them?)

you usually end up waking up first, but you'll be sure to cuddle with him prior to actually getting up for bed. that or having morning sex because that never hurt anyone, did it? unless you have something to get to, as then you'd for sure be late for it because, as we know, quickies aren't a thing for either of you. ANYWAY. a perfect morning for the two of you is a lazy one, really. not having much obligation nor having to think about what the day holds ahead. there are times when you'll just spend a couple of hours cuddled up watching your fav show—matthew would probably end up passing out again. or sometimes you'll be out n about doing some grocery shopping while matty tries his darnest to pick up after his messes only to end up being distracted by a song idea, his puppy, or browsing ebay for some new art to buy.

if you for some reason do have to get up super early, you better be sure there are 5 or 20 alarms set as the two of you combined can set the record for the most snooze hits in an hour.

n = night (how are nights spent with them?)

when you finally live at matty's, you get into your ritual of making sure you eat dinner together when he's around. it's filled with him cooking up the new recipe he just found, sharing a bottle of red wine, listening to some of your fav records, a cute cozy endeavour. there's an unspoken understanding that this is the time when you catch up each other on how your days went.

every now and then, you'll take a bath right before bed and he will come in and sit on the chair besides the tub, reading you a few pages of your book outloud. you may have sex, but even if that doesn't happen, you'll always kiss each other softly for a few minutes before calling it a night. he then passes out stat.

when he's away on tour and if there's nowhere to be after a show, you can expect that he'll be in his bunk or at the back of the bus texting or facetiming you depending on the time zone. if it's a very late video call, it's mostly a silent conversation while you look at each other, sometimes quietly sobbing because you miss each other so.

o = open (when would they start revealing things about themselves? do they say everything all at once or wait a while to reveal things slowly?)

this is a slow endeavour for the both of you, not because you don’t trust each other (hell, you eventually become bffs), but because you are interested in each other romantically almost from the start and don’t want to ruin your friendship by divulging too much. at the beginning, you’d talk about common interests and what not. as you grew up you'd talk about your relationships trying not to be awkward about it. which btw, when you told matty you had lost your virginity he about passed out because a. you were having sex with someone who wasn't him, b. it sounds like the dude was fucking awful at it (you didn't spare the details mentioning that he didn't make you cum), and c. you were comfortable enough talking about your sex life with him which he secretly enjoyed as he got to take mental notes of what turned you on... just in the off chance he could have an opportunity with you... he mostly listened and nodded and shook his head. on the other hand, whenever he would talk about his dating and sex life with you, you'd question him about every single detail (you have no shame or filter), sometimes making him turn scarlett red because of the questions you ask (eg. what's are your kinks or how do you like to go down on a girl?)

p = patience (how easily angered are they?)

for the most part he's one patient human being. he has a pretty chill, calm demeanour in most aspects of his life (eg. the band, his friends, his family, you). he doesn't really believe in getting stressed out too much when things are out of his control, maybe it's all the weed too, though.

q = quizzes (how much would they remember about you? do they remember every little detail you mention in passing, or do they kind of forget everything?)

when it comes to you, it's almost like he has a filing cabinet inside his head, filled with anything and everything in regards to you and your friendship / relationship with him. he's head-over-heels smitten that he remembers and notices the most random details about you: your favourite tea condiments (oat milk and honey), your favourite eye shadow colour (cobalt blue), your favourite kind of cat (orange tabby). he also remembers every single one of your exes and has noticed, funnily enough, that most of them tend to have brown curly hair…

r = remember (what is their favorite moment in your relationship?)

there have been so many memorable times spent with you, but one instance that often comes to his mind was after one of their first shows. everyone was over at his place. you all went outside behind the house to a beautiful green space leading up to a small creek, everyone sitting down by the edge of the water drinking the many beers and bottles of wine brought along. after a few hours, everyone (including yourself) was properly drunk and it was all bliss. you spent hours upon hours talking to all of them, hearing about their thoughts regarding the show they had just played, sharing their favourite bits from the set. it seemed simple, but knowing that you cared so much about him and the band meant the world to him. he remembers as everyone eventually started heading off to bed, but you didn't, you stayed behind to chat with him even though he could tell you were growing tired. and out of nowhere (probably due to the alcohol in his system) he asked you about a boy you had been seeing on and off. "how come you two aren't together?" "i guess i'm old fashioned and just want someone to myself and he doesn't. so i'm not really what he's after." "there’s nothing wrong with that. but i think he's an idiot for not being with you." you laughed it off casually, but he very clearly noticed as you slowly scooted closer to him until your legs were touching. again, it was a small gesture, but that was the first time when he felt that maybe, just maybe, there was something that could happen between the two of you. and god knows he wanted it because he had been dreaming of being with you so badly. however, it still took years to get there. all good things take time.

s = security (how protective are they? how would they protect you? how would they like to be protected?)

he's shy and soft, but he is oh so protective of you almost to a fault; he wants nothing bad to ever happen to you, physically or emotionally. he will defend you whenever someone says anything remotely bad about you. sometimes it's not even something overly malicious, but he can read into things too much when you're involved. like that one time a girl mocked you for your outfit. you honestly didn't think much of it (you agreed really, even if she was a bitch about it), but dear matty here wouldn't shut it as he was more offended than you. he means the best, though.

t = try (how much effort would they put into dates, anniversaries, gifts, everyday tasks?)

oh god, the dates and anniversaries. he wants everything to be perfect that if something goes wrong, then that's one of the times when he'll actually get stressed out and flustered. he's got the dinner making down to a science (he knows your fav recipes by heart), he knows what you like for physical gifts (he has a list on notes app of things you mention in passing), but when it comes to scheduling events or making reservations... that doesn't come so easily to him lol. he has a horrid habit of leaving it until the last minute. that's probably why at the beginning of your relationship, the dates always (well, for the most part) end up being in your flat, with him making you dinner instead, which you honestly prefer that as it makes it for personal and romantic. after a few months, it becomes an unspoken agreement that you're the one that schedules any restaurant dinners or trips (and he's oh so grateful for it). you just tell him where and what time, and he'll be there with bells on, wearing his best bf matty outfit possible. you better bet that for one of your restaurant dates he'll pull out this number and you won't even want to finish dinner because you have to get back home and shag him. and when he wears this one for your one year anniversary, well, you end up renting a room at the closest hotel because there is no way in hell you're waiting to use that bow tie to have some fun.

u = ugly (what would be some bad habits of theirs?)

he picks his nails and it drives you up the wall. you try to get him to stop but he always swats your hand away when you do so. he does it so often and doesn't even realize it. you've jokingly given him mittens every single year for his birthday as a (not so silent) plea for him to stop lol.

v = vanity (how concerned are they with their looks?)

it goes in phases with current bf matty. it mostly depends on his mood, really. there are times when he'll just choose from the pile of clothes he left on the floor throughout the week and that will suffice. but there are other days when he tries out about 7-8 different outfits until he lands on the right one for the occasion (mostly to impress you).

for some reason he has gotten into straightening his hair every now and then which made you throw a fit when you saw the photos on twitter while he was on tour. the thought of him frying up those beautiful curls of his made you tear up a bit but deep down you were like FUUUUUUUUUUCK ME UP DADDY you're gorgeous.

and don't get me started on the chain necklaces. if he wears those without a shirt on? you immediately have to excuse yourself and go scream into your arm because you cannot handle it. and he is well aware of this, which is probably why he does it in the first place. little minx.

w = whole (would they feel incomplete without you?)

nope. even if he waited years and years you're the only person who would truly make him complete. and to be fair, everyone and their mum knew this was the case before either of you fully recognized it or did anything about it. he's like a lost puppy without you, even to the point that when he hears your name mentioned, he perks up looking to see / hear what is being said about you.

x = xtra (a random headcanon for them.)

he has one of those freaking electric scooters which he likes to ride everywhere, and he can be very annoying about it. you bet he's inside the concert arenas doing laps on this thing while the stage is being set up.

he will try to get you to ride with him even though you hate it as you feel like you're just gonna fall off and break your leg. but in reality, he gets you to ride along as an excuse for you to hold on to him, because he's too afraid / nervous to show physical affection towards you in many other ways.

once you start dating and he reveals this, you bow to never go on or near that thing ever again. but that same christmas he does gift you your own as a joke (well, not really tho) so you have to resign yourself to ride around with him, but not after getting yourself a helmet because the last thing you want is for your death certificate to read "cause of death: matty healy's scooter."

y = yuck (what are some things they wouldn’t like, either in general or in a partner?)

some random things that he dislikes: sandals with socks, raw onion, cars honking, his old cranky neighbour, vaping, hann when he's trying to teach him a grownup lesson.

some things he doesn't like in a partner: when they chew loudly or when they lie. we're talking two very different ends of the spectrum here. make sure you never lie to him if you don't want to see him get truly mad...

z = zzz (what is a sleep habits of theirs?)

it's absolutely clear to every single person who knows bf matty that he LOVES his beauty sleep. he makes sure to take a short nap (almost) every day to give him some energy, cuddling up to mayhem and/or you if either are near him. during tour, everyone knows to not wake him up when he's in his bunk otherwise he'll be grumpy and a diva for the rest of the day. when he's not sleeping with you in his arms, he will lie on his stomach with his arms under the pillow and snooze away. he's also an underwear-only kind of guy when he goes to bed at night (or naked if he's just had sex with you).

--------

if you made it this far again, thank you for indulging me :)

let me know if there are any bits you'd like me to expand on. always more than happy to do so when it come to this matty (my dream boy, really).

#sfw alphabet #matty healy alphabet #matty #matty healy fluff #matty healy headcanon #fluff #matty healy fanfic #matty the 1975 #the 1975 fanfic #the 1975 fic #matty healy x reader #bf matty #bf matty blurb #matty healy x you #matty healy smut #mw

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dfortrafalgar · 5 months

Text

I'm Losing You... (But We're Filling the Cracks)

Having a family isn't always as easy as fairy tales make it seem. But sometimes, you just need a little bit of love... and a little bit of science.

Warnings: read chapter 1 for warnings

(also it's far too late in the game for me to be asking this but can someone help me figure out why everyone's blogs outside of the first five people in the tag list dont show up. ive been on tumblr since like 2014 and still cannot figure this stuff out im sobbing)

Chapter 28

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Your maternity leave had started early, not helped by how active one of your babies was at the crack of dawn. Every morning when you woke up to the sound of your alarm and rolled over to hoist yourself out of bed, you felt a kick against your abdomen. When you stood up, you felt that familiar fluttering sensation. One morning, you slept in only a few minutes longer than you normally did, and were punished with a small shove against your bladder that had you involuntarily unloading your urine into your pajama bottoms.

That one made you cry, Law keeping his chuckles to himself as he helped you clean up in the bathroom.

“Stop berating them through my stomach,” you sobbed. “I just pissed my pants.”

Your husband had answered you with a soft kiss to your swollen skin as he bent down to pick up your soiled clothing and bring them to your washing machine. “It happens, darling. It wasn’t your fault.”

Needless to say, it had been an emotional third trimester thus far.

On a Friday evening, you were sitting reclined against the arm of your couch, a book resting on your belly as you munched on some apple slices when Law came bursting through the door. He was frantic to kick off his shoes and shrug off his lab coat, hanging it on the hooks in the entryway before scrambling into the living room and plopping himself down next to you. He was holding a notebook in his hand.

“Hello to you, too,” you stated sarcastically, placing a paper bookmark in your novel to mark your spot and adjusting yourself on the couch to sit with your legs crossed under you.

“I was busy on my break today,” Law stated matter-of-factly, flipping through the wrinkled notebook with a fervor. When he found the page he was looking for, he folded the journal in half and held out the exposed page to face you.

A bunch of squares and barely legible writing covered the lined paper. You squinted. “I have no idea what I’m looking at, babe.”

Law rarely had moments where he got so excited that he couldn’t speak, but this was clearly one of those moments. He would forget that other people didn’t have over 20 years of medical training going back to the age of five. “Sorry, sorry.” He turned the notebook back toward him, using his finger to point out what he had scribbled down. “These are genetic predictions. It’s estimated that about 50% of fraternal twins will be opposite genders, so a boy and a girl. Which means about 25% will be both boys, and about 25% will be both girls.” He moved his finger from one scribble to another. “I have black hair, which I’m assuming to be the dominant gene among the two of us. However, I’m also a carrier for brown hair, because my mother and sister both were brunettes. Accounting for your hair color, I’m estimating that it’s a 75% chance that both of our babies will have black hair. At least one of our babies will have my eye color, but I believe your eyes are the dominant trait. I remember you saying at one point that someone in your family had curly hair, right? I’m estimating a 25% chance that at least one of our kids will have curly hair. If both of our babies are boys, the chances are 75% that they’ll be colorblind, and 25% that only one of them will be colorblind. If both are girls, it’s a 75% chance that both of them will be carriers for the colorblind gene, 25% that only one of them will be. But again, this is all approximations. So then I started thinking about more technical stuff. I have B+ blood, but I couldn’t remember what your blood type was, so we have to go off of the Rh factor, which is dominant with positive Rh, which means that at least one of our babies will have Rh positive blood, likely both. Male pattern baldness is also a dominant trait in most families, but I’m 26 and still have a full head of hair, so hopefully if we have a boy, he won’t have to worry about hair loss. Funnily enough, I learned today that having six fingers on one or both hands can actually be a dominant allele in some genetic lines, but neither of our family members have had any form of polydactyly that I can recall. Just an interesting thought. Anyway–”

Your shoulders were shaking with your laughter. “Law, slow down! Breathe!” Your hands reached forward to grab his shoulders to settle his excited rambling, his face slowly losing color as he was speaking more than he was absorbing oxygen.

You watched as your husband took a long gulp of hair in before blowing it out slowly. “Sorry. I got excited.”

“Don’t apologize, you’re adorable,” you replied, stroking your hand along his cheek. “How long did it take you to write all that down?”

Law glanced one more time at his notebook before closing it and discarding it on the coffee table. “About 15 minutes.”

You snorted. “I hope intelligence is a dominant trait so that both of our kids will be as smart as you.”

“You’re smart too,” he argued back, his voice light and content.

“Not ‘scribble down multiple punnett squares in 15 minutes’ smart,” you countered. “Have you eaten anything yet?”

He shook his head, stretching his arms behind his back. “Nope, I came straight home. I was too excited to show you that.”

You grinned, struggling to lean forward to kiss the tip of his nose. He assisted you by leaning forward on his own legs, pressing his forehead to yours.

“How have you been feeling?” he asked suddenly, diverting the topic. One of his hands came to rest on the crest of your belly, petting the taught skin through your shirt.

“Tired,” you replied. “It’s hard to stand up. Robin said both babies are probably around 2 or 3 pounds by now, but honestly it feels like I’m carrying lead weights when I stand. I feel like a turtle.”

“Any more movement?” he asked, scooting over the cushions to be closer to you, wrapping one of his arms around your shoulders to pull you into him. You gladly followed his gesture, dropping your head into his neck.

“One of them moves in the morning still, the other likes to kick when I go to bed. The only reason I’ve been able to tell is because I feel them on different sides,” you groaned. “I don’t know what it looks like with them folded up in there, but they haven’t made it easy on me.”

Law hummed in response, his free hand stroking your belly. The feeling of his palm against your bump felt more soothing than the finest lotion. “I’m just glad that they’re both okay… not like I’m thrilled that you’re in pain, obviously, but…”

“No, trust me, I am too,” you sighed, closing your eyes. “I’ve made it this long now, and both of them are still alive. And pretty soon…”

Your husband knew exactly what you were going to say when your voice trailed off. It was a subject the two of you had been tip-toeing around for quite some time.

The birth.

“That’s the one thing that’s still scaring me,” you admitted. “I’m already high risk, and anything could go wrong. I might have to be ripped open while awake to get them out. I might die, even.”

Law felt his chest clench. “Don’t say that, you won’t die.”

“But we don’t know that,” you sighed, your voice growing more nervous by the second.

“No, you won’t die,” he replied firmly.

You felt mildly guilty for broaching the subject. You knew how difficult it was for him to even think about the slim chance of losing his family again, not when he had come so far and achieved so much with you. You leaned your head upward to kiss the soft skin of his neck, his sideburns tickling your forehead. You felt his arm around your shoulder pull you even closer to him, his breaths shallow.

“I’m sorry…” you muttered.

“Don’t be,” he responded quickly. “I mean it. You have nothing to be sorry for.”

His hand dropped from your belly to grasp your own, tilting his head down to meet your own as his lips gently pressed against yours. Your eyes slipped closed, leaning into his tender kiss and wrapping your free arm around his torso. The size of your belly made it hard to be flush against him, but you made do. After all, you would have to get used to cuddling with two babies soon enough.

You pulled away from his lips. “Hey, so how’s the studying been? For that surgery?”

Law groaned, not at you, but at the mere thought of the looming procedure that had been bearing on his mind for the past eight weeks. “I feel like I’m back in med school, that’s for sure. I feel ready for it, but at the same time I can never be too prepared. It’s going to be… a lot.”

Dual heart-lung transplants were very, very rare, and used for the most severe of cases. The procedure had never been performed at Law’s hospital before. Single heart transplants had been done, and a few lung transplants, but never at the same time. Law’s cardiac ward was specifically chosen for the operation because of the young doctor’s expertise in the field. The patient’s life was quite literally in Law’s hands.

A small smirk flashed on his face. “I started wearing gloves in that patient’s room with his family. I don’t want them to see the tattoos on my fingers.”

“Do you not wear gloves for any other patients?” you asked with a small giggle.

“No, I do, when performing treatments. When I’m on rounds, I just stick my hands in my pockets,” he explained. He had one dimple on his cheek that showed up when he smiled. You couldn’t help but peck a quick kiss to it. His stomach suddenly grumbled, startling the two of you.

“You stay right here, I’ll make us some dinner,” he said, making a move to stand up.

“Pancakes,” you demanded with your own mischievous smirk.

“We had pancakes a week ago,” he replied with a smile.

“And?”

Law leaned down for one last kiss on the crown of your head. “Alright. Pancakes it is.”

—

Your pregnancy journal had gone from an anxious possession that you worried would jynx your good luck to a vice that you crawled back to whenever you were bored. The pages were filled with the ink from your pen as you used the prompts to delve into some of the thoughts you kept to yourself, your feelings about your body, your babies, your relationships, the hopes and dreams and the worries and troubles you tried not to stress about. You kept track of the gifts you had received, the words of advice from your doctor, and the unprovoked comments from elderly ladies at the supermarket who liked to comment about how cute of a couple you were when you shopped for food with your husband.

The grouchy, black-haired surgeon with bags under his eyes and a resting bitch face, and you, his slightly shorter, glowing wife with a very large pregnant belly and a polite, shining smile on her face. You were truly a match made in heaven, one might say.

Law had been busier and busier in the weeks getting closer to your due date. As the weather got colder, the holidays came and went, and the new year began, he was diving more and more into his studies preparing for what was easily the largest, most intense, and most serious surgery of his professional career. Some might assume that you would get tired of the neglect, growing frustrated that he wasn’t around to spend time with you in your third trimester, but in reality, you couldn’t be more proud.

The sight of him hunched over your kitchen table surrounded by old textbooks and papers was an image straight out of your college days, where you’d let yourself into his single dorm room close to midnight and find him on his floor in the dim lighting surrounded on all sides by professional journals, research papers, and textbooks from every esteemed surgeon in his field. You’d sit down next to him and diligently push french fries against his lips as his eyes stayed glued to his studies, rewarding you during his sparse downtime with awkward kisses that tasted like salt and firm yet shaky hands that were obsessed with traveling up and down your body.

The only difference now was that Law was that professional in his field, that he was in an apartment, and that you both had rings on your fingers. The french fries stayed the same, but he at least had a piece of mind to feed himself while you watched from the couch and giggled. Every once in a while, he would lean back against his seat and pop his spine with a satisfied groan, toss you a fond look across the room, and go back to reading. Sometimes, you would stand behind him and rub his stiff shoulders, encouraging him to stand up and stretch his legs just as he would do to you to ensure you remained strong during the final weeks of your pregnancy.

The only thing weighing on your mind was the panging worry that he would be in the middle of this massive procedure when you went into labor. You were both informed by your doctor that most twins would be delivered either naturally or induced at around 36 weeks, almost a month before single babies were usually born, and with your due date at 38 weeks being in the middle of May, you had a nagging feeling in your head that he would miss it.

You both tried to hold onto hope that your babies would be delivered any other day that month. He would be gone for only a day, a full 24 hours, in total the day of the surgery. What were the odds that your babies would be born on that specific day? Slim, to say the least.

At around 32 weeks, it was getting hard for you to stand up. Your movements were slow and labored, and you were spending most of your days in your apartment either on your couch or in your bed, standing up when instructed by Law, or Shachi and Penguin when he was at work, to walk laps around your home. The fear of blood clots forming in your legs and traveling to your lungs, as described by your lovely husband in far too much detail, was enough to make you more determined to keep the blood pumping in your body.

“Alright, ready?” Law stated, standing behind you in the kitchen as you slowly made your way through a pile of dirty dishes in the sink.

“Ready,” you stated back, your eyes focused on washing the silverware in your hands.

His inked hands traveled around your torso and under your belly, lifting up against the bottom of your bump. The sudden relief of having the weight lifted off of your back made an almost erotic moan leave your lips, your grip on the silverware releasing slightly as the tension in your entire body flooded from your veins like a broken dam.

“Feel good?” he asked from behind you with a smirk, his chin resting on the crown of your head.

“Oh my god,” you groaned. “I saw a lot of posts that said that it feels good, but I didn’t think it would feel this good. I wish you could do that constantly.”

Sparse kisses were placed to the back of your head as his hands slowly released their pressure against the bottom of your bump, leaving your back aching once more as your body was forced to bear the brunt of the weight in your abdomen. You stifled a whimper as you were forced to hold what felt like 50 extra pounds on your own again, but Law’s lingering presence behind you with his hands resting idly on your belly soothed your aches subconsciously.

“Busy spring, huh?” he asked, filling the room where the only other sound was the sloshing from your dish washing.

You hummed in response, rinsing your hands and turning off the tap, drying your hands on a towel that lay on the counter beside you. “You could say that.” You turned around to lean against the counter, Law’s hands remaining on your body as you rotated. He leaned forward to capture your lips in his, you rewarding him with a smile.

“I’m sorry I haven’t been able to be more physical with you…” you sighed.

Law pulled away. “Why are you sorry for that?”

You shrugged. “You seem like you’ve been a lot more handsy with me lately, and I can’t reciprocate. And I’m probably not going to be able to reciprocate for a while after I give birth.”

Your husband chuckled, planting chaste kisses across your cheeks. “I’m not ‘being handsy with you’ because I want anything. I’m ‘being handsy’ because I want you to be happy and comfortable. I’m not expecting anything in return. And by the way,” he pulled away to stare into your worried eyes. “I know what you’re thinking. You’re thinking about your post-birth body being somehow inferior to how you were before pregnancy, I know it.”

You averted your gaze, your lips pinching together.

“And I know you don’t like the stretch marks on your belly,” he added.

“Where are you going with this?” you asked, your voice quiet.

“Because I’m going to remind you every day how beautiful you are. Always. Even the changes that come with having a child. You’re always going to be beautiful to me. I’ll never be repulsed by your stretch marks or wrinkled skin or cellulite like you think I’m going to be. The person standing in front of me is a beautiful woman who has given me a life worth living, and I’m going to cherish her and support her through everything.”

Your eyes darted toward his neck, where his glass necklace still sat between his collarbones. He religiously wore it every single day, only taking it off to shower, sleep, and perform surgeries. Likewise, you never removed your glass ring. Hot tears began to form in your eyes, but your lips curled into a smile. Your expression fought for dominance over being happy or sad, and what resulted was a shaky grin, furrowed eyebrows, and watery eyes.

“What did I do to deserve you?” you asked, letting a few lose tears escape the corners of your eyes.

Your husband kissed the damp streaks that your tears left behind on your cheeks. “You fed me french fries on the floor of my dorm room in college. I think that’s when I knew you were going to be my wife one day.”

A bubbly laugh left your throat as your hands gripped his shoulders for stability. “I think I knew when you found me out behind my dorm building that night.”

Law leaned in to kiss you one more time, but a sudden gasp left your lips as your entire body tensed up. A stinging cramping sensation rippled across your abdomen, lingering in your muscles. It lasted about 30 seconds, where your shaking hands clenched the cotton of Law’s shirt, his eyes wide and frenzied as his hands supported your upright posture, before the pain finally dissipated into a mild buzz, then nothing at all.

You stared into Law’s eyes. “Can you help me sit down?”

#x reader #reader insert #fem reader #law x reader #trafalgar law x reader #one piece x reader #op x reader #trafalgar d water law x reader #trafalgar d water law #trafalgar law #i'm losing you

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valeriianz · 2 years

Text

Thinking about how we, as a fandom, seemed to have forgotten the ridiculousness of the mistletoe tradition. Oh, to be kissed by a stranger under a parasitic plant in public! Why yes, sign Dream up.

Thinking about Hob decorating the New Inn for Christmas. Dream drops in unexpectedly (but certainly not unwelcome) as usual, curious to see Hob draping multicolored lights along the open shelves of liquor behind the bar.

“What are you doing, Hob?”

“What does it look like I'm doing?” and Hob would turn back to his work, and Dream would watch, fascinated. Listening to the cheery music playing through the speakers, listening to Hob speak of the centuries past, how the celebration of the Christmas holiday had been pretty steadily thus since the mid 1800’s.

“The pagan holiday?” Dream would inquire, dragging his fingers along the taped up holiday cards along the backsplash of the bar, like moth’s wings stuck out and on display. Some even transferring soft glitter on Dream’s fingers, making him rub them together curiously.

“Well,” Hob would shrug with a grin. “The Christian bastardization of it.”

“Hardly,” Dream mused. “The Romans celebrated Saturnalia in this time, honoring the god with a feast and gifts.”

“No foolin’, eh?”

And, since it was late and Hob was feeling good about the work he’d done, he’d pour Dream a glass of red and offer him a seat, both of them sitting at the bar and admiring the twinkling lights, the smell of pine from the fresh garland, the garish oversized stockings tacked to the walls, and– Dream noticed with puzzlement, a single bunch of berries and leathery leaves hanging from the ceiling in the middle of an archway.

“I do not recognize this.”

Hob followed his friend’s gaze and, “oh,” he’d laugh. But it sounds… off-kilter, nervous or embarrassed.

“It’s mistletoe. Just this– parasitic plant–”

“Why does it have a bow on it?”

“For fun.” Hob would level Dream with a look like, lighten up. Get into the spirit.

“Elaborate.”

And Hob would hmm and haa about this relatively silly tradition about kissing under a mistletoe, how the “rule” had kind of faded away in the past decade or so, but it was still a fun little thing and Hob, ever the purveyor of all things dreadfully human, wants to keep the tradition alive, even if no one really follows along anymore.

And Dream, knowing full well he doesn’t need an excuse to kiss his immortal, very human partner, decides to humor Hob.

He slips from his seat, hearing Hob snicker from behind him, probably knowing full well what he’s about to do, and Dream walks to stand directly under the plant.

The bar is closed, no one else is in the building, but Hob looks around anyway, like there would be anyone else who would take advantage of this opportunity. Dream has to physically bite down a delighted smile as Hob shrugs– well if no one else will– and all but jumps from his stool, slowly walking toward Dream with his hands in his jeans’ pockets.

Without even touching Dream, Hob leans in and pecks him on the mouth.

Dream’s brows rise up to his hairline. “Is that it?”

“I’m afraid so, love.” He points up to the plant above them. "They don’t hang these in public places for full blown make out sessions, you know.”

“Hm…” Dream considers this, and decides if the tradition of kissing under the mistletoe only yields one chaste thing, then he’d have to start collecting them enough to make something substantial out of it.

Cue the ridiculous montage of Hob finding Dream in various locales, venues, anywhere he’s at (even at a holiday staff party) and in all manner of positions, under a mistletoe.

“Was that even there before?” Hob would ask, a red solo cup in his hand and smirking like a fool at the sight of Dream slouching against the wall, a– quite large actually– mistletoe dangling from the ceiling above his head.

“Does it matter?” Dream would counter and Hob would shrug, fair enough, and acquiesce to the plant’s demands. It was a Christmas tradition, after all.

Or Hob entering his office at work and finding Dream draped across his desk, holding a plastic mistletoe that looked like it was bought at a drug store high above his head.

Hob would take a few moments to stand and stare, enamored by this ridiculous creature.

“You know how much I love you?” It’s not what Hob meant to say, he was going to quip something about dramatic Endless and their need for attention, but he’s so gone over Dream that his mouth barely cooperates with his brain in these situations.

Dream would preen, stretching his long legs down so they dangle off the edge of the desk, like a cat sunning himself, shaking the plastic plant for emphasis.

“You could show me.”

This is their new tradition, every Christmas season. Hob finds Dream everywhere in the waking world, distracting Hob, raising eyebrows, and starting up strange rumor mills. But it’s in the privacy of his own home, coming back from work, and finding Dream wailing desperately against the foyer of his kitchen, a planted mistletoe hanging from the ceiling, as usual.

“Oh, Hob Gadling,” Dream would cast an arm over his eyes. “How I’ve waited for you to come back and free me from the spell these dreadful berries have put me under.”

“Okay,” Hob would grin, biting back a laugh. “Would a kiss suffice?”

Dream would be hanging off the wall, his long, rail thin limbs bent at every angle under faux duress.

“Oh! It might do. I feel shackled under this strange power this greenery emanates.”

“Dream of the Endless,” Hob would tease, dropping his bag and taking off his coat as he walks to his impossible lover. “Brought down by a common earthly sprout.”

“Yes, yes, now will you get over here?”

And once Hob is within arms reach, laughing hard enough to wheeze, Dream would grab him by the shoulders and pull him in.

#dreamling #hob x dream #hob gadling #this is very much crack treated seriously #except its not that serious pfft #i saw a tiktok like this and couldnt get Dream dramatically posed against a wall out of my head #its just so him #my writing #the sandman

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