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1kook · 4 years

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new parent syndrome

— kim namjoon x (f) reader

SUMMARY You love Namjoon, honest. But you love your daughter Hyejoo even more— it’s not a controversial sentiment when you know he’s the same way! —and going back to a regular adult life sans kids absolutely sucks. (Or so you thought.) WARNINGS dilf!joon, dreamy husband joon, loving parents au, jimin is also a dad, bathtub sexy times, exhibitionism 😳 kinda sorta, tiny praise kink, joon calls her wifey TT, fingering, cunninglingus, doggy style, it’s kinda cheesy n romantic /.\, unprotected sex, …. impreg kink RATINGS m (18+) WC 9.5k

NOTES writing parent fics is harder than i thought :/ i had this idea last week n was like yes, lets write this fic that absolutely no one asked for... except me! <3 so here we are, fantasizing about dreamy dad joon.... as always i have to thank rumu ( @kigurumu ) who is kind enough to edit these n b like that don't make no sense -_- anyway lemme know what u think !! enjoy !!

No matter how hard you try, the letter f refuses to fit itself into Hyejoo’s phonemic understanding. She’s a growing toddler so it’s only normal that there are sounds she still can’t pronounce, words she doesn’t quite get. But her inability to say food or family or friends, which are undoubtedly the three most important things in her three year-old world right now, is definitely a setback you didn’t see coming.

Your worrywart husband has taken matters into his own hands, using the power of Google and about twelve parenting books to create an extensive, one-hour-a-day, mini lesson to try and increase her pronunciation skills. Of course, Hyejoo already attends daycare in the mornings while you and Namjoon are off at work, and gets sufficient learning done there. So she can’t exactly sit through Joon’s lectures, no matter how pretty he tries to decorate her flashcards. She’s still tiny— she’s still your baby, and you want her to enjoy the last of her daycare years before you’re forced to submit her to the worst twelve years of her life (also known as compulsory education).

But as you’ve mentioned before, Namjoon doesn’t quite feel the same way.

“She can’t sound out the letter,” he mopes in bed that night. He’s laying down beside you, face smushed against your thigh. The lamp on your side of the bed is the only thing on, casting a faint golden hue on his cheeks.

This conversation has occurred a variety of times these past few weeks, and you’ve just about ran out of every comforting reassurance possible. You settle on stroking a hand through his hair. There are emails to respond to and clients to check in with, but there’s also a huffy husband in bed beside you who quite pitifully crawls up into your arms.

It’s with his face between your boobs that he speaks again. “What if she’s getting made fun of at school? Or her teachers think she’s dumb?” You roll your eyes. “My baby is not dumb, __,” he says, as if you don’t know. “Her IQ came back above average when I took her to the development specialist that one time, remember?” You have half the mind to tell him an IQ test on a three year old isn’t exactly valid, but there’s already enough stacked on his plate. Finding out he wasted a hundred bucks for an invalid test would just be the cherry on top of all his worries.

Water clings to the very tips of his hair, remnants of his bath with Hyejoo. Namjoon is getting older now, nothing like the dashing grad student you had met what feels like a lifetime ago. There’s bags under his eyes, bags that surpass any all-nighter-pulling college student’s, induced by none other than the sheer power of becoming a parent. And still, he retains his beauty, looks like a doll with his skin so dewy from his skincare routine, lips puffy and red and kissable.

He looks up, and you take the opportunity to place a kiss on his lips, his familiar scent making you melt into his arms. When he pulls away, there’s still a subtle furrow between his brows.

“Hyejoo is fine,” you reassure him, carding his brown hair out of his face. He leans into the touch, eyes falling shut. “Our girl is the smartest three year-old out there,” you huff, feeling the slightest bit annoyed that he could even insinuate otherwise. “And if she was having problems at school, you know I would be the first one in there, fighting all the other moms.”

Namjoon relents, face falling back into its haven between your tits. “Okay,” he mumbles, muffled from the way his plush lips drag against the soft skin over your sternum.

The subject of Namjoon’s worries is in the other room sound asleep, not the least bit concerned with measly letters and sounds. It’s really only Namjoon who is, his stack of letter flashcards glaring at you from on top of the dresser. “Your mother hen is showing,” you tease as he slips beneath the covers, leaning over you to flick off your lamp. Just like everything else in your house, his t-shirt smells like him. It’s a natural, woodsy scent that floods your nostrils and makes your toes curl when he comes so close.

Namjoon snorts as he settles beside you, beefy arm pillowing your head as he pulls you close. “I’m not a mother hen,” he says, hand on your waist, the tantalizing expanse of his neck before your eyes. “I’m the rooster— the cock,” he snickers, and you reward his terrible attempt at a joke with a pinch to his side that has him retreating to the other end of the bed.

Hyejoo’s best friend in the entire world— or, as she says, her best pren in the entire world —is none other than Park Yerin from daycare. As the universe would have it, Park Yerin is also the one and only daughter of your college philosophy seat neighbor, Park Jimin.

Crossing paths with him later down the road was not something you could ever anticipate, especially when you and Jimin were never that close in college to begin with. It was the only class you had with him in all four years, one where you had quietly acknowledged his charisma and occasionally shared homework answers, before never speaking to him again. You could have greeted him on campus, as you often crossed paths. But Park Jimin was a walking friendship magnet who seemed to bring with him a parade of followers everywhere he went, and approaching him required three layers of strategic planning if you wanted to catch him alone.

So bumping into him at the entrance of Hyejoo’s daycare six years later comes as a bit of a shock. You had never pegged him as the type to settle down so quickly— you don’t mean to label him, but there were certain college stereotypes that he fit like a glove —but there he was, carrying the tiny love of his life who’s currently dressed in a bright pink Minnie Mouse dress.

Unsurprisingly, just like her father, Park Yerin has the same enthralling personality that makes everyone in the three to four year-old daycare class want to be her friend, and your sweet little Hyejoo is not exempt.

Long story short, out of all the kids at Sunny Side Daycare, Yerin is Hyejoo’s favorite, and Hyejoo is Yerin’s favorite.

So now it’s been a little over a year since the two girls have established their friendship, which means it’s been a little over a year of acquainting yourself with Jimin again. He’s a house husband, something you never expected, and he loves his daughter like no other. Some afternoons after daycare are spent with Jimin and Yerin at the nearest coffee shop, watching the girls haphazardly scribble over every piece of paper they can get their hands on while the two of you catch up.

Overall, you’re happy Hyejoo can have a friend like Yerin, and secretly, you're also happy you can finally befriend a fellow parent as nice and put together as Jimin. On top of that, Namjoon’s liked him on the few occasions he’s met him; the two have even gone out for drinks.

However, befriending Jimin and Yerin comes at a cost, and that cost is seeing your little girl grow up.

It’s your turn to mope.

“Yerin asked her to sleepover,” you groan, sadly patting in your skincare routine the next night. Namjoon is somewhere behind you, his naked back glaring at you through the reflection of your vanity mirror. He’s so broad and big, sleep shorts clinging to his waist as he lotions up his body post-shower. There’s a thin gold chain around his neck that glints everytime he moves around, biceps flexing and bulging in plain view until he finally slips his shirt on. There was a time in your life where his back could not go more than two days unscathed, your rabid (read: horny) claw marks painting rosy trails down his spine. These days, you can barely remember the last time he’s held your hand.

“Who?” he asks once he’s settled beneath the covers with whatever book he’s reading now and his thick-rimmed reading glasses.

“Who else,” you say, tugging your night robe closer to your chest as if it’ll prevent your heart from breaking anymore than it already was. “Hyejoo’s first sleepover,” you sigh.

You take it harder than you imagined. In the back of your mind, you’ve always known your little girl was growing up— hello, you were literally watching her grow more and more inches every single day —but you had convinced yourself she would stay your baby for a little while longer. As much as you wanted her to see and learn about the world, you selfishly wanted to keep her home too. She was your baby, your only one at that.

At least Namjoon feels the same way. “Absolutely not,” he squawks, abruptly slamming his book shut. He’s usually really meticulous about lining up his fancy bookmark right on the line he left off on, so his sudden carelessness tells you all you need to know about how he feels.

You sit down beside him, hand over his. “It’s Yerin’s birthday,” you inform him in what you hope is a comforting tone; unbeknownst to him, you’re trying to reassure yourself as well. “And Jimin said he and his wife are gonna be there the whole night.” You trust Jimin, you really do. If there’s anyone who’s more in love with their kid than you and Namjoon, it’s Jimin. He would never let anything happen to his Yerin, and by extension, he would never let anything happen to your Hyejoo. He’s a good dad.

Namjoon rubs at his eyes. In the span of two minutes, he’s aged about five years. “No,” he sighs softly, squeezing your hand tightly. “Once she starts going to sleepovers she’ll start wearing makeup and getting into relationships and having her heart broken—“

A kiss is enough to silence him when he gets like this, his warm breath fanning across your bottom lip when you pull away. “She just wants to wear tutus and sing Baby Shark right now,” you murmur, hand creeping up over his chest. His heart is beating fast as hell beneath his t-shirt, feels like it’ll burst straight out of his chest if you don’t calm him down.

He’s the bigger worrier out of the two of you, has a classic case of paranoid parent syndrome.

It’s no secret that Namjoon has a big brain; he’s an educated man with a respectable job. For every problem he encounters, he can procure a variety of solutions with different approaches. He’s always prepared and part of you thinks he’s a huge reason you managed to survive those first few weeks as a mom. Unlike you, who had attended a whopping two mommy classes in preparation for your upcoming child, Namjoon had studied up on parenting. A lot. He had read books and reviewed scientific studies, had learned about development on the chemistry level and the social level, did all he could until he was confident in his own dad abilities.

But, for every solution Namjoon can find, there are always twenty-eight other factors to worry about.

“What if she has an allergic reaction and Jimin doesn’t know what to do,” he pales, death grip on your hand. His matching wedding band digs into your skin and you have to wrestle his hand away before he accidentally breaks your finger. He nearly broke your neck once when you were in college, had almost sent you to the ER mid-thrust because he had underestimated his own strength while trying to choke you.

“Hyejoo doesn’t have any allergies,” you remind him, giving up on your awkward half-seated position as you clamber over him. His thighs are full beneath you, tense up as you move over him and he manhandles you into his chest.

He’s not done. “What if she asks Jimin for a fizzy drink and he can’t understand her?” His eyes are owlish beneath his glasses, covered in what you can only describe as a visible sheen of absolute terror. “What if he thinks she’s saying ‘pissy’ not ‘fizzy,’ __— what then?” It’s amazing, really, how a man who graduated cum laude can hypothesize this many disasters pertaining to a four year-old’s sleepover.

In the other room, Hyejoo calls for you, so you gladly take the opportunity to remove yourself from Namjoon and his spiraling thoughts. “Look,” you say, tightening the sash of your robe as you get back up. “I’m gonna go tell her that she can go to Yerin’s sleepover tomorrow,” you tell him, giving him exactly three seconds to groan dramatically, before continuing, “and you figure out how to turn that big brain off by the time I come back.”

Luckily, the cause of Hyejoo’s sudden wake up is a tiny bug bite she got from playing outside that just won’t stop itching. “Mommy, it hurts,” she whines, digging her nails into the tiny red mark by her knee.

“Uh huh, lemme see,” you order, turning on her bedside lamp to illuminate the space. Her room is the prettiest shade of yellow, fitting for a ball of sunshine such as herself. “Were you playing by the flowerbeds?” You ask, running a finger over the mark a little too weird looking to simply be another mosquito bite.

She knows she’s not supposed to play near the flowers— the bugs like her a little too much. It’s with a hesitant little nod that she confesses to it. You give her a pointed look. “You’re not supposed to play too close to the flowers,” you remind her, a tiny scolding for now.

With a sniffle she responds, “not by the plowers.”

A little bit of anti-itch cream has her settling, and by the time you return to your bedroom, Namjoon is out cold.

“How old is Yerin turning?” Namjoon asks her at the door, heartbreak clearly painting his features as you help Hyejoo into her shoes.

“Pour,” she beams, her tiny hand held up to show four stubby fingers. She has Namjoon’s pretty smile, an honest look in her eyes that makes you want to put her in your pocket and never let her go. Alas, Yerin’s sleepover party starts at five and Hyejoo has been trying to leave since noon.

“Pour,” Namjoon repeats, shooting you a pointed look as if to say see. He had fought the decision up until the end, had even tried to tactically convince your daughter to stay home by getting a head start on preparing her favorite food. And well. She said no. So now the two of you are stuck having dinosaur chicken nuggets for dinner without her.

She’s got her little travel bag on now, tiny feet stuffed into her ladybug rain boots because it had rained last night and she’s awfully addicted to jumping in muddy puddles. She’s absolutely adorable, your little girl, and you think Namjoon might’ve let out a tiny sob earlier. (Or maybe it was you.)

Namjoon joins you at the front door. “Be good,” he warns her. His eyes are suspiciously wet, but you don’t say anything because yours are too. You’re both crouched in front of her, her big eyes glancing back and forth between the two of you without a care in the world. Mixing your self-assured personality with Namjoon’s (mostly) composed attitude was quite possibly the worst genetic crossover to ever happen; Hyejoo doesn’t even seem remotely bothered by the fact she’s spending her first night away from home. Meanwhile, you and Namjoon are on the verge of a joint breakdown.

Anyway, Namjoon gives in first. “Love you forever, princess,” he tells her, their ritual expression, and kisses her forehead.

She accepts it and then, in an unexpected turn of events, surges forward to hug him around the neck. “Love you pporever, daddy,” she repeats, and your heart feels so painfully full at the sight, like you just unlocked a new life achievement from seeing your daughter and her father be so cute together. You don’t get to coo at them for long, because then she’s giving you a warm hug as well, the same phrase muttered in your ear.

It’s the hardest thing about parenting.

Seeing your kid slowly broaden their horizons, meeting new people and learning new things. Leaving home. (Granted, she’ll be back by tomorrow afternoon but even that feels like an eternity away to the dramatic parents you and Namjoon have become.) The second goodbye on Jimin’s doorstep isn’t any easier, especially when Hyejoo tugs on your arm and asks you to “say night to daddy please” for her, and your heart breaks just a little more. Jimin flashes you an understanding smile but all you want to do is punch him in the nose for ever telling Yerin what a sleepover is.

You get home and Namjoon is in a calmer state by now, some old sitcom he hates playing on the TV. Usually, this time of day is reserved for his daily phonemic lessons with Hyejoo, drilling the f sound into her tiny brain, so you guess this is his preferred method of coping in its place: torturing himself with some boring television show.

“Hey,” he says, and you crawl into his lap with a sad sniffle. “Shh,” he soothes, hand on the back of your head as he guides you into his chest. You’re actually crying now, which is super embarrassing in itself considering you scolded Namjoon for this exact behavior last night. He doesn’t mention it as he pats your back, stupid sitcom paused in favor of soothing you with the deep vibrations of his voice. “Hye’s gonna be back tomorrow, baby.”

“I want her back now,” you huff, vaguely aware of how childish and silly you sound. The tables have turned, and you find yourself wishing you had the same emotional fortitude as Namjoon now. All those parenting books have clearly amounted for something. Somehow, you will the feeling back into your body and pull away from his chest. You must look a mess because he doesn’t even try to hide the amusement on his face. “This is the worst day of my life.”

Namjoon laughs, deep and hearty, with his eyes squeezing shut from the force. “Come on, wifey, those chicken nuggets aren’t gonna eat themselves.”

It’s quite possibly the most boring evening you’ve had in years.

(The internet calls it new parent syndrome, where you’re so undeniably in love with your first child and the parenting experience that the rest of the world is put on pause.)

You love Namjoon, honest. But you love your daughter Hyejoo even more— it’s not a controversial sentiment when you know he’s the same way! —and going back to a regular adult life sans kids absolutely sucks. (Or so you thought.)

Kids are prone to asking weirdly philosophical questions, a fact that had greatly delighted you when Hyejoo first started speaking. Who am I? What’s money? Why not? It could get annoying sometimes, trying to answer all of Hyejoo’s curiosities. But as you begin on your second batch of dinosaur chicken nuggets, all you can think about is how Jimin gets to answer them tonight.

Anyway, seven rolls around and you and Namjoon are bored. You can only watch so many episodes of Seinfield before you get tired of feigning interest, so you retire from the living room for the night. “I’m gonna take a bath,” you tell him, but he’s as brain dead as you by now.

A second later, “lemme join.”

It’s been a while since the two of you have squeezed into the bathtub together, usually assigning each other days to individually join Hyejoo. So it’s really not either of your faults when you realize a second too late how small the space is. One on each end, feet bumping into each other with every movement, it’s like trying to squeeze two feet into one shoe. You try to readjust yourself, but the bath flooring is slippery and you nearly take away Namjoon’s procreative abilities with a mighty kick.

To make a long story short, you end up pressed against his chest, Namjoon’s thick thighs framing you as you relax into the steaming water. Instinctively, he reaches for Hyejoo’s bottle of baby shampoo that sits on the tub’s ledge and only catches himself just as the first droplet is meeting his palm. “Oh, fuck,” he sighs, quickly closing the lid before he can waste any more precious product. “Shit, I’m so sad.”

You snort, sinking farther back into his chest. He’s warm and soft in all the right ways, the hot water making him slippery. “What did we even do before Hyejoo?” you ask, reaching into the deepest crevices of your mind for answers. Namjoon’s hand comes around, fingers sprawled out over your knee, the one you have propped up and breaking the water’s surface

He makes a rather vague sound, something like I don’t know, as he lolls forward, forehead on your shoulder. “Go on dates,” he responds eventually. “Fuck like crazy.”

You roll your eyes. “Besides that,” you chide, pinching the back of his palm. “Don’t we have any hobbies? Any interests?” He doesn’t answer, which is all the answer you need. Why didn’t you get into puzzle solving back when it was a trend? “Is this what our life has become? Crying in a bathtub at seven pm because our emotional support child isn’t here?”

“Our only child,” he corrects. Namjoon tries to placate your looming existential crisis with a kiss to your shoulder, lips against wet skin, that he trails up to your neck. “And what’s wrong with going on dates and fucking?” he murmurs, hands around your stomach. “That’s how we got here,” he teases, and you’re not sure if it’s the warm water or the way his voice is like melted chocolate dripping down your body, but you become all too aware of his presence at that moment. Particularly, of the plush lips mindlessly kissing your shoulder, the wet smack of their motions.

Another kiss, this time right below your ear. It has your head rolling to the side, exposing more skin for him to kiss up on. There’s still that overwhelming cloud of worry in the back of your mind, but it’s gradually nudged away by Namjoon’s warm hands on your skin. Sensing your weakening resolve, Namjoon strikes again. A hand slips down over your stomach, brushes over your belly button and finds itself between your thighs. “You used to love date nights, baby,” he says, the pad of his pointer finger grazing your clit.

It’s been so long since you and Namjoon have been alone like this, months since you’ve been able to touch him beyond a simple make out session, a halfhearted grope beneath the sheets. Your daughter, as much as you loved her, made intimacy impossible for the two of you. She was always around, always looking for one or the both of you, so there was never time to even think about getting frisky.

Only now, with his finger circling your clit, do you realize the blessing in disguise that was your daughter’s first slumber party away from home.

His finger nudges your clit, flicks it teasingly. “Why don’t you let me take care of you, hm?” he hums, the hand that had been soothingly stroking the inside of your thigh coming up to rub at your breasts.

“Yes, please,” you whine. Resting your head on his shoulder leaves Namjoon with a clear view down your front, lips kissing and sucking along your neck. His huge hand palms your breast, massaging the sensitive skin. You hadn’t realized how sore you’d been until now, his nimble fingers pressing deliciously into the skin. If your nipples weren’t already hard before, they certainly were now.

He traps one pearled nipple between two fingers, the sudden pinch making you hiss. “Easy, now,” he chuckles, his low tenor paired with his wandering hands making your eyes roll back.

Namjoon liked to use a higher tone around the house. He read somewhere that children prefer lighter, sweeter tones, so the last few years have been spent listening to him lighten the tone of his voice for the sake of your daughter. The deeper, growlier voice that had first made you fall in love with him became a rarity in your household, reserved for quiet nights in the living room or long drives where Hyejoo was asleep in the backseat. Only then does he unleash the gravelly qualities of his voice.

Then, and apparently, now.

His doll-like lips press against your jaw, suck lightly enough to make your body tingle. “Do you remember how it was the first time?” he says suddenly, his hot breath against your neck.

Namjoon’s got your clit trapped between two wandering fingers, has your pussy twitching with the vibrations of his voice alone. And for some reason, he’s trying to reminisce about your first time sleeping together.

“N- Not really,” you confess, subtly reaching down. You cover his palm with yours, hoping your touch will encourage him to carry on with his actions. It doesn’t. It just leaves both your hands hovering over your pussy, your thighs instinctively closing in on them to keep him there. Namjoon responds to that, releasing the breast he had been gently massaging in order to pry your legs apart. He does it so easily, despite the way your legs feel tight as hell, and the fact makes you whimper.

Once he’s got his hands back between your thighs— this time, he uses one hand to carefully part your quivering lips, the other one gingerly pressing down against your clit to draw the most heavenly sensations out of you —Namjoon feels the need to dive into a recap of your first fuck. “You were so cute,” he laughs, and you don’t know if you should take offense. Well, considering you're married and have a kid now, it’s probably too late to say anything anyway. His hand suddenly switches gears, three fingers joining together to begin caressing them over your throbbing clit. “Kept talking to me so politely, even when you were creaming my cock.”

You scoff, but it gets cancelled out by the moan he draws out of you. “D- Didn’t know you that well,” you remind him, your thighs twitching. You desperately want to buck forward into his giving hands, want to feel the true power of those long, pretty fingers on your cunt.

Behind you, Namjoon’s cock grows thick, his breathing a slow and steady pace by your ear. You can already imagine how heavy he is, the vein that runs along the underside and throbs with each new bit of stimulus he receives. Normally you would reach back and try to offer him the same helping hand he gives you, but your thighs feel wobbly already. Your libido has been dormant for so long that even just the barest flick of his thumb has you dissolving into his arms like this is your first time.

It’s as if Namjoon’s sensing your inner battle, a muffled laugh against the side of your neck. “This is about you,” he reminds you. As much as you want to protest, a sudden hard rub against your quivering lips has you gasping for breath. “Give me a kiss,” he commands softly, nudging his nose against the side of your face. It takes a second for you to ground yourself, draw yourself away from your building pleasure, to turn toward his waiting lips.

Namjoon kisses you slowly, like he’s taking his time with you. For the first time in a long time, he truly can. He doesn’t have to worry about a certain someone waking up in the middle of the night or walking in or anything along those lines, lips molding against yours. Plush as always, the faint taste of dinosaur chicken nuggets clinging to his lips. It makes you laugh a little, drawing away with an airy giggle. Namjoon smiles at your reaction, murmuring a soft, “what is it?”

You shake your head, eyes fluttering shut as he continues his circular motions against your clit. “Nothing,” you pant, finally getting in your first thrust against his fingers. “I just really need you,” you say instead, pushing his hand harder down against you.

You’re feeling a little antsy, having been deprived of this sensation for so long. Namjoon knows this, which is why he very purposely slows down. “There’s no rush,” he smirks, placing a kiss against your chin. “How do you want it, baby?”

The inside of your brain is a scrambled mess, filled with fantasies and ideas that have been plaguing you for months. There’s so much you want to do, want to try, but it’s like your brain completely blanks out when he asks. It’s just as you’re beginning to formulate a thought that you’re interrupted by the sound of your ringtone in the other room. Your husband’s arms tighten around you. “Don’t go,” he says quietly, the tip of his nose running along your neck. It’s so tempting to stay here, to let yourself go in his arms and chase the pleasure you’ve been craving for so long.

But the endless possibilities of who exactly could be calling wins over. Was it work? Was it your parents? Jimin?

It is with a heavy sigh that you reach for Namjoon’s hand, slowly pushing him away from your cunt. “I’m sorry, honey,” you frown, standing up out of the tub. Your legs really do feel like jelly, and you nearly slip and crack your skull on the porcelain edge. Luckily, Namjoon is there to steady you with two secure hands on your waist. “I’ll make it quick,” you reassure him, dropping a kiss on his pouty lips as you fasten a towel around your body.

The phone is just starting up its final ring when you reach it. It’s Jimin, and you’re torn between being thankful that you’re getting word on Hyejoo and full blown panic from the fact Jimin is calling you while Hyejoo is in his care. The unease has you accepting the call without a second more to waste. “Hello?” you say, hand tightening on the front of your towel. Stray water droplets trace ticklish trails down the backs of your thighs.

“__?” comes Jimin’s sweet voice. It’s normally soothing, but right now it has every hair on your body standing on end. Before you can even respond, Jimin is jumping headfirst into a whirlwind of a conversation. “Sorry for calling so late, but I just wanted to check in on you, babe. I know you were really panicked about Hye’s first night away from home, but don’t worry! Me and the missus are doing everything we can to make sure she’s fine.”

His confidence reassures you, lessens the weight that had been sitting on your chest all afternoon. But at the same time, you find yourself wanting to throttle him.

Your gorgeous, sexy hunk of a husband is sitting in the other room, cock at full mast and ready to pleasure you to the moon and back, and here you are listening to Jimin brag about how good of a caretaker he is. You were definitely going to make Jimin pay for this.

Deep breaths, you tell yourself, toying with a stray thread on your towel. “Really,” you drawl, and you can practically see Jimin’s ego swell over the line.

“Yup,” Jimin agrees, and by the sounds of it, doesn’t seem like he’s hoping to end this call anytime soon. You want to shoulder part of the blame; you had been extra sad and mopey when you dropped your daughter off. On top of being a good dad, Jimin was also a good friend. It was only naturally he wanted to reassure you when he could.

Still, the memory of Namjoon’s wet chest was calling out to you.

“The girls are playing princess in the living room with the missus right now,” Jimin chats on. “New dresses and everything— the Yerin Birthday Special —and they asked me to be their handsome prince!” You sincerely cannot wait for the day you get to introduce Jimin to your right fist.

“That’s great,” you offer, not that he’s really listening. He’s too busy talking about Yerin (and making sure to include Hyejoo in for your sake) and how amazing it is to watch your kids grow up before your very eyes. And while you agree with the sentiment, you really wish he had called you and told you this earlier, when you were at the peak of your motherly meltdown. Not now with Namjoon waiting for you in the bathtub. Was the water even warm anymore?

The mind blowing orgasm practically slips from your fingertips the longer Jimin talks. “Anyway! Enough about them. I’m thinking of trying out that blueberry bread recipe that aired on TV last night. You know, the one they had that actress make.”

You’ve just about resigned yourself to listening to Jimin talk about his love for pastries for the next thirty minutes when something brushes up behind you. “What the fu—“

He’s so tall and broad, practically covers your entire frame when he stands so close. And his smile is so pretty when he aims it your way. “Sh,” Namjoon murmurs, gesturing towards your phone.

“__?” Jimin calls. “Everything alright?”

Namjoon nods eagerly, the hands on your waist properly positioning you in front of him. It’s with a shudder running down your spine that you respond. “I’m fine,” you tell Jimin, letting go of the front of your towel when Namjoon abruptly pushes you over. The white comforter infused with both of your scents comes all too close, your elbow barely managing to reach out in time to catch you.

Wide eyed, you turn to throw Namjoon a scandalized look over your shoulder. He meets you with a close-mouthed smile, the dimples in his cheeks making themselves known. His chest is drier now, the smooth planes covered in a thin dewy glow and a spattering of droplets he missed. There’s a towel around his waist that’s barely doing its job, especially when you catch sight of the erection tenting beneath it.

“As I was saying,” Jimin rambles on. Namjoon nods towards the device, refusing to move again until you finally turn back around to finish your conversation with Jimin. “That actress fucked it up so bad. They really give anyone with a pretty face screen time these days, huh? At least I know how to properly preheat an oven.”

You nod. “You do make the best cookies in town,” you respond, a ball of anticipation building in your throat from the mere fact Namjoon is standing behind you.

It’s completely warranted once you feel two cold fingers trail up the back of your thigh, your towel gradually pushed up to drape around your waist. The air in your room is a little chilly, and the goosebumps that raise on your skin are partly due to that, as well as the ghostlike touch of Namjoon’s fingers. “Pretty,” he murmurs, so deep and gravelly it has you shuddering.

Two fingers dance along your skin, and you subconsciously jolt away when they meet the tender skin around your pussy. By your ear, Jimin says, “if I completely fuck it up, we’ll just pretend this conversation never happened. Deal?”

Using your own body against you, Namjoon lets one finger dip just the smallest bit into your quivering hole. You clench up, thighs trembling when he eventually pulls it back out and traces your own wetness over your folds. “Perfect,” you bite out, clutching at the sheets beneath you as Namjoon reaches for your forgotten clit. It’s still so sensitive from your little fun in the bath, and it takes every ounce of strength in you to hold back the whiny gasp in your throat.

Behind you, Namjoon suddenly presses in close. One hand on your hip, he gently encourages you onto the bed. Your knees sink into the mattress, one less strain on your legs. “Good girl,” he praises quietly, rewarding your behavior with a finger sinking into your cunt.

“Joo—“ you almost slip, burying your face into the sheets just in time.

A devastatingly slow pace, his finger just barely moving in and out of you. The bulk of your pleasure is coming from that bundle of nerves towards your front, but the teasing gesture isn’t appreciated anyway. When he leans over you, breath against your neck, you feel the length of his cock against your thigh. “He’s asking you a question,” Namjoon whispers, “answer him, baby.”

You nod, eyes rolling to the back of your head when he presses himself closer. Jimin hasn’t even noticed your lack of participation, mindlessly humming a song. The sounds of a running sink highlight his vocals. “Oh, absolutely,” you babble. “I wouldn’t tell a soul.”

“Ha!” Jimin scoffs. “I knew I could always count on you, Miss __,” he snarks playfully.

The hand toying with your clit comes around your waist, fingers stroking against your folds from this new angle. A silent moan has you writhing forward, unconsciously away from him as Jimin babbles on the other end of the line. He’s none the wiser to the lewd acts happening on the line, listening to the sound of his own voice. Namjoon lands a mean little bite against your shoulder, plunging his finger deeper inside of your clenching hole.

Paired with his teasing fingers, it’s nearly impossible to withhold your moans, biting your lip until it stings. “Fuck, fuck,” you whimper against the sheets, holding your phone as far away as possible from your mouth as a litany of curse words spill from your lips. Namjoon chuckles at your dramatics, not like he has his fingers deep inside of you right now or anything.

“So cute,” he hums, removing his hand from your clit to snatch your towel away. It gives way too easily, messily thrown over the edge of the bed. With your back completely exposed now, Namjoon wastes no time trailing a line of kisses up your spine, finishing off with an especially wet and hard one behind your ear. “Hang up now.”

His permission sets your body on edge, drawing your phone close again. Jimin is talking about dinner or something, you don’t even know. Not an ounce of remorse fills you when you clear your throat and hurriedly announce, “I have to—“ Namjoon’s cock, finally uncovered by his towel, presses against your folds and you nearly lose it. “—I have to go now, Jimin,” you say, leveling your breathing as best as you can.

“Wait, what the fuck?” Jimin says, thrown off by your sudden departure.

The mushroom tip of his cock kisses your clit. “Fuck— I really have to go.” And you hang up, chucking the phone off to the side hastily. With your hands both freed, you scramble onto your back, meeting the amused gaze of your husband behind you. “Fuck me, now.”

Namjoon laughs, reaching for the towel barely clinging onto his waist. One suave swoop later and it joins yours on the floor. “You did good,” he praises, lowering himself between your spread thighs. You roll your eyes, grabby hands reaching for his hips until he’s sitting snugly against you, cock resting over your throbbing cunt.

“Yeah, yeah,” you snap, the tight feeling in your tummy growing with every second that passes. Namjoon isn’t as unaffected as he pretends to be, a pearly bead of cum appearing at the tip of his engorged cock. “Just fuck me now.”

He raises a brow. “Missionary?” As if it’s the first time.

“Is there something wrong with it?” you ask anyway, self-consciously reaching an arm over yourself to cover your naked breasts. They’ve pebbled over just from his stare alone.

Namjoon hesitates, the hand on your hip drawing slow circles with his thumb. Eventually, he responds with a halfhearted shrug. “It’s not the best.” This is news to you, and you find yourself sitting up at the sudden bomb he’s dropped.

He’s still hard as rock between you, his dick laying almost artfully against your slit. You really just want to throw aside all reservations and begin grinding against him, penetration be damned, but now Namjoon’s got that thoughtful quirk to his lips. The one that usually accompanies any big brained idea, so you settle down, nudging him with your thigh until he’s looking at you again. “Penny for your thoughts?” What you really want to say is please fuck me like I’m just another cum rag of yours and make it hurt, but alas.

Namjoon sits back on his haunches. “I read somewhere that on your hands and knees is the best way to get pregnant.” You choke on your own tongue, face ablaze from his forward statement. Meanwhile, Namjoon is looking as relaxed as ever.

You hadn’t really discussed children after Hyejoo. The wordless agreement had been that sure, you were both down for another kid sometime in the future. But the exact date had sort of been murky. Hyejoo is three now, and you heard from another mom that it’s difficult for children with wide age gaps to get along. You don’t want her growing up being far removed from another sibling.

But also, now?

It’s like Namjoon knows your thoughts before you even do. “Alright, wifey, say no more,” he says, leaning down to place a kiss against your lips. “I’ll get the condom, alright?”

And then he’s stepping off the bed, every muscle of his toned body flexing as he swaggers over towards the dresser. He’s a walking dream, the physical embodiment of all your crazy sex fantasies, and he wants to fuck a baby into you. Your pussy says yes, but your rationality is still on the fence.

You roll onto your side, head propped into your open palm. “You want another baby?” you ask tentatively. Namjoon shrugs, carefully opening the new box of condoms you had bought half a year ago.

“It wouldn’t hurt to have another kid,” he answers, procuring a tiny foil packet from the box and returning to his spot between your legs. It’s like staring at a marble statue from this angle, the defined planes of his chest and abdomen, the gorgeous slope of his nose, the sharp angles of his face. You really lucked out.

Your decision comes just as he’s easing the rubber over the tip of his cock, the swollen head just barely enveloped. You place a hand against his wrist, earning his attention. “Take it off,” you mumble, and you swear on your entire life he swells another inch.

“Oh, baby,” he groans, hastily throwing the condom somewhere across the room. He rolls over you, bulging arms sweeping you up into his embrace, lips capturing yours in a sloppy kiss. You whimper, letting his tongue push itself past your lips. When he pulls away, it’s with a wet pop and glistening lips. They’re so puffy now, flushed a nice rosy color, that makes him look even more handsome when he smiles down at you. “Gonna look so pretty all pregnant,” he beams, placing a chaste kiss against you one last time before he’s hurriedly rolling you onto your stomach.

You hide your bashful expression against the sheets, suddenly feeling very shy before him. But then Namjoon’s cock is running along your lips and you’re left a shivering mess. “Please just fuck me,” you beg hoarsely, and Namjoon obeys.

“Whatever you want, wifey,” he teases, and before you can call him out for his cheesiness, he’s pressing his thumb into your aching hole once more. “Is this okay?” he asks, somberly for the first time in what seems like forever.

“I’m okay,” you confess, a little shyly now that you know his true motives.

Namjoon chuckles, quickly removing his finger from inside of you to give your ass one soothing pat. “Going in,” he warns you, and finally, you’re rewarded for all your struggles. It’s only as his mushroom head squeezes in that you realize you could have done with a bit more stretching, but that thought fades away the more and more he pushes in. “Fuck,” he groans, the low intonation of his voice making your toes curl.

If it’s not his voice, it’s the sheer length of his cock inside of you. The girth makes your spine tingle, has you muffling a pitiful whimper into the comforter beneath you. “Relax for me,” he directs, and then suddenly he’s placing a palm against your back, pushing you further down. “Hips up.”

You groan. The normally soft fabric of the blanket feels like hell on your sensitive breasts. “I’m trying,” you whine, pushing back onto him in an effort to familiarize yourself with his cock again. It’s been so long since he’s been inside of you like this, since he’s filled you so well, that your body acts a little stupid now. He hasn’t even begun thrusting and you already feel like you’ll cum just from this.

The angle is different than your usual style, has him moving along every inch of you as he sinks in. Two big hands grab at your waist, manhandling you closer to him until you’re just like he wants you to be. “There we go,” he sighs, and with him motionless, you finally relax. It’s about a two second pause before he begins to draw himself back out. “How do you want it?” he grunts, but it’s lost beneath the moan that escapes you. It’s the same question he asked you in the tub, right before Jimin called, except this time you have an answer.

“Fast,” you gasp, the pain from the stretch finally, finally, melting away as your body grows accustomed to his presence inside of you. “Do it fast, please.”

Namjoon does as he’s told, waiting until he’s pulled out until the tip to satisfy your requests. And then he’s off.

Your body isn’t as young as it once was, left a little worn from the entire child-bearing process. Sometimes you wonder how exactly you and Namjoon would fuck until sunrise before, how your sex drive was so high that it allowed such a thing to happen. Admittedly, there’s currently a stiffness inside of you that has been there for a while now, and you barely remember how you got rid of it before. Apparently, this is how.

Namjoon’s hard cock rams into you once, makes you release the most embarrassingly loud moan at the sudden intrusion, and it’s like all those months of tension that built up in your body are melted away. His cock pushes past your folds, creating a lewd squelching sound that would otherwise leave you mortified to learn it came from your body. You shudder, desperately pushing your ass back against him in a feeble attempt to feel it again.

“Still so fucking tight for me,” he growls, snapping his hips forwards. His skin slaps against yours, leaves you feeling tender from the brutal movements of his body. But at the same time, it feels absolutely terrific.

Your lips are still coated in your own wetness, have him noisily moving in and out. “J- Joon,” you whimper softly, but you doubt he hears it over the sound of his own labored breathing. “More.”

He responds with a sudden piston inside of you that has the tip of his cock nearly kissing your cervix. “More?” he huffs, the hand on your back pressing down until you fear you’ll become one with the mattress. “You want more?” You nod hurriedly, somehow managing to stretch a hand down between you to toy with your clit. The brush of your own fingers has you bucking back onto him in surprise.

Wordlessly, he speeds up his pace, thrusting his hips into your velvety walls at a faster speed than before. It’s a weird sensation, a sort of ticklish feeling m that makes you tremble with each roll forward. You can’t say the two of you have done it in this position a lot, always preferring the more romantic missionary position to anything else, but this experience was quickly making you an avid believer of its validity as a top tier sex position.

You swirl your pointer finger around your clit, trying to sync up your shaky touch with his steady thrusts. It’s useless, because every time you feel like you’ve gotten into the same groove, Namjoon one ups you by hauling you back against him. “Oh, f- fuck,” you sob, clawing at the sheets beneath you.

Namjoon groans, momentarily pausing his rapid thrusts to roll his buried cock against you. “Come on, baby,” he husks, the hilt of his cock kissing your folds.

There’s a lot of built up sexual tension inside of you, months on top of months of nothingness. Not to mention that little scene in the bathtub just now. So you’re not really surprised that your orgasm rears its head so early, curling up tightly in your stomach the longer Namjoon fucks you. He’s back to thrusting now, shallow little movements that make you see stars every time his cock glides inside of you. “Joon, I'm gonna...” you rasp out pitifully, grinding back against him.

“Whenever you want,” he murmurs, leaning forward to press a kiss against your shoulder. It’s sweet, but on top of that, it has him pushing in further than before, finally pressed against that sensitive spot inside of you that makes your entire body lock up. You sob, thighs quivering when he reaches an arm around you. It’s almost romantic how your hands meet, his fingers covering yours as he guides them over your clit slowly. “Give it to me, baby,” he croons, lips pressed securely against your neck. He leaves soft kisses there, smooches really, that make you melt.

Another shallow buck of his hips forward and you’re cumming, breaths picking up until they accumulate into a choked wail against the sheets. “Fuck— oh, fuck,” you cry, your thighs spasming from the force of your first satisfying orgasm in months. Namjoon holds you through it, slowly thrusting inside of you until he’s drawn out your entire orgasm.

The new added pleasure makes his movements sound even wetter, dirtier even. “That’s it,” he purrs, pushing himself back up to his full height behind you. You feel absolutely boneless beneath him, laying limply against the mattress as Namjoon repositions your hips for himself. “Can I finish like this, sweetheart?” he asks anyway, thumbs drawing a soothing pattern along your hip.

You can barely catch your breath, so you settle on a halfhearted nod that has him huffing out a laugh.

For some reason, Namjoon fucks you harder once he knows you’ve had your fill. Like he’s trying to draw another orgasm out of you, but is also the least bit concerned with you. Honestly, it works. He moves fast and hard, like he has no regard for your pleasure, and for some reason that turns you on more than it should. It’s this weird fantasy of yours, to be mistreated by a man as respectful as Namjoon, and you find yourself weirdly fulfilling it now as he fucks his cock into you.

His fingers dig into your skin, wildly bucking into you as he chases his own high, and it’s embarrassing how quickly a second one builds up for you. You moan at one particular thrust, body sensitive all over. “Oh,” you whimper, “Namjoon.”

He grunts, your cries fueling him on as he continues his mad race to the end. “Gonna cum with me again?” he pants, his quick pace rocking you forward. You nod, using your killer grip on the sheets to ground yourself as you weakly attempt to meet his thrusts. “Aren’t you the sweetest,” he hums, and doesn’t let you respond as he continues to jackhammer his way into your pussy at a bruising pace.

It takes a few more thrusts, and one whiny cry of his name— “come on, Joonie,” you whimper, turning to throw him a teary-eyed gaze over your shoulder; he shudders at the sight —until Namjoon is finally tipped over the edge, shooting his pleasure deep into you on the next thrust. It’s warm, paints your walls and threatens to spill out when he finally pulls out.

But Namjoon has read up, using those big strong arms of his to keep you from collapsing onto your tummy as he scrambles around for something to keep your hips up. “It sticks better this way,” he says, a sheen of sweat against his temples when he flops down beside you.

“What sticks better,” you groan, the achy feeling of just having your world rocked quickly settling into your bones.

Namjoon leans forward and places a kiss against your lips, as if saying here, for all your hard work. “You know... it,” he shrugs, hands behind his head as he prepares himself to supervise your post-sex nap, just to make sure you don’t accidentally move around and let his cum leak out. “You did good, wifey,” he praises with another smooch. “Maybe we should let Hyejoo sleep over at Jimin’s more.”

Hyejoo’s return is the highlight of the year.

You pick her up around noon, and your heart nearly grows ten sizes when you see her come running down Jimin’s front steps and into your arms. “Hi, mommy,” she beams, the same smile as Namjoon. And just like Namjoon, you can’t stop yourself from covering her face in tiny kisses. She says they tickle and squirms and squeals in your embrace.

Jimin’s at the door with this weirdly blank look on his face. “Hey, Jimin,” you call out, helping Hyejoo load her bag into the backseat.

“Hey…” he greets, just as Hyejoo frantically begins calling for you to buckle her in. “Um, __,” Jimin says, but you’re a little busy securing the tiny love of your life into her booster seat, so you just throw him a quick glance to let him know you’re listening. Kinda. “There’s something I have to tell you—“

“I wanna see daddy!” Hyejoo babbles from the backseat, wildly waving her hands around as you finally close the door on her. With it shut, her loud voice is drowned out and you’re left raising a brow at Jimin as you round the front of the car.

“What’s up?” you ask.

Jimin comes down the steps, awkwardly hovering by the front of your car. “Um, when we were on the phone—“ Hyejoo knocks her tiny hands against the window, gesturing for you to hurry up. You flash Jimin an apologetic frown at the interruption. “Well, you see. She kinda heard us— well, me—”

Another flurry of knocks, and you can’t wait to relay to Namjoon how excited your daughter had been to see him again. It’ll boost his ego, not that he really needs it to be any bigger. “That’s fine,” you tell Jimin, swinging your door open. Immediately, Hyejoo’s high-pitched voice fills the space between you and Jimin. “You know I don’t mind talking to the missus,” you joke, nudging his side. “She’s my friend too, ya know.”

“Gotta show daddy something!” Hyejoo shouts from the backseat, has this big smile on her face that makes you smile as well.

Beside you, Jimin is quickly falling apart. “No, well—” you drop down into your seat “it wasn’t her who heard—“ You shut the door, lowering the window to thank Jimin one more time. Hyejoo beats you to it.

“Bye, Mr. Jimin!” she says, tiny legs kicking around all wildly in her excitement. You shake your head with a grin, waving goodbye to Jimin one last time as you pull out of his driveway.

“Daddy!” Hyejoo shrieks upon entering your home. Her tiny overnight bag is tossed down at the entryway, ladybug rain boots haphazardly kicked towards the general direction of the shoe closet. Namjoon had been upstairs in his study when you left, but he now comes bounding down the steps at the sound of your daughter’s voice. He cries out a dopey, “princess”, as he scoops her up in his big arms. He does a twirl and everything, so dramatic. But it makes Hyejoo giggle like crazy.

She allows one big fat kiss against her chubby cheeks before she’s shushing him with the news of her announcement. “Daddy, look,” she beams, holding his face between her tiny hands. “I can say the f sound now!”

Namjoon has been avidly working towards this ability for months now. Namjoon, who has spent nights reading every page of every child development book possible, who has spent hours decorating pretty flashcards for her, who has sectioned off time from his busy schedule everyday just to go over lessons with her. Well, Namjoon looks over the goddamn moon at the news.

“Let’s hear it, honey,” you urge, stepping in when his happiness renders him incapable of speech. So he just nods along, looks like a bobblehead doll beside you.

And with both of her proud, sometimes overprotective, parents standing before her, Hyejoo puts on a big grin and says, “fuck.”

#bangtanhq #networkbangtan #namjoon smut #kim namjoon smut #namjoon fic #kim namjoon fic #knj fic #bts fic #bts smut #kim namjoon x reader #kim namjoon x reader smut #namjoon x reader #namjoon x reader smut #mine

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whump-a-la-mode · 4 years

Text

Villainsicle | Part 10

Okay so I know I said I was going to write backstory. But hear me out. I forgot.

On this episode: Will Medic ever make a good choice. Will Villain ever get comfort? Like, ever? Probably not!

Taglist:

@whatwhumpcomments

@sola-whumping

@professional-idiocy

@trappedgoose-in-a-writblr-room

@literally-just-kirby

@teachunks

CW//Superhero whump, villain whumpee, conditioned whumpee, drugging, dehumanization, restraints, muzzles, choke chains, collars, pet whump (kinda), conditioning, forced sedation, just an absolutely unhealthy amount of caffeine

Medic watched as Villain calmed.

They sat on a chair, a simple plastic one, near their patient’s bedside as the various scattered monitors reported on the situation. On the left, the heart rate monitor diligently beeped as a nervous, rapid heartbeat turned to one far more steady. On the other side of the room, the breathing monitor reported much of the same-- shallow breaths grew deeper, slower.

The doctor kept their gaze fixed on those displays until their readings were to their liking. Until they were certain that their patient was asleep.

They glanced over to the bed, in the center of the room. Its occupant’s skin was nearly pale enough to blend in with the white sheets on which they lay. Ever so slightly, they twitched in their sleep, struggling unconsciously against the padded restraints securing their wrists to the bed frame. Such a measure was likely unnecessary, but it meant that Medic had one less concern. Their already-weakened patient wouldn’t be going anywhere, not anytime soon.

With a sigh, they braced their hands against their thighs and stood.

They hadn’t been especially concerned about Villain’s escape in the first place. The captive had learnt their lesson from their earlier escape attempts, certainly, and their weakened, nervous state didn’t hurt. Besides, the base was built as a maze. Any escape attempt wouldn’t go very far.

This wasn’t about that, though.

Medic took one last glance at the monitors before pushing open the steel door to the room, not so much as bothering to lock it. It was late--far past midnight, at this point. Far past the hour at which the others retired to their quarters. The only other waking souls in the building would be the few scattered guards, and perhaps Leader, pacing in their office.

That wouldn’t be a problem, though.

Ensuring that their footsteps stayed quiet, Medic moved through the labyrinthine halls. They passed their quarters, and Leader’s office, moving further and further into the base’s core. They did not stop until turning down a barren hallway, at which point they at last halted, before a door marked with little more than a simple plate.

“Lab,” it was labelled.

It had been too long since they’d been able to visit. In the early days of the resistance, it was where they had spent nearly every last second of their time. Now, there were far too many injuries to treat. Far too many reports to make. They hardly had time to sleep, much less time to return to their old stomping ground.

Medic slid a key into the lock, and entered.

The room was barren. Other than the thin layer of dust that seemed to coat every surface, it was immaculately clean. Every last device had been put away, secured in the various meticulously labelled cupboards. The only object remaining on the tables was a computer-- a simple laptop.

The only thing Medic had taken with them.

They sat at a chair before the computer, prying it open. Some of the dust had even managed to sip in beneath the device’s lid, coating the screen and keyboard. A quick swipe of the hand sent it, flying off into the air.

The laptop groaned for a moment, fighting to start up. When, at last, it did so, a familiar screensaver illuminated Medic’s face.

“Property of Organization. Unauthorized Use Is Unlawful.”

It was almost nostalgic.

They entered their password, smiling as the desktop appeared before them, scattered with folders and files and memos. Selecting the right one was almost muscle memory.

Again, the computer whirred, struggling to remember the contents of the old file. After a few seconds of waiting, at last, the video sprung onto the screen.

Medic had no concern about Villain’s escape. No, they knew such a thing was impossible. This was why they had waited for them to fall asleep. So they wouldn’t see this.

It was going to be a long night, they knew that. The black coffee they had drank would ensure Medic would be awake for all of it-- the Secobarbital they had mixed in Villain’s food would ensure the exact opposite.

The video was old, its file having been passed between far too many computers and flashdrives. The quality was starting to fray around the edges.

Medic couldn’t care less.

They pressed play, and after a moment of digital whining, the first video began.

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

Counselor looked up as, with a thud, a cup was placed on the table in front of them. The smell of coffee overwhelmed their senses a moment later.

“It’s decaf.” Hero’s voice came. “You look like you could use the sleep.”

“Thank you.” Counselor smiled, picking up the still-scorching coffee and taking a sip, even as it threatened to burn their tongue. It was black, without a hint of sugar or milk-- not the way they usually took it, but right now, they could hardly care less.

Hero sat down across the table from them, a can of Sprite in hand, in place of his own coffee. Sweat glued their bangs to their forehead.

“You okay?” They raised a brow at Counselor.

“Hm? Oh. Yeah, I’m fine. Just tired.” They tried at another smile, though this one came off far weaker. “Where have you been? I’ve hardly seen you.”

“Leader’s had me off on missions. Four in a row. I’d be lying if I said I’m not tired, too.”

“You just got back from one?” Counselor guessed, raising a brow.

“How did you know?”

“You look like you just ran a marathon.”

“Oh.” Hero laughed. “Yeah... I guess. What, uh, what are you up to? Leader said you’ve been sitting here for like, three hours.”

“You talked to them?”

“Yeah? Is... there something up with that?”

Counselor shook their head.

“No. I’m just- I’m sorry. I’m just tired.”

“Maybe, then... It’s time to put the folders down and get some rest.”

Hero’s gaze turned to the manila yellow folders spread out in front of Counselor-- some marked with coffee stains on the edges.

“What’s in those, anyways?”

“Uh..” Counselor flipped through the folders; closing some, sliding them about, shifting papers between them, before finally flipping one of the folders around so that it faced Hero. “It’s about Villain.”

With those words, they flushed. They’d hardly been able to think about anything else but their captive, recently, and they had to admit that it was verging on becoming an obsession.

Hero pulled the folder closer, opening it and examining the papers within. There were hardly any. Most consisted of printed-out screenshots of security camera footage, or transcripts of radio communications, or emails.

“Leader isn’t really the record-keeping type.” Counselor began. “I think you know that. We have some stuff, though. Most of it is just kinda random, stuff we used once and then shoved in a box somewhere. This is all the records I’ve been able to find, about them. About Villain. We’ve only seen them a couple times, though... There’s not all too much to go off of.”

Hero furrowed their brow.

“Have you been able to find anything in these? I don’t, I mean I don’t want to be rude, but-- Counselor, these kind of all look like crap. There’s nothing here,”

Counselor flushed again, chuckling under their breath.

“I know. That’s the thing.” They dragged the folder back towards themself, flipping it back around. “I know we don’t really keep records, but, I thought there’d be something to go off of.”

“Is there something you’re... looking for?”

“I guess.” They closed the folder, putting it atop the rest of the manila files. “I mean, what do we know about them? Really. That’s not a rhetorical question.”

“Uhh...” Hero looked as though a light bulb had gone off above their head. “You have a good point. I mean... their name is Villain. They control technology. Uhh, they had people with them? Sometimes? Like, two of them.”

“And that’s it.” Counselor sighed. “We don’t know where they came from. We don’t know who they work for.”

“Do you...” Hero lowered their voice. “Do you think they work for Supervillain?”

“I guess it’s possible.” They dipped their head. “That’s the problem. We have no way of knowing. We don’t really know anything about them. I don’t... I don’t know how I’m supposed to help them. If I don’t know anything about them.”

“Help them?”

Counselor shook their head.

“Don’t worry about it.”

“I- Help them with what?”

Counselor bit the inside of their cheek.

“They’re sick. Or something like that. There’s something wrong with them. They collapsed, the other day. Leader has given Medic full medical custody-- permission to do whatever they think is necessary. I want to help but... I don’t know how to help someone who may as well be a ghost.”

They’d expected a sympathetic nod, or some quiet words. They hadn’t expected Hero to push their chair back from the table.

“Well,” Hero began, “Who would know? Where do we start?”

“I-” The words woke Counselor up more than any coffee ever could. “I guess Villain would know. Unless they’re some kind of amnesiac, they’ve got to know their own past, right?”

“Right.”

“And then... Leader? Maybe? They seem to act so weird around Villain. Maybe they know something we don’t?”

“Makes sense to me. How about I talk to Leader, and you talk to Villain?”

“Well,” Counselor widened their eyes, averting their gaze, “I don’t know if Villain... I don’t know if they trust me. I don’t think they do. I can try, but...”

“Well, you won’t gain their trust by sitting here.” Hero raised a brow. “I’ll talk to Leader. You earn Villain’s trust. Okay?”

“Okay, uh, okay!”

The two stood at the same time. Counselor turned to leave, ignoring their coffee, but was stopped by Hero’s words:

“We’ll go do that, after you get some sleep.”

By the way they spoke it, Counselor knew that the demand was nonnegotiable.

“Fine.” They sighed. “Tomorrow, then?”

“Tomorrow. Sleep well, Counselor.”

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

The video began.

Medic couldn’t say they recognized the person the screen depicted-- they had probably seen them before, once or twice, but their name eluded them.

They stood, straight-backed and grinning, in a room made of white tile on floor, walls, and ceiling. Their attire was confident-- they wore no armor or guards of any kind.

The only equipment they had was a leash.

The strip of leather attached to a collar-- one made of metal links, chained together, with inwards-facing spikes around the whole circumference. The choke chain was looped around the neck of a far less confident looking person, their jaw gritted against a muzzle and their eyes practically blazing with raging flame. The fact that their arms were tightly bound behind their back did not stop their attempts at struggling-- they yanked and growled against their bindings, despite wincing every time the spikes of the collar tore at their flesh.

“Hello.” The presenter smiled, as if they didn’t notice the grappling of their captive. Medic’s Latin skills were somewhat rusty, but they could still understand the speech, for the most part. “And welcome. If you’re watching this, then you have very likely found yourself assigned as a new handler for our Assets program.

Now, I understand that there has been considerable confusion regarding this program.”

The prisoner attempted to trip the presenter. A quick tug on the sharpened collar around their neck quickly stopped the attempt. Throughout, the presenter did not so much as break eye contact with the camera.

“The Asset program is a new endeavor. So far, we have had considerable success with various test cases. As such, Supervillain has advised that we expand our efforts.

As you are probably aware, the process of creating an Enhanced person is very complicated, and does not always work as planned. Unfortunately, not all those who go through the program end up being entirely themselves, or entirely loyal to Organization. Before, this was not a problem. However, now that we have lost the capability of creating new Enhanced, at least for the time being, we must work with what we have.”

With the hand that did not hold the leash, the presenter grabbed directly at their captive’s collar-- on the outside, where there were no spikes. They dragged them closer by their neck, until they were looking at the camera. The prisoner whined in pain against their muzzle, clearly struggling to breathe.

“Some of these Enhanced turn to our side easily, with enough incentive. Others, unfortunately, are far more stubborn. They are the focus of the Asset program.

Through the program, these unusable prisoners can be turned into valuable soldiers. Several victories have already been attributed to them.

I understand that this likely seems like quite the daunting task. But, in all truth, an Asset can be trained as easily as any dog. Through this video series, I will demonstrate how this can be done.”

With a smile, the presenter moved towards the camera.

“I’ll talk to you again in the next video. Bye!”

The video froze, and after a moment of whirring, another video appeared in its place. Medic clicked play.

#whump #whumpblr #whump community #hero villain whump #villain whumpee #conditioned whumpee #pet whump #powered whumpee #villainsicle #superhero villain #hero villain trope

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gossip-girl-of-middleearth · 3 years

Note

Please tell us about the cinema, I beg you

Oh boy...that accursed night. If you think fanfic plots are chaotic, just wait for this story.

Story under the cut:

So, I just got this job at my small town’s local theatre. I genuinely enjoyed it, and was quite content with the way things were going—fun shifts, cool coworkers, and a nice boss. So I thought.

I was only two weeks in when the “incident” occurred.

At the theatre, we had to collect a walkie talkie radio at the start of every shift, and sign it in and out with a piece of paper in the office.

It was a little clunky and annoying when cleaning cinemas with vacuums, but nothing to cry over.

One night, I’m put to work with a new supervisor I hadn’t met before and some new coworkers (they’d all been there a while, but this was my first shift with them).

For a little context, I’m 19, and most of the other employees were like 15-17. So, I was basically being bossed around by pretentious, power-tripping kids. Fun.

King Kong vs Godzilla had just been released, so of course, the theatre was packed that night — 130 people per room.

Now, we usually have 20-30 minute intervals between sessions to clean the cinemas, but with the release of a new movie, it was cut down in half, sometimes less.

I was cleaning the most popular cinema that night, and was first told to take my time, as it needed to be spotless. Also, side note, can people please not throw popcorn everywhere? It’s a pain to clean. Then again, I don’t work there anymore nor ever will, so do what you want, I suppose.

My little coworker told me to take my radio off my belt and put it aside to get a good vacuum going through each aisle, as it apparently made it easier, as the cord would sometimes get wrapped around the radio stem.

Fair enough.

I did so, and left it on the wooden platform of the rows to begin vacuuming. He leaves and I get to work.

However, he comes rushing back a few minutes later and says, “what the hell are you still cleaning for?? We’ve got a hundred people waiting outside???”

I’m over it™️ at this point because I only took this job to see the behind the scenes of how a cinema works. I shrug and go, “okay”

I pack the vacuum up and try to leave hastily, as he’s being very antsy and pushy.

He gets frustrated and grabs the rest of my cleaning crap to leave, and tells me to hurry up behind him.

My hands are full and I can’t grab the radio, so I say, “what about the walkie talkie?”

I swear I hear him say, “leave it, there’s no time!”

I shrug and think it’s weird, but trust him to know better.

However, once I dump my crap and prepare to leave, as a hundred people are pushing in behind me, my intuition tells me to grab the walkie talkie.

I rush back in to where I left it, and find it missing

I have a brief moment of “oh shit”

However, I think to myself, “it’s okay, you only took this job for shits and giggles. If they fire you, you have your other job anyways. What’s the worst that can happen?”

If only I knew.

An hour goes by into my shift, and I’m cleaning another cinema with the same coworker. I’ve kind of shoved the walkie talkie thing to the back of my mind, because I was doing a closing shift that night and could probably get away with not facing my manager about the sign out sheet.

However, at one point the boy goes, “where’s your radio??”

Sheepishly, I say, “uh...I left it in cinema 3, like you told me to?”

He sort of pales and I think this little skinny high schooler is about to pass out.

He starts yelling at me and tells me that I need to get my flashlight and start checking every single row in there.

I go, “fuck no, the movie is still going? You want me to flash a torch in the peoples’ faces during King Kong?? The one cinema hosting the entirety of the sweaty balls side of reddit right now???”

He gets very shitty and says, “I’ll do it myself, wait here.”

By now I know I’m in the shit, but shrug and remember I can always escape through the vents if need be.

Now, there was this really fucking annoying 15 year old boy I was working with that night, who’s the definition of the “well aCtUaLlY” guy irl

He comes sprinting into the theatre I was cleaning, and starts literally interrogating me over this walkie talkie. Like, he thinks he’s the “bad cop” or some shit. Other coworkers closer to my age had already warned me about him before I even met him.

The other boy I was working with apparently couldn’t find it, and just didn’t want to deal with the consequences that night so much, that he called his mum to come pick him up early.

Weakling child.

It was at this point that I quietly arrived at the conclusion of “they think I stole it”

I didn’t understand why, it’s a fucking walkie talkie? What’s the big deal? Go get a Dora the Explorer one to replace it from Target??

I let my inner Mickey Milkovich come out, and play cool.

Him: you fucking stole it

Me:

This 15 year old Ben Shapiro-looking fucker starts grilling me, and literally places me under theatre arrest. I wasn’t allowed to leave the room I was cleaning, in other words.

He gets uncomfortably close—just me and this weird boy in this dark theatre—and goes, “I want you to be brutally honest with me...did you take the walkie talkie? I won’t tell the manager that you did.”

If you guys know me well enough from my blog, then you know this boy suffered a great deal of aggressive sarcasm in response.

He gets pissed (brown-noser), and tells me to continue cleaning, as he leaves the theatre.

Only ten minutes go by until he comes back, but this time with “good cop”.

I roll my eyes, and turn the vacuum off.

They stand at the bottom of the cinema blocking my entrance with their arms folded, and start interrogating me about stealing it.

I give them some more Mickey Milkovich sarcasm, as I had already explained to them a hundred times what happened.

They involve the manager (snitches) and now I’m really in trouble.

They force me to go into the cinema whilst the movie is still playing to look for it. Begrudgingly grabbing my flashlight, and preparing for rightfully angry people as I search their crotches in the middle of a highly anticipated movie, I head inside theatre 3.

Fuck doing that though, I watch the movie instead with the people and eat some popcorn.

Figuring a reasonable amount of time to search had gone by, I sadly leave the cool laser battle scene, and head back out.

Me: “I searched and couldn’t find it.”

Power-complex 15 year old with a punchable Ben Shapiro face: “Did you look everywhere in the cinema??”

Me: “Yeah, I shoved a flashlight up seat 33’s asshole and checked it myself.”

Some more pissy exchanges take place, and I’m told to go clean another cinema.

I’m having fun at this point, because I’ve worked enough jobs to know this situation was being dealt with incredibly immaturely by the other staff.

Regarding accidents like these in the workplace, and given how big the cinema chain is, they should know insurance covers a simple walkie talkie, and that assuming the new employee stole something which is misplaced is a bad way to integrate them into your company. It’s simply a bad look for your business.

I’m cleaning another cinema when all three come in, and tell me they’re going to put cinema 3 on lockdown when the movie ends, and check everyone’s bags.

I’m amused at this point, so I really just go “damn bro that’s wild”

They do exactly that, and it’s as awkward as you can imagine.

People are angry and annoyed—all 130 of them at 9:30pm huddled in a group, having their bags searched for a damn walkie talkie.

After discovering no one had actually stolen it, like I said, they start interrogating me again.

“Are you sure it was cinema 3??? Is your memory perhaps failing you???”

“If I say yes, will I go home sooner?” (my shift ended 15 minutes ago, and I wasn’t allowed to leave)

Naturally, I stayed another 40 minutes, and had to search the entire building. I’m talking arcade, toilets, offices—everywhere.

It is eventually deemed completely lost, and I basically end the night saying, “well, I ain’t about to strip nude for you all for a full body search, and although I’ve never had such a fun shift anywhere else, I’m not a fan of work environments that promote skepticism and cohort-wide distrust. I ain’t coming in next week, or the week after that, or the...well, I think you get the point.”

I leave my badge behind, and basically book it out of the cinema an hour after my shift was supposed to end. I worked illegally longer than I was supposed to, and wasn’t given the legal shift break.

I received text messages and emails from the head office shortly after, asking if I was coming back, and ignored them for a little while, as although I can handle irl confrontation, virtual ones spook me?

Anywho, the walkie talkie actually costs $1000, but as mentioned before, I, an adult, recognise insurance covers these sorts of things, especially in companies as big as these.

So, moral of the story, don’t leave 15 year olds in charge of adults, because most of the time, they’re too young to realise what insurance policies are :)

#I have so many more stories like this #and I’m pretty sure I left a few good details out #but it was like 2 months ago so I don’t remember #was a wild night #and I can’t wait to tell it around a fellowship campfire #or to my kids #I’m not kidding when I say I am literally Alvin the chipmunk given how many times I get myself into trouble and sticky situations #xoxo gossip girl

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the-lincyclopedia · 4 years

Photo

* adapted from @librajiminn on twitter

A fun game to celebrate 2020 ending! The rules are simple: recommend your favorite OMGCP fics so everyone can enjoy them, while trying to fill in enough slots to get a bingo!

This is going to get long, so I’ll put it under a cut. Also, I’m too orderly to try to shoehorn my favorite fics into these particular prompts, so I’m just going to go right to left, top to bottom, taking the prompts literally, until it’s bedtime.

1. first fic you bookmarked: “Here Comes the Sun” by @doggernaut, 19k, G, no warnings, Zimbits

For the past month, the man with the baby and the sad blue eyes has been stopping in for a cup of coffee an hour before closing. He always sits in an overstuffed chair in the corner and drinks his coffee while his baby sleeps next to him in the stroller. Sometimes he pulls a book out from the diaper bag he carries with him; other times he just stares straight ahead as if in a daze. He never asks for a refill, always respectfully gathers his things and leaves ten minutes before the shop officially closes. Eric desperately wants to ask him what his story is.

My notes: I read Check Please over the course of two days in June of 2019. On the second day, right after catching up, I looked at @peppermintfeminist‘s AO3 bookmarks and found a fic by @doggernaut. Then I read just about everything @doggernaut had ever posted. It was glorious. This fic in particular is so cute.

2. most recent fic you bookmarked: “Flight Check” by @edgarallanrose, 15k, E, no warnings (though there is a creepy/handsy guy at a club to watch out for), primarily Zimbits with most of the other popular pairings in the background

Flight attendant Eric “Bitty” Bittle has been working his way up at Samwell Airlines for the past four years, and his new promotion has provided him the opportunity to work with a brand-new crew. Unfortunately for Bitty, that crew includes an incredibly handsome but equally grumpy pilot, Captain Jack Zimmermann, who seems to want nothing to do with Bitty. Even worse, Jack refuses to eat any of Bitty's baked goods. Will Bitty be able to win the captain over? Or is there another reason Jack has been avoiding Bitty?

My notes: There are a lot of great things about this fic--Jack’s character arc, Lardo’s dialogue, that scene in Seattle--but the reason I bookmarked it is the scene where Bitty’s basically slut-shaming himself and Jack gently but firmly tells Bitty not to do that and that it was the creep’s fault.

3. a fic that made you cry actual tears: “a little bit more” by @ivecarvedawoodenheart, 14k, T, no warnings, Holsom

“I just wanted,” he says, “a perfect day. With you. Because it’s our last day together and our last day being here as undergrads and we’re kissing the ice tonight, and the weather’s supposed to be beautiful, and you’re moving tomorrow and Holtzy I just — I don’t want to be missing you already.” Holster wipes his eyes before he even realizes he’s crying. Behind him, Ransom sighs. “One more day where everything’s the same,” he says, feeling around blindly for Rans’ fingers. He feels Rans nod as he laces their fingers together. “Yeah. Yeah, Rans. I’d like that a lot.” __________________________

Holsom after graduation and throughout the subsequent six months after Holster signs to an expansion team in Oregon, and realizes his feelings for Ransom too late. Holster's POV :) kinda angsty, but there's a happy ending :)

Inspired by shitty-check-please-aus: "Holster moves to Oregon while Ransom stays on the east coast. The time difference makes it difficult to talk and one day they wake up and realize they aren’t best bros anymore."

My notes: I almost never cry at fics. I searched “tears” in my fandom email account and only a handful of my fic comments came up, but Syd is a literal master of Holsom angst, always.

4. longest fic you’ve read: “Like Real People Do” by @xiaq, 153k, M, No Warnings, Kent Parson x OC

Parson gestures with his spoon toward Hawke. “So am I allowed to ask about the service dog or is that not PC?”

“My medical history is more of a 3rd date conversation," Eli says.

“Oh? Why’s that?”

“Because. No one sticks around afterward and I like to live in glorious denial for a short period beforehand.”

It comes out more self-deprecating than he intended.

Parson looks…thoughtful. “Well, does this count as one or two?

“Pardon?”

“This. Ice cream. I mean, technically it’s a second location, but still the same night. So is this one date or two?”

“One,” Eli says firmly. “If it’s happening within the same three-hour period.”

“You’re the expert,” Parson says, which, he’s really, really, not, but ok.

“So still two dates to go then?” Parson continues.

“I—what?”

“We’ve got a roadie coming up but then we’re home for almost two weeks. When does your semester start?”

“You want to do this again?” Eli asks.

Parson stops idly twirling his spoon.

“You don’t?”

He does, Eli realizes. He really does. Because apparently he actually likes Kent fucking Parson.

My notes: Okay, this fic has my whole entire heart. I’ve read it multiple times in its entirety, and it’s almost twice as long as the full-length novel I’m querying. Eli is one of my favorite OCs I’ve ever seen in a fic (probably tied with Damian Navarro and Ari Paxton, both brainchildren of @fozmeadows). Anyway, this is probably going to be the next thing @themeaningoflifeischeese and I read out loud to each other.

5. a fic you almost didn’t read: “when all else fails (i’ll still be right here)” by @whoacanada, 6k, T, Creator Chose Not to Use Archive Warnings (and I don’t remember if I think there’s stuff to warn for, sorry), Zimbits

The National Hockey League is resurrecting the Quebec City Nordiques, and the expansion draft hits the Falconers much harder than expected.

My notes: Given that this was for @omgcpheartbreakfest, I was worried this would be all angst--all hurt and no comfort. Which made me sad, because I love @whoacanada‘s writing but I wasn’t up for reading unresolved angst. But @doggernaut reblogged the fic, so I asked if the ending was sad, and it’s NOT! There is quite a bit of angst but the ending isn’t sad.

6. a fic that convinced you on a ship you didn’t ship before: “it drops with the gravity of rain” by @geniusorinsanity, 16k, T, Creator Chose Not to Use Archive Warnings (attempted sexual assault by an OC), Nurseydex

It happens like this:

“I don’t--this is a bad idea,” Dex says, his lips still tingling, his hands shaking on Nursey’s hips where he’s shoved him away. “This is a really bad idea, Nurse. I can’t--We can’t do this.”

And there’s hurt in Nursey’s eyes and his bottom lip is swollen from Dex’s teeth, but he says, “Okay.” And then, “It’s chill, Dex. Just friends, then.”

It happens like this:

“Actually,” Nursey says, talking more to his granola than to them, “I kind of have a date.”

It happens like this:

When Nursey calls, Dex almost doesn’t pick up the phone.

My notes: So I was really confused and a little disturbed when I first found out people shipped Nursey and Dex. Like, Dex just wasn’t someone I trusted. But then I was moving out of the house I’d been living in, and I needed stuff to listen to as I packed and cleaned, and @khashanakalashtar‘s podfics came in clutch. I gave this one a try even though I didn’t like Dex, and @geniusorinsanity blew. My. Mind.

7. a fic from an unusual POV: “Excuse Me While I Kiss This Guy” by @porcupine-girl, 8k, G, no warnings, Zimbits

Jesse Snowden knows all the best restaurants and gourmet food shops in Providence, so when Jack Zimmermann starts bringing in incredible baked goods, he's eager to find out where the new bakery is. When he meets the man behind the pies, he decides that there's no way Jack could really appreciate this guy's talent the way he does, even if they are friends. He starts hiring Jack's chef on the side, in the hopes that maybe once Bitty's done with college he'll come work for Jesse.

Good thing there is absolutely no way whatsoever that Jesse could possibly be misinterpreting this situation.

My notes: Oh my gosh this is so funny. The secondhand embarrassment factor is huge, but like, the hilarity.

8. a comfort fic: “Don’t Need to Compromise” by @khashanakalashtar, 11k, E, no warnings, PB&J

“Hey,” said Kent, unknowingly setting off a chain of events that would change his entire life, “you said that like you know from experience. Have you done this before?”

Jack and Bitty have not done polyamory before, but they do know Ransom and Holster’s polycule, which contains March.

And March?

March is trans.

My notes: I’m in love with @khashanakalashtar‘s entire Directionverse series (and honestly a lot of their other writing), but “Don’t Need to Compromise,” which is the second fic in the series, just makes my heart swell especially much. The gender feels are so good, and all the characters are so good to each other, and when I listen to this on walks I have to actively try not to arm-flap.

9. a fic you wish could be a movie: “Ice Crew Please!” by @petals42, 61k, T, no warnings, Zimbits

Jack Zimmermann was drafted first by the Providence Falconers when he was eighteen years old. He is good at hockey. Very good. His team won the Cup his second year and now, in his third year, they are looking good. Jack should be on top of the world. And some days, he manages to convince himself he is.

He’s not, of course.

Enter the Ice Crew.

AKA: The Ice Crew AU

My notes: This fic has its tender moments, but what I love most about it is the sheer goofiness. Ransom and Holster and Shitty are HILARIOUS in this one. I’d love to see their shenanigans in movie form.

10. a WIP you read as it was updated: “Something Borrowed” by @fozmeadows, 48k, M, no warnings, Kent x OC

All things considered, Ari did his best to prepare himself for the advent of Kent Parson, Potentially Difficult Housemate and New Star Liney. The problem was that his best was an idiot.

My notes: So technically I didn’t start reading this until the first 19 chapters were posted. But there was still plenty of anticipation for the final few chapters. And like, @fozmeadows (as mentioned above) makes EXCELLENT OCs. And I love how their fics consistently convey that having bad things happen to you does not mark the end of your story.

Okay, it’s bedtime, so have 10 excellent fics. I got bingo twice, because I went straight across on the top two rows.

#mine #omgcp #omgcheckplease #check please #fic recs

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homebody-nobody · 4 years

Text

touch me someone

HIIIII it’s your favorite fic writer back from the dead with TWO whole fics real close together maybe I’ll finally become a consistent publisher?!? we can dream. Anyway. JJ and Kiara are my new Bellamy and Clarke I guess so enjoy this VERY angsty smutty hurt/comforty poetic nonsense the idea for which would not leave my brain til I wrote it. Please for the love of god read this bc I actually kind of love it and need validation or concrit or literally any feedback at all bc my none of my irl friends like this show so pls interact/comment

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ao3

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He pulls away from her, and his eyes are wide but dry as his chest heaves. He looks wild, uncaged and raw, the moonlight turning his blond hair white and his blue eyes into pools of silver. Tragedy and shock have destroyed him, the chains he’d wrapped around his brash, heedless, unending want twisted into shards by an explosion of hurt and grief. He has always been the victim, the boy left behind in empty rooms with nothing but loss and bloody fragments, told to piece himself back together. Finally, they’ve taken the last thing. When he told John B they had nothing to lose, they still had each other. And now, he doesn’t even have that.

But she’s still here.

--------------------

Touch me someone

I’m too young to feel so

numb, numb, numb, numb

You could be the one to

Make me feel somethin, somethin.

The Phantom went down around 8:30 PM. Or maybe 10:30. Kiara doesn’t remember. She only knows that the hours between then and now have felt like a lifetime and also no time at all. Like she’ll turn and John B will be there, behind her shoulder, laughing at something JJ said, Sarah hanging off his arm; but also like the world is dark and will be dark and has been dark forever. Like the sun will never rise after this. Like the storm took the light and heat from the world just like it took her best friend.

Later, she’ll learn that John B’s official time of death is listed as 8:34 PM, when they stopped trying to establish radio contact with him and Sarah. Later, she’ll watch news stories about the manhunt for Rafe Cameron and the scandal of Ward Cameron’s property being left to his second wife, rather than his remaining daughter. Later, she’ll get an email from an internet cafe in Bermuda and her whole world will flip upside down one more time.

But now, she is laying in her four-poster bed, watching the ceiling fan lazily trawl the same, tired circle, listening to the pull-chain tap not-quite-silently against the glass fixture. Now, her hair still damp from the shower that her mother made her take, eyes stinging from sharp wind and tears not yet shed, the inside of her mouth shredded and sore from the hours she spent chewing on her lips, the world is too quiet, too peaceful. The crickets outside sing soft and gentle, just like they have every night her whole life, and the texture of her comforter, the quiet harmony of the night, the soft click and whoosh of the fan -- it all feels so chokingly familiar, like spiralling back down to earth after spending weeks dipping in and out of orbit.

She wants to scream until her throat is raw, sob and fight and unleash herself on every single adult that hurt John B, that brushed him off or refused to help or wouldn’t listen to him. She wants to gut Ward Cameron for ripping everything away from John B, first his father, and then the gold that was his by right. The gold that was theirs. She wants to rip off Rafe’s skin piece by piece until he’s in shreds at her feet. She wants to eviscerate his father with the same gaff hook he used to rip apart those two mainlanders and ruin John B’s life. She’s so full of hurt and grief and anger that her fists keep clenching white-knuckled in her blankets and she wants to bring down the sky itself. But at the same time, she’s haunted by that same emptiness that followed her after Sarah’s childish betrayal, like she’s watching it all from the outside.

She can’t sleep. She won’t. Sleep is just an escape, a place to forget, and she’ll have to wake up and remember what happened all over again, remember the rush of hope and the hours of adrenaline and apprehension that ended in a tragedy none of them could have ever predicted. What child foretells death?

Rolling over, she presses her face into her pillow, smothering herself until her lungs force her to turn her head for air. She opens her eyes, no less heavier than they were hours ago. Her throat tightens like tears are about to well up, to spill over and stain her sheets, but they don’t come. Itchy and claustrophobic, she throws back the sheets and paces over the smooth boards of her room, bare feet making soft noises over the lacquered wood. She has to get out, to make sure that she didn’t dream up the whole goddamn thing.

She dresses quickly, throwing on denim cutoffs and an old drug rug that cycled its way through at least two of the boys’ wardrobes before landing in hers. She doesn’t know where she’s going, doesn’t know what she needs, but she throws her wallet, her charger, a flashlight, and her water bottle in her beat up backpack, and, on second thought, a toothbrush and some deodorant. She picks up her keds and tiptoes down the stairs, avoiding the creaky eighth stair.

The key rack is empty, and, chastising herself for believing her parents would leave the car keys out after everything she’d pulled in the last few days, she rocks on her heels, assessing her options. The most prudent one is probably just to go back to bed, given the usual risks of going out at night as a teenage girl, the massive punishment that looms in her future, and, now, the lack of a vehicle. But the thought of returning to her stale room, skin crawling and mind racing at a standstill, makes the decision for her. She slips out the back door, making sure to catch the screen door before it slams, and digs out her bike from next to the garage. The tires could use air and the gears are misaligned, but it still rides, and it’ll get her… somewhere else.

Her original intention is to go to Pope’s house, mostly because it’s closest, but then she thinks about how she kissed him earlier that afternoon -- and God, was that just this afternoon? There’d be implications, now. Showing up in the middle of the night, throwing pebbles at his window -- it would mean something. So she stands up on the pedals and pushes past his street, floating like jetsam through the night.

She ends up heading for the chateau, which is where she was going all along. After her family moved to the outskirts of figure eight just before high school, it was the only place that felt like home anymore. She cruises deep into the cut, where even the smell of the air changes, from freshly mowed grass and chlorinated in-ground pools to gasoline and oil, rotting seaweed and the salt marsh.

The little house sits in the reeds, ramshackle and welcoming as ever, tired and reaching under the moon. It’s empty and forlorn, alone on the edge of the edge, out past the main cluster of the cut, pushed past the tideline, separated from the rest of the flotsam by a freak wave. The Routledge boys never fit in, even with the outcasts, and they made their home like they knew it. Skidding to a stop in the gravel driveway, the sting of tiny rocks against her bare ankles is the only thing she’s really felt in hours. Her heart picks up, skipping over itself as her memory stumbles over all the years seeping out of the wind-weathered boards and the sinking foundation.

Again, it feels like this would be a moment for tears, like the sight of John B’s house, the memory of Big John’s booming laugh and all the bonfire-scented nights on that sagging porch should mean enough to make something in her crack, to finally shatter the glass walls of shock and let the grief come pouring in. But it doesn’t. She just stares up at the chateau, one part of her aching for the ease of a found family she’ll never get back, the other dreading the fate of the little house.

The breeze changes directions as she stares up at the rickety shutters and holey screens, bringing with it the tinny sound of music played out of a cell phone in a solo cup, a noise she knows well. Her stomach drops to the hard-packed dirt, crashing there with her bicycle and sending up a cloud of dust. Maybe John B survived. Maybe he made it back to shore, and he’s laying low, doing that stupid, chivalrous thing he does, trying to protect them by not letting them know. Maybe he’s out by the shed in that old metal lawn chair, Sarah in his lap, exhausted and defeated and alive. But as she gets closer, the moonlight glints off tawny waves crusted with sweat and salt, and the momentary, wild hope crashes and ebbs away from the shore.

JJ hears her, of course, sitting up in the hammock and turning toward the sound of her flat-soled sneakers slapping the dirt. “Hey,” he says, his expressive face, for once, inscrutable.

“Hey,” she says, slightly out of breath from the sprint. “I thought you were…” she trails off, because he knows. Because he’s the only one in the whole world who can look at her and understand the cathedral dreams and vaulted memories crashing down in her chest.

“I’m not,” he says, an answer that belies more than either of them knows. JJ gets this look, when he’s seconds away from doing something particularly concerning (and usually criminal). Manic energy lights up in his blue eyes, burning anywhere from mischief to stubborn determination to full-tilt rage. The well-developed muscles in his shoulders and arms refuse to relax, and his hands get so fidgety they lose the coordination it takes to flip the zippo lighter between long, practiced fingers. His face fights with itself, half already spitting with well-steeped anger, the other tired, and broken, and grieving.

“I noticed,” she responds. She drops her bag on one of the metal folding chairs, dooming it to a coating of flaky, faded paint. Crossing the grass, hoping her broad strides will disguise the rattling breath in her chest, the shake in her hands, she moves to sit next to him in the hammock, and he shifts his weight to allow her.

There’s no verbal communication, no squabble about personal space or indignant demands she find her own seat. There never is, not with her boys. The Pogues. It seems so silly now, hiding behind that name for themselves, a name she’d never really belonged to, anyway. He’s holding a lit joint in one hand, a bottle dangling from the other, and he offers her one while swigging from the other. The old favorites of a Maybank in crisis. She takes it.

He falls back next to her, sending the hammock swinging as he gazes up at the stars. Sarah had known the most about constellations, of the five of them, but JJ knows a fair amount, too, some of the only memories of his mother the nights when she would hold him under the stars, tracing the designs across the sky, her hand wrapped around his tiny one. His eyes keep drifting off the sky and landing on Kiara, eyes distant, bathed in moonlight.

“He’s not dead,” JJ says, surprising himself as much as her. He sits up, and she follows. He stares at his feet for a while, and she thinks about putting her arms around him. “I --” he picks his head up to look at her and stops, voice stolen by the hope in her eyes. “I’d feel it,” he finishes lamely, and watches the spark die.

“The first stage of grief is denial,” she says, and it’s supposed to be at least slightly lighthearted, but it falls cruelly to the crabgrass.

“You sound like Pope,” he counters, and there’s too much weight to that name to throw it around for long. They’re both thinking of Kiara kissing him, and the memory is pleasant to neither.

She doesn’t really know why she did that. Maybe it’s because he’s everything she’s supposed to want, intelligence and ambition and ingenuity, everything she tells herself is important in a guy. Maybe because he’s in love with her. Maybe because she’s definitely in love with one of her best friends, and he’s the one who makes sense. She takes another hit and hands the blunt back to JJ.

“I’d know,” he repeats, and she knows it’s not her he’s trying to convince. He lays back in the hammock, putting the blunt between his lips and dragging deep before tilting his head back and blowing the smoke into the tumultuous night. She looks back over her shoulder, watching his jaw and the movement of his throat as he exhales. Laying back next to him, she tries not to think about the warmth of his skin against hers, the strength of the body pressed to her side. It’s only JJ, the same reckless, stupid asshole who carried that damn pistol everywhere all summer and has a talent for getting into trouble. He’s not giving her butterflies with his proximity, and she’s not thinking about reaching down and lacing her fingers through his.

Eventually, JJ flicks the roach into the darkness and stands as quickly as he can without tipping Kiara out of the hammock. She starts, not realizing she was dozing on his shoulder until it’s gone. “It’s late,” he says.

She stands as well, tucking her hands into the pocket of her sweatshirt as he kicks at the dirt. “I don’t --” she starts, and the hesitation makes him stop his nervous movement, meeting her eyes. “I don’t want to go home.” He opens his mouth to say something, but she interrupts him. “I can’t go home.”

“Okay,” he says, after a second. He doesn’t want to be alone, either. She nods, and walks past him, picking up her bag. He follows her up to the house, and they stop at the foot of the stairs to the porch, staring at the buzzing light. JJ takes a stuttering inhale Kiara pretends not to hear, and he goes up the stairs first, wrapping a shaking hand the handle to the screen door. He pauses before going in, frozen, and it isn’t until she lays her hand on his shoulder that he summons the courage to push the door open.

They knew the place was going to be tossed, but it still hurts Kiara and kills JJ, to see the overturned table and scattered papers, the couch cushions scattered on the floor and the coffee table flipped. He tries to shuffle backwards, to run from the sharp, fresh grief and the deep, familiar ache of loss and violation, but Kie is in the way, and when he turns to escape she catches him, her arms around his shoulders, his clutched around her waist. “I can’t --” he chokes, his face pressed to her neck, “It’s not --” his breath speeds up, his shoulders shaking. “They --”

“I know,” she says, swallowing down tears, herself, in that same small voice from the night in the hot tub. She knew JJ was broken, on that deep, fundamental level that, intellectually, she could conceptualize, but she could never feel. But that night, seeing the bruises on his ribs, damning as fingerprints, the ghost of his pain, the whisper of breath knocked out and the brush of betrayal, turned her chest inside out. This feels the same way, watching him lose the last shred of some semblance of home to the same kind of mindless anger and selfish authority that claimed the first one. “I know.”

But she’s still here. “Kie…” he breathes. She opens her mouth to reassure him again, but then his hands are on her face and he’s kissing her, deep and rough and desperate. She bursts into flame underneath him, paralysis broken, stupefaction overcome, as the glass walls she’s been watching through crack and shatter at her feet. JJ’s hands wrap around the back of her neck and spread across the small of her back, pushing her up against the door, and she twists her hands into his shaggy, sun-streaked hair. Every desperate question is met with his touch, and she chases it, even as he pulls away in horrified shock.

“Fuck,” he gasps. “Fuck, Kie, I’m so sorry --” He tries to shove himself away from her at the instant she curls her fists in his shirt, and it almost rips as she pulls and he slams back into her. Teeth clash and noses bump and it’s not perfect or soft or loving, but passion born from desperation and terror of what it would mean to stop. Putting his hands on the door on either side of her face, he pushes himself off of her, even as she tries to yank him back. “What are we doing?” he asks, in a voice that won’t like the answer.

“JJ,” she gasps, pushing her fingers back up to tangle in blond, salt-sticky waves. “Shut up.” Pulling his mouth back down on top of hers, she gasps into him as his hands come down and frame her ribs, one of his arms sliding around her waist and the other pushing back up into her hair.

“Don’t you think --” he tries, even as he leans over her, their breathing ragged, his knuckles white in her impossibly soft curls. His forehead is pushed to hers and he can’t pull away any farther, sucked into her gravitational field, helpless to it.

“I don’t want to think,” she insists. “I want this, I need this,” This momentary pause is already too long, and if he stops kissing her, stops touching her, the tears she’s been holding back will crash over her and they won’t stop. The dark room is loud with heavy breathing as she catches the scent of him, salt and sweat and smoke. “I need you.”

His grip falters and the momentary relaxation has her pressing herself against him. “Are you sure?” he asks, and this is a choice, now. This isn’t something that either of them can pawn off as a mistake made in the heat of a desperate moment. He wants this, has wanted it, ever since he met her, but he won’t be a decision half-made, won’t take advantage of vulnerability only to become a regret. He’s giving her a way out, knows her pragmatic nature and her anxious need for well-thought plans. He wants her to think, even if she’s desperate not to.

He’s right, when he almost never is, but she knows that if she waits too long or lets in the doubt that expects her, she will break. “JJ,” she gasps, “Please.” His name, she knows, he can’t resist, not when paired with urgent pleading, and in this way, she makes her choice. He surrenders to her.

They fall onto the creaky pullout, still set up from JJ’s most recent stay, not minding the sheets and blankets wrought asunder by the angry police search. He can’t let go of her, his hands pushing up her sweatshirt, dragging over her sides and up her thighs, tangling in her hair like he’s drinking her in with his touch, intoxicated with the smell of peach in her hair and the taste of sweat on her skin. Kiara lets herself get lost in him, ride the wave of desire pushing through her, moans and gasps when he hits the right spots and closes her eyes as he lifts her shirt over her head and attaches his lips to her neck, his hands finally coming up to cover her tits, and the long careful fingers she’d spent so many afternoons watching prove adept at twisting and pinching her nipples and leaving her begging for him.

She almost rips his t-shirt off, pulling his bare chest against her own and letting the feeling of skin on skin light her up, setting fireworks off behind her eyelids. Wrapping one hand around the arm holding him up, she can feel his teeth on her neck, and she knows he’s leaving marks, and, for once, it doesn’t feel like she’s being claimed. She knows what it is -- proof this is happening, that they’re alive and feeling and crashing together again and again. She sinks her nails into his bicep as his fingers skim below the waistband of her shorts, and feels him smirk against her lips.

“Yeah?” he asks, and the teasing in his voice is tortuous and reminiscent of his old, humorous self, just enough to make her sad for a moment, and when she nods quickly in return, it’s a bid to forget that sadness. His fingers flick open the button of her shorts and as his fingers dip lower, the only thing she can think about, the only thing she can feel, is his touch, his all-consuming presence, radiating heat. The bastard takes his time, her only gratification the press of him against her hip, hot and hard. He teases her through her underwear, and she can’t say she doesn’t enjoy it, arcing into his touch, shocks of pleasure building in incredible anticipation, but he’s going too slow, and he’s wearing too many clothes, still, and the intense want gnawing at her has too much potential to turn into grief.

“Would you just --” she grunts against his mouth, cut off on a moan as he presses his fingers against her clit. “Fucking -- ah,” he works slow, hard, circles, enjoying himself as she tries to form sentences with his hands on her. “Fuck me already!” Because even this can’t be easy, not between the two of them. Because she’ll always be fighting with him, even with her bare chest pressed against his and his hand down her pants.

JJ grins, scraping his teeth over her ear. “What,” he says, still teasing, still bittersweet, as he finally pushes his hand into her underwear, “aren’t you enjoying this?” Slowly, much too slowly, his fingers part the lips of her cunt, pressing down over her clit before finding the wetness further down. JJ practically growls as his middle finger dips between her folds and he finds her soaked, dropping his forehead against the forearm braced above her head. “Fuck, Kie,” he moans, and he can’t disguise the wasted crack in his voice. “God, you’re so fucking wet.” He’s already drunk on her, every new sensation dragging him deeper.

“Your fault,” she stutters as he puts his hands, lean and strong and practiced, to good use, dragging slick fingertips back up to her clit and teasing small circles, rough, calloused skin creating delicious friction. And this -- this is what she was so desperate for, to feel only his touch and the way he pushes her higher, closer to an edge far away from the bleak grief of their every day world. He moans, too, as he dips his middle finger into her and she keens into his mouth, and she’s not thinking anymore, only chasing heat and skin and pleasure, the rest of the night foggy and distant, moonlit and blurred.

She doesn’t even know how much time passes before he’s kissing his way down her body, only that he’s fucked her so well with his hands he has three fingers inside her and she’s asking for more. He pulls his hand away and she lets out an embarrassingly high-pitched noise at the loss of contact, only to end on a gasp when she opens her eyes to see that he has his fingers curled around the waistband of her shorts and his face is hovering near her hips, pupils blown wide as he looks up at her. He asks her something, but blood rushes in her ears as her heart pounds and her chest heaves and it isn’t until his tongue darts out to wet his lips that she realizes what he’s saying.

“Fuck, yes, please,” she whines, and it feels like less than instant before her shorts are on the floor and his head is between her legs, his tongue on her clit, and she screams, pushing her hands into his hair as his mouth launches her higher and keeps her there, wave upon wave crashing over her until her legs are shaking, and when she feels the pull deep in her stomach and he takes half a second to breathe, she has enough presence of mind to yank him back up, slamming his lips down onto hers, tasting herself there.

“Inside me,” she gasps, ragged and raw and scraping. “Now.”

“But you haven’t --” he breathes, and she reaches down, shoving past the waistband of the shorts he’s still wearing, her hand on his cock stopping him dead.

“Now,” she repeats. And then, leans up to kiss him, slightly softer than before, as if in apology for being so rough, but more as a distraction as her hands unbutton his shorts and shove them down his thighs, her hands finding him again and stroking his cock until he’s gasping into her mouth. “Unless,” she says between short kisses, trying to keep her tone light, even as her cunt aches for him. “You changed your mind?”

He scrambles out of his shorts and boxers so fast it’s almost funny, but the laugh falls out of her chest as he braces his forearms on either side of her face, pushing her hair back from her forehead and looking at her so carefully it almost hurts. “I don’t have a condom,” he says, uncharacteristic worry trembling in his voice.

“I’m clean,” she says, her hands reaching up to tangle in his hair once more, to ground her, and disguise their shaking. “You?”

He nods. “What about --”

“I have an IUD,” she says, more grateful than ever for her liberal mother and her own presence of mind.

He licks his lips again, eyes dropping to her mouth before flicking back up to her eyes. “Last chance,” he says, like she’s going to change her mind and push him off of her, run off into the night and leave him here, disgraced and embarrassed. “Still sure?” he asks, like he’s expecting her to say no. She nods without hesitation, caught in his blue eyes, turned cobalt in the half-light. He kisses her one more time, and it’s laden with years of things he hasn’t said, and she surges up with urgency, not ready for the tenderness in his touch. JJ tries to slow her down again, to revel in the moment of bare skin and vulnerability, no matter how guarded it may be, but she reaches down, wrapping her hand around his dick, guiding him closer to her, and he’s falling into her touch, into her orbit, helpless.

She draws him inside her, his forehead dropping to her shoulder with a forsaken, heavy breath. It’s too soft, this moment before he moves, too easy to break, every sense on fire. The air is too close to her skin, too tight around her arms, like she could rip the fabric of it with the barest movement. She wants to be lost in him again, to feel separate, far away and floating above herself, not so torturously in her body, JJ trembling and present above her. “JJ,” she says, opening her eyes to find his, a split-second mistake, the next word hitching on its way out of her chest. “Move.”

He does, mercifully lowering his face to press against her neck, the eye contact too substantial, too burdensome to hold. The bubble surrounding them expands as he works her up to that blissful edge with ease, his mouth letting out a stream of filthy words about how good she feels surrounding him. Closing her eyes, she tilts her head back, letting her hands have free reign over his back, his shoulders, his arms and up into his hair, every place she wants to touch him when she watches his ridiculous muscles ripple under his young, tan skin. He shifts his weight, hooking her knee over his hip so his cock hits exactly the right spot with every thrust, and she cries out, racing higher.

She should have expected that JJ likes to run his mouth -- she only catches parts of what he’s saying, things like ‘so fucking hot’ and ‘sound so fucking good’ and ‘so fucking wet for me’ and as her moans increase in pitch and volume, he growls “c’mon, Kie, cum for me,” and she falls apart. He fucks her through the aftermath and she barely knows what noises are coming out of her mouth, her nails digging angry welts in his back. Just when she thinks she can’t take anymore, he tenses and spills inside her on a half-broken sigh.

Her vision sharpens as he rolls off of her, collapsing on the squeaky bedsprings, and the house is too quiet all of a sudden, the air once again too close. Her breath slows, the sweat cooling on her skin in the soft breeze pushing through the wooden walls, the still-open front door. Neither of them says anything, and Kiara can feel him looking at her, his blown out smile too loud in the fallout. She sits up, almost flinching at the light touch of his fingers on his spine when he picks up a strand of her hair. “I’m gonna pee,” she says, finding her underwear and pulling them on, and then, after half a moment, pulling his discarded t-shirt over her head.

Her head echoes as she steps over the scattered mess to get to the bathroom, like she’s walking through a tunnel. Her legs ache and tremble, and she wraps her arms around herself, numb and falling. She fights tears as she washes her hands. The bathroom is, as always, a deplorable mess, products everywhere and hair all over the sink. Her green bikini top is still on the floor from when she’d forgotten it just the other day, and that girl feels impossibly far from the one staring at herself in the mirror, wearing her best friend’s shirt while he’s naked in the next room. There’d be shame, and guilt, too, if the smell of John B’s deodorant didn’t choke her with overwhelming loss. Bracing her hands on either side of the sink, she can’t hold it back anymore, and sobs spill out of her, harsh and echoing in the small space.

JJ is behind her an instant, half-dressed in basketball shorts and drawing her into his arms, tucking her close to him, her tears hot on his skin. “He’s gone,” she whimpers. “He’s really gone.” He doesn’t say anything, just guides her back to the pullout and straightens the blankets enough for her to fall in. She curls up on her side, crying so hard she can’t breathe, and he climbs in across from her, pushing one arm under her neck and using the other to pull her against him, his lips pressed to her forehead.

Tears leak out of his own eyes, silent and soft to her earth-shattering grief. “It’s gonna be okay,” he reassures her, fighting the quiver in his own voice, his chin shaking with the effort of it. He stares into the empty darkness above her head, every jerk of her prone body another crack in his breaking heart. “He’s coming back,” he says, more to himself than her. “He’s coming back to us.”

When she finally quiets down, the betrayal of dawn is beginning to lighten the sky, the moon fading, and the idea of this night being over feels impossible. For a short while, they breathe each other in, her forehead pressed to his collarbones, his hand trailing up and down her spine. Her head aches and her eyelids fall heavy over gritty, exhausted eyes, but she still fights sleep, stubbornly resisting another day, the beginning of a life without John B and Sarah. “I can’t stay here,” she says, finally, pushing back from him. “I should go home.”

He reaches up to catch her chin as she watches her hands curled close to his chest, reluctant to go. “Kie,” he murmurs, lifting her gaze to meet his. He moves forward to kiss her, and she flattens her palms against his skin, stopping him even as her eyes fall to his lips.

“JJ,” she says, an exhale more than his name. “We -- I mean, I --”

“Shit,” he sighs, and it almost sounds like a laugh, formed from expectations he wished hadn’t come true. “Okay.” His eyes flutter close, and she watches him draw back into himself, close all the doors, like he wants to turn off the lights and pretend he’s not even here. But then, he looks at her again, gently smoothing a curl behind her ear. “It’s just --” he starts, and inhales again, wetting his lips as he struggles to keep his eyes on her deep brown ones. “Can we go back to normal tomorrow?” Her eyebrows push together a fraction of an inch, and he focuses on the wrinkle there, a thousand times easier than holding her gaze. “Please,” he says when she inhales to say something. “I don’t want to be alone.”

It’s the first time either of them have been completely honest all night, and the most he’s said in hours. “Yeah,” she says, agreeing without thinking. Making it about him instead of admitting to herself that she wants to stay, that she doesn’t want to be alone either. “Yeah, okay.” She allows herself to be kissed, to be held and kept softly. JJ twists his fingers in her curls, skims his lips over her hairline before pressing his forehead against hers.

He tucks his hand against the side of her neck, his fingers spanning from her ear to the juncture of her neck and shoulder. “It’s gonna be alright,” he promises, and they both pretend he’s saying it to her. She’s seen JJ cheerful and stubborn, breaking and angry, seen him a thousand different ways. But never like this, kind and soft, quiet in the grey, grieving dawn. Eventually, she falls asleep under his touch and reassuring whispers.

The morning is just as sticky and unforgiving as every other that summer, and she wakes up damp and sticky with sweat. JJ is stretched out on his stomach, arms tucked under his head, mouth slack and hair falling over his eyes. Her head still hurts, and now so do her back and thighs, and she stretches her hand out across the rumpled sheets, tracing the red lines she’d left down his back. He blinks awake, closing his mouth and freezing when he feels her touch on his skin.

“Hey,” she murmurs.

“Hey,” he replies.

She waits for him to say something, but he just watches her, his clear blue eyes unflinching. She bites her lip. “I should get home,” she says, keeping her eyes on the knuckle tracing over his back, his gaze too heavy to hold.

“Yeah,” he says, “okay.” Neither of them move. The world waits on a hair trigger, and JJ’s more familiar with this kind of silence than she is. She wants him to break it first, to be the impulsive hothead he always is, to make the choice for both of them. But he doesn’t, and the moment crumbles, and she sits up and goes in search of her clothes.

He doesn’t say anything until she stoops to pick up her bag, sweatshirt in hand, ready to shove it into the biggest pocket. “Kie,” he says, and she stops dead, looking up at him. She doesn’t know what she wants him to say, but she deflates anyway when he just asks “my shirt?”

She’d forgotten she was wearing it. Pulling it off, she feels his hungry eyes trace up her bare chest as she untangles the drug rug before pulling it down and arranging it around her hips. She tosses him the shirt, and he holds her gaze as he flips it right side out and tugs it on. They stand on either side of the disheveled living room, daring the other person to say something, move, do anything first. He knows what he wants, what he can’t have, what he’s convinced himself he never will. She remembers the line she drew, the boundary she’d very clearly set. He chooses to respect it while she waits for him to break the rules.

Birds sing in the unflinching morning, and a breeze stirs the hair around her face. She slings her backpack over her shoulder. The sun blazes as gulls call and waves lap against the dock. He tilts his chin back, like he always does just before a fight. She turns to go.

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friendlylocalwhumper · 5 years

Text

“Hello?”

Emory flicks his thumb across his phone screen, watching the email preview turn red and disappear. Deleted. It’s boring, sorting through emails, but kind of addictive in a droning, productive way, too. So he skims through previews, swipes, and scrolls as Lux answers his phone.

“Uh… u-uh, um…”

Lux sounds uncomfortable. Nervous. Thumb pressing on the screen, holding an email in limbo between seated in his inbox and flung into nonexistence, Emory glances up to see his boyfriend staring at the floor, shoulders scrunched up with tension.

It doesn’t feel good to watch Lux. To invade his privacy, to seem controlling. Emory looks back to his phone and lets the email fly. Forces himself to read the next one.

“You don’t - you can’t…” Lux’s voice catches in his throat and fades as he listens to whoever called him. “I don’t want to,” He says quietly, hesitantly. He’s afraid.

Who could he even be talking to? The only people who would call Lux, that Emory can think of, are Anders and Alex and Kiara, and none of them would get this kind of reaction out of him. Maybe there’s someone else in Lux’s life, in his past, that he hasn’t shared about? It took him a long time to bring up his parents. Maybe it’s someone he knew when he was young.

There’s a little sound. Emory stares hard at the email he’s opened, not reading a word of it. Was that a whimper? Or something metal creaking, some hinge squeaking? Whoever’s on the phone can’t be bad enough that Lux would make a tiny, scared sound like that. He’s not even sure if he actually heard it.

“No. You can’t… you can’t make me.” A pause. Lux glances over at Emory, and they lock eyes; the warlock is pale, terror leaving marks like the little wrinkle between his eyebrows, the little indent in his bottom lip from biting it. “No. My answer is no.” His voice is more firm, now, like he’s bolstered by seeing Emory, being supported with silent, confused concern. He stands a little taller, sets his shoulders with flimsy, but at least attempted, confidence. “And you - you can try. B-but, but, I wo-on’t make it easy.”

Lux lowers his phone, blinks, taps the screen. Lets it drop to the counter.

“You okay, Curls?” Emory asks, deliberately holding still, no demand for answers in his tone. Lux is trying to be brave. He might crumble, anyway, looks like. It’ll help to stay calm.

“Uh-mmmh… um, I-I…” The warlock pats the counter, pats himself, steps back with a shaky breath. Like he’s trying to remember what he was doing, or to find something to pick up and work on to look casual. His thoughts are scattered. “Yeah. M’fine. Just… did you, hear any of tha-at?”

“Yeah. Your side of it. Sounds like someone was stressing you out. Trying to get you to do something?”

Lux nods. Glances at his phone, clicks it on, clicks it off, shoves it in his pocket. “He was… he wants… it was the Hu-unter.”

“What?”

“The Hunter, he, called me-”

“What?”

Lux flinches, even though Emory’s voice is pitched with nothing more than shock. “...Called me, to say. He-e had an id-... idea, and, he wants to… he thought of something and he wants to do it. To me. Like I’m…” He closes his eyes and shakes his head, crossing his arms, before looking back over at his partner. “Like I’m still in his house, in a corner somewhere, and he can just pull me out and throw me down there again when he feels like hurting me. I don’t - I don’t wanna. Ev-ven if he says he’ll let me go, after.”

His phone forgotten on the couch, Emory stands, shaking his head. “Yeah, no, fuck no, Lux, you don’t have to. You said - you said no, right? I heard you say no.”

“Ye-eah, I - I said no. To h-him.”

Emory’s stomach turns as he watches Lux shudder. As he sees that skin already paled with terror go a couple shades closer to looking sick. As he wonders how Lux has been hurt, in the past, for saying no to that man.

“Will it work?” Emory asks, captivated, mortified. “Saying no?”

One shoulder - a shoulder that must be hurting from the tension wound through him after that call - inches up in a half-shrug. “Don’t think so. I could - I could ward the house. Ward myself, I guess. Hide, or something. But he can get in my h-head. Undo it, see anything coming. S-so… um, it mi-ight be easier to just, to just go.”

“No, Lux. You can’t. He’ll hurt you, he won’t let you go, and I’ll have to wait, wait for you, and you’ll come back all…” He falters, overwhelmed. Lux knows. Lux knows full well how it’d go, and how far it would set him back in his recovery. He knows what the Hunter will do to him, and how inescapable he is, how inevitable it is to get hurt again. Emory can’t accept it, but Lux had to, years ago. Like he’s still in the Mindfucker’s house, just pretending to be safe until the man wants to drag him back down and break him again.

Lux looks torn. It can’t be easy for him to even consider withholding what the Hunter wants. Emory gets a sudden unwelcome, horrific mental image of Lux, younger and alone, cowering in chains, presented with a single choice: shatter openly on command, or die.

Finally, he speaks. “...O-okay. Um… well, I, I did say no, already. And I… have a lot of magic. Maybe, ma-aybe Anders knows something that can help, a charm or a gem or something, to protect me. And I can just… ward the house, and stay inside, and try to - to k-keep him out of my head. Ma-aybe he’ll give up?” Lux is shaking where he stands. Emory’s heart is going to burst with pride. “Maybe, I can, I can, I don’t have to, le-et him have me?”

“Yeah, Lux,” Emory agrees, letting all his hope shine through. “You can. You can do this.” He steps around the kitchen island, arms open. Lux flinches, steps back - hesitates, trembles, closes the distance and hugs him, hard.

“I-I don’t wanna go, I don’t wanna b-be good for, for, for him, ag-gain,” Stammers the warlock, dragged from casual comfort to utter terror with one thirty-second conversation over the phone. “I wanna sta-ay here.”

“You can, honey. You can stay here. He won’t get you. And if he does, somehow? If it’s all too scary and you’re hurting and he gets you? I’ll get you back home. You’ll be okay. No matter what, Curls, it’ll pass. Nothing’s ending, okay? You get to be safe. He’s not getting you back.”

A shard of a dry sob sounds over Emory’s shoulder. “I don’t wanna die down there.”

“You won’t. You’re gonna die old and sitting in the garden you and I plant, honey, we have a plan. No stupid hunter is gonna ruin our plan. I promise, Curls, it’s gonna be okay.”

#drabble #whump #mine #lux #emory #afraid #stuttering #strong #shaking #past trauma #disobedience #isn't he so brave!#look at lux saying no to the hunter!#wow i'm sure this will have no consequences!

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dust2dust34 · 4 years

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Four Walls (Of Law Firms and Honey) - Olicity AU, Explicit

Summary: Oliver is Felicity’s boss at Queen & Queen, a prestigious international law firm. She’s the tech genius, he’s the top dog’s son, and they viciously disagree on nearly everything. Despite that, they work together, neither outright acknowledging the ever-present simmering attraction that has slowly been growing hotter and hotter…

Until a chance meeting at a grocery store one night has them crossing a line, a tiny little line that was never meant to be crossed.

A collection of ficlets in the same ‘verse: Of Law Firms and Honey.

Rated: Explicit

Full fic: AO3 | Tumblr | Timeline

Reminder: This is not a story about love. This is a story that ends in love, but it definitely does not start that way.

Please read the story tags and notes at the beginning of each chapter.

This fic is being told out of order. Please see the timeline to read them in order. Please see the previous installments for additional author notes and story information.

Check out the Four Walls playlist, and if you have suggestions, I’d love to hear them!

Additional A/N: This was originally intended for Olicity Clue, but I’m super late on that now. My prompts were Felicity’s glasses, Queen Consolidated, and Isabel Rochev. This is partially written for a Fic For Food Drive I’m taking part in (please check out the details here, and consider donating!), and I say partially because I intend on writing something else in this series for a generous donor.

(read on AO3)

10:06 p.m. Queen & Queen

“There you are. Of course you’re in the last box I check.”

Felicity fished out the honey, destroying her beautiful packing job in the process. Her stapler fell over and the Doctor Who mug she used for her pens and pencils tipped precariously against the tray filled with projects she wanted to finish. Projects you should probably delegate since you, you know, have people to delegate to now. Felicity made a face. Yes, fine, it was a logical idea, but they were hers, damn it. It was her blood and sweat that had made them, and she wanted to finish them the way only she knew how.

Not very boss-like of you.

“Learning curve,” she grumbled. She pulled the bottle out with a triumphant, “Ha!”

Silver caught her eye and she inched her door open to see the letters fully.

Felicity M. Smoak Director of Information Technologies

With a smile, Felicity brushed her fingers over her new title like she had, oh, twenty thousand times over the last two weeks. Her name, on her door, on her corner office - her huge corner office with glass walls that turn opaque when you click a switch, and a bathroom, and a couch… Everything was looking up. She was settling into her promotion, she was getting dinner with Caitlin and Barry this weekend, she had been given leeway to hire more techs to go along with being given the reigns for setting up the system at the new Queen Consolidated…

Everything was good.

Her computer dinged.

The smile evaporated as she spun to her desk.

“No.” Felicity hurried over to her computer. The thick area rug she’d bought first thing muffled the smack of her bare feet until she hit the marble floor again. “You’re not supposed to find anything, what are you finding?”

She landed in her chair with a plop so hard it sent her chair - an ergonomic monstrosity that still reeked of plastic from being packed away - rolling. She grabbed her desk to stop from crashing into the credenza behind her. The honey bottle got in the way and she tossed it away, sending it rolling into her still-steaming mug. Tea sloshed over the sides, but she barely noticed. Her eyes were too busy bouncing between the three screens before her, looking for what had made that very specific noise that had all the hair on the back of her neck rising.

Foreign code was in the system.

In her system.

“Frak,” Felicity breathed, attacking her keyboard. “Frak.”

A few keystrokes later, the alien code popped up on the middle screen, and she was ready to launch into a full-on attack…

Felicity frowned.

It was her code.

“What the hell?” she whispered.

It had her framework, her technique, but it was nothing like what she used here, at all. And nothing she had used, considering it was missing her signature. Which meant someone else had used her code on her servers. And simplistic as it was, it was still hers and very capable of doing damage. Which it had, she discovered with a curse, as she dug deeper, tripping over holes where files had once been. Not that it was hard - everything this person had touched was a flashing red hot mess that she would have eventually found anyway because they hadn’t even tried to cover their tracks.

So it was stolen and sloppy.

“Oh. Hell. No. You steal from me, and then you use it on my servers, and you don’t even try to pretend you didn’t? Do you even know who you’re messing with? Ooh no, no, no…”

It took all of twenty-three seconds to follow the trail.

She expected it to be from outside the building, to lead back to some whippersnapper who didn’t know who she was, and who was about to learn that when you mess with her company, you’re messing with her…

But it didn’t.

It led to a terminal right here in the building: QQ112.

Her chest hollowed, buzzing filling her ears, scorching heat numbing her fingers.

It was impossible to remember who was assigned to every computer at Queen & Queen. A handful stuck in her mind from her technician days. The attorneys who barely knew how to open their email. The users who lacked any common sense when it came to downloading any old thing they found on the internet. Those who thought they hid their browsing history on the extremely not-safe-for-work side of Reddit, and those who didn’t even bother. The ones who insisted on fixing problems themselves and always wound up making it worse.

And Oliver Queen’s computer.

She fought to breathe as she stared at the letter and number sequence. She waited for it to change, to become something else, attached to someone else, to not be this. But nothing happened.

Except something had happened, hadn’t it?

Ice scored her insides.

She had shown him that code months ago, before anything had happened between them, back when she thought he might have been a friend. She had shown it to him as a courtesy, to teach, to spread the knowledge and maybe make Queen & Queen better by association. Not to use it against his own firm’s servers. Not to use her code on Q&Q’s servers. If someone who knew half of anything happened to be in there, they would be able to spot it.

They would be able to trace it back to her.

“Son of a bitch.”

Rage tore into her gut.

“What did you do?” Felicity growled. She went after the code with a fervor that had her keyboard scooting over the desk with every furious keystroke. Her eyes darted across her screens as she used everything she could think of to find out exactly what he had been doing. Angry tears filled her eyes, but she blinked them away rapidly with a harsh curse. No. He didn’t deserve her tears. He didn’t deserve anything. She forced herself to breathe through a growing pressure in her chest, but all she could manage were short, sporadic breaths as she murmured, “You bastard. You stupid, stupid bastard…”

He had used the code two times. Both in January.

Felicity’s fingers faltered.

She hadn’t found out about her promotion until February.

The word sabotage seared her mind.

Is that what this was? They were co-directors now, more or less. They shared the department instead of her answering to him. She had taken his old position as Director of IT and a new one had been created for him - Director of Production. She had no idea what happened behind closed doors, but she’d wondered if everything she had done here - all that Oliver had taken credit for - had finally seen the light of day.

Or was this something else? Was it about Isabel, about the holiday party, about the horrible night that had followed here before she started separating herself from him and the debauched things they had done the last few months?

Fire ripped through her and more goddamn tears burned the back of her throat.

Isabel was gone and things hadn’t gone back to the way they were before.

Did he think they would?

Felicity fought to keep her hands from shaking - with anger, she told herself.

Things would never go back to the way they were. Because she didn’t want them to. Because she didn’t want him. She didn’t like waking up looking for him, missing his touch, or that there was an emptiness she couldn’t explain inside her. She hated that she felt anything at all. She hated what they had done. She hated who she was with him. She didn’t want whatever had been between them. And things were good now, she was happy, she was-

There.

He had deleted…

Emails?

Felicity leaned closer to the middle screen, as if she could make sense of the data fragments, but they were too broken still.

The only good thing about him using her code was she was able to deconstruct it quickly. Her code was effective, but it was simple, and it had nothing against the algos she threw at it to put them back together. If it had been someone else’s, it might have taken longer. But it was hers and she had a backup on top of her backups, and it was just a matter of time before she would see what he had destroyed…

All too soon bits and pieces of correspondence appeared. Broken email chains without senders or recipients, or dates or times, the words appearing in splintered sentences that had just enough for her to try and make sense of them.

It’s being split. I brought this up last month anyway,

It’s hers

Call me when you’re out

What do you want

Are you positive?

It can go out next week if you want

CONFIDENTIAL

We had an agreement. This is what you’ve been working towards. Are you sure?

Do you have any idea what you’re doing?

I found them

Let me know and we will get this in motion

I don’t think that’s a good idea

We have a deal

Call me.

yes

It’s best for everyone to get Felicity out

“Get Felicity out of what?” she demanded.

She tried to beef up the program to make it work faster, but there was too much information to cull through to find what was missing from the servers. Felicity huffed, even though she knew it was going as fast as it could within its limits. But waiting for every piece to appear, in the right order? She cursed under her breath. Her leg bounced in time with the speed of her thoughts, nearly matching the agitated beat of her heart. Pinpricks of heat danced over her cheeks, burning. It wasn’t until a lance of pain sliced through her jaw that she realized she had been chewing on the edge of her lip enough to tear a piece of skin.

“Ow,” she hissed, grimacing when her tongue touched the tiny wound. The taste of copper flooded her mouth.

Email addresses.

“Oh,” she blurted.

She could narrow the search to see who was involved. She hammered at the keyboard, changing the directives, switching priority to email addresses, and to order them by the amount of emails they appeared in.

A list immediately began populating.

[email protected] [email protected] [email protected] [email protected] [email protected] [email protected] [email protected] [email protected]

The floor fell out from under her.

Felicity stared at the last one, waiting for it to pop up and explain itself, but it didn’t. Instead a boulder crushed her chest and the back of her neck burned as ice showered her insides.

“I thought I’d find you up here, Oliver.”

“I see old habits die hard.”

“I like your shoes.”

“Isabel knows.”

The list continued.

[email protected] [email protected] [email protected] [email protected]

“What?” she breathed at the last one, but before she could even begin to put any of it together, the program started bringing up the corresponding emails. Her email address was attached to only one, and the subject simply read:

Please see the attached.

It wasn’t done loading, but she didn’t wait, opening it anyway. There was nothing in the body of the email. It was just the attachment, addressed to her…

And Oliver.

The attachment was a video.

From Isabel.

“Oh god,” she choked out, her stomach twisting. Her hands shook so hard the keyboard rattled and she snatched them back, digging her nails into her palms. She stared at the email, dread coating her insides like tar.

She told herself it was because it was still loading that she didn’t immediately hit play, but even when it finished - even when the other emails finished coming together - she didn’t touch it.

Felicity wasn’t sure how long she sat there until she finally opened the video.

All she saw were black and white flickers and pixelated snippets. The cursor along the bottom told her it was playing, but nothing showed up, and for a blissful second she let herself believe it was nothing.

Then an image appeared.

An agonized moan fell from deep in her chest.

It was her and Oliver, in an elevator. He had her pinned to one of the walls, his face buried in her neck, one hand in her hair, making a mess of it, the other migrating down her neck, then her chest. She didn’t have to watch to remember the feel of his fingers slipping inside the band of her skirt and yanking her blouse out where it was tucked, so hard it tore one of her buttons. She had one of her legs up as much as her skirt would allow and wrapped around his, so damn eager that she hadn’t cared in the slightest where they were.

Isabel had this.

Her stomach pitched until she thought she was going to be sick.

In a twisted haze, Felicity watched her own hands claw down his back, raking over Oliver’s suit jacket where it strained against the width of his shoulders. She dug her nail into his neck. Her eyes half-closed, her mouth slack in pleasure, so obviously flushed despite the grey wash of the video. She remembered waking up with hickeys and bite marks all over her neck and chest. She had been so mad, she numbly recalled. But not while it was happening. Never while it was happening.

The Plaza, she remembered. They had used the suite the firm kept there for high-end clients.

“They never check the records, Smoak. They don’t want to know.”

The video abruptly switched, and it showed her walking backwards with Oliver following her down the hallway, towards the Premier Suite.

It occurred to Felicity in that second that it wasn’t showing his face.

There was no way there wasn’t video somewhere of him - entering the elevator, at the very least, because someone else had been on there when they’d first gotten on. Oliver had been standing next to her, only attacking her when the person got off a floor later. But the way the video played, if someone didn’t know, it looked like Felicity was taking some random person up to the suite.

His back was still to the camera as they reached the door. She had the key card, having taken it from him earlier, and she slipped it into the lock. She twisted the handle before turning to enter the room backwards. The soft lights overhead reflected on her glasses as she grabbed Oiver’s tie and yanked him in with her.

A blip of static overtook the screen and then it showed her slipping out of the room some time later, head bowed, her hair up in a chaotic ponytail, her clothes askew, her heels in-hand as she hurried to the elevator.

Alone.

It was all her.

The numbness cracked, just enough to take a breath, to frown, to think.

Felicity switched back to the email from Isabel. Short. Simple. To the point. To both her and Oliver.

So why…?

But if someone knew it was Oliver with her, that they were using the suite under his name, under the firm’s name, then there wouldn’t be much reproach, would there? Because regardless of his status within the firm, he was still a Queen. A hand-slapping, perhaps, and she would surely get reprimanded in some way.

Just her, though? Seemingly taking advantage of the firm like this?

But then why had she gotten the promotion she’d been angling for since long before Oliver swooped in and stole it out from under her last year?

She shook her head. None of it made sense.

Heart fluttering so fast it hurt, Felicity flipped through the other emails. There were so many of them, a couple dozen easily, most of them formalities, simple back and forths, nothing substantive. The ones between Oliver and his father were the most confusing, both of them talking in shorthand about a plan, something Oliver had been working towards, their conversations talking around something they both obviously knew and didn’t need to explain.

She stopped when she saw an email from [email protected] to [email protected].

No subject, no body, not even a signature.

Just an attachment.

A draft announcement naming Isabel Rochev as CEO of the newly formed Queen Consolidated.

Release date: March 1.

Felicity stared at the mockup uncomprehendingly. She read the words over and over until they blurred. She noted the empty spot where Isabel’s picture would go. She stared at the question mark after the date in parentheses. She tried to think, to understand what she was seeing, what she had seen. What had happened. How it had happened… and all without her ever knowing. It was blackmail, plain as day. Isabel had the perfect leverage in her possession.

And she had used it to get what she wanted.

“Oh my god,” Felicity blurted. “What did you do? What did you do?”

She grabbed her phone with trembling hands, swiping it open, going straight to her phone app. Muscle memory dialed the number she could never forget, but when his name appeared because her phone recognized it, her heart spasmed and she almost hit the END button.

A soft trill echoed from down the hallway.

Felicity’s head jerked up, her breath catching.

Another trill, so faint she barely heard it.

But she did.

Her phone hit her desk with a thud, but she didn’t hear it, already up and out the door. Her bare feet barely made a sound as she followed the ringing past darkened offices, a copy room, the shadowed kitchen, to the opposite corner of the floor.

To his office.

The trill abruptly stopped followed by a harsh, “What?”

She heard it from the open door that came into view when she turned the corner.

A nervous wash of adrenaline crashed through her veins, especially when a softer, “Felicity?” followed. The closer she got, the more her limbs felt like they were going to shatter, each step shakier than the last. “Felicity?”

She heard him so clearly her mouth went dry.

Felicity stopped when she reached his door.

Oliver stood by his sitting area, just like the one she had, his office a mirror version of hers. He had a sheaf of paper in one hand, his phone in the other, a dark glower on his face as he glared at the little coffee table before him.

Her chest squeezed tight.

It had been so long since she’d been in here - so long since she’d seen him, period. He seemed bigger, yet somehow he took up less space. His muscles were bulkier, but his waist was leaner. His face had a gauntness that hadn’t been there before, his jaw sharp and angular. His tie was off, the first buttons of his shirt undone, the sleeves rolled up in messy bunches, his hair askew from running his hands through it. Dark circles underlined his eyes and in place of his signature scruff was the beginning of an unkempt beard.

She had deliberately not sought him out. She didn’t look for him. She barely offered him a glance when they had to interact outside of telephone calls or emails.

He looked like hell.

She stepped inside.

“Are you…?” he started before he saw her.

Oliver’s words died off, surprise widening his eyes. Then he frowned, and the closer she got, the deeper the furrow between his brow went.

“Felicity?” he said, his voice low, rough. “What’s wrong-”

She grabbed his face with both hands as she pushed up onto her toes and kissed him.

He froze. She barely noticed under the press of his lips to hers again. They were dry, chapped, but still so soft, just like she remembered.

Felicity whimpered and grasped him tighter, pressing closer, kissing him harder. The little wound she’d given herself a few minutes ago burned under the pressure, but the pain only edged the heady sensation of his mouth against hers again. God, she had missed it, she had missed him, more than she wanted to admit. But it was impossible to deny right now, when it had been months, when the last time she had kissed him had been in anger, her only intent to hurt and maim, to inflict the pain she’d felt. There was none of that now. This was different.

He stood stock still. He didn’t even breathe, stiff and unrelenting, implacable.

Until he wasn’t.

Oliver melted into her.

She gasped at the abrupt surrender, the sound morphing into a strung out cry as he kissed her back. He dropped the papers and his phone, both landing with a thud, the papers hitting her naked toes, but she barely felt it. He wound his arms around her and yanked her off her feet.

It had been so long.

Too long.

Felicity opened her mouth at the same time he did, their tongues meeting halfway. She groaned at the first taste, eclipsing his breathy whine. He clutched her hard as he bowed forward, chasing the kiss with vigor, his tongue spearing into her mouth. Her knees buckled, her feet hitting the ground in an uncoordinated mess, and it was only because of his hold that she didn’t fall. But then she pushed off the floor, shoving back against him, kissing him with equal ardor. Teeth collided, lips yanking, pulling, sucking, tongues exploring and tasting and tangling. Despite how they chased each other, he still eclipsed her, surrounding her, swallowing her up. She whimpered at the overwhelming sensation and he drank it all in as his hands roamed all over her, before falling to her ass. He gripped her so hard she broke away with a cry.

He didn’t let her get far, though, and she didn’t want him to.

Not anymore.

Oliver captured her mouth again, sucking on her bottom lip, groaning when she nipped at him.

The back of her legs collided with something hard before she even realized they were moving. The coffee table. The heavy, low-sitting furniture scooted across the floor, but they just followed it. Oliver urged her down with hard hands. Felicity clawed into his shoulders, unwilling to release his lips, forcing him to follow her as she laid back on the table. It was awkward and uneven, but neither of them cared, or bothered to fix it, because it meant stopping, and that couldn’t happen. Oliver loomed over her, gripping the edges of the table, his muscles rippling to keep from crushing her as he ravaged her mouth with a thoroughness that left her head spinning.

But then all too soon, he was wrenching away.

With a ragged gasp of air and fogged glasses, Felicity arched up to follow him - don’t go, don’t stop, don’t - but he just fell to his knees before her. She tried to spread her legs to wrap around him, needing to feel him pressed against her as much as possible, but her skirt was too tight. She frantically yanked it up as his hands flew to his belt and pants.

Heavy breathing and the rustle of clothes were the only sounds for a moment.

Pants half-hanging open, Oliver grappled for his wallet. He ripped it out of his pocket and dug out a square package. He tossed the leather away as Felicity pushed her panties down, pulling her legs up enough to yank them down one leg, leaving them hanging off her foot as she spread for him.

Oliver’s eyes dropped to her sex. Mouth swollen, cheeks flushed, lids heavy, he stared at her as he rolled the condom down his length, his pupils eclipsing the stormy blue as he drank her in.

A shiver shot down her spine.

She missed this, missed how he looked at her, half-drunk with need that matched her own.

“Please,” she begged, grasping the edges of the table and scooting closer to him. “Oliver.”

He grabbed her hips, yanking her until her ass hung off the edge. The swollen head of his cock rubbed up her cleft, and then back down, nudging her entrance.

“Yes-”

Oliver thrust in, hard and fast.

Felicity shouted at the intrusion. Her back bowed, her eyes squeezing shut as he filled her to the brim. The pressure was incredible, his girth stretching her nearly to the point of pain. She felt him in every inch of her body and it stole the air right out of her lungs.

“Shit,” Oliver gasped, his hands grabbing her waist as he pulled back out. “I’m sorry-”

“No,” Felicity pleaded. “Don’t-”

She found his hips and yanked him inside her once more. She hissed when he stretched her so wide it was all she could to keep breathing. But she did, and she angled her hips to take him in even deeper. She hadn’t realized how much she had shut down, shut him out, not even entertaining the option, to the point she wasn’t ready for him like she would have been before. But she would be, again. She knew if they kept moving, her body would catch up. It would.

Her name fell off his lips in a choked moan as his fingers dug into her ribs.

To stop her. To pull out. To leave her.

Felicity shook her head wildly.

“No, no, it’s okay, it’s okay,” she babbled breathlessly, but her voice breaking betrayed her. She arched up to keep him inside her. “It’s just… been a while, I’m… I’m okay, I’m not… I can’t… Just don’t stop. Please don’t stop. Don’t stop-”

She was begging him.

The anguish in her voice sliced her heart to ribbons. She felt ready to burst into a thousand pieces, for a thousand different reasons, and absolutely none of them made sense. She had prided herself on keeping her distance, on being stronger than whatever was between them, on being able to walk away.

But now all of that was gone in the blink of an eye, just gone, as if it had never been there.

The realization tore through her and Felicity fell back against the table with a broken cry.

All of it had been a lie. She was a lie. Everything she told herself she felt was a lie.

Another sob threatened to escape, but she bit it back. Because the only thing that mattered in this moment was staying here. With him. She needed to be here - with him - and she couldn’t think about it, about what it meant. She could only feel.

She only wanted to feel.

“Please,” Felicity breathed, arching up again, her legs winding around him, her nails scrabbling under his shirt. “Don’t stop. Please-”

“I’m not,” Oliver whispered in a rush, falling over her. It changed the angle of his hardness inside her and she whimpered as he cupped her face on a ragged, “I’m not stopping. Ever,” before his lips found hers in a burning kiss.

It matched her desperation so perfectly that tears burned her eyes. It shouldn’t soothe her, and she knew that. But it did, and it felt so good, so right, to be here, to be back with him. But it was more than that. It grounded her, in a way she couldn’t do herself. She mewled, opening for him, winding her arms around his shoulders. He kissed her until they were both gasping for air, and then he kissed her even more, deeper, harder.

He invaded her in every way possible.

More.

Felicity twisted his shirt, twisting it, yanking. She slid one hand under the collar, and then his undershirt. His skin was blisteringly hot against her palm, and she moaned, kissing him harder as she dug her nails into his muscles. His hips jerked into hers, and this time they both moaned when he slid in a little easier, sending tiny bolts of pleasure through her.

“Off,” she mumbled, tugging at his shirt. “Off.”

He didn’t bother with the buttons, ripping his dress shirt off along with his undershirt. Buttons went scattering, but Felicity barely heard them pinging, or felt the ones that hit her as she yanked her own shirt off.

Her breath caught at the sight he made. His abs stood out in stark relief, too stark, the lines of his body harsh and rigid, a wall of pure muscle. He had always been well-defined, but this was extreme. Felicity flattened her hands to his stomach and smoothed them. She was transfixed by the feel of his hot, silky skin over such hardness, her fingers ghosting over his taut nipples, his rock-hard pecs…

“C’mere,” Oliver grunted, hooking his fingers in the front of her bra and yanking her up.

The lace tore across her skin and she yelped as she crashed into his chest. The pain only fueled her need as the new angle had him shifting inside her again, gasoline on a fire, turning a simmer into an inferno.

Felicity’s teeth found his collarbone.

He cried out, grabbing the back of her neck. He crowded her closer as she worked her way up his neck, savoring his salty taste, sucking and nipping, leaving little marks that would be there for days.

“Fuck… Felicity…”

She’d never heard her name so many times from him like this. She was always Smoak. But not right now, and the knowledge that he was just as undone as she was had her licking and sucking harder, wanting to hear more of it. He gave it to her, a raspy plea as he turned his face into her hair, his breathing hot and damp, his fingers digging into her neck as she marked him, up his throat, his jaw…

On a groan, Oliver captured her lips with his as he inched his hips forward.

He filled her up, so much more smoothly, so good, so perfectly. Burning need arched through her, the pressure changing, her slickening inner walls clamping down on him. Oliver swallowed down her cries, matching them with his own as he pulled out a bit to thrust back in. He rubbed against her with each thrust, his pubic bone hitting her clit, sending little bursts of pleasure sparking through her. She keened, clinging to him, and he did it again, and again, slow and steady, making sure she was ready for him.

“Yes,” she whimpered, grabbing his face, kissing them both breathless. “Yes.”

His fingers found the clasp of her bra. He undid it quickly and pushed her back down to the table.

The cold tabletop was a shock, but then Oliver was pulling her bra off, tossing it away…

And then all she felt was the burn of his gaze, and then his hands as he grasped her waist.

His hips slowed as he stared at her with unfathomable eyes, so dark, so intense. It was almost like he couldn’t get enough of what he saw. Captivated. Transfixed. His gaze danced all over her, up her chest, her neck, her mouth, then back down to her breasts, her abdomen.

“Felicity…”

He dragged her name out, tasting every single syllable. Did he know what he was saying? He couldn’t, she thought, not with how he looked at her, or how he touched her. There was a reverence that hadn’t been there before.

Felicity’s heart skipped, her mouth going dry, her stomach fluttering.

She had missed him, so much, and not just his body. But that was the confusing part. They didn’t have a relationship. They didn’t have anything.

And yet… the way he looked at her… how he made her feel…

“Felicity…”

She shivered, and fought to breathe, but then he was touching her. Oliver smoothed his hands up her waist, his thumbs brushing the undersides of her breasts before slipping back down, one hand cupping her ribs, the other spanning the width of her stomach…

So soft.

So gentle.

Felicity shuddered, goosebumps erupting over her skin. They sent another shiver ripping down her spine, and another. The goosebumps spread everywhere, her chest, her stomach, her breasts, peaking her nipples into hard little beads that ached.

It was nothing compared to the way he stared at her.

It was too much.

“Oliver,” Felicity choked.

His dark gaze flew to hers and her heart clenched at the look in them.

Too much.

She grabbed his hands and slid them up to her breasts, cupping herself with his fingers. Lust slackened his face and he took over, squeezing them before raking his thumbs over her nipples. Pleasure spiked through her and she moaned, loudly, and he did it again.

“Yes,” she breathed, nodding, closing her eyes as she arched her back, rocking her hips. “Please. I need you-”

On a harsh growl, Oliver squeezed her breasts, so hard and fast it took her breath away. Using his grasp on her to keep her still, he thrust into her, burying himself as deep as he could. Her hands scrambled up his arms for something to hold onto as he gripped her breasts, relentless and unforgiving, and thrust into her again. Again. Again.

“Oh… god!” she cried. “Oh… oh god…!”

Oliver fell on top of her, pinning her to the table, spreading her legs impossibly wide.

“Say it again,” he demanded, his mouth finding hers in a messy kiss.

She struggled to respond, but his demanding lips stole her ability to do anything. He ripped away only to shove his hands up into her hair. He destroyed her ponytail, pulling on the long strands until enough was free so he could make tight fists. Oliver braced himself over her and used his new leverage to pull out nearly all the way before thrusting home, so hard the table shook. Felicity shouted, grabbing his sides for something to hold onto. She was completely at his mercy and it had a rush of arousal sweeping through her, her juices flooding her sex, a desperate ache for him to fuck her sensenless razing her from the inside out. Blood rushed in her ears, her heart pounded, heat swamped her veins, a mind-numbing pressure deep in her core coiling tighter as Oliver thrust into her so hard the table slid across the floor.

“Say it.”

“I need you,” Felicity gasped. He groaned at the words. “I need you. I need you. I need you.”

They moved together, finding a rhythm to his pleading, “Again,” and her breathless, “I need you,” echoed by the sounds of their harsh pants for air and her wet sex taking in every inch of him over and over until they both dissolved into mindless cries.

The orgasm hit her in a tidal wave, bowling her over, eclipsing everything. White sheeted over her eyes, a series of short, startled cries flying from her as she fell to pieces.

Oliver’s grip on her tightened so much she whimpered as he started thrusting with abandon. Hard, harder, each collision sending her higher, dragging her pleasure out until she didn’t know where he began and she ended. His forehead landed on hers, skin slick, his breaths hot and ragged against her mouth. Felicity grabbed hold of him, cradling him, nonsensical words falling from her as he plowed into her, erratic and frantic, chasing his pleasure.

He jerked, his back bowing, his pistoning hips stuttering.

With a strangled, “Felicity,” on his lips, he came.

Oliver collapsed on top of her, burying his face into her throat, her skin muffling his desperate noises. He didn’t stop, his hips rocking into her as he rode out his orgasm, her inner walls milking every last bit out of him, his cock twitching deep inside her with each burst.

It was a long moment before he finally slowed, and then fell still.

Buzzing filled her head.

Pleasure. Satisfaction. Shock. Confusion.

She wanted him to move. But she didn’t. She wanted to want to. She wanted to get off this uncomfortable table, to get his bulk off her where he crushed her, but at the same time, she didn’t. She didn’t want to move. Ever.

Oliver made the decision for her.

He slowly pushed up. He slipped out of her, trying to quiet his groan when he left her wet heat. Felicity bit her lip so hard it nearly tore the skin as her sex clenched at the sudden emptiness. And then he was off of her, pushing to his feet. He grabbed his pants, yanking them back up as he turned away from her.

He didn’t look at her once.

Felicity sat up, grimacing at the throb blossoming between her thighs. She stood up gingerly, her hands shaking as she pushed her skirt back down. The silence was deafening. He moved to his desk, peeling the condom off as he went before tying it off and tossing it. The cool office air stung her sweaty skin and she crossed her arms over her breasts, looking around for her blouse.

She spotted it in a crumpled heap next to his tangled shirts.

It smelled like him when she slipped it over her head.

“Were you supposed to be the CEO of Queen Consolidated?”

Silence.

Felicity looked at him where he stood by his desk, his hands frozen where he’d been re-buttoning his pants. The slacks were tight across his backside, stretched over his thighs in a way that they hadn’t been before. His back was covered in red marks where she’d raked her nails over him, making the well-defined muscles in his back stand out in harsher relief when he finished fastening the buttons. His belt was next.

That was it.

“You were, weren’t you?” she asked. The full weight of that hit her and Felicity’s ribs closed in around her, making her gasp. “You were leaving Q&Q. But now you’re not. Because of Isabel. Because of…”

Us.

He turned his head slightly, but that was it.

“How did she know?” she asked. She caught the edge of his forehead creasing in a frown. “About the Plaza. That we were there that one night…” He finally turned, his brow creased in muted surprise, and she huffed. “C’mon, Oliver, give me a little more credit than that. This is my system, remember? I know when something’s wrong. Or… missing. I saw the video. And the emails. And the announcement about her, that you sent. Like it was… gift-wrapped. Because she had something that she couldn’t have possibly known about, didn’t she? But the odds of her picking that one night…”

He didn’t answer her. He just turned to his desk.

“Oliver-”

He opened one of the bottom drawers and pulled out…

“My glasses?” Felicity frowned when she recognized the frames. She absently reached up to touch the replacement pair she currently wore. “I thought I lost those.”

“A couple weeks ago…” Oliver said in a low voice, not making a move to hand them to her. He tilted them back and forth in his fingers, the move so easy and familiar, as if he’d done it a thousand times. He stared at them as he spoke. “Isabel walked into my office and handed these to me. I told her they could be anybody’s, but then she showed me the security tape.”

Felicity’s heart sank. “Oh god…”

“I told her to go to hell,” he continued, still watching the glasses. He huffed. “She must not have liked that very much because then she sent the video to both of us. Except this time it was focused on you. She said she wanted you gone, and that if we didn’t do anything about it, she would take the video to the Board, since you not only work here, but are slated to be so involved with getting Queen Consolidated set up.”

Felicity closed her eyes.

This was her fault. It wasn’t them, together, specifically. It was her. She remembered wanting to escape that room the next morning more than anything, before Oliver woke up, before she had to face what they had done. Again.

“It was a game to her,” he said and she opened her eyes to see his locked on her. “She wanted to see what we would do when she pushed us into a corner. If it was just me, or if it was both of us, I could have at least… But it was you, and I knew I couldn’t do anything without risking her releasing that tape, so I gave her something she couldn’t resist.”

“Queen Consolidated.”

“Queen Consolidated,” he echoed. The broken way his lips lifted in a half-smile, an attempt to hide the depth of what he had given up, cracked her open. “It didn’t matter, though. Whatever we had, it had nothing to do with your job. You’re the best asset this firm has and I wasn’t going to let you pay the price for something that wasn’t your fault.”

Felicity could only stand there, staring at him, too overwhelmed to comprehend any of it.

So she focused on the one thing she could fix.

“She still has the video.”

Oliver pursed his lips on a slow nod. “Yeah.”

“Well then, I guess it’s a good thing they tapped me to set up Queen Consolidated, isn’t it?” She gave him a tight smile before lifting her hands to wiggle her fingers at him. “I’ll get it. Somehow. Once I’m in, I’m kind of hard to escape.”

Something flickered over his face, but it was so tiny, nearly indiscernible, that she wondered if she saw it. Then she remembered how he’d looked at her a moment ago and her heart faltered.

He dropped his eyes back to the glasses.

“Here.” Oliver cleared his throat as he stepped towards her and held them out to her.

Felicity slowly took them. “Thank you.”

All he had was a tight nod and a bland attempt at a smile before he turned away.

She grabbed his arm. “Oliver, wait-”

He looked back, his brow twisted in what she could only read as concern, but she barely gave herself time to discern it.

The second he faced her, she pushed up onto her toes again and kissed him.

It was soft, chaste, her lips capturing his with an ease that settled something deep inside her.

“Come home with me,” she whispered against his lips.

He hesitated and her chest caved in.

“Please.”

An eternity passed, their breaths mingling, noses brushing, but that was it.

She pressed her lips together before biting her bottom lip, the urge to ask him again - to beg - overwhelming her, nearly taking over.

Please.

Oliver pulled back and she barely bit back a whimper. He was going to say no. She squeezed her eyes shut, unwilling to see the look he gave her, to face what she was asking him, after she had slammed the door in his face. Felicity bit her lip harder, fighting to keep more words from falling out…

He cupped her jaw.

Felicity’s eyes flew open as his thumb tugged her lip away from her teeth with a whispered, “Are you sure?”

“Yes.”

The word was out before she could think, and the second it was, his mouth was on hers. With a sigh, she fell into him as Oliver wound his arms around her, pulling her into him. They opened for each other, and she whimpered when he took a deeper taste, re-sealing the unspoken bond between them.

“Yes.”

Thank you so much for reading! Reviews literally feed the soul and muse!

On a final note, I want to thank everyone who has engaged with me about this story. I appreciate every single comment and tweet and DM and ask. I know the way I'm writing them in this 'verse is very challenging, and demanding, and it's not an easy read. But it shouldn't be, because I don't want it to be. I don't want my readers comfortable during certain parts of this story, because I'm not comfortable. I'm pushing a lot of boundaries with this story. This is my most difficult undertaking to date, and I question myself at every turn in this process. All the more reason I truly appreciate those who continue to read, who reach out, who share their thoughts with me. I'm learning a lot about myself as I go on, and I thank you for being on this journey with me!

#olicity #olicity fic #olicity fanfic #olicity fanfiction #olicitysquee #oliver queen #felicity smoak #arrow #fanfiction #olicity au #of law firms and honey #four walls #my fics #my fics: au

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five-wow · 4 years

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Hi, I'm a fellow writer in the fandom and I admire your work. I wanted to ask, as a popular writer, do you get fixated sometimes on the number of kudos/comments/hits etc that your new work gets, and does this impact your motivation/inspiration? I think comparison is the thief of joy, and I really want to get over this feeling when I post my own work, so was wondering if even popular and regular writers such as yourself feel like this to, and if , what's your secret? Thanks!

Hi! 1) You are so sweet, ahh, and 2) YES, I DO. Gosh, yes, I absolutely do get insecure about those kinds of things, and I think that anyone who says they don't ever feel that way is either lying (to themselves, possibly) or maybe just pure magic, like some cross between a writer and a unicorn.

I love ao3 and I love all of its metrics and I love numbers and statistics, but there’s definitely that shadow side where having all of that easily available makes it deceptively easy to compare your own work to other people’s. I do it all the time! It honestly makes it a little hard for me at times to read h50 fic and fully enjoy it, because I keep... looking at it and wondering how my own stacks up against it, unwillingly. That's not a relaxing experience, and sometimes not even a very fun one. (Another part of it is that I just write SO MUCH for h50 and there is SO MUCH I still want to write, and I don’t want to risk reading something that’s very close to an idea I had and then never being quite sure if what I write after that was influenced by the other person’s work or if it’s really still my idea, because I have this (pretty irrational) fear of accidentally stealing someone else’s work even though one of the really great things about fandom is that it’s a very collaborative process as a whole and being inspired by other people’s stuff is usually totally okay, buuuut that’s a different rambly story.)

And I definitely do also get... some cringey feelings, hardcore, around fics I posted that don't do very well numbers-wise. Sometimes it's expected - fic that doesn't follow traditional formats or doesn't feature Steve/Danny, for example, is always something where I KNOW it won't get as much attention because I know how fandom works and that lessens the sting because it doesn't HAVE to hold up to those other fics that perform way better, because I already know it's not really comparable. The truth is, of course, that most fic is not really comparable to other fic, but it’s easy to fall into that trap anyway. If I post something that seems like my average kind of work and it gets less kudos or comments than usual, I do start to doubt the fic and second-guess myself - is something about this weird? Is it too [insert quality x]? Is it bad? Did I unknowingly do something terrible and people are now avoiding me? The answer to all of those is probably no, and going through it a bunch of times has definitely helped, because what usually happens is that I end up somewhat avoiding the fic in question because it makes me a little ashamed and awkward to think about it (a relative failure! oh no! I'm human!) and then, eventually, I return and reread the fic. By that point I have enough distance from it in time that I can look at it a lot more objectively, and it's way easier to see what works and what does not than when I posted it and I had just read it a dozen times in twenty-four hours and the words were burned into my brain. And upon that reread, inevitably, I realize that, holy shit, it was NOT AS BAD as I had made it out to be in my mind! It’s actually kind of fun! Imagine the ego boost of realizing your most cringy recent work is actually pretty okay, haha, and it's silly, but it's a revelation every time. The quality of a fic is not dictated by how many people read it or comment on it or like it, and intellectually I absolutely know that, but it’s hard to remember when it’s about yourself and you’re still in that emotionally vulnerable place of having just shared your work with the world and it feels like the world is not as into it as you thought (or hoped) it’d be. It’s honestly very, very reassuring to have those experiences to fall back on, but sadly the only way I know to get there is to just tough it out and feel super awkward for a while.

When I’m writing, on the other hand, I usually don’t really think about what other people might think of it. I have the advantage that (pretty much) all of my work consists of fairly short stand alone stories, which means I don’t have to struggle with keeping my motivation up for a second chapter of something but I get to start fresh every time, and that’s nice, because I can just lose myself in the joy of throwing words around and making characters do things that make me giggle. That’s not to say I never think of the outside world while writing - I realized, pretty recently, that I occasionally end up constructing paragraphs or pieces of dialogue a certain way mostly so it will make for a good excerpt to put in the eventual fic description, which might give me a sense of accomplishment because it’s nice when things work out and look good, but in all fairness it’s probably far more motivated by attempts to package the finished work attractively so other people will want to click on it than by anything else. I don’t know if that’s a bad thing. I don’t think so - I don’t feel like it lessens my work and it doesn’t interrupt my enjoyment of it in the moment, which are the key elements for me - but other people might disagree.

But the heart of thing is, just, there are SO MANY factors that influence a fic’s numbers, and not all of them are visible (I’d argue most of them aren’t, in fact), and it always helps me to keep that in mind. It puts things in perspective somewhat and softens the harshness of a black and white kudo count judgment. Numbers can depend on when you post a fic (what day of the week, time of the year, time relative to big fandom moments, whether you’re in the middle of a global pandemic or not), how you pick your title, what you put in the description, how you use the tags, what genres or tropes are popular in your specific fandom, the genre of your fic in general (pwp as a rule tends to get lots of hits and few kudos or comments, for example, making it totally unfair to compare it to G-reated fluff fic with super different ratios), how much you’ve posted before (because if someone likes one of your works, they’re often likely to check if you have more in the same fandom), how many fics other people post around the same time (because yours might be gone from the first page of most recently updated works in a fandom or ship tag very quickly if others push it out), how big your fandom is(!!!) (over two thirds of my works on ao3 are for h50, but h50 only makes it into the top 10 of my most kudo’d works by the skin of its teeth) and definitely also what your fandom’s culture is like (compared to a lot of other fandoms, h50 fans are a-ma-zing when it comes to leaving comments, my gosh, and as a writer I adore all of you), how old your ao3 account is (the longer you’ve been around, the more likely a higher number of people is subscribed to you as an author or has read your previous work or has encountered your name, etc), how long your fic is (under a thousand words in my experience generally does less well than 1-5k, but longer fics might end up with lots of chapters which switches things up because people come back to it when there’s an update, and even if a long work is all in one chapter it will probably stand out for the wordcount and might attract attention that way, etc), whether or not your fic is part of a series (in my experience it will probably get more hits because it’s a chain of fics that leads you to the next one, but the kudos might not go up at the same rate because people might forget a kudo or reread previous works when a new one is added), whether you make a habit of commenting on other people’s fic (I’ve had comments saying MY comment on their work led them to my fic!), if you have social media like Tumblr or Twitter where you can promote your work (it’s advertising, basically), and any of a bunch of random little other factors. Sometimes, I see a sudden little cluster of kudos on an old fic in the daily ao3 kudos email, and I assume someone somewhere maybe recced that fic, but it usually remains a total mystery who or where or even if it happened at all and wasn’t just a weird coincidence to begin with. Sometimes the thing a fic’s popularity depends on is really just whether it clicks with people at that point in time, whatever that means, which is an even more impossible thing to grasp or predict than anything else.

Or you can look at things from a totally different angle and not try to make yourself care less about numbers, but just accept that you do because you’re human and we all crave validation, and instead try to roll with that. A brain hack: when I do start getting down about numbers, it also helps me to focus on one work and just... try to visualise what those kudo (or hit or bookmark or comment) counts mean, if you were to translate them to the real world. While it can be super helpful to remember that there’s a LOT going on that you can’t see and that’s virtually impossible to really explain, it’s also nice to somewhat do the opposite and try to make things as concrete as possible instead. I like measuring in school classes (~25-30 heads, I’d say) and “my fic only has fifty kudos but this other person’s has ten times as many” could easily make anyone sad and demotivated, but “my fic has fifty kudos and that’s TWO WHOLE CLASSROOMS packed full of people that all read my work and liked it so much they wanted to give me a little thumbs up for it” is actually pretty cool and encouraging, I think. Or you could measure in sports teams (I don’t know sports, but soccer has 11 players on the field per team, so as soon as your fic has 33 kudos that’s three teams which means you’ve got yourself a little beginning league! how exciting!) or in DnD campaigns (variable of course, but most of mine have had around four players plus a DM, so if you have twenty kudos? that’s FOUR WHOLE DnD campaigns that enjoyed reading your fic, and it’s fully up to you how many half-orcs that includes). You could apply this method using literally any other measurement that works for you, too. If you have a hard time painting a mental image of numbers, you could even open up a Paint doc or get a piece of paper and start counting out little dots or copy-pasted images of a person, or get a big bag of physically present M&Ms and count them out, or take a good look at your dog and then go around the neighborhood and collect forty-nine more dogs and pile them all into your home and be slightly frightened by the utter delighted fluffy chaos that ensues in your living room. That’s how many people liked your fic! That’s a heck of a lot of wagging tails! Who knew a kudo could bark this loudly!

Disclaimer: maybe keep the dog thing as your very last resort, because your neighbors might not be super into their pet getting dognapped for the purpose of visualizing fanfiction stats. The point is really just to remember that there’s an actual person behind every kudo you get, no matter what the cumulative number is, and even if you have seven or five or three kudos, that’s seven or five or three very real people that hit that button. That’s pretty damn awesome. Also keep in mind how you feel if you read a fic, and take some time to realize that every single person that left you a kudo went through that same process of spending time reading words (the words you wrote!) and experiencing that story and THAT’S why they left that kudo. It’s a real person’s real investment.

This ended up very long and rambly, so tl;dr: You are in no way alone in feeling that way, it's okay and normal and so very very human to feel like that, but you still shouldn't let it get you down, because numbers fake being meaningful very well but are deep down just little squiggles on your screen and they’re more scared of you than you are of them, while at the same time there are real individuals that enjoy your work even if you usually never see them. Your fic is worth posting. That’s the one factor in all of this that’s a constant, not a variable.

(And as a very important sidenote, just be kind to yourself, always. Does it truly stress you out? Are you feeling really bad about it today? Does it make your anxiety spike? Then give yourself room to take a little step back and allow yourself some time away from it. Go watch something you enjoy, or read something nice, or do something else that makes you feel good. Fic is something that should add to your life, not subtract from it. You don’t owe anyone anything, not even yourself in this context, and I used to push myself occasionally to get something finished TODAY, and eventually I started realizing, well, why? Why not instead of reading it over again just get some sleep or watch an episode of something I want to watch, especially if I literally just finished the fic and I feel a little unsure about it and it might actually be beneficial to me and my own feelings about it if I just give it a day or even a week and let it rest and then look at it again and THEN post it, if I want to, whether that’s with some changes beforehand or not? Who set me that deadline that’s apparently looming over me? I did, and it’s fake, and it’s there for absolutely no good reason. Breathe. Put yourself first. Be really really really selfish about your own fic writing experience, even, because it’s supposed to be something you enjoy (that’s what a hobby is!), and the rest is secondary.)

#anon #ask #writing #ao3 #it's very odd to get called a popular writer by the way oh my gosh #nice!!! so very nice!!! thank you!!! but also difficult to reconcile with my own internal image of myself #all the more evidence that brains lie to us all the time #*

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xavierpak · 4 years

Text

Self-para 001; When things get fucked up, the fucked up get going.

Alright, fine, he’ll admit it - perhaps the exposing got to him more than he initially led on. He claimed there to be no motives behind the reckless outbursts of tweets, that he was just exercising his right to defend himself, the whole ordeal nothing but some online banter people would soon forget. After all, somebody literally got exposed for murder a week ago and it seemed as though nobody even remembered his name anymore. So, that was that, some rumors, a couple of mean-spirited messages, and wandering eyes following him as he walked down the hall - in a day or two, everything would go back to normal.

Besides, all he did was crack a few jokes - changing your twitter handle to fit the narrative you’re being accused of? C'mon, that's hilarious. And even if it's not, all it is is going along with the joke. With no receipts to support the claims, no secret confessions or account numbers linking the two together, no one had any reason to believe the whole Kapu thing was meant to be taken seriously anyway, there wasn't as much as a picture of Xavier in the same room as one of Kapu’s paintings, nor an acknowledgment that he's ever even heard of the artist at all. The only connection the two shared in the public eye was Mrs. Imogen Park. The same Imogen Park that has not spoken to her son in years.

Though he’d never admit it, not even to himself, somewhere deep, deep down - way down, buried underneath a pile of empty liquor bottles and cigarette buds - Kapu stood as a bridge between his family and him; an excuse to send an email to his mom, even though it boasted a stranger’s name. A hope that maybe, just maybe, creating a fake persona could stand to become a successful attempt at gaining his parents' respect. At the end of the day, did it matter if their letters of praise sung about one mysterious Kapu, an artist they relished and poured hours of support and appreciation into, unbeknownst to them that the words of love were read by no other than a boy who longed for them all his life? Did their words not hold the same kind of recognition?

No, no they didn’t.

And yet, as it turned out, his intentions behind the project didn't matter at all. It was a fraud, so they said, a quick crash grab. Another empty soul trying to reach stardom - a scam. As though the paintings weren't the same as they were, as though it wasn't his hand that traced the lines, his disdain for the corrupt world of art-trade that fueled the stories behind it. As though his face alone was enough to strip an art piece of its value. Sure, he was the first to claim the paintings held no meaning in the first place, but that's beside the point. Nobody cared about the real value of art anyway, he felt like a fool for having believed anyone would stop and take the time to listen to his message at all.

Truthfully, he’s never felt heard before, and he wasn’t sure whether that stood as the cause or the result of his struggle to express himself. One of the very reasons he fell in love with art was just that, its ability to transcend words, deliver a message through color, shape and atmosphere, fill the air with a feeling, rather than a saying. Ironically, he found himself utterly useless at that as well, countless unfinished poems, smashed figurines and torn-up sketches ridiculing the incoherent strings of thoughts whirling in his mind. He never thought to put them aside and revisit them after the heat of the moment had passed - no, if it wasn't perfect the first time round, it would never be perfect at all.

If it couldn't make the family proud, it was time to chuck it aside, pop out a new one, and make that the sole recipient of all the cultivated love and support. The old one had already been deemed a lost cause anyway.

Anyway. Another shot of whiskey and all was well again. Another one, and the distant cries for help echoing within no longer reached his ears.

What exactly did they want him to do? Pick up a phone? Call a friend? What friend? The only friend he has just might be well on his way towards becoming the only friend he had - just as it usually went. Even those who stuck around after the first signs of trouble had to admit defeat sooner or later, forced to realize there’s no honor in fighting somebody else’s demons when they won’t even put up a fight themselves.

He was one of the most popular kids in high school, but hey, fuck it, with a big-shot football scholarship and an off-campus apartment at UCLA, he didn’t need those high school losers anyway. A semester into the first school year, alcohol convinced him he didn’t need the scholarship either. Well - it wasn’t the alcohol that drove his decisions, not at first, it was merely a distraction from the deep-rooted issues he wasn’t quite ready to deal with yet, a convenient scapegoat to unload all of his problems onto. Until it became the very center of his battleground, leaving him without a family, without a girlfriend, without a scholarship, and, after his friends had realized weekend-long parties were only holding them back, without his status of a party god as well.

He went from living in a Manhattan mansion to crashing on strangers couches within the span of four years, burning every bridge along the way. Who did he have to call? That guy whose bathroom he threw up in four months ago, and was then allowed to spend the day on his couch out of sheer pity? That girl who, bless her heart, recognized him at one of the parties as ‘that guy she used to take a business class with’, wanted to help him get home safely, only to realize he had no home to get to? He managed to spend the better part of two weeks in her bed - it’s crazy what all people will do for a pretty smile and a touch. At one point in time, he even got involved with a group of local artists and convinced them to let him drag an old mattress into their art studio, and so he lived somewhere between a sketch and a masterpiece, paint fumes helping him color in the edges of reality.

Long drags of flavored cigarettes, his nude body draped across the bed, sprawled all over the floor a moment after, his trembling fingers drowning in buckets of paint, indulging in the sensation, just to splatter a bright colorful mess all over the big white sheet hung across the wall, first yellow, then orange, then green, topped off with a flood of black.

The moment he realized art wasn’t real.

The story behind it didn’t matter, no title deserved its praise of a cathartic cleaning - there was no cathartic cleaning. There were empty buckets of paint on the ground, holes in the canvas, and tension within.

A day before mother’s day, he plastered the word HYP OCR ITE onto a blank canvas and sent it off to his parents' house. As his friend had later described it, the last thing they did was open google translate, typed in ‘buffoon’, and chose a random language to translate the word into - and so Banksy’s newest rival was born.

Oh, the days when people cared enough to stick around and fill him in on parts of the night he didn’t remember. Back when getting kicked out of his apartment seemed like the start of an adventure, albeit a solo one.

He used to think people intentionally tied his feet down onto the pier, chaining him in place while boats came and went, mocking him with the wind in their sails; he used to think everybody wanted to slow him down, just so they could soar. He was never able to see the ropes around his feet for what they were; safety nets, keeping him from going adrift and losing himself out on the open sea, alone. He still couldn't.

With great haste, he swung at anyone who tried to tie him down, failing to realize time and time again it didn't have to be just him against the world.

But it was. And if it took a secret of his getting exposed to remind him of that, then so be it.

Caught up in the whirlwind of asperity, he almost thought to force out a tear, even if just for the theatrics of it, even if just to prove the cold-hearted man walking the halls of Masters remained nothing but a mask - Instead, his body was as lifeless amidst the dirty sheets, the joint in his hands having burned out a long time ago, his face as unhinged as ever.

#para:self #masters.points

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veridium · 5 years

Text

heartbreak warfare

WELCOME TO MORE QUEER PAIN

Hope ya’ll are ready for some shit. Because I brought the shit. Heaping dose, because I have had a wonderful day and feel all mushy. Enjoy!

part one // last episode

-- The man was a no-good blond bastard with too much wool in his wardrobe and clumsy taste in flowers. White carnations represent pure love, and he had the audacity to come around with a fist of them. He should have crawled up the stairs on his knees if he wanted to present pure love. Yelling at him made Olivia feel close to the goddess Medusa in levels of vindicated fury, though she was inconvenienced by the lack of hair snakes.

Despite her almighty and supernatural ire, Ellinor granting him entry is something she disagrees with but ultimately respects: her best friend is tired, and deserves to feel loved, and maybe the one silver lining is that there isn’t much else Cullen Rutherfudger can mess up more. Maybe if they get it together she won’t have to peel her up off the floor next weekend. Damn, had their standards for a good Saturday crashed down below sea level.

But, she will be keeping a close eye on him. A very close, and scathing, eye. To be fair, the man shows up and tows the line when he has fucked up; which is more than she can say for who she once thought of as a potential suitor as Sunday passes with no word. Potential suitor. Ugh, that kind of working only happens when you’ve paid attention to someone who’s a rhetorical romantic. Too much attention.

Monday comes, and is mundane. She keeps a low profile, and attends classes with little fuss; her Professor asks how she is doing because of her silence in class discussion, and she gives an excuse about getting over a head cold. Yeah, right. Besides lecture and a short shift at the gym, she goes back home to continue being reclusive. She does not cross paths with Ellinor much, though she fields the almost hourly texts asking her how she is, where she is, and if she needs anything. Ellinor is doing that innocent thing all friends do when they find themselves luckier in personal exploits than their loved ones: sympathy that is all-too-easily swallowed as pity when you’ve been kicked down one-too-many times.

Tuesday also comes and goes. Classes and a midterm exam, one she completes with confidence; cold war history is interesting enough. It helped that she had someone, for a brief time, to rant about it and dissect things. During the free response portion she uses a word Cassandra did during one of their debates: “pejorative.” How the hell she knew that word was whatever.

Then, Wednesday. Even though it’s only been a few days, when she wakes up to Ellinor’s voice it feels like it’s been a century since the last time she’s heard it.

“Liv, release the hostage oreos.” Oh, great. Long time no see, and she’s come into her room just to attack her for her life choices.

Olivia growls and hides away, bastard red velvet oreos in her clutches. “Bite me.”

“Liv. Come on,” Ellinor’s standing by her bed, hands on her hips like a fed up soccer mom trying to get her kid up for school. “You haven’t been responding to my texts and you don’t answer the door. I worried you ate yourself into a coma. I keep hearing the Scientist on repeat through your door. I think I can play the piano part off of just memory alone.”

“Good, maybe Cullen would enjoy another concert.”

“Olivia!”

She gives in and rolls over, tossing the oreos to her without looking. “Fine! Have at ‘em.” Ellinor misses and they fall onto the floor with a sharp, plastic crack. The worst part though is the thought that comes immediately after they crash: Cassandra would have caught it.

She groans again and tosses her comforter over her head. “What time is it? My alarm hasn’t gone off.”

“I caught it as it went off, bitch,” Ellinor grumbles. The sound of her picking up the oreos and tossing them to the table. She cares. I shouldn’t be so mean. She cares.

“Oh. Hm.”

“Seriously, are you alright? You haven’t dropped off the radar with me since that time you shaved half your eyebrows off at the Homecoming after party, remember?”

Oh, Jesus. How could she forget. “Mm. I’m fine. I’ve just been swamped with homework.”

“You? Olivia Sinclair, swamped by homework?” Ellinor’s voice veers farther away, towards the door. “Shit, the rapture must be upon us.”

“Give me a break, please. What are you doing up so early anyway? You don’t have class until…” that was a silly question. There could only be one reason she would be up and about like this. A week ago, it would have been the promise of coffee by Olivia. Now, it’s the promise of someone else’s coffee. Blond roast. Bleh.

“...Uh,” Ellinor chuckles nervously, “Nothing. I’m just hanging out. If you’d rather be left alone, I can go back to--”

“Don’t lay an egg, Ellinor.” Olivia gripes, stretching her toes. “You can say you’re up for him. I’m not a widow. Have fun, whatever it is you heteros do at the crack of dawn besides milking cows and...I don’t know, watching TLC or something.”

Silence. Ellinor sighs, and opens the door. “Okay, Olivia.” Dammit, she feels bad. Ellinor shouldn’t be feeling bad. She deserves to be happy, and she deserves a best friend who would support her being happy. Olivia flips over to lay face down and continue loathing herself. Every bone in her body wants to snarl and hide from everything good and cheery. Soon, Cassandra won’t be the only one steering clear of her, if she keeps this up.

Just outside her shut door, she hears a deeper voice. A deeper, calmer voice. Then Ellinor’s more opinionated tone. She says something bossy -- sounding like ‘I’m gonna kill your roommate for this, I hope you know.’ A sigh immediately responds. Typical. Cullen better have prepared himself to be with a woman who didn’t pull any punches, who could fight her own fights...and sometimes, fights that belong to her friends who have grown too tired of it all.

All she can do is wonder what it’ll take to feel okay again. It is one thing to say you’re hard to love, and make people miserable. It’s another to have someone confirm it so unapologetically.

Wednesday is as repetitive in the first half as Monday was: the same lectures, and then eventually a couple hours in the TA office waiting for nothing and no one to show up for assistance while she grades Blackboard responses to the week’s study question.

She’s in the thick of it when an email notification pops up on her laptop. Her women’s history 305 Professor, saying they’re switching texts for next week’s discussions. They’re going to study Heloise, a 11th century French nun and scholar. Great, fantastic, except none of their texts are about her. The Professor kindly asks they search for the suggested reading online or in the library. Olivia would be completely okay with digging up the text online if her laptop hadn’t just been salvaged from a virus stemming for the last time she did so.

Besides, the library was a reliable source. Why not do something she’s good at, and dig?

With a half hour left in her office hours she takes the liberty to stroll down to the main campus library. The book in particular is old so it should be in the stocks. When she goes to a computer and checks the catalog, she finds one copy is still available; her class’s rush to obtain it free hasn’t nosed her out completely just yet.

The Dewey decimal number takes her to a shelf on the fourth floor, but after 20 minutes of searching she uncovers nothing. No book, no Heloise. Defeated, she stands alone in the aisle and looks around one last time. It should be here, there’s no reason it shouldn’t. It said so in the database.

Climbing down to the main floor, she takes the issue up with the work study student manning the checkout desk.

“I’m sorry,” she says after looking it up on her own computer, “it’s been incorrectly logged. It happens.”

“What? What does that mean?”

“We have a couple satellite locations in town where our reserves are loaned long-term; sometimes their books are kept under our organized log when it’s with them.”

“So...so it is here. In town, right?”

“Oh, yeah, it should be. It’s just at one of our outsourced places.”

She asks if she can check them out still, and to her relief, the answer is yes. The kind woman writes down the address and name of the place for her, so that she can find it for herself once and for all. Handing it to her with a nice-enough smile, she sees her off.

Olivia makes it through the metal detectors before checking the piece of paper with pencil writing.

‘203 Northeast Lillian Way.’ Why is that so familiar? Shit. No, no, no, no. She rips her phone out and starts scrolling feverishly with her thumb through the old and taboo messages between her and she-who-still-shall-not-be-named. Lo and behold, it’s the worst possible outcome: the Church library. Of course, they would demand premium on books about a French Nun. How poetic.

She stands outside the library for a few minutes and deliberates her choices. With any luck, Cassandra is elsewhere -- it’s mid-afternoon, she probably has practice, or volunteer hours, or class. She tries, but she can’t remember for sure what her Tues/Thurs routine is. It’s been that long, or it’s been that hard to have her in her life. Regardless, she needs the book, and if she can get a hold of it she can make a photocopy and give it back with no harm done. It takes her a while, but she convinces herself to make a break for it: pulling out her keys from her bag and heading straight for the blue parking lot where her trusty car is awaiting.

All the same, she can’t help but curse her luck.

The drive to the Church would make her emotional if she had any emotions left to give. Days of alternating between crying, eating junk food, denial, and good ol’-fashioned anger have jaded her. At this point, she would dare the fates that be to make her days. The point between her pulling into the parking lot, turning her car off, and walking inside is all a surreal blur. Once she would have rather walked on a chain-link fence edge barefoot than set foot in a House of God, and now it’s twice in one month’s time.

Walking down the center aisle of the hall isn’t the same without Cassandra there to burst open a door on the other side. The stained glass isn’t as colorful, and the bread bowls aren’t as interesting. Still, thankfully, she finds herself left alone like before: no one to pretend they care about her soul, or ask if she’s been saved. The whole place feels like a ghost town, actually -- an odd thing for 4:30 in the afternoon on a weekday. But who is she to judge? The Pope?

A right, then a left, then up stairs. She logs it all in her head. There’s so much more room in the hallway with just her. Too much room. Eventually, she finds the double-doors. One cocked open, with a wooden stopper wedged underneath it. She hesitates to show herself: she’s not as modest as she was when she first came around, black high-waisted shorts with tights on under, with a black short-sleeve v-neck tucked in. Heels, because, of course -- and they clank on the wood floor.

But she does go in. Brave enough, finally, after a couple breaths: and she’s vindicated for doing so. No one’s in. No school kids hiding out, no Missionary interns studying away. No Cassandra, either, skulking or pacing with a book in her hands contemplating the secrets of the universe. Fabulous, she can pull out the paper in her pocket with the decimal system number, find the damn book, and be out like a thief in the night. The mischievous fates have been thwarted, so it seems. If she ignores the sinking feeling in her stomach and feet, being back where Cassandra first surprised, she can be on with her day.

Coming towards the standalone shelves rowed together, she studies the note she made for herself. The first shelf is way too early in the alphabet, so she comes around to the middle and peeks down the first section. Nothing and no one, and still in the C’s-E’s. She needs J.

Then, the sound of paper rubbing against itself. Like a page being turned. She freezes, takes a breath, and approaches the corner of the second aisle.

God, please, no, anyone but--but it’s her.

Her shoes are hitting the ground too hard for her presence to be a secret, and she knows well enough. She stops, and a heel grades against the wood grain. Cassandra -- dressed in black leggings and a sweatshirt, over-sized, and the most casual she’s ever seen her styled -- is sitting cross-legged on the floor. Up against the stacks, with several books piled around her. One open in her hands, kept in her lap. At the noise of Olivia’s footfalls she looks up. Not expecting her, clearly, her eyes go wide and she jerks up to her feet in the blink of an eye. Agile enough to do so without stumbling all over herself, but not confident enough to stand all tall and proud. Not like she did in the gallery.

Olivia steps back, and she can feel her face sour. She crinkles the paper in her hand, and it bends beneath a fist. She doesn’t respond, only glares with steeled hopelessness.

Cassandra closes the book in her hands. “W-what are you doing here?”

“I came for a book.” Iced, and disdainful.

Her face strains a bit, and she adjusts. “Oh.”

“Yeah,” she rolls her bottom lip and holds her ground. “That is all.” It’s crushing her slowly, the priorities: yell at her, say sorry again, cry, beg. Too many needs and too many wants. She takes a page out of Cassandra’s metaphorical book and holds it all in under a guise of self-sufficient introversion.

“I...okay. D-do you need--”

“No. I know how to work a library.”

“...Alright.” She accepts it, and nods. Olivia sucks on her teeth. They both try to get on with whatever it is they were up to before they were aware of each other’s presence: Cassandra, sitting back down on the ground, and Olivia investigating the far end of the shelf. She tracks down the J’s, but there’s no book in sight. Again. First, twice, and thrice she checks the row where it should be. A couple minutes have passed, and she’s left standing there with no reward to her risk.

She lets out a sigh through puckered lips.

“What are you looking for?” Cassandra’s voice, clear and calm.

She keeps her eyes on the shelf, clinging to the paper. “I don’t need your help.”

“Um…” she treads lightly, very lightly, “some of the shelves are disorganized, because of the students.”

Fan-fucking-tastic. She’ll never find this damn book, she’ll never do her homework, she’ll just drop out and call it good.

“I’m…” she starts, but stops when Cassandra suddenly shows up next to her, having risen to her feet without so much as a sound. She takes hold of the paper that is in a death grip in Olivia’s hands, one which she releases against her better judgement.

She raises a brow. “Hm.”

“It’s--it’s a book with copies of letters from--”

“Heloise and Abelard. I know this anthology, I had it for...um, hm. You won’t find it here, though.”

Olivia slouches, and frustration escapes her. “What? Again?!”

“No,” Cassandra shakes her head, and then turns around, “it’s over here.” Without a word, she walks away, with the presumption that Olivia will come along. An audacious presumption; if she had not come all the way across town to track down the damn thing she would have laughed and said ‘fat chance.’ Beggars can’t be choosers.

They go to the back corner, where there are rows of tall volume books that look like dictionaries. The shelf above them is where Cassandra slants onto her toes and searches. Olivia does her best to keep her eyes preoccupied elsewhere -- anywhere else, but her -- and waits patiently. Finally she falls back, pulling a book out that’s rather small and thin. But it’s weirdly pink, like the catalog image.

“Here,” she breaths, pivoting back to her and holding it out.

Olivia stares at the outstretched book, brow pressing low as she bites back more bitterness on her mind. She takes it, gripping onto the opposite diagonal corner to Cassandra’s grip.

“T-Thanks.” She spits out, holding it to her stomach. “Do you know if I have to….to do anything special to check it out from here? Or do I just take it to the main library?”

“You just take it there…” Cassandra confirms, reaching across her own stomach and clasping onto her elbow.

“Okay.” Olivia keeps her eyes to the ground, and her responses curt. “Thanks again. I’ll be going now.”

“Olivia, I’m sorry.” The words cut through the air like a chef’s knife. Eager, and quick, like it’s the last word she’ll ever get in edgewise. Olivia has turned to the side by the time she hears it, and she stops cold. The book to her belly now feels like armor she can’t live without. She can’t bare to look at her, at whatever face she’s making. It’ll be too sincere, too heartfelt.

“I really don’t want to hear it.”

“I know you don’t, but you deserve to.”

“You thought I deserved to hear a great deal of things.”

“I...I know. And…”

“What?”

“And it was unfair of me. I shouldn’t have cornered you, when you were already feeling uncomfortable. It wasn’t right.”

Olivia sucks in her gut; the words she is saying are too poignant to face with a chin tucked in shame. She looks, only to feel punished for it: Cassandra is frowning, and not the way she does by default. It is a sad one. It makes Olivia’s heart skip, and plummet at the same time.

“Y-you know, Cassandra,” she replies, her voice brittle as her throat gets thicker with tears she thought she had long run out of, “I...I just wish I knew what your secret was.”

Cassandra blinks a few times, beautiful black eyelashes fluttering. “My secret?”

“Yeah. Your secret. The one behind how you always look so undaunted and...and un-phased,” she closes her eyes to hold back tears, and cradles the book in both hands against her. “You know, Cullen talks to Ellinor, and Ellinor talks to me. I hear about how you are minding your own business, going about your day, while I cry myself to sleep or eat my body weight in Taco Bell. Every time. It hurts, but I tell myself, ‘oh, she’s just coping in her own way, she has to be as messed up as I am about this, just as torn up, just as…” she takes a shallow breath, but it does little to assuage her. “‘She has to be just as inexplicably messed up as I am.’ But even when I worried you didn’t care, or that you were indifferent, never did I think you would walk into the room and rip my heart out the way you did.”

Cassandra had become more and more engrossed in a painful kind of way, the more she talked. It wasn’t hard to understand -- it was probably the most brutally candid Olivia had ever been in her presence. Bearing her most cringe-worthy sides of her survival, for reasons she could not articulate half as well.

“So…” she sharply sniffled, “I just want to know what the secret is. What you do, what you...you tell yourself, that makes you so magically put-together. Maybe it’s the same shit you take that convinces you that I’m the one tormenting you when I…” she closes her eyes again, but a stray, small tear runs down the outside corner of her eye. That is enough for her. “You know, whatever. I’m...I’m not gonna…” she started to walk back, verbally and physically, expecting nothing else but her own shame.

A few steps, and then, the second twist of the knife.

“Liv, please.” Once again, she asks, and once again, Olivia stops. This time, her back is to her.

“I…” Cassandra takes a moment, collecting her breath by the sounds of it. “Cullen knows me, but he doesn’t know...me. He sees me coming and going, but he doesn’t know what happens while I’m getting by. If he did, he’d tell Ellinor--or, probably you, more like--that from the moment you first spoke to me I haven’t been able to get your voice out of my head. I’ve never been good with sentimentality, much as I appreciate it. But when I’m...when I’m around you it feels like I don’t have to worry. If anything’s been a secret, it’s been that.”

The sensation of hugging her in this room is still fresh. The way her arms wrapped around her waist, the way her breath felt against her neck. The briefness of it, and wishing it could last. But nothing lasts. Head high as much as she could pretend, she swallows stiff and keeps her eyes on the door for just a beat longer. Then, she faces her again. And Cassandra, she...her red eyes, her slightly red, tired eyes. It’s horrible.

“If you were so crazy about me, then why didn’t you kiss me? I was all yours, I was--”

“Because I didn’t want it to be like that.”

“...You…”

Cassandra sighs tersely, rubbing the side of her face. Exasperated. “I didn’t want the first time I ever kissed you to be during a fight about you being slut-shamed and me invading your privacy, alright? Is that...is that so much to ask? That if I was going to...to let myself be with a woman, a woman like you, that that kind of thing would be a little more special?!”

“I would have agreed, if you would have just talked to me! About anything!” Olivia shifted, now head-on with her. “You said you knew what you wanted, Cassandra, but that’s just it. You knew. I may have had my hopes and...and you may have been right about me having more of a clue than I admitted, but a clue is not consent. It isn’t a consensus. When you rejected me, I felt like an ass! Like I had taken advantage of you in some way.”

“Something you would have known wasn’t the case if you would have just stayed and listened to me! I was trying to tell you!”

“Trying?!”

“Yes! Or have you forgotten how hard it was to say out loud to the first girl you ever liked that you had feelings for her, and you were terrified she’d walk out?!”

“I did--!” She begins to hiss back, but stops. Forgiveness was an easier visitor when it came to certain suffering. She couldn’t swing the gavel when it came to that: it was like breaking ten different rules of queer code. Ugh, dammit. “Intimidated or not, we’re adults. This isn’t a recess, or homeroom, it’s...it’s life. I don’t get it, you’re always so...just...mature, with everything else but this.”

Cassandra half-nodded, and folded her arms. “The heart of man is a labyrinth, whose windings are very difficult to be discovered.”

Olivia delayed her retort, a bit off-guard. “...Um...yeah, that is...one way of putting it.”

Cassandra’s sweetly sore, peering down at the ground. “It’s an excerpt, from one of Heloise’s letters to Abelard. It’s...it’s after one where he implores her to revoke their union for the sake of God, but she refuses.”

Who even is this woman? Some thesaurus of mankind’s broken desires, reincarnated into one toned, statuesque, androgynous body? Is she even real?

“Yeah, well...Abelard was an elitist asshole who wasn’t worth it. And you’re still pompous, I take it.”

She smirks again, but not as sadly, as her eyes meet hers again. “Maybe so, on both counts. However, he still encouraged her in her work, and her learning.”

“Yes, as a means to punish her for behavior he deemed carnal even though he was a complicit beneficiary of if, not to mention--”

“Behavior he was punished for as well, rather grotesquely, if I can recall.”

Olivia’s hold on the book loosens, and she looks down at it, before back at her. “He...yeah. I mean, it was just a little...castration. It be like that sometimes.” They stare once again, and she clamps down on her tongue. They’re both fighting back something, some kind of expression, though Olivia denies the hope that Cassandra wishes to smile as she does. That is, until they both cough up a chuckle. The first in a long time; she can hardly remember the last occasion. That hurts.

After a moment, she gathers her wits. She slides the book into her shoulder back, and gets back to the unsavory topic.

“We’ve made a mess, haven’t we.” She can’t help but smile. Cassandra could run her heart through the mud and gravel, and then say something clever, and that’d be all it takes. She’d smile.

“I’m afraid so. They must think we’re devising to kill each other,” Cassandra says, coming forward. There’s no need of explanation as to who she’s referring to. In a flash, images of a very worried Ellinor and slightly scared Cullen come to mind.

“You would deserve it.”

A wry smirk. “Oh, would I?”

“Yes, you were a dick.”

“And you were an insensitive snob.”

Olivia chokes back another laugh. “Compared to the company you keep, Cassandra, I’m a down-home piece of apple pie.”

Cassandra scoffs. “Leliana? Ugh, God,” she grins, “she only pulls that act when she’s trying to pull something. She was being an ass, but, she was just...trying to protect me. I’m sure she’ll appear out of nowhere and explain herself, so, be prepared.”

“Oh, wonderful, I crave her company,” she mocks, eyes rolling gently as she looks back towards the door. “Why doesn’t she just show up now? I’m eager for more mortifying company.”

“She knew I wanted to be left alone. She does listen, you know.”

“...Oh. Well, damn.” That was a nice thing. Boundaries, huh, who knew. She can sympathize -- Olivia also has a friend who left her alone after one too many acidic quips. Oh, Ellinor. Though she wants to, she can’t crucify the woman for wanting to put up a fight for her friend. “Look, I know it makes me an asshole every time, but, I really should be going this time around. I have things to do tonight, and I really just needed to get this….this book.” She says it, but she hates it.

She hates it even more when Cassandra frowns, and blinks her eyes away. “I understand, no, it’s alright. You can’t just stay in every room I find you in.”

“No, I can’t, hah.” But I wish I could.

“Hey, Olivia?” she says one last time. Her full name. It’s nice, without all the malice.

“Yeah?”

Her eyes brighten a little. Bravery. “I...I hope that you’ll be happy. Whatever that means for you. You deserve it.”

It’s a stab to the side, clean and direct through her ribs and into her gut. Her voice saying ‘I think you knew what I wanted,’ rings loud and clear in her mind again. Wanted. Not want, wanted. And now this. Oh no, Cassandra, please, please don’t tell me you’ve really let go.

“...Thank you, Cassandra. I...I wish the same for you.” I wish it, and I wish it’d happen with me. Be with me. Ask me to stay. This time I’ll stay, I promise. Just ask it.

“Thanks. Um, drive safe, okay?” More of those polite, detached manners. Again. No, no, no.

“Yeah, um,” Olivia swallows, “I will. See you around, maybe?”

“Yeah. I think so.” A smile. She’s smiling. Oh God, she really has accepted it. That they aren’t meant for each other. Like Heloise and Abelard: Olivia as Heloise, ranting and raving in her letters about having been consumed by amorous affection. And then there’s Abelard, pointing her away towards higher callings, wishing her the best. Fuck Abelard, and fuck this.

Olivia tries her hardest to hide it, and she manages a wide grin and wave before leaving. She makes it out the hallway, down the side aisle of the Church pews, out the door, and into her car.

Slamming the car door behind her, she sinks into her compact leather seat and bangs her head against the headrest. Cassandra is letting her go. She did at the gallery, technically, but now it hurts in a different way. A way she feels no enraged pride in, no vanity. No need for spiteful indifference. She wants to take it all back, this time.

The one thing she couldn’t say, and perhaps will always regret, is that Cassandra was right. She is right. And now, she’s giving Olivia what she wants, what she clamors for, all the time. She’s giving it rather than trying to change her. So this is what respect feels like from someone who wants to love you.

The book stays in her lap as she drives home. When she stops at every red light, she clutches where Cassandra held it. If it were all a movie, this would be where she’d drive off into the sunset after her coming-of-age tale, leaving the reckless love behind. But she wants to do anything but that.

How long will it be until she finally stops? The answer is now.

She brakes hard and pulls into a street parking spot -- one of the luckiest moments of her life. Digging in her bag on the passenger’s seat, she finds her phone. Thumbing and thumbing, until she finds her name and the message thread she could never make herself delete.

--You know what’d make me happy? Because I have a couple ideas on the subject. The first is Friday night, at 11. Stay awake, or miss out.

#college au update #adventures of ellinor and olivia #modern!Olivia #ellinor trevelyan #day & age #WOOO AN UPDATE

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fandomshipping · 6 years

Text

like ships

[Inspired by this piece by @hachi-san88 and for @biohazard4ever. Hope this suffices!]

“Ships that pass in the night, and speak each other in passing, Only a signal shown and a distant voice in the darkness; So on the ocean of life, we pass and speak one another, Only a look and a voice, then darkness again and a silence.” ― Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, Tales of a Wayside Inn

Perhaps it was always going to amount to this.

Claire doesn’t think about Raccoon City as often as she used to. But when she does, it’s sudden, like a gust of cold wind that comes out of nowhere.

Perhaps it’s the way that child held himself, or how some places smelled like of decay, or how a survivor’s skin rotted against bones and muscle. And then she’s back—to the nineteen-year-old who thought Chris was just being an ass, to the college kid who wasn’t supposed to experience the things she had.

She remembers the gun being pointed at her, how she felt stuck between a rock and a hard place—

—and the relief that came after, knowing she was not its target.

“You alright?”

It makes her a little sad when she thinks about it now. How warm Leon sounded. How kind. How their meetings were always cut short by explosions and chained doors.

But perhaps she should’ve known by then. Not just how Raccoon’s specter would haunt the rest of their lives, but their parting.

Leon doesn’t think about Raccoon City as often as he used to. But when he does, the memory’s faded, diluted by tragedy and the scent of whiskey.

He knows it’s probably not the best way to go about things. Hunnigan will be all over his case the next day, and Chris will too, seeing as they’ve begun conducting joint missions with the BSAA. But he really doesn’t care, to be honest—he’s just another cog in the machine, killing zombies and the next BOW that gets in their way. Some days he wonders why he even bothers.

But in between jobs, when he’s out at a bar feeling sorry for himself, he thinks about Raccoon and everything it stood for and why he hated it so. How it killed good people. How he couldn’t save them. How its secrets corrupted those in power.

How they took away him and Sherry.

“You okay?”

And suddenly he’s back—to the 21-year-old rookie under the government’s employ, to the landing pad where he first met Chris Redfield.

Claire looked kind, but so, so cold.

“Yeah,” he said, garbling the words in a way that betrayed how he really felt. But he couldn’t break down just yet. For Sherry. And now, for Claire. He looked at the tattered aircraft to see if there was anybody else there. “Is your friend here? The one in the email?”

She bit her lip, and at once he regretted asking.

“He, uh... he didn’t make it,” she said, voice as garbled as his was. Shit.

“Claire, I’m so sorry,” he said, apologetically. But even then he wasn’t sure how to take it—should he come closer, give her a hug, tell her everything was going to be all right? He felt glued to where he was, with legs as heavy as lead.

Instead, she tried to assure him, telling the same lies he did and keeping the same strong front. They were similar, he and Claire. Sometimes a little too close for comfort.

He wonders if this was why never talked after Harvardville. She was just a click away, after all—there was Chris, the brother she adored, but he couldn’t quite stand sometimes. And there was Sherry. But the mere thought of it brought him back to that moment when he couldn’t quite comfort her the way he used to nor bring himself to give so much as a reassuring squeeze.

And then he thinks that perhaps this is the way it always was. That she was better off without him, much like the other people in his life. If anything, it was too late now.

Sometime after the fiftieth biohazard, things eventually died down a little. More countries began to chime in on legislative and executive measures to counteract bioterrorism, and a crackdown on companies, governments, and organizations that made use of these measures were made. The dispensation of the vaccine worldwide was made a top priority. And while there were a few odd individuals here and there who still made use of BOWs, the BSAA and Blue Umbrella had enough resources to go after them before they presented a worldwide threat.

But while things weren’t exactly the way they used to be, it did allow some quiet moments. And during such a time, Chris suggested a quick celebration.

She couldn’t help but snicker a bit. It just wasn’t like him—if anything, he was more of a workaholic than she was, and way too serious to party. But then he mentioned how Barry really wanted to get together, and how Jill and Parker and even the guys at the DSO were willing to chip in, even for just one night. It was the holidays, after all.

“And Sheva’s planning to fly in this weekend.”

“Well look at you,” she teased, something Chris didn’t particularly like. But she had to hand it to him, anyway. He’d already been through so much.

They’d already been through so much.

"And by the way, Claire,” he said, just as she was making a turn. “Leon’s coming, too. Thought you should know.”

She probably hit the brake a little too hard.

“Oh,” she said, phone secure between her cheek and shoulder.

“Oh? I thought you’d be a little more excited.”

A pause. In her heart of hearts she knew he was right—that she should be a little more excited, it’s been more than twelve years for God’s sake—but she just couldn’t. Over the course of a decade, it was as if Leon had turned from friend to legend, someone she only knew through Chris’ ramblings. And she didn’t know how to feel about that.

“Of course I’m excited,” Claire lied, glad they were having this conversation over the phone and not face-to-face. “Some asshole just tried to cut me in line, per usual.”

“Just let him. Better a little inconvenience than a full-on road accident,” he replied, in that concerned, brotherly tone he never grew out of. At least it gave her a distraction. Eventually, she maneuvered her way out of the conversation and bade goodbye, glad she didn’t have to broach the topic.

But they’d have to, sooner or later. She wasn’t sure when or why Leon became a touchy topic. It wasn’t like he abandoned her or did anything wrong. But perhaps it was precisely that. The fact that nothing bad happened between the both of them made things even worse.

Midway into the party, most of the attendees were either drunk or chatting up a storm. It was comforting, in a way—both because it gave a sense of warm kinship and allowed her to retreat into her thoughts.

She’d finally met Rebecca in person, who also found it funny how they’d only met then despite their long involvement in Chris’ life. Sheva was equally brilliant, with her sharp wit and knowing smile. Whenever they huddled to chat Claire saw Chris look over in concern, and impishly she wondered if he regretted bringing them all together. Barry and Moira came a little bit later, while Sherry, Hunnigan, and some DSO staff arrived after. Even a few Blue Umbrella reps joined, somewhat sheepishly, but after a few drinks and backslaps from Barry, they eased up a bit more in their presence.

And Leon was nowhere in sight.

Claire desperately wanted to find solace in the fact. Here, she was surrounded by people she loved without any immediate threat, bioweapon or otherwise. And her biggest concern was nowhere to be found. She should be happy. She should be enjoying this.

But she couldn’t.

“Claiiire,” came a voice, and suddenly Sherry Birkin had her arms around her in drunken stupor. While it was nice to see her happy, Claire wasn’t too keen on her drinking beyond her limit. Looking to Barry for answers, it only took a second to decipher the shot glass in Moira’s hand and the grin on her face.

“Moira,” she said, sighing. The girl waved her hand and winked.

“Hunnigan said we could play a drinking game!”

Amid Hunnigan’s protests, Claire took it as an opportunity to steer Sherry towards a couch and convince her to take some water. Before long, the girl was fast asleep, and she was at least secure in the fact that Hunnigan was there to watch over her.

She’d grown so much, Sherry. And so strong.

She’s not sure she could say the same thing about herself.

“Claire,” came Chris, and she gave Sherry one last look before heading towards him. At least Hunnigan is here this time. At least she’s safe.

“Yeah?” she says, noting the phone in her brother’s hand. He seemed concerned.

“I can’t reach Leon,” he said, plainly. “Not sure if he’s just flaking off or something, but I feel like there’s something’s wrong. Could you try calling him on your cell?”

It was like a lump had lodged itself in her throat.

“Yeah, sure,” she said absentmindedly, hoping Chris didn’t notice. Never mind that she wasn’t sure if Leon had changed his number or not. Or if he wanted to hear from her either. “I’ll just see if I still have the right number.”

“I could give you his current, if you want.”

“Sure,” she said, the lump growing larger. Reluctantly, she took his phone and dialed in the number, waiting for an answer.

She honestly hoped he wouldn’t respond.

Words couldn’t describe the relief she felt when it stopped ringing.

“He’s not answering my call, either.”

“That doesn’t sound good. Maybe I should go see if he’s alright.”

Calls from some drunk BSAA operatives seemed to prompt otherwise, and she noticed Chris’ brow furrow like it often did when he felt conflicted.

She knew what she had to do, and she didn’t like it.

“I’ll handle it,” she said, ignoring her own discomfort and faking a smile. “Can’t keep your guests waiting, after all.”

He looked concerned, as always. “You sure about that?”

“Yeah,” she said, a little too brightly. “I’ve got an earful for him that’s long overdue.”

That was the thing, however. She wasn’t sure if she had anything to say.

The apartment complex was faded and reeked of decay, with trash littered across the corridors and termites hovering around light bulbs. The whole place was a health hazard, like one wrong move could warrant a skin infection.

He didn’t really care, to be honest. The dilapidation suited him just fine—surely no one would bother finding him here.

Sluggishly, he looked down the bottle in his hand—a large whiskey type obviously not made for drinking up straight. It doesn’t stop him anyway, and before long he’s downed another bottle, twice in a row.

The dinner he prepared for two was probably rotting by now, but to hell with that. He doesn’t know why he even tries sometimes, especially when she gave him so little to run on. But maybe it was precisely that: that perhaps he was just looking for something to look forward to, no matter how dismal it was.

Then there was Chris and his stupid party, which he should’ve gone to in retrospect. It was probably better than drinking himself to death; at least some people would talk him out of it. But as he watched his phone ring and vibrate, he couldn’t help but think he’d sooner tell Chris to go fuck himself than go to that pithy get-together.

He was hard on the man, he knew. Deep down, he knew Chris was only doing this because he cared. But he couldn’t bring himself to accept that.

A few raps on his door interrupted his self-pitying tirade, but he was too boozed up to notice. Or, if he did, he assumed it was a trick of his imagination. Eventually, the knocking became persistent, and out of habit he took the pistol on the table, slowly approaching the door.

It better be Redfield.

“What do you want, Redfield?” he said, perhaps a little too angrily. Not surprisingly, he was greeted with silence.

He took a more cautious stance as he inched towards the door, ready to neutralize any possible threat. With a finger on the trigger, he paused for a moment to assess the situation before looking through the peephole.

“I think you’ve got the wrong Redfield.”

And his hands suddenly felt so, so cold.

Almost instantaneously, he found himself opening the door—to hell with it whether it was a decoy or not. But there she was, auburn hair and all: a specter of the past he never thought he’d face again.

Claire Redfield.

She was real.

“Hey, Leon,” she said, almost reluctantly.

For a moment, the two just stood there in silence, awkward as it was. Once again, she found the lump in her throat forming, like a cold stone that forced its way down her esophagus. What was there to say, anyway? Good to see you? How have you been? Her eyes darted around what little space they had in search of a topic, before landing on the small dining table just off the living room.

“I see you’ve been waiting for someone.”

Instinctively, he rested his head on the doorway. “Not really. She was a no-show.”

“That’s too bad,” Claire said, voice like tin. “So I guess you wouldn’t mind a little company?”

He paused for a moment, trying to fight out of the fog and haze that descended in his head. “Yeah, sure. Just come right in.”

Somehow, the unexpected arrival sobered him a bit. He found himself consciously trying to hide his staggering steps, even if he knew his breath had already given him away. Even if his table was a mess of alcoholic drinks and a strange milieu of food combinations.

Claire didn’t seem to mind, despite noticing it all. If anything, she seemed uneasy about another thing, but he couldn’t tell what.

“Chris wanted to check on you,” she said, finally. “He was worried when you didn’t answer your phone or went to the party.”

Slumping on the couch, the words hit him and made him laugh, almost bitterly. “That’s it? Really?” Slowly, he rested his legs on the table, moving the bottles aside with his feet. “Well, it’s nice to know he’s concerned. Especially if he sent you just to check up on me.”

“Leon,” she said, with a lilt he was familiar with. It was a warning.

“So,” he continued, arms resting on the headrest. “Is there anything else Chris wants to tell me? Or is that it?” He knows he’s in dangerous territory now, but he couldn’t stop—there was something about the mixture of shock, and disappointment, and hurt that kept him going, even if he knew he was an asshole at this point. Her silence just prodded him further.

“I mean if that’s all you've got that’s fine by me. Just tell Chris I’m fine, and I’m sorry I couldn’t go to his party, okay? Now if you’re done here, the door’s just right there so you could see yourself out and—”

“Leon, what the fuck is wrong with you.”

The words hit him like a bucket of ice to the face.

She was seething now, he knew. But not in a way he expected. It wasn’t plain anger or hatred—he could see the same hurt, the same disappointment that he felt reflected in her eyes, and it stung. But he just couldn’t back off now.

“Me? What the fuck is wrong with me?” he said, voice rising. “I’m not the one barging in here after more than a decade just to play messenger for someone else! Is this really all it took to talk to me, Claire? Am I that inconsequential to you?”

“That’s not true,” she said, teeth gritted. “That’s not true and you know it. When I keep tabs on Sherry I keep tabs on you, and you fucking know it. I have fucking voicemail from Hunnigan to prove it.”

“Well, I’m sorry I’ve been busy all the time trying to save someone else’s ass,” he said, matching her tenacity. He knew deep down he shouldn’t be doing this, but he was all riled up and couldn’t stop. “I did say we could meet some time a little more normal, didn’t I? Well, things haven’t been exactly normal, have they?”

“They are now,” she said, like she was wrenching out a response. Like she was holding back tears.

“Are they really?”

The silence felt heavy and suffocating, like a dark, tar-like liquid. They couldn’t even look each other in the eye.

It shouldn’t have escalated to this point, that much he knew. And with the guilt finally getting through to him, he knew he had to do something.

“Claire...”

“I don’t want to fight with you, Leon,” she said, voice soft and hollow. It made him feel even worse.

He gave a sigh. “Claire, why don’t you sit down. There’s plenty of space on the couch.”

Her eyes finally met his, with stinging clarity. Hurt. All he could see was hurt. “Okay,” she said, almost under her breath.

For a moment, they just sat there, trying to find the words to say. And after more than a decade of silence, it wasn’t an easy feat. For the most part, they stared into the distance, trying their hardest not to catch the other’s eye.

“You cut your hair,” Leon said, breaking the silence. It was so obvious that it sounded dumb, but it was better than nothing. Instinctively, Claire reached out for the shortened ends.

“Yeah,” she said. “I had surgery some time back and had to chop some of it off. Apparently it takes a while for it to grow back.”

“Oh,” he responded. “What happened?”

“It’s a...” she said, taking a strained breath. “It’s kinda a long story.” A pause. “How about you? I heard you still had a thing with Ada going.”

“Oh. That,” he said, a little flatter than usual. “To be honest, I’m not so sure myself.”

“I see.”

It wasn’t exactly the greatest conversation, but it was something. He felt numb, still, but slowly it was like something had begun to thaw.

“It’s kind of funny,” Claire said, and immediately he averted his gaze towards her. She gave a little bitter chuckle. “When this whole mess started out, you were the first person I turned to when I was looking for Chris. Nowadays, he’s the one telling me what’s been happening with you.”

For some reason, that amused him. “I reckon they aren’t good stories.”

“Not really. More like updates in passing,” she said. “Sometimes when he tells me these things, I feel like he’s talking about some co-worker at the BSAA or some old war buddy. The Kennedy Report this, or Glenn Arias that. Like you weren’t someone I actually knew. And I sometimes wonder if I actually did.”

Perhaps it was because he drank too much, or because it was the middle of the night, but as she told him this the realization sloshed around a bit in his head, evading actualization. When it did, however, it was ice-cold—cutting through any shred of doubt he carried over the past 13 years or so.

Maybe she didn’t hate him after all.

“You’re always going to be the one I went through Raccoon City with,” he said, reassuringly. “Nothing’s going to take that away from us.”

“Well, we didn’t exactly spend much time together,” she said, a little ruefully. It reminded him of a kid going through a phase, to the point that it was almost cute.

“Doesn’t matter. It was still you,” he said, smiling. “This is probably gonna sound wrong, but back then, I was just glad there was someone out there who went through the same thing. That I wasn’t alone. That even when you were out finding Chris, I knew there was someone I could talk to about the outbreak.”

“Then why did you stop talking to me?” she asked, but this time it was devoid of all pain or anger. Now, it was a genuine inquiry, subtly laced with concern. He shrugged, a little guiltily.

“I dunno,” he said. “I guess I was in shock? Or maybe I didn’t want to hurt you or something. You had the whole thing with Sherry, and Chris, and... Steve, right? I dunno,” he continued, leading his head back on the sofa. “I guess I didn’t want to be a burden or something.”

She gave a small smile. It reminded her a bit of his Raccoon City self.

“You wouldn’t have,” she said, turning to face him. “I think, more than anything, it would’ve made things easier.”

Facing her, he couldn’t help but notice how kind she looked, how close they were. Kind of like their time in Raccoon City, when she was scared but trusted him nonetheless and he believed in her and wanted to keep her safe and how they both were before everything turned to shit. It was almost symbolic, in a way, as if the gulf between them had slowly closed in. That even in the years that passed, or the many partners he’d have, she would always be that one constant after all this time.

“And just so you know,” she said. “I didn’t just go here because Chris told me to. I think I always wanted to, but... I guess I just didn’t know how.”

It was surprising how much relief that gave him. “I guess that makes the two of us.”

And for the first time since Harvardville, he heard her laugh.

Sometime after, she took care of Leon as she did Sherry—gave him water, stirred him towards an actual bed—and as she was about to head for the sink, he grasped her wrist, almost in a panic.

“Claire, wait.”

The urgency in his voice brings her to him immediately.

“Leon? What’s wrong?”

“Are you leaving?”

She furrowed her brow, much like how Chris does when he’s conflicted. Sometimes she wonders if it runs in their family, this feeling of being torn.

She wonders if that’s all she really feels now.

“I can’t stay for long,” she said, quietly, placing a hand on his. “But if you need me, you know where to find me.”

Her heart felt so painfully full, like it would burst any second now.

The way he looked at her seemed to bring her one step closer to that.

“Okay,” he said, in a half-doze. “And Claire?”

She leaned in to hear him more clearly. “Yeah?”

All he could muster was a soundless mumble before he fell asleep. And to an extent, part of her was glad he did. She had enough for tonight.

Before leaving, she tidied up things a bit—cleaned the dishes, cleared the bottles—and once things looked a little more livable, she placed a glass of tomato juice on his bedside table with a little note.

She knows she couldn’t be there for him all the time, as much as she’d like to. But at least this should suffice.

When he first wakes up, he’s surprised at how mild his hangover felt compared to all the other nights. He could’ve sworn he downed two bottles of whiskey, but his body feels otherwise—it’s an enigma he couldn’t quite process.

His room doesn’t quite feel like his room, either. It’s much more... cleaner, even smelling of the fresh lemon Lysol he kept in his cabinet for God knows how long. Before he rattles his head for a culprit, however, the answer is right in front of him, written on a yellow post-it note.

Groggily, he reached for it and brought it up to his face, and but before he got to the signature, he already found himself smiling, knowing perfectly well who’d be responsible for this.

Leon,

Drink this glass of tomato juice once you wake up. As is. DO NOT SPIKE WITH VODKA. Sherry and Chris have my number in case you want to chat.

Love,

There’s something about the letter that makes him inextricably happy, and for the next few minutes, he just stared at it until Hunnigan called him for another round of scolding and an update on his whereabouts. He tried to talk his way out, as per usual, but afterwards he finds himself lithe and limber as he downs the tomato juice and prepares for the next mission.

Claire is his friend again, and all is right with the world.

But there’s something that still isn’t quite right yet, however. Twisting in his gut ever so slightly, he had yet to decipher what this strange feeling was.

He’d find out soon enough.

Work after the holidays involved a lot of paperwork, as it turned out, with reports and projections and memorandums galore piling up as TerraSave prepared for the next five years of operations. Needless to say, it left a lot of them in a slump for a good part of the day—particularly Moira, who seemed bored out of her mind.

“These numbers don’t even make sense anymore,” she whined, stretching across her table. Claire just smiled.

“You’ll get used to it.”

The girl just pouted, giving the monitor a mournful scowl. Amused, Claire carried on with her report in silence, until Moira had stirred again.

“I think it’s high time for a break,” she said, with renewed vigor.

“Moira.”

“Come ooon,” she whined, still keeping a pleading grin. “We’ve been here for hours, Claire! We could play like a round of crazy eights or something.”

“Or maybe my daughter needs to get her ass back on the job,” came a good-natured voice, and Moira just pouted, watching as Barry came over to their cubicles.

“Dad.”

Claire couldn’t help but suppress a smile. “What’s up, Barry?”

“Some exciting news, for once. We’re back on the field next week.”

Moira let a whoop out into the air.

“Fuck yeah! I can finally get out of this cubicle!”

“You’ll still have to do the paperwork when you come back,” Claire teased, with the other girl sticking her tongue out in reply.

“I wouldn’t get too cocky if I were you though,” Barry said. “It’s gonna be one of those joint missions, so we might have to dial it down a bit.”

“Joint mission?” Claire said, curiously. “Who are we going to work with this ti—”

Then she felt it, the cold hand on her shoulder that was neither Moira’s or Barry’s. With an uncharacteristic jolt, she gripped the hand and spun about, ready to face its owner—

—and found Leon Kennedy instead, with an impish smile.

A wave of indecipherable feeling crashed over her then and there, and she froze, trying to retrace her bearings. “Good God,” she managed to say, bringing a hand to her forehead. “Leon, you scared me.”

“Just wanted to check up on my partner before the big meeting.”

“... Partner?” she blurted, the question hanging in the air.

“Yeah,” Leon said, casually. “Or, well, you’ll understand once we get to the meeting. See you in fifteen. Barry. Moira.” With a lithe nod of the head he greeted the two, disappearing as quickly as he came.

Baffled, Claire stared at where the man once was, as if to process everything that had happened. Barry just shrugged, continuing from where he left off.

And Moira smirked, a devilish glint in her eye as she looked over at the woman.

“What was that all about?”

She wasn’t sure she had the answer to that, either. But there was a warmth there, a lightness, and while a suitable explanation seemed elusive, something told her things were going to be just fine.

“I don’t know,” she stated, plainly, then turned to the younger woman with a smile. “I guess we’ll find out in fifteen minutes.”

#cleon #Claire Redfield #Leon Kennedy #resident evil #re2

64 notes · View notes

atruelioness · 5 years

Text

and ooh, it’s good to know...

i never thought i’d be writing this. i was going to leave it at 3 and done. i like 3. 3 is nice. 3 is neat. 3 is trinity. i figured that was all i would have to say anyway. that my confession would somehow lead to liberation and then would come love, then marriage, then baby carriage bc what else is marriage sex for?

anyway.

soundtrack: amerie - just like me (on repeat).

“for somebody, somebody who’s just like me...”

i’m listening to old songs again to remember who i am. i used to be a woman so inside of herself that all she had to do was think and there it was. the truth.

now it seems like i have to search and surrender and sacrifice and scream from the mountaintops just for anything to be or feel or manifest itself as true. well, not anymore. i freed myself and broke chains all by myself or whatever beyonce and kendrick said as they were splashing barefoot through puddles.

i meant to password protect this. partially because i doubt you even read this. just like my IG stories. just like my book i sent you. just like everything i do that’s usually for a man’s ego and not his heart because naivety. mreeuh said stop using that word bc it’s a self-fulfilling prophecy but i say it because sometimes truth is the light you need to shine to dispel darkness.

plus i’m tired of hiding. my feelings. my heart. myself. man up and recognize a real one when you see her. or read her.

“somebody, somebody who feels like me.”

GOD WHAT IS THIS ALL FOR? i’m tired. i’m tired of loving with a heart with no sense of direction or GPS and making all the wrong turns that have me ending up exactly where i need to be each and every time like a pinned tweet.

can you be real without me fucking up first? can love be real without the frontin and denying and triangulation and abuse and emphasized and loved texts but never a text out of the blue (pun fucking intended and dismissed) to see how i am doing while i pray and basically ascend you and raise you as a king only for you to randomly and spontaneously sweat everyone but me so hard that they themselves have to question why you’re so obsessed with them. wyd?

like, no really, wassup with you? can i invoice you for all this wasted time because i could really use the money to get out of the situation i was never planning to get up out of in the first place. like, i get it. mans a huge fucking wasteman. huge bloodly bloodclaat pussyhole eediat. i get it get it or whatever drake said.

“that there’s somebody... there’s somebody, somebody who loves like me.”

but what was the point of being rescued only to wind up on the white horse by myself? i guess i could have rescued my damn self so i did but i keep giving credit where none is due. just like the logos i placed on that flier for no reason for people who would style me in a second, i built an entire throne in my heart and placed you on it just to get someone else off only to find that you never set it in anyway. you too busy being whoever the fuck you are when you’re not being the man of my dreams which seems to be any time spent outside of my own head which is why i wasn’t with the shits in the first place.

but hardhead. but hopeful romantic. but God. yeah yeah, ye ye ye. burn har like a burna boy song. do whatever makes your ego feel amazing because i guess all of m y love and and prayers and accolades and whatever the heaven i was doing was just me being a spiritual schoolas again and not a grown ass woman.

GOD NO REALLY WYD?

i’m ignoring every call and text and DM and email of my narcissistically abusive ex-lover for my possibly narcissistic crush to lead me on a long journey to nowhere. i say nowhere because how in the world could you get that close to love and decide you wanna subtweet her and the God she serves?

who are you and why did i ever think you were the One? what kinda illusion, what in the obeah, what kind of rice water did you dip your face in to come up with that one? who sent you so I can ship you right back to sender?

okay that was mean. but didn’t they tell you that i was a savage? didn’t your wife tell you that we could be heartless, regardless, of our conscience? women that is. i’m not upset or bitter so much as i am perplexed and disappointed.

do you know what i went through to trust you? i still have the worn out magazine. i still have a thousand blue items strung around my home. i still have this memory pressed inside of my head of how it felt to finally release that night to your music and how you felt like the only pure energy in the room. how i knew exactly what to do and where to sit even if i didn’t know what to say. how you were always where i could see you and how all of our favourite songs were playing. how i placed khanzi in your lap only to come out and find him in someone else’s. how many people have it twisted and still don’t get it.

“i’ve waited so long, for somebody who can do it like me.”

i don’t even wanna write about it anymore. i don’t want to spend another second on anything that isn’t real or God or love or all of the above.

i took it far enough to know i don’t need to take it any further. i went through this already. with so many others. didn’t i tell you? did i not recite jhene aikos stranger perfectly and wasn’t sparks will fly w. jcole about.... ? nah. no more.

never again. because next time i will be sure.

because i am a true lioness. because i don’t come easy. because i am a girl like this, in a world like this. because i’m a bbc queen, star.

what hapn to you?

i guess we’ll never know. this is not me giving up, btw. this is me not giving in. to temptation. being delivered. not from evil, but still. amen. mentally and socially and culturally and verbally and spiritually preparing for africa. i said 2021 but jah9 said kenya 2020 and i’m like you know what, that could work. i just wanted to see vision 2020 come true for jamaica. i know i said forever, but 3 stacks said forever never feels that long until you’re grown.

and i’m a grown ass woman. again. there’s a song about this you’ll never listen to: xavier omar - grown woman. another xavier omar - blind man. and hours spent loving you (spzrkt).

“waited all my life, for somebody like... somebody who’s just like me.”

i mourn all the songs i’ll never get to play for you. i mourn all the locs i’ll never get to play in. i mourn khanzi and mocha’s play dates. i mourn those navy blue shorts and what i accidentally almost felt was in them and how for some reason in that moment i wasn’t shy whatsoever, and all the unspeakable things i did in the name of love and liberation.

by mourn i mean listen to r&b lol. by mourn i mean... damn, bruh.

maybe next lifetime.

i’m not with ntn. just God alone.

still love you. but yeah, bless.

💙

#self-care

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siavahdainthemoon · 6 years

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I’m a fucking hopepunk, and I will kill you with kindness.

‘Not all people are bad. The bad people are just the loudest.’

I think we’ve all heard variations of that truism by now. Of if you haven’t—there you go, you’ve learned something new, you’re welcome! But in either case, something clicked for me yesterday that I think I have to share.

(This is going to be a long one. Bear with me: I swear there’s a point to it. If you want to skip it all, @thebibliosphere says it all more eloquently and far more succinctly than I ever could here.)

About a month ago, I contacted an online seller, concerned that my package hadn’t arrived. I was polite, and made it very clear that I wasn’t requesting a replacement—it was stated very clearly on the seller’s site that if you didn’t purchase tracked shipping, items lost in the post couldn’t/wouldn’t be replaced. Instead I asked what information they had about the package, anything I could potentially use to figure out where it might have gone.

We exchanged several messages back and forth, during which I stayed polite (and so did she). I explained that I was worried the package would be forever MIA—the postal system where I live is not great, and it wouldn’t be the first time something had been stolen or lost—and given that the item was limited-edition, was there any chance she could set another one aside for me? If the package didn’t arrive, I would like to buy a second one. I understood if she couldn’t or wouldn’t do that—there was no obligation and I knew she had a store to run—but what did she think?

She said that was perfectly fine, no problem. I expressed great gratitude and relief.

A few days later she sent an email saying the package had been returned to her, so I paid for shipping again (tracked this time!) and all ended well.

What struck me—and upset me a little—was how relieved and grateful the seller was for my being understanding. She explicitly said as much. What upset me was the implication that other customers with similar issues had not been polite and understanding about it.

Last week, I reached out to another seller about a different missing delivery. (I told you the postal service here is terrible). She had already sent me one replacement free of charge, so this time I insisted on paying. The item was hand-made, and I said her time and skill, not to mention the materials used, ought to be paid for. So I did, and this time I paid for tracked shipping (I’m learning my lesson), and hopefully this one will reach me.

This seller also expressed what I would consider disproportionate relief and gratitude for my understanding and politeness. She said that she had been growing depressed lately because other customers whose packages had disappeared had left poor reviews on her store, and I think probably sent unpleasant messages about it (she didn’t say so explicitly, but that was the impression I got.) She said (she was very, very sweet) that I’d restored her faith in people, and in customers specifically, and she was grateful for that.

I sent back one last message thanking her for being so incredibly helpful and kind through the process of helping me. And I told her that she created beautiful things, something I couldn’t do, something none of her customers could presumably do, and that there were people who appreciated that, and anyone who didn’t were idiots and didn’t deserve her time.

Her last message said that I’d made her cry—in a good way!—and that she would remember this for the rest of her life.

I swear that knocked the breath out of me.

Over the last little while, I’ve made more of an effort to leave positive comments in my browser history—retweeting updates from my favourite authors with way too many exclamation points, leaving comments on the fanfictions I read, the videos I watch, the art I see. Even the Kickstarter projects I back.

And every single time, the (always positive) reaction I got was drastically, almost insanely out of proportion to the amount of effort it had taken me to make it.

I’ve heard ‘good people have to be louder’ many times in discussions about social justice, but always in terms of big, physical action. And those actions are incredibly important! Voting and showing up for protests and making blockades and calling out people who need calling out—it’s all incredibly important.

But yesterday it hit me that that’s not the only kind of ‘louder’ we need.

If you haven’t heard of hopepunk, it’s basically the idea that being kind is an act of resistance in a world that wants to grind you down. It’s the point-blank refusal to give in to either indifference or outright negativity, and about fighting to be good. Not good like saints—not good like perfect. We’re mortals; I don’t think it’s possible to be perfect, and to be honest I don’t think I’d like to be a saint anyway. But still good. Good as in kind. Good as in gentle, when gentleness is called for. (You are allowed to be fierce, you are encouraged to be fierce. But be gentle to yourself, and to others when you do not have to be fierce.)(Or maybe I’m phrasing it badly. Be fiercely gentle. Be gently fierce.) Good as in fuck you, I will not let you make me into someone who does not care, who does not love. I will be kind because you want me so badly not to be and you cannot stop me. I will be a light in the dark no matter how dark you make it.

And guys—yeah, that means protests and petitions and voting and everything else. It means the big things.

But if we forget about the small things, it doesn’t matter who is president or what laws get passed. If we let the world make us cruel—even casually, unintentionally cruel—then there is no world to fight for. Not one that’s worth fighting for.

We have to remember what we’re fighting for.

A few years ago now, I wrote a post that went kind of viral, the ‘you are not filler’ post. In it I talked about how we all make ripples with our every action, inaction, with our very existence. It’s basically chaos theory—the whole ‘a butterfly beats its wings, and causes a storm on the other side of the world’ thing. We all matter because we all make ripples simply by breathing. We are all irreplaceable because without any single one of us, the world would be different. You are not filler because if someone else was in your place, the ripples would be slightly different. Maybe almost imperceptibly different. But different. This world would not be this world without all of us in it.

Somehow I never made the leap to realising that it’s not just that you make ripples simply by living. You can make ripples on purpose.

You can be a hopepunk. You can make not just neutral ripples, but positive ripples. You can choose to be kind and set off a trail of bright gold dominoes that ring the earth. And it can be so easy! It can take only seconds; saying ‘thank you’ to a server, writing a quick comment on a fic you like, holding the door open for the person behind you. I’m a writer who’s struggled with depression for years; guys, those comments and reviews can change someone’s life. They can save someone’s life. I promise.

And it can be hard, too: you can swallow your frustration when you’re dealing with a customer service rep whose fault it isn’t, even when you’re tired and you’ve been passed between four different people already. You can not snap at someone even though someone else has just hurt or angered you. You can be patient when you’ve explained something a dozen times and need to explain it again. Those kinds of things are hard. They are.

But every time you manage it, you have managed to not make a ‘bad’ ripple. You’ve made a good one instead. You’ve cancelled the potential darkness and added a bit more light to the world instead.

Here’s another truism for you: ‘an eye for an eye leaves the whole world blind.’ Here is how to be a hero every day: when a dark ripple reaches you, don’t pass it on. Don’t be the next domino in the chain. Your boss snarls at you because he hasn’t been sleeping because the investors are anxious because and because and because—and you don’t snap or lash out at the next person who gives you an excuse. You don’t take it out on anyone else. The chain of small or not-so-small cruelties and meanness and indifference reaches you, and you break it. You are the one who says stop. You are the one who doesn’t take an eye. You are the one who says enough.

You are a fucking hero.

You are, though. Some of you are scoffing at me right now, but think about it. You know how hard it is to do that. You know that you say things you regret to someone who isn’t the cause of your pain or stress. You’ve had someone do it to you. Now think about the strength of will it takes to hold that pain or stress and not pass it on. It’s like a game of hot potato, only the potato is a burning coal and there is no music to make it stop. The burning coal has been passed from person to person to person and given to you. You’re the one who has to make it stop.

Think about what it takes to hold onto that coal and not pass it on.

Think about what it takes to crush it into nothing.

It is hard. It hurts, sometimes. How is that not heroic? You’ve stopped an evil. A little evil, maybe, but little evils build into big ones. And even little ones can break people, hearts, lives. You know that too, if you think about it.

I remember being about fifteen or sixteen years old, so happy because for the first time in my life, I’d gotten 90% on a Maths test. The highest mark I’d ever managed in that subject. I brought it home beaming because my dad had spent years frustrated with me for struggling with mathematics. It had been a low-grade, sometimes not so low-grade vein of disappointment and small miseries for all of my life, and now I’d finally done it, and he would be so proud of me.

He barely glanced at it when I showed him. He said something absently, vaguely congratulatory and continued on with what he was doing.

It’s been ten years and it still makes me want to cry.

And that wasn’t any kind of deliberate cruelty. That was just a father who was exhausted from working 5am to 9pm in the middle of the credit crisis, who knew his job was on the point of being terminated and who had to borrow from his father-in-law to make our rent. He had every reason to be that tired and absent-minded. Just like you have every right to be raw and snarly after a terrible day at work, to be maddened by the idiocy of that customer service rep, to feel like the whole world’s against you after a million tiny things go wrong in one day.

You have every right.

But you can choose not to pass on that coal.

It’s hard. We’re mortals: sometimes we fuck up. Sometimes we’re cruel by accident, sometimes we make mistakes, sometimes we don’t know the whole story. Sometimes we’re just so fucking tired.

But you can choose to try.

Even stopping just one evil makes you a hopepunk. Makes you a hero.

And what about being more than a hero? What about crushing that coal down into a diamond, and passing that on instead?* What about deliberately choosing to be kind when someone has been cruel, when the world has hurt you? By which I mean: what about turning around and doing something to make a positive ripple when a bad one reaches you? What about being a magic kind of prism, and turning the darkness that reaches you into a rainbow?

I’m not saying, do something good for everyone who hurts you. Like I said, I’m not a saint, and I don’t want to be. If you can be or are that good, then…then I can’t even. You’re something more than the rest of us, and you have my unfeigned awe and I am happy you exist. But for the rest of us—when your boss yells at you, maybe drop a penny into a charity box. Grab your roommate’s favourite treat for them on the way home. Write a positive review for an app you like on the app store. It can be anything. It can be tiny. Smile and say thank you to the person who makes your coffee at Starbucks, I don’t know.

But drop the coal on the fucking ground, and give something small and beautiful to someone else instead.

If you’re good, make your voice heard. Remind strangers that the world isn’t all bad, that the terrible people featured on the news are far from the only people out there. Give someone a moment of kindness that they might just remember forever. Help make a world worth fighting for by refusing to let Them make you into someone who wouldn’t.

You won’t always manage it. We all have bad days, we all make mistakes. That’s okay. But try. Do your best.

When you can, stand next to me—stand up with all of us—and when a ripple of casual cruelty or deliberate evil or just plain indifference reaches you, say no.

Say It stops here.

Because I’m a fucking hopepunk, and I will kill you with kindness.

(NB: I’m not advocating pacifism here. You have no obligation to be kind to - well, arguably anybody, I guess, but especially not to people who hurt you. And there are some kind of cruelties that you need to push back against, not just stand against. But I believe we need this kind of resistance as well.)

(*Yes I know that’s not how diamonds are really made, that’s not the point!)

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