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softjaehyvn · 4 years

Text

when i leave

pairing ;; jung jaehyun x reader (main focus) ; johnny x reader

special guests ;; kim yugyeom (got7) , jeon jungkook (bts) , kim mingyu (seventeen) , lee taeyong , ten lee

genre ;; hanahaki au , angst & fluff

warnings ;; alcohol / drinking , character deaths , cheating

synopsis ;; your grandmother had warned you about it - the hanahaki disease. where the ill person coughs up petals if their love towards someone is unrequited. and of course you had to fall in love with the one person, jaehyun, a stranger, who managed to help you through the rough break-up with youngho. however, he as well had his secrets - just like youngho had them.

word count ;; 9.8k

note ;; this was requested back on my other blog! part of the collab with @hangsxng, also happy jaehyun day !!

It was only a short video that you had received from your older brother Taeyong, where he filmed your boyfriend talking about you in a drunk state. You couldn’t believe what he was saying there.

“You know, I never loved her. She was so innocent and sweet, she just fell for me”, he giggled, grabbing his cup and taking a sip from it. “She’s so stupid.” Everyone around started laughing; you just stared on your phone as the video ended, getting up and packing your stuff.

You waited for a bit. You wanted to ask him yourself if he meant what he said. Even though he probably would be drunk, you still waited for him.

“Hey Y/N”, he greeted you, definitely sobered up; you noticed that from the way he was talking to you. It felt like you couldn’t breathe for a minute.

“What’s up?”, he asked as he saw your tensed state. You just didn’t say anything but got up. You quickly left the place with your car’s keys.

Wiping the tears out of your eyes, you tried to focus on the road and drove around; not sure where exactly. Your mind was completely blurry and maybe it wasn’t the best idea to drive a car while being in this kind of stage. However, you managed to drive safely and not get into any accident.

You only had left your boyfriend of six months, Youngho; seeing that video of him saying that he only played around with you. How could you be so foolish? How could you trust someone who would betray you like this? You pulled off the car and stopped it quickly before you let out a loud sob. Why did he do this to you? What did you do to him that he decided to make fun of you?

He didn’t care about you the way you did about him. It was driving you crazy.

When you finally calmed down, you started your car and were about to drive off as someone knocked on your window. As you looked out, you saw a young man in front of you, motioning you to roll it down. When you did so, you quickly wiped your tears away again.

“Hey, are you okay? I saw that you were just here and was wondering if you were all right?”, he asked you and you chuckled. Even a stranger cared more about you than your ex did.

“I’m… okay”, you lied and smiled up to the guy but the smile didn’t reach your eyes and the stranger noticed that.

“Come on, don’t lie. I can see it when someone lies. First, come get out of the car”, he instructed you, moving a little out of the way so you would have enough space to open the car door.

The stranger closed the door as soon as you got out. You had no idea what the guy was planning to do. “Great. Now lock your car and let’s go”, he said. “I feel like you need some time out. I know a place where you can try to calm down.”

Should you trust him? You didn’t even know his name. As if he could feel your insecurities, he introduced himself to you; feeling stupid for not doing this earlier.

“I’m Jaehyun, by the way. I’m sorry if I made you feel uneasy. I really don’t want to do anything bad. I feel like you just need someone with you right now.”

You simply just nodded when you followed him the street along. For some reason, you felt comfortable around this guy. It was like you know him for ages. “Was there a reason why you wanted me to come with you?”, you randomly asked him while you continued walking side by side – there was just a small space between you.

“Actually, I was just walking around because I needed some fresh air after studying a lot when I saw you in your car crying”, he explained swiftly. Shortly after, Jaehyun stopped walking – you did the same as you looked around. You had arrived at some cliff type of thing – there was the big ocean in front of you, the sound of the waves crashing against the cliff.

“It’s so calm here… I like it here”, you mumbled. Somehow, this place seemed so familiar to you but you didn’t know why.

Then it hit you.

“I love you”, Youngho murmured. You two were lying on a blanket, facing each other. His fingers were slowly playing with your hair. Your eyes closed, you listened to Youngho say those sweet three words like he did the last two days ever since you two had confessed your feelings to each other; listened to the waves crash against the cliff.

“I love you, too. Idiot”, you laughed when he pushed you on your back and laid his body on yours. Youngho did his best not to lower his whole weight on your body. He once again was only looking into your eyes before he slowly leaned down and placed his lips on yours.

“Am I still an idiot?”, he asked when he finally lied down next to you again, looking at you, there was nothing but love in his gaze.

“Yes, but now, you’re my idiot”, you grinned and closed your eyes again.

“Everything alright?”, Jaehyun asked you when he realized that you were lost in thoughts. You lightly nodded but Jaehyun wasn’t that oblivious that he wouldn’t notice your teary eyes. “No, I don’t believe you. You wouldn’t be crying if everything was alright.”

You cursed yourself for being so bad at hiding your feelings, gulping before you finally spoke. “I’ve been at this place before.” Jaehyun looked at you confusedly.

“Seriously? Barely anyone knows about it. How come?”

“My ex brought me here once. We were lying on that exact spot together, it was only two days after he had confessed”, you briefly explained, not wanting to go into detail. It hurt you to talk about Youngho.

“I get it, you don’t want to talk about it. However, I hope that I’ll be able to distract you tonight a little”, Jaehyun told you. You didn’t reply anymore, however you decided to nod at least to give him any type of a response.

“You know, I just went through a rough break up as well, just recently”, Jaehyun suddenly said after a while you two sat on the cold stone. You two didn’t talk a lot, just sitting there. For some reason, you felt extremely calm and comfortable around him.

“Really?”, you chuckled. “Seems like we were destined to suffer.”

“Actually, in my case, she cheated on me. I caught her texting to another guy with hearts and ‘i love you’-s. I pretended like everything was alright. I even knew who the other guy was. He was one of my closest friends”, Jaehyun admitted.

“I’m sorry to hear that. It must’ve hurt to know that someone you trusted betrayed you like that”, you told him. He just chuckled and shook his head.

“No, it’s alright. It’s been a few weeks since I found out and I’m better now”, he smiled lightly. “I guess, someone just gets used to the fact that the relationship is over now. It doesn’t hurt as much as it used to, so… be patient. It’ll be better, Y/N.”

“I really hope the pain will stop soon, Jaehyun”, just a few seconds later, he heard a soft sob from you, immediately pulling you into his embrace and tried to comfort you as much as possible.

It was weird for you to feel so safe next to a stranger, but you admit that this was exactly what you needed today.

When it got darker, Jaehyun said that you should get going now. He escorted you to your car and even offered to drive you home but you declined. The male was a stranger after all. However, you still exchanged phone numbers and agreed on meeting up a few days later in a café in Itaewon.

As soon as you got out of the car, you started running to your brother’s apartment as it had started raining and opening the door with the spare he gave you. You rolled your eyes when you saw your brother with a girl on his lap and them making out heavily.

“Seriously?!”, your brother exclaimed. “Don’t you have your own apartment?”

“Don’t mind me, I’m going to my room. Have fun”, you said with a slightly disgusted look on your face as you went to your brother’s guest room and threw yourself on the bed. Before you had rented the apartment with Johnny, you lived here. This had been your bed and you had a few heated or romantic moments with your now ex-boyfriend on here. You remembered when he sneaked in to see you; now you knew better and knew that he only pretended to be excited to see you.

“Hey… what’s going on?”, your brother asked you and slowly entered your room. You turned around laughed.

“You look messed up, big bro”, you told him and he giggled; coming closer and sitting next to you. Taeyong slowly brushed over your hair, being the caring brother, he always had been. “Where is your girl?”

“Sent her away. I have a sister to take care of after all”, he said and opened up his arms, silently telling you to hug him. You loved this side of him. He always had shut everyone off just to take care of you; after all, you were the only family he had left. Your parents had passed away during a huge car accident. You two only had each other and he wouldn’t trade you for the world.

“You didn’t have to”, you said, feeling slightly bad for him that you interrupted him from his one-night stand.

“I did and we both know that. I can’t see you being sad and in a bad mood while I have my fun with a girl. That’s just not fair”, he told you and softly stroked through your hair. “What happened? Did… did you watch the video?” You only nodded and hugged your brother tighter; then you started crying and your body started shaking as you remembered beautiful things you experienced with Johnny one by one.

“He… why would he play me like this, Tae? What did I ever do? I did nothing else but loved him. I tried my best to make him feel better whenever he needed it. I tried to be the girl he wants me to be. But he just played me like that?”, you cried.

“It’s going to be okay, baby”, he mumbled softly and caressed your back, trying to comfort you as much as possible. “It’s going to be okay.”

It had been a few days since you had left your shared apartment with Johnny and moved in with your brother again. Taeyong had tried to distract you as much as possible by taking you out on random dinner dates with him, he paid for anything you wanted; it didn’t matter if it was clothes, food, or just you dyeing your hair into a random color (which turned out to be a darker blue; Taeyong dyed his hair into a similar color). He did everything to make you happy.

“Thank you so much, Tae”, you smiled and hugged him.

“Of course, love. Do you wanna go somewhere else?”, he asked you but you shook your head.

“No. You already spent so much money for me”, you told him. “I’ll just walk around a little and then I’ll come home, yeah?”

“Are you sure? Do you want me to come with you?”, he asked you worriedly, he didn’t want to leave you alone when you were in a bad state.

“No, thank you. I’ll just come home in a bit, yeah?”, you told him and smiled at him reassuringly. “I’ll come home in a bit.” You hugged him and he softly kissed you on your forehead.

“See you then.” He let go of you, taking all the bags full of clothes from your long shopping tour.

You didn’t think much before you just turned around and walked the whole way to your apartment with Johnny. As you were going there, you received a message with a picture. You were confused as you noticed that it was you and Taeyong right before you left him in the city.

You already got a new one? You’re quick, you little slut

You didn’t know who it was as you hadn’t saved the number. You ignored the message and just continued your way. As you finally arrived there, you took out the keys Johnny had given you just two months ago when you two moved in together. You couldn’t believe that it took him two months so take out his real face and you to find out that he was only playing around.

“Y/N? What the fuck are you doing here?”, Johnny yelled as you entered the apartment. You couldn’t believe what you were seeing there: a girl on his lap and them making out. You had no idea who it was; not that it mattered.

“The question is, what the fuck are you doing here?”, you asked him and pushed the girl away from him.

“Just partying around, the usual”, suddenly there was someone else in the background; it was Ten, one of Johnny’s friends.

“Shut up, Ten, I didn’t ask you”, you yelled. Then you glared at the girl. “And you get the fuck out of my apartment.”

“This isn’t only your apartment, Y/N. It is mine, too”, Johnny told you and came closer to you.

“Fuck you, Johnny. You don’t even care a little about me, why would you care about this fucking apartment?”, you exclaimed, going into your shared room and started to pack another bag full of clothes. He followed you.

“Did you really think I cared about you?”, he asked and laughed. “Did you think I cared about you? The truth is, I never loved you. I never did. I only did it to get into your pants. That’s everything.”

“So, you lied? Every single time you told me that you love me, you lied?”, you asked him; you tried your best to keep up your façade and tried to seem strong. You did your best not to start crying.

“That’s right, I lied. I lied every time”, he said, not daring to even blink.

“Great. Now you hurt me. Are you happy now? Huh? Does my fucking pain make you happy?!”, you started screaming and pushed him away with every single sentence as you finally broke down and started crying.

He didn’t answer you. He stayed silent as you wiped your tears away and grabbed the last few clothes left there. “Fuck you, Johnny.”

Those were the last words you told him and finally left the apartment.

But little did you know that he only lied because Ten was there and he had to stop himself from hugging you and telling you that he loved you.

The next day, around the time you were supposed to meet up with Jaehyun, you were rushing around at home, trying to get everything you needed together, when suddenly someone knocked at the door. Not even bothering to check who it was, you immediately opened the door and immediately tried to ram it closed when you saw Johnny in front of your door. However, Johnny held the door open with his hand, he was strong enough to easily resist you trying to close it.

“Babe, please, let’s talk”, Johnny said when he finally managed to get into your place. “I really need to talk to you and clear this whole thing out. There are some things I have to talk to you about.”

“Fuck off, Johnny, I don’t want to see you, please, get the hell out”, you yelled, trying to get him out of the apartment. However, Johnny was much stronger than you and easily put his hands on your arms to hold you still.

“Please, let me talk to you once”, he spoke to you in his comforting, soft voice that always managed to make you feel calm. You hated that he still had this effect on you – you didn’t want him to manipulate you the way he always did until now. “I will never even come near you if you let me talk to you now.”

“No. Fuck you, no!”, you yelled and this time, you were supported by Taeyong who finally came out of the shower.

“What the hell are you doing here, Youngho?”, Taeyong’s voice was calm and soft; you were sure that he was trying his best to remain composed. “Get the fuck out of here, I don’t ever want to see you around.”

“Taeyong-ah, please, let me talk to her once. I swear I will leave her alone afterwards if you let me talk to her now”, Youngho tried once again. Taeyong was having none of it, though. He pulled you behind him and finally Johnny gave up and sighed. “Promise, you will let me talk to you one day?”

He just left when you didn’t give him a reply.

“Sorry, I’m a little late… I had to deal with something”, you apologized to Jaehyun when you finally sat down across him. He just shrugged it off.

“I wasn’t sure what you’d like to drink so I didn’t order anything for you. It’s on me, though, so just choose whatever you want”, Jaehyun smiled lightly, exposing his dimples. You nodded as you shot him a smile back.

“Thank you, Jaehyun… I really needed this today. He just…”, it took you a bit before you could speak up on the issue. “My ex just came over today. He wanted to talk to me but my brother stopped him from doing so. Seeing him again hurt though.“

„I get that… you know, my ex also came over last night. Said she wanted to apologize and that she misses me. Her new boy dumped her”, he laughed and took a sip from his coffee. “Well, it’s her own fault. I don’t care about her anymore.”

“That’s what I love to hear! I’m happy that you were able to get over her… and the pain”, your voice got slightly lower with the last few words. Jaehyun grabbed your hand and softly stroked over the back.

“Your pain will stop one day as well. It will hurt for a long time, knowing the absence of someone who was there for you for a very long time. It will stop eventually, Y/N. I promise. I am ready to help you through it all”, he promised, making you smile lightly.

However, it was a faked smile.

And you hoped he didn’t notice.

However, he did notice.

Jaehyun was someone who paid a lot of attention to what was around him. Especially, if it was someone who needed special care after a rough situation. He was used to notice things like that; he started paying attention to people’s facial expressions when he was still a little kid. His mother would smile at him and tell him everything is fine.

Jaehyun would know that nothing was. He might have been little and the way he acted was still childish, but he knew how to divide between a real and a fake smile.

Yours definitely was a fake smile. However, he couldn’t do anything about it, so he never said anything.

“Hey, you know, a friend of mine is celebrating his birthday soon. Do you want to come along?”, Jaehyun suddenly asked you. That surprised you but you would never say no to some distraction. So, you just nodded as a yes.

“Sure thing”, you shot him another smile before taking another sip of your hot chocolate. Sitting here with Jaehyun – who you felt very comfortable around -, just chatting and talking about the most random things, really helped you. For a few hours, you seemed happy and also felt happy after a few days of crying your eyes out.

“Thank you for today. It was quite fun, let’s do this again one day”, you suggested to which he agreed to. Then he made sure you got the address of his friend to come over to the party in a few days. As he had to travel home to his parents in Busan for a few days, he wouldn’t be able to spend any time with you. When he finally left the café, you were once again left to your thoughts.

You decided to walk instead of taking the bus, so it would take you a lot more time to get back home. When you were halfway home, you felt the first drops of rain on your skin. Thinking, it wouldn’t rain, you hadn’t taken a jacket or an umbrella with you.

“Need a ride home?”, someone yelled and you turned around. “Come on, get in.”

It was Johnny. You couldn’t believe he actually had the guts to call you over to his car and drive you home. You’d rather walk the rest of the way home and arrive there completely soaked than sit in the same car as the guy who played with you.

“Please, Y/N. I promise I won’t do or say anything that’ll hurt you. I just don’t want you to get sick”, he said, however you decided to ignore him and just continued walking. Johnny always had been a stubborn person. So, it didn’t surprise you that he continued driving slowly behind you.

“Stop fucking following me!”, you yelled. “How many times do I have to tell you that I don’t want to see you ever again and that I fucking hate you? Haven’t you had your fun already? Wasn’t it enough to humiliate me and play me like you did with your friends? The bet wasn’t enough fun for you?”

“Please, if you’d listen to me once, you would understand everything, Y/N”, he stopped the car and got out quickly and before you could run away, he put his hands on your arms. “Listen to me once and let me explain. It’ll all make sense then, I promise.”

“Fuck, you, no! I told you so many times. No!”, you once again declined and tried to get out of his tight grip. Once again, you failed – Johnny was a lot stronger than you were and he could hold you back easily.

“I’m so sorry but I have to do this, Y/N”, he mumbled and quickly just picked you up and carried you towards his car.

Your cries to let go of you were pointless – no one would hear you. You were in some forest where barely anyone ever walked through. However, that always had been the way you took home, as it was the shortest way.

“I’m sorry, love. I just need to talk to you. It is very important and you deserve to know”, he said when he had you in his car and started driving.

“Johnny, please. I can’t stand being next to you. I just can’t. You broke my heart by saying all these words and you know that”, there were a lot of tears running down your cheeks. Johnny didn’t reply, he just focused on the road.

“You said you had to talk to me but now you aren’t even speaking! Is this another of your games? If yes, please leave me the fuck alone because I definitely don’t need-“

“I’m being threatened.”

When you heard these three, simple words, you didn’t know what you should or could say. What the hell did he mean by he was being threatened?

“It might sound like a lie but Ten and I don’t really get along. The only one I could trust is my friend Yoonoh and your brother. There is so much going on, I couldn’t even tell you about it all right now. Once, Ten made me say all that shit you saw in that video. The one who recorded it was also Ten. The one who sent the video to your brother was Ten. It was all Ten”, he started explaining.

That new info made you doubt your ex-boyfriend once again. Whenever Ten came over to your shared place that you and Johnny had rented just a few weeks before that incident, they always seemed so comfortable around each other.

Was that all an act as well?

“What was he threatening you with?”, you asked him, your voice was really soft and low and you weren’t even sure if Johnny had even heard you.

“He found out about a few things that I did back in the days before I even met you. I really don’t want to talk about it and get the whole thing out again, but there were things that I’d rather have kept for myself”, Johnny explained. You had to laugh – however, it wasn’t a laugh because something was funny or anything. It was more because you were disappointed.

“So, you seriously think I’m going to believe that?”, you asked him but he just shook his head.

“Take my phone.”

“What?”

“Just do as I told you. You know my pin.”

Confused, you just took Johnny’s phone and unlocked it. You then followed his instructions to open his and Ten’s private chat and scroll up until a specific date. 18th July 20xx.

The date Johnny had asked you to move in with him. You remembered that day well – it was the happiest day you had experienced with him. Thinking about that day made you smile slightly, something that didn’t get unnoticed by Johnny.

“Read the chat. If you don’t believe me afterwards, I will never talk to you again. I promise”, he told you and you just nodded, completely focusing on the chat.

Ten

[Video 0:18]

Is this familiar?

You tried clicking on the video but Johnny stopped you. “Just read. You don’t need to watch it.”

Johnny

Where did you get this from?

No one knew about it

Ten

Well, now I do. Would be fun if I’d show this to your sweet girlfriend, wouldn’t it?

Johnny

Fuck you. What do you want from me?

Ten

Break up with her. You don’t deserve her

Johnny

Who does then? An asshole like you?

Ten

Anyone is better than you, Johnny Suh.

Also, if you don’t do what I want, you’ll see the consequences. I’m a man of my words – I will fucking ruin you if you don’t do whatever I want.

“Believe me now? He threatened me, Y/N.”

His words still lingered in your head. You had read the chat yourself – he wasn’t lying.

“Jaehyun is here. He said he’ll wait in his car”, Taeyong yelled from the living room while you were getting ready for the party. You hurried up and checked yourself up in the mirror before you quickly grabbed your phone and keys and left the apartment. Only yelling a goodbye to Taeyong, you quickly ran down the stairs.

“Hey there! There is no need to rush”, he laughed when you quickly got into the car. “Jungkook will be happy that I’m not coming over all by myself.”

“Ah, so that’s the name of your mysterious friend? How old is he now?”, you asked him curiously.

“Same age as me, we’re just a few months apart.” Jaehyun proceeded to tell you a little about his friend so you would know a little about him.

“Here we are”, Jaehyun stopped the car close to the house where you could already see colored lights out of the windows and when you got out of the car, you already heard the loud music. It surprised you that the music could be this loud without anyone being bothered by it.

“These boys are pretty much crazy. Please don’t judge me because of their craziness”, Jaehyun laughed when you two entered the house. Just a few seconds later you two were surrounded by a few boys, who excitedly greeted Jaehyun.

“Who is that pretty girl with you?”, one of the guys – Mingyu, as Jaehyun had told you – asked you. “I don’t think we know each other, do we?” You shook your head and shot him a light smile.

“I’m Y/N, a friend of Jaehyun”, you introduced yourself.

“Just a friend?”

“Y/N? What are you doing here? I didn’t expect you to know Jungkook?”, someone yelled over the loud music and prevented you from answering Mingyu. You looked back and widened your eyes as you recognized one from your older friends group, Yugyeom.

“Gyeom? What are you doing here?”, you laughed and hugged your friend, feeling much more comfortable than before. Knowing someone around here made you feel so much better. Yugyeom didn’t hesitate and just pulled you to the kitchen where it was a little quieter.

“I didn’t know you knew Jungkook?”, he asked you while he grabbed a drink for the both of you.

“I don’t. I know Jaehyun”, you told him and thanked him when you grabbed the drink. “We met a few days ago after something happened and he helped me a little through it.” For some reason, Yugyeom raised his eyebrow, but you had no idea what that was supposed to mean.

“What happened? We didn’t even text for the past few weeks”, he asked you and you sighed as you shook your head.

“I don’t believe this is the right place to talk about this. It’s all good, though”, you answered him before you shot him a light smile. However, Yugyeom didn’t believe you. That was understandable, Yugyeom had known you for such a long time now, it wouldn’t be easy to convince him.

“You and I, tomorrow. Where we always hung out. I don’t care if you already have plans or not, you will be there at three, otherwise I will come to your place and drag you out of there”, Yugyeom told you and you knew he wasn’t joking. He would actually come over. You knew that because he did it once before.

��Fine. I will be there”, you sighed when you took two cups of the beverage that was in one of the bottles. When you finally found Jaehyun again in the crowd, you saw him with someone else. She was trying to talk to him while he kept on pushing her away, however, she would not stop pestering him.

“Fuck off!”, you heard him yell at her, his voice was so loud that everyone in the room could hear him. “I don’t want to see you! I don’t want to talk to you, nothing! It’s over, why the hell won’t you understand that?”

So, this was his ex. When you looked at her, you noticed that she seemed familiar for some reason.

Then it hit you.

You knew her because she was the girl you saw in your shared apartment with Johnny when they were making out.

“Hey, calm down”, you tried to calm Jaehyun down when he stormed upstairs after his fight with his ex-girlfriend. “Who was that?”

“My ex. She wanted to try again after her new boy dumped her. Fuck, I was just getting over her… why did she have to come here?!”

“It’s alright. Calm down, I’m here. Just… try to calm down, Jae”, you hesitated for a moment, then you just hugged him. He seemed like he needed comfort as he put his arms around your waist and pulled you closer to himself. This moment seemed like it wouldn’t end, everything was so much slower and it felt like, the loud, banging music wasn’t even there.

And for some reason, being in his embrace felt like home.

Jaehyun didn’t want to return to the party anymore and as you didn’t know anyone else but Yugyeom, you decided to stay with the young man, so you wouldn’t feel awkward between all those unknown faces. Neither of you were in a party mode anymore, so you ended up lying in that huge bed in the guest room. Being here in this bed was awkward as well – you were lying in one bed with a man you had met a week ago – but it was better to stay here with him than going in another room.

Jaehyun had offered to sleep on the ground but you didn’t want him to – sleeping on the ground could be painful for his back – so you now ended up in this awkward situation. None of you were talking, it was a peaceful silence – ignoring the loud music from downstairs – and for some reason, you enjoyed being here.

You hadn’t really noticed but you fell asleep very soon, only waking up once where you found a little rose petal in front of you on the pillow. It confused you, where did that come from? You hadn’t seen any flowers around. You decided to ignore it and tried to sleep again, just to wake up once again with an extreme cough.

Then you saw the red petals on your hand and everything slowly started to make sense to you.

“Baby, there is something I have to tell you about”, your grandmother handed you a piece of chocolate while you sat next to her bed, you were around fifteen, or maybe fourteen or even thirteen? You didn’t remember for sure. “I want you to be careful about love, baby. Please, promise me.”

“I promise, granny, but… why? Is there something I have to know?”

“Yes, honey, you have to be careful. I don’t ever want to see you suffering because of…”, suddenly she started to breathe uneven and heavier, “hanahaki.”

When she said that last word, the machines around her started beeping like crazy and the last thing you could process properly was that a nurse pulled you out of the room and more nurses and doctors surrounded the old woman.

“Time of death, 4:27pm.”

After you had recovered from your grandma’s death, you had decided t go through book and the internet and finally find out what the hell ‘hanahaki’ was. Your results were that it was a disease, that would make a flower grow inside your lungs. Mostly, it was the favorite flower of the person you love, however, who didn’t requite your love. It would make it hard for the person to breathe.

Now, you were sure that these petals meant you fell in love with someone who didn’t return your feelings. Jaehyun.

You quickly got up and left the room while you continued coughing up those red petals. You didn’t want to wake Jaehyun up who still was lying next to you, sleeping in peace. He had no idea…

For some reason, this was confusing to you. It had been a week since you met him. Were you someone who fell in love so easily?

And this would mean that Johnny never lied to you about his feelings. You never had this disease ever before. That meant, Johnny loved you or… it meant that you never had true feelings for Johnny.

You didn’t know what you were feeling. Your emotions were too much for a moment that you stopped walking for a moment to calm yourself down and closed your eyes as you breathed in and out properly.

“Are those rose petals?”, someone asked you, it was a young woman. It was Jaehyun’s ex and also the girl you caught making out with Johnny. “You fell for Yoonoh, didn’t you?”

You raised your eyebrow for a second. Who was Yoonoh?”

“Oh, Jaehyun. His actual name is Yoonoh, though. He uses both names”, she told you, when she came closer to you. You immediately backed off, trying to get away from her. “Don’t worry about it.” She smiled lightly when she put her hand in her pocket and pulled out a few petals. It confused you when you finally realized what flower’s petals they were. Anemone, Johnny’s favorite flowers.

“But you were with…” – “Yes, I was with Yoonoh. I met Johnny through Yoonoh. Didn’t you know that they were close friends? Like, really close friends. I thought you’d knew as Johnny’s girlfriend.”

You knew that Johnny had a friend with the name Yoonoh, however, you didn’t know that Jaehyun’s actual name was Yoonoh.

“No… I didn’t know”, you murmured when you just started walking once again and just walked past the girl. You left Jungkook’s house without another word and started running home to the only person you could trust right now. Taeyong.

Your brother was still sleeping when you came back home. Due to the rush, you hadn’t checked what time it was, so when you checked it, you saw that it was only 8am. You knew that Taeyong would wake up in an hour so you decided not to bother him and went to your own room.

You didn’t feel sick – you didn’t even choke out any more petals since you left. Maybe it was that it would just happen if you’re close to Jaehyun.

Your body still was weak – you struggled to move your body and you assumed that the disease evolved faster for you than it was in Jaehyun’s ex’s case. When you finally were in your bed, trying to sleep, however, you couldn’t. You had so many questions; why Jaehyun didn’t tell you that he knew Youngho? Did he know that you two had broken up? Why did he hide these things from you?

Maybe it was also something Johnny had planned? You turned around and tried to get yourself to other thoughts, however it didn’t work out like you wanted. You still were totally lost in your questions and those made you go insane. You hadn’t even noticed that your brother woke up and saw you in your room over the half-opened door.

“You’re back? I thought you would spend the day with Jaehyun”, he asked you and you just sat up in your bed. You shrugged, Taeyong seemed to notice that something was off as he came into your room and sat down next to you. “What’s wrong?”

“I don’t know… everything is just so weird and I have so many questions, which is why I left”, you explained briefly.

“Do you want to talk about it?”, he asked you and you just shook your head.

“Can we talk about it tonight? Maybe go out for dinner? I don’t really feel like staying home today”, you asked him and felt immediately comfortable as your brother smiled softly to you.

“Sure. I’ll get you after work and we can go to some restaurant, maybe the one around the corner?”

“Sounds good”, you finally smiled at your brother and he quickly ruffled through your hair. Taeyong knew how much you hated that so he ran out of the room and could escape the room before your pillow hit him. You just heard him giggle when you finally laid down again and tried to sleep. This time, you fell asleep rather quickly and slept peacefully.

You only woke up when the ringing of your phone didn’t stop. You grabbed it from your nightstand and picked up with a groggy “what?”

“Finally! Goddamn it Y/N, I thought something happened to you”, it was Jaehyun and his upset voice immediately made you sit up.

“No, no, I’m perfectly fine but what happened?”, you asked him then.

“You just left without a word while I was sleeping? Jiyoo told me you left early in the morning and when I tried to call you, you didn’t pick up. I thought something happened to you”, his voice seemed a lot calmer than before.

“Sorry, I just had to leave. There was something with my brother but it’s nothing serious, don’t worry about it”, you lied to him and immediately felt bad for lying to the young man. However, you couldn’t let him know about what was happening to you.

“It’s alright. Do you have some time for dinner tonight? I want to take you out”, you could picture him softly smiling at you.

“Sorry, I already am going to dinner with my brother.” You quickly checked the time and saw that it was already past five pm, means Taeyong would come home in around ten minutes. “In fact, I have to get dressed and go out in a bit. Raincheck?”

“Yeah, sure. I’ll call you tomorrow then, yeah?”

Saying your goodbyes, you breathed out shakily. You weren’t ready to meet up with Jaehyun, especially not after all the things you found out about him today. You weren’t sure whether you could trust him or not, so you decided to text Johnny for once and ask him a little about his friend Yoonoh.

Johnny didn’t reply, though. You had no idea what was going on or why he wasn’t answering, he usually replied quickly.

When Taeyong finally arrived at home, you quickly took your phone and bag and finally left the place to go to dinner where you would finally tell him about what was going on with you.

See, this was one thing you absolutely loved about Taeyong. You could always be so open with him, never had to keep secrets from him; he would always notice that something is off and he would immediately try to help you as much as he could.

“Okay, so… uhm, this is a bit hard to talk about”, you opened up the topic. You were slightly nervous to talk to him about this, but you knew that you had to talk about it. “I fell in love with someone else.”

“That’s great, isn’t it?”, Taeyong smiled at you, he was happy that you managed to come over Johnny this easy. When he saw your nervous expression, his smile also dropped. “Is something wrong with that?”

“Actually, yes, there is. Remember the stories grandma used to tell us. About people who fell in love with someone who didn’t love them back and who died because of the flower growing in their lungs”, when he nodded, you continued.

“He doesn’t love me back.”

Taeyong didn’t know what to say. Was his sister going to die now because of a guy who didn’t love her as much she loved him?

“I… did some research and I could get it removed with a surgery, but… then I wouldn’t be able to love anyone romantically at all and I don’t want that. So, either I need to tell Jaehyun about it and find out if he truly has feelings for me or… if I will die very soon. Taeyong, if I die because of the disease, I don’t want you to be sad. I could never handle you being sad because of me. I don’t want you to mourn after me, I just don’t deserve that”, you told him and it was breaking your heart to see your brother so close to cry but still holding himself not to.

“Will you promise me?”

Hearing these words hurt him. You didn’t want him to be sad and mourn after you, and the worst was that he knew, he was too weak to handle that.

“I promise”, Taeyong finally said. “I promise, I won’t cry.”

However, both of you knew exactly that he wouldn’t be able to keep his promise.

A few days passed. Today, you wanted to meet up with Jaehyun and talk to him about your situation. Your assumption that the disease was evolving quicker than in Jiyoo’s case came true as each day passed, you felt so much weaker than the previous day.

You were scared, but you knew that this had to be done. You didn’t know what result this conversation would give, but you knew that you had to go through this all. It wouldn’t be easy for you; you already had a small breakdown when you told Taeyong about all this.

Time didn’t seem like it was passing. Five minutes felt like five hours and you were so impatient for Jaehyun to finally pick you up.

When he finally called to let you know that he was waiting downstairs

You were scared, but you knew that this had to be done. You didn’t know what result this conversation would have, but you knew that you had to go through it. It wouldn’t be easy for you; you already had a small breakdown when you told Taeyong about it and now you would have to tell Jaehyun about it?

Time didn’t seem like it was passing. Five minutes felt like five hours and you were so impatient for Jaehyun to finally call you downstairs.

When that finally happened, you rushed downstairs, however, you had to stop walking when you started coughing again. You held your hand in front of your mouth just to see more rose petals when you looked at it.

You knew what you had to do.

“Are you feeling okay? You look like you’re sick. Are you sure that you’re feeling good enough to be here right now?”, he questioned you. You shook your head when you looked up, you looked so worn out and exhausted.

“I’m okay, Jae. I’ll be better soon”, you tried smiling at him but he seemed to notice that your smile was once again not reaching your eyes. It wasn’t a real smile and he knew that.

��Please, tell me if something is bothering you”, he asked you and you sighed, then nodded.

“Yes, there is actually something I have to talk to you about. It’s quite a lot so I understand if you don’t want to talk to me afterwards.” When he nodded and motioned you to continue talking.

“Do you know the story of hanahaki?” Once again, he nodded.

“I fell in love with someone… and this person doesn’t love me back. For the past week, I have been coughing up rose petals.” Hoping, he would take the hint and maybe understand that it was about him.

Jaehyun wasn’t stupid. He already understood when you brought up the topic that it had something to do with him.

“I already told Taeyong about this all and I have to know, Jaehyun. I just have to.”

He didn’t answer and just looked down on his hands. You felt like you knew what he was going to say.

Jaehyun didn’t return your feelings.

You were already aware of that. If he did, you wouldn’t be suffering because of the disease.

“I understand. I just have a few questions, Jaehyun. Or should I say Yoonoh?”

His eyes widened when he heard his actual name. How did you find out? Who told you? He knew that he hadn’t told you, he was sure he didn’t.

“How do you know about that?”, he asked you, gulping nervously. “Who told you?”

“Does that matter? It shouldn’t matter who the hell told me about your close friendship to Youngho or about your real name? More, I want you to answer whether Youngho asked you to spend time with me or not.”

“No! That definitely didn’t happen! I didn’t know Youngho was your ex until I saw that wallpaper on your phone!”, he exclaimed, his loud voice got the attention of a few other customers in the restaurant. “I’m sorry if you thought I did something like this to you. I didn’t. I really had no idea. Youngho kept his relationship a secret – even from me, his closest friend. I didn’t know he was dating until the day he called me where he told me that he was in deep shit about the whole thing with Ten.”

“So, you didn’t lie to me about that. Thank you, Jaehyun. I needed to have that clear, before… well, you know”, you lightly smiled when you got up. “That’s all I needed to know, Jaehyun. Thank you for being there for me at my lowest. I didn’t get to know you much, but you’re a good guy. I loved the times I spent with you. I truly hope you will find the right one for yourself. Goodbye, Jung Yoonoh.”

It took all your patience not to cry in front of him. When you understood what those petals meant, you didn’t even realize that you had feelings for the young man. However, now, you knew that you were head over heels for the boy.

Finally, you were outside where you finally let your tears roll down your cheeks. It was hard to breathe for a moment. You just told the guy you loved to find the right one for himself because you knew that you weren’t the one. It hurt you so much to admit it, but this made you feel so free and lighter.

You only had one person left to talk to.

“Thank you so much for coming here, Youngho”, you smiled lightly when Youngho sat down in front of you.

“Of course, that’s the least I can do for you after all I did to you”, he answered.

“Yeah, there were quite a few things you could have done differently. I… I asked you to come here because I had quite a few things I had to tell you and a few questions I needed to ask and clear before…”, you stopped talking for a moment and breathed in to calm yourself down before you started talking once again. “Do you know the hanahaki disease?”

Johnny seemed to understand already what you were on about. He sighed lightly and grabbed your hand. “I know what you’re talking about. Yoonoh already told me”, he admitted and you chuckled.

“Of course, he did. You two were close right? Funny, how he never mentioned that to me, or you”, you snickered and shook your head lightly. “I knew that your best friend’s name was Yoonoh but I didn’t know that he was Yoonoh. I was so disappointed when his ex-girlfriend told me his actual name. Anyway, I just… I just thought I’d meet everyone that meant a lot to me and let them know before… you know.”

It was hard for you to say those words. You were still so young. Now, exactly what your grandmother had warned you about would be the reason for your death. You would leave so many people behind who meant a lot to you.

It hurt you to know that you would leave so many people behind who cared for you. Only because you fell in love with a guy who didn’t care about you as much as you did about him.

“We spent a long time together, Johnny. Even though you did hurt me and I thought I could never forgive you for that, I am. I am forgiving you because I understand your reasons and why you hid all these things from me”, you smiled and quickly wiped your tears away as they rolled down your cheeks.

“Hey, love, don’t cry. Please, don’t cry. I know, this is hard, but at the end, all of us will reach this day. For you, it was just a little too early”, Johnny tried to calm you down.

“I’m so sorry for leaving you all behind just because of my dumb feelings.”

Johnny didn’t say anything more before he got up and took your hand. He pulled you up and escorted you out of the restaurant. “Let’s go somewhere calmer”, he suggested to which you nodded. You didn’t know where he would bring you to.

He didn’t drive fast, however, it was a long way there. When he finally stopped the car, you understood where you were. The same spot Jaehyun had brought you to and where Johnny.

“What a great choice, John”, you laughed lightly and took his hand once again. “I even wanted to ask you to bring me here once more but seems like you thought ahead as usual.”

“Of course, that’s usual for me, you know that, babe”, he grinned and slowly, you two walked there.

While you sat on the cold stones, none of you talked. You just leaned on his shoulder, watching the sun slowly going down. This reminded you of how you had found comfort on Jaehyun’s shoulder a few weeks ago after you had broken up with Johnny. Back then, you hadn’t thought you would come back to this same spot with the same man who had your heart broken.

“I want to ask you for something, John”, you looked up to him and the way your eyes were still a little teary made Johnny feel so disappointed in himself. Maybe if it wasn’t for his mistakes, none of this would be happening.

“Can we pretend like everything was before everything went down? Only for tomorrow and only if your want to, of course. I don’t want to force-“

“Yes. Sure, we can do that”, he smiled and softly pressed a kiss on your forehead. “We can absolutely do that.”

That night, you spent with Johnny. You two were in his bed, he was holding you in his arms when you two were trying to sleep. However, none of you managed to fall asleep, both of you just stared somewhere else. The atmosphere was quite awkward, you hadn’t done this with Johnny for a while now, however, you tried to ignore it as much as possible.

Being here with Johnny also made you feel comfortable. You were very calm and even your coughing wasn’t as crazy as it was whenever you were alone or with Jaehyun.

This would’ve been the perfect moment for you to finally let go.

However, you didn’t want to, yet. You just weren’t ready for it.

“Try to sleep, love. We’ll go outside early in the morning, yeah?”, Johnny asked you and you nodded slightly, before you closed your eyes and finally fell asleep calmly.

The first place Johnny took you to, was a small café out of town where you two often went to while you were still together. The breakfast you ate there was good and Johnny managed to make you laugh so often. It was like everything was like before and it was so great for you that you managed to forget about your pain for a while.

Of course, everything good went downhill after a while. You started coughing up more petals and Johnny quickly escorted you out of the café and yelled that he would come back in a second to pay. “Hey, calm down, it’s going to be fine, love”, he softly rubbed over your back while he was talking sweet nothings so your coughing would stop.

When it finally got better, he made you sit down on a bench and quickly went back to the café to pay for the food. You tried to breathe properly and when Johnny was back, he sat down next to you. “Are you better now?”, he asked but you shook your head.

“It never will be better from now on, Johnny. Never. Everything will go down and down until I just can’t breathe anymore. It hurts so much and it’s not just the physical pain”, some tears started rolling down and you didn’t have the nerves to speak anymore. “Everything will get worse and worse until my body can’t take it anymore.”

Johnny didn’t want to pressure you and took you back home to your place with Taeyong. “Are you sure, you want to be alone until he comes home?”, he asked you, making sure that you’ll be fine. After your little breakdown at the café, he decided to bring you home so you could rest a little. However, he didn’t expect you to ask him to leave.

“Yes, I’m sure. He’ll be home in like three hours anyway, I’ll be fine, Johnny”, you told him while you took off your clothes in your room to change into more comfortable things. Although he had seen you barely clothed very often, he insisted himself to stay outside.

“Alright, I ordered something for you to eat, I’ll get going then, yeah?”, Johnny yelled and a few seconds later, you could hear the door closing and the soft beeps of the door locking.

Johnny really had been a great boyfriend. He always had been sweet, caring, until a bit before you two started spending less time together. Then, you had seen the video of him, where he said that he wasn’t serious about the whole relationship.

Except that, he was the best boyfriend someone could wish for.

Now that both of you were still on good terms and moved on, it was nice to spend time with someone that meant a lot to you before. He still meant a lot to you; however, it wasn’t the same as it used to be.

You decided to watch an episode of your current drama until the food arrived and you could finally eat something. However, your whole body felt so weak, so you had struggles to get up and open up the door when the delivery rang your bell. When you finally managed to get to the door, you took the food Johnny had ordered for you. The guy said it was already paid and left with a simple goodbye.

You slowly moved toward the kitchen and sat down, when you suddenly had problems to breathe. The pain in your chest was making it hard for you to calm down and you sank down to your knees as everything started to get blurry.

Then, it all went black.

Jaehyun was just getting inside of his small studio apartment when he felt a stinging pain in his chest. He groaned in pain as he didn’t understand what was going on – the pain just started without a reason. When the coughing started, it was weird.

As he looked on his hand, he saw the dark, dead petals of roses, remembering the stories his mother told him about the dead petals someone coughs out.

The person who’s love was unrequited didn’t survive.

Jaehyun didn’t know what to do when he understood what happened. Soon, someone knocked on his door and Jaehyun opened it. It was Taeyong.

“I assume, you know what happened?”, Taeyong asked the young man with tears in his eyes. When Jaehyun nodded, the older man handed him an envelope. “It’s for you. She left it for me to give it to you if something would happen.”

Only thirty minutes later, Jaehyun was feeling better so he finally opened up the envelope. The paper inside of it was small and didn’t have a lot of text on it.

When I leave, please don’t blame yourself or anything. Maybe you didn’t have the same feelings as I did for you, but please, don’t blame yourself. It’s not your fault, not at all. It’s simply mine for letting you into my heart so easily.

- Y/N

main taglist ;; @wownajaemin @n8dlesoupguk @winniet @loviehyuck

other tags ;; @jaehyvnsvalentine

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eirikaanemo · 3 years

Text

Venti’s a Celebrity (GN)

1) You’re a fellow celebrity and do a lot of collabs with him

You both produce music professionally and work for the same album company. Your styles work well together so they have you do a lot of duets. Or sometimes you’ll play the music and he’ll sing, or vice versa.

Eventually the two of you collab with each other more than you make individual content. Individually content is still made, but your joint performances do incredibly well. So it’s only natural that the two of you would form a group together

In all reality, it’s not very different from what you were doing before. You just get to come up with a group name and generally spend more time together.

The two of you get closer and bond (you have all the inside jokes). It’s honestly a dream come true for you. You’ve always thought he was cute, but the more you get to know him, the more you grow to like him

Starting a romantic relationship with him is just a natural extension of your already existing relationship. When they catch you making out, your staff were more delighted than surprised to see that you’d finally acted on your mutual pining

You gaze in the mirror, admiring the work of your makeup artist as you wait for a stagehand to let you know when it’s time. Tonight’s performance is live, on-stage and you’re a little nervous. You lightly trace your meticulously done hair with your finger, too afraid of messing it up to do anything more. There’s a knock on the door. “Come in,” you call. The door squeaks as someone enters.

A few moments later, two arms wrap around your torso and you hear Venti take a deep breath. You rest your hands on his and manage the courage to give him a little smile. “Hi Venti,” you whisper. “Hello!” He replies. “I see my precious songbird is nervous for our first performance. Would a kiss cheer you up?” You smile a little wider. “It would,” you admit. “But I think Lisa might just kill me if I mess up my makeup.”

2) You were his very first fan

He started out small on YouTube. You were always the same to like the video and leave a comment. And you would always share it with twenty of your closest friends (or really just anyone you could- internet strangers included)

He appreciated your support so much, always responding to your comments and sometimes giving you shoutouts in his videos. Everyone knows that the role of #1 fan is already taken

It took years for him to get big, and you were there for him the whole time. So when he finally did it, he sends you tickets to his first performance with an invitation to meet with him

You’re ecstatic to know that he’s finally getting the attention he deserves, and are thrilled to receive the ticket and invitation. Of course you accept! And if it took begging for a few days off and splurging on an airplane ticket there… well, he didn’t need to know that

When the two of you meet, you really hit it off and become friends. It helps that there’s so much history between the two of you, but you also find that you have some things in common

After a while of staying in contact as friends, he invites you to another event… as his date. While it was a bit of a shock at first, you were happy to attend and had a lovely time with him

You squeeze his hand lightly as the two of you walk back out to the limousine. He’s chatting about how great it was to see so many of his friends and introduce you to them. You are honestly only half listening, as you hum and agree in all the right places. Tonight has been a lot and you’re still processing what happened. He notices that you seem sort of distant once you’re both seated in the limousine and holds one of your hands with both of his.

“Did you enjoy tonight?” He asks. “Oh, yes,” you say kind of distantly as you snap back to focusing on him. “It was wonderful. My brain is just struggling to comprehend that I just met fifty of your closest celebrity friends.” He laughs. “Well, do you think you’d be up to doing it again? There’s another event in a couple weeks that I’d like to bring you too.” You smile warmly. “Sounds like a date!”

3) You randomly meet them in a regular situation and don’t recognize them

You’re sitting at a bar with your friends, sipping your drink and jamming out to the music playing. It’s by your favorite artist, The Bard, and is one of your favorite songs

Said music artist happens to be at that bar that night and notices you jamming out. So, just for fun, he decides to go sit by you

He asks if you really love the music so much, fully expecting you to recognize him on sight. You don’t recognize him and proceed to go on a rant about how awesome he is and how much you love his music.

He’s surprised, but pleasantly so, and the conversation eventually drifts to other topics. You have a great conversation and he really enjoyed spending time with you, so he gives you his number

You think it’s kind of odd, but he asks you to not give other people his number. Of course you agree, but it’s kind of a weird thing to ask. Why would you just randomly give out the number of some guy you met at a bar?

When he leaves your friends all pounce on you and ask about him. You’re really confused about why they’re interested until one of them mentions him actually being your favorite music artist. It takes a while for them to convince you that they’re not joking around

“Just call him!” Amber proposed. “Who better to convince you who he is than him!” You frown, Venti was just a nice, cute guy you met. There’s no way he could be a famous singer and songwriter. But you know they won’t leave you alone until you ask. “Alright,” you sigh, ignoring their cheers and high fives.

Pulling out your phone, you open a new text chain, type a new message and send it. ‘Are you The Bard? Sorry about the weird questions, my friends are making me ask.’ You wait a couple minutes with your friends on the edge of their seats. Ping! Your phone let you know you received a message. ‘Yep!’ The text reads. ‘I didn’t think it would take you this long to figure it out ;)’. Your friends swear, to this day, that your jaw dropped to the ground and your eyes were the size of dinner plates.

4) You somehow show up in many pictures of them, despite being a random bystander

He likes taking a bunch of pictures, including selfies, and putting them up on social media. It’s his way of connecting with his fans, and it works pretty well. A ton of people follow him and like his pictures

That day you happen to be at his performance and every. single. picture. somehow has you in it. You’re even in the backstage ones because you got a backstages tour. He doesn’t even notice until one of his fans points it out in a comment

His fans love you so much already and insist that he get a proper picture with you. They come up with wild theories and have the craziest ideas of why this is happening, when in reality it really is just coincidence (or is it fate?)

One moment you’re just hanging out in the food court waiting for your friends to get back with your food, the other you’re being tugged along by the star of the show himself? You’re really surprised when he asks for a picture with you. Why in the world would he want a picture of you?

But you agree and the picture is taken. The fans love it so much. So he and the crew invite you to a joint interview stream later. You’re pretty sure the sky is falling, pigs are flying, and that hell has frozen over, but you agree

The fans ship you already and can tell from your matching blushes in the picture that you think each other are cute. So they play wingman and get you together with their full support

“This question is from istananon in chat,” the person reading the questions says. “Venti, if you were to take them on a date, where would you go?” Venti blushes harder and laughs nervously. “Wow, you guys are really asking a lot of questions about us dating,” he notes. “Um, I guess I would take them to Angel’s Share and we could just talk and get to know each other more.”

“There’s a follow up question,” they remark, turning to look at you. “If Venti were to ask you on a date, would you accept?” You hide your face in your hands and whatever you say is muffled. “What was that?” Ven asks nervously. “We didn’t quite catch that.” You pull your face out for a second to respond and then hide

#eirika writes #genshin venti #venti #venti x reader #genshin impact x reader #celebrity au

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pucksnsticksnhockeyboys · 4 years

Text

you say you hate me

summary: four times you were forced to spend time with Matthew plus one time you chose to.

warnings: mentions of drinking, swearing

word count: 7.2k

note from the writer: is it bad that I’ve already started another Matt fic? also this gif is *chef’s kiss* amazing

ONE

You knew you ran the risk of running into him when you moved from St. Louis to Calgary. But you couldn’t pass up the job opportunity you were given, even if it meant you were looking over your shoulder as if to avoid running into him.

But after three months of living in Calgary you hadn’t seen him, so you were certain you were in the clear. You reasoned that he would’ve popped up sooner, you followed each other on Instagram and have each other added on Snapchat, so you knew that he knew you were in Calgary. You pushed him to the back of your mind, though, not wanting him to take up any more residence in your mind than he already did. And after a while you figured you were safe from his presence and any headaches that seemed to follow him around.

So imagine your surprise when he shows up while you’re in the middle of a date.

Chris is a nice guy. It’s your third date, and the bar he’s taken you to is a little more on the casual side, but the Edmonton vs. Canucks game was on the television above the bar and you knew he was a big hockey guy.

Clearly, you had a type.

“So, I think my boss is going to give me a big project, which would be a huge step in the right direction for the promotion I—” You were gushing about the news you had received earlier in the day, but you were unable to finish your thought as Chris yelled.

“Oh, fuck off, Mcdavid! You should have scored that.”

After realizing that he wasn’t talking about your ability to buy a goal or calling you McDavid, you learned two things about the man sitting across from you. One, he hadn’t been listening to a single word you were saying and you could count on the hockey game being more interesting to him than anything you could have said. You should have known, anyways, on your first date he spent five whole minutes talking about how the Oilers were his favorite team after you mentioned you grew up in St. Louis. And two, he was that kind of hockey fan. The kind that tore down their team’s top players over any little screw-up. The kind that made your skin crawl after having grown up with the sport.

“It was a rookie mistake.” Chris’ attention turned to you since it was a T.V. timeout and you blinked at him for a moment, wondering just how your night took a downturn so quickly. The bar was so low, and he managed to limbo under it.

“McDavid. Rookie mistake?” You blanched, propping your chin on your hand as you waited to see what kind of bullshit excuse he funneled at you. He stuttered over his words, and you were about to interject with a very well laid out explanation about how players were people and able to make mistakes without having their skill questioned. Plus, it was McDavid.

But then a hand landed casually on your shoulder, and your first instinct was to turn and face whoever decided it was a good idea to randomly touch with a scowl. Your frown only deepened when you spotted who it was, completely ignoring the choked noise Chris made.

Of course he had to show up on the one night you were on a date.

“Couldn’t hide from me forever.” Matt drawled easily, removing his hand from you and leaning against the edge of the tall table you were sitting at. You rolled your eyes, not at all surprised at the fact that he decided to start the first actual conversation you’ve had with him in weeks with a tease.

“I’ll try harder next time.” You stated dryly, taking a sip of your nearly empty drink and avoiding the gaze of both men around you. Well, Chris was too busy eyeing Matthew and puffing out his chest as if he was trying to assert his dominance. Please.

You didn’t get the appeal of Matthew. Sure, he was attractive and pretty good at hockey, not that you’d ever admit that to anyone, but he was a pest. He grew up next door to you, which meant the better part of your childhood was spent at the mercy of Matt’s teasing. You adored the rest of his family, you had a four-hundred and thirty-six day Snapchat streak with Taryn, a number seven Senators jersey hanging up in your closest, Chantal’s number was saved as ‘mama tkachuk’ in your phone, and you had once called Keith in a panic when you were sixteen and got a flat tire and your parents weren’t answering.

Matt had laughed at you when you stumbled walking across the stage at graduation.

You were not his biggest fan.

“Hot date?” Matt questioned, not even looking over to Chris who nodded the moment the words entered the air. You winced at the question, because you were technically on a date, but you weren’t exactly feeling it, especially after what had just transpired. But you would marry Chris on the spot if it meant annoying Matt.

“I’ll see you later.” You spoke through gritted teeth, plastering on a forced and obviously fake smile. Matt grinned at you, his mischievous look that you had seen a thousand times growing up that warned you that he was going to do something to get under your skin made warning alarms flash in your mind.

Your suspicions were proven correct when he reached a hand up to ruffle your hair before slipping back into the crowd. You pouted, glaring at his back until you couldn’t see his mop of curls anymore and turned to face Chris again. Your date was looking at you with an annoyed expression, one that was surely mirrored on your face but the only difference was his look was directed at you and yours was at Matthew for showing up out of nowhere.

“Are you okay—?” You barely got the question out before Chris was interrupting you. Again.

“You can’t talk to him if we’re going to see each other.” He stated, as if it was that easy.

It wasn’t as if you wanted to hang out with Matt, not since you hit middle school, but it would be a cold day in hell before some guy told you who you could and could not talk to.

“We’re neighbors, nothing will ever be going on there but our families are good friends. I literally have to talk to him whenever I go home.” You weren’t sure why you were explaining this to him, maybe a part of you wanted to see if he’d bactrack and apologize, even if the relationship was damaged beyond repair. Those hopes were squashed the moment he spoke next.

“Then I’m out.” And he was standing up, barely giving you a second look before he was headed towards the door.

It was pettiness that had you crossing the bar in search of the one person that you couldn’t stand to be around for an extended period of time. You had seen a whole new side of Chris in a matter of five minutes and a small part of you was glad that Matt interrupted and brought it out. Emphasis on small, though.

“You owe me a drink.” You nudged Matt’s shoulder, sliding in next to him at the bar. You didn’t care that you were interrupting his conversation with one of his teammates, you had just been dumped by the guy you’d been somewhat seeing for a few weeks because he couldn’t handle the idea of you knowing a NHL player. “Scared my date away because he didn’t like the fact that I talk to you.”

“I feel like I did you a favor, if he really is that insecure. We don’t even like each other.” He had waved down the bartender with a chuckle, ordering you a beer like the one he had clutched in his hand. It was seconds before the cool glass was set in front of you. Perks of being a hotshot hero in Calgary, you assumed.

“I’ll drink to that.” You clinked your bottle against his, taking a generous sip as Matt watched with an amused grin. He was leaning against the counter, his back now fully turned on his teammates. Clearly, he wasn’t planning on letting you finish your drink in peace.

“Mom told me you got your dream job, so tell me about it.”

“Like you care.” You rolled your eyes with a scoff. You were feeling especially bitter, and you were taking it out on Matt. To be fair, he was taking it all in stride, but you knew he was biding his time until he could make a joke.

“Try me.” Matt wasn’t a bad guy. Annoying, sure. A pain in your ass? Since the day you met. But you knew him better than most—begrudgingly, of course—and you could tell he was genuinely curious. He probably had plans to tease you about it later, you would put money on the fact, but with the way your night had turned out, you couldn’t find it in you to care.

“Fine, but just until I finish this drink and my Uber gets here.”

TWO

mama tkachuk: Hi sweetie! Keith and I are in town for the weekend and were wondering if you wanted to get dinner with us and Matt! Text me when you get a chance!

It was so unfair. How could Chantal be as sweet as she was and have produced a child like Matthew? You were so caught up in how kind her invitation was that you had agreed to meet up with them before it really set in that you would have to sit through a dinner with Matt.

You had arrived at the restaurant a few minutes later than the agreed upon time due to traffic, so everyone else was already at the table by the time you made it. Chantal was the first to jump up and greet you with a hug, Keith following after with a ‘how are you, kid’ and a tight squeeze. You shot Matt a tight-lipped smile, trying to remain civil infront of his parents, and he returned with his typical smug grin, though it was more subdued than usual as a result of sitting next to his mother.

“You always liked to be late.” Matt teased as you sat down. You rolled your eyes at him, annoyed but willing to let the comment slide for the sake of his parents.

“I don’t know why you guys bicker all the time, you used to tell us all the time that you were going to be a family someday. You guys even practiced with Taryn and Brady.” Chantal reminisced, and you smiled uneasily at the memory. It wasn’t necessarily an unpleasant one, some of your best memories took place in the Tkachuk living room. Back when you were kids, you and Matt were attached at the hip. Tweedle-Dee and Tweedle-Dum—if Matt was caught sticking his hand in the cookie jar you were right at his side reminding him to grab one for you too. This particular instance stuck out in your mind, though, because your mom teased you about it whenever she got the chance.

It was a rainy Saturday, Keith was out of town for hockey and your dad was at the office, which left the moms sitting in the kitchen chatting about whatever adults talked about. Taryn had just learned how to walk, which meant that she was trying to follow you around to the best of her ability, even if that meant watching from the sidelines as you played mini sticks with her brothers.

But after Matt had scored against you and Brady enough times, you declared that it was time for them to play your game—house. Taryn was your baby, and she happily filled the roll as she toddled behind you. Brady was your other son, and Matt was the dad. You played like that for an hour or so, Matt pretending to come home from road trips while playing in the NHL just like his father, only to help you pretend to cook dinner and put ‘the kids’ to bed.

At six years old, he was a dream pretend-father.

“I can’t help it if Matthew runs his mouth too much.” You chirped, and though you meant it in good fun there was some seriousness. Matt never knew when to quit, his comments more obnoxious than endearing most of the time. Though, he did have his moments, you were willing to admit. You knew he had your back when it came down to it, but he also would be the first one to crash your date and tell the guy you were with some embarrassing story about you from when you were seven.

He did that no less than three separate times when you were teenagers.

“Remember when they pretended to get married at like six? And Matt cried when I told him that he wasn’t actually her husband.” Keith nudged his wife with a grin, his statement earning a groan from Matt. You flushed, keeping quiet as the memory flashed in your head—the theme of the night, apparently.

It was a summer wedding, so to speak. Sometime during the offseason your family and the Tkachuks rented a lake house for a week and you spent the entire time racing from one activity to the next while clutching Matt’s hand. Your aunt had just gotten married, so weddings were on your mind and you decided you wanted a party like she had. Your choices for potential husbands were limited, Brady and Matt the only other boys close to your age. When Brady claimed that you had cooties and ran away, Matt was the only option left and it simply took the bribe of sharing your dessert with him after dinner for him to agree.

You had made paper rings and even forced Matt to fake propose to you, all while both your mothers looked on with camera’s clutched in their hands. You had claimed your unending love for Matt that day, and he had done the same. In an effort to tease you, your mom had said that he had to kiss the bride and you both looked at her like she was crazy—though he did end up pressing a quick and sloppy kiss to the back of your hand to appease her.

And then twenty minutes later he shoved you off the dock because you were too scared to jump in.

Matt was watching you as his mother told the story, chuckling as she added in anecdotes about how she and your mother had almost started planning your real wedding that day and similar comments. It was no secret that she was rooting for you to get together with her son, and even though Keith would try to get his wife to tone down her comments, you saw his smug grin every once on a while.

The rest of dinner and dessert passed by with minimal reminiscing, and soon enough the check was paid. Matt picked up the bill, and though you tried to argue that you could pay for yourself, Matt simply stuck his tongue out at you and Keith said that he would’ve paid for everyone if he had only been able to grab the check faster. You rolled your eyes at Matt’s childishness, but thanked Keith for his kindness despite the fact that he hadn’t even really done anything.

“So where did you park?” Chantal asked as the four of you stepped outside. The cold air made you shiver, and you used one hand to tighten your coat around you while the other gestured over your shoulder in the general direction of where your car was.

“Like three blocks away. It was pretty busy when I got here.” You replied. Chantal nodded, opening her arms for a hug you readily reciprocated.

“I’ll walk you. It’s way too late for you to go by yourself.” Matt spoke up, interrupting your goodbyes with his parents. He handed his keys off to his dad so they could wait in the car while he went with you, and because he simply couldn’t just be nice, he added his next comment. “You’d probably get lost if I don’t go with you.”

“Thanks, Matt.” You said sarcastically, the roll of your eyes coming almost naturally. There wasn’t room for you to argue, because Chantal was nudging you in the opposite direction she was headed to get to Matt’s car. Part of you wondered if she somehow planned this in an another attempt to get you to spend time alone with her son. You didn’t have time to think about it too much, between saying goodbyes and making plans to meet up when you went home for the holidays, you were rushing a bit to get out of the cold.

While you walked, Matt stayed quiet, something you didn’t realize he was capable of. Your hands were shoved deep into your coat pockets to try and stay warm, but you felt his arm brush against yours every once in a while.

“Thanks for coming tonight, mom loved it.” He was softer now, his voice devoid of any of its usual smugness.

“Are you kidding? I love your parents.” You teased, trying to figure out where this quiet side of Matt was coming from. It was the side of him that rarely came out, especially in front of the media and never on the ice, but it was the side that you got along with the best. You stopped at your car, turning to face Matt. “Thanks for walking me.”

“No problem. Uh, text me when you get home, or whatever. So I know you got there safe.” He scratched the back of his neck awkwardly, a slight redness to his cheeks that caught you off guard. You nodded, unlocking your car and offering him one last smile and goodbye before climbing in.

You couldn’t help but grin to yourself as you drove home. He was trying.

THREE

You had the worst luck.

Firstly, the only flight you could get home for the holidays was a red-eye to try and save some money. Secondly, your parents were making you get a cab from the airport instead of coming to pick you up. It was fine, you were an adult and could handle both those things. You had long come to terms with it by the time you were settling into your seat as everyone boarded.

But third—

“No way am I this lucky.”

The sound of the familiar voice had you tilting your head back with a groan, not even bothering to look at the person who was dropping unceremoniously into the seat beside you. Though his curls were tucked under his hoodie and he was trying his best to remain undetected, his presence was one that you would recognize anywhere.

“I’m just really, really, unlucky.” You told Matt, and though your comment was a jab at him, he wore the same grin he always did.

“That’s mean.” He teased, reaching over to poke your side because of course he hasn't outgrown giving you jumper cables. You glared at him, momentarily pausing your efforts to dig through your bag in search of your headphones just so he knew how annoyed you were. Not that he cared, or that it ever really stopped him.

“Look, Matt, I’ve had a long day, and I was looking forward to just sleeping this whole flight.” You sighed, dragging a hand down your face in frustration.

“I’ll leave you alone, promise.” Matt grinned that stupidly smug grin of his.

Yeah, right. You thought, but kept the comment to yourself. It was better to let Matt think he won than invite him to keep going by replying. He grinned at you, simply miming zipping his lips shut as you rolled your eyes.

He lasted longer than you thought he would—ten minutes.

“I don’t know what you don’t like about me so much, it’s not the hockey thing, because you love Brady.” Matt spoke up, going so far as to pull your headphone out of your ear so you could hear him.

“Brady’s adorable and like a baby brother to me.” You said matter-of-factly, earning a snicker from Matt. “You chipped my tooth when we were twelve and then blamed it on me.”

“I’m sure he’ll be glad to hear that.” He snorted, and for a second you thought he’d leave it at that. He had succeeded in getting under your skin, just like he usually did. “And it was your fault. You weren’t paying attention.”

“You didn’t have to shoot the pucks at me that hard!” You frowned at the memory. You had offered to stand in goal for him while he practiced shooting, and though you were definitely not destined to play in the NHL like him, that didn’t stop him from acting as if he was taking part in the hardest shot competition.

Matt didn’t respond, instead he just shook his head with a grin. Clearly, he was more amused by the memory than you were.

He went back to leaving you alone, though he stole one of your headphones and placed it into his ear to listen. He scrunched his nose up at the song, and you rolled your eyes at the silent jab at your taste in music.

Eventually, you did end up falling asleep. When you woke up to Matthew shaking you gently, you realized that you had fallen asleep on his shoulder and that he was waking you since you had landed and people were starting to exit. You waited for the chirps to come about your subconscious action, knowing he probably had a few comments up his sleeve. Except, he didn’t say anything, only stood up to retrieve both of your carryon bags from the overhead storage.

Matt stuck by your side the entire time you got off the plane and headed to luggage claim, unable to help himself from chirping you at the fact you couldn’t find your suitcase. You poked your tongue out at him, admittedly a little juvenile on your behalf, when you spotted your bag come around the carousel. Before you could grab it, though, he snagged it and stuck his tongue out at you before departing into the airport in search of his parents. Now, you were forced to trail after him.

Your annoyance faded, though, when you heard Chantal call your and Matthew’s names. You smiled at the woman, who hugged her son quickly before turning and pulling you into her arms.

“Guess who I got to sit next to?” Matt chimed, sounding a bit too pleased with himself for your liking. You rolled your eyes, unable to help the tiny bit of amusement you felt at how excited Chantal looked at the idea that you had each other on the flight. You and Matt may both be adults, but to her, you were still toddlers that needed constant supervision and she loved the idea that you were there to watch after each other.

“Oh, that’s lucky!” Chantal cheered and you grit your teeth, forcing a smile on your face at the way Matt was grinning smugly at you. Okay, you figured it could have been worse, you could have been seated next to a creep, but you weren’t about to admit that to Matt.

“So lucky.” You muttered sarcastically. Thankfully, Matthew wasn’t given a chance to comment further on your response, as his dad spoke up before he could.

“Is your dad here? I got a new set of clubs I want to brag about.” Keith questioned and you shook your head with a genuine smile. Living next to a retired NHLer gave your dad plenty of opportunities to bring out his competitive side, and golf was definitely one of their favorite pastimes.

“No, he and mom couldn’t come to get me because they both had work.” You explained and Keith rolled his eyes in good fun. You always wondered how both families got along so well when you couldn’t stand Matt.

“Do you want a ride home then?” Chantal offered sweetly.

“That’d be great, thank you.” You were glad you wouldn’t have to worry about getting an Uber, and you didn’t feel as if you were crashing the Tkachuks’ time with their oldest son since as soon as you started to head to the car, Chantal fell in step with you.

“Oh, Matt, you’re being such a gentleman, carrying her suitcase for her.” Chantal gushed after having noticed that Matt had an extra bag and you didn’t have one. She shot you a look and you just knew this was only fueling her belief that you were destined to end up with Matt. She would probably mention it to your mother, and then you really never would hear the end of it.

“Didn’t know you had it in you.” Keith chirped, earning an eye roll from Matt and laughter from you and Chantal. It was all in good nature, the teasing comments a sign of love amongst the hockey family.

And really, you had no choice but to agree with Keith.

FOUR

“I need you to run next door and give this to Chantal.” Your mom told you, holding out a tray of holiday cookies. You sighed, reluctantly getting up from your spot on the living room couch. You weren’t doing anything, but the aspect of having to walk all the way next door was not totally appealing.

But you did as she said and stuffed on some shoes before heading next door and letting yourself in. Taryn was the first to greet you, taking the tray of cookies and leading you towards the kitchen. As soon as the platter was set down, you both helped yourself to a cookie.

“How’s Calgary? Is Matt showing up randomly to bug you?” She was teasing, but she was right. You laughed, nodding as you broke off a piece of your cookie to eat.

“He showed up while I was on a date, completely by chance, and ruined it.” You chuckled at the memory and at the way Taryn laughed loudly at that. It wasn’t entirely true, Chris was doing a pretty good job of ruining the date on his own, but Matt’s appearance was the final nail in the coffin.

“That’s because he's practically in love with you.” She spoke between giggles. You rolled your eyes, having heard the comment countless times before. It had followed you and Matt around since you were kids, and by the time you were thirteen it morphed from platonic love to your moms explaining what soulmates were to you guys. You’d be lying if you said you hadn’t considered the idea of Matt having a thing for you, but you had long since given up on that idea.

You didn’t have time to comment on it, though, because speak of the devil, and he shall appear.

“What’re you guys talking about?” Matt marched into the room, a smug grin on his face. While he spoke, he reached across to where you were standing and broke off a piece of the cookie you were still eating. With a pout, you watched him pop your cookie into his mouth all the while eye contact with you and wearing a self-satisfied grin.

“Oh, just how you’re in love with each other.” Taryn said casually, her sentence punctuated by Matt choking on the cookie. Clearly, he was caught off guard.

“You deserved that, and no, we were not.” You told Matt as he tried to catch his breath. You couldn’t help the grin you were wearing, and for a brief second you acknowledged that he looked adorable all flustered. Matt shot a glare at his sister, who was laughing hysterically at him, and launched forward to dig his fingers into her sides.

You watched carefully as he tickled his sister mercilessly, preparing to make a break for the living room if he turned his attention to you. You were smiling, widely and genuinely, as you watched Matt mess around with his sister.

This was the Matt that you grew up best friends with.

As you were distracted, Matt let his sister go and she caught her breath while cursing him out and you let out a loud laugh at some of the creative things she said. She certainly was from a hockey family.

But then Matt turned his attention to you, a wicked grin on his face and a playful look in his eyes. Your own eyes went wide, and as soon as he took half a step towards you, you spun on your heel and dashed out of the kitchen.

You heard him chasing after you, but you didn’t risk looking back knowing that if you even wanted a chance to outrun him you would need to stay focused. And as you took a particularly sharp turn into the other room, you heard him crash into the wall, clearly not as agile as he thought he was.

“Hi, Mr. and Mrs. Tkachuk! I brought cookies from Mom!” You greeted with a laugh as you sprinted past Keith and Chantal in the hallway. You barely had time to register their looks of amusement before you felt Matt’s fingers brush your back, signaling that he was close to grabbing you.

“Don’t hurt her, we like her more than you!” Keith called after you, teasing Matt and catching him off guard enough that he stumbled, and you were able to put some distance between you and him. You were laughing maniacally, the sound mixing with Matt’s chuckles and Taryn encouraging you to run faster.

Eventually, you made it to the living room, and you spotted Brady’s head poking up behind the back of the couch as he watched some rerun hockey game. You know it’s a longshot that Matt will give up and that you need to bite the bullet and let him catch you, but your stubbornness is what makes you throw yourself over the back of the couch, your head landing in the lap of a very confused and surprised Brady.

“Protect me.” You order, grabbing the younger Tkachuk brother’s bicep as Matt leaned over the back of the couch, his curls wild and grin wicked. For a second, there was a softness in his eyes that made your heart skip a beat, but then he was back to being smug.

“Brady can’t stop me.” Matt teased, leaning against the back of the couch. Brady didn’t comment, though he rolled his eyes at his brother. It was an argument that had been going on for a decade or so—which brother was stronger? And though they wrestled from time to time, Brady being victorious more often than he used to be, you knew they would never actually fight. You had been there when Keith made them shake heads and promise not to drop the gloves the first time they played each other.

“He’s taller.” You argued, and Matt chuckled as he made his way around the couch. You watched as he lifted your legs, dropping into the spot on the couch they once occupied before resting your limbs across his lap.

“Doesn’t matter.” He replied, giving your shin a squeeze as he spoke. You rolled your eyes, getting comfortable in your spot laying across the Tkachuk brothers and turning to watch the Blues vs. Stars game Brady had put on.

It felt nice to laugh with Matt again. It was as if things were back to normal, and you tried to ignore the funny fluttering feeling in your stomach as his thumbs brushed back and forth along your legs. You hated it, because it was Matt, and you had long since declared that you couldn’t stand him. And yet, there you were, melting under his touch.

“Oh, come on, you’re not going to attack her?” Taryn complained as she dropped into the free chair on the other side of the room. You stuck your tongue out at her, smiling at the sound of Matt’s chuckles. You were going to make a comment about how she was supposed to be on your side in response, but Brady was faster, and his words—for whatever reason—made any reply die on your tongue.

“It’s because he’s in love with her.”

AND ONE MORE

You hated the fact that you weren’t able to sleep. But even more so, you hated the fact that you knew exactly why you couldn’t get your mind to turn off. You couldn’t stop thinking about how sweet Matt had been earlier in the day, and though you knew he always had a soft spot for his sister, for some reason this time it was hitting you differently. Plus Taryn and Brady’s ‘he’s in love with you’s were bouncing around your head.

Finally, after what felt like the hundredth time you had tossed around under the covers, you sat up and snagged your phone off of the nightstand. You sat up, unlocking your phone and opening messages and before you could really think about stopping yourself you typed out a text and sent it.

Only after the message was sent and you couldn’t do anything about it, did you reread what you said and check the time. You couldn’t help but cringe at the one in the morning ‘hey, are you up?’ text that seemingly glared back at you. But then the three dots appeared that signaled that he was typing, and you quickly slid out of the conversation so he wouldn’t think you were waiting for his text. You were, and though he responded within a minute, you didn’t want to give his ego that extra boost.

matthew: usually I’m the one that sends that text

You couldn’t help but roll your eyes, having expected him to say something along those lines. You had practically handed that joke to him. Before you could type out a reply telling him to forget about it, your phone buzzed again with another text.

matthew: front door is unlocked, meet in the basement for a movie?

He was giving you a choice. You could go to bed and pretend this never happened and continue to tell everyone around you that the only thing you felt for Matt was annoyance. But you didn’t. You knew that you might regret it, but you slipped out of bed and tugged on a pair of leggings and a hoodie over your sleepshirt. Shoving on a pair of shoes, you tip-toed outside and to the house next door. It felt a little ridiculous, you were an adult, sneaking around to visit a boy like a teenager. But, you were quiet, and made sure you didn’t make any noise as you slipped down the stairs.

“Why am I sneaking around here like we’re fourteen again?” You teased as soon as you saw Matt already on the couch as he flipped through movie options. For a reason unbeknownst to you, your heart skipped a beat in your chest and your breathing stuttered as you cataloged just how attractive he looked in something as casual as a hoodie and sweats, how suddenly you wanted to run your fingers through his curls that definitely needed a hair treatment.

“I don’t want my family to know you’re here because then I’d have to share.” He teased, snapping you out of your thoughts and opening his arms to silently ask you to cuddle him. You hesitated for a moment, because that was not something you usually did except for maybe when you were three, but decided to throw caution to the wind and curled yourself into his side, your head resting on his shoulder. Besides, you didn’t usually text him at one in the morning either, so precedent was already out the window.

As soon as you settled into him, he draped the blanket that had been folded over the back of the couch over both of your legs. You blushed at the thoughtful action, but tried to hide the flush of your cheeks by staring straight ahead at the television.

“What are we watching?” You found your voice after a moment. When Matt didn’t respond right away, you turned to face him to find him already watching, a small smile on his face and a gentle look in his eyes. For the second time that night, you felt your breath catch in your throat, and it was only the surprised look on your face that had him snapping out of it.

“Oh, uh, you can pick.” He handed the remote to you, and you raised a brow at his odd behavior. You reached a hand up, pressing the back of your hand to his forehead as if to check his temperature with a confused look on your face.

“Are you feeling okay? You must be sick, if you’re letting someone else choose the movie.” You teased, grinning when Matt laughed, swatting your hand away and tugging you closer all in the same movement.

“I’ve been thinking—” He started, but after having grown up with hockey players, you were quick to think up a chirp.

“Are you sure you’re okay then?” You teased, enjoying the warm feeling you got when you heard his laugh. He had your back pressed to his front, so you were facing the television and couldn’t see whatever the look on his face was.

“Would you just let me talk for a minute?” He chuckled and you felt the vibrations in his chest from where you were cuddled against him. And though he was teasing you, there was a softness to his tone that had you nodding, still facing forward. “I kinda sucked when we were teenagers.” He confessed, and you couldn’t help but laugh at him. Though, holding true to your word, you stayed quiet and let him talk. “I was a preteen boy that didn’t know how to act around you and ended up making an idiot of myself.” You knew there probably was a deeper meaning to his words, but you weren’t ready to dive into that and he kept going. “And then we were fifteen and you were in love or whatever with Tommy Banner and I was jealous. And then you broke up but I had to go away for hockey and I don’t regret that, but I do regret not making things better with you before I left.”

His confession hung in the air for a moment as you processed his words. He threw a lot of information at you at once, and you cringed momentarily at the memory of your first ‘serious’ relationship.

See, the thing was, as much as you talked up your annoyance at Matthew, he had always been your person. You fake married the guy for a reason, even if you didn’t really know the implications of your actions way back then. You knew what marriage looked like from your parents and Matt’s, and you wanted that for yourself. You wanted that with Matt. He was your first real crush, and those never really go away. Or at least, yours didn’t.

But once you were teenagers, you stopped pining after your neighbor, a seemingly unattainable goal, and started hanging out with other people. You and Matt started to drift, and then eventually his teasing comments always seemed to be directed towards whatever guy you were seeing, thus making you grow contempt for him.

But now, he was showing his softer side, and those feelings from when you were younger resurfaced as he confessed that he felt the same. You couldn’t deny that you felt something when his hand brushed against you or when he grinned at you—no matter how self-satisfied he looked.

Suddenly you became aware that you had been silent for a moment too long, and you sat up straighter and turned to face Matt. He was studying you, and for the first time in as long as you could remember—except maybe that one time in eighth grade when he asked you to go to the school dance with him because he wanted to make his mom happy—he looked unsure of himself. It was an emotion that didn’t sit right on his face, and as often as you complained about his teasing, you much preferred his shit-eating grin.

“It’s your turn to talk now.” He joked, trying to lighten the mood but only succeeding partly since the breathy chuckle he gave at the end told you he was nervous.

Before you could help yourself, you had cupped his face with both your hands and pulled him forward to connect your lips to his. It took him a second to relax under your touch, but as soon as he realized what was happening, he grabbed your elbow to hold you in place.

When you felt his tongue swipe at your lips you knew you had to pull away before you got too caught up in him, which you knew you would, and you separated. His grin was wide, a little smug like usual, but mostly he was looking adoringly at you.

“I thought you hated me?” He teased, because it’s Matt and of course he would. You rolled your eyes, willing to admit that you had set him up with that one.

“Don’t push your luck, Tkachuk.” You pecked his lips once more, wondering why you had waited so long to do so. If he had been telling the truth, and you knew he was, then he had been crushing on you as long as you had been on him.

“Yes ma’am.” He joked, mock saluting while leaning towards you to chase after your lips for another kiss. You complied, but then pressed a hand on his chest to lean back enough to give him a serious look.

“And if this is going to work, you have to stop being such a pest all the time. Tone it down a bit.” He nodded, grin widening at the mention of your relationship moving past the night. You smiled at him, leaning up to give him one more kiss before settling back into his side. “And I still get to pick the movie.”

Matt chuckled, but didn’t argue. Instead, he settled for pressing a kiss to the top of your head. He let this arm fall from around your shoulders to your waist, and you knew without looking at him that he was wearing a satisfied grin.

“Who’s going to tell our moms that they were right about us?” He spoke up after a moment, and you chuckled. You were as stubborn as Matt was, and neither of you were too excited to admit to anyone that you had been wrong about the fact that you’d end up with each other. You were even certain that Brady, Keith, and Taryn had a running bet about when you and Matt would get together.

As it turns out, neither of you would have to, because you fell asleep together on the couch and Chantal was the first to find you cuddled into her son's chest.

Just like she knew you always would.

#Matthew Tkachuk #Matthew tkachuk imagine #Matthew tkachuk imagines #Matthew tkachuk x reader #hockey imagine #NHL imagine #calgary flames #calgary flames imagine

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petri808 · 3 years

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1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14

Inukag *warning this chapter might hurt*

Staring out through the windshield of his car, his darkened home was the picture-perfect mirror of the pain settling into his soul. Inuyasha had no idea how he’d even managed to make it home without driving off a cliff or plowing himself into a stone wall, because his body and mind were completely numb.

‘Read’ but not answered…

Was it a good sign that the woman at least looked at it? Inuyasha rested his head against the steering wheel and closed his eyes. He’d fucked up… again— just like the night of the accident. His eyes squeezed tighter shut as the emotional pain of everything slammed him with the force of a freight train. This was bad… bad, bad, bad… “FUCK!!” He roared into the still night air. With Kagome’s memories coming back, she’ll remember everything, and it was over. He’d had this second chance to reverse all the damage and he went and fucked it up again.

Not surprisingly, Kagome didn’t respond to his first text, so he typed out a final message for the night: ‘You’re mad at me. I get that so I’ll give you some space but I just wanna say good night Kagome. I love you -Inu’

‘Read’ but not answered…

It was all he could do for now, his only solace knowing Kagome had her mother to comfort her. Inuyasha sighed, long and deep as he pulled the keys from the ignition and dragged himself into his home. His body felt heavy with exhaustion. A weight crushing him down like a boulder. It took all he had to just drop his keys to the floor beside the entrance and shuffle into the bedroom instead of falling right then and there. He didn’t want to move anymore. He deserved the silent darkness of this tomb-like home along with its judgmental echoes of the life it once held.

The next morning after a restless sleep, Inuyasha called out of work. When would he be back, he couldn’t answer them? Part of him didn’t care anymore. Fire him, it wouldn’t matter to the walking dead. Miroku called in concern for his friend, but Inuyasha let it go to voicemail. He didn’t feel like talking to anybody right now, not when he knew it would have a ring of ‘I told you so,’ mixed in. That wasn’t necessary. Didn’t he feel bad enough?

A good morning text sent… left on Read…

An apology text….

Another apology text…

Voice messages left randomly through the day…

All left on Read and unanswered.

The anxiety filled hours ticked on with Inuyasha left curled up in a ball under his blanket. He’d done a number on his living room to physically release the anger he felt at himself, and now he was just dead to the world. All the drapes were tightly closed to the sunlight outside and he only left his bed to attend to bathroom matters. He didn’t wanna give up all hope, but with his mind in tatters and thoughts only of despair, there was nothing left to cling to.

By nightfall Inuyasha was convinced Kagome had truly given him up and he couldn’t blame her for it. This was all his fault. Him and his stupid big mouth. There was no denying it. He shouldn’t have argued with her. Just like before, instead of using his ears to listen, he responded with ego when he had no right to chastise her over not telling him something. The whole reason he was in this mess is because he never listened to her when it mattered the most— and there in lay the heart of it all. Neither of them had the opportunity to talk about what caused the original fight or process what drove Kagome to leave. Inuyasha thought he’d understood its origins and accepted responsibility for it, but clearly, he was wrong, and this new situation is most certainly what would have taken place if Kagome hadn’t crashed her car— a debilitating depression.

If Kagome didn’t want him anymore, then there wasn’t anything left for him in this world as far as Inuyasha was concerned. His yoki called out for her, wept for her loss, and with it all the energy in his soul to care slipped away. He was simply empty without her. No appetite or desire or thirst, just an ocean of dread, and waves of numbness dulling all his senses.

How much time had elapsed, how many days gone by? The clock ticked away hour by hour like a death knell with Inuyasha simply waiting for a release to come. All the messages left on his phone were from everyone other than the one person who could have brought him out of this funk. But her ringtone never came. It is what is it. Was it day four? Five? Six? Inuyasha couldn’t tell, but feeling his body starting to let go, he decided to send one last message to Miroku before shutting off the phone for good.

At the Hoshii residence, Miroku and Sango were on edge dealing with the crisis. Sango had been doing her best to help Kagome to cope with her pain, but Miroku was growing frantic over Inuyasha’s refusal to answer him. He’d driven by the man’s home and knew the car was there, and that was it. No one answered the door and with all the curtains closed he couldn’t see inside. Finally, on day five while they were visiting with Kagome, Miroku heard his phone ping with a message.

Inuyasha: thanks for being a good friend. Tell her she was the only one I’ve ever loved

“What the hell?” Miroku blurted out as he mulled the message over and over in his head.

Sango rushed over at the concern in her husband’s voice. “What is it?!”

“I think that idiot is planning to kill himself— I better… I better go.”

Hearing the commotion, Mrs. Higurashi also came out of the kitchen. “What’s going on?”

“It’s about a message Inuyasha just sent,” Sango explained as her husband was digging around in his small pouch and grabbing his car keys. “Miroku is gonna check on him.”

“What did it say?” Mrs. Higurashi questioned.

So, Miroku showed the woman his phone. “It doesn’t sound good.”

“Oh, dear!” She reached for a jacket near the front door. “I’m coming too! Sango will you stay?”

“Of course, I’ll be here with Kagome. You two go.”

It was a good thing that Miroku had held onto a spare key to Inuyasha’s home that he’d been given and simply forgotten to return. When he and Mrs. Higurashi walked through the door, chills crawled over his skin. It was evident that the house had been closed-up for several days, no windows opened, or ventilation, just a silent graveyard feeling with a fog of musty air mixed with the scent of rotting kitchen garbage and body odor. It was revolting and only heightened the pairs concern for the occupant.

“Inuyasha?!” Miroku yelled as they made their way through the dark home but received no response. The man wasn’t in the living areas or bathroom, so the logical option was the master bedroom at the far end of the hallway. ‘Please be alive,’ he prayed.

Once inside the room, they could see an unmoving body underneath the blankets and if the buildup of body odor told a story, it was sure to be his friend underneath those covers. “Inu?” Still no response.

Mrs. Higurashi turned on the bedroom light, and the brightness finally caused the blanket to shift ever so slightly. “Oh, thank heavens,” she gasped out in relief as she held a hand to her chest. He was still alive.

Miroku rushed over and yanked the blanket off. “Inuyasha!” Tears instantly gathered in the panicked man’s eyes. The state of his friend was heart breaking. Inuyasha had lost weight. His skin was gaunt and pasty white, hair matted and dirty. “Oh, fuck, we— we should call emergency!”

“No…” Inuyasha croaked out and buried his face deeper under his arm. “Let me die.”

“Fuck no, you idiot! Kagome still needs you!”

“Better… off… without me…”

‘Seriously?!’ It was rare for Miroku to get so upset, but in that moment, the anger that bubbled up to surface took over and his arm flew up ready to strike his friend. “You stupid—!!”

“Don’t!” Mrs. Higurashi yelled at Miroku. “He needs help, not anger right now.”

That seemed to snap Miroku out of his emotions, but the tears broke free. It was hard to see his friend in this position, just so frail— nothing like the tough hanyo that he’s known for years. Even after the death of his mother, Inuyasha didn’t break down this badly. Miroku grit his teeth to his own pain and pushed forward. “You idiot. Dying isn’t gonna help Kagome. So, whether you like it or not, we’re gonna help you.”

Mrs. Higurashi now moved around the bed to where she could sit beside Inuyasha. Her own eyes were clouded too, but the woman pulled on all the strength she could muster to hold it together. She placed a hand on the arm he was using to cover his face. “Inu, Miroku is right. Kagome is hurting just as much as you, and I don’t think you’d want to cause her anymore heart ache by going out this way.”

“But she hates me…” Inuyasha whimpered weakly. “Please just let me go.”

Mrs. Higurashi had to squeeze her eyes shut to hold back her tears. Her heart broke for the man. Gently, she pulled his arm down, her voice shaking as she spoke. “Inuyasha, you’re like a son to me, and I won’t let me son die. We’re gonna figure this out, but you need to live please, for her, for all of us that cares about you.”

Inuyasha’s eyes cracked open just a tad. “I’m so, sorry,” he mumbled. “So… sorry…”

She kept her voice as soothing as possible. “I know, and so does Kagome.” Mrs. Higurashi then turned to Miroku. “Do you think you can get him into the shower and clean him up? I’ll make something for him to eat. He needs something in his stomach immediately.”

“Y-Yeah, I think I can do it.”

It took both of them to help Inuyasha into the bathtub. He was so emaciated and dehydrated, that he had no strength left in his body, just dead weight. While Mrs. Higurashi left them to deal with the kitchen, Miroku stripped his friend of clothing and ran a bath to bathe him. Inuyasha offered no resistance, just a few tears flowing down his cheeks.

“I’m sorry,” Inuyasha kept repeating.

“Don’t apologize to me. Save it for Kagome. I can’t believe you’d think we’d be okay with you dying! You’re my best fucking friend you asshole! I want my kids to grow up with their uncle!”

“But I keep screwing up.”

“And that’s life. It ain’t the end of the world yet.”

“Feels like it.”

“Whether you believe us if not, Kagome is hurting cause she in love with your stupid ass too. You can still fix this.”

“Don’t know how.”

“And that’s why we’re here.”

“Thank you…”

Inuyasha’s eyes started to roll back, so Miroku slapped him hard in the face. “Oi! Don’t you be dying on me now! So, wake the fuck up!”

“So… tired…”

“Gonna clean you up and momma Higurashi will get your strength back, so hang on just a little longer…”

Now cleaned up and dressed in something comfortable, they prop Inuyasha up in a recliner since he was still struggling to hold up his own body weight. He simply had no reserves left to draw from and under human standards wouldn’t have lasted this long. A hospital was better equipped to deal with this kind of situation. Inuyasha should have been put on IV fluids to hydrate him faster along with special supplements pumped directly into his system because after this long, the organs would have started to shut down, and his stomach would struggle to process anything. But Mrs. Higurashi made due to honor his request, starting with a bland rice water chicken broth of starch, proteins, and vegetable nutrients to re-prime it slowly. She also sent Miroku to the store to purchase drinks with electrolytes given to infants when they are dehydrated. It was a painstaking process to feed Inuyasha spoonful by spoonful.

“I need you to help me fight Inuyasha,” the woman coaxed the weakened hanyo. “So, you can live through this and see Kagome again.”

Tears flooded Inuyasha’s eyes at the mention of Kagome’s name. “After everything, why would you still want me around her?”

“Because you love her, and she loves you, and as long as there’s love it can find a way. Son,” she placed a hand on his, “I know it feels like the end of the world, but it will get better if you want it to. Do you want it to?”

“Yes,” he sobbed.

Her hand now gripped his tightly as her expression grew determined. “Then fight for it!”

It took several bowls of soup before gradually Mrs. Higurashi started giving Inuyasha fish and small pieces of chicken meat to eat. She had to stick to easily digestible foods, but at least his coloring was improving, and he could feed himself now. The sun has already set, by the time Inuyasha could finally stand up on his own.

“You’re lucky you’re a hanyo. That’s what’s probably saved your life.” Miroku expressed to his friend.

“I know.” Inuyasha could feel his demon half working harder to regenerate his physical body. Though while his body was recovering, his heart still felt broken. They kept telling him that Kagome still loved him so there is hope, but a part of him struggled to believe it. He’d already hit such a low point, to suffer rejection now was almost too unbearable to even comprehend.

Miroku continued talking. “Inuyasha, you’re not gonna do this alone. We will be there to support both of you, but it’s time you confront this. You and Kagome need to talk… about everything— even though she may not remember, a lack of communication is exactly what triggered this whole situation.”

“I know…” Inuyasha sighed.

“All couples go through struggles,” Mrs. Higurashi added with a comforting tone in her voice. “A strong relationship doesn’t come from a having a perfect one, Inuyasha. It’s developed through adversity. How well a couple can take the challenges thrown at them and grow from it.”

“You remember what happened with me and Sango, we almost didn’t make it because of my bad behaviors…”

“Your damn womanizing,” Inuyasha cut in.

“Yeah, that,” Miroku grumpily agreed. “She had to give me a harsh ultimatum to wake me up. But I did, and now look at us. This is your harsh moment, and you can choose to wake up, or loose the best thing that’s ever happened to you. It’s your choice.”

“Okay, okay, I get it.” Inuyasha ran a hand down his face. “Of course, I don’t wanna lose her.”

“Then are you ready to see Kagome?” Mrs. Higurashi questioned.

Inuyasha exhaled slowly. “Ready? No…” he was terrified to face the woman. “But I’ve gotta do it.”

#inukag #inuyasha #inukag au #inukag fan fic #inukag fan fiction #kagome higurashi #missing memories #ch 11 #petri808

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wtfsaidthefox · 4 years

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Can’t sleep?

Duskwood - Jake x MC - 1779 words - Spoilers for Ep7!

Starts out with MC (who I randomly decided to name Sam) struggling after the events of Ep7, and Jake wanting to comfort her. Ends in self-indulgence fluff, because apparently that's the only way I can imagine Jake.

Under „read more" due to length~

Middle of the Night. She could hear rain coming down, beating against the open window of her bedroom. It wasn't all that cold, but she felt cold, even with her blanket pulled up halfway over her head. There was just a shiver going through her she couldn't shake. By now, she must have been lying in bed for a few hours, trying to find some sleep but dreading it all the same.

It had only been yesterday. Someone she had come to call a friend and care about in these last days… killed, right in front of her. It still didn't feel real. Then again, it felt like the only reality she had left. The pictures didn't leave her. Richy, coughing up blood. Richy, his face slowly growing still and lifeless. The panic taking over her, her heartbeat too loud and too fast in her own ears, that one thought hammering in her head, „do something, do something, do something".

If she'd try to recall her own actions right now, she barely could. She told the others. Desperate, incoherent syllabyles and half sentences. They went through disbelief, shock and denial all in a few seconds, but one of them managed to call the police. They had barely spoken since Richy's body was found, and on her end, she couldn't blame anything but guilt. Maybe they had pushed too much. Maybe it was her fault. Maybe she could have done something.

With a small, low groan she reached for her phone. Sleep wouldn’t come, and if, it would come with the same nightmares of last night, so she was tired of fighting for it. Anything else would do.

Opening her phone, she realized that she had an unread message.

Jake.

Between everything falling apart and coming undone, Jake had tried his best to stay calm. But it was even hard for him. ‚He must be so worried‘, she thought, ‚what this could mean for Hannah. Is Hannah dead already too, after all? Will everyone abandon the search for his sister?‘. In truth, he was worried for her.

„Hello Sam. You're probably asleep by now, at least I hope so. I just wanted to ask if you were alright. I mean, whenever you wake up. Please just let me know.“

A slight smile ghosted over her lips. Had someone told her after that first voice distorted phone call that the man under that hoodie would turn out to be such a sweetheart, she'd have laughed at them. But there was really no other word more fitting for Jake. Going through the best, most convincing „I'm all good" standard responses in her head, she noticed the little green dot next to his name. He was online. And just a few seconds later, another message popped up, he had seen her being online too.

„Can't sleep?“

„No. Do you ever sleep?“

„Some times?“

There was a bit of a break. She didn't know what to say, her thoughts a mess and her fingers shaky. Jake started typing. Stopped. Erased the Text. Then again.

„If you can't sleep Sam, I'm here for you.“

„You're sweet Jake.“

This was bittersweet, if she was honest. His care for her made her feel warm for the first time since she crawled under her blanket. But she was also at a loss for words. Shouldn't he focus on Hannah? Did she really deserve his support now? And most of all… how? How could he help her, far way, at some place she didn't even know. But she’d bite her tongue off before admitting to that thought.

„Do you want to talk?“

„You mean Smalltalk? 🤭“

Well, this sounded familiar.

„I would love to Jake, it's just…. I don't even know about what. Anything else would do, but I'm only coming up blank.“

„I'd know something.“

Oh? Now this was new. Curious, she asked him to go ahead.

„While I was in hiding, the only thing I could think of was you. How much I missed you. All the things I wanted to tell you. All the things you didn't know about me yet, but that I wanted to share. Even if I never shared them before, or couldn't even say why it suddenly meant so much to me to tell you. And more then that, all the things I didn‘t yet know about you. All the things I wanted to ask for no other reason then that I want to know you.“

He straightened up in front of his PC. Close to 2 in the night, he hadn't even moved away from his desk yet. Sleep, especially good sleep, had been a stranger to him for so long now, he had given up trying. There was always something on his mind, something to be done, one potential mistake to double check, one preparation more to make. If he was honest, most often, it was pointless. Nothing but his own ghosts from these last months on the run from the governement keeping him awake.

But this time was different. This time, the reason was right.

„You can ask me anything you want Jake“

„What makes you happy?“

Unexpected. Again. She furrowed her brows as she pondered the answer to his question.

„That's a hard one to answer"

„I know. I don't think I could have answered it myself just a short time ago.“

The implication was obvious enough, but still, she needed to hear it. Hear it spelled out.

„But you do now?“

„I do. You. You make me happy.“

She read those words a few times, with a smile on her face, aloud, or in her head in what she imagined his voice to sound like. Jake was normally not too good at reading other peoples emotions, but she couldn't help wondering if he knew how much she had needed to hear that. What those words meant, especially now, when all she was capable of was blaming and doubting herself.

„You make me happy too Jake“

„And that means more to me then I can say. But still, I'd love to hear what else does.“

„Are you planing to use that information against me?“

„Yes. Repeatedly and without fail :)“

How cute could he get? Laughing, she shoke her head and decided to just list everything randomly that would spring to mind.

„Well…. My neighbours, they have this little dog, and every time it sees me in the hallway it's all excited and overjoyed and adorable. That's just infectious. And the first flowers coming out in spring. Every year. Getting to sleep in on Sundays. Getting to hug my friends and family, especially if I haven't seen them for a long time. And seeing them smile. Oh, and you know what? Giving them a present that was just right. You know this horrible feeling of anxiety and impending failure every time you fret over what best to get a loved one for their birthday or on christmas? But then when you hit the nail on the head, and they love it – that has to be one of the best feelings in the world!“

„Of course you would", he answered to the last bit, before she could go on.

„I would what?“

„List giving others presents over receiving them.“

„Well, I'm not complaining about that either 😛 oh, and before I forget to add: parks, forest, beaches – just taking a walk through any of those. Or sitting down for a picnic and just watching the sky. It’s been way too long since I did that last. Have you done that before?“

„No, at least not for a very long time. But I would love to do that with you.“

„As a warning: I will tell you how every single cloud looks like a bunny, or a duck, or my old angry math teacher"

„What if I can identify those clouds first?“

„Then I'm impressed and you get points"

„And what do I get if I have more points then you and win?“

„An actual cloud. So cotton candy.“

She really was the only person that could still make him smile. Just like she was the only one that still made him feel like one day, he could be genuinely happy again himself. That there were people in this world he could trust, no second guessing, no double checking, no constant overthinking every word he said. Talking to her was easy. It made him feel weightless and light-headed, and he had no idea anymore how he had managed to fight those feelings for one second in the beginning.

He had started to tell her, trying to write down just what she meant to him, but in the most unfair contradiction, finding the right words for that was impossibly hard. And given what had just happened, was this really the right time?

Before he could finish debating on hitting send or not, another message popped up.

„Jake…. Is there really a chance for that? Can I really meet you, one day? Because… I wished you were here"

„I know. I wished that too. So I could be with you and support you, more then just with a few words. But I promise you, once this is all over, I'll find a way.“

Yes, he would. He had started to think about how while he had been on the run, and he knew he could make it happen. There was simply no other choice.

Realizing this again, he had deleted his previous attempt at telling her just what exactly she meant to him. Maybe the time wasn't wrong, but the how was. He’d tell her in person. He’d tell her in his own voice, looking into her eyes and seeing her reaction on his face after every single word. And then he‘d tell her again, until she was tired of hearing it.

Which she would probably never be. She felt herself exhaling, letting go of a breath she hadn't even realized she was holding in, as she read his answer to the question she had been so afraid to ask. Which she should have asked sooner, because his answer brought her more relief then she could have hoped. It was exactly how he could help her, more then anyone else, no matter where he was right now.

„Thank you Jake"

„:)“

„I'll reserve all the prettiest picnic places in all the nearby parks 😉“

„Well I hope there are a lot, so we get to spent a lot of time together.“

„There are! Though at some point we will probably also have to think of something else 🤭“

„Looking back at your previous reply, I guess I’d get you flowers next. Or hugs. Or a dog. I'll decide spontaneously :P“

#duskwood #duskwood fanfiction #jake x mc #I love my hackerboi #I havent written stuff in a decade or something #and I dont think I published anything before #how did this happen lmao #I will blame social distancing #cute Jake just makes me happy I guess

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penguintransporter · 4 years

Text

Winning The Game Called Love (Hector Bellerin) PART V

Part V of this little piece that I enjoy writing so much. It is a bit longer, but if you ask me, totally worth your time. The entire story was inspired by the outfit in the picture, so I wanted to post it. Also, I kinda want to dedicate this chapter to one and only @varanest because of all the support I got, and of course all you anons that decided to write me - you have no idea how much it means to get encouragement for one’s work. Anyway, this was supposed to be the last part, but I think there will be one more after this because I don’t want to leave you hanging (epilogue maybe?) Let me know what you think...

Part I

Part II

Part III

Part IV

________

Aida wrapped her long coat tighter around her body, trying to stop herself from shivering even if she was well aware that she wasn’t doing so because she was cold.

Her battered Dr. Martens boots echoed as she walked along the edge of the vast parking lot, and except for few expensive-looking cars parked randomly and a very bored security guard, sitting in his small cubicle, watching Fawlty Towers – it was completely empty.

Aida pulled her phone out, nervously checking the time, but deep down she was just doing it in order to see if there was maybe a text message from Héctor, telling her where to look for him.

What if this is all just a prank?

Was he watching her now, laughing his arse off?

Just as she was about to jump on the train of doubtful thoughts and untrue conclusions, she spotted him – her heartbeat speeding up ever so slightly.

Héctor was leaning on the wall, illuminated by the spotlights surrounding the exit doors – eyes trained on his phone as he lazily moved his thumb across the screen. Aida’s stomach did a quick flip as she stopped for a second, observing him from from afar - letting the familiar rush of excitement run through her, followed by yet another shiver.

This time she didn’t even try to make herself believe that it was because of the low temperatures.

Deciding that she had been creeping on Héctor for too long – not that she could be blamed in the first place, Aida started walking towards him – her heart beating loudly in her ears, masking the noise that her boots made. Nervously, she smoothed down her clothes, exhaling softly.

Héctor looked up at her as she approached – a slow grin appearing across his face as he slid his phone in the pocket of his trousers. Aida smiled back feeling her bile rising as she quickened her pace, and before she could say or do anything, Héctor had already pulled her into one of those hugs that made any other hug she received less important.

Surprised by the sudden and unexpected contact, Aida wrapped her hands around him awkwardly.

It was a mistake, she knew it, but she couldn’t help herself – inhaling deeply, she let her guard down for just a few seconds, enjoying their closeness. Aida could tell that he recently had his post-match shower, both by his scent and the wet tips of his hair that tickled her face as they hugged.

“Nice to see you,” Héctor spoke, breaking the hug, and Aida, for the lack of better reaction, smiled softly as she took a reluctant step backwards. There was nothing more she wanted than to stay in his embrace for much longer, but she had to maintain healthy distance – after all, they weren’t even – heck, Aida didn’t even know what they were.

Still, that pretend distance that was supposed to keep her feelings in check meant nothing once Héctor gave her a cheeky once-over, grinning like an idiot. Not knowing what to do or say, Aida nervously pulled at the strings of the hoodie she was wearing – suddenly feeling warm throughout her entire body.

She was blushing.

You’re acting like an idiot, Aida.

Héctor smirked at her – index finger moving closer to her chin only to tug the string out of her grip gently, muttering something in Spanish.

Or was it English? Catalan?

“I hope you don’t mind me wearing it in public,” Aida muttered, smoothing down the hoodie while avoiding looking at him. When he didn’t say anything, she continued, trying to sound like her normal self that seemed to be lost somewhere between her feelings for the handsome right-back and the intense brown of his eyes, “I really enjoyed the match, thanks for inviting me.”

“All of it? Or just the last fifteen minutes that I was out on the pitch?” Héctor teased, giving her a small wink. Aida felt that familiar warmth wash over her yet again as he pointed at the exit doors behind him. “It’s a good thing that we won, then. That goal was a proper beauty.”

Aida, deciding that her sarcasm might be her best bet, gave him her best fake surprised face as he stepped forward, opening the doors for her and holding them in place. “Wait, what?” she asked, suppressing a smile, “are you trying to tell me that you weren’t the lads in blue?”

Héctor laughed lightly, adjusting the red beanie on his head, and it made Aida stop for a second when she realised how well put together he actually looked – despite playing a major game just an hour before. From the choice of his clothes to the tiny details like his cross earring and few statement rings on his long, tattooed fingers.

Stop staring.

“You humour me,” Héctor retorted as Aida she squeezed herself next to him and took a few steps towards the glint of light that was coming from the world outside.

“Look, I will stand here and all you have to do is try to kick the ball past me,” Héctor instructed, still crouching in front of her where he was adjusting ‘the ball’.

She enjoyed the silly competitions - never failing to make a fool out of herself willingly or not, and she had nothing against some football, despite being very, very bad at it, but as Héctor tried to explain the challenge, Aida noted two problems.

First – the ground beneath her boots was slightly muddy, sticking to the soles of her boots, and second – the ball that Héctor was fixing wasn’t actually a ball, but a pine cone that he kept hitting as they walked through the park since they arrived.

For some reason or another, they ended up in Highbury Fields – taking the empty pathway along the rows of naked trees and wintery bushes, and despite the silence between them, Aida enjoyed their stroll as she stole glances at him every now and then like a lovesick schoolgirl. The park seemed to be very quiet just for them, with only occasional passerby that didn’t even spare a second look at the professional footballer and a petite brunette with rosy cheeks next to him.

“It’s ridiculous,” she commented, adjusting her hat nervously. “I know it doesn’t look like it, but I have two lefts attached to my body.”

Héctor chuckled at her, glancing quickly at her. “You just have to believe in yourself.”

“Easy for you to say,” Aida huffed, “it’s like competing against, I don’t know—have you seen yourself on the pitch?”

“Few times, but I am glad to find out that you did as well,” Héctor teased as Aida felt her stomach being evaded by thousands of butterflies. “Would it help if I motivated you somehow?”

Aida looked down at him, finding herself both annoyed and turned on with his cheeky smirk. She could sense that he had an idea on his mind, and frankly, she was slightly scared. “Go on, vice-captain…” Aida urged, placing both of her hands on her waist.

“That ball—,”

“—Pine cone, you mean?”

Héctor made a silly face at her, and once again, her stomach made a flip.

“That pine cone,” he corrected himself, “if you manage to get it past me, I am buying you dinner after this. There’s a great vegan place down the road, and I’ve been peckish for a while now.”

Aida blushed, imagining them sitting at the table together, candle burning in middle, and his hand slowly touching hers— she stopped herself, shaking her head lightly.

You need to stop watching Hallmark movies.

“And if I don’t?” Aida asked, composing herself.

“I haven’t thought about it,” he spoke as he got up, dusting his hands against his trousers before giving her a look under his eyebrows. “Come on, unicorn. Have faith in yourself because I do.”

Not only did she lost the challenge, but she has also managed to fall on her arse and stain her relatively new coat with the wet mud. Despite giving her best, Aida knew that with her two left legs and balance or rather lack of it, she wasn’t going to win this one, no matter how much he tried to make it easy for her.

“Well, that was embarrassing,” she grinned at him like a Cheshire cat, brushing her coat with her hands as he took off his hat for a second, running his fingers through his locks before putting it back in the place.

Héctor stifled a laugh before hitting the unlucky pine cone with a real force, making it fly and land along the bushes, few meters away. “It wasn’t that bad,” he grinned, and Aida rolled her eyes at him. “I’ve seen worse.”

“Who? My granny?” she joked as Héctor took a step closer, only to pull her hat over her eyes, making her gasp and swat his hand away. “I was actually looking forward to that dinner,” Aida added with a sigh.

“It can still happen, y’know?”

“That’s because you’re peckish, innit?” Aida teased back, blushing lightly as Héctor smirked at her.

Slowly, they made their way down the long stretch of park, towards the exit as Aida tried to come up with something to say. She knew that she had no need to keep talking, but she enjoyed the silly banter with him; it was relaxing her.

Aida looked around the park.

The dusk had already set – the layer of fog forming slowly, and despite the gloominess of the winter, it looked beautiful. She stuck her hands in her pockets as she observed the nature surrounding them.

“I was wondering…” Aida started softly after a while – a thought that has been bouncing around her mind, tickled her curiosity.

“Hmm?” Héctor hummed as Aida glanced up at him – her heart making a dip into her stomach.

Hot. Ridiculously hot.

“Why did you want to meet up after the match?” she asked, making a detour around a small pool of mud in front of her. “And most importantly, how did you get my number?”

Héctor laughed lightly, glancing at her and Aida quickly looked away. “Blimey, are you always this curious?”

“Sometimes,” she teased, but on the inside she was becoming a nervous wreck. Héctor stopped for a second; Aida did the same, feeling of anticipation growing inside of her as she waited for his answer. “Come on, Hec,” she added softly, using his nickname for the first time.

He took a step closer – his face shadowed by something else other than his boyish demeanour; something that Aida couldn’t put her finger on what it was.

“Let’s say that I suddenly got curious about magical creatures,” he finally answered – the corner of his lips moving upwards as he took a step back away, starting to walk again. “Also, you still owe me a sign language tutorial. Don’t think I forgot about that.”

It was Aida’s turn to giggle as she caught up with him. “Hate to say this, but not many birds would appreciate that kind of flirting, Héctor.”

“What about you? Would you appreciate it?” he asked nonchalantly and Aida’s breath hitched in her throat.

How can he say something like that and keep his cool?

For what seemed like ages, Aida tried to make herself breathe again. The only thing she was able to do as she tried to gain back her composure was to open and close her mouth like a fish. It certainly didn’t help that Héctor kept his eyes trained on her, smirking mischievously.

He was more than pleased with himself.

“I… I’m, ugh – idiot,” she groaned, burying her face in her hands.

Héctor chuckled, tugging at her coat sleeve, making her look up at him. “My God, you are unbelievable, but in a good way.”

Aida blushed a further shade of red as she looked at him, wishing she wasn’t because a certain type of tension was growing between them and it made her heartbeat accelerate.

“It’s all your fault,” she blurted out, quickly realising that she actually voiced her thoughts instead of keeping them inside her head. Burned with the realisation that she humiliated herself once again, she took a step back.

“Guilty as charged,” he grinned at her playfully, and all Aida wanted to do was to find a rock and hide underneath it for a while. “Y’know, I wasn’t joking with what I said about the dinner,” Héctor started, switching the subject casually as Aida managed to gain some of her confidence back – her cheeks cooling down ever so slightly, “but you still need to keep the end of your bargain.”

“And here I thought you forgot about it, silly me,” she joked back, trying to sound cool, but on the inside she was feeling the nervousness growing yet again. “What do I have to do?” Aida asked, pretending that she was ready for whatever he had in his mind.

“Kiss me,” Héctor responded nonchalantly as if he was asking her about the time or as if he was wondering if it was raining outside.

Aida swallowed – her eyes going wide for a second as her mind shut itself. She was desperately trying to find the goddamn switch, but it was in vain.

She was not ready for this.

“Fine,” she whispered, nervously sticking her hands in the pockets of her coat. “A kiss,” she repeated and Héctor nodded, looking at her with a small smile dancing on his lips as he waited. She nodded as well, more as an encouragement to herself before taking a step towards him.

Without wasting a moment, she tiptoed ever so slightly, giving him a peck on the cheek - softness of his skin surprising her for a second. Not pleased with the execution, but glad that she didn’t humiliate herself once again, she smiled, taking a step back and in the direction of the exit gates that were in front of them.

Before she knew what was happening, Héctor’s hand pulled at her arm, and Aida only blinked fast couple of times when she found herself facing him once again. He was gently pulling her closer towards him - one of his eyebrows rising slightly as he locked his eyes with hers. Aida waited for that cocky grin of his to appear on his face, but it didn’t; not this time.

She only saw moments like this in the movies and TV shows, and more than often she wondered if they existed in real life or if they were just a product of creative freedom. Whatever the case was, Aida wasn’t sure what was she supposed to feel because instead of the romantic anticipation she imagined when watching those, all she felt was a turmoil of butterflies in her stomach and a slight wave of panic rising inside of her.

Aida blushed a deep shade of red as Héctor’s arm sneaked around her waist, underneath her open coat, and for a second, she thought that her heart had stopped beating.

“For someone who knows the sign language, you really are very bad at reading them.”

“You didn’t specify— it’s not the same,” she breathed out shakily as Héctor’s other hand went up to her cheek where it settled perfectly against her jawline as he drew her in closer. The rings he wore felt cool against her burning skin as he watched her – eyes searching for a silent encouragement in hers. “Héctor,” Aida mumbled, heat rising inside of her, “whatever you’re about to do, can you just do it?”

She didn’t expect him to laugh, yet he did – throwing his head back for a second before looking back at her, and just when she was thinking that he was only teasing her, he leaned down, capturing her lips in proper kiss. The moment it happened, her eyelids fluttered close and she felt a tingle ran down her spine – her legs suddenly becoming weak. Quickly, she pulled her hands out of her pockets, sneaking them around his neck for support.

Maybe that was exactly what he was waiting for because Aida could feel him deepen the kiss, pulling her even closer.

There were moments, many of them, if she was going to be honest, when she wondered how it would feel to have his lips against hers, and now that she finally had the chance, Aida didn’t want to stop, and it scared her. Getting on her tiptoes, she brought herself closer, wanting him to know that she wanted the kiss; that she needed him to kiss her, and just as she started to relax into him, the kiss became just a gentle brush of his full lips against hers.

Much to her dismay, Héctor pulled away, and she suddenly became childishly shy, looking bashfully down at their shoes.

Do I say something now?

Is it wrong that I want to snog him again?

You just kissed Héctor, Aida.

“Much better,” Héctor smirked, giving his bottom lip a small bite as Aida glanced up at him, wondering what was going through his mind. Did he feel the same tingles as she did? Does he want to kiss her again as much as she wants to kiss him?

“Uhm—,” Aida trailed off, nervously looking away – her arms nervously swaying as Héctor took a step back while running his hand along his jaw. Aida felt a shiver of cold run through her, suddenly missing the the warmth of his hand against her face; his arm around her waist.

“Hungry?” he suddenly asked, sticking his hands in the pockets of his jacket.

Aida didn’t say anything, but nodded confusedly, closing her eyes for a second as they started walking towards the exit gate – a small but timid smile appearing on her lips.

#footballers #footballer fanfiction #Football Fanfiction #footballer imagine #football imagine #soccer fanfiction #soccer imagine #soccer oneshot #soccer imagines #hector bellerin fan fiction #hector bellerin fanfiction #hector bellerin fic #hector bellerin imagine #hector bellerin oneshot #arsenal fc fanfiction

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petertingle-yipyip · 4 years

Text

Selfish - Peter Parker

//Absolutely not requested. This idea came to me SO randomly but I really liked it so. first two anons are what i sent her, and the last one is what someone else sent her regarding my concept.//

//Tags: @stuckonspidey // Warnings: Language, violence //

Pairing: Peter Parker x Reader; Spiderman x Villain!Reader)

Word Count: 9,935

Summary: Y/N Y/L/N never cared for her father, Tony Stark. After growing up without him in her life, she grew to despise him and the Avengers. She finds solace in causing chaos, including (but not limited to) constantly ruining a certain webbed-hero’s night. The thing is Y/N and Peter are dating, and neither of them know each other’s secret.

You never liked the sound of Y/N Stark. It felt fabricated, like a person you were never meant to be. If you had been raised by the billionaire, your life would be exceptionally different. You wouldn’t be enrolled at Midtown with your friends. You wouldn’t have met Peter the way you had, wouldn’t have fallen in love with him. You didn’t feel bad about not liking the sound of your father’s last name paired with yours. And from what you could tell, Tony Stark didn’t like the sound of it either.

Your mom was the one who made the decision to raise you away from Tony. She explained it to you when you were still in elementary school, when Iron Man first started gaining traction with the public. You had thought she was kidding. There was no way your absentee father was Iron Man. It seemed too convenient, but she even showed you your birth certificate. Sure enough, his name was on it where the father’s name usually goes.

So, you grew up knowing you were Tony Stark’s daughter. It always made you wonder how many other estranged Stark children were there. But you also knew Tony Stark didn’t care about you or your mother. He sent birthday cards, a credit card with the note “Go nuts. -TS” was included when you turned fifteen. Your mom said he paid a year’s rent for you at the beginning of every year. She swore your father was a good person, but all you saw was a joke.

Genius, billionaire, playboy, philanthropist. But never known to the public as a father. He was everyone’s hero, everyone’s savior. Where would New York be without Iron Man? You always thought it’d be about the same. You grew up great without Tony Stark. New York would be fine.

You thought it was ironic that he could put himself on the line time after time to protect the world, a place full of people he’d never meet, from threats, but he couldn’t meet his own child. It made you feel unwanted, ignored, rejected, and forgotten. Spiteful even as you grew older and understood things for what they really were. You had even started to wonder if his secretary was sending the cards and he was just signing them. But that feeling, that gnawing bitterness that lived in your chest, it grew into actions. But being Stark’s kid had one upside. You were a genius.

You were able to develop multiple pieces of tech, ones that were just dangerous enough that you could make some trouble. You created a vocal manipulator, able to manipulate your voice across different frequencies and toy with people’s sense of hearing. You were able to create a neurotransmitter that you could embed in a knife’s handle so you could direct it once it left your hand. You were also able to use some of those deep Stark pockets to get professional level martial arts, knife-throwing, and singing classes.

You found a way to develop highly responsive shoe inserts, able to add 18 inches to your vertical jump and absorb most if not all of the sound of you walking. You were able to create a number of highly potent, easily absorbed solutions with a variety of functions. A paralyzing agent. A temporary bronchiole restrictor. Another that forces one to tell the truth. Five variations of sensory deprivation, one for each human sense. And your newest, a neurotoxin that activates pain receptors across the body. All of your concoctions were temporary, that much you made sure of. You didn’t want to kill anyone or cause any long term damage. More often than not, you just wanted to ruin their night.

Since your dad was a hero, you wondered if it was your path in life to be a hero as well. A local hero, like Spiderman. You had thought about it when you first started toying with chemicals, using your new solutions for good. Maybe even help people. But the thought of being in the same column as your father, being part of the superhero world, it made you sick to your stomach.

You were disgusted with the whole concept of heros. A group of people with martyr complexes who wanted glitz, glam, and glory in exchange for “risking their lives” to save the world. It was ridiculous. No sane person would stand against aliens, high tech monsters, and god knew what else because it was the “right thing to do”. You didn’t even believe Captain America really meant that.

So, you decided to be a troublemaker. Use your brain and your anger to wreak havoc. You never had any intent of keeping it up long term, more of a temporary deal to blow off steam when you were especially pent up. But that was before you met Spiderman.

“Little late to be out, isn’t it?” He said casually, leaning on the wall in front of you.

“Piss off, dude.” You smiled sweetly. Your mask hid your eyes, the reflective fabric showing only a gray screen. “Don’t you have an old lady to help across the street?”

“You know, you seem a little young to be out right now.” He countered. “Don’t kids have a curfew?”

“Coming from the boy who sounds like he hasn’t even hit puberty?” You laughed. Your hand subtly slid to the high collar of your suit, adjusting the sewn in meter to the deeper end of the vocal scale. “Mind your business.” Your voice came out deeper, more threatening and with an added bass that wasn’t auditorily picked up.

“Woah.” Spiderman said in amazement. “Your voice changed!”

“What?” You said after sliding the meter to normal, shock obvious in your voice. “You heard the difference?”

“Well, yeah.” He shrugged, his voice cracking. “I kind of have, like, super senses.”

“Huh.” You nodded slowly, formulating a new plan. You carefully crossed your arms over your chest and activated one of your neuro-linked blades. “Are all of your senses heightened?”

“Yeah.” He began explaining. “Even my brain works different.”

“Your brain was changed?”

“Yeah, it’s kinda like- I don’t know. It's hard to explain.”

“Hmm.. Tell me, how does this feel?”

Before Spiderman could say another word, you sent a knife, soaked in your new pain serum, into his side. You smiled wickedly as he fell against the wall, obviously in pain all over but not knowing why. You called your blade back as you walked away, proud of the outcome.

You texted your boyfriend as you walked home. You figured he’d be asleep or working on his stupid Stark Industries internship so you didn’t expect an answer right away.

Peter’s phone went off as he was left leaning against the bricks for support. He felt like he had been slammed against a building, worse than when he left the airport in Germany. Whatever was on that blade had his entire body in pain, as if every place where he could feel pain, he did.

It didn’t wear off for what felt like hours. Peter couldn’t even focus to swing home. He had to walk the 12 blocks and clumsily climb the fire escape to get to his bedroom. Once there, he was able to slide out of the suit and lay curled in a ball on his own bed. He finally was able to check his phone, and a message from his girlfriend was there to make him smile.

pretty girl🤩💛: hey petey. heading to bed. that chem work had me physically in pain lmaoo. meet in the morning to go over it?

pretty girl🤩💛: i love youuuu. good night bby xx 🥰🤍💓

He managed to send his replies before giving in to the now dulling pain and falling asleep.

As you were tucking your own suit and weapons away, you received a text from Peter.

lover boy🥵❤️: okay same :( come over when youre ready and we’ll walk to school.

lover boy🥵❤️: i love you more

lover boy🥵❤️: 😘😘🖤🖤

The next morning he stood in front of his mirror, examining his side. There was no scar from the blade, only a deep purple bruise from the healing. Peter couldn’t stop thinking about the girl from last night. He was amazed that she could manipulate her voice the way that she did and he didn't even remember seeing her hand move to throw the knife. The biggest thing that stuck out to him was how familiar she seemed. He could almost swear that he knew her, that he knew her voice. He felt it in his bones, in his sixth sense.

You got ready quickly for school, greeting your mom on the way out of the apartment.

“There’s mail for you.” Your mom nodded to the two envelopes on your kitchen counter. When you stopped to examine them, she slid a plate of food towards you. “Since I know you didn’t eat much last night.”

“Thanks, Mom.” You smiled, picking up a pancake in one hand and an envelope in the other. “It’s a Stark Industries letter. Throw this one out.” You tossed it to the side.

“Sweetheart, maybe Tony is trying to be in your life.” She said softly. “You should give him a chance. I think you’d like him.”

“I don’t think I would.” You shook your head with a mouth full of pancake. “He can’t go around trying to save the world and then try to do things for us in the shadows. I’m not gonna be here as a piece to his redemption.”

“Y/N-”

“I’m sorry.” You said honestly, knowing you shouldn’t have cut her off. “If you still have love for him, that’s great. Hold on to that. But I just can’t feel love for someone who hasn’t interacted with me through more than a birthday card.”

“Just open the letter, please.” She said sweetly, pushing the Stark Industries letter towards you. “Maybe it’s not about Tony.”

You sighed gently, putting down your breakfast to open the letter. You dropped the torn envelope on the table and unfolded the paper. “Miss Y/N Y/L/N, we hope this letter finds you well.” You began reading out loud. You offered your mom a look that said you didn’t want to continue reading, that you didn’t feel like it would mean anything. She nodded eagerly, telling you to continue. “Everyone at Stark Industries is highly impressed with the grades that you received from Midtown School of Science and Technology. Mr. Tony Stark would like to personally offer you a summer opp-” You laughed and threw the letter in the trash, heading to your room for your backpack.

“Y/N Y/L/N, you get back here.” Your mother said firmly.

“Mom, that letter is a joke.” You replied, throwing your backpack over your shoulder. “Tony wants to ‘personally offer me a summer opportunity’? That’s bullshit.”

“Don’t cuss at me.”

“Sorry!”

“Tony and I just thought-”

“You knew about this!?” You said loudly. “Why would you do that? You know how I feel about him and Stark Industries and the Avengers. It’s bad enough that Peter has that stupid Stark Industries internship. Why would I want one?”

“Will you at least talk to him?” She tried. You could see the sadness in her eyes, the pain from the broken family. She still loved Tony, that much was clear. And you knew it was valid for her to still love him. You just couldn’t forgive a man who didn’t want to be forgiven. But it was for your mother, the woman who raised you. The woman who left the man she loved so you could grow up normal. You knew it wasn’t fair to put her in the middle of your one-sided feud with your father, so you gave in.

“Yeah.” You sighed in defeat. “I guess I can have one conversation with the man. But I won’t go to him… If he wants to talk, he can come to us. And I won’t talk to him through a phone call.”

“Thank you.”

“I’m only doing this for you.” You added, holding your arms out for a hug. “I’m heading out a little early. Peter’s gonna go over the chem work from last night with me.”

“You finished it, right?” She asked as you headed towards the door.

“Yes, ma’am.” You nodded, offering a salute as your goodbye. “Love ya.”

“Are you coming home or going to Peter’s?” She called as the door was shutting behind you.

“I’ll call you and let you know.” You answered quickly before heading to Peter’s apartment.

You reached his apartment with about fifteen minutes left before you two would have to start heading to school. You knocked twice before May ushered you in. She gestured to Peter’s room, saying he was still getting dressed. You smiled, hugged her quickly, and headed into his room.

“Petey?” You knocked quickly before entering. “You decent?” You covered your eyes until the door was shut behind you.

“Y/N! Hi!” He said quickly. When you put your hand down, you saw him shirtless. You had only caught a glimpse of the deep purple bruise on his side but that was enough to draw your attention. He noticed your eyes on his tender injury but quickly tried to brush it off. “I went to help May with dinner last night and I fell into the edge of the counter.”

“You fell? In the kitchen?” You asked carefully, watching his face for his reaction.

“Yeah!” His voice cracked. ��Yeah, I slipped in my socks.” He laughed nervously.

“Hmm.” You nodded slowly, not believing his story but not thinking of any other way he’d get a bruise that deep. Unless he took up a contact sport without telling you. “Want me to kiss it better?” You teased.

“Well, if you’re offering.” He smirked.

You skipped over to him and went up on your toes to kiss him quickly. When you pulled away, he pouted. “That’s it?” He whined.

“Aw. Does it still hurt, baby?” You joked.

“Mhmm.” He nodded, hitting you with his big puppy dog eyes and pursed bottom lip.

You chuckled lightly as he kissed you again, one of his hands finding your hair to hold you in place for a few moments longer.

“Anyways…” You smiled when you pulled away. “Can I see the chem work from last night?”

“It’s on the desk.” He nodded towards his cluttered workspace before rummaging through his closet for a shirt.

Everything else that day was normal. School went quick and you went to Peter’s afterwards. You two got food from Delmar’s on the way to his place. You struggled through your calculus work as Peter breezed through his. He talked you through some of the problems and you helped him with his English writing assignment. You two laughed and joked and teased each other until it was time for you to go home.

That night, you suited up and wandered the streets. You had no real intentions as you walked the familiar streets you grew up on. You simply wanted to be alone with your thoughts for the night. Sure, it was easy to lock yourself in your room and muddle in your messy thoughts, but you weren’t truly alone. Your mom would be home, checking on you or coming in to show you something funny she found on Facebook. So once she was asleep, you took off.

You wanted to do something big that night, something that could distract your mind until the next morning. You had ended up in front of Peter’s apartment building when you looked around to make up a plan. With no ideas, you climbed the fire escape until you reached the top of the building. You kicked your feet over the edge, flicking a knife into the distance and calling it back.

“This is an oddly specific spot for you to be.” Spiderman’s voice came from behind you. You dropped your hand, letting the knife fly past you towards the spandex-clad figure behind you. You stopped it about an inch in front of his face. You stood slowly, taking a deep breath to gather your composure before turning to face him.

“Are you stalking me?” You teased, walking slow circles around the bug-themed hero. “I’m a little creeped out, not gonna lie.”

“I- I wasn’t- I just-” Spiderman stammered.

“Doesn’t matter.” You shrugged, bringing your knife back to your hand. You tucked it away and looked back to Spiderman. “I’ve had a rough day and I’m gonna take it out on you.”

“What? Why-” He began, but before he could finish his sentence, your fist had connected with his jaw.

“Why?” You laughed, aiming another punch that he ducked. “Because all you heroes are the same. You think-” Another well-aimed punch. “-you can swoop in-” A swift kick to the ribs. “-uninvited-” He swung a fist back but you ducked under, twisting his arm over your shoulder and flipping him onto his back. “-and expect everyone to thank you.”

He jumped up quickly before speaking again. “What did I do to you?” He exclaimed, yelping as you aimed a kick for his head that he barely ducked.

Peter didn’t understand why he was taking so long to react. Usually his mind could process and guess where his opponent would strike before they made a move. But when he was fighting this new girl, he had no idea how to fight back. All he could do was defend. “I don’t even know you.”

“No, but I know you.” You laughed, pushing your gloved fingers through your hair. The sentence sent a wave of panic through Peter’s body, bracing for you to expose him but it never came.You hadn’t planned on any fighting, so you didn’t make a point to put it up before you left the house. You now regretted that choice, a thin layer of sweat making your baby hairs stick to your face. “You’re all the same. You think you’re doing your part to make the world better but all you do is abandon your family.”

“Abandon…” Spiderman repeated, his mind racing to put it all together. “Did someone hurt you?”

“Doesn’t matter.” You shrugged. “I’ll come face to face with him soon enough. For now, you need to worry about who’s hurting you.” You quickly flicked a knife at him, one dipped in a sensory deprivator. You were pretty sure it was the sight, but you couldn’t quite remember.

“What the-” He exclaimed, reaching his hands out in front of him. “How did- What did you do?”

“Sensory deprivation.” You said smoothly, walking to pull the knife out. “It was hard to perfect these ones without testing them on myself, if I’m being honest… It’d be too obvious to the people around me what I was up to.”

“I can’t- I can’t see! I can’t see.” He repeated, panic rising in his voice. You almost felt bad for him, like you had taken it too far. Something about the octave of his voice, the speech pattern, it felt familiar and that made the regret that much worse. Not only that, but it made you realize something. He was young, maybe as young as you were. “H- How- How long- How long is this gonna last?”

“About an hour.” You said slowly. You sighed gently, adjusting the pitch of your voice a bit higher. You knelt beside him, carefully putting your hand on his shoulder. “You’re gonna be alright.” You said with a slight tune to your voice.

You had picked up the singing lessons as a hobby, but you had quickly learned how easy a man would fall for a song. Using your tech and skills, you were like a modern day siren, manipulating men with a simple tune. Only when you used it on Spiderman, you didn’t use it to hurt him.

Peter was in a state of pure panic. He had never been without his sight before, and being on top of his apartment building, with an expert knife thrower that had a vendetta against heroes only made his nerves worse. He had no idea what her plans for him were. He wasn’t even completely sure of what she was capable of. Everytime he encountered her, she had something new to throw at him. As far as he could tell, she wanted him dead. She could throw him off the roof right now and he’d be as good as dead.

He was already on his knees, having collapsed from the knife landing in his thigh. He felt her hand on his shoulder and he flinched, raising his hands in a quick defense. But instead, a soft tune found his ears, a gentle promise that he’d be okay. He didn’t know why it made him feel a bit calmer, but it seemed to slow his mind. It reminded him that it was only temporary.

So, he gave in to the loss of sight. He gave in to the new nothing and allowed his sixth sense to take over. He wasn’t sure if she wanted to fight anymore, but he was ready for it.

“You’re young, aren’t you?” You asked when you saw some of the tension leave his body. “Everyone says you could be any age, but I don’t think you’re that much older than I am.”

“Now you care?” Spiderman scoffed.

“Wow, sorry.” You rolled your eyes.

“You literally just blinded me and I’m supposed to be nice to you?”

“Just forget I asked, damn.” You pushed yourself up and turned to face him. “It’d be so easy to end all of this right now. You’re blind, defenseless really. You’d never see my attacks coming… And maybe it’d make me feel better to take one hero out of this world.”

“Take your best shot.” Spiderman challenged.

You lifted an eyebrow, wondering if it had worn off already. But there was a slight falter in his movements, confirming that he was still blinded. So, you went for it. You threw punches and kicks, some connecting while some were dodged. He had landed a few good shots on you, one causing you to bite your own cheek. You spit the blood out, nodding in respect to him, before attacking again.

You used one blade, gripped tightly in reverse so your swings had a bit of an edge to them. You opted against any puncturing or any coated blades, deciding to hurt him by brute force this time around. He was able to block a decent amount of swipes, hitting your forearm with his. Spiderman was a tough opponent, eventually pinning you near the edge of the building.

“Go on then.” You breathed heavily. Spiderman had the hand with the blade pinned under one knee while he had his foot against your chest. He was careful not to put too much on his weight against you, but he made sure you couldn’t escape. “Throw me over and be done with it.”

“What the hell is wrong with you?” He exclaimed breathlessly in shock. “I’m not gonna throw you off a building!”

Despite the slices, throbbing bruises, and fuzzy vision, Peter still didn’t want to hurt whoever she was. She obviously wasn’t grown, had no real intent on hurting people. She was just… troubled.

“That’s where you and I-” You managed to get your knees between your bodies. “-are not the same.” You shoved roughly, flipping him over and off the building.

His scream echoed through the alley, until a harsh thud against the fire escape silenced it. You waited, catching your breath and steadying your racing heart and mind. You soon realized that you just threw Spiderman off the roof of an apartment complex… You rolled over quickly, sliding off the building and down a few of the fire escapes until you saw where he had landed, on his back but moving.

“I’m okay.” He groaned, trying to push himself up but failing. “I’m just gonna lay here for a while. Do you- Ah. Do you have a name?”

“Yeah, uh.” She said carefully as she got closer. “They call me Heretic.”

Peter laid on the cold metal in pain. Pain all over. His vision had returned thanks to his advanced healing, but was made blurry by the hit to his head. His spine ached, his lungs trying to refill after having everything knocked out of them. He watched as the girl’s figure slid down the side of the building via the fire escapes until she had past him. She was careful not to step on him, and he was grateful for that. Glancing over, he realized that he was outside his apartment so he rolled inside and laid on the floor.

“Heretic.” He repeated her name. “Cool.”

You made your way home quickly, practically running from your latest mistake. You had almost killed Spiderman. Throwing him off the roof was one thing. You knew he had the reflexes to save himself, but throwing him off while he was blinded was too dangerous. You had taken things too far, and that kid almost paid for it.

“Heretic, what the hell was I thinking?” You mumbled as you walked. “Fucking Heretic. I mean, it’s not terrible but giving yourself a name commits you to this character.” You nagged yourself. “Now, you have to keep this up. At least till Spiderman gets bored and leaves you alone.”

The next day, you woke for school and found yourself greeted with a black eye. You sighed, knowing you’d need to explain it to your mom and Peter. You covered it up as best you could but the deep purple leaked through your best cover up.

“What happened to your eye?” Peter asked when he saw you that morning.

He had noticed more than that. He just didn’t want to say anything about it, not yet at least. He noticed you looked tired, progressively getting worse as the week played out. He had started to wonder if you had been sleeping. Maybe you had too much on your plate and it was catching up to you. He was hoping it was nothing too bad, maybe a few nights of sleep and a date night could fix.

“I had softball practice last night” You began explaining the lie you thought of on your way to school. The team wasn’t a lie, Peter had been to plenty of your games. Only the practice last night would be the lie. “Well, I was pitching last night and Missa hit a liner right back at me. I barely got my glove up in time so it didn’t break my nose.”

“Nice black eye.” Flash mocked as he passed.

“You want one to match?” You threatened with a smile.

Peter took you by your hand, pulling you down the hall. He led you around the corner to a less crowded hall and looked at you in concern. You crossed your arms once his grip on you was gone, chewing the inside of your cheek. His eyes were soft, eyebrows furrowed. He scanned your face for some hint as to what was wrong, but he came up empty.

“Alright, what’s up with you?” He asked carefully. “What’s wrong?”

“Nothing.” You snapped.

“Y/N.” He tried.

“Peter.” You replied in the same tone.

“I’m serious!” He urged, his hands tugging his backpack straps. “You usually ignore Flash or just flip him off. You look like you haven’t slept in days. What’s going on?”

“My dad.” You gave in, offering half of a truth. “He reached out the other day. Him and my mom got together and thought it’d be good for me to get to know him. He offered me a summer job.”

“Is that what has you freaked out?” He sighed in relief. “Jeez, Y/N. Why didn’t you tell me?”

“Cause I don’t wanna do it.” You shrugged. “I’m only doing it for my mom. She still loves the jerk.”

“You’ve never told me anything about your dad.” He tried, seeing if he could get you to talk through it. As you opened your mouth to speak, the bell rang.

“That’s our cue to go.” You gestured to the intercoms above you. “Can we talk about this later?”

“Promise you won’t dodge it?” Peter said accusingly, pointing a finger at you.

“I do not dodge.” You defended, but Peter’s stare convinced you otherwise. “Okay, maybe I dodge a little.”

“Pinky promise.” He held out his pinky. “Pinky promise me right now that you’re not gonna avoid this and we’re gonna talk about it?”

“Seriously?” You smiled.

��Yes, seriously.” He chuckled. “Pinky promises are sacred!”

“I pinky promise.” You hooked your pinky around his. “You know, if you don’t kiss to seal a pinky promise, it doesn’t count.”

“Really?” He furrowed his brows, releasing your pinky to tug you forward by your belt loops. “Never heard that one before.”

“Mhmm.” You nodded, wrapping your fingers around his backpack straps and gently pulling his lips to yours. “It’s a new thing that started like five seconds ago.” You smiled before placing your lips against his.

“I love you.” He mumbled against your lips.

“I love you too.” You replied gently when he pulled away.

“Parker! Y/L/N!” You heard Mr. Dell yelling from down the hall. “If you two don’t get to class right now, I swear you will be in detention for a month!”

You screamed softly, grabbing Peter’s hand and running off to class. The first half of your day was easy enough. Your classes were simply going over projects or introducing new topics. You took easy notes, trying to ignore Peter’s concerned stares. You noticed bruises along your knuckles as you wrote, feeling pain every time you gripped your pen. You hoped Peter didn’t see the flex of your hand, but you had a feeling he did. Peter seemed to notice everything.

During lunch, Peter pulled you to the bleachers by the football field. You resisted, telling him you didn’t want to talk about it at the time. He ignored you. Peter refused to allow you to avoid it, gripping your wrist tight enough so you couldn’t slip out but not tight enough to hurt you.

“Peter, will you stop?” You sighed, uselessly trying to tug your arm out his grip.

“No, cause you’re gonna bail!” He countered, leading you to the top of the bleachers. “Sit down.”

You glared at him as you crossed your arms defiantly.

“Please.” He said softly, his eyes pleading.

You sighed slightly, caving to his soft expression. You dropped into a seat beside him, dramatically dropping your hands into your lap. You tilted your head to look at him as you waited for his questions.

“What happened to your hands?” He started with.

“What about them?” You asked, lifting your now makeup covered hands. You used a bathroom break during the only class between morning and lunch you had without Peter to quickly cover the bruises.

“In Physics when you were taking notes, you kept making a noise when you held your pen. Like it hurt.” He pressed.

“I shut my finger in my window last night…” You said quietly, as if you were embarrassed.

Peter was growing more and more suspicious of your sudden injuries. He knew you had been playing softball for years and wore a facemask when you pitched. He knew you didn’t open your window at night because you didn’t like moths getting into your room. He was starting to wonder if something else was going on, something you couldn’t tell him.

“What about your dad?” He changed the subject, deciding he’d hang around your apartment later that night on patrol.

“You wouldn’t believe me if I told you who he was.” You laughed in annoyance. “Everybody knows my dad.”

“Your dad is a celebrity?” Peter teased with half a smile.

“Oh, ha ha.” You mocked with a smile. “I’m serious!”

“I know, I know.” He chuckled. “Okay. Who is he?”

“See, you know him.” You argued, trying to find a way to tell Peter without telling Peter. “I mean, I never made it obvious that you knew him but you do… You met him kinda recently…”

“The only celebrity I’ve met recently is Mr. Stark.” Peter answered in confusion. You cringed slightly, covering your eyes and shaking your head. “Mr. Stark is you d-”

“Shut up!” You hurried to cover his mouth. “Why do you think I never told anyone!? Tony never cared about me before so I don’t acknowledge that we’re family.”

“Y/N, that is awesome!” He geeked.

“No, it fucking sucks.” You countered. “Pete, my mom left him when I was born because she didn’t want to be part of what Stark Industries does. Did. And then he went and made the Iron Man suit and became a hero.” You rolled your eyes. “He was the biggest weapons supplier in the country and suddenly he’s the good guy? It’s bullshit.”

“Mr. Stark is a good guy.” Peter defended gently, a slight shrug in his shoulders.

“I’m glad you like him.” You said honestly. “My mom still likes him too… I just can’t. You know how I feel about that whole superhero stuff.”

“I mean..” Peter casually shrugged. “Not all superheros are bad… Y’know, like Spiderman.”

“Yeah, Spiderman.” You scoffed, remembering the reason behind your lingering black eye and bruised knuckles. “I’m sure he’s great.”

“You don’t like Spiderman either?” Peter asked sadly.

“It’s nothing personal!” You argued quickly. “I mean, he’s probably some random guy pushing his mid-20’s that thought he could make it big time with Captain America and Iron Man. But from someone who has seen it, Tony Stark doesn’t care about the little guy.” You covered.

“I- I wouldn’t say Mr. Stark doesn’t care.”

“I would.” You confirmed. “Peter, you and I obviously know two different Tony Starks. And that’s fine. You met one who actually wants to mentor and care about a kid. I’ve never even met the one I know so... I guess we’ll see how it goes when he comes to town in a few days.”

“Right…” Peter trailed off, turning his attention to his food.

Pete had always known how you felt about heroes. He knew you were never their biggest fan, but you never really explained why. Peter never pressed the issue because he figured that you would tell him when you wanted, and he didn’t want to risk exposing his alter ego. But knowing that you hated heroes because your dad was Iron Man only made things more complicated. He started to wonder if Mr. Stark knew he was dating you. He wondered if Mr. Stark was purposefully absent in your life. Peter felt like he was in the middle of a war, being urged to pick a side. Peter wanted to be Switzerland, to remain neutral.

Later that night, you left your apartment building in your costume. You wandered aimlessly, not knowing what you were even doing on the streets anymore. You felt like your alter ego was a chore now, something you had to keep up for Spiderman’s sake and less of your own. You blew out a defeated sigh, realizing another idealized figure in a mask had swallowed an aspect of your life.

With no other outlets, you turned and slammed your fist through the glass of a nearby bus stop. The remaining fragments showed an etched image of Spiderman. The shards dripped, the yellow glow of a nearby streetlight giving the blood an unnatural hue. You shook your hand, a stinging sensation shooting through.

“Son of a bitch.” You mumbled, knocking out the rest of the glass. You held your hand close to your chest, pressing hard with the other to slow the bleeding.

“We’ve really gotta stop meeting like this.” A familiar voice came from above you. Looking up, you saw Spiderman perched on the roof of the bus stop. “Did you break that picture of me?”

“A well deserved breaking, I think.” You smiled tightly. Sliding your meter to a higher pitch, you softened your expression to mimic a plea. “Please Spiderman, I need help. My hand is bleeding and it- it hurts.” You feigned fear, sniffling to add effect.

Spiderman jumped off and landed softly in front of you. He cautiously held his hand out for you to take so he could examine the injury. Once he was close enough, you reached out to grab him by the forearm. You twisted his arm outward, driving your knee up into his ribs. When he doubled over, you slammed an elbow against his spine to lay him out.

Peter groaned slightly, rolling onto his back. All he wanted was to go to your apartment building and see what you were up to. He just wanted to check on his girlfriend, but no. Nothing was ever simple for Spiderman. He didn’t even know if Heretic had a goal when she started fights with him. He was starting to think she just wanted to annoy him.

“Y’know, Heretic.” Spiderman mumbled from the ground, causing you to freeze. “It’s not nice to trick people.”

With an eye roll, you reset your vocal meter and turned to face the spandex suited boy. “You think I care what you have to say?” You laughed. “I couldn’t care less what you think about me, Spiderman. Did you ever stop to think that people like me pop up because of people like you?”

“What is that supposed to mean?” Spiderman asked, carefully pushing himself up to a crouching position. You stood fully, gesturing to yourself as you spoke again.

“Everything I can do is because of tech I developed.” You explained. “My mask has a neurotransmitter that’s linked to my knives that are coated in different chemical compounds that trigger different bodily responses. My vocal range is due to a soundwave manipulator that can change my pitch. My shoes are completely sound-proof. Nothing about what I do is natural.”

“But what does that have to do with me?”

“Villains arise to challenge heros.” You clarified. “If this wasn’t a world of superheros, I wouldn’t be doing this. I’d be a different person.”

“What if you could still be a different person?” Spiderman offered, standing to be eye level with you.

You scoffed slightly, crossing your arms. “How? Pulling a Tony Stark and suddenly deciding I’m going to be the good guy? Suddenly realizing that what I do hurts people so I need to make amends? Oh, but I won’t make amends to the people I’ve hurt. No, I’ll hide behind a suit and be a vigilante. That’ll be my redemption, right?”

Peter stood there in shock, dumbfounded for a moment. He was starting to connect the dots, but he was hoping he was wrong. He was praying that he was wrong. Peter was starting to wonder if Y/N and Heretic were the same person. He realized how many things were lining up. Every night he fought Heretic, Y/N came to school with an injury. Every night that he talked to Heretic, she brought up superheros and how she hated the thought. But something about the Tony Stark speech, the deep rooted pain that was conveyed in her words, it was painfully familiar. But Peter knew better than to speak on it.

In a split second decision, Peter bailed.

“Gotta go!” He said quickly before swinging away.

You watched Spiderman leave in surprise. Spiderman never ran from fights between you two. It was seemingly out of character for him, but you shrugged it off. You didn’t care enough to follow him nor did you care enough to really think about it. You simply headed home, trying to figure out how you’d explain your busted knuckles to your mom and Peter.

What you didn’t see was where Spiderman went. Peter decided to test his theory, to do a little investigating of his own. He swung to the building across from yours. He could see the fire escape outside your window. He always knew which one was yours because you kept Christmas lights shaped like snowflakes around the bars. You had explained your reasoning for keeping them up to him one night, saying you kept them up so you would have cute lighting for night pictures and so you would have light when you two sat on the fire escape at night.

Peter waited for what felt like forever. He had almost given up his suspicions when he saw Heretic climbing the ladders. He was pleading for her to keep climbing, to keep going past your window and he could put the whole idea to bed.

His heart dropped when he saw you enter your window.

“She’s Heretic…” He said sadly, defeated almost. “I can’t tell her now… Maybe I can’t tell her at all.” He reasoned with himself as he headed home. “She hates Spiderman. She’ll hate me. What she finds out and breaks up with me? Oh my god.”

The next day was Saturday. You woke up to a throbbing pain in your hand. Looking over, you saw your knuckles swollen and red, covered in dried blood. Sighing in annoyance mixed with regret, you dipped a nearby shirt in a glass of water on your nightstand. You gently scrubbed some of the dried blood, wincing when you pressed too hard.

“Honey!” Your mom called from down the hall.

“Yeah, Ma?” You yelled in response, quickly dropping the shirt before her head popped in.

“Get ready.” She said simply. “Tony is coming today.”

“He’s actually coming?”

“Yes!” She said happily. “God, I haven’t seen him in years.” She sighed dreamily.

“Can Peter come over too?” You asked, leaning to the other end of your bed where your phone was charging.

“You want Peter to know?”

“He already knows.” You shrugged in defeat. “He pried it out of me at lunch yesterday.”

“If you’d be more comfortable, sure.” She smiled softly. “Now at least shower and put on real clothes.”

“Alright, alright.” You laughed, pushing yourself out of bed.

“What happened to your hand?”

“I was on the fire escape last night and one of the-” You tried to explain.

“Stop.” Your mom cut you off. “I don’t want you to keep lying to me, Y/N. Are you doing this to yourself?”

“What?” You asked in shock. “No! No, Mom. I’m not doing this to myself. I’ve just been distracted lately with this whole Tony thing that I haven’t been paying attention that much. The truth is I spilled some chemicals on my hand yesterday in Chemistry and I was embarrassed about it so I didn’t say anything…”

“Oh, honey.” She sighed, coming into your room to sit next to you on your bed. “I know this is a lot to process, but I promise it’ll be worth it.”

“I’m only doing this cause you asked me to. You know that, right?”

“Yeah, I know. Thank you, by the way.”

“Thank me when it’s over.” You smiled slightly.

While you got ready, you messaged Peter that you wanted him to come over. He told you he had to do some paperwork for his Stark internship first and then he’d come over. Instead, Peter had called Mr. Stark who was stopping at Peter’s apartment before he made his way to your home.

“What do you need, Kid?” Tony asked Peter. “I have somewhere else to be today.”

“Yeah, Y/N’s place.” Peter filled in, keeping his eyes on his busy fingers.

“She told you?”

“Yeah…” Peter nodded carefully. “But there’s something else I need your advice on.”

“Spit it out then.” Tony said, waving his hand to coax Peter. “Her mom is gonna kill me if I’m late.”

“Well, you know how I’ve been fighting this new villain…”

“Heretic, yeah. What about her?”

“I know who she is… And the problem is that I know her.” Peter explained. He didn’t want to say Y/N’s name when he was talking to Mr. Stark because he didn’t know how Mr. Stark would react. After all, he still loved Y/N. That much didn’t change.

Peter was only bringing it up because he was scared. He knew from the start that telling Y/N he was Spiderman was going to be hard since she didn’t like heroes to begin with. But now that he knew she was Heretic, knew that she was doing what she was doing because of him, it scared him. He was scared of how his relationship with her would change. He didn’t want to lose her. He couldn’t lose her. She meant so much to him, more than he could ever put into words, but now there was an even bigger elephant in the room.

“What do you mean, you know her?” Tony asked carefully.

“I go to school with her. I have classes with her. I hang out with her!” Peter’s voice began rising, panic lifting the octaves in his voice. “Me and her get along! But she hates superheroes. A- and she doesn’t know that I’m Spiderman. But if I told her now, what if she stops talking to me? She’s already thrown me off a building so if she knows, I don’t know what it’s gonna do to-”

“Back up.” Tony interjected. “She threw you off a building?”

“Yeah, but I was fine.” Peter shrugged it off. “The point is, Mr. Stark, I don’t know what to do.”

Tony paused, thinking about what he wanted to say next. He could tell that Peter was upset and scared. Tony was wondering how important could this girl be to him, especially if he’s already dating Y/N. Tony shrugged it off as being a childhood friend, but he still chose his next words carefully.

“You got two options.” Tony said, holding out both hands. He lifted his right slightly higher. “First option, call her out on it. It’d probably expose you since she interacts mostly with Spiderman.” He leveled his right and lifted his left. “Second option, you tell her who you are and see if she exposes herself. Either way, you have to tell her who you are.”

“What if she hates me for it?” Peter asked softly.

“Doesn’t seem like you have a lot of faith in her.” Tony questioned.

“I do!” Peter corrected quickly. “But… I can’t lose her, Mr. Stark.”

“Who is she to you anyway?” Tony pressed. “You break up with Y/N or something?”

“No, no, we’re still together. She’s just someone I’ve known for a long time.”

“You’re not cheating on my daughter, are you, Parker?”

“It’s so weird hearing you call her your daughter.” Peter laughed nervously. “But I’m not cheating on her. I would never.”

With a satisfied nod, Tony motioned for Peter to follow him. Together they went to your place. You sat in the living room with your mom. You had covered up the lingering black eye and bruises along your knuckles. You couldn’t do anything about the cuts so those were left in the open. You were dressed decently, a simple white t-shirt with a blue flannel and jeans. Your mom was a bit more dressed up, and while normally you’d tease her, you knew why she was doing that. So you let it be.

Peter entered first, knocking three quick taps before letting himself in. He placed himself next to you, saying he finished his internship stuff sooner than he thought so he headed over. You leaned against him, his arm wrapping around you. A few minutes later, someone else knocked on the door. Your mom jumped up, hurrying to open the door.

“I’m gonna throw up.” You muttered, rolling your eyes.

“You’ll be fine.” Peter chuckled, placing a kiss on your forehead. “If it goes well, want to go get ice cream after?”

“What if you spend the night instead?” You countered, turning to look at him with a gentle pout. “Please, Pete. We can make sundaes and binge Star Wars.”

“Don’t give me that look.” He groaned, pushing your face away with a laugh. “Yeah, I’ll stay.”

“Love you.” You said in triumph.

“Yeah, yeah. Love you too.”

“Y/N, I’d like you to meet your father.” Your mom said as she came back into the living room with Tony Stark following behind her.

Suddenly, you were at a loss for words.You never thought the man would actually show, but there he was in your living room. He was dressed nice, as expected. A sharp suit with slightly tinted glasses. He smiled softly, and it seemed to be real. All of the snarky comments you had planned to use were suddenly forgotten. You were just a lonely kid again, wondering why her dad was gone.

“Hmm.” You managed through closed lips, nodding in acknowledgment. You saw the look your mother flashed you, one reminding you that you had promised to try. Peter nudged you slightly, urging you to say something more. “Glad I got to actually meet you before I turned eighteen. Here I was thinking you forgot I existed.”

You had intended for it to come out sharp, to inflict damage to his ego if nothing else. But hearing your own voice, it felt strange. Your words had no edge, no venom. Only pain. Loneliness. But your resentment wouldn’t show in your voice, no matter how badly you wanted it to.

“Peter and your mom have told me a lot about you.” Tony opened with, sitting on the loveseat with your mom. “Did you get the letter I sent?”

“The Stark Industries letter?” You laughed. “Yeah, trashed it.”

“What letter?” Peter asked carefully. “Y/N…”

“It was a joke.” You said flatly, not looking at Peter.

“I offered her a summer job.” Tony explained. “With the opportunity for something more permanent if she wanted it after summer.”

“Wait, why didn’t you tell me?” Peter asked you.

“Can we talk about this later?” You urged quietly.

Peter nodded slightly, muttering a response before losing himself in his own thoughts. He knew you’d rant to him about how the conversation went anyways, so he wasn’t missing anything by zoning out. He was more concerned with how to explain that he knew you were Heretic. He didn’t want to lose you because he was Spiderman, but he couldn’t keep fighting you.

“You never called.” You said to Tony, trying to maintain the level in your voice. “You sent a birthday card and that was it…”

“I thought it’d be best if-”

“If you pretended I didn’t exist.” You cut in. “I get it.”

“It’s not like that, kid.” Tony sighed.

“Then what is it like? You ran the most successful weapons corporation in the country but stopped production because you saw the pain you were causing. So you changed Stark Industries to something that was better. You created your Iron Man suit to be a vigilante that protected the nation. Until your old coworker got ideas. Then it was the son of one of Grandpa’s old friends, one that helped create your Arc Reactor. Oh, and then the Mandarin, right? Fast forward a bit and now you’re running the Avengers. You can do all of this to try to make the world a better place but you can’t be a family man?” You pressed. Once you started speaking your mind, the words wouldn’t stop. The words flowed like water from a broken faucet, unable to be stopped. “How you gonna fix this? You can’t even fix yourself!”

“Y/N, honey, let’s calm down a bit.” Your mom tried to settle you.

Your hands were now trembling, your eyes were burning with tears that wanted to be released. You wanted to cry out of sadness, out of anger. You were finally getting the chance to take the weight off your chest, to stop blaming yourself for why Tony was never in your life. You were able to get the answers you wanted since you were a child. But something about that chance was scarier than when you took up your alter ego.

“I’m sorry, Mom.” You shook your head. “But I can’t. It’s not fair for him to put the world as a priority when he can’t even put his family in the top ten. You still love him even though you know he doesn’t care about us. He cares about you, if that.”

“What do you want me to say?” Tony tried calmly. “You want me to ask to move in with me at the Tower? Cause you’re both more than welcome to. Your boy Peter is there all the time for internship stuff. You can still go to Midtown.”

“You think trying to be in my life now is going to fix what you did?” You laughed as you shook your head. “Tony, I don’t want your money! I don’t want you to suddenly pretend like you want to be a father to me. What I want is the truth.”

“You want the truth?” Tony pressed.

“Yes.”

“Because it’s what your mom wanted!” Tony answered quickly. “When she left, she asked for me to keep my lifestyle away from you guys… She just wanted you to have a normal childhood, Y/N.”

“What?” You asked carefully, turning your attention to your mom. “You asked him to stay out of my life?”

“I didn’t want you to be in danger.” She said softly, sadly almost. “I know I made a mistake, but I’m trying to fix it. Why do you think I reached out after all these years?”

“Don’t try to make it sound like you did this for me, Mom.” You stood suddenly. “I’m not responsible for your self-made obstacles.”

With that final line, you went to your room and shut the door. You couldn’t control your tears anymore, covering your face with your hands to muffle your sobs. Your heart felt heavy, shattered deep in your chest. The pain felt like you couldn’t breathe. You grew up hating your father, superheroes, and everything they stood for. You created an alter ego to let out that hatred, to focus all of your pain on one source. On Spiderman. But now, now it all felt misplaced.

A light tap at your door sounded before it opened. You were on your floor, arms crossed over your bed under your head. Your chest was rising and falling heavily, your breaths shallow and broken. The bed dipped with the weight of a body and a different hand landed on your back.

Peaking up, you saw Tony sitting on the edge of your bed. Glancing to the side, you saw Peter on the floor next to you. You sat up with a sigh, wiping your face with your blanket. You laughed nervously, casually using your foot to kick your duffle full of Heretic gear deeper under your bed.

“I guess I owe you an apology, Tony.” You said, your voice raspy and sad. “I guess I just needed someone to blame...”

“You didn’t know.” Tony reassured you. “You were right to be angry, Y/N. I should’ve done more, even if your mom asked me not to. See, I was always worried that I was going to end up like my old man so I used that as an excuse to stay away. But! I was wrong. My offer still stands for you to come stay at the Tower.”

“I can’t leave my mom.” You shook your head. “She’s all I’ve ever had… Other than Peter.”

“Y/N, I- I kinda have to tell you something.” Peter said carefully.

“This is the girl!?” Tony cut in suddenly. “Now might not be the best time.” Tony said with a quick shake of his head.

“What’s going on?”

“Well, since people are being honest, I um- I have a secret… A pretty big secret.” Peter continued.

“Peter.” Tony said. “Don’t do it.”

“Wait, Dad. Hold on.” You waved Tony off, focusing on Peter. “What kind of secret?”

“Aw, you called him Dad.” Peter smiled before focusing back on his reveal. “Okay, so you know my internship? Well, it’s not qui-”

“Quite an internship anymore.” Tony cut in, throwing his hands to the side in a grand reveal. “Congrats, kid. You’re officially part of the team.”

“Wait, what?” Peter questioned. “No, that’s not-”

“That’s really great, Peter.” You hugged him tightly. “Although, I wish you didn’t make it sound so bad. I thought you were going to say you had a secret life or something.”

“Yeah… Sorry.” Peter chuckled nervously. “Guess I could’ve worded it better, huh?”

“I’m happy for you, baby.” You smiled as you pulled away, kissing his cheek quickly. You stood, turning your attention to Tony. “As for you, we can’t change the past… And I get that you were just doing what my mom asked, but there’s a lot of built up resentment towards you and superheroes.”

“Well, you have a superhero family whenever you want it.” Tony offered you his hand to shake. “Go on. Shake my hand.”

“Why?”

“Shake it first.”

“No, tell me first. I’m not going to agree to something without knowing the facts.”

“Fair enough.” Tony nodded. “We agree to spend time with each other once a week, alternating in who picks the activities. You’re my daughter, Y/N. And contrary to what you may think of me, I do want you in my life.”

“I can agree to that.” You smiled slightly, shaking his hand.

“And we tell each other something new everytime we meet up.” Tony added. “I’ll go first. I know you use the credit card I gave you for knife-throwing lessons, martial arts, throwing knives, and a lot of biochemicals. Now you go.”

“What?”

You were dumbstruck. You hadn’t even thought about the fact that all of your purchases were on the bill that was sent to Tony. You felt like an idiot, not even thinking about whether or not Tony would read the bill. Let alone that he would call you out on it in front of Peter.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.” You tried.

“Yes, you do.” Peter sighed. “That’s what I wanted to talk to you about… We know that you’re Heretic.”

“How do you know about Heretic?” You turned on Peter, eyes squinting in suspicion.

“The black eye. The busted and bruised knuckles. The fact that you come to school more and more tired every day. Y/N, I know something is up. The other night I saw Heretic climbing through your window and-”

“Your apartment is five blocks away, Peter.” You cut in. “There’s no way you could’ve seen anything from your apartment. Were you spying on me?”

“No, I-”

“Did you have someone else spy on me?”

“No, I just-”

“Then how did you see anything?”

“Because he’s Spiderman.” Tony said plainly. “Sorry, Peter, but you weren’t getting anywhere.”

“You’re…” You spoke carefully, processing the sentence. “You both need to leave. Now.”

“Y/N, baby, please don’t do this.” Peter tried.

“Leave!”

In silence, both of the boys walked out of your room and out of your apartment. You locked your door, ignoring your mother’s knocks and conversation attempts. You laid in bed until the next morning, simply staring at the ceiling. Your mind was racing, looping back to the conversation in your bedroom. You wanted to scream, to cry, to curse the universe. But all you could do was stare numbly at your popcorned ceiling. You felt empty, like you had truly lost everything. You had nothing. You were nothing, a hollow shell of who you had been mere hours ago.

#peter parker #peter fanfic #peter parker fanfic #peter parker fic #peter x you #peter parker x reader #peter parker imagine #peter fic #mcu peter #peter parker x you #peter x yn #peter x reader #peter parker x y/n #peter parker x yn #Peter x Y/N #spiderman #spiderman fanfic #spiderman imagine

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mostlycompetentwriter · 4 years

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Scene Stealers

F/M Pairing: Y/N x Seo Changbin

Warnings: mild language, they both go through a lot of angst, but I can’t resist making it better with fluff at the end.

Genre: Violinist AU; College AU; Friends to Enemies to Lovers (AKA the Golden Triangle)

Word Count: 4.5K

Summary: Y/N and Seo Changbin share a tentative friendship, but when it comes to claiming first chair violinist for their school’s upcoming orchestra, their reasons for wanting the spot might just tear them apart.

A/N: Shoot, I was kinda mean to Changbin, but it was important for the sake of character development.

I had been playing the violin ever since I could first hold the instrument in my hands, smooth and luxurious paint glistening under the lights of my bedroom. It was the first time that I had ever fallen in love with something, and I passionately gave my heart and soul to the music I created. As a result, my entire life became consumed by my incessant desire to improve and rise high above the ranks of my classmates.

However, it wasn’t until I started university that I realized what competition truly looked like because everyone in my liberal art’s school was insanely talented. These were the same people who had also split their blood, sweat and tears into the pursuit of perfection. They shared the same aspirations, and their thirst for the very top was just as all-consuming as mine.

Ironically, our professor told us that we were acquaintances, first and foremost, and needless taunting and fighting would not be tolerated without serious consequences. But my classmates and I found ways around their rules, and the relatively harmless pranks usually sent strong messages to those who we perceived as threatening. Of course, there were also the occasional cliques that formed, and they usually consisted of like-minded individuals who knew that they could use one another to help their self-motivated aspirations.

But I never thought that I would join any of them until I met Changbin.

Because he seemed just like another face in the crowd, despite being alluringly handsome. Yet, when he managed a score a perfect A+ on our mid-semester examination, everyone immediately knew that he was not to be underestimated. Interestingly, Changbin often kept to himself in spite of my classmates’ approaches. They wanted him to join their circles because it was better to cement your status by joining with the best that our school had to offer. Plus, it allowed you to keep a close eye on the competition, and I had seen my fair share of friendships destroyed because of a petty disagreement.

But Changbin never seemed interested in making friends, and I admired his tenacity, which might explain why I allowed him to sit next to me at lunch since our other classmates were otherwise occupied with their own friend groups. And I certainly never considered that he had any ulterior motives, until he randomly started a conversation with me. At first, I was taken aback by the surprisingly timid greeting that he extended in my direction, but I decided that Changbin was harmless.

You see, I never intended to extend our relationship beyond casual lunchtime conversations, but he started sitting next to me in class as well. I wanted to protest the sudden change until Changbin changed my mind because he was helpful with our menial class assignments, and he even offered to help me with my general education courses. It registered as a kind-hearted gesture that seemed out of place considering our highly competitive field.

But I accepted his help because I genuinely appreciated anyone who could tutor me through basic calculus, and he was patient with me, walking us both through worksheet exercises with a calm and steady approach. After that, I didn’t mind acknowledging Changbin as a friend since he was always considerate and helpful, and his personality naturally complimented mine. Where I was quick-tempered and active, Changbin was laidback and gentle. I balanced him when he was struggling to find enough motivation to finish his assignments (even though he was a certified genius), and he managed to convince me to take breaks from making hundreds of highlights in my textbooks.

Yet, at the back of my mind was a constant reminder: Changbin was still one of my competitors, and I valued my future far more his friendship.

Present

I could tell that something interesting was about to happen when our Professor walked into class for our morning lecture. He smiled at the rows of students beaming back at him in expectation for whatever it was that he might be planning. “Students,” he said, pacing across the front of the room. “We have our first orchestral concert coming up.”

There was an excited murmuring that swept through the classroom, and I turned my head to the side to meet Changbin’s excited gaze. “Are you ready?” he asked, and I inhaled sharply around the smell of his cologne.

“Of course,” I said in response before looking back at our Professor.

“Most of the positions have been decided,” he continued. “But we still need someone for first chair violinist.”

My heart nearly skipped a beat inside my chest at the advertisement, and I clutched tightly to the edge of my desk. “This Saturday, I’ll be holding auditions at noon. Don’t be late.”

I leaned back in my desk while doing my best to restrain my excitement. Our Professor had already commenced the beginning of his lesson, but I couldn’t focus on anything else other than the coveted first chair auditions. It was everything that I had been working towards my entire life, and I was consumed with ideas for my song performance. Should I go for something classical? Or would that be too expected? Perhaps I should create something original?

The ideas were endless, and I waited until the end of class before I started speaking to Changbin in a rapid tone, hoping that he might give me some insights into my unfortunate conundrum. “I don’t know, Y/N,” Changbin said, scratching at the back of his head like he was nervous about something.

“You’ll come and support me, right?” I asked him. “I’d like to see you there.”

Changbin looked away from me. “Yeah, but I’ll be auditioning too.”

I immediately froze in my steps, glancing at him from the corner of my eye. “Oh?”

“I thought you knew that,” he said, chuckling at the awkward situation that we found ourselves experiencing. “I’m not really interested in first chair, but my father said that he would be pull me out of the music program if I failed.”

I blinked at him, feeling like the entire universe had just been knocked off-kilter. “I guess you’ll have to try, then.”

“We can always practice together,” Changbin said with a note of desperation. “Just like we always do.”

“Sure,” I said, but the lie sounded inauthentic even to my own practiced ears. “Maybe we can try to schedule a time.”

“Tomorrow,” Changbin said, and his stare was intense. “I can meet you after class.”

“I’ll see if I have a free hour,” I said, and Changbin looked surprised that I didn’t agree to his offer.

“Do you already have plans?”

“One of my professors has office hours,” I said in return, even though we both knew that I rarely took advantage of meeting my instructors outside of scheduled classes.

Changbin nodded, but I could tell that he wasn’t easily convinced. “What about lunch? We can find something cheap in the dining hall. My treat.”

I resisted the urge to sigh. “Rain check?”

Changbin scoffed, reaching out for my arm to hold me in place. “Are you really mad about the audition?”

“Of course not,” I said, pulling my arm free from his unexpectedly tight grip. In actuality, I was far more disappointed than I was angry.

“Y/N,” Changbin said. “I’m sorry, but I can’t lose this.”

“I know,” I told him with a nod. “But this has been my dream since I was eight-years-old.”

“I get that,” Changbin said, and I could tell that he was frustrated. “It’s a competition, but that doesn’t mean that we can’t hang out.”

“You’re right,” I agreed with a tight smile. “Maybe I’ll see you around later.”

I thought that it seemed casual enough, but Changbin was nothing short of incredulous, shaking his head at me before I watched him retreat in the opposite direction.

The Next Day

It was late at night when my phone vibrated against my nightstand. I let out a groan as I rolled onto my side to silence the notification, pausing when I realized that it was a text message from Changbin: there’s a party tonight, Y/N. You should come with me.

I frowned at the mention of a party, especially when it was such a random request from Changbin. He had never invited me to this kind of thing before, so why was he asking out of the blue? Especially considering our earlier argument from the previous day.

Maybe he was trying to distract me, I thought to myself, snatching my phone and sending a reply back to him: Not tonight. I have plans.

It wasn’t necessarily true since I had initially planned to stay in my dorm room, but I suddenly thought of something that I could do to occupy my time. And it would also benefit me in regards to the upcoming auditions. But then again, when I really thought about it, I realized that Changbin was a contributing factor in pushing me to the edge of full-blown panic, and I was suddenly anxious to ensure my position for our school’s upcoming performance. Likewise, when I considered the situation, if Changbin was going to a party, then there was a good chance that our other classmates would attend as well.

With that thought in mind, I grabbed my violin case from its position against the wall because I had just received confirmation that I would have the practice room to myself - allowing me the rare opportunity to improve without the others around. And that most certainly included Changbin. It was enough to get my heart racing, and I secured my coat tightly around my waist before rushing outside, inhaling the cold, crisp winter air as I found myself practically jogging to the music building.

As I suspected, it was empty inside, and I turned on the lights and set-up some of the more expensive equipment that I wasn’t privileged enough to use outside of regular instruction. Satisfied, I sat down on one of the stools near the front of the room, tucking the violin against the familiar spot between my neck and shoulder, and I started to play with a huge smile pasted across my lips. Because this was when I felt the most comfortable, and everything was familiar, listening to the notes and chords form the beautiful melodies that had fascinated me as a child.

It was my favorite way to lose track of time, and I didn’t pay much attention to the late hour when I finished my entire set, pausing at the end of my performance to take in a deep breath. Was that okay? I wondered to myself, regretting the fact that I hadn’t bothered to record my practice run. Because it had become the best way to single out the little mistakes - whether it involved my irregular posture, or the slight hiss of a note that might go unnoticed by the untrained ear.

Whatever the case may be, I was too tired to revisit my prepared performance again, so I carefully cleaned up the practice room and stowed away my violin inside its case. Afterward, I took one last lingering look around the practice room before I was walking back outside. Thankfully, the building automatically locked itself behind me, so I knew that a Janitor had come by at some point, and the night was relatively quiet and undisturbed as I started walking back to my dorm alone.

However, any semblance of loneliness was quickly ruined by the unexpected vocalization of my name: “Y/N!”

I turned around, resisting the urge to roll my eyes when I saw one of my classmates running down the sidewalk. “Hey,” I said, keeping my tone inflectionless on purpose.

“I’m surprised to see you here,” she said. “I thought you might come to the party.”

“I had other plans,” I told her dismissively.

“Yeah, Changbin said that he invited you,” she said, and I froze at the mention of Changbin. “He seemed pretty upset about it.”

I narrowed my eyes because I couldn’t quite figure out why she would feel the need to tell me that. “He knew I was busy.”

“I guess,” she said as if finally figuring out that I wasn’t in the mood for a conversation.

I nodded tersely, jerking my head in the direction of my dorm. “I was on my way back.”

“Oh, right!” she said, shaking her head as she took a step away from me. “I’m sorry if I bothered you.”

“It’s fine,” I said dismissively, spinning on my heel as I continued the short trek back to my dorm room, and I tried to ignore how my mind seemed stuck on the revelation of Changbin’s dissatisfaction with my decision to stay away from that stupid party.

The next morning, I could tell that something was off with Changbin when I sat down next to him at our usual section. His gaze was cold when he acknowledged me, but he didn’t say anything as he continued flipping through the sheet music waiting in front of him. It was completely out of character, but I had bigger things to worry about, lending my attention to our Professor when he walked into the lecture room to begin our lesson.

However, at the same time, I was irritated with my train of thought because I found myself wondering about Changbin instead of the History of Mozart. It was a cumbersome predicament because I wasn’t the type of student who became so easily distracted. In fact, I once spent nine hours straight in the library researching for a project that wasn’t due until the end of the semester.

Get it together, Y/N!

“Okay, everyone,” our Professor continued. “We’ll pause here for a moment and you can discuss the Mozart Effect Theory with a partner.”

I immediately looked at Changbin who sighed as he allowed his pen to fall from between his fingers. “What do you think?”

I hesitated because his question could easily be taken out of context, and it could be applied to something far more personal than the Mozart Theory. “It’s interesting.”

“I agree,” Changbin said, and I could see his jaw clench. “I heard that you were in the practice room last night,” Changbin added, and his tone was strangely cold.

How did he even know that? I wondered, but I knew there was no use in lying. It had never even appealed to me. “I wanted to make sure my performance was ready,” I replied.

“You lied to me,” Changbin growled, and I decided that I didn’t like the way that he was talking to me.

“I never lied,” I said. “I told you I had plans.”

“To practice?” Changbin scoffed. “You’re the one who always tells me to that you can’t push yourself too far, but I’m beginning to think it was all some kind of plot to make sure that I stayed behind you.”

“What are you talking about?” I asked. “I would never intentionally jeopardize another student’s success.”

“Really?” Changbin questioned. “So, why was sneaking away to the practice room more important than taking the night off with me?”

His questions were becoming harder to answer, and there was a part of me that didn’t want to deal with unnecessary drama. I had always been told that I had an unfavorable personality, but it usually involved my inability to deal with these kinds of situations - when someone thought that my time was theirs to utilize as they commanded. Then again, maybe it was my fault because I had simply allowed Changbin to get too close, and I could easily rectify that problem.

“We were never friends, Changbin,” I said, refocusing my attention at the front of the room because the words hurt to vocalize aloud. “You should know better than that since we’re all competitors.”

“Is that what you think?” Changbin asked, and he looked at me closely, searching for something that I knew he wouldn’t find. “I’m sorry that I wasted your time,” Changbin concluded, and he returned to his work without another word.

On the day of the audition, I was surprised when I received a phone call from my mother asking to meet me for lunch before my scheduled performance. It was a breath of fresh air - a necessary distraction because my stomach hadn’t settled ever since I woke-up that morning. In fact, I was experiencing an onslaught of unexpected nerves that I hadn’t felt since my required entrance examination. Overtime, my confidence had steadily built to a healthy level, but the idea of the audition was enough to crumble the entire foundation.

But my mother’s smile was kind when she invited me into a familiar embrace, and I inhaled the smell of her sweet perfume. “Y/N,” she said, pulling away and looking at me closely. “How are you?”

“I’m good,” I said, and she gave me a knowing look before inviting me inside the little cafe that we had agreed to meet at for our scheduled lunch.

“What would you like?” my mother asked as she stood next to the front counter.

“Whatever you think...” I trailed off, and my eyes settled on someone that I hadn’t spoken to ever since our cold exchange in class the other day.

The sight of Changbin sent another pang to my churning stomach, and my mother called my name when she noticed my distraction. “Is he a friend?” my mother asked, and I met Changbin’s gaze just before he decided to turn away from me.

“A classmate,” I said, and the words tasted bitter on my palate.

“Well,” my mother said, exchanging a few words with the employee behind the register. “I ordered us something light.”

“Thank you,” I whispered, jerking my head away from Changbin. “I’ve felt nervous all morning.”

“That’s not like you,” my mother said, and she gave me a concerned look.

“I’ve had a lot on my mind,” I offered as an explanation, and I made sure that we sat far away from Changbin at the other end of the cafe.

Eventually, my mother clapped her hands together when a waitress brought our food. It seemed tantalizing, and I took a bite of my sandwich before quietly sneaking another glance in Changbin’s direction. The action was automatic, and I was crushed to see that he was gone. “Are you sure that boy was just a classmate?”

I sighed because leave it to my psychologist mother to understand everything better than anyone else. “I don’t know.”

My mother offered me a sympathetic smile, and I watched as her hand enclosed over mine. “Tell me about him.”

“I think we were friends,” I offered hesitantly. “But I screwed everything up.”

“What happened?”

“He was mad because I decided to practice instead of going to a party with him, which is really stupid since we have auditions,” I said. “I mean, we weren’t really ever that close.”

“Are you sure?” my mother asked, and I groaned at the look on her face because I had seen it many times before. “Did you spend time together outside of class?”

“Well, yeah...”

“Doing what?”

I considered her question, recalling my first meeting with Changbin as something inconsequential. But afterward, it seemed that our time started to matter more, like when Changbin came over to my dorm in the middle of the night because I was panicking over a calculus exam. Or, when he took me aside after class because I made a dumb mistake and he reassured me that it would only make me stronger. And then there were the little things in between those moments - casual conversations during our classes and lunch, walks to and from our dormitories, and hooking Changbin on one of my favorite dramas that I liked to watch when it felt like the world was too difficult to manage on my own...

I glanced up at my mother, and there was a sad smile waiting for me. “Y/N, I think you’ve made a mistake.”

Her assessment was difficult to accept because I had spent my whole life believing that I couldn’t afford to make mistakes. I always panicked on anything that strayed from perfection, and my mind was stubborn and impenetrable when it came to the smallest of errors. And considering the idea of losing Changbin as a mistake? It was an enormous blow.

“What can I do to fix it?” I asked my mother, and I was startled by my own voice because it sounded so small and insecure.

“That’s up to you to decide,” my mother said. “Some mistakes can be fixed in a million different ways, but some are so severe that you have to really think about the consequences.”

The nerves that I had experienced before were suddenly affecting me tenfold, and I knew that there was only one thing that I could do to remedy the worst mistake of my life.

Stage fright used to be a foreign concept to me, but when I walked across the stage for my audition, the heat of the overhanging lights added to the sweat glistening on my skin, and it seemed like I was experiencing tunnel vision when I managed to single out a familiar face. As such, I could see Changbin in the audience, watching me with narrowed eyes. It was a look that I never expected to receive from someone who was normally so quiet and reserved. And I couldn’t stand to know that it was because I had been so cruel to a man who had stood loyally by my side.

“Y/N,” my Professor greeted me warmly, shifting through the papers on the table in front of him. “Whenever you’re ready.”

I tightened my grip around my violin, positioning it between my neck and shoulder as I had done a thousand times before. But this time was different because I already knew the outcome, and there was a tremendous weight being lifted from my shoulders as I pulled the bow across the string with too much pressure. The accompanying screeching noise was jarring, and I could see some of my classmates flinching in reaction.

Meanwhile, my Professor’s mouth had fallen open in shock, and I closed my eyes and sighed. “Thank you,” I said, bowing in front of my stunned Professor before I walked off the stage.

It was hard to remember what happened thereafter, but I recalled ignoring the voices of my classmates backstage, fighting the crowd for the fresh air waiting outside. But the sunlight was the first thing that I really felt, and it was warm and reassuring against my skin as I inhaled with several, deep breaths. It was a beautiful day, and I found myself smiling as I walked over to one of the little benches waiting along the edges of the giant auditorium building.

For a moment, I wondered what my younger self would think about this strange turn of events. Surely, past Y/N would launch into some sort of tirade about how irresponsible I was being with our future, telling me about the “path” that we needed to follow in order to find success in life. And it was stunning that one kind-hearted boy, with dark hair and eyes, had managed to show me what it was like to appreciate something more than music. Because it wasn’t everything that life had to offer, and I really wanted to take advantage of the other exciting adventures that I had scorned in favor of longer practices or reading textbooks about the countless theories of instrumentals.

What a waste of time, I thought to myself, craning my head back until I could feel the pressure lessen in my neck.

“Do you understand what you just did?”

I opened one eye, finding Changbin standing in front of me with his arms crossed over his chest. My heart reacted to him before my brain, and I scrambled for the right words to describe everything that had happened. “I thought about it beforehand.”

“And it seemed like a good idea to you?”

“Considering the circumstances,” I said, giving him my full attention because he deserved nothing less. “I want our Professor to nominate Seo Changbin for the first chair, and I made sure that I couldn’t get in the way of what you deserve.”

Changbin was quiet for a moment, even as his arms fell to his sides. “You did that for me?” Changbin asked with eyes that were alight with wonder.

“Yeah.” I nodded, savoring a passing breeze. “It seemed like the right thing to do.”

“Why?” Changbin asked, and there a slight hint of anger in his tone that told me he hadn’t forgotten my dismissal of him from earlier this week.

However, I was calm when I answered him, like an enormous weight had been lifted from my shoulders. “For most of my life, I had this idea that there was only one future for me, and I needed to follow some kind of weird, strict plan...” I paused, patting the empty space on the bench next to me. Changbin hesitated for a moment before he sat down. “But lately, I’ve started to really hate that kind of thinking, and I hate the fact that I thought playing music was the only thing that could give my life any sort of meaning. Because it’s really not.”

“Do you believe that?”

I smiled at his innocent question. “Meeting you taught me a lot, and I’ve finally realized that I want other things in my life.”

It was a solemn declaration, and when Changbin looked at me, I knew that it was true. “Like...friends?”

“Yeah, friends,” I agreed, knocking my shoulder against his. “I also want to be a better version of myself. Someone who’s less obsessed with perfection.”

“You want me to think that I’m responsible for this epiphany?” Changbin asked, and his accompanying laugh filled my heart with a bright feeling of happiness.

“It starts with you,” I admitted. “I want you to ace that audition.”

“Well, after hearing all of that...” Changbin trailed off, and he straightened his shoulders. “I have some things that I should tell you.”

“Me?” I repeated, giving him an incredulous look.

“You.” Changbin confirmed, and the way he wrapped an arm around my shoulders was nothing short of delicate. “I like you a lot, Y/N,” he confessed. “This whole fight...I’m glad that you seem happier, but I would’ve never let it last. I need to be around you, and I want you to understand because I’m hoping for something even bigger than friendship.”

I swallowed hard, processing his words. “What do you mean?”

“Something like this,” Changbin said, and I wasn’t expecting the soft fingers directing my head to the side. But I really could’ve never anticipated the first touch of our lips together - gentle and inquisitive. They were soft like the rest of him, and it reminded me of a velvety touch that was impossible to resist. “Look at me, Y/N,” Changbin requested, and I forced my eyes to open to meet his gaze. “Forget about competitions or cliques,” he said. “Let’s just make it Y/N and Seo Changbin. I think that might benefit us both.”

I laughed at his explanation, but there was nothing humorous about the affection in his dark gaze or the beautiful intimacy that could only be shared between two people who had finally made their peace with the union of our two very different souls.

#stayverse #stray kids #stray kids fanfiction #skz #skz fanfic #seo changbin #seo changbin fanfic #seo changbin angst #changbin fluff #stray kids imagines #stray kids scenarios

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karajaynetoday · 4 years

Text

ours, for the rest of forever | ashton irwin

Hello friends! Here is a godparent!Ash one shot, based on this blurb about being godparents with Ashton and also inspired in part by that scene in Season 5 of One Tree Hill when Brooke is randomly looking after a baby but has to also finish fashion sketches so Lucas comes to her rescue with babysitting and it is overall very soft and cute. You know the one! Lol.

A very big thank you to Jex @sadistmichael , Anna @cheekysos , Jae @jae-writes-fanfiction and Hailey @talkfastromance4 for proof-reading and providing feedback on this when it was in its draft stages. You’re all absolute gems!

Anyway, enjoy the softness and as always, please let me know what you think! I’ve got some thoughts for a potential part 2, so we’ll wait and see how part 1 goes :)

(This is a fem reader insert)

Word count: 3.3k words

Warnings: none

More writing here | send feedback/thoughts/suggestions here

When your best friend Alice told you she was having a baby, you were over the moon. She was honestly one of the most kind-hearted people you knew, and the amount of love in her heart for others would only bloom more for a little baby to hold and cherish. Her partner James had been by Alice’s side since your university days, and their relationship was one that was literally #goals. They’d moved over to Los Angeles because James had an opportunity to work at an indie creative agency working with music artists, and when you followed a year or so later to pursue a consulting job, they’d welcomed you with open arms into the little community they’d formed of Australian ex-pats, LA creatives and generally good quality, salt of the earth people.

In the early days, there were lots of late nights (that became early mornings) running amok in West Hollywood, going from one house party to the next, but as you grew older, it became more likely to be a quiet Sunday sesh in someone’s backyard, with a barbeque cooking and someone playing their favourite tunes on a portable speaker while you floated in the swimming pool or lounged about on the grass with everyone’s various pets in attendance. When you met Ashton, he was drumming shirtless at his own house party, and then doing shots with James and their friend Calum. You were more than a little intimidated, although he had a kind face and welcoming nature, Ashton was forthcoming his opinions. On the other hand, you were always more reserved, and it took you time to feel like you belonged with their crazy crew of friends. One night, you and Ashton ended up alone in the kitchen sharing some chicken nuggets and potato gems tater tots after a wild night on the house part dancefloor, and from there you could feel a solid friendship starting to take hold.

A few months after Alice and James told you they were expecting, they’d invited you and Ashton out to brunch at one of your favourite spots. It was a little hole-in-the-wall café in Studio City that you’d first come to after Ashton wouldn’t stop raving about how good their iced coffees were. You all ordered your favourites (avocado smash with a side of smoked salmon and a hash brown for you, raspberry hotcakes for Alice, a breakfast burger for James, and pulled pork eggs benedict with a side of halloumi for Ashton) and were chatting away about your weeks at work when Alice reached down and pulled two envelopes out of her tote bag and handed on to you and one to Ashton. You took them, looking confusedly at Alice and James, who had big goofy smiles on their faces.

“Well, go on! Open them!” Alice half-shouted excitedly, squeezing James’ hand on top of the table. You and Ashton glanced at each other, perplexed, before tearing open the envelopes and finding a card inside. Yours read, “Will you be my godmother?” in gold writing on the front, and inside was an ultrasound photo with a handwritten note from Alice that made you tear up when you started reading it. You could see in your peripheral vision that Ash had a corresponding card in his envelope too, and he was standing up to give James and Alice a hug with an enthusiastic “Fuck YES! Of course I will!” that garnered some disapproving looks from the middle-aged women sitting near you. You held it together just enough to stand up and exchange hugs and choke out a “Y-y-yes” to Alice and James, before basically bursting into full blown tears of happiness and apologising profusely as your brunch was delivered to the table. As you wiped away your tears and managed to begin eating your avocado smash, you felt Ashton squeeze your hand reassuringly under the table, and when you glanced towards him he was grinning at you with a smile that was as bright as a thousand suns.

It was a normal June day at the office a few months later when your phone pinged with a text from Alice in your group chat with her, James and Ashton that

read “It’s go-time. We’ll keep you updated!”. You replied with lots of exclamation points and crying emojis, and for Alice and James to let you know if they needed anything, and a few minutes later Ashton had penned a full paragraph about the beauty of the creation of life, how he knew that Alice and James would be incredible parents, and that he couldn’t wait to meet the little one once they made their way into the world. Ashton was frustratingly eloquent sometimes. Later that night, you received a photo message of a small, pink baby snuggled up on Alice’s chest, with James’ arm thrown around her shoulders, and the caption “Charlie Rose, ten fingers, ten toes. Come visit tomorrow, she can’t wait to meet you x” and you could barely sleep from the anticipation of meeting your darling goddaughter for the first time.

Ashton insisted on meeting you at the hospital so you could visit Alice, James and Charlie together (“Dude, we’re a godparent team here! A package deal! A dynamic duo! Can’t have you getting in there as the favourite from day one!”) and you’d never seen him more gentle or smitten than when the small, wriggly bundle of blankets that was Charlie Rose was placed in his arms. Ashton rocked her gently, kissing her head, and whispering to her about how incredible she was and how excited he was to see her grow. James was snapping away with his camera, and he asked you and Ash to stand together for a photo holding Charlie, which would later be stuck on your fridge for years to come (and possibly be your phone lockscreen, but no need to mention that to Ashton).

Charlie was a tricky baby at first, resisting sleep and struggling with colic, but Alice and James were incredible and persistent and by the time she was 6 months old, they basically had the hang of this parenting thing. They didn’t want to christen Charlie in a church, but instead decided to hold one of your cherished backyard barbeques as a naming celebration for her. All of your nearest and dearest were there, and Alice’s mum had even flown in from Australia to meet her newest granddaughter. Despite it being an incredibly informal affair, Ashton insisted on making a speech about how he felt to be in Charlie’s life, to love and support her through every milestone and challenge she might encounter along the way. Charlie was happily gurgling in Ashton’s arms as he spoke, and she reached up to grab at his cheeks when he told her he loved her. Alice’s mum insisted on getting photos of everyone, including you and Ashton holding Charlie, and you tried to ignore the butterflies you felt when Ash slid his arm around your waist and pulled you into his side for a cosy photo pose. Were you actually starting to fall for him, or was it just the baby fever talking? Because damn, that man looked good with a baby in his arms.

When Charlie was almost 12 months old, Alice decided that she wanted to go back to work a few days a week. Charlie would be in childcare for most of the days, but you’d recently adopted a flexible working arrangement with your own office, and you insisted that you would love to look after Charlie for one day a week. The older Charlie got, the more adventurous she became, so what you’d originally envisioned as nice, quiet days of baking and craft activities and napping soon became full of visits to the playground and the beach and the zoo. Once Ashton heard about your regular babysitting day, he insisted on clearing his schedule as best he could, and joined the outings you and Charlie went on. It’s so much easier to cope with her boundless energy (and occasional temper tantrums) when you and Ash are together, and you have to admit it’s just as nice on the quieter days as well, when you snuggle in on your couch to watch a Disney movie, or do some puzzles with Charlie on the lounge room floor.

When Ashton was back out on tour, he’d insist on FaceTiming with you and Charlie on your babysitting day so he didn’t miss out on all the fun. Sometimes he’d read her a story or sing her a lullaby before naptime, and sometimes the timezones wouldn’t work out and he’d end up calling during naptime, so the two of you just spent a little time catching up on each other’s lives from your opposite sides of the country or the planet. Ashton also loved collecting little souvenirs for Charlie on his touring travels, and your group chat with Alice and James was regularly filled with photos of snow globes or little soft mascot toys he’d found in one city or the next. It was so cute how excited Ashton got when he found a new souvenir for Charlie, and you couldn’t help but imagine how adorable he’d be when he had his own children and carried on little traditions like this for them too.

One particular weekend, Alice and James were going away overnight to attend a friend’s wedding nearby, and despite their anxiety and nerves (and admittedly, your own), they decided to leave Charlie with you for the night as your house is the main one besides their own that she spends time in. They dropped Charlie off just after lunchtime, and after a teary goodbye, she’s soon happily playing with her toy cars and trains on the lounge room carpet (including making broom-broom noises, what a cutie) when you get an unexpected call from your boss. They’re rambling about a client needing an urgent rewrite on something that you’d submitted the previous day, a pretty sizeable project, and you could feel yourself starting to fill with dread at the idea of having to rework the entire thing while also keeping Charlie happy and entertained. After managing to jot down the gist of the rewrite on the back of a colouring in page you found on your coffee table and ending the call with your boss, you took a deep, calming breath before looking over to where Charlie was still playing on the floor. Sure, she looked content and adorable now, but nap time was fast approaching, and then dinner, and then eventually bedtime, and there was nothing Charlie liked more than stomping her feet and putting up a fight where sleep was involved. It was time to call for help, and your fingers found Ashton’s contact in your phone and hit “call” before you realised what you were doing.

“Hey, how’s it going with my favourite girl?” Ashton answered cheerily, and your heart stopped beating for a moment before you mentally face-palmed when you realised that he was talking about Charlie, not you, being his favourite girl.

“Hey Ash! All good so far, but um… I think I’m going to need some help. My boss is having a crisis, so I need to smash out some edits and new content in the next three hours, but Charlie’s due to go for a nap and you know that she -” You could feel yourself starting to sound more panicked with each word that you spoke, but Ashton quickly cut you off with his soothing voice.

“That she likes to pick a fight at nap time, yes. A truly assertive future world leader on our hands, I reckon. I’m just finishing up a demo, but I’ll be there in 20 minutes. I’ll sort dinner as well, spaghetti sound okay?” He mused, sounding as calm as ever.

“That… would be amazing. Thank you. You’re actually the best human to exist, you know that?” You gushed, feeling some of your anxiety immediately begin to disappear.

Within half an hour, Ash was in your lounge room handling Charlie’s nap time negotiations while you were furiously typing away at your laptop at the kitchen counter and fielding more frantic phone calls from your boss. Another 20 minutes passed before Ash proclaimed victory as Charlie lost her battle against sleep, and he came to see you in the kitchen and make a start on dinner. You were so lost in your task that you didn’t hear him come in, and you jumped a mile out of your seat in fright when he gently touched your shoulder in greeting.

“Jesus christ, Ash! Don’t sneak up on me like that!” You huffed, taking your glasses off and rubbing your eyes in exhaustion.

Ashton leaned on the counter opposite you and raised his eyebrows in concern. “Sorry love, didn’t realise you didn’t hear me come in. You good?”

Damn it, why was he always so nice to you these days? Remember the days when you were scared of him because he used to argue with you about politics and the state of the world? Why did those seem somehow easier because fear was more natural to you than whatever this other feeling was that you were starting to have whenever Ashton was around you.

You sighed and put your glasses back on, frowning briefly at the screen before hitting save one more time (just in case your bad luck took a turn and fucked you over with lost documents).

“Yep. Sorry. It’s just been a bit of a day. Did Charlie go down okay?” You forced a smile as you glanced up at Ashton over the top of your laptop screen.

“Yeah, she gave in once I offered another bedtime singalong. And maybe, juuuust maybe, I might have mentioned something about some sweets after dinner…” Ash looked at you guiltily, licking his lips nervously. You rolled your eyes and shook your head at him, but you couldn’t keep the small smile off your face.

Ashton got started on making spaghetti while you tapped away at your computer, and soon enough you heard Charlie calling out for Ashton in her little sing-song voice on the baby monitor you had set up on the kitchen counter (“Asht-aaaaa! Where are youuuuu! Asht-aaaaa!”). The spaghetti smelled incredible, and when Ashton brought Charlie into the kitchen from her nap and she’d had a little while to play a bit more, you settled at the kitchen table to tuck into some dinner. Well, Charlie was more interested in playing with her food than actually eating it, but yours was delicious and for the third or fourth time that day, you thanked Ash profusely for being such a gem (to which he just gave you one of those dazzling smiles in response).

After dinner, Ashton took Charlie for a bath and read her a bedtime story while you powered through the final part of the project edits you needed to finish before your boss burst a blood vessel. You could hear Ashton reading to Charlie on the baby monitor, doing all of the different character voices, and her little giggles in response were both breaking and warming your heart. Warming it with the cuteness and how much you loved that little girl and her cheeky soul, and breaking it with the guilt about how it was supposed to be you snuggled up reading to her, but instead you were frantically typing about key messages, marketing strategies and budget lines. You were doing your last section of re-writes when Ash came back into the kitchen, and this time you didn’t jump when he gently placed his hands on your shoulders. In fact, you leaned into his touch, and moaned quietly in relief as his thumbs began to work into the tension in your muscles.

“How’s it going?” Ashton asked quietly, continuing to press his hands into your back and shoulders.

“Almost there. Mostly just proof-reading now, and then I can send it and not fucking think about it for another second until at least Monday. Ash, I’m so sorry again, I know this isn’t what you had in mind for your Friday night and I should’ve been more organised but I just didn’t think that -” You began to ramble, feeling the guilt wash over you.

“Hey, hey. Stop. It’s fine. We’re a team, remember? The dynamic duo? Gotta stick together. We’ve got a whole lifetime of dealing with Charlie meltdowns and milestones ahead of us, love. It’s our job and our blessing, for the rest of forever. Don’t feel guilty over one night.” Ashton said softly, squeezing your shoulders and pressing a soft kiss to the top of your head. There were those butterflies again, and your skin was almost burning from where his hands had touched you. You simply nodded at his words, before returning to your laptop and the task at hand. Ashton stepped away and quietly began washing the dishes (honestly, is there anything this man didn’t do?) as you began typing again.

Finally, about twenty minutes later, you hit send on the email to your boss with the completed rewrites, and shut your laptop with a deep sense satisfaction, letting out a triumphant whisper-yell, mindful of the sleeping child down the hallway from you. Ash looked up from where he was sat on the couch, scrolling on his phone, and rushed over to high-five you when he realised that you’d shut your laptop.

“Right. You go shower and I’ll put the kettle on, then it’s one episode of Sons of Anarchy and then off to bed with you.” Ash began, tugging you out of your seat and pushing you towards your bedroom before you could protest.

“Wait… how did you know I was watching Sons of Anarchy?!” You turned and asked, with one hand on the door to your bedroom.

“I was stalking through your Netflix earlier when you were lost in editing land. Plus, I know you can’t resist a charming male lead who has a killer smile and looks damn good in a leather jacket.” Ash chuckled, shooting you a wink and one of those goddamn smiles.

You hated to admit it, but you felt so much better after your shower, and having Ash pull your feet up over his lap and absentmindedly run his hands softly across your legs from time to time wasn’t exactly bad either. You stuck to your promise of only one episode of Sons of Anarchy, and after pulling your groaning self up off the couch and jokingly half-carrying you to your bedroom door, Ashton bid you goodnight with a hug and a kiss to the forehead before disappearing into your guest room.

As you settled into your own bed, alone, and pulled the blankets up over you, you couldn’t help but think how nice it was to have Ash so present with you and with Charlie, and how sweet it would be in the morning to wake up together in the same house and go for breakfast at your favourite little brunch spot down the street, before waiting for James and Alice to return in the early afternoon. It was all your own little family unit, and as you felt yourself being lulled into sleep, you also felt a deep sense of content in your heart about the loved ones in your life. And then also there were those butterflies, just slowly but surely making their presence known, and getting a little bigger every time you thought of Ashton, and how much he loved Charlie, and how much she loved him and you, and how much you loved them both.

Shit. Did you actually love him? Were you falling in love with Ashton Irwin? Before you could panic too much, the need for sleep won out, and you slept peacefully knowing two of your favourite people were also sleeping calmly in the rooms either side of you.

More writing here | send feedback/thoughts/suggestions here

#my writing #ashton irwin #ashton irwin one shot #ashton irwin imagine #ashton irwin blurb #ashton irwin fanfiction #5sos imagine #5sos writing #there's going to be a part two #charlie rose ten fingers ten toes #soft AF up in here on a saturday morning #also i fucking miss going to brunch with my pals that I based alice and james on

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be-ready-when-i-say-go · 4 years

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what if in the distance series, she’s been having a really stressful week with her album promotions and whatnot and all calum wants to do is make her feel better and the facetimes can only help so much so he decides to fly out and surprise her 🥺

Thanks so much for the suggestion! I’m going to combine it with this one:

i’m feeling rlly down do u think for the distance series you could write another blurb about the reader being really upset and not wanting to bother cal but she tweets a really concerning tweet and cal calls her and she’s balling and maybe he sings to her to make her to feel better and the next week she gets a care package?

I did some tweaks. Her album’s not out yet. She’s just promoting the singles. But the album is coming out soon! I’m not a professional, so I don’t know how any of this actually works. But I’m trying.

Here are parts one, two, three, four, and five. This is the Distance series on my masterlist!

If you have any suggestions or ideas for this series, please feel free to send them to me! I will try and use as many as I can while also progressing the story along!

_______________________________

The thing about life is that, sometimes when one thinks there’s not much lower that they can do, there’s something right around the corner that proves deeper is possible. Though the tweets hadn’t exactly lessened, she made a point not to be on social media unless she had to be, she only interacted with fans for a spare few minutes, liking tweets and reply to the love and positive outreach. Her relationship with social media is rapidly evolving and for the first time in a while, she kind of understood the reason why Calum never seemed to be on his. It was a hard river to get out of, if one floated down it too long.

But now, she was looking at her schedule for promotion and while thankfully most things were still relatively close to her, traveling this much so soon, made her nervous. She tried to speak with her manager and the team, to see if some of the interviews could be scheduled for video. They had managed to keep a decent portion video based but still too many required her traveling. “I’ll try to talk to some people, but you really have to get out there, have people see your face. Besides, you already traveled out of the country once before. What’s the big deal now?”

It makes sense and she’s still new to this game. But going to see Calum is completely different than being in cities for hours before flying out for the next. Just the idea of her being herded around made her a little uncomfortable. “I understand that, but when am I supposed to be a human being during all of this? I still have songs to finish. And I visited a friend for a few days. Totally different than bouncing around god knows how many countries in two weeks. I need time to breathe in all this.”

“Listen, we’re here to help you out. The only way for this relationship to work is if there is mutual respect.”

“That’s rich,” she retorts. “I’m only simply asking that for my mental wellbeing that we adjust some of the interviews, that’s all.”

“And we will see what we can do.” The rest of the meeting is tense and it grates every nerve in her soul that there seems to be no real regard. It’s really just in the tone. Like she’s a child begging for candy in the checkout line while her mother has already told her once before that there is candy at home.

But she has to in some ways take them at their word. She lets this go for now but when the next day, she receives an email that the schedule will remain the same, she knows in her gut that no one actually talked about rearranging anything. Can she really afford to cause a ripple? Especially so early in her career? These people kind of did pluck her from obscurity but at the same time, shouldn’t her voice be heard?

Remember the compression socks, reads the message from Calum. He sent her a care package last week, after hearing about her promotion schedule. It was going to be hell and Calum wasn’t going to hide that fact from her. She hadn’t told me about the small feud. So he sent things that helped him out a lot, the socks for the constant air travel, a sleep mask, vitamins, a book that he recommended but she hadn’t stopped by the local shop to buy, a pack of her favorite pens that she had to order from a place in New York, and a beautiful bound leather journal. Her wire bound notebook was curling at the corners and well loved. It was by time to get a new one but she had a hard time giving up on things.

Snapping a picture of her carry on, she makes sure the socks are resting right on top. I would never.

You got this, buttercup. Calum stares at his phone, wishing he could do a little

The first couple of days aren’t so bad. The flights aren’t terribly long. The interviews are kind of fun, filled with plenty of laughter. There are gimmicky games based on her singles and they didn’t always pan out completely, but for a second, she figures maybe she had overreacted. But soon the interviews grow repetitive, the games are no longer fun. She can’t even write, by the time she’s on a plane, all she wants is sleep. The time zones are killer and she swears time means literally nothing as she’s hurded about.

I’m losing it, she texts Calum. Losing all sense of her humanity. She’s grateful to meet her fans in the small pockets of time she’s allotted and that keeps her going. But slowly and surely, her body is drained. No amount of sleep means anything. She can’t hardly concrete. It’s all crumbling around her. She doesn’t feel human.

“Are you sleeping?” Calum asks, through the screen. His picture goes pixelated for a quick second but then it straightens back out.

“Yeah. Just doesn’t seem like enough though.”

Calum knows that feeling. He knows that look in her eyes too. It’s hard to keep up the facade when constantly about. “Eating enough?”

“Kinda,” she admits. She tries to think what she had for breakfast. But that was hours ago and now she’s sitting waiting for another plane that will take her even further ahead in time. Will she be eating breakfast again soon? Does it even matter right now?

Calum passes along a few more tricks, but mostly aims to distract. He talks about the new music he’s working on. She asks if she can get a sneak peak and he’s more than happy to oblige. If that’s all he can do for the small moments in time, he’ll do it. He wishes he could do more though. It’s not easy and he’s fortunate to have three other people that are going through it all at the same time as him. There’s always a support system. But it’s just her. And she can confide in a couple of her security guards, they’ve become a level of friends, but it’s still not quite the same.

“I miss my dog,” she confesses, randomly amongst the reverbing rumble of Calum’s bass as he finishes the last chord in the progression. Her chest starts to ache. And the tears are stinging her eyes before she can really stop them. “I miss my dog so fucking much,” she cries in a whisper. “I miss my bed. I miss you.”

“Hey, it’s okay. It’s hard to be away. I totally get it.” His heart races, because of her tears but also because of her confession. Now, probably isn’t the time, not to get hung up on that last sentence but his mouth is moving before he can will it not too. “I miss you too. And I know your dog misses you. And it’s okay to miss us. We’ll always be right here when you need us.”

It doesn’t help to be having this breakdown in the middle of an airport. And sure, there might be headlines in the coming days but at the end of the day she’s so human. No matter how much she wants to pretend nothing ever affects her, it does. It always will. Her wall isn’t without some flaws. She does her best to calm the tears, steady her breathing but it feels so right just to let it all out.

She manages to excuse herself to that bathroom. There are still about thirty minutes before her flight and she has to get it all out now before she boards. With Calum still on the line, she sobs in the bathroom. A toilet flushes alerting her that she’s not as alone as she once expected but locked into the stall, it doesn’t matter. Calum soothes her as best he can, telling her it’s okay to get it all out. Ten minutes later, she’s cleaned up and running back to her gate. “Thanks, Cal.”

“No, no need to thank me. Just take care of yourself, okay? Please.”

She nods, guards waiting for her with her bags. “I’ll talk to you later.”

Just like she knew, it’s all over the internet the next day. The woman interviewing asks if everything’s okay, what sparked the teary episode. “I’m human, in case anyone forgets. I am human and I just hit my limit. I think we all need to take a moment to remember we are human. I am. You are. The person listening to this. We’re all human at the end of the day.” That’s all she has to say because if truth be told, she’s still at that limit, she’s still hitting that wall in which everything feels hazy but crying her eyes out helped a little bit.

Calum sees her interview, not trying to look for it, but it pops up on his timeline. Her voice shakes as she speaks, lower lip quivering but her tone is strong, there’s a fire behind her eyes as she talks. Calum knows she’s hitting that wall and she won’t really get over it until she gets home and gets a chance to unwind. It’s crazy. Really, but he can’t do much over a call or over a video chat. So he figures out when her return home is and books a flight out for the next day. He should really make sure she wants company to, but it’s too late now as his email dings with the confirmation.

It’s midday and it should require more pants than she’s currently wearing, her only plans are to stay curled up on her couch and snuggled up with her dog. She has plenty of food in the house and she doesn’t mind taking the moment to cook for herself. The knock at her door is surprising and she stands, hollering that she needs just a moment and scurries to her room to grab a pair of shorts off the chair in her room that has just become the clothes chair when things aren’t dirty to go into the laundry but aren’t clean to stick back into the drawer.

And there’s Calum, just standing at her door. A hoodie on his head, covering the baseball cap and his sunglasses. “Hey,” he exhales with a tiny grin.

All she can do is hug him, shaking with a small bit of laughter. “I don’t know what you’re doing here, or if I’m hallucinating this, but I’m absolutely okay with this.”

He kisses the top of her head. “Just here to cheer you up, buttercup. That’s all.”

-H

#calum hood #calum hood blurb #calum hood imagine #calum hood fluff #calum hood x famous singer #distance series #calum hood 5sos #5sos #h writes #asks #answered #5 seconds of summer imagine #5 seconds of summer fic #5 seconds of summer fanfic #5sos fic #5sos blurb #5sos imagne #5sos fanfics

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slimeyslimeyballsack · 4 years

Text

If You Only Knew, You'd Hate Me Chapter Four

Pairing: Bucky Buchanan x OMC (Zebediah Kaskitt)

Summary: Bucky and Zebediah had a fleeting interaction years ago and Zeb has been hung up on the boy ever since. Even with his arrogant and dismissive exterior, Zeb still tries to make a connection.

Warnings: swearing, that’s actually it, this was a mild chapter, Bucky being dumb af

Tags: @thebtrmuffins @diagnosed-crazy @lykenbcrn

Ask if you'd like to be added or removed

Part One Part Two Part Three

Bucky woke up with his legs intertwined with Zebediah's. His eyes went round. He quickly detangled himself and sat up, legs dangling off the bed. He looked at Zebediah, who was still sleeping.

"I don't hate you."

He doesn't know why he says it. He won't be able to hear him. Still, he continues.

"I don't even hate zombies, I think. I just, my parents, I have to be perfect for them. If I'm different, they," he paused. "But I deserve it. I just want to impress them, but I feel like I can't, no matter what I do. I'm scared of them."

Zebediah doesn't move. He doesn't show any signs that he hears what Bucky is saying. Seeing him sleeping, free of stress, made it that much clearer how much he carried when he was awake. It seemed so noticeable now that he saw him so carefree.

"You're stronger than me. You've gone through so much. The whole world's been against you, and you keep smiling. You're just a good person, all the time. I'm not. I'm a bad person. I don't know if I can be better."

He checked his phone. It was after six. He wasn't going to school today, but he still needed to be home before his parents woke up. He took one last look at Zebediah, deciding to write his number down before walking home.

Bucky was gone when Zeb got up. He went to check his phone and a small slip of paper fell onto the floor. He picked it up to see a phone number written in immaculate handwriting. Bucky signed behind it. He put the number in his phone before texting: Hey, did you get home alright?

His pa walked into his room.

"What are you doing? Come on, time to get up. You can have breakfast on the go."

Zeb rushed to get ready, grabbing his breakfast and walking toward Zebina's.

"Zebina, you have no idea what happened last night."

Zeb ran toward her, resting his hands on his knees when he reached her porch.

"Did you run here?"

"Yeah I was late, but that's not the point. Guess what happened last night?"

"You actually stu-"

"Bucky came over!" He cut her off.

Zebina's eyebrows jumped into her hair.

"He what? Why?"

Zeb recounted his tale. It was bittersweet. He had had a successful interaction with the guy he'd been dreaming about for years. But the reason he ran into Bucky made him sick. He knew people like Bucky's parents first hand, and he wished Bucky didn't have to deal with it.

"That's crazy, I- I'm happy for you."

Zebina was incredulous. She had been ready to console him when Bucky never gave him more than a passing glance. She was not prepared for Bucky actually talking to him, nicely, at his house. That had been completely out of the realm of possibility.

When they got to school they didn't sit in their normal spot. They, instead, sat with the wolves. Zeb had received a text saying that he had and that he would be staying home today, so he didn't mind where they sat. They took their seats between Willa and Wynter.

"He doesn't hate me."

Zeb leaned in to whisper to Willa when the rest of the group was distracted with a conversation. She looked around the room.

"He's not here today."

"Willa, you know who I'm talking about right?"

With everyone's attention turned to them, she settled back into her spot. She didn't say anything more about it, but she did give him a half-smile and a nod. The conversation moved on and eventually the bell rang, the wolves and Zebina letting out a howl. Willa gave Zeb a little nudge, encouraging him to join in.

Zeb exchanged texts with Bucky sporadically throughout the day. He actually hadn't expected him to really answer him.

Me, 7:17 am: Hey, did you get home alright?

Bucky <3, 7:43 am: Yeah, I won't be at school today though

Me, 7:43 am: okay, feel better

Me, 7:44 am: and ice it

Bucky <3, 8:26 am: I will

Bucky <3, 9:06 am: What are you doing after school?

Me, 10:01 am: nothing I don't think

Me, 10:01 am: why

Bucky <3, 10:19 am: I need to talk to you

Me, 11:04 am: why?

Bucky <3, 11:44 am: I'll let you know later.

Me, 11:46 am: okay

Bucky <3, 11:50 am: Is it okay if I come over?

Me, 12:37 pm: yeah

Me, 1:39 pm: it'll be like 15 after class

Bucky <3, 1:40 pm: Okay, see you then

Bucky managed to get a group call with the Aceys after school ended. There was no way he was inviting them over in his current condition. He also wanted to get a head start on walking to Zebediah's house, so he started the call as he walked down the street. He had a Seabrook hoodie over his head to cover up his bruises. The group exchanged small pleasantries chatting a bit before Bucky cleared his throat.

"Hey, guys. Remember that zombie guy. He would always give me compliments just like randomly?"

"Oh my god, that kid? He's such a loser." Jacey laughed.

Bucky didn't really like Jacey much, but they needed another Acey after Tracey bailed. There was a silence while everyone waited for Bucky to comment.

"Yeah, he's going to be joining us, like an Acey but not. His name is Zebediah. So Jacey? Shut up."

"So, does this mean we don't have to be mean to zombies anymore?"

Lacey quickly shifted the conversation to avoid potential drama. They did not need that. The question did surprise Bucky. He didn't realize that he was making them act that way. He just assumed that's just how they were.

"Yeah, but not too nice."

"Oh, thank goodness. Because, like, it was honestly so tiring. Like, its just so much energy you know? And I just-"

"Stacey, shut up."

Stacey interjected in the middle of Lacey's little rant. The conversation moved to a more casual topic and Bucky wasn't really paying attention. He was thinking about Zebediah, and how he was going to tell him about joining the group. He was worried that his parents would see his true intentions, or someone else would. He didn't want people to think he liked Zebediah. He also didn't want Zebediah to think that he hated him. He rounded the corner of Zebediah's street and easily excused himself from the call.

"Here goes nothing."

Zeb found Bina and the wolves after school.

"Hey, Bina and I are going to study after school, anyone want to come?"

Zeb could see Bina's face fall at the statement, then brighten up again when everyone said they couldn't, including Zebediah. So, in high spirits, the three embarked on the journey home. Bina and Wynter happily bantering back and forth. Wynter brought out the talkative side in Bina and you could tell that Wynter was just happy to have someone listen to what she was saying. Zeb, not wanting to be engaged in pity conversation, put his earbuds in. No, he was not listening to music. He took the time to think about what was going to happen.

Zeb was excited to see Bucky. Yeah, he just saw him yesterday, but like that was several hours ago. He was curious as to what Bucky had to say to him as well.

He'd wave to Bina and Wynter when he left them at Bina's house, skipping the rest of the way home, eager for their meeting. He walked in to see Bucky already sitting down. He was laughing with his pa and dad.

"You've got yourself a good one, Zeb." His dad clapped his hand on Bucky's back.

"Okay, well, we need to talk so bye."

He grabbed Bucky's hand and pulled him upstairs into his room, shutting the door behind them.

"Have fun you two."

"Dad!"

Zeb could feel his face getting darker. He looked down to see their hands still together. He looked back up to see Bucky grinning at him. He quickly removed his hand, wiping it on his pants. He didn't think it was possible to be more flustered than he already was.

"So, I, uh. What did you want to talk about?"

Zeb gestured for Bucky to sit on the bed, following quickly behind him. Bucky looked him in the eyes. Although they were about the same height standing, Bucky had a longer torso, so Zeb had to look up to see into them. Wow, they were such a pretty brown.

"I've been thinking." Bucky placed his hand on Zeb's. "I actually really like you, Zeb, like a lot."

Zeb froze. Bucky liked him. Bucky Buchanan. Bucky "pro keeping things the way they are" Buchanan liked him.

"This is unexpected, to say the least. I actually have been daydreaming about this for a long time. Wow, that's embarrassing to say out loud. I think this is actually-"

"You talk too much."

Bucky cut off Zeb's rant, quickly catching his lips in his own. Bucky pulled Zeb flush against him, Zeb reaching up to cradle his face. It was everything Zeb had thought it would be. Yeah, it was clashing teeth and hunger and neediness. But it was also fireworks and warmth and it was perfect.

"Zebediah Kaskitt!"

Zebina was in front of Zeb. She pulled an earbud out of Zeb's ear. He grinned sheepishly at her exasperated face.

"What is up with you?"

"Bucky."

"So the usual." Bina laughed.

The two exchanged 'I love you's and Zeb waved a goodbye to Wynter. To follow his daydream, he skipped the rest of the way home. The fantasy was interrupted when he saw Bucky fidgeting on his front porch. He slowed down a little bit to watch him, stopping and leaning against a pole. Bucky switched from playing with his hands to fiddling with a lawn ornament, panicking when the plastic cup he was spinning fell off.

Zeb decided to step in before he could do any more damage. He jogged up to his porch waving at Bucky. He grabbed the cup Bucky had semi refitted onto the iron rod.

"That wasn't me."

"Mhm." Bucky chuckled at him. "Come on. We can talk in my room."

Zeb pushed the door open. His dad and pa sat at the kitchen table.

"Hey. This is my friend Bucky. We're gonna talk up in my room, okay?"

"Just keep the door open. Do you want any snacks?"

Zeb looked at Bucky, who gave him a blank stare.

"Maybe later."

Zeb gestured for Bucky to follow him up the stairs. He led him into his room, making to keep the door open.

"So what did you want to talk about?"

Bucky took a deep breath before starting. "I want you to join the Aceys. You wouldn't have to change your name or anything, just hang out with us. But don't get a big head or anything about it, and don't act too friendly in front of people."

Zeb was dumbfounded. Sure, Bucky wasn't professing his love, but it was a step in the right direction.

"So I can act all friendly when it's just us?"

"Shut up."

Zeb laughed, looking sideways with a lopsided smirk.

"So, does this mean I get to wear actual clothes?"

It was something that Zeb couldn't have even thought about happening a year ago, and here he was, doing it with Bucky. Bucky shrugged and nodded.

"Rad. You want some snacks?"

Zeb didn't wait for a response. He jumped up and grabbed Bucky's hand, pulling him off the bed and out of the room. He walked him down the stairs into the dining room. Pa had set out some broccoli and even ranch. He must have known how badly Zeb wanted to impress Bucky. Ranch was only brought out during special occasions.

"So, Zeb, introduce us to your boyfriend."

Zeb looked to see Bucky blushing, and from the heat on his face he was looking similar. Black blood pooled in his cheeks. His dad snapped his fingers in his face, turning his attention back toward his parents.

"What? No. He's not my boyfriend, just a friend. Dad, Pa, this is Bucky. Bucky this is Zelon, my dad, and Zamian, my pa."

Zeb was a little nervous. He expected to see disgust on his face, or malice, but all he saw was a growing confusion.

"Well, Buckster, tell me a bit about yourself."

Zelon went to pull Bucky into a side hug, Zeb grabbing his arm in the air, wrapping it around himself instead. Bucky gave him a grateful nod and Zeb made up an excuse about Bucky not liking strangers touching him. The group sat down and Zeb gave Bucky a nod to go ahead and start talking.

"Oh, well I was previously cheer captain but gave it up to become student president. I'm the best cheerleader on the squad."

Bucky tapered off. Everybody knew everything about Bucky, except Zeb's parents. Zelon and Zamian continuously assaulted him with questions, smoothing them over with the occasional over the top compliment.

"You are quite the handsome young man," Zamian said.

He leaned against his husband, legs crossed and one hand splayed across his chest. Bucky made a face; his brows furrowed and his nose crinkled. This couldn't happen; he hoped to god that Bucky wasn't homophobic. That really wouldn't help better their situation, and it was entirely likely considering his parents.

Bucky <3, 4:02 pm: do you want to leave

Bucky <3, 4:02 pm: I can make up an excuse

Me, 4:02 pm: Yes, please.

"Hey, Bucky and I were gonna head out. I gotta go upstairs I'll be down in half a sec."

Before Bucky could respond, Zeb ran up the stairs into his room. He lifted up a floorboard and pulled out the money he had saved. $162.17. That should be enough to buy new clothes. He shoved the ziplock bag filled with change and a ridiculous amount of ones into his back pocket. He ran back downstairs interrupting his dad's spiel about the economy or something boring like that. He was about to walk out when his dad spoke up.

"Aren't you forgetting something?"

Zeb closed his eyes and pursed his lips, sighing through his nose.

"Love you. K bye."

He started to open the door before his dad cleared his throat. He turned around and hugged them both.

"Okay bye."

He pulled Bucky out of the house before they could embarrass him further. They walked for a little bit. Instead of heading toward the gate, Bucky made a turn back into Zombietown. Zeb was still too frightened about his reaction to mention it. Bucky found an alley with some wood boxes for them to sit on.

"You have two dads?"

To Zeb's surprise, his words weren't filled with disdain. It was a genuine question. Zeb nodded.

"How?"

"I was adopted."

"But why do you have two dads?"

"Because they love each other."

"You can do that?" Bucky's eyebrows shot up.

Zeb laughed. Did he really not know?

"Yeah, you can do that. Guys can like guys. Girls can like girls."

Bucky's jaw fell slack. "So that means I could like boys?"

"Yeah, or you could be like me and like both."

"So you could like anybody?"

Bucky's tone was a sort of mix between bewilderment and excitement. It was like a kid's when they saw their older sibling do something cool. Zeb shrugged and blushed. He was doing more blushing today than he would've liked. He wasn't overly fond of the way he looked when he blushed. It was like ink blotches on his face, neck, and ears. His hair hid his ears and back of his neck but the rest was on full display. He threaded his fingers through his hair, pushing it back out of his face.

"In theory, yeah, but right now I kind of got my eye on someone. They're, uh, actually the reason I joined cheer squad."

Zeb quickly decided he did not like the feel of the air and refocused the conversation.

"And, you could decide that you actually want to be a girl or you could decide that you don't want to be a guy or girl."

Bucky smirked. "Nah. I'm definitely a guy. I'm Bucky; I'm the epitome of manliness."

He flexed and made a couple of poses, letting out little grunts of effort. Zeb giggled, bringing his hand to his mouth.

"Whatever you say, big guy."

Zeb patted his hand on Bucky's chest, letting it sit there for just a moment too long before abruptly pulling away. He cleared his throat and stood up, mumbling something about how they should go before all the good stores closed.

They walked back toward the gate, this time in a more comfortable silence. They checked through the gate and Bucky didn't seem to notice the funny look the guard gave. He led them far into Seabrook, farther than Zebediah dare go by himself. In all honesty, it was making him a little frightened. He knew what people around here were like and what they were like toward zombies. He stuck closely to Bucky, shrinking in a little when he saw people pass by. They came up to a small store, and Bucky pushed the door open and leaned against it, beckoning Zeb to go in first. He did so and was almost immediately greeted with the unhappy face of a middle-aged woman.

"No zombies. I'm going to have to ask you to leave or I will call Z-Patrol. Now."

#z o m b i e s #disney zombies #disney #disney channel original movie #disneys zombies #z-o-m-b-i-e-s #buckediah #if you only knew you'd hate me #chapter four #bucky zombies #bucky buchanan #zebediah kaskitt #tw: swearing

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emotionalgirl101 · 5 years

Text

Question | Chapter 7

Words: 3650

Genre: college au, angst, fluff

Pairing: SKZ x reader

Summary: Your best friend, Minho, had been refusing to introduce you to his other group of best friends for months now, with no explanation as to why. One night after getting drunk after work together, he gave in to your pleas. Oops.

Warning: Contains mature content (such as coarse language, violent themes, etc).

A/N: I’m back! 2019 was pretty shitty except for seeing Stray Kids and going to Korea. Thoughts and prayers go out to my fellow Aussies suffering from the fires. I hope you guys like this chapter (it’s the longest so far) and I hope to write and be more active this year!~

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You were just sitting there, staring at your phone. You had been all morning. You were just staring at his contact, looking at the ten numbers below his name. Your eyes scanning over and over again, as if at some point something would change or jump out at you to tell you what to do.

This had been what you’d spent all Thursday afternoon in your apartment doing. Once Minho had left, you quickly saved Jaemin’s contact. You hadn’t told Minho, but you had a feeling he must’ve had some idea because he didn’t give you a weird look when you hadn’t thrown out your bubble tea cup. You’d made some excuse about needing to keep it to remember your order. Instead of getting a sarcastic ‘sure..’ you received a nonchalant, simple ‘okay’. Mans had been acting weird all day.

You still stared at Jaemin’s name and number displayed in your phone. What the hell were you going to do? Do you call? Text? What if he’d forgotten all about you? What if he gave his number out to heaps of girls that came to the shop he worked at? What if you weren’t just some girl, though? What if he was genuinely interested? What if you’d left it too late? What if—

Suddenly, the phone buzzed. The screen faded out of the open contact and back to an incoming call screen, Eunwoo’s name spelled out for you. Thank g*d! It’s like she knew you were overthinking and came to the rescue. She was amazing like that. It happened often. You both just got a gut feeling that something was up and knew when the other needed you. The strange sense of intuition was rarely off, but on the odd occasion it was, a quick catch up was still the end result.

“Hello.” A smile took purchase upon your face before she spoke a word. You could bet it’d be about Jaemin. As soon as Minho had left your place, you texted her to see if she could call. She picked up the phone almost immediately and followed along with your recount of events, squealing occasionally on the other end of the line. You said that you’d contact him the next day because you didn’t want to seem too eager, and as your best friend, she didn’t call you out for lying through your teeth. She understood your nerves but made you promise to text him the following day.

“HAVE YOU DONE IT YET?!” You held the phone away from your ear. You’d expected this, and that it would happen again when you timidly replied with ‘not yet’. She didn’t hesitate to scold you. “WHY THE HELL NOT?” You opened your mouth to reply but shut it. Eunwoo wasn’t finished yet. You knew how dramatic she could be. Her reactions were the best. One of the many things you loved about her.

“He gave you his number! He’s interested! There’s no need to doubt that. All you have to do is send him a text so he has your number. He’ll do the rest.” The line went silent for a few beats. A sigh sounded through the phone. “Want to wait until tomorrow night then?” She was referring to your girls’ night that was scheduled for the next evening. You couldn’t believe how quickly Saturday was approaching. That would be a good time, you agreed mentally, softly responding with an ‘okay’ into the receiver. A few more words were exchanged in an effort to plan before you hung up.

You were tasked with grabbing snacks, an errand you’d have to run today as you wouldn’t have time to tomorrow. You had an unavoidable shift scheduled for work tomorrow, which left you barely any time to get home, changed and to Eunwoo’s by 6pm. She’d planned to start the night early as possible so you would have plenty of time to do whatever the hell you wanted. That meant your day of lounging around in comfy clothes and having some time to yourself wasn’t going to go exactly as planned. At least you wouldn’t have to stray too far from home.

You changed your pants into something more suitable to be seen by the outside world and threw on a hoodie, slipping on some shoes while heading out the door. You placed your keys in your purse and set up your headphones. You didn’t mind the walk to the shops. It was only a few blocks away, allowing you to get lost in your music and be there before you knew it.

The weather wasn’t too cold, probably assisted by the walk, but you couldn’t see the sky. There was a grey blanket of clouds hiding the sun that was inching closer to the horizon. It somehow didn’t feel too dreary. The streets were lined with trees that still held their leaves, looking deceivingly as lush and green as ever. The buildings in the area weren’t all slate grey, having occasional pops of pink, blue and yellow to break up the dull metallics. The neighbourhood was modern and still had a bit of life to it. It cheered up the atmosphere of a rainy day with ease.

Like always, you had arrived at the small grocery store sooner than you’d expected to. The shop was on the corner, well-lit and was decorated with cute signage that invited customers to come inside. You walked in the door and into a random aisle so you could fish out your phone without getting in anyone else’s way. Eunwoo had sent you a shopping list of snacks she thought were ‘essential’ to any girls’ night. You were allowed to add to that list, too, of course. You knew most of the list would be on the sweet side, so it was a safe bet to make your way to the confectionary aisle.

You realised rather quickly you’d need a basket once you saw how long the itinerary-filled text was. As expected, baskets were located in convenient places all over the store, so you pick one up on your way through. You didn’t have many complaints as to what she picked. There was a snack for every craving category you could think of.

After grabbing everything, within reason, you went to grab some drinks. You made it to the end of the aisle and were still staring at your phone when you turned. That’s why you collided with someone. Before you looked up, you began apologising profusely. To be honest, you were too embarrassed to look up, hesitating to meet the person’s eyes. What if you met them again randomly. No one exactly wants to be known as ‘the girl that walked straight into me at the grocery store that one time’.

Once you realised it was inevitable, you finally looked up to find the beaming smile of none other than Kim Seungmin. You recognised him straight away but took a minute to register why. In your defence, you were still half asleep. Yes, at 4 in the afternoon. While you were buffering, Seungmin stabilised you, acknowledging the fact that it was you with a cheerful ‘fancy meeting you here’.

You explained to him that you lived a few blocks away. You were both surprised you hadn’t seen each other in that particular shop before, especially as you both frequented the place often. Seungmin mentioned how you should make your chimek nights a regular thing. The boys had really enjoyed your company, so he said. As he spoke, it was clear that he, and supposedly the other boys, were genuinely excited at the prospect of you spending more time hanging out with them. It was a nice feeling. His eyes lit up a moment later. He then put an idea to you. “We haven’t really planned out dinner, but would you like to come over again tonight? Everyone should be home.”

On any other day you’d accept the offer without a second thought, but with a full work day ahead and the little sleep you were bound to get at Eunwoo’s the next night weighing on your mind, you knew it’d be better to stay home like you planned.

“Thanks, Seungminnie, but I’ve got a big day tomorrow. Can’t risk lack of sleep or a hangover. If the next couple of days weren't so hectic, I'd definitely be saying yes right now, though. Rain check?” Knowing you meant what you'd said, he still made you pinky promise to it. Seungmin helped you with the rest of your shopping list and waited until you had both gone through the checkout before you parted ways.

The walk home seemed longer this time around. Maybe it was because part of you really wanted to turn on your heel and sprint after Seungmin, to take him up on his offer, but you knew you shouldn’t. You’d made the right call.

You made it to work on time for a 9am start, thanks to the good night’s sleep you somehow managed to get. The shift had been steady, with a few customers coming in every couple of hours and contributing to the day's targets. You were alone for the majority, with another girl coming in as lunch cover. You weren’t really close with her, only making small talk for the brief overlap of your shifts because you felt you had to.

2:15pm. You had been checking the clock every 3 minutes for the past half hour. You had only been alone for that long. There wasn’t much to do on a Saturday. All the stock had been unpacked the day before with no new shipments due until later in the next week.

You managed to occupy your time by going through your music library. Your work place was more relaxed when it came to atmospherics. As long as the music was family friendly, language-wise, and fit the vibe, you could play almost anything your heart desired. You weren’t usually in charge. You were either happy listening to what was already playing or just not the first person in that day, thus no control. That being said, it meant that all the work-safe songs were scattered in your library. You decided the best course of action was to make a playlist, and if you questioned whether or not you should add a song, you could play it out loud to see if it passed the test. You were enjoying yourself.

It was now 2:54pm, which you only knew from the incoming text you received from your manager. She had forgotten to mention she didn’t finish up “revamping” the faulty rack. That was her way of saying that there were new items to be added from out the back and to reorganise the rack accordingly. You’d usually complain, but you were pretty bored and creating the playlist was getting tedious. You didn’t realise how much of your music was NSFW.

You were returning from the store room and making your way towards the aforementioned rack behind the counter. That’s when your ears peaked upon hearing the distinct voice. The speaker was obstructed by the left side wall of the hallway you were walking up. No matter. You already knew it was Felix.

The boy was dressed casually in a colour block jumper with a pair of black trousers and some white shoes that resembled a pair you saw in target. He was unaccompanied, phone to his ear and running his hand through his blonde hair as he listened attentively to what was being said on the other side of the line.

A light-hearted sigh tumbled from his lips, spare hand pushing through the close on the rack. You weren’t sure if they were really his taste. His face scrunched up as he flipped through the hangers, but you couldn’t be certain if it was because he didn’t fancy any of the clothes in front of him.

He picked out a shirt, forcing it off the rack and straightening it out to examine it. He tilted his head, a while later humming in acknowledgement of the person he was conversing with. He tucked the shirt under his arm after he had finished his careful consideration, moving on to dig through more clothes. You watched, amused.

He had grabbed a second shirt, two jumpers and a pair of shorts as well as ended his phone call before he realised there were a set of eyes on him. There was a subtle hint of hesitation when he turned around. His gaze was adorably blank and sheepish when he turned, but it was like a light bulb switched on when he recognised your face. "Y/n! What are you doing here?"

The amount of genuine wonder that laced his tone was so sincere. He obviously hadn't noticed the lanyard around your neck and the unusually nice clothes you were wearing - okay, you sometimes wore nice clothes, but this didn't exactly scream your usual style. You thought there would be no harm in teasing him for his lack of observation, as well as his forgetfulness. You mentioned where you worked the night you all met. Then again, the mental image of a passed out Felix followed by his hungover state the next morning flashed through your mind. Oh well, it was Felix. From what you knew, he wouldn't mind too much.

"Oh, you know, just watching you being a fashionista and leaving a trail of destruction for me to clean up later." His face changed from confusion, to processing - once he noticed the lanyard - to realisation before settling on embarrassment. His cheeks were tinged pink as he uttered the next string of words, "Sorry, I wasn't really thinking," he rubbed the back of his neck, looking anywhere but at you, "I was on the phone to Channie hyung and was so lost in thought and trying to multitask. I swear I'm not usually this careless- I mean, I have a lot of respect and understanding for retail workers-"

"Felix" He hadn't taken a breath and part of you swore his face was soon to turn blue. "I'm just teasing. I wasn't serious." You chuckled lightly as his nervous laughter, followed by a relieved sigh from the blonde. "I'm glad."

You made your way over, gesturing for him to give you his items of choice. You offered to set up a change room for him while he continued to browse the mens section. You pointed out he may have missed a few things since he was so wrapped up in his phone call. You left him to his own devices and started to begin work on the usual closing duties. There wasn't much you could do, since it was so early, but at least it gave you a head start on the end-of-day.

Some time later, he made his way to the change rooms. You let him be until he called out to you for assistance. "Okay, thoughts on this outfit...?" proceeding to emerged from the change room with the shorts and one of the jumpers from earlier, a different, collared top peeking through around the neckline and past the over-layer's hem. The idea was there, but the execution wasn't. The colours of the shirt and jumper not only didn't match but were different hues. Anyone with a basic knowledge of colour theory would be feeling sympathetic towards his attempt at styling.

"Usually I have Hyunjin or Seungmin to give me advice, but they're both working today and this is the only free time I had." You nodded slowly, mainly trying to think of the best way to let him down gently enough for him not to lose hope in his ability to do this by himself. The comment about the other boys was a clear indicator that he usually doubted himself. Any other colour scheme and it would've looked great.

"Honestly, you have a good sense of style," You proceeded, worried his face would light up before you got to your constructive criticism, "but the colouring of the top half doesn't work. It also doesn't really compliment your skin tone." You looked up, gaging his response. He nodded thoughtfully. He spoke again.

"Do you think any of these would suit me?" He moved aside so you could peer into the change room. You scanned the options and managed to put together an outfit, however, you had something else in mind. "Okay. Before I do anything, what is this outfit for?" You looked to him. It went unspoken that the occasion influenced the styling choice you both had to make. You almost thought he hesitated before he spoke, ”It's for a party, but it's slightly on the nicer side." I thoughtful hum slipped past your lips. “So, are you thinking of something that looked kind of effortless but still looks really good?" He smiled at how well you understood him, "Precisely."

You gestured to the initial outfit you came up with from his chosen items, "try that on as a 'fit while i work on something. I have an idea and I think it'll really suit you." Without a moment wasted, you turned on your heel and went back out onto the floor to dig up a few things you had noted earlier. To your delight, no one else had come in. You could fully focus on your 'help Felix with styling' mission.

You returned with two similar concepts in mind, but completely different colour palettes. As you rounded the corner to the change rooms, Felix emerged in a timely fashion, decked out in the first possible outfit. It was very Felix but still had a clear theme in terms of colour. He stood in a blue turtleneck with the black pants he walked in with and his white shoes. He accessorised with the his beanie he must’ve bought elsewhere, it conveniently being a similar shade of blue.

"What do you think?" His arms spread wide to showing off the look inspired by his own taste. It was a good start, but you thought he could do better. So, you told him just that. With a quick nod and a grin, the boy took the next set from your hands and disappeared behind the curtin. You could tell he was already regaining his confidence. All he needed was a push in the right direction.

Felix returned a short while later. He looked into the mirror at the outfit while you spoke, "Okay, so this one isn't your usual style but I thought it suited your skin tone a lot better than your first outfit." He nodded again. He stared awhile longer. When he looked back to you, it was obvious you agreed. "It's really cool, but-"

"-it's way too put together to look effortless." You finished his sentence, receiving a hum from the boy, which most likely was along the lines of couldn't agree more. "Honestly, I'm kind of happy because this one already had my vote to begin with." The genuine excitement in your voice made him laugh lightly. He traded the other garments for those strung over your arm. You fixed up the pieces on their hangers while you waited.

Felix practically sauntered out of the change room, confidence radiating off of his body now. He looked good, you had to admit. Felix wore the plain white tee he already had on prior to the fashion escapade. It was fitted beautifully to his chest and peaked out teasingly from beneath the blue and black sports jacket. The positioning on his shoulders along with its length was just right. The denim jeans were a new addition, rounding out the outfit. His hair still slightly messy from the beanie, yet smoothed out moments earlier with the palms of his hands. Every element worked in harmoniously, and the way he pulled off the colour story, effortless. You did good, Y/n. The whole look was perfect, fitting the brief, and you had to admit, he looked pretty hot. "I know I don't need to say it, but this wins hands down." He smirked. This bitch knew he looked good.

Once he was back in his original attire, Felix rejoined you at the checkout. The total cost was slightly more than what what he had in his budget, but you didn't mind bending the rules for a friend. You applied your discount, to which he thanked you profusely, and sat back while the system processed what he had paid. You bagged his newly acquired sports jacket and jeans, tossing in the receipt, "if you want, you can even try it with a pair of black shoes. I reckon it'd look even better." You smiled.

He returned it, "Thanks for all your help, Y/n. Sorry for taking up so much of your time." You hadn't even glanced at the time since Felix had come in. You almost squealed when you noticed it was already 4:16pm. 14 minutes until closing. "No, thank YOU, Felix. I swear I was dying at how slow the shift was going. Besides, I had a lot of fun." His grin widened but faulted, startled when his phone began to ring. "I better go but I'll see you soon, hopefully. Thanks again!" He gave you a half-hearted wave while he answered the call. He walked out the doors, turning the corner and was instantly out of view.

Apart from the two Asian aunties perusing the sale jewellery, the floor was dead. It was now 4:19pm. You could start the end-of-day routine. You figured out that if you timed it right, you could have the floors vacuumed, tills counted and the place all locked up by 4:37pm. You sprung into action, happily reminiscing on what was obviously the highlight of you shift and enjoyed the lull of music that was still playing.

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leanarg · 4 years

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Practice Challenge II

((Hi again! So, these are 3 fics in one post! Including my first two rps with @ladyreggiewright (our very first one after ages not doing this so asdfghk) and with @wylan-caldwell I had so much fun doing both, so thank you, guys! <3 Thanks for reading too, hope you enjoy them as much as I stuggled writing them ;P Google Docs link: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1ARTjqveFJ1njDc2LL0PU4C0ShN2jlO9JC1Imt9MDTh8/edit?usp=sharing ))

A CHANGE OF LUCK

“Alright, y’all ready?” Rita said with a loud voice vibrating with nervousness. “The speeches are over. In the next block, Prince Arin will be picking the names.” That was her fifth lap around the entertainment office floor and she just couldn’t stop repeating what Vandy Post had already announced before each round of commercials. I knew she was trying to act authoritative, but seeing her in this state was always amusing.

It wasn’t unusual that the building was bursting with energy this late at night. The pre-press team always stayed working on putting together the bulldog broadsheets content and adding the last details, then sent the whole thing before the deadline to the press team operating on the last floor, where they were all in charge of the printing process. I would dare to say there was activity in this place 24/7. But this particular night, we were focused on The Report. The streets looked almost empty from up here, everyone was at home in front of their TV waiting for the names of the lucky girls randomly picked by a drawing of names out of different crystal boxes. 35 provinces, 35 boxes, 35 names.

My attention had been focused on Arin’s stern expression. His life was about to be decided by fate, or as many people want to call it, destiny. I wonder what was he thinking, standing there expressionless, willing to uphold his duty.

Is he excited? Is he nervous? Is he wishing he could run away from that room and leave all this tradition behind?

My name was inside of one of the boxes, so I should had been even more anxious and edgy than Rita herself, but, after the PET Gala fiasco, where: I hadn’t gotten the clues I was so close to getting, I hadn’t finished the job I was supposed to be doing and my one month salary had been reduced to half; I was certain that whoever was in charge of my luck was not very fond of me.

“They are back!” Rita shouted as soon as Arin’s face reappeared. Everyone in the room fell silent. I scoffed a laugh when I noticed them unconsciously leaning slightly towards the big tv, but I ended up doing the same after adjusting my glasses. One by one the basic information of the selected were being transcribed from the screen to our devices as Arin picked out their papers.

<< “From Allens, Idalia Moretti, from Angeles, Emily Rose White,... from Honduragua, Callia Adair…” >>

My fingers were moving fast across my cellphone’s keyboard. These were the girls we would be hearing a lot about from now on and I needed to know everything about them.

<< “From Labrador, Lea…” >>

I froze. My head felt dizzy trying to take in what I had just heard. For the shortest of seconds, everyone’s eyes were on me. I could hear Rita’s voice instructing them to get back to work and maybe someone else was now in charge of The Globe’s blog but at that moment I couldn’t care less about that.

It’s really happening... I made it to the selection!

Finally, I could stand up. I was feeling so much energy inside me that I wanted to run. Suddenly, the lift made a sound and my dad came quickly out of it and … wait, my mom is here? She was carrying my sleepy little brother, Dean.

I could read the shock on my parents’ faces.“I’m in!!” I said a little too loud but since Mr. Grant was there no one dared to complain. My dad let out a short laugh before extending his arms for an embrace. “Congratulations, Rosie, I knew it would happen, didn’t I tell you V?” He said to my mom. “Grants always get what they want.”

Ugh, I wish. But I wasn’t going to argue with him right now, so I just offered him a wink.

As soon as my father let go, my mom surrounded me with her free arm. “So how does it feel to be a lady, huh? We have to celebrate this!”

“Well, do ladies feel hungry this late? Cause I wasn’t feeling it a moment ago.” “Yes, let’s leave these guys to work in peace.” my dad said suddenly remembering where we were. After clearing his throat as if that simple gesture was a switch between the dad and the boss, he talked with Rita to make sure someone had replaced me updating the blog, then he congratulated everyone for their dedication and finally wished them good night. “I just hope you are paying me the full day,” I said to my dad as we all headed outside.

“I mean, are you working right now?” He raised an eyebrow, mockingly.

I sighed “I guess Grants can’t always get what they want after all.” And I meant it in more than one way.

The next week ran fast. My father and I agreed that I had to keep going to the office as usual, but it wasn’t easy to balance my work and my phone ringing every 5 minutes. More than once I had to ride home in the middle of the day because someone was waiting for me at home.

First, a man with a very peculiar face came to do some kind of interrogation, which was understandable until we got to the most uncomfortable, personal ones. I almost spit my coffee laughing until I realized he had no intention to leave until he got every answer to each one of the questions on his list.

Like him, I received a tailor and a doctor; but it wasn’t until the press started to ask for interviews when I realized my life had made a turn of 360 degrees.

The thing I lamented the most about this odd schedule was that I couldn’t travel to the provinces to interview some of the selected as we had planned, but I did take advantage of every opportunity I had to do deep research about them.

Some of the names or last names could be found on old newspaper editions, there were tragedies, accomplishments, unfortunate events… I smiled to myself, while I made annotations on my journal, fascinated by all the different interesting lives that were about to gather under the same roof. And I guess somehow that included mine.

The farewell party organized by Labrador’s Mayor seemed more like a political campaign than a real party. I might have fallen asleep during his speech if I hadn’t been texting Harris for the 40th time that week.

The last time I knew something about him was the night of the announcement when he sent me a simple “Congratulations, Lady Lea.” Then as the photographer, he had to go with Rea to the half-tour over the country to cover the selected interviews.

“How dare you not be here when you are needed,... you lucky mooncalf.”

I looked up to see the crowd from my place on the big platform set in the middle of the Amberly park. It hadn’t been a very good idea, because there were grey clouds gathering over us and the sun was partially covered by them already.

Someone forgot to check the weather section today.

But the trees surrounding us were decorated with purple and green metallic balloons -the colors of our province- and there were several signs with good wishes so I appreciated the effort.

Everyone was here; The Globe employees that didn’t like me at all, my family on the first row, my college best friend, Liv had made space on her busy schedule to come to the event, even my grandmother had sent his chauffeur with presents. That was her way to show support and I honestly didn’t have any complaints. After the Mayor’s speech, the great boss Maxwell Loyd took the microphone to speak, I rolled my eyes, not caring about the people in front of me. He didn’t waste this opportunity to promote himself and flatter me. I mean, if he really had thought all that about me I would have had a promotion and a raise already, instead I just got ridiculous instructions and a handshake.

When they both finally finished, the rain had started to pour, plus it was almost time for me to leave for the airport. I buttoned my coat before taking my place behind the microphone to start talking, but the eyes of the lady in charge of my schedule forced me to skip until the end of the speech I had prepared the night before. Every time I was going to make it sound deep and sentimental she made a sign for me to hurry.

“I appreciate your support… I will do my best… thank you for coming.”

Were the only complete sentences I managed to say under such pressure. There was clapping and cheering afterwards, but there was after the previous boring speeches as well, so I didn’t get too excited about that.

“Have a good time, my Lea.” My mother said after kissing my brow. I could smell her sweet perfume that I was going to miss. “I will, mom. Take care, I’m only leaving cause I know you are going to be in charge.” I side eyed the two men of the house. Then I kissed my little brother and messed his blond hair. “Bye bye little toad.” He just babbled something and waved his little hand.

“So, Lady Grant. What do you expect from Prince Arin? Do you secretly plan to drink all the coffee from the Angele’s Palace? Rumor has it your father won’t let you marry until you turn 48 years old do you think Your Highness would wait for you that long?” “Wow, Mr. Grant you ask pretty basic questions, I have been asked the same ones all week.” He gave me a big tight hug and I ignored the wool of his coat feeling itchy on my cheek. “I’m very proud of you Leana, and of course I’m not talking about this selection situation… I’m sorry about-” I stopped him not wanting to have our little disagreements as today’s last memory. And I also hoped I could change his mind by the time I returned home. “We can talk about that when I come back, dad.” He nodded. “I’m starting to feel bad for our dear Prince Arin.” I scoffed a laugh.

“Lady Grant, we are past the established hours already.” I heard a lady behind me.

I turned to my friend Liv with an apologetic expression but she just smiled and waved. “I will text you… Bye! The rain started to fall harder but I had read the weather section on the paper this morning so I was properly dressed with boots and a coat over my white shirt and black pants.

I walked towards a guard who was holding an opened umbrella to cover us with it. He opened the door of the car. Then he offered to take my bag for me, but I had packed some of my old journals in there among my personal things. “Thank you… What’s your name?” “Finn Ray, my lady.” He answered confused. “I will keep this here with me, Finn.” I said in what I hoped was a reassuring tone before entering the car. I guessed he was new at guarding selected, because I noticed him turning to look at the woman in charge of the schedule. She nodded once at him and joined me inside the limousine.

By the time we got to the airport I had learned that our chauffeur was called Alan Cobb, he had been working for the palace for 3 years on special occasions. He had three kids and his wife was expecting a baby girl.

The strict lady was Miss Ramirez, she was happily single, obviously tardiness was her biggest pet peeve and she had worked there for 6 years already, but she enjoyed her job and had never thought of doing anything else, although I didn’t quite understand exactly which was her role in the royal offices of Labrador.

She left me at the boarding door after wishing me luck.

The flight to Angeles was long. I shared a plane with 3 others selected, that seemed pretty decent at first sight.

We had a polite introduction conversation before we took off, but then everyone focused on her own thing; Jen Li, -the Yale law student from Waverly- took advantage of the 8 hours flight to sleep. Alana Hansen looked out from the window almost the whole time lost in her thoughts, and based on the green tone on Regina Wright’s face I guessed she was a risky company for the moment.

I remembered I had read about her parents' unfortunate plane accident in an old newspaper, they used to be famous politicians and she was an apple that had fallen close to the tree. Hopefully not too close.

So, considering my options I prefer to write in my journals during the whole trip.

As soon as we arrived we were hurried to a room for makeovers. For me it felt more like a day in the salon, nothing drastic was made, just a few lights on my hair, perfect makeup and a stunning blue dress with matching elegant pump heels shoes.

They did insisted on giving me contact lenses, since I had forgotten to pack mine, so after a long argument with the stylist, Mariel, I decided to wear the contacts and let him enjoy “his creation”.

In the end, despite the little changes, when he showed me my reflection in the mirror, I had to recognize I was content with the upgraded version of me.

ESSENTIAL RESEARCH

The tour around the palace was quite short considering its size. I was almost sure that it was bigger on the inside than it looked on the outside, but the curiosity to see my new room, made me settle with the basic information,

I took a glance down at the little map on my hand. Eloise Hall room 28, second floor. As I headed to the stairs, the decorations and fancy details surrounding me were impossible to ignore. With every step you could find paintings by famous old artists -my mother admired- hanging on the walls, expensive vases and beautiful furniture.

Looking around I spotted one of the selected quickly scribbling some notes in a notebook. As I got closer I noticed she was my plane mate, Regina Wright. Her green tone had disappeared or maybe covered with makeup and she looked much more secure now that we were down here on earth soil.

I laughed a little bit inside walking by her side “Hope whatever you are writing is worth a bump on your head.”

“I hope so too” She said absentmindedly, not looking up from her notebook. After some seconds she took a short look at me, flipped through her notebook and quickly closed it before I could react and lean discreetly to read what she was working on.

Okay, now I’m curious.

“Excuse me, hi. Leana is it?” She gave me a polite smile.

“Yes, feeling better... Regina..? I asked faking ignorance.

She looked at me as she didn’t know why I was asking her that but then just answered, “Splendid. But please, call me Reggie.”

We continue walking up the stairs towards the second floor, while we shook hands,

“I'm Leana Grant but you can call me Lea or Lee” I said touching the arc of my glasses I had put back on as soon as I left the makeover room.

She nodded. “Alright, Lea. Journalist, correct?” She made her pen click as if she was going to start writing again. I frowned, puzzled. “You too?”

She chuckled at the question as if I should already know who she was. And the truth was, I did.

“No,” she finally said, opening her notebook again, adding something, then she continued. “So, what brings you here?”

I was sure Reggie had many qualities but subtlety wasn’t one of them.

I pressed my lips together, thinking about my motives, which one of them should I tell her? I’m here as an inside informant for The Globe; or, I’m here to live and learn about this whole selection phenomenon… I didn’t even know which one was the right answer. “... just figured I couldn't miss this whole thing, you know.”

Half- truths are always safe.

“Are you here for politics?” I added before she could even think about my answer.

She looked pleasantly surprised by my question, clearing her throat. “Yes, that is one of the reasons.” She narrowed her eyes at me. “You did your research.”

I guess it was my turn to feel recognized, but unlike her I didn’t want to be so obvious, so I shrugged. “Your name rang a bell.”

She looked at me suspiciously, lifting her chin, a slight movement I didn’t quite understand. “Is that so? That's good, I suppose. Best to be prepared.”

“Maybe you are right, I guess you actually did your research. What do you have about me?” I asked directly now, pointing at her notebook casually.

She remained serious. “Oh, just the usual. Occupation, caste, age. Name, obviously. There's 35 of us after all. Would be a shame to get anyone mixed up.”

“Well, now most of us are threes and the twos are pretty well known.”

“Yes well, obviously. Was to be expected. It's still an appropriate mix.”

Her statement made me remember her parents somehow, obviously she had their school but I wonder how much she agreed with them. “That’s... a word to describe it, yes.” I answered incredulous, “So where are you staying?” I asked, as I noticed I have already found my room.

We discovered we were room neighbors which I decided was very convenient for me. I liked people who have answers to my questions.

She was concerned about my acoustic guitar hobby and I assured her I hadn’t brought mine with me. “The music room will do.” And she assured me her studying was going to be silent.

The conversation continued but my curiosity was already unbearable, so I opened the door of my room to check it out. I didn’t want to be rude so I invited Reggie inside as we talked.

“What are you working on?” I stepped inside

She followed. “Political Science Major.”

I gave her a glance to let her know that was not the answer I was looking for.

She blinked with realization. “Oh, I see I misunderstood. Well, actually I was just writing a paper on the pros and cons of capitalism and if our country should focus more on it like we did when we were still called the 'United States'” She air quoted the name.

I looked around my room considering her answer. Suddenly my eyes met with three maids standing in line in the middle of the room. When they saw us they made a courtesy and I nodded at them as a greeting, hoping we can have proper introductions later.

“Hmm the lesser of evils... but the United States not exactly an example to be followed.” I said to Reggie.

“Exactly.” She said. I noticed her writing a mark in her notebook.

“A-are you like grading me?” I dared to ask what I had suspected since the beginning, but I didn’t want to believe. It was shocking at first but after the third mark it became amusing.

“Who else do you have in there?” I asked curiously before running next to her to peek at her notebook. She closed it again. When I looked at her she smiled at me awkwardly “No, of course not. Just remembered something.” Her notebook was behind her back, now out of my reach. She straightened her shoulders before adding, “Well, thank you kindly for your invitation, glad to have met you…”

I stayed there confused, Had I gotten it wrong? Or was I right and she didn’t want me to know? Anyway, I should have said nothing. “Alright ... glad to meet you too, see you around.” I said worried that she might be uncomfortable now.

She nodded as she headed to the door. One of the maids hurried to hold the door for her.

I frowned concerned, I couldn’t just lose a source like her. “Wait for me tomorrow, I think we can walk to the dining room together.”

She turned to give me a frown, seemingly confused by my suggestion. “But I already know where it-” then she smiled. “I will.”

As soon as Reggie left I took out the journal from the pocket of my dress and tossed on the pretty desk by a large window where I peered at the view of the Angeles city.

FOR THE RECORD.

After introductions my maids brought me dinner up to my room. So while I was eating the best creamy mustard chicken I ever had, we had a little chat.

Among other things we talked about I expressed my surprise when I didn’t see any Royals when we arrived. Liberty, Camila and confirmed the Schreaves didn’t plan to meet any selected tonight, we would have to wait until morning. Queen Anjeli and Princess Ayesha had to leave the palace to attend important matters and Wylan Caldwell in spite of not being a selected was currently living in the Palace. Back in Labrador, I managed between college, work and extra work to fill my schedule, my mother never liked me being out of the house so late at night or sometimes not being able to have a complete breakfast in the morning, I enjoyed being busy and drive my Vespa from one place to another, but it was hard for me to admit that one of the reasons I liked my life that way was that besides when I was concentrated writing notes on my iTypewriter; I was not good at being alone with my thoughts. That’s why when I was a child my mother bought me a ukulele to play when I was feeling anxious, which gave excellent results. Later when I entered college I took a short guitar course with the same purpose.

Therefore, later that afternoon, when my maids went back to their chores, leaving me alone I decided to leave my room to check out the music room, as I promised Reggie I would do.

It took me some minutes to find the right door downstairs but my memory had never failed me and it wasn’t going to start now.

I opened the third door in the west hall and peeked inside. I felt relieved when I saw the big piano in the last corner and dared to walk inside. Besides the piano, there were several instruments resting on their stands spread around the room, most of them to play classical music, but luckily, an acoustic guitar was among them. I was going to pick it up to test it when I spotted shelves full of old vinyl records.

I walked towards the vinyl record player, it had a beautiful vintage look, it’s big horn imitated the ancient gramophones used during the Victorian years, but I suspected to be a more recent model.

I noticed someone had left a classic record on, I wonder which one of the Royals had been listening to it as I moved the tonearm onto the outer edge of the disk, the little diamond tip to touch the groove.

I guess I still remember how to use one of this.

I stretched my arm and pulled one of the discs from the upper shelf, the others came down with it and << "KNEEE-KNEEE!!" >>

The blaring sound of violins vibrated around the room making me wince for the annoying sound filling my ears.

“Damn!” I covered my ears while trying to find a way to turn the bloody record player off before my head exploded. Overwhelmed by the sound I went on my knees and stretched my hand behind the furniture looking desperately for the plug, but before I could find any the music stopped.

I stood up still touching my ears

Have I gone deaf?

“I take you didn’t mean to do that.” I heard someone say behind me.

Okay, I haven’t

I turned around to find a guy eyeing me warily, from the corner of my eye I noticed a laptop and a couple of heavy leather books that weren't on the table before.

“I was considering turning it on but it made the decision for me,” I said without explaining.

At that moment, a couple of guards came into the room alarmed. They scanned the room quickly before looking at us puzzled.

Wylan followed my gaze and turned to them, slightly. “Just a mishap. We’re fine.” He acknowledged with a wave of his hand. I let out a sigh of relief as they left the room to return to their posts.

“First time using a record player?” He asked to continue teasing

I gave him a deadpan look. “Ha-ha I take that the last person who played it had some hearing problems.” Before I crouched to pick up the rest of the vinyl records still scattered on the carpeted floor, I noticed a smile tugging at his lips that didn’t last.

In a minute he was bending in front of me to help. “You picked some good ones.”

Suddenly we looked at each other for a second, I narrowed my eyes suspiciously at his for a second trying to figure any sign of sarcasm in them, and he just had the word “awkward” written all over his face. Obviously I was making him feel uncomfortable.

I would have laughed if I hadn’t been so busy trying to read him.

“I like classics- acoustic to be precise.” I finally said with a shrug. “Do you own any of these?”

“This John Mayer one is mine. I have some other ones too. They’re over there.” He gestured to the rack behind me, then stood up with the vinyls he helped pick up.

I raised my eyebrow and nodded approvingly. “You have some taste, I will give you that.” I looked up at him, waiting for him to offer his hand for me to help me stand, but apparently living in a castle was no guarantee of anything, so I just stood up slowly, brushing my dress.

“Some were gifts I grew to love.” He acknowledged, holding the vinyls out for me. “I’d recommend keeping the volume down before you turn it on next time.”

I took the discs to put them back in its place on the shelves “Well, you should put a sign somewhere,” I joked, a bit annoyed by his recommendation.

I adjusted my glasses and stayed standing there, admiring the vinyl records once more. My curious mind wondered about the Prince. “Which ones are Arin’s?”

“I’m not sure. He might not own any.” I caught him glancing at his things he had left on the table before back to me. “Might be a good question to ask him yourself.”

Or you’re just evading the question. But fortunately, one of the things my job had teached me was to have thick skin so I wasn’t going to let him get away so easily.

“You really don’t know or you don’t want to tell me?” I asked with an amusing tone.

He let out a small sigh, relenting a bit. “He likes The Killers. There’s probably a vinyl or two of those in here if you really need a good conversation starter.”

I faked a grimace “ugh! that piece of information should’ve hurt…” I said mockingly before adding. “I guess some advice for tomorrow’s interview is completely out of the table.”

“Depends on what advice you’re looking for,” he let out, surprising me.

I started to walk around the room still looking at him, considering my answer. “I don’t know, you are his friend... knowing a little bit about his personality would help,” I said casually, as if I didn’t already have thousands of questions listed in my head.

But somehow he knew I did. “I’ll answer one question you have. Just one.”

“So generous …” I said more to myself than to him. My hand went unconsciously inside the pocket on my dress and my fingers touched my journal inside of it, purely out of habit. Of course, I wasn’t going to take it out so I crossed my hands in front of me as I resumed my walking around the room.

“Okay…” In my mind I was looking for a single question that could indirectly tell me things about Arins personality … and why not about Mr. Uncomfortable himself too.

“How do you start getting along back in college, like how did you become friends?”

Suddenly he let out a laugh, startling me. I frowned at first, but then I decided it wasn’t so bad, it picked my curiousness further.

I looked at him genuinely amused and he begined, “We were both going for runs and without knowing, I drifted a little too close. I was listening to music and not paying attention. His bodyguard sort of…” He paused to bring his fist to his neck simulating a punch. “And took me down.” I could see he was amused, for real.

I laughed picturing the scene on my mind, considering all his previous teasing and had to admit it was a little bit entertaining to do so. “Ouch! His bodyguard does look ... fierce.” I commented remembering the man’s complexion I had seen several times on TV.

I wait for him to continue before asking, “what happened next? What did Arin say?”

His smile was more like a ghost on his face now, not physically there but somehow still present. “He apologized. After that we found out we shared a couple classes together and I offered to help him study for exams.”

“That’s an epic story… I bet it left you marked for some days.” I made a grimace, touching my neck, imagining the pain.

“Swallowing hurt, to say the least,” he said, remembering. After a minute, he combed a hand through his hair. “ Did that satisfy your question?”

“Hmm yeah, it was good, for now” I answered scoffing a laugh. The truth was I didn’t expect to enjoy his story that much, but I just couldn’t settle with only one question, but it wasn’t convenient to push more questions on him now.

Fortunately he didn’t refuse, he just rolled his eyes at me, amused. “Alright, well I have to get back to work. At least try to not deafen the entire palace again.”

“I can’t promise anything.” I let out, finally taking the acoustic guitar from its stand, while he turned to gather his things.

“Reassuring.” He gave me a side glance and started walking out the room, he offered a two fingered salute before disappearing behind the opened door.

After a second, while looking down at the guitar already in place on my lap, I compelled, “Wylan... thanks!”

“You're welcome.”

I heard him say from the hallway just before I started strumming the guitar strings, hoping its sound was enough to help me survive the first night.

#OC 6 #PC part 2 #Reggie Wright #Wylan Caldwell #((thanks again to Cassey for reading and giving me some perspective ))

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