#but guitar/bass would be sexy as fuck

[nintendont2502]

I should learn drums that would increase my tboy swag by like. At least 50% I think

[toviolet]

so annoyed that i won’t get to see these sick taiwanese indie bands when im there. cmon past me why didn’t we do research like any earlier :(

[sugarlywhispers]

Rock band!Bakugou Katsuki. He plays the drums and sometimes sings, but the main singer of the band is Denki. Kirishima plays the electric guitar, Tokoyami the bass and Sero the keyboard. Shinsou and Bakugou are the masterminds behind the lyrics, while Jirou produces.

They aren't extrictly rock, they love to play with sounds and knew styles.

That's why you became their fan. They are not big in the industry, but they are quite known. You haven't missed a single presentation –no matter how small or big– since you found them.

You have spoken to them here and there, especially since that day when you ventured to ask for their autograph after a presentation at the parking lot when they were putting away their instruments inside their van.

Denki and Kirishima were so excited they even offered pictures, which you definitely took with them. Tokoyami, Sero and Shinsou played it cool. Jirou gifted you a necklace with the pick she used when she played her guitar sometimes –of course you hugged her in thanks. Bakugou, on the other hand, acted like it simply didn't matter, like he didn't care one ounce.

Little did you know, Katsuki knew exactly who you were.

How could he not? He had seen you in every presentation, right there in the front, cheering and screaming for the band. Looking all beautiful and cool, never shying away from recommending their music to anyone who would listen –and yes, he knows this because he has stalked your social media accounts.

In his defense, he found you by mere coincidence. He was suddenly swamped by edits of him in his personal account and right there, in one comment, he found yours.

The video intented to be a compilation onf him acting sexy, all Katsuki smiling and making faces for the fans as he looses himself in his drums. A comment said, "daddy material". That made him snort amused. But he almost choked on air then he recognized your profile picture –even that small in the comment section– answering to it with a simple: "agreed 😍🥵".

Not one, but TWO fucking emojis.

He felt like in fucking cloud nine.

Again, it had been mere coincidence, but he would deny to everyone that he was always looking forward to any publication you made.

So yeah, even though he acted a bit cold and mean, you couldn't avoid the think he was just... Fuck. Awesome. Handsome.

That's how you found yourself completely enraptured when a new song is announced in the middle of the concert, and non other than Bakugou Katsuki stepped in the front after Denki himself presented him as the singer.

Katsuki sang with his eyes closed most of the time, but in the moments he did open them, you swear he was looking at you. You wished. That was your head playing with you... Right?

.

Only if you knew that Katsuki wrote that song thinking about you. For you.

[sparrowofthedawnsworld]

For everyone’s entertainment (because according to my friend, it’s hilarious that I’ve fucked to nearly every gvf song) -

Greta Songs that I have done the deed to and how I rank them:

Age Of Machine, 10/10 - this one hit. I can’t even begin to explain it. If you haven’t put this song on your filthy playlist, it should be on there. Go do it.

The Archer, 10/10 - Gah damn. That’s all I can even say about this one.

The Barbarians, 10/10 - Obviously. I mean, come on. Good shit.

Frozen Light, 10/10 - That bass line? She’s sexy, so therefore… it fits a sexy environment.

Fate Of The Faithful, 9.5/10 - This one is down right NASTY. Like holy fuck I’d let this song put a baby in me. DAYUM when I tell y’all this one just hits different. Jesus christ.

Stardust Chords, 9/10 - I know what y’all are probably thinking… but it’s so good.

The Falling Sky, 9/10 - Was definitely adding to the intensity. In the right situation, this shit will get you railed.

Built By Nations, 9/10 - Once again… if the vibes are right, shit will get you railed. It’s heavenly, really.

The Weight Of Dreams, 9/10 - This shit was almost like an otherworldly experience. The guitar solo??? Yeah. Mhm. Orgasmic.

Meeting The Master, 8.5/10 - The change in intensity throughout this song is really what makes it so good to me.

Sacred The Thread, 8/10 - This shit… whew. The drums sell it. The rhythm is immaculate, tbh.

Brave New World, 8/10 - would have NEVER truly expected this one to hit as hard as it did. Good god.

My Way Soon, 8/10 - This one is solid. If it played again while I was doing it, I wouldn’t be mad at all.

Watching Over, 7.5/10 - I can’t say it let me down. It didn’t. It doesn’t always fit the vibes, though.

Lover, Leaver (Taker, Believer), 7/10 - Again, could absolutely dig it in the right situation, otherwise I would deem it a little much.

The Indigo Streak, 6.5/10 - While the solo is sooo fuckinggg sexy, the song overall would not be my first choice, but I don’t dislike it, either.

Safari Song, 6.5/10 - this one was pretty fun after you get beyond Josh’s scream at the beginning 💀

Age Of Man, 6.5/10 - This one would genuinely be sooo much higher on the list, if it didn’t make me so damn emotional.

The Cold Wind, 6/10 - this one’s crazy but… on the occasion I like it.

Light My Love, 6/10 - Unless you’re trying to be all sweet and sappy, I’d stay away from this one… but it was lovely. I won’t lie. I liked it.

Trip The Light Fantastic, 5.5/10 - I loved it and also felt weird about it all at once???

Caravel, 5/10 - I… As sexy as the bass line is, for some reason it just didn’t quite scratch the itch in my brain all the way.

Talk On The Street, 5/10 - Before actually fucking to it, I would have said, “hell yeah, I bet this one would be great!” But it’s just mid.

Heat Above, 5/10 - So sweet… but i’d rather not have flashbacks to my greta show and suddenly be on the verge of tears.

Highway Tune, 4.5/10 - I tried it simply because Jake said it was in a sex scene…

Tears Of Rain, 4/10 - Lowkey… could have put this higher, but also I have to mentally prepare for this song or I will cry. Sooo… idk.

Broken Bells, 3/10 - Great if you like choking on sobs while having sex.

Flower Power 2/10 - This one played on accident… And i did lay there contemplating leaning over and skipping it.

You’re The One, 1/10 - I just… I can’t. It’s TOO sweet, like in a little highschool crush kind of way.

Farewell For Now, 0/10 - This one couldn’t have played at a worse time and I hated every second of it. Love the song, but not for THAT.

[sucker4sixx]

Raising hell

Pt.3

PLOT: you and the crüe need to preform a set together and for nikki.. it doesnt go as planned..

WARNINGS: public embarrassment

You spend the rest of your Sunday complaining about having to preform with the crüe, your managers call both bands to a rehearsal studio to practice what you will do, mick, the guitarist for mötley is very vocal about how short notice this is and how it wont end well, some of your band mates agree but mick just glares at them when they speak up, not wanting to deal with their “shit”. Nikki doesnt even steal glances of you or try to avoid you, as if nothing happened and it makes you feel incredibly awkward.

After practicing how you will enter the stage and the set list and running it through you all agree you know what your doing, not wanting to spend a second more with eachother. Your band head back and offer for you to go out but you just wanted to go back to the hotel and sulk in your hungover state.

Later that night, round about 11:27 you get a knock at your door, you get up and open it to a drunk nikki, hes breathing heavily and swaying alittle. “Nikki? What are you doing here?” He rolls his eyes “im good thanks.. here” he passes you your bottle opener you left in his hotel room the night before. “Sorry for making things awkward and uncomfortable but.. you get where i was coming from yeah?”

“Yeah.. lets just.. forget about it okay?” You both nod and fall silent. “Why dont you come in? We dont need to do anything-“ he cuts you off “no.. i better get back to my bed” you give a small smile “okay.. night night Nikki” he leans down to press a soft kiss to your cheek, “night night sweetheart” he makes his way back to his own hotel room and you close the door, your cheeks going red.

The next day your bands need to be in extra early, the set up on the stage was crazy, two drum kits, two basses, two guitars and two singers.. hectic. Your band would play your songs while the other band would walk around stage, having to act like they would punch you in a second and the same the other way around.

Nikkis in a shit mood, incredibly stressed and taking it out on everyone, you accidentally trip up over his foot during rehearsals and he growls “clumsy bitch!” He spits, you get up and try to square up even though he was almost a whole foot taller. “Hey! Its not my fault you have big clown feet!” He smirks “you know what they say about big feet right?” Your blood runs hot at his smugness “yeah.. must be why your a huge dick!”

Show time comes and you and nikki are 10 arguments in, the bands strut onto stage and the crowd is louder than youve ever heard, crüe start and you stalk around stage, nikki was your assigned target so you walk around him, narrowing your eyes as he leans into you, his faces inches away from yours as he glares at you with genuine hate. Back and fourth and back and fourth till the last song, its your band playing the last one and you decide to really humiliate nikki.

“So.. for this song i decided to give you all a treat and nikki a big surprise. Someone bring me out a chair!” Everyone looks around in confusion but nikki drops his bass and gets a chair just for himself, stalking towards you “sit.” You order him like a dog and he sits just behind you “good boy!” Once again, treating him like a dog. “Start the mother fucking song”

The song starts and its a sexy riff, you sing along and slowly lower yourself onto nikkis lap, his hands snake around to your hips as you sing, hes surprised but knows he needs to keep his cool. You give him a lap dance as you sing, the crowd (mainly the women) going crazy. Nikkis grip tightens painfully into your squishy hips as he feels himself getting hard. A solo starts and you turn off the mic, nikkis mouth moving to your ear. “Im going to fucking kill you” he growls “why? Because you have a boner? I can feel it.. right here” you grind right into his erection and he hides his face in your neck as he lets out a whimper.

When you start to sing again you turn around so your backs facing the audience but your facing nikki, his eyes staring into your soul as you belt out the last lyrics, standing up as the crowd scream, nikki not sure how to get around hiding his boner, he decides to be proud of it and stands up, its painfully obvious but its the last thing on his mind right now as he thinks of ways to sabotage and embarrass you.

When you all get off stage your manager nods and smiles, glad you done what you did for publicity reasons. You head for the bar but nikki grabs your wrist and slams you against the wall “you cunt! You completely embarrassed me!” He shouts “not my fault y-“

“No it is your fault! The whole crowd practically saw my dick!” he shouts in your face “then dont wear tight leather pants!” He lets go of you and steps back “you know, im tired of trying to get on your good books and seeing where it takes me, your so fucking difficult” you step forward “well you should’ve been such a dick this morning-“

“I was stressed! Of course im going to be a dick, i was so fucking stressed out!” He cuts you off once more “your fucking impossible, you know that? Theres not one good thing i can say about you right now” he shakes his head and leaves..

[yourmomsemogarlicbread]

Club Lights And Sex On The Beach - Part 4

A/N: I'm Alive!!!!!! So incredibly sorry for the delay I was so unmotivated and suffering from a serious case of writer's block. Oh, and I got into a car crash but that's whatever. (everyone's fine dw). Hope you all enjoy it!

masterlist & ao3

Pairings: Josh Kiszka x Reader

Summary: You learn who Josh even is, quickly falling in love with his new persona. The two of you keep in touch and go on a date, what could happen afterward...

word count: 3.3k

Contains: fluff, fluffy aftercare, and smut. (consensual sex (consent is sexy kids), vaginal penetration, unprotected sex (wrap it before you tap it y'all), couch sex)

You look back at them as their faces express shock and confusion. “Wait, you don’t know who we are?” Josh asks you, placing a hand on your shoulder. “Nope…” Josh and Jake look at each other, smirks smearing across their faces. You can only imagine if twin telepathy was real they would be saying “Oh fuck yeah!”

Josh gives you a smug ass laugh and smirk. “Well, me and Jake are in a band along with Sam and Danny, if you remember them from last night. I’m the singer, Jake is on guitar, Sam’s on bass, and Danny is on drums. We’re called Greta Van Fleet, sweetheart.” you feel both your heart on jaw drop. You’ve heard the name before but you didn’t recognize their faces. You have heard of them in passing and were they good, you just hadn’t bothered to get into them yet. “Are you shitting me right now?” you ask, causing both of them to laugh. “Oh my god, this is embarrassing,” you say, putting your head in your hands with a laugh at your predicament. Josh pats you on the back. “Don’t worry we’re not offended, sweetheart,” he says. “Yeah, honestly even better, it’s always good to have someone who didn’t know you were famous when you met them.” Jake buds in. 

You laugh at yourself as you continue to eat your breakfast, “Well there’s always that I guess.” Josh and Jake turn to each other with their knowing-ass look. They look at each other like they are the same person just different hairstyles - well they’re twins so you guess technically they are - you can’t help but wonder what they’re thinking about - completely neglecting the fact you said you’re in between job right now just a few moments prior. The twins just look at each other and don’t say anything for a moment or two, finally turning back to you and changing the subject to how good of an amazing cook Jake is. 

After a bit Jake finally leaves saying he will return in a bit to Josh, finally giving you and him alone time. “Well thank you so much for breakfast I appreciate it,” you say, walking back into his bedroom to collect the fallen soldiers of last night's affairs. “Of course, it’s my pleasure- here take these.” he hands you a pair of plaid pajama pants, “I would hate for you to have to put back on your dress.” he beams kindly. God he was sweet, you could only feel the butterflies and warmth in your cheeks grow at his gesture. No previous hookup has ever treated you with such kindness before, hell even boyfriends. You really can’t neglect the fact of how kind this man is anymore. “Oh, thank you so much. I will get these back to you when I can,” you smile at him putting on his pj’s. “Don’t worry about it, they look better on you anyways,” Oh my god, does this man want you to marry him because it sure as hell feels like it, my god. “Josh, don’t do this to me,” 

“Well, why not? Can’t a man give away his clothes to pretty ladies in his own house if he wants to?” 

You sigh, looking back up at him, “I mean yes he can but I’m still gonna be nice and give them back.”

“If you give them back I hope you know I’m making you wear them home again.” 

Oh, he did not just say that. 

“Ok then.” you give up, smiling brightly at him as you pick up your lost purse and dress from the ground. “But I’m at least getting out of your hair for today. I’m sure you don’t want to deal with me with all of your assistant bullshit going on.” He laughs as he walks you to his door, his hand on the small of your back guiding you. “Thank you for having me.” your hand is on the door handle as you go to leave, you turn back to him, smiling brightly because you just can’t help it. “It was my pleasure, thank you for taking a chance on me sweetheart.” You smile so big you think your mouth just might give out. He pulls you ever so slightly closer to him. Your lips meet for the final time of this rendezvous, feeling like fire and ice all at once. He breaks your lips apart, “Oh, and I called you an Uber, they’re the white Tesla outside, you just tell them where to go, ok?” 

For a moment you think you just got close enough to god to feel true bliss for a moment as the words leave his lips. “Josh-” “Don’t argue just go. And have a nice day.” He is truly the epitome of compassion, you think to yourself. “Thank you.” is all you say before giving him another kiss. “My pleasure, darling.” is all he says before you wave goodbye, walking down the hall to the elevator. 

This man is gonna be the death of you. 

☾ ⋆*･ﾟ:⋆*･ﾟ

As the days pass you can’t stop thinking about him. His hair - curly and delicately cut into a unique mullet that suits him well. His eyes - so sweet, only filled with compassion and love, no matter what form it is. 

But at the same time, fear took over you when you thought about googling him. What if he is a piece of shit, What if he got canceled, What if anything bad shows up? Questions swirl in your head for the next few days, hesitation ruling your actions. You guys were still talking though, a bunch actually, good morning and goodnight texts, phone calls whenever the both of you were free, which usually was at 10 at night after he was done working on songs. Every single mention of studios and songs threw you for another lovestruck loop. 

Thursday night you caved. You just got off call with him - he was talking about how he and Jake were fighting in the studio and Sam called them a bunch of asshats and almost walked out and how Danny had to mediate everything. The thought was hilarious to you, laughing both with and at Josh on call. He was somehow a perfect human being with all of the perfect flaws one needs to be perfect. He was just Josh. And Josh is who you found yourself more fond of after every text and call and mention of the name Josh. 

So after you hung up, you googled “Greta Van Fleet”. You looked at their Wikipedia, then discography (which you put on in the background), then their Instagrams (to which you followed all of them hoping they won’t notice you), and finally googled him. He was just, Josh. The man you just met was just how anyone who looked at a picture on Pinterest would think he was. And although you’re biased, you can’t help but wonder if all the pictures, videos, and edits of him were made by people like you - people who simply are trying to make ends meet in Nashville or any other place. 

Then you remembered. 

You still need to find a fucking job. 

You spent all night looking at celebrity assistant jobs on Indeed, LinkedIn, and every other place where you could find anything. Then came up nothing, either it was for people you can’t stand or they were paying minimum wage - typical for celebrities. Hell, the most you’d been paid before in this industry was 23 an hour, and the celebrity you worked for always made sure you knew he was being generous, just like the jackass he is. 

You decide to stop your pitiful search after an hour of hopeless scrolling. Calling it quits, you choose to text Josh asking what you were doing for your date tomorrow. He responds almost immediately - shocker - saying that he’s taking you to a nice restaurant at 7 and will pick you up at 6:45. Fair first date you think, after all, this is probably going to be the best first date you’ve been on. He texts you again, “Oh and wear something nice, it’s a fancy one ;)” Classic Josh, always trying to impress. And it’s truly a shame that you already know that after hooking up with this man last Saturday. 

You’re already trying to wrap your head around what you’re gonna wear. Giving him a simple “Ok! See u soon <3” as a reply before going to bed. Do you even have anything that fancy still? Who knows, maybe you still have that dress from when you went to an awards show with your old boss. You fall asleep, thinking about him, what could happen that will ruin this man for you? - nothing. 

☾ ⋆*･ﾟ:⋆*･ﾟ

You spent your whole day getting ready. Although to your credit the day was only about 4 hours for you since you woke up at 2 pm. You took an everything shower, did your hair, makeup, everything. And by 6:30 you were finally ready - physically at least. Mentally you were a fucking mess. 

Not for one second could you truly believe that you were going on a date with Josh from Greta Van Fleet. To you, Josh was just Josh from the bar who gave you the best sex of your life. You find yourself struggling to comprehend that he’s a literal rockstar. And that you’re not only going out with Josh from the bar but Josh from Greta Van Fleet. 

And then you got the call from Josh, shocked at how it was already 6:45 you picked up, making your way over to your door. “Hello?” you call into the phone, already reaching for the door handle. Opening the door, you’re greeted with Josh already at your door. Shocked, you jump back, “Oh my god!” you gasp, making Josh laugh at your surprise. “Hello!” he says, placing a calming arm on your hand to calm the shock he caused. However, you sigh a quick relief, embarrassment striking up in your gut. “Hi, sorry about that.” you laugh. “You’re fine. You ready?” he asks, gently wrapping his arm around your waist. 

“Ready as I’ll ever be.” 

☾ ⋆*･ﾟ:⋆*･ﾟ

Your date went incredibly well. He took you to a nicer, more high-end restaurant. The dress you picked made you fit right in. Josh stole the stoplight in your eyes although, from his nice stature to his charming laughter and jokes he was just…

Josh. 

Talks of music and touring turned into talks of your night together at the bar and tales of drunken tour mishaps. He charmed with every story he told, conjuring laughs from the both of you and what you can assume will be pleasant memories. 

Josh was just him, he was like no other man you ever laid eyes on. So when the check came, which he paid without hesitation, you couldn’t help but feel disappointed that it was ending all too soon. 

But when he took you back to your apartment that night, you couldn’t help yourself.

Your back is forcefully pushed up against your door as he presses his lips on your neck, burning sensations fueling both you and him. Passion was an understatement, it was just him and you, pure in what you were doing, undefinable. Your leg is caught between his hand and against his thigh. Thoughts of filth race through your mind as you feel electricity rush through you. “Please,” is all you manage to whisper out. Josh gave no response, instead picking you up by your waist, your legs wrapping around his hips. The way he picks you up is exhilarating, the grasp he has on your hands, the force of them holding you up against him and the door makes you feel soaked, more than you already were. His breath on your neck feels sterling every way he made you feel glorious and sexy was that way. He made you feel like you. The date went so well that on the way home you couldn’t help but ask yourself  “What happens if this is my last first date?” 

He snaps you out of your short fantasy by moving you from the door and carrying you back to your couch a couple of feet away. He gently drops you down onto the sofa, giving you a glimpse of him in the moonlight shining in through the window. “God it’s dark in here.” He reaches for the lamp beside the couch above your head and turns it on, welcoming its warm, soft glow into the room. You see him now, him looking down at you, hovering. It feels…dominant, the last time this happened the dominance felt mutual but this was different. He was in control in the best way possible. 

He continues his gaze as he puts his knees right next to your hips. His gaze is infuriating for you, in desperate need of him yet he still lingers for another moment. His hand comes up to your face, cupping it in his hand dwarfing you with its size compared to your cheek. He leans down and kisses you once more, this time slower. So slower in fact that it's all-consuming, making you feel every touch, every connection, every single time tongue passes over your teeth. You moan into the kiss and he responds just the same. His hands wander to your waist, pulling you closer, as he explores your mouth more delicately. You deepen the kiss, hungry for more. He quickly pulls at your shirt, suggesting the disregard of the cloth. You pull your shirt off as you sit up, Josh sits on his knees pulling off his own as he locks eyes with you. 

He lunges at you, your lips meeting suddenly. He takes your bra off, grasping at it as you both begin to fill the rooms with sweet little moans. “Fuck mama-” he lets out between breaths. 

Oh. 

The nickname makes you want to pass out, the butterflies in your stomach almost take over as he pushes you back down on the leather surface. He begins to get more desperate, clawing his way down your body, hands wandering, kisses traveling back down to your chest and tits. Your skin lights as he slips his hands down your belly, tugging at the fabric of your skirt. He pauses to look back up at you, begging for permission. “Please-” you’re interrupted by him kissing you harshly. His hands slip under your skirt, pulling it down and throwing it somewhere in your living room. Josh’s hand slips underneath your underwear, teasing you when you are already so wet it is pointless. 

You reach up and undo his pants, pushing them down and rubbing his hard on. You feel him moan into your kiss, soft but filled with lust and passion. He suddenly rips your panties off as he pulls down his boxers to his knees in a desperate attempt for friction. 

His hands grip your thighs tighter than ever before. He makes desperate whimpers in between kisses. “Fast or slow baby?” he breathes out in only a hushed sigh. “Fast- please” you feel so desperate to cure the ache, with Josh acting all hot and bothered you can’t help it. 

He wastes no time lining himself up with you, teasing just a bit before he looks back up at you with those eyes. 

Those sweet, gorgeous eyes. 

“Can I?” 

“Yes…Please.” 

He slowly pushes himself into you, the feeling of intoxicating pleasure fills your stomach as he bottoms out and begins to pick up pace. You two quickly set a good pace, making both of you feel like your hearts are exploding in the best way. 

Moans, whimpers, and whines uncompas the both of you, the pleasure increasing by the second. Josh suddenly grabs under your thighs, pinning them up to your chest, making every new thrust better than the last, angles you never achieved with any other before. 

Your skin sets ablaze as Josh breaths heavily right on your neck, making precious sounds against it. The two of you are connected. 

Physically. 

But somehow, in some way you’re connected… 

Mentally, aswell. 

Josh reaches down and makes quick circles on your clit, sending you spiraling. “Mama- Fuck. I’m close sweetheart” he says into your ear. “Where do you want me?” obviously referring to where he should finish. “It’s ok, I’m on birth control- just- please” you only manage to breathe that out before you feel the beginning of your orgasm wash over you. 

You curse as you feel yourself go into the depths of pleasure. Josh comes quickly behind you, filling you up even more than you ever have. His hips sputter and come to a halt, him slowly laying down a bit on top of you, making sure not to crush you. 

“Fuck.” he breathes out as he slowly pulls out of you. You watch as he steps to the side of the couch, “Can I carry you sweetheart?” he says it with the warmest, yet tired smile you’ve ever seen. Caring in such a way that no one has ever treated you before. 

“Of course.” you smile. 

He carefully picks you up bridal style and carries you back to your room and into your bathroom, setting you down in front of your toilet. You smile up at him, “Why thank you.” 

“My pleasure,” he smiles back at you as you take care of yourself as he washes himself off in the sink. You walk over to him with slightly shaking legs. Josh takes your hand in his and places a kiss on your knuckles. “Thank you for letting me take you out.” you laugh at his thank you, only because you should be the one thanking him. He is a busy man after all. A rockstar taking the rock scene by storm, selling out arenas almost every year.  

“I should be the one thanking you. You made time for me after all.” you say, placing a more chaste kiss on his lips. You watch as his eyes look at you in surprise. He pauses for a moment staring at you, a smile slowly appearing on his beautiful face. 

“How are you so kind?” 

“What do you mean?” 

“You’re the first person who has ever been this kind to me. People usually try to just get me to pay for dinner, sleep with them, and then try using me for my money and fame in the end.” 

You pause at his statement. 

How could anyone in the world even think about doing that to anyone. Especially Josh. 

Josh is the kindness in the world. He is the only man you’ve ever had the pleasure of meeting that treats people so kindly. He’s respectful, generous, and most of all just so radiant. He’s radiant in the ways of kindness. Radiant in every way of love. Josh is love. 

And you think you’re in love with him. 

“You should’ve never been treated that way, you know. I’m sorry that people are shitty. Out of all the people I’ve met in my lifetime, you have got to be the most radiant, kind, respectful, and loving person I’ve ever come across.” 

Josh looks at you with the best sincerity. You can see the way that statement made him feel. The gentle happiness coming off of him. 

“Thank you. I don’t think you know how much that means.” 

“Of course I do, I can feel it from miles away.” 

Your lips meet gently as he runs gentle fingers through your hair and on your waist. It’s sweet. It’s nice. It’s…love, at the very least on your end. 

“You wanna go to bed?” you chuckle to him. “I’d really like that,” he whispers against your gentle lips. The two of you walk back to your bed, cuddling as the two of you end a good evening out. You end it with one more important person on your hands, along with a new connection.

[foxymoxynoona]

Tell Me What Changed (Pt. 6)

Banner and lines by the talented @awrkive

Summary: Alex and Jungkook have been best friends since childhood –actual best friends. She is NOT in love with him, for real, and wishes people would stop assuming that. Why does no one question if he’s in love with her? Huh? But it might have to do with his successful fuckboy status, while Alex is very much… not that. Which is fine and doesn’t matter! Until Jimin’s impending wedding leaves her eager for a date and willing to put herself out there, and Jungkook can’t believe what happens next.

Fuckboy Best Friend JK x OC

CW and tags: fuckboy behavior, jealousy, pining, heartbreak, angst, bad language, explicit sex, sexy photos, alcohol, f2l, who knows what else

Read on AO3 here or below

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“We should be swing dancing to this,” Jungkook said low near Alex’s ear, his thumb pressing in to reduce the noise so she could hear his voice through the music.

She did not return the trick, just laughed as she pushed him away and shouted, “You don’t fucking know how to swing dance!” He scowled, frustrated he couldn’t grab her hand and push and pull her away to somehow prove he was in fact a swing master. He wasn’t; he knew the same three steps she did, which they’d exhausted at school dances when they were younger. She was the perfect height for spinning because he didn’t elbow her in the face like he did with every other girl he tried it with. He always ruined it by pretending he was going to lift and toss her and then she’d screech and grab onto his arm like a cat you were trying to put in a bathtub.

“Son of a bitch!” they shouted along with the music. “Get me a drink!” They didn’t know this opener band, Nathaniel Rateliffe and the Night Sweats, but the hook was easy to pick up, and the music had that upbeat dancy feel that got the job done at getting the audience pepped for the headliner. The next song was slower but Jungkook still felt his heart locked in, swaying his shoulders, bumping into Alex on one side and Jimin on the other. He didn’t even know this band and yet the guitar riffs and steady bass had the effect live music always did, making it feel like the world shrank away to him right here, right now, inside himself. Alex there with him.

And Hoseok on her other side, his hand tucked into hers. And their friends and Alex’s sister having their own feelings further down the row –but they were out of sight, out of mind for the time being, partly thanks to the assigned seating that created some order to the energy, all of them in their spaces like ducks in a row. Even Jimin faded in and out, sometimes bumping against Jungkook’s arm, other times leaning against In’am who looked bemused by the whole show. 

Once upon a time they would have been down in the pit, but these days Jungkook wasn’t any more interested in it than Alex and it hadn’t even been considered for the show. Balcony all the way. They’d done their time down there when they were younger, working out a system for survival. For years Jungkook had taken up position behind her at shows, chest to back, arms poised to ward off any infringing on her space whether it came from the left or right. He threw a mean elbow when someone threatened Alex’s personal space. Sometimes it was a little fun when someone got pushy and he got to push him back; they’d glare at him as if he was the threatening one and then Alex would go off on them about being such an invasive asshole. Jungkook didn’t love having people crushed on him either, but Alex could literally get crushed! He’d liked the energy of the pit in high school but he was grown now, mature. It was cool to be able to sit whenever you felt like it even if he’d never do it while a band was playing, out of respect if nothing else.

Besides, even if they’d been in the pit, it wouldn’t have been Jungkook’s job anymore. Hoseok would have been her guard. Jungkook wondered how he would have done at it. He was too polite! Jungkook was an asshole, the perfect guard. But Hoseok would probably do his best, and maybe he had secret reserves to pull out… or something. Probably in some more mature way than throwing elbows or flexing his jaw threateningly. He’d like, befriend people or something, throw his arm around them and the whole pit would just sway together. 

Hoseok had bent down to whisper something into Alex’s ear, so Jungkook leaned the other way to see what everyone else was doing. Their friends seemed mixed on the opener. Jimin and In’am were standing, nodding along, calmly listening like they were making a study of the audience. Rebekah looked into it. Namjoon did not, face reflecting the light of his phone. Minxi, on the other side of Rebekah, was hard to tell, but she seemed to be humoring whatever May was saying beside her. May had invited herself along but since she’d been the one to tell Alex about the concert in the first place, they hadn’t felt like she could say no –Alex had told Jungkook all about it when they’d been buying the tickets, back before May and Hoseok had even met. Jungkook didn’t really care either way but Alex had been pissed it meant introducing Hoseok before she wanted to, and Jungkook felt a little smug about the fact she had any hesitation whatsoever. Jungkook was desperate to know what May thought, but knew he was unlikely to get a serious answer. 

Besides, what opinion could she formulate from the opposite end of the row? Jungkook was only two people down and not sure he’d be able to pull off his own secret operation: prove to Hoseok he was non-threatening. He’d even considered sitting on the other side of Hoseok for the show but couldn’t bring himself to do it. At a concert, Alex was who he wanted to be standing and dancing and singing along next to. 

Shit. Did that mean he’d already failed? How was he supposed to convince Hoseok he wasn’t any threat to their relationship when he wanted nothing more than to take Alex all for himself? When secretly, deep down, he was hoping they’d hurry up and break up already, even if it hurt her in the short term…

But he wouldn’t be the one who caused it, he was certain of that. That was why he wasn’t a threat, because he wasn’t willing to risk losing what he still had of her on the slim chance she reciprocated his feelings –but not enough to break up with her boyfriend. Like, that sucked. He’d still take that, being her second choice, but he didn’t think he even had a shot at that. It was clear she didn’t reciprocate his feelings. Maybe he hadn’t realized his feelings until too late, but Alex had only started dating Hoseok a few months ago, if she’d harbored anything for Jungkook, he would have known, and probably it would have helped him realize his own feelings sooner. She hadn’t. So all he could accomplish by trying to come between them would be Alex hating him. That was the worst result; they’d both be hurting. At least this way…

At least this way, Alex was happy because she had her best friend and her boyfriend on either side of her as she sang her heart out –endearingly badly but Jungkook loved that about her– to the bands playing. At least this way, only he was hurting. And not that bad, right? Nothing was really different right now except that he had to overthink everything he did with her to make sure it wasn’t something that was going to threaten her apparently easily-threatened boyfriend. The only thing that sucked was that he had to watch someone else get to do all the things he wanted to do with her.

Like last time they went to a concert, he had thrown his arm around her shoulder and they’d sung together. Hoseok did that this time, though he wasn’t singing, just swaying and smiling because Alex was so into it. He didn’t seem as quick to figure out the lyrics as Jungkook and Alex were, and he wasn’t familiar with the headliner band which was kind of a shame, that he hadn’t studied up, but at least he’d come to support Alex. That was… nice. But like who the fuck didn’t know Kings of Leon!? 

This was the new normal. And Jungkook needed to prove he could be cool about the new normal. He had to lock himself into the new normal because it’s not like the old normal would work anymore anyway. Maybe, he considered, this was actually better that if Alex wasn’t going to hold his wrist while he was the one with his arm draped around her shoulder and his nose stuck into her hair (ok, maybe Hoseok gave her a kiss? Jungkook used to do that just to smell her shampoo), she at least was happy doing that with someone else. Maybe this was actually better than if Alex let Jungkook do those things but they meant nothing to her even in the absence of someone else doing them for her. It would be pathetic for him to secretly pine for his best friend who didn’t have any interest in him like that. He’d never do that! He wouldn’t do that now. He had to work on getting over it, and her having a boyfriend who kissed her nose before he went to piss was a good tool to help him get over whatever his silly little stupid love feelings were for her.

Or at least it would be. 

Someday.

Eventually he’d figure out how to see her smile after a nose kiss and not feel a grumble in his chest because obviously he would just chomp her whole nose to make her wrinkle it up and hit him in the stomach and then he’d steal a real kiss while he was hunched over coughing for breath and then maybe she’d feel bad and caress his face–

Ah. No she wouldn’t. The problem with fantasizing about your best friend when she didn’t want you that way was that it ran the risk of breaking your heart. And Jungkook was not into that idea. No heartbreak here! Yeah, it sucked he was in love with Alex and it wasn’t returned, and he had realized it too late to even try and convince her to give it a try. But… it’s not like he would have done that anyway. He fucked, he didn’t feel. Usually relationships didn’t work out and he’d seen enough of his friends go through heartbreak to know he wasn’t interested in it. And it would have the added risk of losing him his best friend? Nah, man, keep it.

Honestly, he thought he was being incredibly mature about the whole thing. Yes, he was watching to make sure Hoseok deserved her and as soon as he saw proof that the guy didn’t, he’d be quick to do… something. Not sure what, and for now it didn’t seem to matter because Hoseok just continued to seem mostly annoyingly awesome. And Alex continued to seem mostly annoyingly happy. And the most annoying thing was that Jungkook was being conservative with that “mostly.” 

Alex was happy. And he loved her enough to be glad she was happy. Especially when there was zero indication she wanted him to be the one to make her even happier. Maybe he couldn’t. Maybe this was the only thing he could do to contribute to her happiness. Just stay the fuck out of the way.

Fuck. He was glad the opener started a feeler-song at the right moment to distract him from that path of dark wallowy thoughts he refused to look at. Wallowy wasn’t hot. Pussy game was definitely going to take a hit if he seemed like he was pining for some girl– wait, but would chicks find it endearing? Could it get him more pussy? 

He felt kind of numb to the idea though. He didn’t want pussy right now, shockingly. He wanted to close his eyes and smile at the swell of music. And since he couldn’t take Alex’s hand, he reached out and ruffled her hair instead.

She, predictably, punched him on the arm, and laughed, “It’s so good!” Energy matching his. Of course it did. Because they matched! 

Hoseok reached out to fix the strands of her hair that Jungkook had mussed.

Was he crazy to feel like there was something intentional to that? Hoseok had seemed casual when they’d arrived, polite, but Jungkook felt watched. Shouldn’t he at least trust Alex that things were fine, even if he didn’t trust Jungkook?

Jungkook wanted to ask Jimin if he got that feeling too, but worried that would mean explaining the whole incident to him. He had told no one. He didn’t want to ask Alex either in case it upset her. So instead, when the opener stopped and they had the awkward amount of time to hang, Jungkook reached over Alex’s head and asked nudged Hoseok to ask,

“Hey, wanna go get some beers?”

“We should go pee before Kings start,” Alex suggested, completely ruining his plan. He should have known though, that pea-sized bladder of hers. He’d had to whisper-catch her up in movies how many times when she couldn’t hold it any longer and had to waddle-run to piss? Sometimes he jokingly did it at concerts too, just long enough to annoy her as he sang the wrong song over the one currently being played to catch her up on the songs she’d missed.

“Are you going to the restroom?” In’am asked, leaning around Jimin and Jungkook both. Further down the line, Jungkook could hear this echoed like birds on a telephone wire. 

So they all went. The whole fucking line of their friends, kindergartners on a fieldtrip to the restrooms, weaving through the crowds of people doing the same. Sometimes at shows, depending who they were seeing, the women’s bathroom had a much shorter line and Alex was almost through the snack line by the time Jungkook finished up and went to find her, but this time the audience was pretty even and Jungkook was through the bathroom in a breeze.

Hoseok conveniently beside him.

Before anyone else could join them, Jungkook elbowed him, “Hey, let’s get some beers before we head back. We won’t want to leave again once the band starts.”

Hoseok looked confused but followed Jungkook away from the restrooms, only mentioning once they were in line, “Alex said she didn’t want a drink.”

“What, telepathically?” Jungkook laughed.

“No, before we came here. She doesn’t want to have to leave the show for a bio-break.”

Bio-break. Jungkook briefly saw red. Bio break. Fuck, what a corporate goon– and the insinuation that Jungkook didn’t know all about her biological need! He’d been going to shows with her since Hoseok was in business school or whatever impressive thing he’d done for college.

“Yeah, bladder the size of a pea, amiright?” Jungkook laughed. He didn’t like the way Hoseok’s brow furrowed and his head tilted so he instinctively hunched his shoulders and lifted his hands to shadowbox the moment into a more playful one but just as quickly realized that if things were already awkward he might as well cut to the chase.

“Hey–” He began just as the crowds behind Hoseok jostled him right into Jungkook. He stepped fully on Jungkook’s Docs, the very ones he’d found thrifting with Alex when they were hunting for things for their apartment. They weren’t the Prada ones he’d had his eye on for years but you couldn’t go wrong with Docs. These things would outlive everything, even Hoseok stomping on them. 

“Ah, sorry sorry,” Hoseok said, looking flustered as he righted himself. “It’s so crowded!”

“You don’t go to shows often?”

“Ah, no, not really… the last one I went to was Lady Gaga.”

Jungkook just nodded and refrained from commenting. Not that there was anything wrong with liking Lady Gaga! Would Alex have fun at a Lady Gaga show? Probably, as long as there were seats and she didn’t get crushed. Lady Gaga was fine. He could go to a Lady Gaga show with Alex if she really wanted to–

Off track. The line shuffled forward and Jungkook saw the heads of their friends in the distance, so it was now or never.

“Hey, just want to level with you,” he rushed out, leaning close so as not to attract eavesdroppers around them in line. “I already worked it out with Alex but I know she told you about uh, the stupid thing I did while I was drunk.” Hoseok’s eyebrows lifted. Jungkook didn’t know what that meant but it annoyed him anyway. Quickly he added, “It was a mistake, it’s never happened before, it won’t happen again. Don’t want you to think I’m trying to steal her away or anything.” 

“Ah, I see.” Hoseok pursed his lips and nodded.

“Yeah. So… yeah, that’s all. You don’t need to worry about me. I get plenty of tail, Alex isn’t like that.”

Hoseok looked up like he was trying to make sense of the very normal thing Jungkook had said. That annoyed him too. But he swallowed that down and smiled and clapped Hoseok on the shoulder.

“OK? Cool. Sorry I kissed your girlfriend, man.” He grinned, even laughed as he said it, to seem casual. “Congrats on that, though!” Damn it was getting hot in this crowd of bodies. A cold beer was sounding really good now.

“On… Alex’s kissing technique?”

Jungkook swiped the hair back beneath his bucket hat and shrugged, “Yeah or whatever, on dating her. I meant it like good for you, not for me, you know? Things don’t need to be awkward between us because I’m not competition. She’s basically my sister.”  

“I know.” Hoseok smiled as he said it. Jungkook bristled. Wait, was Hoseok a total dick?! The impulse to grab Hoseok’s shoulders and shout actually I know everything about Alex, more than you can ever hope to catch up to; I love her better and more and longer than you are capable of; the only thing that keeps me from being your competition is that I respect her choice, even if I don’t like it was hard to resist. But no, even that monologue wouldn’t satisfy; what it really made him want to do was prove he was steep competition. He wanted to prove he could steal Alex with one hand tied. He wanted to make Hoseok regret saying that. 

But this was one challenge Jungkook would not rise to. It’s about Alex, it’s about Alex, it’s about Alex, he repeated to himself. Alex wasn’t a Ninja blender or a Slushie machine or a fuzzy slingshot monkey he could win with tickets. Alex was a person and his best friend.

Now if Hoseok wanted to turn out to be an asshole and crash and burn on his own and Jungkook could just sweep up the pieces from his moral high ground, he would jump at the opportunity! 

But Hoseok might beat him at that game too, because he now clapped Jungkook on the shoulder and insisted, “I’m glad you two worked it out. She said everything is good and she’s a strong woman with her own mind, right? She tells it like it is! I know she’d be sad to lose you as a friend. Ah, here, let me buy your beer.”

“No man you don’t have to do that,” Jungkook insisted as they reached the counter.

“Hey, why didn’t you wait for us?” Jimin called up the line from where he stood near the back.

Jungkook laughed and waved his hand like there was some joke Jimin should understand, hoping to pass it off. Scrambling to think of a cover for why he’d gone off with Hoseok, it confused him at the point of ordering, which meant Hoseok wound up paying for his beer, and a soda for Alex, and a glass of wine for himself.

Jungkook found that an interesting beverage choice for a concert but all right. He didn’t say anything because apparently Hoseok thought Alex had meant she just didn’t want beer, when Jungkook knew she would have meant she didn’t want anything to drink. She was going to end up with a UTI, dehydrating herself like that. But if Hoseok brought her a soda she might feel compelled to drink it and– ah, ok, he might very cleverly be doing a kind boyfriend thing, even if she fussed about having to run to piss at least once during the set.

They headed back, Jungkook swinging by to tease the others about taking too long to piss. It meant he walked alone back to his seat to find Hoseok and Alex already there, talking and laughing with May and Minxi. He hesitated because Minxi was in his seat. He could move to another one but then they’d get permanently stuck in those seats for the show and that was his seat. He wanted to sit by Alex. He’d really worked to engineer that seating arrangement.

So he cleared his throat and grinned at Minxi, “Hey that’s my chair but if you get up for a sec you can sit in my lap. It’s a lot more comfortable.”

“Really?” May snickered. “Your bony lap?”

Jungkook gasped, “Jesus, I don’t have a boner! That’s not what I said!”

“Bo-ny. Bony! I’m talking about boners, gross boy!”

“I was just being nice. May. What the fuck. Indecent. You’re sick.”

Minxi covered her eyes and shook her head, “Thank you so much for your kind offer, JK, I think I’ll just move down…”

“Wow,” Alex teased as he sat in his reclaimed chair. “Haven’t seen you that lacking in game since you were twenty-one? Twenty?” She had somehow procured Nachos at lightning speed.

“I’m not trying to use game on Minxi, I just wanted my seat back.”

“Oh! Right right, no game, just sulky baby.”

“I’ll give you sulky baby with your little baby snack,” he taunted without thinking about it, reaching down to try and pinch the side of her neck. “Need to stand on your chair so you’ll be able to see the band, crispy shrimp?”

She scrunched her shoulders up and teased right back, “Sounds like someone regret choosing beer over Nachos. Get your own, you fucking raccoon.”

“How dare– no, now I am obligated to steal yours.” He reached out to grab one and she twisted and lifted to try and keep them away from him.

Unfortunately, the rough-housing jostled Hoseok’s arm, knocking his red wine all over his shirt and jacket. Alex yelled and tried to somehow stop the liquid by grabbing Hoseok’s arm, but it just sent the rest of the wine splashing across Jungkook’s gray shirt too. 

“Oh my fuck,” Alex gasped, looking back and forth between them. “Oh my god I’m so sorry–”

“Yeah, real childish,” Jungkook laughed and tugged her hair. Damn, no way to really get the wine out right now. The lights dimmed and a roar went around the stadium as the band prepared to come out, so Jungkook instantly forgot about it.

But Hoseok was still standing with his arms out, staring down in horror. His shirt was yellow and he had a light denim jacket on for some ungodly reason, both now coated in bright red wine. 

“I’m so sorry,” Alex said again. “I’ll replace them– I can pay to replace them. Napkins… hey does anyone have napkins?”

At this rate Alex was going to miss the opening moment. It annoyed Jungkook that Hoseok looked like that. It was just some fucking wine. They were at a concert. You had to dress assuming someone was going to spill something on you.

“I’m uh– I’m going to go see if I can find something to buy and try to rinse this in the sink,” Hoseok said, setting the empty plastic cup down beneath his seat.

Alex grabbed his arm, “Ok, I’ll go with you, I’m so sorry–”

“You’ll miss the band.”

“Ok, you’re sure?”

Alex might not be able to see it from her height but Jungkook could, the flicker across Hoseok’s face. He had expected her to insist on going. 

“Hey, anyone got a Tide to go pen or whatever?” Jungkook called down the line. “Alex is getting wild down here!”

In’am was already asking the question too, and a moment later Rebekah passed one down, which Jungkook handed over Alex’s head, as if the little pen would be enough against the sea of red. Mostly Jungkook just wanted Hoseok to hurry up and go because any second now the music was going to start and that first moment was always so good and he didn’t want Alex to miss it.

“I’m so sorry, Hobi–”

“Yeah, I’ll be back…” He gave her a weak-ass smile and hurried away.

Jungkook didn’t mean to look any particular way, but Alex still scolded him, “Don’t look like that! I get it. No one wants to sit around covered in wine for a whole show… it’s going to stain his clothes and he dresses so nicely…”

“Yah, what am I? Chopped liver?” Jungkook demanded, motioning down to his sleeve, side, and chest speckled with large red splotches. Her eyes widened even more and he realized he’d pushed too far. She was genuinely distressed, almost to the point of tears. Did Hoseok make her like that? Had he reacted badly in the past when she’d spilled or dropped something? Messed something of his up? He didn’t have to make such a big deal. Yeah it sucked to get wine on your clothes but obviously Alex felt bad, he didn’t need to make her feel worse than she already would. It was an accident. 

He threw his arm around her and squeezed, “Hey, spills happen. With you it happens a lot, has he not learned that yet?”

She punched him right in the gut–

And left behind several smudges of yellow nacho cheese.

“I’m a mess!” she wailed.

“What the fuck is going on over there?” Jimin demanded, peering around; In’am was doing the same, and passed down a packet of wet wipes someone had dug out of their bag. Rebekah again. The only prepared adult among them, apparently. 

But the lights went down, the roar went up, an opening chord played and Jungkook grabbed the wet wipes and shoved them into his pocket so he could take her hand with his free one and ordered,

“Who the fuck cares, stop worrying about it. Just close your eyes…it’s starting…” He shouldn’t have had to tell her, that’s always how they started. He’d taught her that. So they could fully, for those opening notes, just take it in and live in the music. That wasn’t an exclusive thing with Alex; he lifted his arm to balance it on Jimin’s shoulder too, who also had his eyes closed, holding In’am’s hand, so maybe he’d passed the importance of that moment along to his fiance as well. Jimin had been to almost as many shows with Jungkook as Alex had and this moment was important and hey, it hadn’t been on purpose or his fault or anything but he was kinda glad Hoseok was gone for just this minute. In five minutes or ten he’d be back wearing a Kings of Leon shirt and hopefully he wouldn’t be a dick about it if it wasn’t his style and he could soak his clothes when he got home and maybe they’d be ok. In five, ten minutes Alex would be Hoseok’s again but for just these few minutes, Alex was his. 

That would have to be enough.

And for those couple of minutes, it was.

One more night, one more night will you stay here?

Ooh when you see yourself are you far away?

Is it night or day?

When it comes to you, if you reach the moon,

Can I be there too?

“Pickles?”

“Ok I’m starting to feel like you only like me for my pickle,” Alex called from the kitchen.

“No no, that’s your new nickname,” Rebekah assured her, coming to lend a hand this time with the carrying of the food. Which was good because Alex was definitely about to balance too many plates, cups, and bowls on her arms and probably spill them everywhere. She prematurely cringed about it, even though she hadn’t done it yet, but because now it recalled another instance in which she had spilled shit on or around Hoseok and he’d given her that endeared but also dissatisfied smile and gently scolded her about being more patient and asking for help. AS IF he had somehow already figured out in the scant few months they had dated that those were the things she struggled with. What, was he paying attention to her or something? Ghastly. He should stop that.

“All right, what’s an acceptable thing I can call you back?”

“Rebekah. Bekah if you’re feeling bold.”

Alex snickered and pressed, “I’ve always thought it’s funny how you hate ‘Becky.’”

“Ok Al.”

“But see, that doesn’t bother me. Why would it? I’ve been called so much worse–”

As if cued, the front door swung open just as Rebekah and Alex walked past it, hands full, and Jungkook shouted, “Yo Tony! Help a Broseph out?”

“Tony?” Rebekah repeated, confused.

Alex rolled her eyes and lifted her hands as she passed the front door, “Sorry, Broey, hands are– what the fuck is all that?” She stopped walking and stared as he tackled his way through the door, arms overflowing. “Are those… pillows?!”

“I dunno they were on sale at Target,” he said from somewhere behind the pile of bags in his arms. “Move your ass, slothface, I can’t see around this.”

She had to dive out of the way as he nearly knocked the food out of her hands.

“Why didn’t you take more than one trip?!”

“Uh, because I didn’t need to? I can’t– you really can’t help me? Fucking useless…”

“Hey asshole!”

“I’m kidding, you’re a snack,” he huffed, then swore as he stumbled on his own fucking boots tumbled beside the door and slammed into the wall trying not to drop everything. 

“Jesus,” Alex gasped, rushing to set her food down on the laundry basket. They really needed to get a coffee table. 

Rebekah beat her to it though and was the one to actually ease two of the bags out of Jungkook’s arms.

“Gee thanks for the late assist– ohhh, Rebekah,” he smiled, voice changing. “Shit, so sorry. Uh, thanks. Sorry, I’d never talk to you like that, you deserve so much better.”

Rebekah had that smile she always reserved for Jungkook as she assured him, “No, it’s fine. What is all this though?” Alex was left without anything to grab as Jungkook and Rebekah dumped everything down on the sofa; Alex dragged the laundry basket away so nothing would get spilled. 

“Just some things,” Jungkook said. “You know, Target was having a sale and whatever, end of summer or whatever…”

“Target sale?” Alex asked, face screwed up because Jungkook only ever went to Target for electronics or because she made him. Despite the fact he had a blast every time they did because he always found some stupid thing he was excited about, like his Yoda fleece blanket or the retro Etch-a-sketch he’d left Alex infuratiating messages on by the bathroom for weeks. He had been obnoxiously good at it.  “Why were you in Target?”

“Uh, yeah, they had a uh– I needed some new sheets and I was out of deodorant and batteries and uh– and you know you complain when I steal your shampoo. I had a coupon for toothpaste–”

“Jungkook,” Alex warned, because this was exactly what he did when he tried to lie to her. Overexplain without actually explaining, refusing to make eye contact because he knew he’d crumble, breaking off sentences as his little scrambled egg brain tried to find a way to change the subject but failed. He scratched the side of his nose and noisily crinkled one of the bags with his other hand the gig was up.

But Rebekah, dear sweet Rebekah, saved him by pulling FIVE pillows out of two of the bags as she gasped, “Oh, they’re really soft! Are they for your bed?”

The laughter bubbled out of Alex. Jungkook hated pillows. He thought decorative pillows were stupid. He thought bed pillows were an annoying necessity. He kept exactly two, one of which was distressingly flat. He’d told Alex it was the result of fucking so many girls onto it, that their asses wore it down, but he’d had that twinkle in his eye that could also mean he was exaggerating. It might have just been a shitty pillow. She suspected it might be like twenty years old. The other pillow was fine but also the one he let the occasional girl who spent the night use, so Alex usually brought her own when she crashed in his bed.

Not that she did that anymore. The horror of the idea of Hoseok having to ask her not to sleep in her male friend’s bed was enough of a deterrent that she just made that a rule on her own. She’d be jealous if Hobi was sleeping in some girl’s bed, even Amy’s. Too often she woke up all tangled up with Jungkook, sometimes hands up shirts or legs twisted together; Jungkook liked to spoon. She had this mental movie of Hoseok walking in and not believing her explanation that it was innocent. One night after heavy drinking she’d woken up with no pants on, only panties and her shirt up around her tits. Thank fuck she’d been the first awake so Jungkook hadn’t seen that!

Rebekah held up a dusty rose velvet pillow and a white square pillow with a blue octopus stitched into the fabric. A third shaggy white square looked like something dead. The fourth dark blue one had tassels and the words This is home in cursive. The last peeked from the bag: light pink, round, with big pink balls sewn all around the edge.

“That looks like a diseased boob,” Alex blurted out, lifting it. It jostled the bag, revealing two soft velvety blankets inside, the kind you snuggled down with on a couch. If you were like a rich or fashionable person, or had something against Jungkook’s baby Yoda blanket. It looked like him, and Alex couldn’t point it out to him because he wouldn’t get it, but she laughed every time she saw him wrapped up in it.

Jungkook pointed, big dark eyes as wide as could be as he demanded, “You see a boob? Hey, Alex, have you considered you might be… ah, sorry Rebekah. I didn’t buy it because it looks like a…”

“You totally did.” Alex rolled her eyes.

“Uh, I have them too,” Rebekah scoffed. “You can talk about boobs in front of me. I don’t mind! It’s not like I’m some…” Alex and Jungkook waited but now Rebekah looked embarrassed and just pointed at another bag, “What’s in there?”

“Clock.”

“Cock?” Alex gasped, knowing full well that wasn’t what Jungkook had said. She just wanted to see if she could make them both feel more awkward.

“Sorry, was that you trying to sound straight? It’s too late,” Jungkook returned as he lifted a round faced black and white clock, the cheapy ones like you saw in college dorms or elementary school classrooms.

“Why did you buy that– oh, time management for your fucks? You’re stacking them now?”

He rolled his eyes, “No, to hang up in here so we can know what time it is.”

“Phone. I have a phone.”

“If you can’t reach your phone,” he argued. “Or the electricity goes out so the stove and microwave are wrong.”

“Wouldn’t affect our phones…”

“This is a normal thing to have on a wall!” he insisted, suddenly flustered, and turned to lean it against the wall. Alex wondered how long it was going to just sit there before he got rid of it; she couldn’t imagine him hunting down a hammer to hang it.

But then, lo and behold, he pulled out a cheap tool kit and tossed it onto the floor beside the clock.

“Tools,” Alex snorted. “Who are you?”

“I can fix things!”

“We have a tool kit… somewhere…” They did. They used it when they moved in and had to build all their furniture. And then Alex never saw it again.

“I gave that away,” Jungkook waved his hand.

“To… who? Why?”

“This girl– I had to fix something at her place and– it doesn’t matter. I couldn’t go back for it.”

“You fixed something at some girl’s place? What the fuck? Fix something here!”

“I am!” he frowned. “Yeah, I can fix things! I’m not incompetent. Just show me what’s broken and I’ll do it!”

Alex stopped talking, mouth open, confused by his defensiveness outburst. She glanced at Rebekah, whose eyebrows raised as she turned away to set the pillows on the couch. Was he trying to impress Rebekah? Was he annoyed about how he’d look in front of her? That didn’t make sense, but also why did Alex feel compelled to name something broken? She wasn’t sure whether that was to taunt him or soothe him. 

“Uh… I don’t think… anything?”

“Yeah,” he said, as if he’d won some argument, as if he was the reason nothing was broken right now. More like because Alex was willing to draw blood with their landlord to get things fixed. “Well we’ve got tools now so let me know.”

“Ok…”

He was being weird. He looked angry as he pulled the blankets out of the bag and threw them onto the couch.

“You bought couch blankets?” Alex asked gently. “...Why?”

“Sale.”

“Ok…. um… anything else good?” she asked, trying to smile and seem casual and push past whatever his sudden grumpy mood was. “Oh… babe,” she realized –and slipped on the petname in her teasing– “was this a comfort shop? Did a pussy appointment cancel on you last minute?”

His face scrunched up into a fist, “No! I told you I needed some things! No one canceled on me.”

“Oh, so you’re going out? Ok great we can crank our movie up. There’s a really raunchy sex scene apparently–”

“You didn’t tell me that!” Rebekah gasped. 

“Why, you nervous?” Alex teased.

Rebekah huffed and hugged the shaggy pillow, “No, I just– what kind of movie is this? How raunchy?”

“It’s fine–”

“I’m not going out,” Jungkook said, tugging up one bag tight and slinging it over his shoulder. “I bought snacks.”

“Snacks?”

“Ah, now your eyes perk up…” he mumbled as she looked in another bag. 

“These are… you bought new dishes?”

“We have like three cups.”

“We have more than that,” Alex argued.

“Yah, how many are in your room right now?” he teased. “I’m not touching those until you wash them.”

“Only a couple! I clean them out before Hobi comes over…” she admitted with a laugh at her own expense. Actually these days she kept her room cleaner than she ever had in her life. It was exhausting. Hobi did not understand how cozy it was to take a nap on clean laundry scattered across your bed that you were going to fold eventually. Hobi folded his clothes as he took them out of the dryer. A lot of his clothes he hung up to dry. It was impressive and insane.

Rebekah too had returned to the remaining bags. They dug through the snacks Jungkook had indeed bought; clearly he’d gone on a rampage down the snack aisle. Also in the bags were other odds and ends he’d bought during this “sale” –refills for the scent diffuser; a giant wooden cup she wasn’t sure what he meant to use for; a farmhouse decor style pair of wooden wall hangings for the kitchen, one which read “Tasty Kitchen” and the other which just said “Kitchen” but had a giant rooster and chicken on it. A purple vase. 

“Why did you buy all this stuff?” Alex asked as he returned. She showed him the kitchen signs, “Is this a joke?”

“Um…” He froze and looked at her like he was almost hurt. Like he was panicking. It was weird. She’d thought for sure he picked these signs as a dirty joke. Cock and hen kitchen? Tasty kitchen, like his cum or something? But she could tell in an instant by his expression that he hadn’t thought of those things at all, that apparently these were sincere purchases. An exploration of his… style? No, that didn’t make sense. Farmhouse chic or Tuscany or whatever this was?! They weren’t his style at all!

“Oh a Brita! Finally!” Rebekah gasped, pulling out the box in the last bag. “I’ll go set it up…” She whisked away to the kitchen and that was the last straw for Alex.

“A Brita? Too good for tap water now, huh?”

Jungkook crossed his arms and drew a deep breath and let it out like he was bracing himself for battle.

And then pointed out, “Your boyfriend doesn’t like the tap water here.”

Alex’s eyes narrowed.

“Yeah? I know that. That’s why I was trying to keep bottled water–”

“Don’t waste money on bottled fucking water,” he rolled his eyes. “I got this so we can just refill it and now he won’t get dehydrated.”

Alex watched his back as he went to dig around the snack bag. He pulled a few things out, then seemed to change his mind and just pulled the whole bag up.

“That’s… thoughtful,” Alex said slowly. “But why waste your money on it? Why did you buy all this stuff for our place?”

“I told you, there was a sale. Now what’s this movie we’re watching? Let me change into something comfier first.” He gave her a charming grin before he set off for the kitchen. 

“What do you mean ‘we’?” 

But sure enough, once they’d unloaded the snacks and Jungkook made his own dinner and put on sweats, he settled right down on the couch.

Between them.

“So what’s this movie?” he asked around a mouthful of sandwich. It formed a massive ball in his cheek; it made his eyes look especially cartoonish as he glanced between them. 

“You’re being weird,” Alex told him.

“Because I want to watch a movie with you?!”

“Yeah, why is that weird?” Rebekah asked. “I thought you two watched movies together all the time.”

“Yeah but…” Alex couldn’t explain it. Jungkook watching a movie wasn’t that weird, sure. But it was a Friday night. And he’d just spent a bunch of his money on stuff he always thought was stupid. And he’d bought a Brita water purifier as a favor to her and her boyfriend?? Major sus!

She glanced at Rebekah, who was also waiting for this grand reveal; there was no way for a moment of privacy, so Alex just lowered her voice to ask Jungkook sincerely, “Are you… ok?”

“No,” he said, face falling. “I’m actually dying, Alex. That’s why I bought decorative pillows, so you’d have something– ow ow! Hey!” He broke off, leaning against Rebekah as Alex punched his arm. “Save me, Becky!” he cried, and pressed his face into Rebekah’s shoulder.

Rebekah laughed and flapped her hand at Alex, completely unbothered apparently that Jungkook had called her Becky, and called, “Ok ok, ceasefire! I think the pillows are nice.”

“He bought five.”

“Should we start the movie?” Rebekah suggested without further comment.

To be honest, it pissed Alex off. She knew Rebekah and Jungkook were joking but, for a brief moment she felt a flash of blinding rage that Rebekah would playfully defend Jungkook against her. That Jungkook would turn to Rebekah. That she was the outsider in this moment rather than the literal connection. 

“Aw, Grumple Skrunkle,” Jungkook teased, and pinched Alex’s nose shut to make her sputter. “Yeah, hit it,” he told Rebekah, but then leaned forward himself to push play on the PlayStation controller balanced among their things on the laundry basket. “Oh I found a coffee table on craigslist,” he added, pointing at her, wagging his finger exactly like his mother did. “It needs to be restained but it’s free, I’m picking it up first thing tomorrow but I need your car, your trunk is bigger than mine.” Then he tried to wink as he added, “It’s one of your best assets.” He’d never quite mastered winking though, he always closed the other eye too, but insisted he didn’t do it even when Alex showed him photographic evidence, and insisted she was just racist, at which point she usually tried to choke him or kick the back of his knees.

Instead of commenting on the wink, she got stuck on, “Uh… we don’t know how to restain something.”

“I found a YouTube video, it’s fine.”

“What the fuck…”

“Shhh,” he said, because the opening credits were rolling, as if he was the one who’d been looking forward to this all week. He didn’t even know what movie they were watching until five minutes ago. It was a Friday night! Usually he’d be out fucking things and doing people! 

She held off asking again until they’d finished eating, but when Jungkook paused the movie to load all their dishes into the laundry basket and take them to the kitchen, Alex began to wonder. She wasn’t anything unusual here. This was just a normal Friday night for her. But Rebekah wasn’t always here on a Friday night. Was that the difference? Was Jungkook trying to impress Rebekah?!

She grabbed her phone, ready to text Jungkook: remember the rule no fucking my friends. But he got back too quickly, and probably if she texted him right now, Rebekah would see it. And if that was what Jungkook was getting at here, Alex’s text might accidentally be the thing that made Jungkook and Rebekah talk about it! And decide to go for it! Friendship be damned!!!!

Jungkook plopped down again between them, hit play on the controller –now on the ground– with his big toe, and then flipped one of the blankets open across all three of their laps. The next move felt like the obvious farcical step; he let out a deep sigh and lifted his arms over their heads and stretched them along the back of the couch, pressed against both of their backs, hands hooked around their shoulders. Not even subtle.

Rebekah giggled as Alex sighed, “Kookoo…”

“Oh right sorry, you have a boyfriend…” He lifted his arm away from her, which put him a little closer to Rebekah. “Sorry, am I making you uncomfortable?” he asked Rebekah.

“No, I don’t have a boyfriend. It’s nice to snuggle while we watch a movie.”

Alex made a retching noise in her lap that almost went too far.

“Yeah, don’t make yourself puke for real!” Jungkook cried, knowing. She hated that he knew! She hated that he’d seen it happen before. She just had a suggestible gag reflex, ok?!

Now flustered and annoyed and not sure how else to remind Jungkook he was not allowed to fuck her friends, Alex grabbed his arm and yanked it back around her shoulder and huffed,

“Don’t be such a fucking weirdo, either of you, it’s just a movie. And stop doing things with your toes, it’ll weird my friend out!” He’d been using his toe to tug the blanket a little bit lower to cover his feet. It wasn’t quite big enough for everyone to spread out but with his arms around their shoulders anyway, they were almost tucked close enough. It was really only meant for two.

“It’s fine,” Rebekah assured her. “It’s kind of impressive.”

“It’s not impressive when he pinches you, trust me, it’s like a fucking lobster, especially if he hasn’t cut his–”

“I keep my nails short!” he interrupted, scowling at her. “Don’t say shit like that.”

“You do. It’s really impressive. So many men don’t seem to care about how their feet or hands look but your nails are always nice,” Rebekah complimented him. 

“Can you turn the movie up? I can’t hear,” Alex spoke over whatever appreciative bullshit Jungkook was about to say. He tried to hit it with his toe but the TV remote was harder to control that way. He had to bend down to pick it up once he’d dragged it closer with his foot; he let go of Rebekah’s shoulders to do it, keeping his arm around Alex. That was a little soothing, if her request managed to get between them in more ways than one.

“The snuggling is going to get real awkward when we get to the sex scenes,” she joked.

“Maybe for you,” Jungkook shrugged.

“Uh, no? I’m not the one who will be weird about it.”

“Who, me?!” Rebekah gasped. “Ok let’s be clear about something, I have a sexual history–”

“I meant JK,” Alex laughed. 

“Oh… ok…’

“Are you kidding? Two hot girls and me–”

“Ok stop talking,” Alex said and covered his mouth. She expected him to lick her hand. Instead he just opened his mouth and breathed warm breath against her palm, which was way weirder. “God you’re weird.”

“Yeah, hey can you put the balled tit pillow behind my head?”

“So you admit it!”

“I’m never admitting anything and you can’t make me,” he said, and squeezed her shoulder. “Now stop making noise and watch the movie.”

“I thought you liked noise,” she said, trying to joke, trying to draw out Jungkook acting the way he ought to. Not that he wasn’t. But his arms around them both felt weird even though they snuggled plenty of times while watching movies. It wasn’t a big deal! But was it a big deal for Rebekah? Alex thought she seemed a little too happy. And Jungkook looked smug. 

Suddenly he turned his face down to hers and whispered, “I know I’m hot but the screen is that way, Song.”

“Fuck, your ego is just… it’s so big it’s blocking the screen.”

“Oh, baby, that’s not my ego, that’s–”

“A lame joke, try again.”

“No, there’s a movie on, shush.”

The ‘shush’ did her in. She glared, but he just grinned at her, and for some reason that exchange soothed her. Their little quips were just like they’d always been and it was comforting. Silent communication, that was a thing they could do, they could have a moment like that and understand each other, and Rebekah wasn’t a part of that at all. 

And also… Jungkook wouldn’t. He had messed up so big with the whole kissing her thing a while ago, he wouldn’t just throw another rule out the window to get his dick wet with Rebekah. He had no problem getting his dick wet, he didn’t need to fish in Alex’s pond for that.

Unless… unless he actually liked Rebekah?

But no, that wasn’t a Jungkook thing to do. He didn’t like girls like that. And if he did– Rebekah was great, she really was, but their personality types were all wrong together! They weren’t similar enough or opposite enough for it to make sense!

She would remind him of the rule though, just to be safe. Later. Once she wasn’t busy pinching his thigh and ribs and nipples every time he squeezed her shoulder and tickled her neck to try and make the jump scares worse.

It was disorienting to wake up with Alex in bed with him. He rolled towards her, legs curling around, arms flopping across her lap. Dream and reality fused together, and everything smelled like her, and she was always so warm to sleep next to. He missed that. It’d been so long since she’d crashed in his bed. He liked rolling into the warm space she left behind when she got up first, and breathing in the scent of her shampoo where she’d leave it on her pillow because she always forgot it and had to come retrieve it later. He never put it back for her. 

“No, Jungkook, wake up.” Her voice was raspy and sharp in the quiet of early morning. She was shaking his shoulder. “Wake up, I need a favor…”

“Huh?” He squinted at her, one eye barely open as his brain started to drag itself out of that foggy warm happy half-asleep place. He pushed himself up and rubbed at his face before he was awake enough to stop his hands, afraid he’d give himself pimples.

“Alex?” He turned towards his phone on the nightstand but didn’t move to touch it. “What time is it?”

“A little before five,” she said. “I’m so sorry to wake you up… my car won’t start but I have to be at work in ten minutes and I’m kind of freaking out and there aren’t any Lyfts available right now… fucking suburbs…”

She was talking too fast. He pressed his fingers to her mouth and blinked, trying to clear his head. He didn’t remember any particular dream but thought it had been nice and he regretted being pulled from it. Or maybe it wasn’t a dream, maybe it was just that hazy nice space of being curled around her in bed, thinking of other times he’d been like that–

“Can you just… just ride in the car and wake up on the way and then drive yourself back afterwards?” she asked.

He yawned and blinked at her again, still confused. Why was she sitting on the side of his bed dressed for work? Why was his brain doing this? Oh shit was he about to have a sex dream about her in her uniform?! She wasn’t wearing her apron though, but maybe he could put that on after her clothes were off… he looked down but he wasn’t wearing his work uniform, so this wasn’t a joint uniform dream–

“Jungkook, wake up,” she said, taking hold of his face and squishing his cheeks. “I’m sorry but can I have a ride to work? My car won’t start.”

“Yeah? You need um… oh you need a ride to work?”

Not a sex dream. 

“Yes.”

“Ok. Yeah. Yeah of course, let’s go.” His body wasn’t quite obeying yet but his brain propelled him forward, out of bed –suddenly Alex shot up and called out that she’d meet him at the front door and please to hurry, she’d drive there. He was on his feet before sensation caught up with him and he realized he might have bumped his semi against her arm or something… No, he didn’t think it was that noticeable. Maybe she was just in a rush to get to work. 

Oh shit, yeah, she was late, he realized as he looked at the clock on his phone. So he pushed himself to wake up faster, slipping on his sliders by the front door and grabbing his keys and wallet.

“I really appreciate it,” she said. “Sorry I woke you up so early.”

“Yeah, what’s wrong with your car?” he asked, following her down the stairs.

“I don’t know! It just keeps turning over. I don’t know if the battery is dead or it’s out of um… oil or something? Here, give me your keys, I’ll drive while you keep waking up.”

“I’m ok to drive.”

“Just give me the keys,” she insisted, and honestly she was probably right so he slid into his own passenger’s seat while she got behind the wheel. She’d be breathing down his neck probably if he didn’t drive fast enough anyway. 

He yawned and turned the radio off when it blasted too loud on starting, and suggested, “I’m not working today, I can take your car in. Did you leave your keys upstairs?”

“You don’t have to do that.”

“Eh, it’s fine,” he shrugged. It was weird to see the world as bright as it was so early in the morning. He was never up this early unless he’d just stayed up from the night before. It was further disorienting right now as he dragged his brain out of sleep. Part of him still felt curled up in bed with Alex and her long soft hair and her fluffy pillow. Even though he hadn’t actually been, he realized. A dream. A wish. 

“No, don’t, why would you do that? I’ll just figure it out when I’m off today.”

“We’ve got dinner with–”

“Yeah, I know!” she laughed. “What are you the family calendar keeper now?”

He shrugged, “I don’t know, maybe you forgot now that you have another family.”

“Oh stop.” She hit his arm but only lightly. “Fuck, I can’t believe my car– shit, my phone is ringing, can you–” She lifted off the seat just enough for Jungkook to dig her phone out of her back pocket and glanced at the screen.

“Chesley,” Jungkook read.

“Yeah can you answer, tell him I’m there in like six minutes…”

“Hey. Alex’s car wasn’t working this morning, she’s on her way now,” he said as he answered. He vaguely knew who Chesley was. 

“Who is this?”

“Her roommate.”

“Ohhhh ok that confused me, you don’t sound like Hobi. Did she forget her phone too?”

“No, she’s driving right now and struggles with multitasking outside of work.”

“Uh… ok, is she ok?”

“Yeah. Five minutes she’ll be there, bye.”

“Fuck fuck fuck,” Alex mumbled under her breath, radiating stress.

“It’s fine,” he insisted. “You’re like eleven minutes late. What’s going to happen, someone gets their coffee five minutes late?”

“People don’t handle their coffee being late very well.”

“Well they can go fuck themselves, it’s just coffee. It’s not like you broke your car on purpose.”

“Yeah but people don’t care…”

It took him until she zipped into the parking lot to really wake up, but by then he teased her, “Hey do I get free coffee now?”

“There’s nothing made but if you want to hang out while it brews, sure.” She barely put the car into park before she threw her door open, clearly not engaged with his little joke.

“Hey, it’s fine. You’re here now–” he started as he too got out of the car to walk around.

“Thank you for the ride–” 

“Yeah, is your deed and everything in your glove compartment?” 

She froze as he reached the driver’s side, and demanded, “Why are you insisting on that? I’ll take it in later, it’s not a big deal.”

“Do you have roadside assistance?”

“No that costs money…”

“Yeah, I’ll deal with it, it’s fine,” he shrugged. “Go work.” He jerked his head towards the front door where two of her coworkers leaned, waiting for her with the keys.

“That’s weird. Why are you being so weirdly nice?”

“I’m just nice, Jesus Fuck. Talk about people who need their coffee,” he huffed. “Get out of my car and go to work!” He backhanded her ass as she darted away without thinking about it; belatedly he blamed his sleep deprived brain. He’d even had to bend down to reach, there wasn’t a way to play it off as an accident.

He sank back into his seat but didn’t pull out of the space right away. 

There had been something in Chesley’s voice when Jungkook had answered. Maybe he was imagining things, but he thought Alex’s coworker at first thought he’d just caught her in bed with someone else. Or was that just Jungkook daydreaming? Wishful thinking? He was sure of it though and that it changed instantly once Jungkook said who he was, as if the threat was obviously nullified. Of course, just the roommate, not someone Alex was at all tempted by romantically. Not when she was dating Hoseok, who everyone loved. Guess Hoseok would be the next face of Starbucks or whatever, since everyone loved him so much. They’d replace the mermaid on the cup with his face. Hobucks. Yeah, fucking Hobucks.

Jungkook had to adjust the seat and mirrors in his car before he could drive again. Alex was such a shrimp. He wasn’t even that tall but his knees were in the steering wheel. It was like a Minion driving his car, except grumpier. A cute grumpy pre-coffee stressed-about-running-late Minion.

There was something intimate to him about her driving his car, even for just nine minutes. They drove each other's cars sometimes, it happened. She was a careful driver and he knew she’d be careful with his car. One time when they were much younger, she’d bumped a parking post in his car. Barely scratched the bumper but she’d had a total meltdown over it, and he’d actually felt like an asshole, if she’d expected him to be that worked up about his car. Yeah, he took care of his car as best as he could, but he knew it was an accident. He wouldn’t have torn her to shreds over an accident or anything, and so he’d always made a point after that of being chill if something got broken or ripped or stained because at the end of the day people were always more important than things. 

Besides, it was cute watching her drive his car, the way she had to sit up so high and peer over the wheel because his seat didn’t go as high as hers. He had to keep special pads around the seatbelts because they hit her collarbone weird and gave her cuts and rashes. Actually he’d learned all about that, how cars weren’t really designed for women’s bodies. That had definitely gotten him laid in the backseat of this thing more than once, though his days of backseat hookups were long behind him because he was a fucking adult now with a bed in his own room. 

Not for the first time, Jungkook found himself wondering if Hoseok ever evolved that way as a person or if he still thought everyone existed to be managed and tidy. He was very particular about his Elantra; Alex had told Jungkook how immaculate it was kept, not a single straw-wrapper left inside. Would he have let Alex drive his car? He still thought sometimes about how Hoseok had reacted when the food got spilled at that Kings concert; he’d come back in a new shirt and seemed kinda tetchy to Jungkook for the rest of the night, like he wasn’t having fun and didn’t want to be there and couldn’t even phone it in for Alex to have a good time. She worried about Hoseok having a good time more than she ought to. She cared too much about people around her. 

Well, Jungkook was trying to return the favor. He’d added a few things to their apartment in an attempt to make it a nicer place to be, so maybe she would stop just going to Hoseok’s place all the time. He was afraid she’d start to resent their apartment. He wanted her to enjoy coming home to it. He was going to restain the coffee table; Appa had agreed to help, he just needed to buy the stuff and find a time. Appa even had the sander they could use. Maybe he’d do it today–

No, he was going to get her car fixed today. Because she hated going to the car place and he knew a little bit (very little) more than she did about cars. She’d be so grateful when he gave it back to her later, and what could Hoseok say about it? It was just a nice thing to do! If Hoseok had a problem with it, he’d look like the asshole for suggesting that other people couldn’t do nice things for Alex. Would he have offered to take her car in if she’d woken up at Hoseok’s place with a car that wouldn’t start? 

Ugh, probably.

But maybe not. Maybe Alex wasn’t close enough to rely on him for things like that yet. Well Jungkook would be so fucking reliable. He was a great roommate. Alex benefits from living with him.

He decided it was true and it left him smug instead of pathetic feeling as he tried and failed to fall back asleep and went to the gym instead, and then kindly did not steal Alex’s shampoo when he showered and– ok, fine, used some of her conditioner to jack off with but only because it was right there and he was up earlier than he’d wanted to be. A favor for a favor! It just made the steamy shower smell so fucking good and he liked pleasant smells when he jacked off and it’s not like he was imagining Alex or anything. He didn’t. He firmly resisted those thoughts, which sometimes delayed his release as his brain struggled to fight off the mental image of her in whatever filthy position he was trying to play out in his head. Filthy. So fucking filthy, the dirtier the better, because Alex would never be in that position and–

Ah, his brain always tried to trick him like that. What position, this one? She would never do this? Why, because she’d be shy about it or because you’re worried about her straining a muscle? Which muscle? You’d need to help her rub it out? That would be nice, right? How nice?

It wasn’t that he thought jacking off to your best friend was some deep evil sin. He’d jacked off to the image of plenty of women he was attracted to but would never get a chance with. It’s not like she could read his mind. It’s not like she’d know. And how many times in his life had he insisted to friends that inside your head was a free, lawless place?

But ah, he wasn’t sure that was true in this instance. He was afraid of what would happen if he just gave into those thoughts. He was afraid it would make him awkward around her. He was afraid it would make him desperate. He was afraid it would rip to shreds this very careful net wall he had tried to put up as a compromise between what he wanted and what she wanted. He was afraid that if he let himself fantasize about all the things he wanted to do to her and do with her, it would start filthy and then turn serious and then turn sweet and then probably filthy again and soon his mind would lose its grip on reality and he wouldn’t be able to sit across from her at the table anymore and be casual and chill and convince them both that this was fine.

Because it was fine. It was fine! Being in love with your best friend was a breeze when you had the self control he did. And one thing he knew about maintaining that self control was this: no cheats. No sweets when he was dieting. No minor indulgences when he was saving money for something. No sitting down for breaks when he was at the gym, only active breaks. Young Jungkook, Jungkook 1.0, had terrible self control and what had it gotten him? No girlfriends, no game, no date to prom, and mediocre grades. Jungkook 2.0 had it figured out. Don’t make rules unless they matter, and if they matter, never break them.

Like kissing Alex. Bad idea. And as a consequence, he was now in love with his best friend and watching her fall in love with someone else. He was working to push through all of that, but cheating the rules would just make it worse. He didn’t want to know what might come pouring out. He didn’t want to see how pathetic he might be. He didn’t want her to have to put up a thicker wall between them.

So this was fine. It was fine! For now, he was the one she shook awake to give her a ride to work at five in the morning. Maybe he could even outlast Hoseok and it would always get to be him…

NO. No cheats. No cheat thoughts, no cheat fantasies, no indulging that part of his body that wanted to react in ways it shouldn’t when he got to spend time with Alex. His heart! Not his dick. Although that too! But yeah he had a heart and he was not interested in some big tragic heartbreak, which he was afraid this could become if he let it. So he just wouldn’t let it!

Getting her car fixed took the better part of his morning. She was going to freak about the $600 cost but when the guy replacing the battery (Jungkook had guessed that right! He’d had to jump her car to get it to the shop and couldn’t wait to brag to her about the fact he’d done this! And met a very hot neighbor who’d recently moved in and told him to give her a buzz sometime–) –but when the guy had mentioned her break pads were worn, he couldn’t tell the guy not to fix those. Breaks were important! Whatever, if she didn’t have the money right now she could take her time paying him back. He’d get by. 

She’d put on their shared Google calendar that her shift ended at 12:30. Yes, they had a shared google calendar; no that wasn’t as weird as their friends made it seem like. They both put their work things on there so they could remind each other back in the days where they kind of sucked at being adults. They were better now but the habit of the calendar stuck, and it was convenient to keep things like friends' parties on there, or to be able to quickly see what the other's work schedule was when trying to plan something, or when bills were due, or when someone was traveling.

So at 12:30 he rolled into the parking lot at her work in her newly fixed car and strolled in tossing her keys in his hand. 

The ‘hey babe, your wheels are ready, let’s roll’ died on his lips as Alex called the goodbye to her co-workers and turned away from the counter, nudged by Hoseok’s hand on her shoulder. It meant they saw him at the same moment, with equally as surprised expressions.

“Oh! Jungkook? Uh… you didn’t have to come pick me up,” she said, stepping towards him. “Or did you want that free coffee now for the lift?”

Lest Hoseok think Jungkook was the kind of guy who only did a favor for a favor, he quickly assured her, “No, no coffee, I’m taking a nap after this. Spent the morning getting your car fixed.” Oops, was there something in his voice? He didn’t realize he felt annoyed until he heard it in his terse tone. He twirled her keys around his finger. “Battery was dead dead and also your breaks were worn.”

She grimaced, “Oh shit, sounds expensive…”

“Like six hundred… you can take your time paying me back if you need to,” he insisted at her hiss.

Beside her, Hoseok suggested, “Huh, I wonder if my guy could have done it for less… where did you take her car? My guy is really good, I was just telling her–”

“Matt’s great. Best in the business,” Jungkook insisted. He had no fucking clue what the auto shop guy’s name was. He barely recalled the name of the place, either, he just knew where it was and always went there because Appa went there. 

“I really appreciate it,” Alex said, reaching for his hand to take the keys. “You didn’t have to do that. I know it’s a boring errand and it wasn’t even your car–”

“Yeah but you need your car working.”

“Oh yeah sorry didn’t mean to disturb your beauty sleep,” she teased.

“You can disturb it any– uh, I mean it’s not a big deal or anything,” he said, shifting tone mid-sentence. Goddamnit talking to her in front of Hoseok and trying not to push any buttons was annoying. He never thought about these things before because things were so casual and easy and fun with Alex but now having to second guess everything he said to her was exhausting. “It’s fine, I’m your roommate, that’s what we’re good for.”

Hoseok butted in again, “She was telling me how hard you are to wake up,” he laughed. “I told her she should have called me! I was already up and getting ready for my shift anyway, I could have swung by and picked her up.”

“Nah, no need to go out of your way, I was right there.” He hadn’t released her keys, still holding them above her head to see if she’d jump, or if he could taunt her into punching him. Would she do that in front of her boyfriend?

She did. Right in the stomach, though not enough to do any damage. He doubled over in mock pain just so he could grab her hand for a second, then let her wrestle the keys out of his fingers as he laughed.

“What happens if an employee assaults a customer in here?” he joked. 

Hoseok laughed, “Sorry, you know, I don’t work in corporate anymore and this isn’t my shop…” He seemed so nice and friendly when he said it, but Jungkook wasn’t sure whether to trust that or not. Honestly, were the roles reversed right now, he’d be seething with jealousy, having a hot guy like Jungkook grab his girlfriend’s fist into his stomach and knot their fingers together when she stole the keys from him–

Look, Jungkook had never claimed not to be an asshole.

“This is my shop,” Alex insisted. “I make the law here.”

“Ooh scary. I’m so threatened.” Jungkook took her keys right out of her hand again and held it above her head.

“Whatever,” she scoffed, “You have to use it to get home anyway.”

His head tilted and he lowered the keys, “Oh, you aren’t coming?”

“Well my plan was to head to Hoseok’s place to nap until dinner time.”

“Yeah same– I mean, not at Hoseok’s,” Jungkook corrected. 

“You’re welcome to join,” Hoseok suggested. He thought Hoseok’s smile was a little forced. But so was his as he realized now that he’d come here not only for nothing, but that he was supposed to awkwardly leave alone. In Alex’s car. So he could go home and nap alone in his bed while Alex went and probably fucked Hobi and then took a nap afterwards. And he’d meet them for dinner and be the one at the table who knew they’d both worked that morning and then had a little afternoon fuck’and’nap. And he was the one who’d spent the morning at the car shop with her car –not for a sexual favor or anything but still! Still. 

Alex must have realized it too, how pathetic he was, because she looked guilty as she rushed out, “Shit, I feel bad you came all the way here to get me… I didn’t ask you to!”

“Yeah, you didn’t say you were calling Hoseok, I didn’t want to leave you stranded since i had your car–”

“And I told you not to do that! You really didn’t have to, it’s so nice but you didn’t have to–”

“Uh, that’s what friends do. Why are you being weird about it?” he demanded because she was making him seem weird about it. 

“No I know, I really appreciate it.”

“Yeah, sounds like it,” he frowned. “K, I’ll take your car home. See you tonight. Guess you have a ride to that too–”

“Jungkook, why are you sulking–”

“I’m not sulking. I’m tired and I’m going home now.”

“Jungkook…”

He didn’t like the way she sighed his name and this was embarrassing, there was no graceful way to exit the situation. Anything made him look either dopey or dumb. It didn’t help that they followed him out of the store, and that Alex bumped into him playfully on the way to Hoseok’s car.

“Seriously, I appreciate it. I owe you a big inconvenient errand too now. And you can wake me up at an ungodly hour, I won’t even be mad. And I can give you the money, show me the exact amount and I’ll transfer it to you today.”

“Yeah, you’ve got it?”

She whispered, “Yeah it’s been a little easier to save since Hoseok pays for a lot of stuff, you know? Plus you shouldn’t be out for my car. I’ll give you a tip too, I’ll pay you extra!”

“Don’t give me a tip,” he quickly frowned. “I don’t work for you.”

“I know, but–”

“I’m just your friend. You don’t have to make it weird. I was just trying to be nice when you asked me for a favor.”

“You are nice. I know. Now go nap, I’ll see you tonight, ok? Don’t bail on me!”

I’m not the one who bails he mumbled to himself, and got into her car alone and drove himself home alone. 

***

“So there’s Jimin three plates in–”

“Samples. Samples! Not plates!”

“And me and the baker come out of the back where she was showing me the kitchen, and the girl working is so confused why Jimin is sitting at this table eating all this cake–”

“I thought those were our samples!” Jimin complained, covering his face.

“You thought you’d just sit at a table and help yourself to a bunch of cake sitting on it?” In’am laughed. “You didn’t think it mattered what I thought about each flavor?”

“I left you some of each one…”

“So what were the cakes actually for?” Luisa asked.

“Taste test for the new menu,” Jimin sighed. “But I gave the baker my feedback so… so no harm done!”

In’am snickered, “Except for the massive stomach ache you got after we finished the tasting.”

“Yeah, I never eat that much sugar. Only for you!”

“Such a sacrifice, duly noted,” Alex offered by way of keeping things moving along. 

Dinner was not what she had expected, to say the least. Jungkook had shown up, so that was at least one good surprise, because he’d sulked home so hard earlier she thought he might have locked himself in his bedroom. Then Taehyung and Sabina canceled at the last second, and Namjoon kept saying he was on his way but was running majorly late. Seokjin had brought Luisa, which was another good surprise –Hoseok explained Seokjin was so nervous about meeting new people he needed more of a teddy bear to cling to than Hoseok could be since he’d be by Alex’s side, and Alex had wanted to ask why he felt like he had to choose, but she liked Luisa so it wasn’t a problem! And Luisa was the one to suggest the backup restaurant when they’d shown up to the first –to the sushi place the guys had fallen in love with while Alex was out of town with Hoseok– only to find it unexpectedly shut down for healthcode violations. Yikes.

People bailing on dinner wouldn’t have been such a problem except that bringing Seokjin along felt to Alex like a further step in merging her friend groups, and she wanted a good showing. She had hoped Hoseok and Seokjin would like the sushi place though thank fuck she hadn’t given them food poisoning. Luisa’s backup tapas place was fun though, the food was great, and they didn’t even have to wait too long for a table on a Saturday night. There was a coin fountain and Alex got the hostess to turn a dollar into pennies and then convinced Jungkook to do trick shots with her at the fountain until their nails hurt. Everyone wound up giving it a try and Jungkook had looked predictably smug when he’d been able to land a good shot, though Seokjin had the clinch flick, apparently, and Luisa had made a joke about it that made Seokjin cover his face. 

And the food was great, the sangria was greater. Everything was fine. Why did Alex feel like it wasn’t? She felt so on edge, like there was some expectation on her to make this go perfectly. This was always how it felt after there was any kind of awkward moment with Hoseok or Jungkook, even just a mixup about who was picking her up after work, and it was exhausting. But she recognized that it didn’t mean it was actually a problem. Everyone was fine now. It wasn’t her job to make things perfect!

“But what I want to know,” she said, “Why didn’t the girl working the counter say something when you just started eating all that cake?”

Hoseok waved his hand to answer first, “Ah, I read a study about that! If you pretend you know what you’re doing, people believe you and they won’t interfere.”

“Or she just wanted to see what would happen,” Jungkook suggested.

“Ah, I couldn’t do that,” Hoseok laughed. “You have to keep an eye on people! I’ve had people –we give out samples at work sometimes and they’ll just come pick up the entire tray. Or they grab ten of the little cups. That’s more than a whole croissant!”

“We have to watch people too. If someone comes in and starts lifting merchandise, I have to stop them,” Jungkook argued. He sounded defensive and Alex didn’t know why. Maybe because he definitely took multiple samples if given the chance.

“Well there’s mall security,” Alex pointed out. “They don’t expect you to intervene in a robbery, right?”

“Oh, do phone stores get robbed?!” Luisa gasped. Alex watched the conflict on Jungkook’s face because it was pretty funny. His fuckboy instincts told him to say yes and lean into the admiration this could bring, but he also clearly marked Luisa as Seokjin’s girlfriend (they were not, at least not yet) and he seemed to want to get along well with Seokjin. Which she appreciated. Although it was weird to watch Jungkook try not to shamelessly flirt with someone. The loss of entertainment was tragic so that she almost clarified Luisa’s single status to grease the wheels but something stopped her. Maybe they’d actually gone official. Maybe Jungkook was picking up on something she was oblivious to.

Instead he turned it on the poor waitress, who seemed to be tripping over herself to make his meal a good one, always talking to him as if he was the head of their group. When he asked her lowly for another drink, just water this time, she leaned in and asked him to repeat it. Alex did not think it needed to be repeated.

“You didn’t like the sangria?” Jimin asked him, because obviously the whole table had been able to hear his order. “It’s so good. It’s better than that shit you guys made in the sink.”

“Hey! That was… drinkable!” Alex defended.

“In the sink?!” Luisa repeated. “You don’t have a bowl?!”

“Not as big as a sink!”

“I saw this TikTok, they made sangria in the bathtub–” Seokjin began, which Jungkook picked up with, “Yeah, the one where the guy gets in it naked?”

“Gross!!”

“I don’t think anyone drank it but the guy,” Seokjin laughed. “Still…”

“That was always a rule my mom taught me, don’t drink anything your butt has been in,” Hoseok joked. Alex could just envision it; she hadn’t met his mother yet but she’d heard plenty of stories and seen pictures by now. His mom seemed kind and fun and no-nonsense in a way she hoped she would be able to get along well with. Assuming they met, of course. But they probably would. Eventually. Oh god. Soon Hoseok would meet her mother for her birthday dinner with her family.

Oh god it already made her nervous… her mom could be so nosy! 

Namjoon interrupted her premature panic with his sudden arrival, even though the food was almost gone; he appeared out of nowhere and slid into the empty chair at the foot of the table.

“Shit, sorry I’m so late, that was…”

“What happened?” Jimin asked.

“Oh, hi I’m Namjoon…” he paused to introduce himself before sighing, “I was going to bring this girl I’ve gone on a couple dates with now, but a pipe burst in my house, so I was there trying to mop it up and she’s sitting on her phone and starts asking me all these questions about hey, do I know a Jungkook Jeon–”

All eyes turned to Jungkook, whose own eyes went very wide, mouth open wide for the bite of chorizo on toasted bread he was about to shovel in.

Namjoon nodded, “Uh huh. Happen to know a Seychelle?”

“Not Seashell!” Alex gasped. “You’ve been dating her?!”

“Um…” Jungkook looked like he was starting to sweat. “Yeah…” He kicked Alex under the table.

“Yeah, turns out she didn’t realize we know each other –which I don’t fucking understand how because I’m on your Instagram, and how many Namjoons does she think live around here?! But she was like ‘oh wait that was your bathroom!’ when I brought her into my house to deal with the flood and I didn’t know what she was talking about…”

Jungkook hastily swallowed his massive bite, choking a little; Alex handed him her own water because his was empty and he chugged the lump down before insisting, “I’m not dating her though. You can still date her if you want.”

“Kind of you, man, thanks for your permission–”

“No! I mean, it doesn’t have to be weird just because I uh… know her in the biblical sense– I mean, she’s good, right? SO yeah man, get it! Good for you! She’s uh… a nice girl!”

“Oh my god,” Jimin cackled and covered his face as Alex let hers slump into the crook of her elbow on the table.

“No, not good for me.”

In’am arched her eyebrow and asked, “Why, you have a problem with a woman with history?”

“What? No!” Namjoon defended. “I don’t care about that… I mean… it’s not like it’s a competition between us,” he said, gesturing to Jungkook.

“Yeah I’m sure you’re ok in bed,” Jungkook assured him. He looked delighted. Alex thought he was probably eager for Namjoon to not be mad at him, though Alex felt like it wouldn’t have been fair. It wasn’t Jungkook’s fault he’d fucked a lot of women– ok, well, that was his fault, but being fucked (past tense) by Jungkook shouldn’t exclude a woman from a datable list for anyone else. Especially because uh, that list was pretty long. There might not be a lot of single women left in the tri-city area if you had to filter that list out…

For a brief moment Alex wondered how many women he had actually fucked. Like what was the actual real number, not just the joking numbers they talked about? Fifty? Eighty? Over a hundred? Two hundred?!

It made her stomach twist, which was embarrassing because she didn’t want to be slut shamy of Jungkook. She wasn’t! She admired and supported his slutty behavior. Sometimes he got free stuff because of it and she got to benefit! Good for him! She wasn’t sure why it made her feel a little sick, but decided it was more about her own lack of experience. It made her feel insufficient. Lacking. She knew that didn’t make any sense but she glanced at him and just thought he knows things about sex and bodies I will never be able to keep up with. Not that it was a competition or anything but just… he was on such a whole different level. He probably knows more about a woman’s body than I ever will and I HAVE a woman’s body…

“I’m incredible in bed,” Namjoon glowered. “But Seychelle won’t get to experience it again –which she will regret, believe me– because suddenly she had all these questions about you.”

Jungkook’s brow scrunched up as he demanded, “What questions?”

“Wanted to know why you dropped off the face of the earth. Apparently you haven’t updated your instagram in a month and haven’t been posting on snap chat and whatever else, I don’t know, she was just clearly more interested in knowing what you were up to than focusing on– man, I went on like three dates with her and thought she was cool,” Namjoon sighed and let his head hang.

“I’m sorry,” Jungkook said. “That sucks. If it helps, um… well maybe you can just tell me who you’re going on a date with first and I can let you know if I’ve ever uh met them before, if it matters to you.”

“It doesn’t matter to me as long as they aren’t comparing us or thinking of you the whole time or whatever. It’s fucked up! Sorry,” he said to Luisa. 

Luisa quickly insisted, “I think you have dodged a blade, if she is so concerned about someone else and instagram. She goes on three dates with you and is still asking about another man? It sounds like you aren’t looking for the same thing I think?”

“Dodged a blade,” Alex repeated. “That is so much cooler sounding than dodged a bullet.”

Suddenly Jungkook added, “Also hey if you want help meeting women, I can help you out. I helped Alex, you know.”

“What?! You did not!” Alex guffawed.

“Uh, I did. I tried at least. You kept shitting on everyone I showed you.”

“Yeah, he’s not good, don’t let him help you,” Alex said to Namjoon. “I found Hoseok on my own, hands down better than anyone Jungkook showed me.”

“You don’t know that because you didn’t date any of them.”

Jimin grinned and rested his chin on his hand, urging, “Tell us more about your great taste in men, JK.”

“Well, no, I just mean… I have a lot of contacts. I can make introductions. Honestly. It’s the least I can do for uh, interfering… even though I don’t think I actually did anything wrong here…”

“Maybe you should fuck less good and then women will be relieved to meet Namjoon since he’s clearly better boyfriend material,” Alex suggested without thinking.

“Ah, thanks babe,” Jungkook winked at her and clicked his tongue. Then froze, eyes going wide as he noticed Hoseok, and stammered, “Uh, I mean…”

“I didn’t mean that as a compliment!” Alex cried, realizing her own mistake. “I mean, I don’t even know how you are, maybe you’re bad and Seychelle just–”

“I’m not bad,” Jungkook defended.

“--wanted to know if Namjoon would be bad by association.”

“She already knew I was good,” Namjoon argued, reaching forward to take uneaten food from plates.

“Wow, really? By date three? Ah, I’m so glad you’re slower to move like me,” Hoseok said to Alex, which meant he missed Namjoon’s facial reaction. It was not pleased. 

Seokjin quickly suggested, “I think he meant just that if you move quickly maybe she thought it was casual sex and that’s why she could ask about Jungkook… were you exclusive?”

“No, not after three dates but…”

“Three dates isn’t too soon to fuck,” Jimin argued, earning a look of amused disbelief from In’am. “Come on, how long did we wait? It felt like an eternity but…”

“Five dates.”

“Yeah, an eternity. Would have been two if I’d had my way…”

“Yes, that’s all I meant,” Hoseok quickly insisted. “You waited until she was ready because you were serious. We did the same. I don’t know, maybe I’m too slow! I’m slow about things like that…”

Alex took his hand beneath the table and grinned at him, “That’s ok though, I am too. Glacially slow.”

“Yes but you just need to find someone who is compatible with you,” Luisa advised. “If you’re both fast or you’re both slow, it’s all right. No one is confused.”

“Well but fast and slow can work together,” Jungkook argued. “A relationship involves compromise. The fast person can slow down and be reassured in other ways that the other person is serious about them even if they want to go slow. That’s not a problem.”

Alex stared at him, baffled, and demanded, “Who have you gone slow for? Who are you and what have you done with Jungkook?!”

“I’m just saying I could and would go slow. For the right person! Jimin, Namjoon, any of us, right? You’d have to be a piece of shit to rush a woman who didn’t want to be rushed–”

“But you move too fast to figure out if a woman is the right person,” Jimin laughed. “You’re fucking her so quickly, maybe afterwards you’re like oh shit, she was the one but I already blew it…”

Jungkook’s smile had a degree of shyness to it as he laughed, “No no that hasn’t happened.”

“Yes, our resident relationship expert,” Namjoon muttered. “I hate when you give decent advice.”

“Oh god, Joon, don’t take relationship advice from him!” Alex gasped. “Talk to literally anyone else in our friend group.”

“Hey, I give good advice,” Jungkook scowled at her.

“About getting laid, not about falling in love. If I had taken your advice…”

He looked genuinely upset now and pressed, “What bad advice did I give you?”

“You told me to have sex fast and stop thinking so much about it!”

At the groans around the table, Jungkook defended, “Ok wait wait that’s out of context, I didn’t say that. Don’t say that, that makes me sound bad! I only give you good and careful advice and look, now you have a boyfriend you’re happy with so why are you blaming me?”

“I’m just saying.”

“The purple thing, right? I told you just to wear anything that would make you comfortable and he’d like it. I encouraged you! I was right about that too, right?”

“Purple thing?” Hoseok repeated, eyebrow arching, and Alex wanted to crawl under the table. Oops. Oops oops fucking oops, this was not where she’d meant the conversation to go.

“Ok ok you’re right, I’m just joking,” she insisted. “You gave me good advice. I know. You can listen to him, Joon.”

“Maybe you should get relationship advice from people in successful relationships,” Jimin suggested.

“Or just follow your own heart,” In’am countered. 

“Ask a woman,” Luisa added. “Oh, unless you also date men?”

“I– why? Do I give off those vibes?” Namjoon asked her skeptically. Luisa shrugged.

Jimin snickered, “Why, Joon? Someone else say that to you recently?” Namjoon sighed and rolled his eyes as Jimin happily shared, “He’s been getting hit on men a lot. Apparently I’m a pretty good wingman…”

“I know men! I can introduce you,” Jungkook tried, like he had something to prove here.

“I’m not paying for any of this food,” Namjoon announced and continued to stuff his face.

Hoseok suddenly leaned in close to Alex’s ear and asked, “What purple thing?”

“Oh, it’s… it’s nothing… a thing I bought to wear on our trip but I wound up not needing it.” She beamed at him, remembering how easy and comfortable she had felt with him… eventually. “Something fun for another day.”

“And your roommate saw this purple thing? Is it the kind of purple thing I think you mean…”

Alex froze. Obviously she should not admit to her boyfriend –post kiss– that Jungkook had in fact seen her in the lingerie she had bought to wear for Hoseok. But she also didn’t want to lie to her boyfriend.

“Lingerie,” she whispered back. “It’s just something nice I ordered because a girl he was with had something like it and recommended– I can show you–” 

Liar liar liar!

She broke off as Hoseok suddenly sat taller, his face lighting up as the live band across the restaurant suddenly made a comment about salsa dancing taking place in the building behind the restaurant.  

“No,” Seokjin sighed, looking instantly between Luisa and Hoseok.

“You dance?” In’am asked, then waved her hand at Hoseok, “Of course, Alex told us all about you used to dance.”

“Let’s go,” Jimin agreed. “Finish eating, quick.”

“We have to pay!”

“The dancing is just starting, there’s no rush.”

Alex let out a deep sigh. Hoseok seemed to have instantly forgotten the question and she could avoid answering it for now, at least until more time was between that kiss and now. It had been over a month now and yet she still felt like she was a matador when Jungkook and Hoseok were in the same place.

She was tired of that. Both had said they would be simple and good. Why didn’t it feel simple and good yet? She wanted that to stop now, thanks. 

In fact, it was going to. Enough was enough! She wasn’t going to stretch herself awkwardly like this. Tightrope walker? She wasn’t born for that. They were going to have to sort their own shit because everything was fine and she was not going to enable awkwardness a moment longer!

So she clapped her hands on the table and agreed, “Yeah, let’s dance! I can’t dance for shit but let’s do it and I hope my boyfriend doesn’t dump me over it!”

“Noooo don’t even joke like that, of course you have my heart no matter how badly you dance.”

She felt an instant flush. His words left her briefly speechless, they were so sweet, leaving her to scramble to throw her card down when it came time to pay and finish drinks and avoid looking at anyone so she wouldn’t burst into flames. 

Hoseok put his hands on her shoulder to steer her forward and leaned in close to whisper, “Don’t worry, I mean it. I’ll teach you all I know. Maybe later you can show me something purple.”

*

Honestly, Alex thought Hoseok might have gone out of his way to fluster her the rest of the evening. His dancing was intimidating to witness. He made it look so easy to move in ways her body simply couldn’t keep up with. He was sweet and encouraging as he taught her steps, and laughed with her when she’d feel awkward sliding her hands down her body or up into the air, or when he did it for her. But it was worth the slight embarrassment to watch him move.

At one point she sat out for a while; she pleaded with him to dance with Luisa instead so she could rehydrate with Seokjin at the edge of the dance floor. Hoseok was reluctant at first but Alex insisted, swore it wasn’t a jealousy thing, begged to just watch him dance for a while, and she didn’t regret that even if the awe was definitely mixed with envy. Luisa was as graceful and natural as he was, and their bodies seemed to roll and spin and bend together. 

It kind of felt like grief, honestly. Her body wouldn’t look or move like Luisa’s, even if she dedicated all her time to trying, and usually that didn’t bother her but right now the dream of being able to move like that kind of got to her. It was one thing not to want something because you didn’t care. It was another to feel like it was beyond your reach. Hoseok clearly loved dancing and Alex sucked. She would never be able to keep up with him. 

“Why are you sitting out?” Jungkook asked, suddenly at her other elbow.

“Why are you sitting out?” she countered. “Notice you haven’t been short a partner.”

He feigned sheepishness, “Well, you know, there’s always more women than men at these things…”

“Collecting phone numbers as souvenirs?”

“Why is he dancing without you though?” he asked, gaze fixated, like hers was, on Hoseok and Luisa.

“I wanted a break. I can’t keep up with him! And I wanted to see what it looks like to really watch him go… isn’t he beautiful?”

“If you say so,” Jungkook shrugged.

“Come on, objectively speaking.”

“Objectively speaking, he fucked up letting you out of his sight. Come dance with me now.”

“What? Wait, no, this is my break– Kookieeee,” she whined to be as annoying as possible as he grabbed her arm and dragged her out. 

She looked back to Seokjin for help but he just laughed, “I’ll guard your water!” 

“How come he gets to sit down?”

“Fine, I’ll dance with him next,” Jungkook joked, then turned to face her. She didn’t like how smoothly he did it, lower lip taught, a mischievous glint in his eye. 

“Don’t do fancy things, I can’t keep up.”

“I don’t know fancy things.”

She scowled at him, “That’s not true, I saw you dancing.”

“Oh you were watching me, huh?” he arched his eyebrow. “Come on, hand up,” he said, reclaiming one of her hands and lifting the other to his ribs. 

“I’m tired–”

“One dance, Alex. He already taught you the step. Back two three, forward two three–”

“I’m not that fast,” she complained because unfortunately Jungkook, just like Hoseok, made it look easy. She knew he could dance well but really? Even salsa? He moved so fluidly, hips swaying attractively as he dragged her forward and backwards. What had happened to the awkward stiff way he moved as a teenager? This sucked. He’d changed and she hadn’t. Everything was stupid.

“That’s ok. One two three, two two three. Back two three, front two three–”

“Don’t count, it doesn’t actually help me it just stresses me out–”

“Ok ok no counting,” he assured her. Hoseok had been counting and she hadn’t realized it bothered her but Jungkook doing it now brought back that same insistent, disappointed voice in her ear –which was a horrible way to think about your boyfriend trying to teach you how to dance!! But she couldn’t keep up and as patient and sweet as Hoseok was about it, she knew she was holding him back. She didn’t like feeling like she was holding someone back. She’d rather watch from the sidelines. But then Jungkook had stolen her from there.

Suddenly Jungkook nudged her side to side instead of back and forth.

“I look like a Barbie doll trying to do this,” she joked. “It’s the only time in my life I look like a barbie doll. My legs are like –you know the way their legs don’t really bend.”

“You’re doing great,” he insisted. She could tell by his vacant look he was counting in his head. 

“You know I have no rhythm.”

“Just–”

“If you tell me to ‘just feel the rhythm’ I will punch you in the nuts.”

“Ah did Hoseok– he’s very good.”

“I know, I told you.”

“But you’re good too. It’s just supposed to be fun–”

“You can’t even say that with a straight face,” she glowered.

He leaned a little lower and kept an intentionally straight face as he repeated, “It’s just supposed to be fun.”

“Dancing is fun for people like you who can do it.”

“It’s not that different than swing,” he said, and suddenly lifted her hand and spun her in a circle. As he returned his hand to her ribs, he accidentally brushed her tit. “Oops. Sorry.” He didn’t look sorry.

“Did you learn to dance just so you can cop a feel with girls on the dance floor?”

“Not girls with boyfriends,” he promised. Then, “Hey. Stop trying to count in your head, you’re getting confused.”

“How can you tell?” 

He laughed, “Your face goes blank.”

“No yours does! Stop talking, I’m hopeless at keeping up then–”

“Alex.” He stopped her, just made them both stand still right there in the middle of the dance floor, in the middle of all the people swaying and spinning and gyrating around them. It felt terrible. It was so wrong to be standing still and awkward in the middle of that. She felt like a rock, like a big slow solitary rock. “See?”

“See what?! This is so awkward,” she said, and pushed him to try to get him to dance.

“Nothing happens if you dance wrong. It’s only awkward if you’re worried about the other people. Who gives a fuck? It doesn’t matter if you’re on time with the music or look like a professional or whatever it is you’re so afraid of.”

“I don’t care what other people think. Stop being weird–”

“Then stop counting and just have fun. We look stupid at home, we can look stupid here, it doesn’t matter.”

“Speak for yourself.”

“That it doesn’t matter?”

“You don’t look stupid,” she pouted.

“And no one who matters thinks you look stupid either. Except when you make that ugly face while you count in your head–”

“Shut up!” she laughed and stopped counting to prove a point. Her moves were off the beat, she could tell. She was clumsy following his lead, even though he was just nudging her forward and back and side to side with an embarrassing predictability –except nowhere near the beat. Totally of it it. Just a mess. But as soon as she’d start to get uncomfortable dancing wrong, he’d spin her and that was fun; for a second she felt like a dainty lady, though she wished she had a nice swirly skirt on or heels or something besides white jeans and sneakers. Yeah, she was wearing white jeans! And she hadn’t dumped anything on them yet! Hallelujah, it was a miracle –as miraculous as the fact that she was laughing as Jungkook spun her out and then back in, his arms wrapped around her from behind.

“Oops, your toe.”

“That’s ok, don’t need ‘em.”

“No?”

“Conversation starter,” he joked. “Women love to pity a man.”

“Well men don’t love a dance partner who looks like a fucking Nutcracker.”

“It’s a unique style– hey are you going to puke on me if I dip you?”

“Why would I puke on you– but no don’t!”

“Ok ok.” He pretended like he was going to anyway and she grabbed onto his upper arms so tight that she had to actually disengage her finger muscles. “I wouldn’t drop you, kitten,” he complained. 

“I’m not a cat.” She swallowed. Kitten should be on the list of unapproved nicknames for sure.

“You are such a cat.”

“I’ll just land on my head and crack my head open–”

“I would never allow that to happen.”

“Accidents happen, I go down hard–”

“Oops, this way,” he suddenly said, and practically lifted her from the floor to turn her away from where they’d almost bumped into another couple. They were probably hard to predict because they were so off rhythm. She couldn’t believe Jungkook would tolerate looking this clunky on the dance floor when there were possible lays watching, but he seemed to be having a great time.

And honestly, she was too. As long as she didn’t look at anyone else or think about them looking at her, it was fun to play with Jungkook. It was fun to have his attention. It was fun for those brief moments where the stars aligned and he managed to push or pull or spin her in a way that made her feel like she looked cool. She looked cool with one of the most attractive guys in the room. For the moment, she was the chosen one.

Jungkook’s voice threatened to pull her out as he interrupted her Star Moment to say, “Hey, you know it’s ok to follow your own rhythm, right? You don’t have to match someone else’s if you don’t want to.”

It was so strange it made her pause and look up at him, fumbling the step so that she stayed put and he stepped into her, pressing her race right into that musclebunny chest of his. It sounded like a line from a movie. Scripted. It didn’t sound like Jungkook at all and yet it… did? An older, more mature, less recognizable Jungkook?

What the fuck was going on with him, giving fortunte cookie advice like that?! 

“I turn my back for two minutes,” Hoseok laughed, coming up to them. “I didn’t mean to leave you bored! You said you wanted a break!”

Jungkook stepped backwards and was immediately separated from them by other dancing couples. It was dramatic and unnecessary. It wasn’t like Hoseok was mad or could be mad just because she danced with a friend. She could dance with Jimin and Namjoon and Seokjin too, it was fine. Jungkook wasn’t in trouble! 

But she felt a little in trouble too. A little guilty over being so winded from dancing and laughing and spinning. It was less stressful to dance with Jungkook. Because she wasn’t as worried about impressing him! Or keeping up! Would Hoseok notice she’d had more fun with her friend? Oops. It’s just that it felt like dancing with her was less of a sacrifice to Jungkook… or something…

To banish the guilt, she danced with Hoseok again even though she was really feeling done. She did her best to keep up. She tried to match her counting to his. But her body was just always a little too slow and stiff; she was always a beat behind and her hips didn’t sway so wiggly like that and she didn’t have the confidence to smolder the way you were supposed to when you danced salsa. She wanted to look at Hoseok with sexy bedroom eyes, so he would know, and so anyone watching would know, that they had great sex and he enjoyed being with her, even though her dancing didn’t come close to his. She didn’t want the people who watched him dance with such obvious admiration to then see them dance together and wonder what he was thinking. They probably were thinking that. Why wouldn’t they be?

But Hoseok, to his credit, didn’t seem to be thinking it. He got a little tense during the dancing itself, but when they decided to call it a night –long after Jungkook had left after taking some pictures ‘for Seychelle’, after Namjoon got lost in conversation with some new woman he met and disappeared, long after Alex begged to be set free and made herself comfortable at the table with Seokjin and refused to budge– when finally it was time to go, Hoseok threw his arm around her shoulder all smiles, kissed the top of her head, and deemed,

“That was fun, right?”

“So fun.”

“You coming home with me now?”

“I sure hope so but I am definitely going to want to use your shower.”

“Can’t handle a little more sweat first….?” He wiggled his eyebrows at her and she caved in theory… but when they got to his place, insisted on showering first anyway, pointing out that she didn’t want to get into his bed all sweaty. See, she could get her way too, she just needed to speak Hoseok’s language! Nothing wrong with a shower before and a shower after sex! Being clean and orgasmed was as nice as the way his hands rubbed her tight calves afterwards.

“I’m not a dancer,” she laughed, embarrassed by his caretaking but not enough to ask him to stop. It was sweet and domestic, curled up in bed with him, both of them freshly (separately!) showered, his fingers pressing out the sore spots from her legs.

“Ah well I’m happy you danced so much with me even if you don’t like it.”

“I like it! I’m just not very good. I feel bad I can’t keep up with you yet.”

“That’s ok, I just like dancing with you,” he insisted and she blossomed at the reassurance. He was sweet. Why had she let herself get so self conscious about holding angel Hobi back? He didn’t mind at all. It wasn’t like he’d dump her for being bad at salsa! She looked down and felt glad she had just shaved that day; the smoothness of her legs really only lasted twenty-four hours. 

“Hey,” he said. At first she thought he was about to tell her she missed a spot shaving, but his voice sounded more serious than that. “Did you see Jungkook’s instagram tonight?”

“Huh? No, why? He post something thirsty?”

Hoseok looked to the side and she flinched at her own joke because he didn’t seem to be very amused.

“I don’t want to cause problems,” he said. “I’m trying to ignore ah… I know you said you talked to him, and he had that awkward talk with me too…” Right, the thing at the concert was crazy awkward. She couldn’t believe it when Hoseok had told her about it, that Jungkook had done that. And yet it had also greatly endeared him to her. He’d been willing to do that motifying thing to try and not cause problems between her and her boyfriend? It was sweet. It was such a real Jungkook thing to do.

Now she worried what the latest “real Jungkook” thing was though and grabbed her phone to see for herself. She hadn’t been looking at other people’s social media much lately, mostly just posting happy pictures of her own relationship, excited to be part of that lifestyle for once.

Sure enough, Seychelle’s comment that Jungkook hadn’t been posting lately was true; he had nothing for nearly a month before his most recent post: a photo Alex thought was harmless other than being a weird fit for his page. The aesthetic was all wrong. Jungkook had a rule about never posting a photo of just himself with another woman; said it blocked his game, whereas group photos of him with attractive groups of people made women speculate and reach out about if he was still single or not. 

So then what the fuck was up with this photo, which was just the two of them? Not anyone else in the group, just Jungkook and Alex, him behind her with an arm around her upper chest and a big grin on his face, her winking and pointing at the camera. 

“Oh that’s a cute picture of… um… me,” she blurted out, barely saving it halfway through. 

“It is,” Hoseok agreed, eyes closed like he couldn’t believe she’d said that.

“Sorry, I meant… well, I’m cute in it.”

“You are,” he agreed. But she was distracted now by the caption. 

Salsa night: no gochu left behind.

“It’s a joke about–”

“I’m Korean, Alex, I know what gochu means.”

“Yeah but it’s not about his dick, it’s about– he used to call me um, gochu-noona because–”

“Alex.”

“Because our families compete about who makes the spiciest food and my family always wins and I’m like a week older than him,” she said. “Seriously.”

“And the hashtags?”

#tapas #salsanight #sweaty #dancingthenightaway #favwithmyfav #eternity #norhythmbutmakeitcute #happyselfie #nofomo #justme #andthisgoblinIfound #welookgoodaf #noegojusttruth #nofilter #bestpest

“What are you doing,” she sighed, looking through the list. Honestly she had no clue how that might look to someone else, because it was a lot of inside jokes, or nonsense, or generic. Or whatever. She didn’t know! Honestly if Hoseok wasn’t looking at her like that she might not have thought anything of it on her own.

But yeah. It was kind of a weird post when it completely broke the careful aesthetic of his page. And the tags were less mocking than they should have been.

And beneath it:

Avettegrace: awww looking good is that your little sister?

TheJK.97: definitely not

Definitely not?? What did that mean? In this context?

“I don’t know, he’s being weird,” she said. “Maybe he was jealous I only danced with him the one time.”

Hoseok’s mouth turned down as he nodded and pulled his hands off her legs.

“Oh no, the unhappy frown…”

“I just think…” He sighed and wouldn’t look at her. “It feels like he’s baiting me.”

“For why?”

“Alex… don’t make me say it again…”

“Come on, he’s not…”

“He’s in love with you,” Hoseok said. “He’s so obvious about it. He’s not even trying to hide it anymore. ‘We look good af, no ego just truth?’ ‘Fav with my fav?’ Did you even notice the way he grabbed you when I walked over when you were dancing?”

“He didn’t grab me, I just stopped dancing and he ran into me.”

“He was all over you–”

“He wasn’t and stop saying that,” she snapped. “That’s not fair. I’m allowed to dance with my friend.”

Hoseok gestured with his hands, “Yeah you are but I’m worried if you still don’t think it’s obvious.”

“It’s not obvious because I’m telling you it doesn’t mean that. We’re just friends. I’m sorry if it’s upsetting you or making you jealous, I’m trying so hard not to do that, but I don’t think it’s fair if you’re telling me I can’t–”

“I haven’t said you can’t do anything,” Hoseok interrupted. “Have I? I think I’m being really understanding. You live with this guy! You keep saying he’s your best friend, but if that’s true, where’s his respect for your relationship? I think he’s trying to make me look like a jealous asshole so you’ll run right to him.”

“Hobi. He can’t lie his way out of a paper bag, there’s no way he can pull off a manipulation of that level.”

“He’s a total fuckboy!”

“Ok that’s the second time tonight you’ve been kind of Puritan,” Alex said.

He looked sincerely chastised at least, “Sorry. I don’t mean it like that… I just mean… his whole thing is manipulating women.”

“It’s not. He’s very upfront with what he wants, and a lot of women want that too. He wouldn’t last a day if he tried to lie to women.”

“But you thought this was off when you read it just a minute ago,” Hoseok insisted. 

“I…” She looked at the photo and the caption again, at the comments gathering beneath. 

Is this like a sponsored post for noom or something? Who tf is this girl?

As quickly as she saw it, suddenly the comment was gone. Jungkook or someone else was actively looking at the comments right now and deleting them. But that didn’t mean Alex didn’t know they were there. Was it stupid that for a moment she’d lived in a world where it was just a cute picture of her and her friend and the world was not shitty and he had not cultivated a gathering of shitty shallow people who’d immediately point out the non-aesthetic addition to his page? Maybe people thought the same thing when they saw her with Hoseok, but he cultivated a circle of sunshine and love and support and she felt safe in it. Accepted. Except for a night like tonight when she was clearly an anchor on Hoseok’s beautifully dancing ankle, she was beginning to feel like she could look right with him. Yes, the dancing had been a step backwards, but honestly dancing with Jungkook had soothed her wounded ego in a way she couldn’t have articulated at the time.

“Look,” she tried, “Maybe he posted this tonight trying to be a good friend… he knew I was feeling a little um… just kinda down on myself because I can’t dance the way you do.”

Hoseok’s tone change was instant, expression too as he reached for her hand, “Wait, what?”

“You’re a beautiful dancer, and I love watching you! But it’s stressful and hard trying to keep up and you kept trying to count but it didn’t really help, it just made me more stressed… so that’s why Jungkook was dancing with me, because he saw I felt kind of… bad about myself.”

“Alex,” he frowned, and scooted closer. “Why didn’t you tell me? I don’t want to make you feel bad about yourself! I love dancing, but I really love dancing with you, no matter how experienced you are.”

“I don’t think experience is the issue,” she snorted.

“That’s fine. I don’t need you to be a star dancer. I just really enjoyed dancing with you!”

It was sweet. He was saying the right thing.

And yet it just wasn’t quite as comforting as Jungkook taking her hand and saying stop worrying about the beat, stop worrying about other people, just do some little spins with me, see? Fun!

It was fun. 

“OK. I know. I had a lot of fun too.”

“If I’m doing anything to make you feel bad, please tell me right away! I want to know and fix it!”

Alex didn’t want to be overwhelmed with him trying to belatedly soothe her. Jungkook had already done that, and it was fine. Hoseok didn’t understand what it was like to be on this side of the relationship; he didn’t know what it was like to be the Alex. Jungkook didn’t either recently but he sort of did in the past and anyway, he just knew her better. He noticed. He cheered her up.

Although she didn’t really think the instagram post could be for or about her. It couldn’t be. What did he expect her to take away from this? What was he trying to say or prove or had he not thought at all about it? For all he knew she wouldn’t even see it.

Did that count as another lie to Hoseok? Fuck! In trying not to look at him, Alex looked back at her phone.

AshriAngel: Omg new gf debut? She’s so cute! You two are adorable together!

That comment had been left up, Alex noticed. No response. 

Oh, wait. 

TheJK.97 likes this.

“I’ll talk to him,” she said as her stomach flipped with dread.

Maybe it was an accident. Maybe his reading comprehension was low. He didn’t have his contacts or glasses on. He was drunk. He was half asleep. Maybe he was actively fucking someone right now with his phone one in hand because he wasn’t totally into it but enough into it that it made it hard to read. Maybe he just meant to like it because someone was calling her cute instead of being an asshole.

Although, honestly, there were a few comments saying she was cute or pretty, which was a few more than she had expected on a page like Jungkook’s, full of people so focused on appearances when she was definitely not that and it showed. In the grid of Jungkook’s photos, it started to look less like a good picture of her…

AnitaLove: saw this coming from a mile away. Congrats! 

“Sorry, ok, let me message him–”

“It can wait until tomorrow. Let’s just sleep.”

“No no people are running away with this, and I have a wonderful actual boyfriend, I don’t want the internet being confused for a single hot second.”

“I don’t care about what the internet thinks,” Hoseok insisted. “I care about what the guy you live with thinks your status is.”

“I know, hold on… he’s just dumb, Hobi. He just has a shriveled pea brain sometimes and doesn’t think things through… like a pea that rolled under the counter and you didn’t notice it for a week…”

[Alex]: come on with this instagram post what is this?

[JK]: its a cute photo!

[Alex]: some of your followers agree and the others are assholes

[JK]: eh they’re just jealous enjoy it 

[Alex]: yeah guess who else is jealous that you made it look like Im your gf?

[Alex]: why would you do that?

[JK]: I didn’t do anything its just a pic

[JK]: I can’t help if people jump to conclusions

[Alex]: it’s not cool bro, it’s a good pic of us but it doesn’t need to be on your insta

[JK]: you want me to delete it??

[JK]: :( :( :(

[JK]: we never take good pictures together you’re always making a face

[Alex]: YOU are always making a face!

[Alex]: I don’t care about the picture it just needs to not seem like you’re saying I’m your gf

[Alex]: I dont get why you want to keep it up so bad

[JK]: fine your loss 🤪 lotta girls would kill for that position

[Alex]: i’m going to strangle you

[JK]: 🥴 ok if you insist

[Alex]: omg get laid, will you??

[JK]: oh I am don’t worry about me 😜

She immediately stopped responding to him. She felt like she’d licked a battery and didn’t really want to know more. 

Anyway, it didn’t matter; within two minutes there was a new picture posted, Jungkook standing at a mirror that was not in their apartment, wearing a tank top and his sweatpants hanging low enough you could see the band of his underwear and a glimpse of skin. Alex couldn’t tell if it was just taken or an older one, nothing about his appearance was different enough to confirm.

Caption: ah I see, I scared some of you. Didn’t think I have friends? Fucked up. I’m still a lone wolf when it comes to love … but you won’t catch me crying about it. Life is too short to waste time so let’s get it /// Ladies where you at?

“Ugh, is that better? So gross, he sounds like a fucking cretin…” She thrust her phone at Hoseok. He was staring at his own and glanced at it only briefly. “What are you frowning about?”

“Some of the commenters on this photo are just assholes. I’m reporting them.”

“Reporting who?? Oh, the people saying– forget it. Have you been sitting there doing that the whole time?” She thought of that deleted comment. It was Hoseok then, not Jungkook who was watching out for her? No, Hoseok hadn’t been on his phone then.

“No! I just thought I’d check.”

“To see if anyone was being an asshole about the way I look?”

“What? No! To see if I was right that other people thought it looked like a post saying you’re his girlfriend. And they do!”

“Well now he’s posted this new one clarifying, and I’ll have a talk with him about it and–”

“How far will you let him go before you stop making excuses for him?” Hoseok demanded.

Alex leaned away, taken aback.

“I’m sorry,” Hoseok said. “I don’t mean to sound like that. But you’re so close and you care so much about him, how hard is he going to have to work to steal you–”

“He can’t steal me because I’m not a thing,” she interrupted. “And what he wants doesn’t matter because I’m where I want to be. I’m sorry he’s making you feel insecure but that’s crazy to me because I thought I’m so obvious about how happy I am to be with you? Do you doubt me?”

“No. No, I don’t…”

“Then trust me. I’ll talk to him again. But I need you to not look for proof of something when it’s not there. I’m telling you the pictures or comments or teasing don’t mean what you’re afraid they mean. He doesn’t realize how it sounds because nothing has ever been serious about me before. Like it doesn’t occur to him before posting that someone would ever think he’d date me.”

“All right… I do trust you, Alex. I’m just afraid this is heading for disaster and you’re going to get hurt in this and I don’t want to be the one who hurts you. I don’t think it’s going to be me and I’m worried about you–”

“You think he’s going to hurt me? How?!”

“I don’t know. I just worry. I just care about you.”

“Well if it’s him then your worries are solved, huh?”

Hoseok frowned and took her hand and pulled her into a hug, “No, that’s not what I’m saying. I don’t want to be jealous. I trust you and I feel secure with you. I’m just not sure I trust him…”

“Please try?”

He sighed, “Yes, I’ll try.”

“Oh, it’s that easy? I just ask and–”

“Yeah it’s that easy,” he sighed, more loudly, smiling a little now. “It’s because I’m weak to you. I can’t say no when you look at me so cute… and I do trust you. I don’t want you to think I’m jealous or possessive… I just…”

“I know. It’s ok. I’ll talk to him.”

There wasn’t much left to say about it. With the new post up and the women of instagram rejoicing, Alex put her phone away and stretched out beside Hoseok in bed. It was a relief to talk of other things instead –of dancing, and whether Seokjin and Luisa were going to become a thing for real, and whether Hoseok was going to go visit his parents for Chuseok next month, and whether Hoseok should bring a gift when he met Alex’s parents soon.

“No, don’t,” she begged.

“I’m going to,” he said. “I have to.”

“No, it’s my birthday, they don’t get a gift. I’m their gift, me being their daughter.”

“My parents will actually disown me if I meet yours without a gift. I have to make a good first impression!”

“Are you capable of making a bad one? I can’t picture it.”

“I want to amaze them,” he insisted.

“You will.” She gave him a kiss. “If nothing else, I know they’ll be amazed by you. Who could resist?”

He seemed pleased by her confidence. She was pleased he seemed pleased. She was glad he was happy, and she was happy, and Jungkook…

Hoseok couldn’t be right. The people reacting on instagram were just misunderstanding a post lacking in context. Jungkook’s intentions were good but he didn’t always think things through, like what a sudden post like that might lead people to believe. He definitely didn’t have the brainpower for the type of manipulation Hoseok was accusing him of. He was her sweet, charming, smart but also kinda dumb BFF. His heart was in the right place, even if his brain wasn’t always. And that place for his heart was right there in his own chest, definitely not in her possession. There was no way Jungkook was in love with her,  just because he seemed kind of odd sometimes, and done strange things like this more frequently in the past month. But hey, for all she knew he was still trying to start something with Rebekah! Or… no, that didn’t seem quite right either…

Maybe he’d just always been this weird and she hadn’t noticed until she had a foot on more stable ground? But that made her sad. She wanted to be right there in the weirdness with him. Not to make her boyfriend jealous but because that was home. That was safe and comfortable and she was pretty weird too. Couldn’t people just understand that they were weird, not in love? They were not that. They had been friends forever and they would be friends forever and they did not look cute together the way AshriAngel apparently thought. What the fuck was Anita talking about, “saw that coming from a mile away”??

Alex fell asleep trying to avoid thinking about an interesting dilemma her brain posed at the nudge of those comments: that as much as she loved being seen on the dance floor as Hoseok’s chosen partner, with Jungkook she had stopped thinking about anyone else at all… 

But of course there was no dilemma. There was no debate. It was just an interesting juxtaposition, that was all! One she was not interested in thinking about a moment longer!

So of course her brain decided to keep her up with it for as long as possible, until she finally managed to fall asleep, and then her brain wove it into her dreams too, of dancing with Jungkook: the beat was erratic, their kigurumi were wrong, the music the wrong genre, they weren’t even on a dance floor she didn’t think, and the world didn’t really have definition or make sense. But still, they danced. 

“Reload. Alex… Alex, reload!” Jungkook shouted at her, nudging her with his elbow. She shook her head and did but it was too late, she’d already been taken out. That was a thing that sucked about this particular game –or most of the games, honestly, that you couldn’t do any real kind of cover for your friend when they temporarily spaced out. Usually that was more of a Jungkook thing anyway, but Alex was spacing out a lot tonight.

“Ok, fuck this game,” he said, figuring it wasn’t holding her interest. “What do you want to do, hockey? Basketball?”

“Hm…” She pursed her lips into a duck pout as she looked around the arcade. And apparently failed to see anything that really drew her.

“Need me to boost you up so you can see your options?” he teased, reaching for her arms as if he would just haul her up. 

“No no don’t pick me up,” she cried, predictably flapping her hands at him. That felt better. More like her. Jungkook felt a tension in his stomach ease as he pointed in a direction and hoped she would follow. 

She did. At least physically. But her mind continued to be far away and Jungkook wasn’t sure why. His initial fear (hope) that she was fighting with Hoseok had been regrettably shot down as soon as he suggested it. He asked about work but she said it was normal and turned the question on him, asking if any milfs had picked him up recently. He’d spun a story that was mostly lies and she’d nodded along as if she either believed it or didn’t care.

“You ok? Upset stomach or something?” he asked to distract her as they passed that shittyass lightning game her boyfriend had been suspiciously so lucky at. 

“Yeah, I guess…”

“Would you rather head home and watch a movie or something?” he asked. He stopped and she crashed into him and was slow to push away. “I can make ramen or something. Too much for your tummy? Rice?”

“Huh?”

“Uh… your stomach– come on, what’s up with you tonight?”

“Nothing, how about skeet ball?”

“Skeet ball,” he repeated under his breath. He’d noticed she didn’t call it that around her boyfriend. “Yeah ok you just want to throw something?”

“Kinda yeah, why not? How’s your ticket collection coming?”

“Ah, good question… let’s play and then go take a look, I was getting close…” He bounded around her, hoping his energy would transfer and she would perk up. No luck. He’d already offered candy and pizza but she’d barely picked at either and, truth be told, he was starting to panic. He didn’t really even know why, it just felt like something heavy was about to land on him unless he could distract her long enough until it passed.

They set up in adjacent lanes for skee ball and timed their throws to alternate so they wouldn’t mess each other up. Sometimes the fun was in messing each other up, but he didn’t today, instead focused on maximizing his tickets. Maybe he should go ahead and buy something no matter what it was; that could be exciting. Sure, he was saving up for the big stuff but what was the point if Alex wasn’t having fun with him along the way?

“Woah, holy shit Alex,” he snorted as her second ball hit the ramp way too hard and popped up into his lane. “The fuck are you doing here, pitching for the Majors?”

“Oops!”

“Shit why do I feel like you just aimed that at my head….”

She gave him a wild look, “No! Why would I do that?”

“Ok She-Hulk, nice and easy–”

“Don’t mansplain skee ball to me,” she scoffed and glared but her heart wasn’t in it. And the fact she hadn’t made some crude joke about him being an expert at sinking his ball into holes hurt, it really did. 

So when skee ball was done, he nudged her towards the ticket machine, deciding it was time to break his no cheat rule. Today was the day. Time to cheat. Right? Right, he wouldn’t regret it? Fuck, what if he regretted it and just felt angry with himself later for giving in– he had rules for a reason!

He tapped his card at the reader and looked at the total: 18,731. He needed 21,500 to get both the Slushie machine and the Rottweiler, and his goal had always been to save up for both at the same time. But looking at her now, that sense of dread nudged him forward. 

“Ok, slug bug, it’s time,” he said, drumming briefly on her head. Her squawk of complaint was music to his ears as she batted his hand away.

“Time for what?”

“Slushie machine or puppy, which are we bringing home?”

“What?”

“That’s right, it’s time.”

“But I thought you were saving up for both–”

“Yeah but why? Anyway, the place could close down in a week and then I lose everything,” he pointed out. “Sometimes you gotta cash in early.”

She shrugged, “Nah, I’d help you break in and claim what’s yours.”

“Really?!”

“Yeah, we could pull it off.”

“Unless the employees ransack the prizes,” he countered, but the idea of casing the joint with her was a breath of fresh air. “How would we do it?”

“Uh… well… picking a lock would be the easiest, otherwise we’d need to break into the mall at night and break the padlock on the metal grate thing. Mall cameras would probably notice us.”

He nodded, eager for the fantasy as they walked to the counter, “Yeah sure but we should use someone else’s computer to watch videos about how to pick locks so it’s not in our history. Maybe my brother’s. Ah, we should put on uniforms and insist we’re supposed to be in here, just in case we get caught.”

“Right, ok. And then either the shit you want is just sitting out in the open on the shelves.”

“No no,” he said, “It can’t be that easy.”

“Why not? Why can’t it be easy?” she demanded. “Why does everything have to be hard?!”

“Um…” He looked at her, feeling like there was something else behind what she just said but also a little afraid to push. Was she fighting with Hoseok?! Ok. Ok, he needed to not get too excited. A single fight didn’t mean they were going to break up –it was just really rare, they didn’t seem to fight often, so it could mean that. But if he seemed too eager about it, Alex would get defensive and clam up like the little hedgehog she could be and he wouldn’t get to be there for her during this emotional and difficult but overall good transition. There would be life after Hoseok. Good life after Hoseok. He’d still be there!

At the counter, they had to wait for some little kids to spend their tickets, and it gave him time to continue the fantasy, “Uh, because we’ll look amazing in catsuits. Is that what they call the all black? Like with the harnesses?”

“Maybe you will,” she scoffed.

“Seriously? You’d look banging,” he said. “You need one that’s got pistol holsters like right here so when you cross your arms over your chest when you’re being all pouty, you can also just grab your guns and unload on–”

He was thrilled when she acted this out, even made a fake firing sound, and admitted, “Ok, that’s pretty cool. But those outfits are unforgiving.”

“What do you need forgiveness for?”

“I mean they show everything–”

“Exactly,” he grinned. 

“You’re sick.”

Jungkook couldn’t help the happy future film that began to play in his head: teasing Alex, her saying he was sick, him agreeing and leaning in to kiss and grope her– ah!! Even just those two seconds flustered him. He didn’t let these fantasies play out because it felt like getting into water that was too hot or too cold, something; it made him shiver and it felt like it wasn’t time yet, like he needed to let the water reach a better temperature. If he could just be patient, hold onto that self control…

She might still not choose him. She might never have feelings for him like that. But maybe there was something they could work out… honestly anything would be better than this right now…

“Ok which do you think would be better?” Jungkook asked, meaning ‘to comfort you during your heartbreak.’ “Slushie machine or we finally bring home our baby?”

“I think we should wait on both,” she admitted.

“What? No! Why?”

“I just… I don’t know… you had a plan, you should stick to it.”

“No, I’m tired of waiting. Yes, hi! I want that dog!” he stepped boldly forward and slapped his card down on the counter so he could point. 

Tyler, the college kid they had seen almost every Thursday for months now, grinned, “Yeah, man? Really? You’ve finally got enough?”

“Oh I’ve got way more than enough. I’m coming for that Slushie machine next. But today, the lady needs a puppy.”

“I’m not a lady and I don’t need a puppy,” Alex said, pressing up against the counter. 

He had never been so sure in his life that he needed to bring this dog home right now. There was the perfect place for it in the living room now, in full sight of the front door. The thing was so big and huggable. They could use a baby in their lives right now.

“She’s kidding,” Jungkook said, throwing his arm around her shoulder. “Oh shit, I should make a video!” He yanked his phone out, and when Alex was a poor sport and again insisted they shouldn’t get the dog today, he shushed her and recorded Tyler dragging out the ladder, climbing up, and carting down the 3-foot stuffed dog.

“Our baby!” Jungkook cried as Tyler set the dog on the counter. He panned to Alex’s unamused glare, though her eyeroll and the twitch at the edge of her lips showed hidden amusement. She was playing along now, he thought. 

He felt no sense of regret as Tyler scanned the 6500 tickets off his card, just grabbed Alex in close so they could take a selfie with the dog’s head tucked into the picture.

“What are we going to name him?” Jungkook asked, giving the dog a kiss on the nose and scratching behind his ears. “Oh I think he likes that–”

“You’re unhinged,” she snickered. 

“Come oooon, our apartment doesn’t allow pets, this is the closest I can get.”

“You name him, he’s your dog,” Alex shrugged, grabbing his card off the counter as he was just about to walk away without it. His arms were full when he lifted the pup.

“What about… Bruce, no. Tiny? Eh. Um…”

“Are we going home now?” Alex asked.

Jungkook gasped, “Oh should we keep playing some games with him? Let’s play air hockey, he can be on my team. We can take pictures of him playing all the games here before we take him home, just like his mom and dad–”

“Please don’t post pictures of him on instagram and call me his mom.”

“Alex,” Jungkook whined. “Don’t reject our baby.”

“I’m… not, I just–”

“Ok, you need a hug right now, I get it. Here, hug him and help me think of a name,” Jungkook said, thrusting it against her chest. The thing was fucking huge next to her. It was the most endearing thing ever. She was nearly hidden when she hugged the thing. It made him laugh as he wrapped his arms around them both.

“Ok. See? Everything is going to be ok. You can get hugs from either of us whenever you want, or we can just sit next to you on the couch and watch movies and eat ice cream or– you know, whatever helps!”

“Helps?” Alex repeated. “Yeah. Your um hard time,” he said vaguely. Shit, he shouldn’t have mentioned it in case it was going to make her feel worse right now. When she pulled away, he took the dog so it wouldn’t crush her and added, “Just, I mean, just let me know what you need. You want to keep playing or go home?”

“What I need for what?”

“Uh, you know…”

“I’m not on my period, is that what you’re accusing me of? Just because–”

“No!” he quickly defended, knowing full well Alex did not like if you made even the slightest hint her emotionality might be related to that. It was so bad, it tricked him into saying the slightly worse, “I mean if you’re um ending things with…”

For a second she just blinked at him, and then said evenly, “I’m not ending things with– you think I’m breaking up with Hobi?”

“Uh…” Uh oh. Uh oh, not the response he’d expected. He reached up with one arm and pinched at his neck, the dog awkwardly held in a chokehold in his other elbow. “No? I thought… I thought maybe that’s why you’re in a bad mood tonight…”

“No. No things are fine between me and Hobi,” she said, and he saw her eyes sharpen in a way that made him nervous. “Except for the part where every few days I have to reassure him that my best friend isn’t trying to break us up and to be honest, I’m not so sure anymore!”

“No no no Alex, that’s not what– I wasn’t trying to break you up! I thought you were having a fight with him, that’s all I meant–”

“Yeah but you looked happy about it?! That’s so fucked up!”

“Hey. Can you guys uh take that outside?” Tyler called over. “There are… kids and… stuff…” He trailed off under the heat of Alex’s gaze. 

But she did take off at an angry clip, and Jungkook followed after her, desperately explaining, “Ok, well uh, great then! You’re still together and still happy and–”

“I told you not to buy that dog today,” she said. “This is exactly why.”

“Why is why?”

“Because I have to talk to you about– about the way you’re being lately and I’m afraid it’s not going to go the way it needs to go!”

“What does that mean?!”

She held her tongue until they were outside, face to face on a sidewalk under the parking lot lights. Then she whirled on him,

“You’re still being weird. About everything. You’re posting pictures that make it seem like we’re a couple. You’re weird to Hobi. You’re possessive of me.”

“I’m not! I’m not those things!”

“I have a boyfriend, Jungkook, and it’s not you!”

He recoiled. He had been prepared to say something else, but whatever it was, it was lost at the instant shame and hurt hearing her shout that at him.

“Yeah,” he mumbled. “I know. Why are you–”

“No, so why are you? Am I crazy? You– you’re decorating our house, you’re buying us a baby, you’re posting to Instagram and totally ruining your aesthetic–”

“I– that’s just– you’re the one who’s being weird about it,” he tried.

“Are you trying to fuck Rebekah? Do you like her?”

The question was so fucking insane that he spluttered, “The fuck are you even talking about? Rebekah?! No.”

“Then why? Why all this–”

“It’s nothing!” 

“When you kissed me, was that nothing? Was it really nothing?”

Jungkook froze. Her question confused him. His panic caught and he went completely still and stared at her. Was she… was she asking because it wasn’t nothing to her? Or was that crazy? Was she not fighting with Hoseok because she was instead fighting with herself? All these things she’d noticed, why? He’d tried to be really objective about his own behavior and honestly didn’t think he was acting any different than he ever had before, except being a little more hands off, fewer pet names, that kind of thing. But if she was noticing those things more now, why? 

It couldn’t– did it mean– did she– it could be that she was having the same–

No.

No, it wasn’t possible.

But. 

Unless?

This was a harder situation for Alex. She was the one in a relationship. His feelings were already confusing but at least he didn’t have anyone else making him question or wonder. Hoseok was a great guy and Jungkook knew his relationship with Alex was a lot of good things. He could totally understand why she wouldn’t want to just throw that away over confusion about how she felt for her best friend who she’d not thought about like that ever before. But maybe she hadn’t been able to stop thinking about the kiss either.

He could make this easier for her. She needed proof he was brave and strong and serious? Fine!

He set the dog down.

“Jungkook,” she said and took a step back.

He held up his hands and said, “The kiss was an accident but I don’t regret it.”

“Ju–”

“I think about it all the time. I want to kiss you again.”

“Jungkook, stop–”

He stepped forward but stopped himself from grabbing her arms, knowing she wouldn’t like that, not wanting to ruin the moment as he confessed, “I am not trying to get in between you and your boyfriend. But I am in love with you and if you’re having doubts right now about your relationship and–”

“Jungkook no–”

“--maybe you just need to know how I feel to help you understand that– that I feel that way about you and–”

“No, fuck, stop!” she said, hands lifting to her face. “Stop stop stop just stop talking!”

“But–”

“Just stop! Please!”

“Alex–”

“I said stop!”

He’d reached for her, but she flailed and he took a step back. He felt like he’d ripped his chest open, ripped his skin off, dumped his guts at her feet, and now he was frantic for a response from her. A real one. He needed her to help him put his skin back on right away because this, this was awful, this was terrifying, this was the scariest most dangerous thing he’d ever done and he couldn’t tell by her face what she was thinking. Always he felt like he could read her mind but not right now when it mattered most and oh god oh fuck, what if she was going to say–

“Stop saying that. You are not in love with me.”

“I definitely am–”

“You aren’t,” she said. Was she angry? No. No, but she looked angry… He had not expected her to look angry. He wasn’t sure how to respond to that. “You aren’t! You don’t know anything about being in love! You don’t– you’re not in love with me, Jungkook–”

“Yes I am!”

“You can’t be.”

“I am!”

It was like he’d flipped a switch; she got all red and sputtered, “What the fuck? Mr. Fuckboy Jeon? Who plows through women from his instagram like it’s a fucking Denny’s menu–”

“Hey now–”

“And me!? You get ‘mad pussy’,” she said, air quotes, not a good sign. “And you’re going to turn around and say you’re in love with me. You’re not even a little attracted to me but–”

“Yes I am!”

“--Uh huh, so what is it, romantic love? What, soulmate love?” Fuck she could be so mean. He hadn’t had her anger aimed at him like this in a long long time.

“Yes!” he cried, trying to combat her anger with earnestness.

“No. You’re not in love with me, you’re just throwing a tantrum because I’ve met someone wonderful and you didn’t, and you can’t just keep me as a fucking housewife–”

“You were never a housewife! What are you talking about–”

“No I was your buddy. For years! For so many fucking years! And there was never even a hint of feelings you had for me and then suddenly–”

“That’s not entirely true but–”

“It’s true! What, the joke about us getting married when we were fourteen because I was the only girl you were brave enough to talk to? Yeah, real romantic! Just what I dream of, being someone’s safety, just slightly better than dying alone! And now you’re losing that safety and acting out–”

“I’m not a fucking toddler!” he shouted, needled into it. “Stop talking about me like that! So maybe it takes me a long time to figure out my feelings but you don’t get to tell me they aren’t true–”

“I do when I have to show you that you’re– you’re ruining everything!”

“What?” He took another step back. No, no, this felt all wrong. The flood of regret warred with his desperate hope that this was still Alex putting up a front. He was bad at feelings, but she was too! And she had more to lose right now. More to be afraid of. Sometimes he asked what she wanted to eat and she said nothing but then if he didn’t make her something she’d wind up stealing all his food anyway. Maybe this was just that, except about love instead of food. 

“I’m not ruining anything,” he insisted, stepping forward again, determined to make her understand. “I–”

“Yeah you love me, you said that. Suddenly. Out of the blue. After how many years of not even noticing I’m a fucking woman now you’re suddenly pining for me? Bullshit! It would be one thing if I believed you right now and you're throwing our friendship away in some misguided attempt to confess but– but you don’t love me and so this is fucking cruel!”

“I do! Alex! I would never be that to you, ever. Why would I lie about this? This is fucking humiliating! You aren’t saying it back, you’re just telling me I’m wrong about my own– you don’t know what I think! You don’t know how I feel!”

“I’ve known everything you think and feel for our entire friendship and there was never any interest in me. So tell me what the fuck suddenly changed–”

“I don’t know! I’m growing up! I’m figuring it out! I thought you didn’t want a relationship with anyone so I– I thought you were happy with me before–”

“You thought I wanted to be someone’s housewife while they’re just off fucking everyone who slides into their DMs?”

“You weren’t my housewife. I don’t know why you keep saying that–”

“You thought I liked always being alone and left behind? You couldn’t even calm your dick enough to go to Jimin’s fucking wedding with me as a friend–”

“Well I want to go with you now!”

“Oh yeah? Now? So suddenly?” 

“It just changed, ok?!” he shouted. 

“I’ll tell you what changed,” she said, practically spit the words at his face. “Now when I have someone who loves me and who I love and I’m happy and my world doesn’t revolve around you anymore, so you suddenly–”

“You love him?”

“Suddenly you want to say whatever it takes to keep me–”

“Yes! Yes, I do. I want to keep you to myself. I want you to be mine, not his. That doesn’t mean what I’m saying is a lie!” 

His head was spinning. She loved Hoseok. She couldn’t tell Jungkook she loved him, but she just dropped that like it was the easiest thing in the world to say. She’d known Jungkook for years and couldn’t say it to him anymore; she’d been dating Hoseok for like four months and could already say that. His throat hurt from yelling and his skin tingled and he wanted to cry.

She was right.

He hadn’t waited to make sure the water was the right temperature.

He hadn’t waited until he had all the tickets.

He’d just ruined everything.

“If you don’t feel the same way, just say so,” he said, quietly, feeling smaller by the second and unable to grab at anger the way she seemed to. He wasn’t angry with her except for not believing him. He didn’t know how he felt after a rejected confession. He refused to name this feeling and make it real. He’d never been good at feelings. He wished he could have remained oblivious a little longer.

“I’m sorry, Koo. It’s too late. I’m happy and I won’t let you ruin this for me too.”

“Too?”

“You’re making me choose–”

“I’m not,” he said, realizing his final and fatal mistake. “I’m not making you choose. Ok, you don’t love me back. Ok, I’ll deal with that–”

“Like you’ve been dealing with it?”

“Better. I’ll deal with it better.”

“Koo…” The way her voice cracked nearly broke him. It was another weight added to his chest, another clue as to what he’d just done. He’d risked it all and lost it all.

“I can back off. Now I know– ok, you don’t feel that way about me, so friends, we’ll go back to being friends and–”

She nodded. She nodded even though her face was twisting up into that ugly cry she did at the saddest of movies. 

He desperately loved that ugly cry.

“Ok,” she said. “Yep. Everything will be ok, we’re still friends.”

“Right?”

“I’m uh— I’m going to take a walk and get another ride home–”

“Wait, what? No–”

“I need some space for a little bit,” she said and sniffled even though she wasn’t crying yet and he felt like he could have lifted from the ground at the rate his heart was thrumming. 

“Then you take the car,” he said. “I’ll catch–”

“No, it’s your car–”

“Yeah but–”

“Just go home, ok? Please? Please please please–”

“Ok, ok I’ll go,” he said, giving in at her begging because she was starting to cry and this was going to kill him. “I’m going. But go inside… um… you need a ride–”

“It’s fine, just–”

“Ok but don’t tell Hoseok–”

“Go.”

The shame of her dismissal was the end of it. Obviously she was going to tell her boyfriend.

He grabbed the dog by the head and hauled ass away from her, though not without checking to make sure she didn’t stay alone in the parking lot. She went back into the mall through a side entrance as quickly as Jungkook headed down the row to his car, two magnets repelling now that they weren’t being forced together by a stubborn hand. 

His. His stubborn hand.

Because Alex didn’t love him. She loved Hoseok. And he was making things uncomfortable for them. He was getting in the way.

And the way she cried when she said they were still friends made it sound like a lie. 

Jungkook shoved the stupid dog into the backseat and threw himself into the driver’s seat and buckled his seat belt and started the car and leaned against the steering wheel and broke another one of his rules: for the first time in his life, he cried over a girl. 

Previous Chapter | Masterlist | Next Chapter

[sunchasingstar]

Fame AU w Trans Regulus getting famous from singing Eat Me by Demi Lovato w his band mates, Barty Crouch Jr., Evan Rosier, and Dorcas Meadows.

Like Regulus would be lead singer/frontman (sometimes he also plays violin), Dorcas gives me hella drummer vibes- that or lead guitar and back up vocals. Barty is def the lead guitar, but him and Cas are interchangeable. Evan is bass and piano.

They all kinda do backup vocals or sing for some songs depending, and they’ll write songs together, although most are done by Regulus and the band manager, Pandora Rosier.

Be more predictable

Be less political

Not too original

Keep to tradition, but stay individual

Dirty but washable

Winning but stoppable

All that I'm hearing is you wanna

Make the impossible possible

This is purely Barty’s verse, are you kidding me? Like he wrote this after after his father went big in politics, which of course, his son was against because his father is a dickhead.

Is this what you'd all prefer?

Would you like me better if I was still her?

Did she make your mouths water? Ugh

I know the part I've played before

I know the shit that I've ignored

I know the girl that you adored

She's dead, it's time to fucking mourn

I can't spoon-feed you anymore

I can't spoon-feed you anymore

Dinner's served, it's on the floor

I can't spoon-feed you anymore

You'll have to eat me as I am

You'll have to eat me as I am

I feel like this is so Regulus coded that I shouldn’t even point it out💀 he’s talking to his family and the public image he had to play when he was being controlled by his family. “I know the shit I’ve ignored,” def talking about Sirius and his disownment. Just this verse in general screams Regulus.

Clean and digestible (clean and digestible)

Less of a spectacle (less of a spectacle)

Oh, and dimensional

Try to be sexy, but don't be too sexual (don't be too sexual)

Please be presentable (please be presentable)

This one feels like Evan especially the “try to be sexy, but don’t be too sexual,” because I hc him as asexual and I feel like he struggled with that a lot and forced himself to be this sex image to try and hide who he was and so the “please be presentable” feels like a plea to be ‘presentable’ for his family; or ‘normal’ for them.

Bit more accessible (bit more accessible)

Get up on your pedestal

Everyone's watching, so don't be forgettable

Longer hair and tighter clothes

Would you like me better if I didn't oppose?

Silver platters, pretty bows, fuck

I feel like Dorcas definitely wrote this after being told she wasn’t proper simply because of style and because she’s had to face the cruelty and stereotypes that society pushes on woc and that women in general are sexualized as a whole and I think she’d channel her anger in the lyrics.

[shslskaterboy]

Hey bestie tell me more about that phantom theives band au👀

(^is enabling again)

Oh my god Al. My best friend Al. I have so many thoughts this is gonna be such an essay I hope you’re Fuckin ready

No seriously this got so long it's basically the bones of a fic, but uh, I'm kind obsessed with it so here we are

First of all, it’s an aged up non-metaverse au, so everyone is like 23~ give or take. Akira, Ann, Yusuke, Haru, Makoto and human Morgana all met in university, Ryuji is childhood friends with Ann, and Futaba met the rest of them through her adoptive brother Akira, and Akechi is the ex-boyfriend that no one ever talks about.

The band consists of singer/front man Akira who does the song writing. He was one of those child prodigy musicians who primarily played piano and violin, but taught himself guitar despite his parents aversion to his favourite genre (which is emo-punk bc it’s not a true James hc without some MCR influence.) The first beginnings of the band were him and Futaba as teenagers since she also played the keyboard, but the Phantoms would not be a realized dream until he met the rest of them in uni.

He meets Morgana and Ann first, the former who can play guitar, and the latter who knows absolutely everyone. When Akira floats the idea of wanting to form a band, Ann is more than happy to rally up her friends Makoto, Haru, and Mishima to fill the spots of bass, second guitar, and drums. Things actually come together very well at first, they start simple with practices and small shows at Crossroads (Akira works nights there and Lala-chan is very supportive of his endeavours) and eventually they start to be able to handle more complex songs. Haru becomes truly incredible at absolutely shredding, Makoto is the pinnacle of sexy bass-player coolness, and Akira is more confident than ever in his songwriting. They even end up commissioning their friend Yusuke to make posters and design a logo for them (he would've done it for free since he was hanging out anyways, but they insisted on compensating him properly)

Unfortunately there is one person who is not very confident, and Mishima ends up quitting the band because he’s worried he’ll weigh them down, leaving them with a rather open gaping hole to fill. The Phantoms have become fairly well established at this point and are pretty popular among the other university students, leaving Akira very worried about finding an adequate replacement- and none of the people they audition seem to be able to keep up.

Luckily, Ann knows a guy.

Akira is hesitant because this guy apparently has no experience playing in a band and is totally self taught, but Ann swears up and down that he’s really good and “please Kira just give him a chance, what’s the worst that can happen?” And so he eventually caves and agrees to have the guy try out, assuming that it will end up in failure just like all the others.

Enter Ryuji Sakamoto to the chat. He’s loud, he’s energetic, he’s covered in tattoos and piercings, he’s arguably obnoxious, and Akira doesn’t want to be impressed but he absolutely is. Ryuji surpasses all his expectations and it drives him fucking crazy because he shouldn’t be this good and yet. And Yet.

So he begrudgingly agrees to have Ryuji join them for their next practice, and decides to throw all of their most complicated songs at him. Make or break. Sink or swim. Either way he’s determined to push Ryuji hard until he cracks and crumbles under the pressure, ultimately proving Akira correct.

What he does not account for is Ryuji’s incredible stubbornness and determination, pushing him to outlast and out-perform each and every time without fail, even in the face of the rather tense relationship building between them.

Or at least Ryuji thinks it's tense, but Akira is starting to crumble himself, and although he is loathe to admit it, their new drummer is growing on him.

Of course in this au Akira is autistic (bc again it wouldn't be a James hc otherwise) and communication is not his strong suit, so he expresses himself in the only way he knows how, which is music. He writes the songs himself and is usually the one choosing which ones they're going to play, and the ones he picks become gradually more emotional and personal to him in hopes that Ryuji is paying attention.

The culmination of this being when Ryuji overhears Makoto questioning his song choices, saying "but don't you think the new guy..." and assumes (understandably so) that they're still questioning his abilities to keep up. He confronts Akira about it, only to be told "you know I write these all myself right? So listen and maybe you'll learn something."

Ryuji ends up feeling awfully foolish when the song ends up being about deeply personal struggles, but Akira doesn't hold it against him- instead inviting him out for ramen after practice so they can have a real conversation that doesn't involve them bitching at each other. He apologizes for being so standoffish, and explains the autism that went undiagnosed for so long, and the fact that his parents kicked him out when he was 16 because they found out he was gay- which is what lead to Sojiro adopting him.

In turn, Ryuji tells him about his father and the Kamoshida incident (resolved in a non-metaverse way obv) and a new understanding is formed between them, which eventually paves the way to a budding friendship. They bond over shared taste in music, video games, anime, the works, and the band becomes stronger than ever.

And it isn't long before group hangouts become one-on-one hangouts. They'll get takeout and go back to Ryuji's apartment to play games- Ryuji always drives and always makes a point of opening the door for Akira- and each time they'll stay together a little later, and linger a little longer in the car before saying goodbye.

The rest of the gang is understandably intrigued by this turn of events, especially since Akira hasn't seriously shown interest in anyone since his big breakup, but Ann The Matchmaker is confident that she can give them both the push they need to take the leap. Ryuji is skeptical about her insistence that he absolutely 100% does have a shot with Akira, meanwhile Akira has come to terms with his feelings for Ryuji but does not know how to express them, so he does what any reasonable person would do: get everyone to go drinking and dancing so he can have a very convenient excuse to get very close. He even remembers to put the snake bites in for this one

(spoiler alert, his plan absolutely works and he does not wake up in his own bed the next day)

And then things are good because of course they are. They're the sun and moon, adhd/autism, they balance each other out, they respect each other, they bring out the best in one another, and for the first time in over a year Akira feels totally at ease.

But of course we have to have an obligatory "oops we ran into your ex-boyfriend in public and now he knows you have a new boyfriend and is being weird about it" scene, where Akechi susses out their relationship and proceeds to be a massive bitch about it. Of course all of it is ire directed at Ryuji and his general appearance/demeanor, which doesn't really bother him because fuck it, he managed to get through high school and is okay now, why would he care what some pompous twink has to say about him? Akira on the other hand is not having it, and Ryuji has to interject before they can have a full-on argument in public.

This run-in prompts Akira to actually talk about his relationship with Akechi- something that he had never done before- and in doing so can finally come to terms with how much it really affected him, and gain some semblance of closure. (Perhaps I will talk about the Akechi relationship in a different post so that this one doesn't end up being 800 miles long)

In the end, this is all a very long and elaborate pegoryu story that I haven't really thought of a proper end for, and was entirely inspired by me listening to music whilst walking my dog and going "ough but imagine emo Akira" which became "imagine emo Akira singing." That coupled with the fact that Ryuji is the most drummer ever, and I found myself with a recipe for a delightful daydream that became so wild the more scenes I imagined and wrote in my head.

Maybe one day I'll try and turn this into something, or at least just a collection of scenes ranging from fluff to angst to, uh, other, if I'm feeling really crazy about it, but yeah, long story short I am absolutely buckwild insane about them and I think about this a lot

[prodigal-upsiders]

more fruity four band au

I cannot stop rotating band au in my head, so here’s specifically some random bits about the instruments and covers they play:

Nancy plays the drums, and I have a lot of thoughts about how that comes about. might post a snippet or two about it later.

Robin picks up the bass, because I think that is very sexy of her. (one or two of their original songs do feature some cool brass from her as well, but I don’t think she really like, loves the trumpet itself so much as she just loves making music)

Steve is the lead singer, but he also surprises them with the info that his parents used to pay for piano lessons. they stopped when he got to high school, wanted him to focus on sports and other things, but he gets a secondhand keyboard and goes to town reviving those skills. their original tracks don’t feature a lot of keyboard but it’s very fun flavor to bring out sometimes 

More Steve - he picks up the rhythm guitar parts. Steve is a highly kinesthetic learner, okay; give him something to do with his hands and he picks it up quick. also, "hey man will you teach me how to play guitar” was initially a ploy he cooked up to get Eddie to sit fucking still while he was still healing after spring break, but hey actually he really enjoys it

we all know Eddie is lead guitar. I just didn’t want to not give him a bullet point of his own okay

as far as genre goes I think their band ends up with an experimental rock n roll vibe, not all heavy metal but with influences for sure - they just don’t let Eddie write that many songs about dragons and witches, lol. but he does get to show off with fantastic guitar solos, because honestly is it even any flavor of 80s rock if there’s not a cool guitar solo in it. there’s enough shared roots between their tastes to make something really cool. I know the “steve only listens to pop” is popular, but tbh the fic “Cut and Changed and Rearranged” put Boston fan Steve in my head and he will never leave now, so. I have more specific ideas about which albums Eddie plays to coax them to the edge of the metal genre, though, because of course he does

I don’t envision they ever like, hit it really big - I think a certain level of commercial success would freak them out, honestly. it’s not a lifelong career for any of them but Eddie, who stays in the industry but transitions to mainly songwriting and/or producing in the later years. but they put out several albums, do a couple of tours, and are kind of a cult classic of the scene before they retire. they do record a reunion/celebration album when gay marriage is made legal and it’s all the songs they had to shelve back in the day because there was definitely no way to make them sounds straight lol. they drop the announcement of the album and also the fact that they’re marrying each other in the same tweet.

a couple of the songs I put on their playlist with the hcs about them:

Immigrant Song - Led Zepplin. Steve may be lead vocals but it’s Nancy and Robin who like to do the war cry part

Baba O’Riley - The Who. aka Teenage Wasteland, and Steve absolutely practices that intro for weeks in secret so that he’s got it down enough that he can wink at Eddie the first time he plays it for the band 

Bad Reputation / Call Me Lightning - a couple of the few that Robin takes lead vocals instead of Steve. listen if Nancy and Robin don’t get to cover some Joan Jett then what’s the POINT

[headgehug]

streetlight manifesto: a comprehensive review*

*of one album

streetlight manifesto (SM) is an American ska band founded in New Jersey in 2002, consisting of several members of other musical collectives, such as Catch 22 and Bandits of the Acoustic Revolution. alright i'm done summarizing their wikipedia page. i just learned those things. let's review the album Somewhere in the Between (2007).

1. We Will Fall Together

physically impossible to start off stronger than this! the band is made up of so much talent, several members being former orchestra members, etc. WWFT is sort of your summary for the overarching themes of struggling with religion and fear of death.

If you listen to nothing else from this list, listen to this one! the brass is incredibly sexy (I say brass instead of being specific because there's horns, and trombone, and saxophone.. i mean it's kind of everything and i have a hard enough time telling the difference), the bass is simply devious, and the times it focuses on just guitar are so clever.

not to mention the lyrics! this song in particular is a sort of fuck you, when we go down, it'll be together, with those of us we trust and love.

And when we fall we will fall together No one will catch us so we'll catch ourselves

and in the face of a religion that is in practice only violent and threatening, when things seem this hopeless

They're coming after all of us with everything they've got With the fury of a soldier who will answer to his God So how will we fight? All we have is logic and love on our side

anyways! WWFT is simply maddening in its perfection. it's a rally, it's a war cry, it's a warm embrace in the dark. and how could the rest of the album possibly hold a candle to it? (somehow, it can)

2. Down, Down, Down To Mephisto's Cafe

this one starts out as if it's angsty 90s grunge, but oh, this is no Creep, this is no 1979. we're not lamenting loss of belief and alienation here, we're riding a sick bass line down to hell :)

I will say that in an album that is just so fast, the slower start can be a little jarring, but we're early on, and it's for a good cause, so it doesn't particularly bother me! especially not when we have such hard-hitting lyrics such as:

Someone shouted "Everything's for nothing" (Somebody shouted, "All is lost") But I can't buy that nonsense too

Even in the pits of despair, ostracism for one's lack of belief, facing the idea that there is nothing after this life, perhaps, everything is not for nothing.

This is a fun song in the same way Keasby Nights by Catch 22 is a fun song ("My my my how the time does fly when you know you're gonna die by the end of the night!" is so revitalizing to repeat over and over), because that whatever we're all gonna die, let's do a kickflip about it mentality is awesome, but the emphasis on love and kinship and atheistic morality is so, so important also.

Give 'er a listen here

3. Would You Be Impressed?

AGAIN! you would not think things could get any better after those two. Yet the song opens up with a fresh sound, grittier vocals, and a darker tone. the horns in particular are so eerily announcing... something. and with the song's condemnation of apathy, of cruelty and of detachment from the world, judgement day may not be too far off base.

the song progresses, proclaiming various horrors in the world, from "it's not my fault" to "it's all my fault," the former in protest of responsibility, the latter in stark realization once it's too late. well, that gets pretty dark, but the song itself is absolutely wild.

4. One Foot On the Gas, One Foot in the Grave

well, it was inevitable in an album full of 10s. OFOTG,OFITG is a solid 9 :/ if only because of the slow start, again! if this was your average mid 2000s pop punk/indie rock album, it would be par for the course, but this is ska, and so there's kind of a high demand for your music to be thoroughly adhd.

that being said, we do pick up speed relatively fast, and it's a plucky consideration of questioning one's ingrained beliefs. give it a whirl if you so please

5. Watch it Crash

oh boy, are we back to the 10s. we have some of the most rhythm guitar heavy moments in the intro, and it so suits the desperation and resignation of the lyrics:

It said "We can't just blame it on our mothers Claim everything they did was always wrong" And there ain't no turning back, when our train is off its track And there's nothing we can do but watch it crash

the resounding, nearly ironic cry for "Mercy, mercy me!" paired with this sort of watching it all burn feeling is so real? there's always a cloying desire for the security that religion offers, that there's some force watching out for you. and it can be hard knowing there's not.

but! at least we have watch it crash. listen to it :)

6. Somewhere in the Between

this is THE epitome of that thing that's like, emo/punk/goth is when life sucks and you ___ about it, and ska is off to the side like life sucks but we got a fucking sax solo! doot doot doot

We have an absolutely joyous brass riff throughout this song about how we are all going to die.

Maybe the times we had, they weren’t that bad And everything else was part of our path We sang: “I don’t know where we go from here” This is the anthem, the slogan, the summary of events And we all just idealize the past So you were born, and that was a good day Someday you’ll die, and that is a shame But somewhere in the between was a life of which we all dream And nothing and no one will ever take that away

not only that, but this quivering, sensual instrumental in the middle-- how's that for something amazing in the between? this song is a masterpiece honestly. like-- yeah!

7. Forty Days

once again-- how could you top SitB? well, with Forty Days. we've got this sultry, swinging riff opening a song about the haunting creep of past sins.

with regards to the vocals, i get a Mad Caddies vibe from this song, just with the way the singers sound. a little rough, discernibly edgy.

These lines are kickers:

What a way to begin, we inherit sin

the christian belief that we inherit sins from our ancestors, and that we are born into a sin that can only be cleansed by belief-- well what if you don't believe?

I've tasted seven sins, so they won't let me in I knock knock knock until my knuckles are bruised and raw Stuck in the middle with my blood in a puddle on the floor We made our beds, we'll judge ourselves

I love this set of lines for its rebellion, the "no one can judge me but me" attitude, the knowledge that one's lust for life will be one's eternal downfall.

What a waste! So many decent people at the gates

and when we all get to heaven- the challenging of traditional religious morality, the idea that a perfectly good person could be turned away for lack of belief.

and then while you contemplate all of this, we have a pleasantly clean but complex guitar solo. anyways, it's a must listen, i think.

8. The Blonde Lead the Blind

and we're back to cheerful ska riffs :)

this is a fairly stand-alone song, and can be about popular culture leading those who subscribe to it, or about religion and its affect on those who subscribe to it... well i guess they're both fads, aren't they?

the chorus is delightfully rebellious:

Did you lose faith? Yes, I lost faith in the powers that be But in doing so I came across the will to disagree And I gave up, yes I gave up and then I gave in But I take responsibility for every single sin

let's take a moment to wax poetic about the skill of this band, yes? let me be a hater for just a split second and say that it's a little disappointing to hear so much popular music that doesn't ooze musical talent. it absolutely requires technique and expertise far above my comprehension, but i kind of like to just hear a song where i know the people are ridiculously talented... like yeah these guys are Professional Musicians. okay i'm done lol. TBLTB here

9. The Receiving End of it All

i believe this song references the fact that SM was robbed not once, but twice on their tours of Europe... hence "That motherfucker, he took everything we had"... well considering the other lyrics, it's probably not that, but this is a fun and essential SM fact. no, i don't have any others. just preaching for the album lol.

this song stands alone just a bit, in that it's about a failed relationship. it may or may not relate to the themes of religious separation throughout the rest of the album. it does, however, go very hard.

10. What a Wicked Gang are We

any instrument that can trill is brrrilliant in my book, and this song therefore does not disappoint at all. This is the final track on the album, and holds the position well. it's a biting address towards America as a whole, evidenced by the use of "Tis of Thee" like, as in, "my country".

I mean, in that regard, it's nothing particularly unusual though, just about how the political class is running this country into the ground... pretty standard stuff in the punk sphere?

however, it does wrap the album up quite well. shifting the focus from religion and fear of death towards something that we can control is so smart, relevant in 2007 and unfortunately still relevant now! it's so terribly easy to get depressed in the wake of all this, but do please remember. at least we have killer sax solos.

to sum it up: yeah good album . i'd say more but tumblr is groaning under the weight of all my links. sure hope this posts.

[super-unpredictable98]

All Shook Up | Killing Bono AU

Chapter 2: Shaking Things Up

Warning: Strong language

(General Masterlist) | (All Shook Up Masterlist)

The next morning was cold, but Joyce was all ready to show the McCormick brothers what she could do. She put on her best outfit, did her makeup and hair, all while Gloria watched from afar with the most judgemental look on her face. 

"So, you like the malnourished one then?"

"What? No! I'm auditioning for their band, they are about to get signed with a super hot label and I wanna be in on it."

"Oh, so the cleavage, the sexy lipstick, the short skirt with fishnets... that's all for the audition. You're definitely not interested in that kid."

"I- I'm not not interested. He's cute."

"Oh my God! You slept with him!" Gloria gasped. "That's why you were home so late! You were getting down and dirty with the neighbor!"

"I was not!" Joyce exclaimed. She wasn't a prude or a virgin by any means, but because of her upbringing, she wasn't able to be as free as her roommate. Her parents always taught her that nobody wants to eat a candy bar that everyone has already touched and licked, so she was more discreet about who had tasted her candy. "I was actually not, he was totally high on cocaine, drunk as a skunk, I didn't think it was right, you know?"

Gloria nodded, she had to agree. Sex with someone in that state sounded horrible, she knew from experience. 

"So when are you planning on sleeping with him?" She asked.

"I don't know if I'm gonna sleep with him! If it happens it happens, I don't have any plans."

After carefully tuning her bass and placing it back in its case, Joyce made her way across the hall to their door. She knocked, but there was no response. She tried again, once more nobody opened the door, in fact it was so silent, it didn't seem like anybody was home at all. 

She frowned and thought about going back to her flat, but she couldn't stop thinking about Ivan, something must've happened for him to break a promise. At least she hoped so, they barely knew each other, but from their brief interactions, she didn't take him for a guy who would make a promise only to break it the next day. 

Hours passed and she was still sitting in front of their door when the two brothers finally came, both looking like hell. 

"Fuck! Joyce, I'm so sorry I- How long have you been here?" Ivan yelped. 

"Ever since the time we scheduled for my audition."

"You told her she'd get an audition?" Neil hissed, angry that his brother went over his head.

"Yeah! I think she'll be good," he argued. "But it doesn't matter anymore, the fella we were negotiating our contract with was kicked off the label and so were we. Literally, we were thrown out of the building."

"I'm sorry it didn't work out," Joy frowned, almost losing the last bit of hope she had in her to make it in London. 

She was about to get back to her flat and watch as Gloria made fun of her for being so naive and trusting, but instead, Ivan took her hand to stop her. "Hey, since you're ready and you're here, why don't you audition anyway? We'll have to start over with the band, so it's like a fresh start."

"You still want me to?" She asked.

"Course, we still need a bass."

"Okay then."

Joyce followed the two brothers inside and set everything up. They did as well, preparing to play something and see how she would fit in with their sound. 

"Do you have any preference?" Ivan asked, getting his guitar. 

"Um... I'm sure you guys know U2?" 

"NO!" Neil shouted like a crazy person. "We're not playing U2!" 

"Shit, okay," she nearly jumped back. "Sorry, I didn't know you were not a fan. Maybe Queen then? Another One Bites The Dust?" 

"Brilliant," Ivan smiled, trying to make up for his brother's exaggerated reaction. "You wanna sing too?" 

"Yeah, of course," she stood in front of the mic.

Joyce started playing and they quickly followed. Even Neil had to admit she was good, she had good rhythm and she played the bass well, but the real surprise came when she opened her mouth to sing.

"Steve walks warily down the street with his brim pulled way down low. Ain't no sound but the sound of his feet, machine guns ready to go. Are you ready hey are you ready for this? Are you hanging on the edge of your seat?"

Her voice was an explosion that filled the entire room, it was full and deep, raspy but without straining. Ivan gave Neil a wide-eyed look and Neil simply rolled his eyes, not ready to admit his little brother was right about something. He took pride in making the decisions for the band, even if most (if not all) of them turned out to be wrong.

"Jesus..." Ivan breathed once the song ended. "It's like you're the lovechild of Stevie Nicks and Janis Joplin! Are you kidding me right now?" 

"Thanks," Joy smiled shyly, looking away from him so she wouldn't blush. 

"Yeah, it was okay," Neil nodded with a sigh. "I mean, might not be the right fit for our band but-"

"Not the right fit? Neil are you going insane or you still drunk?" Ivan chuckled, still agape. "You dragged me all the way from Ireland, I believed your bullshit and now we're right back where we started. If you're serious about getting signed then you have to let Joy in! She's our best chance to make it big."

"Can you read sheet music, Joyce?" Neil asked. 

"Yeah, what do you have?" She asked, taking his notebook. 

"Can you sing this?" 

"The sun is shining on the sea today, you're living your life the easy way. You left behind, the world again. So be a tourist, hear the call-"

"Fine! Fine, you're in!" He grimaced, hating how great his song sounded in her voice. "But we'll be singing too, don't think you'll get all the solos just cause you can sing!" 

"I didn't expect to, thank you so much, you guys!" Joyce squealed, clapping with excitement. She couldn't believe it was actually true, she was sure they could be great, she believed that more than anyone, even Neil. 

To celebrate joining the band, Joy suggested going out for a drink, but none of the boys wanted anything to do with alcohol after the night before. Instead, they settled for some fish and chips, only... Ivan had other plans.

"Hey, Neil!" He hissed while the girl brought her bass back to her flat. "You gotta say you don't feel well or something, say you don't wanna go."

"What? Why?" Neil barked.

"Because I wanna go out with her."

"Have you thought about, I don't know, asking?"

"I am asking!" 

"Not me, you twat! Her!"

"Well I did, but I was way too high to remember, just please please stay home? C'mon, please!"

"Fine... not like I wanna spend time dicking around with you two. I have to write some more material to show to the labels."

"You're the best brother in the world!" Ivan shook Neil by the shoulders just as Joy came back. 

"Yeah yeah," he huffed. "Hey, so I'm a little under the weather, you know? Still kinda hungover, you two go."

"Maybe we should all stay and talk about the band?" Joyce asked, but Ivan was already halfway out the door. 

"Nah, he'll be fine. Neil is a real grumpy arsehole when he's hungover, it's dinner time anyway."

Gloria watched as they made their way down the stairs, and that stupid knowing grin on her face made Joy want to kill her. It's not like that was a date... right? Of course not. It was a friendly band hangout.

Ivan insisted he should pay as a welcome treat, even though he probably had way less money than her. He just couldn't be that type of guy who wouldn't pay on their first date. In his mind that was a date... right? Of course it was.

"We only need a drummer now," he murmured, covering his chips in vinegar. "Do you know anyone?"

"Not really, I haven't made any friends since I arrived."

"Why did you wanna leave the States?" He asked. "They have a pretty big music scene there. Why didn't you move to LA or something?"

"I always liked London, all my favorite musicians are from England... well, except Bono."

Ivan shook his head with a smile. As much as his brother resented their friend, he couldn't bring himself to feel the same way. The bastard was talented, it's not like he didn't deserve it. 

"We went to school together, back then when we still called him Paul."

"You're kidding!" Joyce grinned.

"No, I swear! I'd say ask Neil, but I wouldn't if I were you. I sorta auditioned for his band once, but it didn't work out."

"So you could be in U2 right now?" 

"I suppose, if things had been different... we only played together once, it wasn't really a thing."

"So you're happy with our band?" Joy leaned over the table without even realizing it. 

"Yeah! Even more now that you're here to shake things up."

She thought for a moment, not noticing when Ivan also leaned closer, their faces only inches apart. He was ready for a kiss, he thought that's what she wanted, but she simply laughed. Shit, she has such a cute laugh... he thought.

"This should be our name."

"What?"

"Shook Up! You're not the McCormick brothers anymore."

"Y-yeah! That's a pretty cool name," Ivan cleared his throat, embarrassed and hoping she didn't notice how eager he was. 

"So, will you kiss me now?" She asked with a smirk.

Tag List: @seanfalco @elliethesuperfruitlover @firstpersonnarrator @salvador-daley @totallyeve

[randomvarious]

Today's mix:

Metro Tech 7 by DJ Marinho Fischetti 2001 Euro House / House / Trance

Took a trip down to early 2000s São Paulo, Brazil today with this very ephemeral dance mix that was put out by the city's Metropolitana radio station as part of their very own Metro Tech series. Never once in my life have I ever ventured into any of this locale's dance stuff before, but if this set is really truly representative of what was flowing throughout São Paulo at the time, then I guess I was expecting it to be a whole lot more Brazilian than it actually was? 🤷‍♂️

I mean, outside of the total banger that is Fogo's "Another Star"—which interpolates Stevie Wonder's own late 70s song of the same name, and is also therefore very similar to another Brazilian-sounding Bob Sinclar-produced house track by Salomé de Bahia called "Outro Lugar" that interpolates that very same Stevie song—the vast majority of the rest of this is just purely unremarkable trash that's been imported from mainland Europe; basically a bunch of songs that aren't Kernkraft 400's "Zombie Nation," but are just as janky and soullessly goofy with their rote and formulaic combos of things like squelchy bass vibrations and big and stupid, blaring melodies that are more fit for drunkenly chanting along to at soccer matches and hockey games. Não gosto!

But still, standing out from all of that transactional, mindless muck are actually a couple house gems here that don't have any of that cheap Euro-stink on them at all, like this release's final song, "Camels," which is actually a bonus track that falls outside of the mix itself, and is by a prolific Italian guy named Santos, who, from the looks of it, may actually have more aliases under his name than he has bones in his own damn body—and I'm assuming that his body is one with an amount of bones in it that most people would consider to be pretty normal!

"Camels" is a thumping, turn-of-the-millennium filter house delight that fronts with a lovely pair of dramatic and cinematic bits of orchestral string, along with a little piece of guitar funk as well, and then calms itself down with some distorted guitar synth fuzz on its bridge 🤘.

But the thing about that particularly terrific piece of sunshining dance bliss glitz is that you can find it on *plenty* of other releases; a song that I *definitely* can't leave you all today without mentioning is one that I don't think has ever appeared anywhere else besides this very Metro Tech 7 mix itself: a thing called "My President" by La Cubanita.

Now, to be honest with you all, I have no fucking clue who La Cubanita actually is. Discogs links them to a New York Latin house musician by the name of DJ Lucho, but I doubt that Lucho would exclusively release a song like this on some random-ass São Paulo radio station mix; because, really, if he did that, I think he fucked up big time—this song would've absolutely been his calling card.

See, what's so wonderfully odd about this very song appearing *exclusively* on a Brazilian dance mix from 2001 like this is how totally unexpected it is. This is a tune that stars a sexy-voiced, Spanish-speaking Latina who goes by the name of Mónica, and she gets passionately dicked—or perhaps cigarred?—down by none other than American president Bill Clinton himself, with pleasure-filled moans induced from her and all 😂. And normally, I really don't tend to enjoy the particular brand of tribal house that's on display here, but I think you can understand why I make such a big exception for this one. And of all the places to discover it too; like, what an absolutely ridiculous find here!

So, once again, never shut anything off, folks, because you really never know when you might come across an exclusive and exceedingly rare house track about a former American president's sex scandal on a mix from a country on a different continent that was most likely released when that president's successor had already taken office! 😊

Listen to the full mix here.

Highlights:

House of Glass - "Disco Down" La Cubanita - "My President" Fogo - "Another Star" Santos - "Camels"

[breadsandwiches]

Wanted to share my tdp playlists bc i honestly like how they turned out! 💃

Some of these were recommended by dragonprinceofficial! (a, c, v, s)

(Very in depth and thought provoking comments about my fave songs under the cut >>>)

AARAVOS

Time, Stars, Universe Pretty ethereal star god vibes

Play with Fire Whatever his beef with the Sunfire peeps, im enjoying it and am glad he is too. slay queen (literally)

Dishonored 2 Main Theme creepy ominous spider-spinning-its-web vibes ok?

Inside the Cage Listen to sexy mental breakdown song.

In the Palace ~ Agitato Creepy fucked up butterfly beast. For context watch HxH, its fun!!! 😀 (< dead inside) Also soundtrack for Aaravos losing his mind in prison and making his puppets dance till their feet bleed! 😍

Adore Adore The story can change at the roll of a dice babeyy 😎 no fr the lyrics are fire

Throne Wrath and violence on planat earth

Nosk Spider-pulling-in-its-prey vibes. Callum wyd 👁👁

Dark Matter The drama.. the vibes.. "bring me your soul bring me your ~HATE~" *insert elmo fire gif*

Black Train/End Credits ~piano~ Also death etc. etc. idek. damn should this be on viren or claudia's playlist instead? 🤔

CLAUDIA

Restless Year I always imagine her dancing or playing the bass to this. Also this song was literally written about her /lie

W.I.T.C.H. We all know this would be on her playlist in a modern au.

My Zero It's fine, she's just gradually losing grip of her family and also herself, she's losing her beginnings 😀👍 ok

Selfless "You're mucking off, but I will live for you, my selfless love". Screaming crying throwing up etc.

Fireflies Nothing to say here except that it's perfect.

A Victory of Love Objectively a bop. Songs that make me Ascend™

Galaxies Honestly im just rlly invested in the modern au where she's a bassist in a cool band and this is one of the songs theyd be playing. but also the lyrics kinda fit

Spanish Sahara She can have a little vengeance as a treat. Also trauma <3

Young and Tragic sad :( baby magefam feels :((

VIREN

The Unquiet Grave he's a corpse 👍

Werewolf Heart Thinking about Harrow, thinking about Lissa maybe. also those wolves and screams?? sir... 🧍‍♂️ Also sexy bass. what more do you want.

Mohammed Most sexy guitar ive ever heard ever im not joking. leave me alone

LA PAURA DEL BUIO lyrics fit pretty well. also this playlist has a criminal lack of angry rock songs

Fight Like Gods Lyrics and such

Way down We Go idk how to describe it without saying the word sexy again :/

The Sun Pretty 😳

Sleep Oughg (< relates a bit too much)

Ashes to Ashes idk man, its just pretty. like Viren <3 <3 <3

Into Dust damn ok tdpo

SOREN

Beautiful Day idk this just has Soren all over to me. the early sunrise wake up feeling, the hopeful optimism idk man

Uptown Funk Originally wasn't putting this in but it is Sooo S1-2 Soren. Also this

Back Against The Wall A+ rec from tdpo

Ode To The Mets I am so normal about this song so normal i listen to it a regular amount haha *insert one of those feral stick figures with blood all over*

Run Magefam feels 💃

Edge of Darkness Next on Songs that make me Ascend™. "I've got love in my heart for an army apart" :(

Fill Your Heart This is one of my fave songs ever its so joyful i love it and I love Soren

Obstacles This song is already Not Ok on its own, but combined with the Soren-Claudia feels it's an atrocity 👍 Songs for floating away on a river never to return

What's Up Ya boy might not always be the brightest but he's definitely the more emotionally intelligent one also i love him so much hhskvhvhhvhvhbv

[edenwolfie]

For the writer ask - 13, 17, 27, 28, 36!

Hallo and thank you for the ask! I'll stick to my fanfics for answering these :)

13. What is a subject matter that is incredibly difficult for you write about? What is easy? I always always struggle with sex scenes, they tend to not take too long, but are then followed by the most god awful amount of editing to try and make it at least vaguely sexy. Local aroace tries their best lol. Otherwise I don't think I struggle quite as much as that with much else?

27. Who is the most stressful character you’ve ever written? Why? I think it was probably Madam Yu from my MDZS fic series Just Say Yes. Every scene she was in was a trial for me to get my head around because the series was very much a 'fix-it everything you can' kinda deal, but I also didn't want to drastically change anyone's character, so she was a difficult line to walk. Mostly I avoided this by keeping her out of scenes when I could lol. I remember one or two people wanting a chapter from her POV and just, I would have died of frustration and the fic would have never been finished lol.

27. Who is the most delightful character you’ve ever written? Why? I have to be honest, writing Xie Lian for Compass has probably been my fave. I feel like I just get him (whether this is true or non lol) and can just go when writing him.

36. They say to Write What You Know. Setting aside for a moment the fact that this is terrible advice…what do you Know? So much random shit; working in a medical setting, working in a school setting, working in a retail/food service setting, illustration (traditional & digital), animation (2D & 3D), sports (springboard diving, soccer, skiing), music (esp. cello, bass guitar, singing, with group orchestra, choir, bands etc), D&D and board games, and cooking/baking. Probably some other stuff I'm forgetting, but oh well! I think only the music, art, and retail/food service topics have wormed their way into my writing thus far, I'm not much for a modern setting, so a lot of that doesn't tend to apply lol.

[from weird questions for writers ask meme]

17. Talk to me about the minutiae of your current WIP. Tell me about the lore, the history, the detail, the things that won’t make it in the text. Well, let's go with Compass cause it's still in my brain, and the extras are still WIPs. So here's some random brain faff (under the cut):

- Hua Cheng scared the shit out of Xu Hao when he came back to town and cornered him like 'who the fuck is the new guy? name? age? occupation? appearance? birthday? tax file number? etc' and Xu Hao is just like, that's just Wujin he's just our lil guy now. i don't know shit. please blink. - Hua Cheng basically spent the month he was gone out of Ghost City after Zhongyuan having the worlds longest panic attack and sculpting the most frantic bunch of statues he could to prove to himself he still remembered how Xie Lian looked. This also stopped him destroying anything because he was Not Allowed to break them. Is why he got himself out of the city, because otherwise a few blocks were gonna go bye bye. - Dianshui remembers in very awful detail how she died but she will not ever fucking share that with anyone. - I already shared this with a commenter but re: the wine Xie Lian gives to Hua Cheng in Ch 4 (the one where he had worked for the winemaker for a while), there's so many bottles in the cellar because the winemaker is now a ghost now and still making the wine so Hua Cheng likes to buy them as the winemaker spoke kindly of Xie Lian. - The section where Xie Lian makes the drinks for Chunchun's ex was called "Evil Ratatouille" in my WIP doc for absolutely no good reason.

[turntabless]

🔮 la folie - the stranglers 🔮

welcome back to turntable takes, folks!!! hope everyone’s doing wonderfully <3 this week (said so very loosely. i underestimated how hard it would be to do them every week but that’s on ME!) we have a gem <3 i know 2 songs off of it and they constantly occupy my mind! so! if you’re checking this out, thank you!! and hope you enjoy <3 once again i am very musically illiterate and don’t know theory!! this is me going AWOOGA!!!

also i’m not including the bonus tracks off the reissue because i’m TIRED. SLEEPY EVEN. but they’re also really good!

genres: new wave, punk rock, baroque pop

non stop

okay immediately loving the lil tippy tappy drums with a little echo that fade in! cute lil organ lick that is so fun!! i’m also a big fan of talk-singing when done in a sexy way and this is that! GUITAR crunchy echoing bass coming in. OH those drums fuck. this is just so fun!!! very sarcastic singing its scratching my brain!! and the guitars are so cheeky. layered vocals crescendo in volume cute like harmonies??? ooooo stripping it back then speeding up going louder again is such a choice i love it here. CHANGING TEMPO let’s go!!!

everybody loves you when you’re dead

ohhhhhh god i love the keys intro here. bass is sexy and so clear and i’m in love. the odd pitches with the guitar is so nice ! yummy drums!!! synthy business! punky talk vocals with layering going on is so good and these lyrics kinda make me feel insane. god that keyboard part and odd wavering synth in the background is so nice. harsh cymbal type sounds YUM! PICK IT UP LETS GOOOO cute lil tempo change and then right back to it!! ohhhhh slow little breakdown descending in pitch

tramp

OHHHH. flat guitar really interesting here. WITH BUZZING KEYBOARD AND BASS ????? drums are really!!! OOOOOH an instrumental soundscape baby!!! i love these vocals he’s got a great voice very punky and when he pitches up it’s really pretty??? also love the return to the darker sounds during the chorus? BASSSSSSS AH GOD !!!!! love the speed and the experimental nature of the chorus !!! 80s video game synth yummy. there’s something so dancy about this and god the vibrato and INSANELY nice drums????

let me introduce you to the family

OH FAST DRUMS LETS GO!!! ooooo this bass? is it bass? descending thing is so intriguing! faaaast guitar playing a really fun ear catching riff that’s like. this really is so experimental here. okay there’s some freddie m rasp at some parts which are really interesting and then the harmonies and layering of the vocals in the chorus are crazy! that bass is so consistent and so clear and great!!! ohhhh switch up that RIFF babes!!! it’s all very like buzzy fuzzy yum! ohhh TURN up the volume on the vocals add another lil keyboard thing this is sooooooo intricate!! ECHO on the voice for the fade-out ending with a drum beat to end everything!

ain’t nothin’ to it

ohhhhh that guitar is yummy. drums go hard in this beginning. BASS I HEAR YOU BABY YOU SHINE!! these vocals are so fun and sassy!! oh that odd lil dissonance in parts of this song is so cool??? and the lil changes in riffs and pitches sound really cool <3 ohhhhh BREAKDOWN lets gooooooo!!!! fuck it up instrumental section!!! BASS AND DRUMS ONLY OH LETS GO!!! this is really cool i’m obsessed. ohhhhh????? ohhhhhhhhhhhhh guitar little staccato notes??? this repeating instrumental part is so intriguing colour feel taste wise??? it’s so dark and a little unsettling with the occasional flatness but it’s nice????

the man they love to hate

BUZZY KEYS LETS GO !!! god. goddddd. that bass goes so hard. ohhhh crunchy soar on that guitar is so nice. drums going HARD. echoing lil keys are fun!! talk vocals as always are so fun !!! PITCH UP LETS GO !!! uplift meeee !!! back to the really punchy instrumentals on top of those buzzy keys that add such an interesting texture!! some little sweeping synthy kind of cymbal effect? ohhhhh. this is so fun !!! also the little whispered backing vox are fuuuuucking scrumptious! oh jesus it’s getting darker babes…… in tone in lyrics and then right back to light???? what in the world how is this this way. GUITAR FUCK IT UP cute lil solo! ohhhhh PLAYING WITH SHADE AGAIN THIS IS SO…… those lowest instrumental notes are so deep and fat and intriguing.

pin up

fucking insane drums i love you. ohhh??? xylophone-esque twinkly keys? GUITAR THERE YOU ARE BABY! sounds crunchy and thin but in such an atmospheric way! the “oooohhh”s are really nice with the bit of reverb on it??? this is such a fun little song? those twinkly xylophone sounds are back i love!!! the instruments are so so good at melding together so that those lil keys are picked out of the fold so well???

it only takes two to tango

ohhhhhhhh this is such a fun little intro… i don’t know what the name of this stylistic choice is but it’s like someone swinging you around with the drums bass guitar and then you get layered talk vocals with a BEAUTIFUL ascending like… quartet harmony going on. this is so fun!!! warbling keys again they’re so good at atmospheric sounds here. also sorry those harmonies are needed inside my bloodstream stat! OH KEY CHANGE! uh ohhhhh bestie the dissonance is back in the vocals but not in the instrumental i kinda love the effect??? faaaaaaat guitar just swingin around <3 OH the warbling is so interesting looking slightly more haunting as it progresses! LITTLE DRUMMER BOY GOING OFF WITH A FUN LIL HIGHER PLUCKED GUITAR RIFF? this is so….

golden brown

THIS IS MY BABY ONE OF MY FAVOURITE SONGS !!!!!! HARPSICHORD WHAT THE FUCK!!!! also with a bassy keyboard behind it! god his vocals in this are so buttery so yummy with just a hint of nasality? also god this fuckin time signature is all fucked the harpsichord is playing in a completely different time. bass and drums come into the fold so carefully subtly it’s beautiful. everything is just a little heavier but it’s still so light and mysterious and plain cool??? guitarrrrrrrrrrrr oh the reverby echo???? this solo always gets me !!!! ohhhhhh vocalisation that’s so echoey and sooooooo otherworldly is insane. the deepness and the layering of it is Fucked. this is truly such a soundscape AGAIN! chu bee fair idk how they’re so in sync when the times are so different.

how to find love and happiness in the present day

ohhhhhh this is different. screechy little synthy things going on to more spoken vocals with an insane lil bass trying going on? so sectioned with the vocals and instruments it’s really cool!!! the layering of the guitar pitches are so nice. AH TWANGY GUITAR mixed with some bongo vibes!!!! nah this is so fun!!! ohhhh these lil drum things sound like trickling raindrops. not sure what exactly they are but it adds such a cool effect. god that high frequency synth solo what the fuck !!!!! so insane so sick!!! ohhhh it fluctuates so nicely and smoothly between notes. descending vocal line with fuzz and partially covered by the instrumentals TO A FADEOUT

la folie

Oh This Is Grand. this intro is so beautiful???? what sounds like strings (made with keyboard) with a high smooth guitar part with echoey reverb and bass. OH ITS A SPOKEN PART IN FRENCH. beautiful. these words are so lonely and beautiful too and that’s conveyed so well with the effects placed on the voice itself? drums………. god this is so twin peaks right now !!!! DEEP SUNG VOCALS WHISPERING. back to spoken word with the bass getting a deeper sweeping moment??? oh beautiful deep staccato notes. there’s such a cool effect put on his voice this is….. really cool. the stringy synths really paint the background of this with colour. OHHHH high synthy parts joining the mix in a fun little flourish!!!! that bass…….. is so genuinely yummy holy goooood. spoken word so cinematic and lovely. the “la folie” being sung so deeply and whispery is so nice and comforting….. i love this. beauty guitar part at the end so soft so nice so echoey. drums holding down the fort so well UGH.

thoughts: okay. okay. i was genuinely surprised at how varied and genuinely INTERESTING this album was? like the tempo variations the key changes the instruments used the shifting parts the vocals and the USE of all of it to set tone? the tone itself was also so insane and has to be mentioned because there was so much interplay with shadow and light in each song?????????? incredible. i know talk-singing isn’t for everyone but i think it’s cinematic and cheeky and fun so i loved it. l o v e d. genuinely surprised at this guys!!!