#but i do like having people sit with me. being watched while drawing has never bothered me so i like the IDEA of streaming

[lucksea]

if the dmc or whatever wasnt a thing i would stream on twitch every day and just do this. while drawing this example i realized this would be almost exactly like those essay tiktoks where they have subway surfer playing at the bottom of the screen. unmedicated adhd experience

[thexsilentxwordsmith]

Simon "Ghost" Riley x Fem!reader

From the request here

Fandom: Call of Duty

Character(s): Simon Riley, Reader

Summary: When a movie night has you questioning your bodies worth, Simon catches you in the shower to show you that your body is perfect just the way that it is.

Word Count: 4.3 k

Warnings:

“Look at the jugs on her,” one of the guys says at the busty blonde that has just been introduced for the first time in the film. A few others follow suit, whooping at the gorgeous, petite female main character popping up on screen as the movie really gets going. “That’s a woman you could lose yourself in. Fuck, I wish I could find a girl like her; I’d be a happy man for life. To have that waiting at home for me, I’d never even be tempted to stray.”

This is usually how movie night on base goes: people piling into the rec center ready to watch the latest movie from the personal collection from one of the members, but mostly it just devolves into a testosterone fest of horny boys itching to have something to focus their sexual frustrations on by ogling at the new pretty little thing on screen. Usually it doesn’t bother you, you’re used to being around all that chaos, but tonight just feels different.

Simon isn’t one for this type of gathering, but he comes to keep an on the crowd and be nearer to you and as he watches out of the corner of his eye from his place standing towards the back, he notices how your body language changes as the guys continue to raucously talk about the leading lady and how beautiful she is. It’s almost imperceptible the way you shift in your seat while you pick at the skin of your lower lip with your teeth, your shoulders slumping down as you cross your arms, but he catches it outright. He knows you and he knows this isn’t normal. 

Something is bothering you.

The longer you sit there the worse it gets. Their lustful words just cut different tonight; maybe it’s exhaustion from being overworked or perhaps you’re just having an off day, but the longer they hoot and holler over the girl plastered before your eyes, the more you want to crawl out of your skin.

It’s about halfway through the movie when you slowly get up from your seat, trying not to draw attention to yourself by leaving too quickly and exit the rec without looking back. Simon is instantly concerned and wants to rush after you, but one of the newer recruits that seems to be the ringleader in all this turns to him as if to drag him into the depraved fun.

“Whatcha think; gotta admit she’s a fine thing, ain’t she Lieutenant?” he asks, nodding back at the screen. “Come on, even you gotta admit she’s perfect. Couldn’t hope to find anyone better.” 

The look that Simon gives the young man through his mask, that stone cold glare that could make even the bravest man shiver, instantly shuts him up and has him facing forward again to join his brothers in arms in their jokes. His brow furrows angrily behind the fabric as he looks over the crowd of boys once more before heading out, leaving quietly like a specter on his way to find where you had gotten to. 

Simon checks all the usual places, but you are nowhere to be found: the little area outside the rec where you usually join him for a smoke break, the mess hall, even your barracks are empty. Then he hears movement in the communal bathroom and knows he’s finally found you. 

It looks like you’ve been rushing to get done before anyone can catch you. Your hair is damp from the shower and it drips down to leave dark stains onto your t-shirt as you stand staring at yourself in the mirror behind the sink. Simon watches quietly from his obscured place by the door as you look yourself over, scrutinizing each detail from head to toe before you give up with a sigh and a diversion of your eyes, focusing on your toothbrush instead as you pick it up and turn on the faucet. So absorbed in what you are doing, you don’t hear the lock click closed or the pair of heavy boots that cross the length of the room until there is a presence upon you. 

“God, you’re so beautiful baby,” you hear that deep, gravelly voice sound from behind you while a bulky arm wraps itself around your waist from behind as Simon presses up against your back. You look back up into the mirror in front of you and are instantly met with a pair of brilliant brown eyes as he slowly removes his balaclava. “Just standin’ there fresh outta the shower and ya look like a fantasy.”  

Setting the mask on the sink he joins his other arm around you and leans his face in, the tip of his nose nuzzles into the side of your neck before he presses his lips against your jugular. His lips catch the feeling of your pulse quickening through the vein at his touch. Rough hands begin to splay across your clothed stomach, running across and down to your hips with gentle caresses that make you pause. Your eyes stare into the mirror to take in your combined form as he drapes himself over you, hot lips peppering your skin with no sign of letting up.

You chuckle dismissively, trying to play off his words as a joke. Your head still isn’t in the right place and even though you enjoy the feeling of his touch, disastrous thoughts still circle throughout to cloud your mind so that you second guess even his affections. 

“Oh, come off it,” you return as you grab the toothpaste off the countertop. “I do not.” 

There is no hesitation in his reply. “I’m serious,” he breathes that husky whisper against your skin as his lips continue down to your shoulder as his fingers pull the t-shirt away from your collar bone to reveal more skin for him to adorn with his mouth.

You roll your eyes in the mirror so that as he looks up briefly he catches the movement. “Yeah, sure,” you again dismiss him. “Whatever you say.”

Before you can even unscrew the cap to the toothpaste, Simon reaches past you to turn off the tap and take your things out of your hands before he rotates you around so that you face him. Your backside presses into the edge of the sink as you rest up against it, mouth scrunched to one side as he gazes back at you with intent. There is a subtle frown on his lips and an anxious look in his copper eyes. 

“What’s wrong?” he asks, concerned. “Somethin’ happen? Cause I did see ya leave in a hurry back there.”

You divert your eyes, ashamed of your lack of confidence that has come forward tonight. “I don’t know, it’s nothing,” you shrug, but he isn’t buying any of it. 

His large hand rests itself up under your chin, pulling your head back up to look into his face. “I think ya do know,” he says. “Will ya tell me?”

Clearing your throat, you give yourself a moment to figure out how best to proceed. “It’s just,” you say hesitantly, “I guess sometimes I just wish I looked like that, you know? I know I’m usually not this self-conscious, but tonight I guess I just hit a rough patch with my insecurities and something about the shit they were saying just got to me I guess. You see the way the guys talk about girls like in that movie, like she’s the most gorgeous thing in the world. She’s so perfect and… I…”

You gesture with your head down the length of your body to emphasize your point that you are nothing like the actress: your breasts are on the smaller side, your thighs are incredibly thick, and your stomach is not completely flat. Simon follows your hand, looking you up and down before his eyes meet yours again.

“I’m not. I know it’s fucking stupid and I shouldn’t care about all that, it doesn’t really matter, but sometimes it’s just hard to ignore. I’m not the standard when it comes to beauty, but sometimes I just want to feel like I’m the most irresistible person in the room.”

It seems like he wants to say something, you can see his mouth shifting, but instead his gaze drifts down to your lips and he pulls your chin forward to close the distance between your mouths. Instantly he overtakes your mouth with his own, tenderly capturing your lips over and over with a gentle desperation that makes him shudder against you as he moves in closer. 

“Who the fuck said ya ain’t perfect?” he asks, his voice breathy against your lips. “Gimme that bastard’s name. You tell me right now so I can go ring their fuckin’ neck. Cause that is a goddamn lie.”

“No one said anything like that, it’s just the way I feel,” you answer honestly. “And you’re only saying that because you like me.” 

Immediately Simon pulls you into another long kiss as if he is trying to take those insecure words right out of your mouth before you can say anything else. Breaking the kiss, Simon licks his flushed lips and shakes his head. “Really? Ya don’t think your body can drive someone wild? Then what’s this, hmm?” he asks, grabbing your wrist to pull your hand forward so that he can place the palm over top of the soft bulge growing in his boxers. “See whatcha do to me, sweetheart? Ya think that’s lyin’?”

Your hand rubs over the swell and his hips unconsciously buck slightly against your hand as he hums in approval of your touch. It is instantaneous the way you have him begging for even a simple touch from you; no other has ever held that kind of power over him, not anyone that he would give it to so freely like he does you. The warm pressure from your hand causes the pulsing to intensify as he grows harder and you find your heart beat starting to match its throbbing.

“Ya don’t think I catch the men lookin’ at ya from time to time?” he asks as he leans his head forward until it rests against your own, hands moving up under the hem of your shirt to play with the toasty skin of your abdomen as he talks. “Ya don’t think I see that their eyes glaze over as they linger on your body a bit too long for my fuckin’ likin’? Just cause they won’t say it out loud doesn’t make it any less true that you have something about ya that would drive any man wild.”

His words are like a balm to your mind and the longer he speaks the more you find yourself falling under their spell. Rough fingers are pushing up higher into your shirt, pulling it up over your waist as he runs his palms across the area while his hips press into yours. He’s not forceful or harsh, his advances are only full of adoration in that type of intense devotion that only Simon Riley is capable of when it comes to savoring the best damn thing he has ever had.   

“Don’t let what ya heard back there hurt ya,” he says softly. “Yeah, ya don’t look like that bird on the screen, but that doesn’t mean you aren’t an absolute beauty. You’re the most gorgeous thing I’ve ever seen and I ain’t just sayin’ it, baby. But ya don’t just have ta take my word for it. Let me show ya that no one can hold a candle to what ya got.”

Simon pulls you over to one of the empty showers and gets it going, fiddling with the taps to make sure the water is going nice and warm before he turns his undivided attention back to you. Instantly his mouth is back on yours as one by one each piece of your clothing is removed and set aside in tandem with his own until you both stand before the other bare.

“I’ve already showered,” you mutter out between pauses as merely just a statement of fact rather than a reason to deny him.

Simon murmurs his disagreement into your mouth. “Don’t care,” he replies through a break in his kiss, continuing to take off your clothes as he dizzyingly tries to get at your body. “Can’t be havin’ those fuckin’ negative thoughts in that head of yours. Wanna take care of ya, make ya feel like the true beauty ya are.”

More kissing, so much that your lips are burning and raw from the friction. His mouth must be aflame too, but he doesn’t let up; he can’t, he’s captured in the wake of your allure and there is no getting out. 

“What if someone comes in?” The last of your questions spills out quick.

He chuckles at your needless worry. “Already locked the door sweetheart.”

Stretching his hand out, he checks the temperature to be sure it’s right before dragging you inside the steamy oasis. The curtain is barely pulled closed before he has you pinned at the back wall, his stocky torso rubbing against your voluptuous naked body as he steals the breath from your lungs, kissing you so thoroughly that there is no distinction between faces anymore.

The change in temperature has your nipples hardening, the blossoms spiking forward at attention, and Simon can feel them poking against his chest the longer he has your mouth locked in that dance of back and forth. The moment he is aware of their presence his mouth is salivating to get at them. 

You might think they are not perfect enough, but to him they are exactly what he wants.

Breaking the kiss abruptly, removing his mouth so quickly that a trial of spit still connects your lips a moment, he tilts his head downward. Being on the smaller side, he can fit your breast almost entirely in his mouth and he does, filling the cavity with as much of your tit as he can without choking. 

You can hardly remember anymore why the stupid comments had you so upset in the first place when you have a man like Simon who will dote on you like you are royalty. His is the only opinion you have come to care about and it is clear that there is nothing he will ever want more than you. 

He moans deep and guttural into your breast as he sucks while letting the end of his tongue flick around the nipple, circling the sensitive tissue until you are writhing against him as he holds you steady to the wall so that he can work. There is another breast after all that requires his attention and he intends to show it the same amount of affection as the other. Switching sides, he gets to work, keeping the first breast warm by cupping it in his hand.

It’s minutes of you quivering and whimpering before he emerges panting with his lips swollen and red, satisfied with his work so far. Giving his lips a break, Simon gently strokes your cheek with his fingers as he gazes into your eyes, swaying your bodies from side to side in easy movements. “Stay with me luv,” he says softly as he watches you take heavy breaths, “I ain’t done just yet.”

Those lips are on the move again to decorate your body, over your sternum and waist, until he has to kneel before you to get any further. He’s on his knees, all 6’4” of him bent to you as he places kisses across your belly while the heated water runs over his dirty blonde hair and down his back, rippling across the muscles in his shoulders as he holds your hips squeezed securely between his broad hands. 

“You’re perfect just the way ya are, baby,” he groans against your moist skin, letting his lips linger wherever he puts them. “Just like this: real, curves for fuckin’ days, so much skin I get drunk tryin’ to get at it all. And the best goddamn part is that it’s all mine.”

More kisses he places along all the areas you think unworthy of adoration, but that he finds absolutely exquisite. “Mine, all mine.”

His words devolve into incoherent babble as he nestles his face into your abdomen to leave burning trails of his desire with his lips that even the warm water cannot wash away from your skin. Your body writhes in his double-handed grasp as your head falls back to rest against the wall as every inch of tender flesh prickles with the overstimulating sensation of being doted upon. 

Lips keep trailing further downward from your stomach to the mound of your sex, through the trimmed patch of hair at the top of your pussy, before they sink into the bulk of your thick, stocky thighs.

“Ya think I get on my knees for any girl?” he asks from his place at the bottom of the shower as he stares up into your face with half-lidded eyes that darken the more he plays with you. “You’re the only one who can bring me to fuckin’ kneel, baby. You and your gorgeous body. I’m at it’s goddamn mercy.” 

Placing his hand on your calf, he nods and you know exactly what he wants: that juicy cunt smothering his features, your bulky thighs crush against his ears. Carefully he helps you to adjust your footing so that he can lift your leg. Propping it up on his own thigh, he sits back on his calves so that his face sits at the same level as your pussy and he leans in, smothering his face right between those dangerously thick pieces of flesh as you widen your stance with his guidance to make it easier. Hardened fingertips dig themselves into your body, forcing you even more firmly against his face until his nose is pressed into your clit and he moves his head back and forth to stimulate it with the tip. 

There is little oxygen to be had between the heat from the water and the heat between your legs, but it doesn’t matter. The sound of your soft, breathy gasps and moans as he penetrates your entrance with his tongue is enough to sustain him until he can come up to breathe. Lapping and thrusting, wriggling and applying pressure, if there is even a whisper of a negative thought left in your brain it is overshadowed completely now by the overwhelming euphoria of being devoured to the brink of insanity.

You buck wild and untamed, panting heavily as the warmth in your belly begins gathering quicker than you could have thought, the coil pulling tightly as minute by aching minute Simon draws your body to the edge of its release. He is relentless in his endeavor, putting your needs above anything else- even breathing. That tongue has moved up to your clit now and with weighty presses over the tiny bean you soon are spilling over the edge and he has to hold onto you tight so that you don’t slip and fall.

Simon stays locked to your pussy until the very last second, keeping his movements going even as you try to pry him off from the sensitivity that is almost too much to handle. It isn’t until you finally stop writhing that he emerges from between your legs with a smile that has your stomach doing somersaults as he wipes his mouth clean of your cum. 

“Second course,” he growls before you even have a chance to fully come down from your high.

Oh you have got him down bad tonight. 

He carefully flips you round to face the wall and uses his feet to make you spread your legs as wide as you can get them. A hefty hand runs itself over the curve of your ass, following the line down all the way to the underside before he grabs it in his hand and gives the meat a firm squeeze.

“Those little boys just don’t know how to handle this much woman; all these fuckin’ curves are too much pleasure for a bastard that don’t know the treasure he’s got. But I know what a fuckin’ feast ya are,” he groans as he aligns your hips and enters you from behind with a forceful grunt that reverberates off the enclosed space of the shower. 

You push palms flat against the wall to steady yourself. “They don’t know how ta treat ya right, how ta love a body that just keeps givin’ and givin’. But I don’t have that problem, sweetheart.”

Simon’s devout words are like liquid fire and as his cock stretches you wide, the euphoria of his talk runs through you to make you burn. Your body is his religion and goddamn does he always worship it right. All those cares, all that self-loathing and doubt entirely evaporate from your mind as he pushes your shoulders forward to make you arch your back so that he can pound into your pussy hard and deep from behind, making your plump ass bounce off his pelvis with a recoil that draws his gaze.

“Fuck,” he breathes, so obsessed with the way you look around him that he is trying to ingrain the image in his mind.  

His aching exclamation thrills you, making your heart skip a beat as his thrusts continue to rock through you. To be craved in such a way, to be thought of like the woman in the movie, that is what he is giving you now and it is euphoric. His intensity is orgasmic and your body responds in kind as he grabs you to move you closer.

“Don’t concern yourself with the bullshit ideas of some puny little boys when ya got a man who will always make sure you feel like a fuckin’ princess when you’re in his arms,” he says in a whisper at your ear as he pulls you back to leans against his chest. “Cause ya are, sweetheart. Your my fuckin’ goddess of a woman.”

The way he says it makes you ache all over and you can feel it twinge in your clit. “Say it again,” you beg, needing to hear him make those sweet combinations of sounds once more until your body vibrates with pleasure. 

His hand comes up to cup around your breast so that he can massage the nipple between his thumb and forefinger, causing you to mewl at the sensation. “You are so fuckin’ beautiful baby, so goddamn perfect just like this, and I love every last fuckin’ inch of ya. My princess.”

Your cheeks feel like they are glowing and on fire as thrusts after thrust he pounds into you, stretching you and filling you full on all of his passion for your body. You will never be able to make everyone see you for the gorgeous being that you truly are, but that doesn’t matter anymore. Simon is more than enough to keep you feeling like the most beautiful girl in the whole world; you are safe with him.

Your head falls back against his shoulder, eyes fluttering shut as his arms that are filled with your waist clamp down tighter to secure you to him so that he can shove his cock even harder into your now dripping core. “Yes, yes,” you whimper out. 

“Come for me again,” he practically demands as he watches you falling apart once more. “Come on, pretty girl, one more for me. One more together.”

Your limbs are tingling with each snap of his hips against your ass. It’s close, right there, you can almost feel it again as the coil wounds itself tight once more in the pit of your stomach. You clench down on him, making him falter before recovering and continuing on. A few more pumps of him deep in your core and it is right there at the precipice.

“Let go for me,” he whispers into your ear as you clench once more around him and something about the way he says it sets you off. You come for the second time, the orgasm rocketing through you until you can feel it like fire shooting through your veins as you shake with the intensity of it all. 

Quickly he pulls out just in time as he too pops off and comes between your thighs as you clamp them together around his cock. The ejaculate runs down your legs as he milks every last bit out of the tip until his body hangs limp and his head falls down to rest the forehead against your shoulder. Still he holds you close, murmuring soft praises against your neck about how fucking amazing that was and how there is no one else that will ever look more beautiful all flushed and exhausted.

Holding onto you, Simon takes a few steps back forcing you to come along until you are both submerged under the showerhead to let that soothing water run over your bodies until you can both come back down from your high. There are no words yet, none that need to be said out loud, all he needs to do is keep you wrapped in his arms a little longer.

It’s quiet, just the sound of the water rushing filling the silent space for a while, until a noise breaks you both out of the moment. There is a banging on the door from the outside, repeated knocking loudly and clearly; you’ve been in here for too long, but Simon doesn’t seem to be bothered. There is no attempt to leave the steamy oasis yet and soon the sound subsides and you are both left in the silence once again. 

“They’ll just have to fuckin’ wait,” he says against the side of your head in a hushed whisper, lips tempting your earlobe. “They can consider it a punishment for making ya upset. Besides, I’m still busy and you’re not goin’ anywhere.”

[americaswritings]

Voices of Roses and Ruin

Warnings: Psychological torture, manipulation, Coriolanus being himself

Summary: Coriolanus is forced to watch the gamemaker use his voice against you in the arena.

Words: around 2k

Pairing: Young Coriolanus Snow x reader

A/N: I watched TBOSAS yesterday and yeah don't judge me but young Snow is hot and I shipped him and Lucy Gray a lot (until it all went downhill cough cough). Obviously he's horrible and does many unspeakable things later (!!!). But I think the idea of a love story between a mentor and their tribute has so much potential and when I saw the birds in the film I thought of this idea.

This is written from Coriolanus perspective (I haven't read the book yet. I just bought it and I'm so excited to read it!). I obviously wanted this to be about real feelings, but I tried to stay true to his character so there are some 'questionable' and alarming thoughts and motifs in here.

Can be read as Lucy Gray x Coriolanus Snow here

Part II | Masterlist

Coriolanus had thought watching you in the arena, alone and scared, hiding from a pack of murders that were hunting for your life was among the worst things he had ever gone through, but nothing could have prepared him for the Gamemaker’s new horrendous plan.

He was tired, just as you were, but refused to go home like most students had done. Instead his head was resting in his hand as he kept watching your sleeping form, as if he could protect you if he just kept his eyes on the screen and on the lookout for a potential threat.

He wouldn’t be able to do anything for you, if the pack of murders found you. He couldn’t warn you or give you advice.

All he could do was sit here and watch and he found himself thinking if this was not the worst torture of them all; being trapped here while you were out there and all he could do was watch.

You were trembling in your sleep, if from the cold or fear he didn’t know, but he kept his expression carefully guarded as he felt his own heart breaking bits by bits.

Even there covered in dirt, with your hair a wild mess and your clothes strained with mud you looked breathtaking to him.

You were pretty, there was no denying that. Everyone else saw it too. He saw it in the way heads turned for you, men‘s eyes raking over your body like you were theirs to take.

He hated it, every part of it.

They all deserved to die.

But it wasn’t your looks that had drawn his attention to you. What had fascinated him. He liked to think he wasn‘t shallow like most people and blinded by pretty things.

No, what has drawn him to you was the way you carried yourself. The confidence you wore like an amour. Yet you were breakable at the same time.

You seemed to be made up of duality; strong but so weak, fierce but uncertain, opinionated but withdrawn, stubborn but helpless.

You were a dangerous little thing and a petite fragile flower at once. Drawing all eyes on you but forgotten due to your ordinariness by most after a moment.

Not by him though. To him you could never be ordinary.

It was frustrating and captivating and alluring.

Naturally, his constant worry for you since you had entered the arena stemmed from his will to get the scholarship. It was what he deserved and he would claim it.

Tht was why he was so engaged in saving you, not because of the deep unease he felt when he saw you in that arena, your eyes drifting around frantically until they passed a camera and he could have sworn they had locked on his for a moment.

It had nothing to do with the way his whole body seemed to light up when you smiled or the invisible pull he felt towards you when you were in the same room as him.

He definitely didn’t want to kiss you and he didn’t dream about you since the reaping, when his eyes had fallen on you for the first time and he had only thought one thing: You’re mine now.

Mine to claim, to showcase, to protect.

He had gone into the mentorship thinking he would use you to serve him and his purpose of getting what he deserved, but as he watched you now, still rooted in his chair although a deep exhaustion weighted down his body, he knew he was serving you.

Being here with you every second of the way. Vowing to protect you. Whatever it took.

You awoke from your restless sleep right before the screaming started. In an instant you were up, your eyes widened in panic as you gazed around, trying to locate the source. With the rest of the students that had stayed Coriolanus flinched in his seat, leaning forward to try and help you figure this out.

As quickly as it had started the screaming stopped and for a moment you were one, both breathing and blinking heavily as your mind tried to make sense of what happened.

And then he heard a voice. His voice. “Follow me.”

He forgot to breathe for a moment as he stared at what was happening in pure shock. You seemed just as confused, turning around in circles as you tried to find him there.

„Coriolanus?”, you whispered and took a step forward, towards the voice. “Follow me”, it whispered again and he watched you do.

No, no, no.

Around him he heard chuckles from the other students, but he drowned them out. All he could focus on was you, following his voice through the darkness. “Where are you?”, you hissed, your eyes darting around. “Why are you here?”

“I’m here for you.”

He sank lower in his seat, wishing himself somewhere else. It wasn’t him saying the words, obviously, but it was his voice and everyone could hear it, see you follow it.

He hoped people would laugh about you. About your nativity and the brilliant idea of the gamemaker to use your mentors voice against you. Hell, he didn’t even care, if they thought you might have a silly little crush on him and the gamemaker used it against you.

Because if people knew the whole truth, he couldn’t imagine the catastrophe that would follow.

The truth that there was something between the two of you, the mentor and the tribute. That it was something he couldn’t explain, but had let him do dangerous things. Break rules. Forget himself.

The truth that this might not be him speaking those words now, but that he had spoken them to you once. Had they been listening all this time?

His stomach twist in terror as he tried to remember all you had shared with each other, all he had said to you. Promised you.

It would ruin him.

“I can’t see you”, you whispered now, being led further into darkness.

Damn it, think! He wanted to yell at you. It’s not me. I’m not there.

There was no reason for him to be there.

Except…there was.

“I’m here to see you. I won’t let anything happen to you!”

“How cute”, one girl hissed in his ear, but he remained stoic. “She’s as dumb as they come”, another said and he wanted to punch her. Enjoy the feeling of triumph when she looked at him in horror and didn’t dare open her mouth again.

“Looks like you’re guiding her straight to her own death. How ironic.”

And it was ironic.

Maybe in his attempt to protect you, save you, all he had done was ruined your one chance.

All he had said to you to make you trust him and then because he hadn’t been able to stop himself were used against you now and all he could do was watch. Keeping his face carefully blank he shut out their voices. They didn’t matter.

Finally he saw you hesitate. Maybe you had remembered his exact words or maybe you realized that you weren’t getting anywhere. That if it truly was him he would have just stepped out of the shadows and shown his face. “Is this real?”

Oh how funny it was to the people around him. He hated them all. Every single one.

Your words hit a mark. They pierced right through his heart, because he had said them to you. Whispered them. Before your farewell, when he had visited you one last time.

Your faces had only been separated by a few inches and he had fought the urge to kiss you right there and then. But he couldn’t.

Because of everything, but also because it felt too much like goodbye. It was stupid, but if he didn’t give into the temptation then, a part of him hoped it meant you would come back to him.

That your chapter wasn’t over, your story just starting. He would kiss you when you won. When there was a chance for a future with you.

Still those words had escaped his mouth, like he needed the reassurance that you felt the same way. That this meant something, so much that it was worth the risk.

Coriolanus leaned forward in his seat, hope blossoming in his chest. He didn’t know why whatever game they were playing with you hadn’t affected the other tributes yet, but he was sure their time would come.

And right now it seemed you wouldn’t fall for their tricks. Because there could come no answer to your question, as he had been the one asking it.

But he had underestimated the gamemakers.

Instead of a reply there came a scream and then a groan. “Coriolanus?” “Help me!”, he heard himself yelp. What?! He had never sounded like that.

But then flashes came back to him. The bombs. How the arena had collapsed, almost burying him alive. He would have died there, if it hadn’t been for you.

You had saved him.

But how in the hell did they get his voice now?!

“Coriolanus!”

Gone was the glimpse of hesitance and suspicion and you began sprinting into the direction the voice was coming from.

No!

He watched with dread as you ran directly towards the sound. It’s not real, he whispered, knowing you couldn’t hear him but desperately hoping somehow his words would reach you.

When you stumbled upon a clearing you jerked to a stop, twisting and turning, your gaze furiously searching for something.

“Coriolanus! Tell me where you are!” But he could only hear his own painful screams, in between pleading for your help. Sounds he was certain he had never made.

What was this?

With a stab of pain he saw your face was tearstained. You were crying. For him. For someone from the capitol.

Was this what the gamemaker wanted?

Whatever you did or said would never matter again.

All everyone would see when they looked at you now was the broken girl in a dark forest, all alone and desperate and crying for a man she never stood a chance with.

A man who knew hunger just as you did, who in a way fought for survival every day too. But they would never see that, because unlike you he wouldn’t let them. Where you had no choice, he still had one. And he was watching that one chance crumble in front of him.

Flashes of a better life filled his mind.

A house. Plates of food. Tigris smiling. His uniform, a real one made from the finest materials hanging draped neatly over a chair. Laughter echoing through the corridors and then a flash of your face as you stepped into the room, wrapping your arms around his shoulders as you leaned over the desk to peek a look at what he was working on.

It was the life they deserved, he deserved, if he got the scholarship. But you were there too. Alive and well, just as breathtaking. And you were his.

There had never been the choice between the scholarship and you, because they were one. Your life was connected to it and so his was to yours.

But now he could loose both and he felt the agony of that thought travel through his whole body.

The screaming seemed to be everywhere and he watched helplessly as you bent forward, covering your ears. All he wanted was to get the screaming to stop, wrap his arms around you and tell you everything was okay.

Instead he forced a neutral expression on his face, as if seeing you break didn’t break him the same way and pray for this hell to end.

Part II

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[giannaln4]

Silly Little Bet

lando norris x artist!reader

summary: You were an artist and Lando loved to do what you did best with you, even if he wasn't very good at it. (917 words)

warnings: this turns into a make out (not heavy, very short), use of y/n

a/n: hi lovelies! i know i said i was going to take a little break, but honestly i just need to not think about quali today (still crying about it idk what to tell you). anyway, this is incredibly short so i’m sorry but i still hope you enjoy it! pls let me know what you think!! feedback is very much appreciated 🫶🏻 i also wanted to thank everyone who reached out to me and sent support ❤️‍🩹 ily all so much, i really appreciate it!!

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Quiet nights were your absolute favourites. Getting to spend time with your boyfriend without having to worry about some schedule one of you had to stick to was perfect, to say the least. You always found a way to occupy yourselves, doing anything and nothing at the same time. 

Tonight, though, you got to do one of your favourite activities: art. You were an artist, a professional one, and of course he loved that about you; he loved seeing you in your element, so focused on what you did best, and even though he didn’t know yet, you loved dragging him with you so you could see him struggle a bit to at least not be the worst artist the world has ever seen.

Now, he was extremely talented, and if he weren’t a racer, he would be somewhat of an artist; he’s said it himself many times, but that was before he met you, because compared to you, he would never say that about himself, no matter how many times you have said it to him. 

Right now, you found yourselves sitting on your shared bed, facing each other, trying to win a silly little bet you made earlier. It was simple, really. You were supposed to draw the other person, and whoever loses would have to come up with a plan for dinner, which the both of you already knew would end up being a homemade meal, eating it on the couch, and watching some dumb show. This really worked out for him because, as talented as he was, he still struggled to draw real people, and he knew he was setting himself up when he accepted.

You knew that too, and you also knew he only gave in so he could have another one of your drawings of him. But that was okay, because another one of your favourite things was to admire his focused expression while he tried to replicate someone on a blank piece of paper. 

If he was being completely honest, the top reason he loved doing some type of art with you was because you would always come up to him and help with something, holding and guiding his hand or just being really close to his face as you explained something, so he would never say no to that suggestion.

“Okay, so I do you and you do me. Do I have to paint it as well?” He asked as you poured some of your art supplies on the bed.

“No, just a quick sketch,” you replied, scanning the bed as you carefully chose the pencil you wanted to use. “I’m starving, anyway.”

You started sketching each other; you were faster (and probably better) than him, but you couldn’t help but blush any time his eyes fixated on your face for too long, studying every aspect of you to try to draw it. After several minutes, you were done, just finishing up a few details before placing the paper on the bedside table next to you, away from him so he wouldn’t see it yet.

“How is it going?” You asked.

He looked up at you and yelled, “Don’t move!” When you started to get up.

"Sorry,” you whispered, going back to your previous position.

You stayed like that for a while, watching as Lando looked at you repeatedly and then back at the paper, occasionally erasing stuff. He was almost done, but there was one thing holding him back. “I can’t get it right,” he sighed, dropping the pencil.

“What can’t you get right?”

“Your lips. They look too big or too small, and now the paper looks worn out from erasing so much.” He was clearly frustrated.

“Can I see it?”

“Promise you won’t laugh?” Lando asked you with an embarrassed look.

“Of course I’m not going to laugh; why would I do that?”

“You are a real artist, Y/N. You finished a while ago, and I’ve been stuck here trying to fix it, but I’ve only made it worse.”

“Lando, you are actually talented; I don’t make you do art with me because I wanna have a laugh. C’mon, show me.”

He sighed again and slowly turned the paper, showing you the drawing. “It looks terrible.”

Your eyes set on the paper, and an endeared smile appeared on your face. “It looks great, baby.”

"No, it doesn’t; as I said, you’re an artist, and you know exactly what’s wrong with it.”

“I mean it." You whispered, leaving your spot on the bed and sitting next to him, “Maybe the proportions are a bit off, but it does look great, I promise.”

“Thanks,” he replied with a smile, a moment of silence filling the room as you both stared at the drawing. “You know, maybe I just need to take a closer look at them.”

“Oh- I guess that would be helpful." You turned your body to face him, cupping his cheek and brushing away a few curls that rested on his forehead. “Do you want help?”

He nodded and broke the distance between you, locking his lips with yours as he pulled you onto his lap and his hands fell on your hips to intensify the kiss. You got closer and closer, pausing when your bodies couldn’t possibly get any closer to each other even if you tried.

“You know I can actually help you,” you said against his lips and in between kisses.

“Uh huh” Lando replied, not really thinking about the drawing anymore.

[222col]

second best

★ patrick zweig x reader ★ you and patrick are both in relationships, but after meeting at an event, you can't quit each other. you both know it's wrong, but you just can't stop. you're addicted to each other, unable to go without your fix. ★ 10.2k ★ 18+ | cw: angst, cheating, smut: unprotected sex, choking, slapping, f oral ★ an: this one took me a while, hope u luv ! <3

it's not like you and patrick don't acknowledge you shouldn't be doing what you're doing, you do, often. but there's something about patrick zweig that just keeps drawing you back in. he feels the same, patrick may look like he has very few morals, but typically, cheating is something he'd never do. usually, when in a relationship, patrick's completely locked in. but there's something different about what you two share. yeah, it's sex, but it's more. it's primal, the attraction, the whole experience. there should be guilt, you should both feel so guilty that it doesn't continue, so sick to your stomachs that you can't fathom seeing each other again, but you don't. the relationship you share with patrick overshadows every other feeling you could endure. it's an automatic reaction, an addiction, something neither you or patrick could begin to live without anytime soon. it all started two months ago, you'd been with your boyfriend a year, patrick in his relationship nine months. you met at an adidas party a few years into patrick's career, during your second season in professional tennis. setting eyes on patrick across the dance floor, it was as though you could feel your body come alive.

red dress slick to your skin, hips swaying, hands in your hair as you locked eyes with patrick. signature smirk plastered on his face, beer in hand as he watched you dance. licking his lips as you excused yourself and headed his way. it was almost involuntary as your feet started moving, feeling yourself being physically drawn to him. "like what you see, huh?" hands on hips as you speak the first words to patrick. he chuckles slightly, eye contact unbroken. "something like that." patrick introduces himself as you do, flirty smiles across both of your faces. you didn't need to speak to understand each other, know exactly what the other was really thinking, it went unspoken. "do you want a drink?" patrick asks, free hand slipping into his pocket. nodding your head as patrick leads you to the bar, buying you your favourite and moving to occupy a couple empty seats away from the crowd. "just to let you know, i have a boyfriend." you start, met with a hum from patrick, leaning his elbows on his knees as you sit opposite him. "and i have a girlfriend, doesn't mean i can't talk to you, does it?" you both know this isn't going to end with talking, but for now, you'll ignore the tension in the air between you. telling yourselves that you're good people, and would never dream of cheating on your partners.

the two of you sit for a while, discussing your tennis careers, how you got into the sport. flirty smirks and heavy eye contact filling the empty gaps, noticing the time and lack of bodies at the party, you stand, ready to say your goodbyes, but stopped by patrick. "we're at the same hotel, right? come have a nightcap with me." he offers, standing up with you, closing some distance. "that sounds like playing with fire." you half laugh, acknowledging the tension for the first time out loud tonight, only adding more excitement to the air. patrick raises his eyebrow to you, the corner of his lips turning upwards. breathing out, knowing there was no saying no to that damn smirk, you accept. patrick's hand pressed lightly to your back, leading you away from the party. it was only a short walk back to your hotel, his hand staying put against the fabric of your dress. both of you so aware this nightcap was nothing short of an excuse for more time together, specifically, time alone away from onlookers eyes. patrick's hand only dropping to his side to fish his hotel key from his pocket, showing you into his room. opening the mini fridge he pours you both a drink, sitting next to each other on the couch underneath the hotel room windows, his hand draped across the back, beside your shoulder.

facing each other slightly, the electricity in the air only becoming more obvious by the lack of space between your bodies. shoes kicked off feet beside the couch, holding the glass between your hands as patrick's eyes swallow yours. "stop looking at me like that." you laugh, feeling small under his gaze. "like what?" patrick questions, knowing exactly where this about to lead. what should be guilt filling his body is replaced by pure lust. bottom lip between his teeth as his eyes float over your body, only now realising how small your dress is on your body. collarbones fully exposed, the fabric hitching up your thigh due to how you're sat on the couch. "like a meal. you look like you wanna eat me." his breath hitches, eyes moving back up your body to your eyes. holding your gaze, he places his glass down the coffee table next to him. following his movements, you do the same, leaning in towards him. "well, maybe i do want to taste you." patrick admits, his body moving towards you, eyes growing darker as the admission leaves his lips. the slow, gradual movements you're making towards each other feel like miles you have to travel. every second of inching closer feels like hours. every thought leaves your brain as patrick's hands grasp your cheeks and pull your lips onto his. mouths open, tongues sliding over each other, desperate to discover every part of each other's mouths.

patrick kisses feel like you're finally being kissed properly, as though no one before him had ever known how. his lips are soft, tongue hard against yours. his hands moving to your waist, pulling your body onto his lap. straddling his hips as your arms wrap around his neck, hopelessly trying to taste more of him. moving your lips down his jaw, licking and sucking at his skin down to his neck. "my god, you're so hot." patrick mumbles, head falling back, eyes fluttering closed as you nibble at the skin below his earlobe. pushing your head back to face him, eyes locked on each other, breathing heavy as his lips push against yours again. his hips bucking up against you, the harsh fabric of his jeans rubbing against the lace of your underwear. "we shouldn't.." you start, words falling into his mouth, lips barely leaving each others. patrick knows exactly what you mean, knows you want to help your ego, feel like you at least tried to not fuck him. "hmm, i don't care," patrick mumbles, his hands caressing every inch of your curves as yours move to bunch in his curls. trying desperately to pull yourself off of him but your body not allowing it, you're sucked in. he's like a drug, one taste and you're hooked. pushing yourself backwards from his lips, half-lidded eyes looking down to him, his hands holding you in place as you part your lips and whisper. "i want you."

his hands hook under your thighs, lifting you up as if you weigh nothing, legs instinctively wrapping around his body as patrick walks you both over to the bed. dropping you down, standing over you at the end of the bed. propping yourself onto your elbows, looking up patrick through your lashes, watching him pull his t-shirt over his head. "take it off." patrick instructs, unbuttoning his jeans, pulling down his zipper, his body overcome with desire. lifting your dress up your body from the hem, shimmying the fabric up over your chest, slipping it over your head as it's flung off the bed. laid before him as his jeans drop to the floor, matching red lace underwear adorn your skin. patrick's mouth slightly agape, still stood before you, taking in every inch of you. readjusting the tent in his boxers as he smirks down to you. "you gonna stand there staring all night, patrick? or are you gonna actually fuck me?" patrick groans at your words, hearing you verbally admit what you want from him. crawling over your body, your knees bent squeezing him into place, his hands at either side of your head. grinding himself down against you, legs spread waiting for him. leaning his head down to yours, pulling your bottom lip between his teeth, biting down as your eyes roll back.

moving one of his hands to your chest, holding himself up with one arm as the other gropes your boobs. pulling them out from your bra as you push the straps down your arms. grabbing your waist as patrick flips the two of you over, sitting you up on his lap as he undoes your bra, letting it fall down your arms before throwing it in the direction of your dress. knees either side of his hips, grinding against him, the friction causing quiet noises from the both of you. patrick's mouth moving down to wrap around your nipple, hands caressing both of your boobs. manhandling your chest as his teeth graze the skin of your nipple, hissing at the sensation. shoulders pushing back as your head falls with them, patrick's lips attacking your neck as he continues squeezing your breasts. surprising patrick as your hands wrap around his wrists, pushing him down against the bed, his arms above his head. grinding your hips down against him quicker, patrick struggling below you, attempting to escape from your grip but failing. bucking his hips up against you, desperate for some friction on his aching cock. "hmm, getting needy?" you fake pout, patrick sucking his teeth in response. his cock twitching against you, so unfamiliar with the competition for dominance. feeling you start to rearrange your grip around his wrists, he slips from your grasp, throwing you onto your back once more. pushing his boxers down his legs, hands snaking between your bodies to pull your panties down too. reaching down to slip his fingers into you, as his other hand pins both your wrists above your head. smirking down to you as his digits push in and out of your cunt, his thumb circling your clit. your back arched as moans escape you, moving your wrists in attempt to loosen his grip, but failing as he pushes your arms further into the mattress. "stop struggling."

the both of you had never been so desperate for something in your lives. both never felt so overcome with lust and desire, bodies in need of each other. the tension building becoming unbearable, the room filling with heavy breathing and moans. slipping his fingers out from you, wrapping his hand around his member. freeing you from his grip as he lifts your leg onto his shoulder, lining himself up with your entrance. eyes staring into each others, keeping you there for a minute, his cock teasing you as the suspense builds between you. "patrick, fuckin-" you start, words cut off as his thick cock pushes all the way inside you. lifting your other leg onto his shoulder now, fingers digging into your thighs as he wastes no time pounding in and out of you. screams of pleasure from you met with a smirk on patrick's mouth. "you were saying?" patrick teases, his lips kissing down your ankle. holding back your moans through gritted teeth, the sheets balled in your fists, patrick's dick hitting your g-spot with every thrust. your ass lifted from the mattress as patrick's speed increases. fucking you deeper than you've ever felt, seeing a bulge on your stomach every time he thrusts into you. he's hitting places inside your walls you've never experienced, eyes in the back of your head as your moans mix together as one. skin slaps echoing in the room, fingers moving to grasp patrick's thighs, nails digging into the skin. biting your lip through a smirk as you look up to the brunette. "hit me."

"god, you're dirty." patrick mumbles through moans, the request making his cock twitch inside you. dropping your legs down from his shoulders, pounding into you harder as his open hand smacks against the skin of your cheek. the sound that escapes you is sinful, patrick's hand wrapping around your throat. "agai-" you start, cut off by another slap across your face. his body falling onto yours, your legs wrapping around his waist. his hand still around your throat, the other gripping the skin on your hip. teeth nibbling on your earlobe, every sound he makes falling into your ear. fingers scratching down the skin of his spine, sharp nails drawing blood from his back, only to be met by groans from patrick. "jesus christ, where have you been all my life?" he mumbles, thrusts getting sloppy. moving his hand from your hip to reach between your sweaty bodies to circle your clit. feeling you become undone underneath his body, legs jolting as your ankles tighten around him. his hand gripping your throat tighter as he feels you cum over his cock. circling you through your high before slipping his fingers from your skin. hands either side of your shoulders, pushing himself up as his hips slap against yours. "i'm on the pill," you start, struggling to speak through the sensations. "cum inside me, patrick, please."

his cock slaps against your g-spot once more as he paints your walls white, cursing his way through his orgasm. collapsing against you as his dick slips out from inside of you. the sweat from your bodies sticking the two of you together as you both come back down to earth, calming your breathing and dropping your legs down from around his body. peppering the side of your face in kisses before moving to the side of you on the bed. staring at the ceiling in silence for a few minutes as you both recover. breaking the silence once your breathing as returned to a normal pace. "we can't do that again." patrick scoffs, brown curls sticking to his skin. "we're doing that again as soon as physically possible." his head turning to look at you, following suit and looking into his half-lidded eyes. "that was the best sex of my life. i'm not giving that up anytime soon." patrick half laughs, making you giggle and shake your head. "you're gonna get me in so much trouble, zweig." patrick moves to bite down on your earlobe. "i think you're already in trouble."

you and patrick are playing most of the same tournaments on tour, meaning even if you wanted to avoid him and let the guilt wash over you, you couldn't. wanting to avoid him very quickly turns into falling into his bed every night you can. any idea of guilt or remorse is lost the second that smirk appears on his lips and the number of his room is text to you during the first day of the tournament. patrick fucks you like no other, both of you obsessed with the others touch. the others ability to turn each other on with just a look, just a thought. all patrick has to do is let his mind wander and all he can hear is 'hit me' and he's hard during practise. and that's the other issue, the lines are getting thinner. you've started helping each other with your games' during off days, playing practise matches together and hitting up bars after. what two months ago was a mindless fuck one night, has turned into hours of conversations and time spent together. lucky for you both, there hasn't been any major tournament's on the tour yet, ones that family and friends would request to attend. so you haven't had to worry about anyone you know noticing the amount of time you spend in each others pockets. other athlete's have of course noticed, but most are none the wiser or simply don't care. you're both becoming more needy for each other, more desperate for touch when you should resist. patrick making excuses, criticising your backhand to be able to jog across the court and touch the skin of your body to help your game. the addiction to each other growing stronger, harder to ignore and act like you're not doing anything wrong. it's easier to rationalise if it's said to be just sex, lying to yourself that you're lonely and horny on tour, needing someone to scratch the itch while your partner is far, far away from you. that would be easy, if it was just sex.

laying together, bodies tangled together as some old tv show plays from the screen in the hotel you're currently in. clothes spread across the floor, both naked as you lay together, patrick drawing circles on your shoulder, cigarette in the corner of his mouth. "you've improved a lot since the start of tour." patrick compliments, flicking the ash into the empty can on the nightstand. you have, every free minute you have you spend either on the courts or in patrick's bed. it's hard to be distracted by loneliness on tour if you're not lonely. "thanks, maybe it's because you're helping me." you half laugh, stealing the cigarette from him, inhaling and placing it back between his lips. patrick laughs lightly at your answer, he's gotten better too. he knows if there's free time you'll be on the courts, so naturally goes too. the stillness in the room is interrupted by your phone ringing, a picture of your boyfriend lighting the screen. "fuck." you mumble, escaping from patrick's grasp. rushing around the room, picking up a t-shirt from the floor and brushing down your hair. sitting in the corner of the room on an armchair, you answer the facetime call. "hey baby." you can see patrick roll his eyes as he puts the cigarette out in the can, slipping his boxers back onto his body. "yeah, final tomorrow, feeling good. how's home?" patrick watches you from the edge of the bed, seeing you bring your knees up to your chest, brushing against the fabric of his t-shirt you've slipped on. his eyes darken as he notices your exposed cunt, clearly not having had time to put your panties back on. his eyes grow dark, a devilish idea taking over his brain.

he can barely concentrate on what you're saying, not that he cares what lies you're telling your boyfriend, just curious. "i know, i wish you were here too." okay, that one slipped through. a quiet scoff leaves his lips. leaning down from the bed, falling onto all fours as patrick starts crawling across the floor over to you. your eyes darting to him and that signature smirk across his face, hiding any reaction from slipping through facetime. "yeah, us open in a couple weeks so i'll be able to see you then." you smile, trying to ignore patrick on his route to you. kneeling before you, his hands spreading your ankles, your elbows resting on your knees as you hold your phone. muting the call quickly and whispering down to patrick. "don't you dare." what was meant to deter him only spurs him on. unmuting the call before your boyfriend noticing, him still explaining his excitement for the tournament. legs spread open before patrick's face, his tongue licking a line up through your folds. gritting your teeth as you desperately attempt to focus on the call, trying to push patrick's head away, with no success. covering your reaction to patrick's mouth wrapping around your clit with a cough, breathing deeply through your nose. "yeah, i've already got your tickets all worked out, don't worry." your words come out stuttered, you can feel the smile from patrick against your cunt. licking and lapping you up, one hand grasping the hairs at his scalp.

a slight moan escapes you, trying to cover with another cough, met with questions from your boyfriend. "yeah, sorry, i'm fine, just a tickle in my throat." you lie as two of patrick's fingers insert themselves into you, breath hitching at the sensation. "so yeah, the driver will pick you up from the airport and i'll meet you at the hotel when you arrive." you attempt to continue conversation, the feeling in your stomach growing stronger as patrick's tongue draws shapes over your clit, wetness dripping down his chin. feeling his hot breath on your cunt, faint sounds of his fingers thrusting into you. "baby, i gotta go, got practise in half an hour, i'll call you tomorrow." you rush out your words, not letting him say bye before hanging up and throwing your phone down. head flinging back as loud moans leave you, both hands moving to patrick's curls now. "jesus, patrick, you're gonna kill me." you hear him laugh against you, the vibrations flowing through you as he does. he sloppily makes out with your wetness, finally letting the moans fall into the room, making his fingers move faster. his curls tickling your thighs as they clench around his head, bucking your hips up, grinding your clit against his nose. eyes rolling into the back of your head as your orgasm sends shock waves through your body, holding his head in place as you ride it out. loosening him from your grip as you stop seeing stars.

"patrick-" you start, his chin dripping in drool and sticky from your wetness, about to tell him off. "you fucking love it." he cuts you off, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand. shaking your head as patrick pushes onto the armchair you're sat on, moving your body onto his lap, his arm around your waist. "plus, it was very fucking hot." he mumbles as his lips crash onto yours, pulling you as close to his body as possible. "you're gonna get us caught one of these days." you regretted the words as soon as they left your mouth, you and patrick never discussed the idea of admitting what you were doing, not like he hadn't just gone down on you while on the phone to your boyfriend. but admitting you could get caught meant admitting one day it would have to stop, that you'd have to accept that it was wrong and immoral and totally against your values. that you were hurting people that you cared about for the sake of your own pleasure. "so fucking what?" patrick's response surprised you, his hand wrapping around your throat as he pulled your face back down onto his lips. you were scared of getting caught, petrified, you assumed patrick was too. you both cared deeply about your relationships despite the fact you were cheating, so patrick's answer threw you off guard slightly. pushing the thought to the back of your head as your body was lifted to the air and thrown against the bed, giggling as patrick pulled you to the edge of the bed, slipping off his boxers as he flips you onto your stomach. so fuck drunk from patrick's cock that you thought yeah, so what if you got caught, so fucking what?

things carry on the same way up to the us open, both you and patrick looking like strong contenders on your sides of the competition. both dreading the change in dynamic between you once partners arrive to support you during the two weeks of the tournament. sitting on the side of the courts, both breathless after the practise you'd done. "when does he arrive?" patrick asks, chugging down the most part of his water bottle. "three hours, you?" you return, sweat dropping from your skin. "four. we still have the hotel rooms we get assigned, you know?" patrick smirks to you, throwing a tennis ball back and forth in his hands. you were both planning on staying with your partners, in their hotels separate from the tournament. all players are put up in a hotel together during any stops on the tour, you and patrick had stayed there the night previous before both partners arrived today. "patrick, that really is playing with fire." packing away your things, standing up to collect stray tennis balls about the court as patrick begins to help. "we could just say we have commitments, press, practise, whatever." he shrugs, unwilling to accept he'll have to go two weeks without touching you. "we can still see each other, for lunch and things like that." you suggest, putting the balls into the crate, tidying it off to the side with your things. "not the same." he mumbles, sulking as he too puts his rackets back into their bag. "oh boohoo, we knew this would happen." slinging your bags onto shoulders, patrick grabbing the crate of balls and heading inside. "quickie before they arrive then?" you laugh as he follows you down the hall. "please?"

you'd become more open talking about partners, not experiences or what they were like, but in relation to your own relationship with patrick. you'd stopped pretending they didn't exist, more accepting of the fact you and patrick were sneaking around behind their backs. especially with knowing they'd be so close to each other, and to the two of you, aware of the fact you could cross paths with patrick's girlfriend or vice versa. after cleaning up in patrick's hotel room, patrick showering with you before you darted off to your partners hotel, meeting him in the lobby. swept up into affection and care by him, brushing off the idea of sex with an 'i'm tired'. the two of you catching up about your time apart while getting ready for the party held at the start of the tournament, being held at the players' hotel. introducing your partner to some of the female athletes you'd met and played against during the tour, sharing drinks and nibbling on the snacks brought around. his arm snaked around your waist as you mingled through the party, holding in the uncomfortable way his hands made you feel. standing around a table with him and a few other players and their families, spotting those familiar curls bouncing into the big hall. girl to his side, not touching her, her big eyes looking up to him as they entered. his eyes immediately finding yours as he can't hold back the smile forming on his lips.

walking towards you, drink in hand as the two of them slot into your group. stunned at his openness, swallowing down the frog in your throat as patrick says his hellos. "aren't you going to introduce me?" he taunts you, elbowing your side as he slots in next to you, his girlfriend to his left. extending his hand to your boyfriend, you calm yourself and introduce the two of them. "this is patrick zweig, he's been help-" you start to explain a reason for his need for introduction. "we've been helping each other, during the tour." you wish you could slap the smirk off of his face, your boyfriend none the wiser smiles and shakes his hand. "aren't you going to introduce me then, too?" you poke back, moving your head to look to his girlfriend, sweet smile disguising your true feelings. patrick introduces the two of you, further explaining your relationship, for reasons you wish he wouldn't. "yeah as i said, we've been helping each other a lot. she's made me a much better player." your fakeness dissipates, a true smile on your face at patrick's kindness. "me too." you return, the others in your group disbanding, leaving the four of you alone. "sounds like you've gotten close then." your oh so naive boyfriend smiles, arm still resting on the small of your back. "yeah, we definitely have." patrick smiles into his drink, throat bobbing as he finishes the drink. "if you'll excuse us, i owe this one a drink for thrashing me today." patrick smiles, leading you to the bar away from your partners', his hand replacing your boyfriends'.

"getting me alone already? you only saw me six hours ago." you laugh, met with a side eye from patrick as he leans onto the bar, ordering you both a drink. "i don't know how i'm gonna go two weeks like this." he admits. "did you have sex with him?" patrick leans down, whispering the question to you. you simply shake your head in response, receiving your drink from the bartender. "did you?" you find it harder to ask than you should. "nah, why would i when i have you?" patrick winks to you as he walks back over to your partners, guiding his girlfriend over to a table to sit. collecting yourself you walk back over to your boyfriend. "he seems nice." he starts. "did you give him that t-shirt?" he asks you, looking over to patrick, following his gaze you look to his outfit before turning back to your boyfriend, brows furrowed at the question. "you were wearing it on facetime the other week. you must shop at the same places!" he laughs, sipping his drink, turning away as the blush creeps up your cheeks, suddenly very grateful for your very naive boyfriend.

spending the night sharing secret glances at patrick, him doing the same every chance he gets. the night starting to draw to a close, witnessing patrick hug his girlfriend at the door. expecting them to leave, but only she does, patrick locking eyes with you from the exit. signalling his head upwards, towards the rooms upstairs in the hotel. shaking your head to him, lips upturned, patrick just nodding in response before darting off. hearing your phone ping from your purse, hiding the screen from your partner, who's too engaged in conversation to even notice.

patrick: come on, u know u want to ;)

that boy will be the death of you, you think. unable to go more than half a day without touching you, breathing deeply, thinking how you're going to go two weeks like this, hiding and risking getting caught for half an hour of each others time.

patrick: i need youuu

patrick's text chimes through again, rolling your eyes to the phone. interrupting your partner's conversation explaining you need to pack up the things you left in your room ready for press tomorrow, that you'll meet him back at his hotel later. "sure babe." his lips press against your cheek, a pinch of guilt under your skin, lying to his face like this. the remorse was a lot easier to ignore when he wasn't around. chewing the inside of your cheek as you enter the elevator up to patrick's floor, any idea of wrongdoing washing away as the tension builds up in your body. knocking lightly on his door, it opening within seconds of the sound. patrick's smile welcomes you in, pulling you into his arms the second the door is closed. "i missed you." he whispers into your skin, wet kisses placed all over your face. "you literally just saw me." you laugh into his frame, arms around his neck. "but i couldn't touch you." patrick pouts, wasting no time placing your lips against his. his big hands grabbing at your back, claiming the skin as his. walking your bodies to the edge of the bed, sitting together, lips not parting from each others for even a second. hands roaming each other, pulling and squeezing at fabric and skin. breathing each other in as your head feels light, getting your fix of your addiction.

"we don't have long, patrick." you mumble into his mouth, fiddling with the curls on his head. "that's okay, i just wanted to kiss you." you swear your heart stops beating for a second. he didn't even want sex, just a kiss from you. so needy for you that going half a day without a kiss would have been too much for him. you can feel the lines of the relationship thinning even more, trying to rationalise the cheating as just sex. it would be too wrong if you and patrick caught feelings for each other, it would cross the boundaries of culpability. you just liked spending time together, sleeping together, playing tennis together. there were no feelings involved, or at least admitted by either of you anyway. but hearing patrick tell you he orchestrated this current situation, sneaking away from your partners during a party, just to kiss you, made goosebumps form on your arms. melting into him further as his mouth swallowed yours. pulling away from his face, placing a kiss to the tip of his nose. "are you going soft on me, zweig?" you joke, arms still wrapped around each other. "oh sorry for wanting a kiss." he teases back, letting himself be slightly vulnerable with you. he would have been happy just sat holding your hand in this hotel room, anything to be close to you. patrick feels a specific calmness when in your company, a sensation that takes over him whenever you're close. he craves it, any time he's away from your skin.

patrick was more open with himself about his feelings in regards to your relationship, he knew that lines had already been crossed and there was no going back, for him anyway. he also knew you hadn't registered that idea yet, knew you were still refusing to accept that this was anything more than sex. you didn't act like that's all it was to you, but it's what helped you sleep at night. patrick often thought about breaking up with his girlfriend, he hadn't been with her too long before you anyway. patrick was more scared of the rejection he could face from you than breaking up with her. he knew if he were to leave her, it would be for you, and he couldn't handle the idea of you telling him no. telling him you wouldn't leave your boyfriend, for so now, he kept things the same, thinking he'd rather have you in some way than not at all. to you, ending your relationship wasn't an option, not yet anyway. you could handle being alone, waiting for patrick, but leaving your partner would make things messy. mean accepting the truth and having to admit to someone outside of you and patrick. it would mean accepting your wrongdoings and taking blame, making what you and patrick were doing wrong, and part of you could never view your relationship with patrick as wrong. he was like no other, made you feel like no other, and that feeling in your chest could never been told as wrong.

kissing patrick once more, near enough empty duffle bag hanging from your shoulder as you left the hotel with him, heading in separate directions to your partners hotels. your boyfriend in bed asleep by the time you enter, changing into an oversized t-shirt, patrick's of course, not that you noticed it was his. facing away from your partner, face buried into your phone, staying up late texting patrick all through the night.

patrick: can't sleep without u next to me anymore

your lip is constantly between your teeth, chewing at the softness, spinning your head around checking on your sleeping boyfriend periodically. you and patrick shared a bed most nights during tour, in either of your hotel rooms, falling asleep in each others arms, drifting off to the sound of calm breathing.

you: ur gonna have dark circles for press tomorrow, go to sleep!!

patrick holds back a chuckle, phone not leaving his head, his only way to feel close to you. knowing your on the other side of the screen, typing back to him as quick as he is you.

patrick: so are you, goodnight gorgeous

sending back your own goodnight message, finally locking your phone, tossing and turning your way to sleep.

getting dressed after breakfast with your boyfriend, white dress skort and matching tank slick to your skin, packing your bags before ubering to the venue. "i would have picked you up." you hear from patrick as you close the door to your uber, slinging your bags over your shoulders as he locks his car. "and that would have been really subtle, wouldn't it?" you laugh, leading you both into the venue. "that's why i made a point of telling our partners how well we get on, stupid." he teases you, jabbing his elbow into your side, met with an eye roll from you. "so we can still spend time together without any questions." you respond, realising patrick's reason for the introductions last night. "duh. i'll drive you back later." his words are more instructions than an offering, the two of you dropping off your things in the locker rooms. putting another layer of powder on your face, patrick leaving a soft kiss to your exposed shoulder. batting him away, grateful for the empty room. the two of you ready yourselves for press, walking over to the media rooms where multiple promotion screens are placed around the room. patrick is pulled into an interview, standing to the left of him as you await your turn. "you've definitely improved this season, patrick, why do you think that is? any new members to your team?" you hear patrick's interviewer ask him and you get mic'ed up by a member of the press. his gaze lands on you before quickly returning to the interviewer, camera blinking as he answers the question. "no new members no, i've been practising a lot with someone new though, it must be helping." patrick's arms folded on his chest, signature smirk down the camera as the interviewer pushes for more, hearing your name leave patrick's lips. "we've been playing in all the same tournaments, so we've been spending a lot of time together." this interviewers eyes move to you, hopeful to bring you into frame, getting a new scoop for his sports channel.

"come on," patrick states, pulling you over to his interview. cheeks slightly flushed as he does. "we had noticed your improvement too," the interviewer starts, stating your name before continuing. "is that also due to your time with patrick?" considering your answer carefully before responding. "yeah, patrick's been great, it's like having a second coach while we play." you laugh, a chuckle from patrick too. "i'm really grateful for sure." smiling over to patrick, holding his gaze for slightly too long before returning to the camera. "so i assume you're both rooting for each other during this tournament?" the interviewer continues, reshuffling his notes, the two of you nodding immediately. "definitely, i go to all of her matches that i can and she's always at mine." the interviewer asks a few more questions before thanking patrick and carrying on with your individual interview. wrapping up and returning the mic, you and patrick head for lunch in the players food hall. "i can't believe you." you laugh, stabbing your food onto your fork and bringing it to your mouth. patrick's ankle leaning against yours under the table. "what? he asked me a question so i told the truth, you are the reason i've improved." patrick mumbles through full mouth, shaking your head at him, his leg rubbing against yours. "you're making it so obvious though." you return, patrick shrugging as he sips on his gatorade. "can men and women not be friends?" he jokes. "so we're friends are we?"

patrick laughs as he cuts up his food. "you're my best friend, among other things." you so badly want to press, ask him for specifics, know how he views you and your relationship. but you don't, very aware of the amount of bodies around you, you drop the subject. finishing up your food, the two of you head back to the dressing room, readying yourselves to leave for the day. "i just wanna have a shower and get changed." you smile, pulling a towel and spare clothes from your bag, walking over to the private shower cubicle. placing your towel and clothes on the hook, undressing and slipping under the water. sighing as the warm water drips down your skin. washing the soap down the drain as you stand there still for a short while, before the handle of the cubicle moves and patrick closes the door behind you. "patrick, i swear." you laugh quietly, watching him remove his own clothes and place them on the hook. joining you under the water as his hands wrap around your waist. "what? i can leave if you really want." patrick mumbles into your neck as the water falls over you both. melting into his grip as you pull him down to your lips. reaching between you both to stroke his exposed cock, already hard at the sight of you. quiet groans fall into your mouth as you pump him between your bodies.

in one movement, patrick spins you round, your chest pushed against the cold tiles. hands up against the wall beside your head, ass pushed out towards him. patrick kicks your ankles open, hitting his dick against you before sliding in. his hand moving around you, wrapping around your mouth to hold in your moans. his free hand gripping your hip as he pounds into your cunt, your head falling back onto his shoulder. your bodies sliding together with ease from the warm water covering you both. "you're so fucking perfect, baby, my god." patrick mutters into your ear, not caring about the sound of his hips hitting against your ass as he slips in and out of you. peppering the side of your face and neck in wet kisses, lightly biting at the skin on your earlobe. the publicness and ability to get caught only spurring you both on, the band in your stomach being stretched further with every thrust of his cock inside your walls. "patrick, fuck- m'gonna cum." you mumble through his fingers. "show, don't tell." patrick instructs, hand slipping from your mouth to your throat. tightening his grip on the sides as he feels you clench around his cock. drawing blood from your bottom lip as you attempt to hold in the sounds forming in your throat. patrick's grip moving to your waist, holding you up as your body jolts around him. "good girl."

patrick pounds into you harder, pulling your ass backwards to meet him in the middle of every thrust. his short nails digging into the skin of your hips as he pushes into you once more, filling you up with his cum as his head falls onto your shoulder. holding himself inside of you as the two of you calm your breathing together. whining at the emptiness once he slips out of you, the water washing away any remaining proof of sex as patrick turns you around, holding you in his arms. "you've ruined sex for me forever, no one will ever compare." patrick laughs lightly to you, foreheads pressed against each other. "maybe you'll just have to keep having sex with me forever then." something you'd never say if you weren't coming down from your fuck high, a genuine smile forms on patrick's face at your words. "sounds good to me." turning off the shower as you both dry yourself on your towel, getting dressed and letting patrick leave the cubicle first, following after a few minutes later. the two of you grabbing your things and heading over to his car, starting the drive back to your hotel. "how's it going, with him?" patrick asks, one hand on the wheel, the other resting on your thigh. chewing the inside of your lip as you respond. "it's fine, he's clearly missed me as he's all over me," patrick sharply inhales at the idea of someone else touching your skin, kissing your lips, trying to downplay his reaction as he keeps driving. "but it's draining, very grateful for all the press and parties and practise to distract me." you continue, placing your hand over the top of his on your leg, wrapping your fingers around his. "what about you, with her?"

"luckily she knows a lot of people here, so she's got plans all the time that don't include me. but i just miss you most of the time." patrick squeezes your thigh. hiding your smile from him, hiding any form of admission of feelings slipping through. lifting his hand up to your lips, placing a soft kiss to his palm. leaning your face into his hand as he looks over to you during a red light. "i miss you too." your cheeks are flushed slightly, placing his hand back down on your thigh. "are we terrible people?" you laugh, readjusting to sit cross legged on the passenger seat, his hand still resting on your inner thigh. "maybe, but you know, you can't help how you feel." patrick states, looking to the road as he drives down the street. how you feel. the words linger in your mind, wanting to assume he means how he feels about sleeping with you, knowing neither of you can resist each other. but his words trigger something within you, you finally realise. sitting here in his car, caressing each others skin so carelessly, so naturally, you realise that have feelings for patrick. you like the way he smells after a tennis match, how he always has to be touching your skin, how he looks at you. your breathing increasing in pace, looking over to him as your mind keeps running. you love the way he says your name, how he always brings you a glass of water when you're thirsty, how he ties your shoelaces for you when they come undone. mouth slightly agape, wondering if he too feels the same.

the guilt washes over you when you leave patrick's car, arriving at your hotel. after two months of patrick and no remorse, it all hits you now. it was easier to ignore when it was just sex, but on one random car journey, it hits you like a ton of bricks. you've caught feelings for patrick zweig. heading to the hotel bar, ordering a drink and sitting alone on a table by the window, collecting your thoughts. fiddling with your lower lip, deep in thought, feeling the cut on your skin. shit. you drew blood holding in your noises in the shower, and now have to develop a lie to tell your boyfriend. shaking your head at yourself, truly now feeling like a terrible person. it's only now that you consider the fact that you'll of course have to break up with him. how could you possibly look at him the same knowing he'll never be patrick? he'll never make your heart skip a beat with just a smirk, never touch you like him, never make you feel like patrick does. the guilt almost consumes you, hoping the alcohol will numb some of the pain. snapping out of your obsessive thoughts to the sound of your phone pinging.

patrick: already can't wait to see u tomorrow

eyes fluttering closed, a sea of butterflies filling up your stomach at the words on your screen from patrick. how could you not see it? how could you not realise you were falling for him, knowing he was your first thought every morning and the last at every night.

you: me too baby <3

you text each other like lovers, as though if anyone could read your messages or see the way you are alone together, they'd assume you were deeply in love. finishing your drink, you start the dreaded walk up to your shared hotel room. unlocking the door, your boyfriend sat on the couch watching tv. seeing his teethy grin spread across his face as you walk into the room. more guilt. it's like your body is punishing you for all the days you didn't feel any remorse, you're feeling it all built up now. every inch of your body filled with the feeling. you're so angry at yourself, for one, letting it go this far with patrick without seeing the signs, but two, not accepting the fact that what you were doing was wrong. so wrong, so unforgivable, you were hurting someone so deeply and never even giving it a second thought. and the worst part about it was that you knew full well, you'd be all over patrick the second you got him alone tomorrow.

things stayed the same until the day before the quarter finals, both you and patrick advancing to that stage. seeing each other every chance you could before going home to your partners and acting like everything was fine. you had a day off before the quarter final, getting in some practise with your coach in the morning before spending the rest of the day off. entering your hotel room, showering and slipping into a hoodie and shorts. joining your boyfriend on the couch, turning off the tv and sitting to face him, him doing the same. "i need to talk to you about something." you knew it was time, your feelings had been eating you up. you'd barely been eating or sleeping, too focused on the guilt of the taste of patrick lingering on your mouth as you kissed your boyfriend goodnight. "okay." he smiles to you, still none the wiser. "i'm breaking up with you." you finally let out the words, fiddling with the hem of your hoodie, just about able to look him in the eyes. watching his body slump slowly, his eyes glossing over. "why?" he asks you, his words shaky but calm, not shouting or arguing, just wanting to know the reasons why. "i have feelings for someone else, it's nothing you did, it just happened. i'm so sorry." your bottom lip is between your teeth, so ashamed to be admitting the truth, but part of you grateful, the guilt finally dissipating. "who?" he returns, through gritted teeth. "are you sure you want to know?" you ask, hoping he wouldn't. he simply nods his head, feeling you owe him the answers to any of his questions, you tell him. he scoffs as he hears patrick's name fall from your lips. "god, i'm so naive. have you fucked him?" his sudden harshness takes you back, pulling your knees up to your chest, your eyes now glossing over, nodding your head. "wow." is all that comes back to you.

the two of you sit in silence for a short while, before he finally stands. "well, i'm sorry too, that i couldn't be what you wanted. does his girlfriend know?" he asks, pacing around the room. "i don't know, i don't think so." you respond, standing now too. "christ, how many people did you need to hurt?" his words cut you like a knife, immediately starting to pack up the things of yours in the room. "i'm gonna go, i'm so sorry, i never meant to hurt anyone." he half scoffs at your words, opening the door for you as you bunch your belongings under your arms, walking out the door. both of you saying final goodbyes and leaving each other for the last time. dragging all your bags into your uber, you rush to the hotel the players are assigned to. tears finally falling from your eyes once you enter the room. letting yourself feel every feeling you've held in for the past few weeks, losing yourself to emotion as they all come pouring out of you.

cleaning yourself up after a few hours, texting patrick and asking him to come to your hotel. he shows up half an hour later, knocking on your door. pulling him into the room, pulling his lips to yours as the two of you fall onto the bed. pulling himself from you as the two of you sit on the edge of the bed. "what's wrong? you look like you've been crying." he asks, placing a soft kiss to your temple. "i broke up with him." patrick's mouth falls open slightly in reaction. his mind running quicker than he can keep up with. not able to focus on one particular thought, he rushes out his words. "why did you do that?" he's harsher than he would have liked, not being able to focus hard enough to properly form sentences he would rather say. shocked you move slightly further away from his grip. "you, patrick. you're why." neither of you had ever admitted any feelings to each other, you'd barely admitted them to yourselves, let alone sharing them. but those words leaving your lips were all the admission patrick needed. he was very aware he felt the same, but he also knew that it would be too good to be true. patrick was prone to self-sabotage, he did it to protect himself from getting hurt in the long run. "i never asked you to do that." it's almost involuntary the harsh tone in which he's speaking, deep down he wants nothing more than to kiss you and run home to break off his own relationship to be with you. but his mind is singlehandedly running his ability to consider that an actual option in this scenario.

"i know you didn't." nearly matching his tone as you try to distract yourself from the tears welling up in your eyes. "i just thought.." trailing off as your words soften. "you thought what? that we'd dump our partners and run off into the sunset?" you can't believe the words coming from him, never has he been so harsh to you, so cold. "no i just, i thought you liked me." your eyes unable to look at him anymore, a single tear dropping onto the mattress from your eyes. "it's not that easy. this just complicates it even more. i never told you i'd break up with my girlfriend." patrick wishing he could stop himself, slap himself out of it and realise what he was doing. but he couldn't, couldn't pause and consider what he was pushing away. "why are you being like this?" you respond, words so quiet as you meet his gaze again. "we're just sleeping together, okay? was that not enough for you?" patrick standing up from the bed, his voice slightly raised. his words cutting through your skin like a knife, shaking your head slightly, unable to stop the tears now. "just leave patrick, please." your words shaky, lip quivering. "whatever." he leaves with a slam of the door. falling onto your back on the bed, crying out any remaining tears as your body curls up into a ball.

waking up to the sun rising the next morning, sadness turned to anger in the night spent alone. focusing all of your energy onto the match you were playing later today, jumping out of bed with a point to prove. soothing your puffy eyes and hiding your dark circles with light make-up. ubering to the venue and getting in a few hours with your hitting partner before readying yourself for your match. luckily avoiding patrick, who's match was happening at the same time as yours. sitting in your private dressing room, leg bouncing as you wait for the call to head to the court.

patrick: good luck champ

a text from patrick only spurs your anger more, ignoring the message and cracking your neck. the knock comes shortly after, slinging your racket bag over your shoulder as you walk down the hall. white dress with built in shorts standing opposite your opponent, bouncing side to side as the match starts. letting all of your anger out on the court, heavy grunts escaping you. your emotions fuelling your game as you win the first two sets, screaming out at your win. earning your place in the semi finals, asking your coach quickly about patrick's match. "third set is just starting, he won the first." rushing your way through your post match interview on the court, catching the end of patrick's match from the tunnel of the players entrance. arms folded, watching intently as you witness patrick fumble the final set. looking on as patrick's racket is smacked against the ground repeatedly, clearly frustrated with his loss. the racket is thrown across the court as he begrudgingly shakes the hand of his competitor. smirking from the sidelines as he picks up his bag, walking in your direction. slowing down slightly as he reaches you. he can tell you won just by the smug smile on your face as you stare him down. his big hands grabbing hold of your forearm as he drags you down the tunnel with him towards his dressing room.

struggling to free yourself from his grip as he slams the door behind you both. "what the fuck are you doing?" you shout, pushing him away from you once in the private space. the anger he felt on the court lifting as a devilish smirk spreads across his face. heavy hands cupping your face as his lips crash onto yours. hopelessly trying to push him off but not succeeding, your body desperate for your fix of him. your bodies fight against each other, pushing and pulling one another around the room, fighting for control. crashing into lockers and walls, tongues swirling around mouths. patrick pushing off all the items on the table in the corner, lifting you up to sit on the edge, pulling his tank over his head. grabbing the hem of your dress, attempting to pull it over your body but failing. "why can't i get this fucking thing off?" he struggles again, letting you slip it down yourself. "the shorts are built in." you half laugh at his frustration, fingers scratching down the skin of his arms. "stupid fucking thing." he laughs, lips attaching to yours again as he pushes his shorts and boxers down his legs. hooking his fingers around your underwear to pull them down, discarding them on the floor beneath you. pulling you further to the edge of the table as he pushes himself into you immediately, bottoming out. the table banging against the wall as he pounds into you, any anger left over working through his body to fuck you harder than he ever has.

bruising the skin on your hips as his hands dig in, slapping his crotch against yours. legs wrapping around his waist, ankles crossed behind his back. moans swallowed by each other in the sloppy kisses, foreheads pressed together as your nails scratch the length of his spine. "feel so fucking good baby." patrick mumbles into your neck, sucking on the skin. sweat dripping down your bodies, hair sticking to skin, his musk filling your nose. biting down on his shoulder as his hands slip underneath your ass, carrying you to the wall, your back pushed against it. your spine hitting against the cold wall with every thrust, his hands massaging the fat of your ass as he bucks his hips upwards into you at raw speed. his grasp on your skin pushing you up and down with his thrusts, bouncing on his cock as his tip hits your g-spot. the grip you have around his neck tightening as his thrusts grow sloppy, skin slapping echoing around the room as heavy groans fill the empty space. without warning his cum shoots into you, a drawn out groan leaving his lips as he pushes his weight onto you against the wall. slowly unwrapping your legs from his waist as he pulls out of you and places you on the floor. his body still weighing against you, his face nestled in your hair as you return to reality. throwing a towel down on the bench in the room, patrick sits and pulls you onto his lap. feeling his cock twitch as his hard on starts to calm, soft kisses placed on your face.

sitting there for a few minutes, before standing up to clean yourself up and get dressed. patrick following suit, cleaning up the table slightly. you're ready long before he is, waiting for him to slip his tank back onto his body. "don't you need to go find your girlfriend?" you tease, aiming to make him uncomfortable, seeking some revenge for his behaviour last night. you're expecting a laugh, a smirk, anything, but all he does is tense up. "don't talk about her." he whispers through gritted teeth. you're taken back, his words are harsh, protective, not like how he usually speaks. "i-i thought-" you start, rushing out words in attempt to understand. "i'm still with her." he spits out, the words hitting your chest as if he stabbed them into your skin. "i'm not breaking up with her, okay? you need to get that into your head." you've never heard patrick so harsh, so pointed. the thoughts are spinning around your mind, making you lightheaded. patrick was unable to stop himself, his self-sabotaging and attempts to protect himself from possible risk winning out. "if you want me, this is what you get. i'm not leaving her, not for you, not for anyone." your body is slumping, legs giving out on you as you fall onto the bench below you. all the words, all the affection, every glimpse of feeling patrick has ever showed you slowly slipping away as this unemotional version of him appears in his place. "it's second best, or nothing at all." his chest rising and falling as he looks to you.

patrick was different. he made you feel things no one ever had, made you feel electric. looking up to him through half-lidded eyes, breathing out sharply. both of you knowing you'd never be able to say no to him. you'd rather have him in some way than not at all. a single tear threatens to fall as you whisper.

"second best it is."

[penkura]

where you belong [1/10]

Summary: As Luffy's big sister, you've viewed it to be your job to see him become King of the Pirates in place of your absent parents, even as you try to find where it is you belong in the world. You never really expected to draw the attention of Trafalgar Law in the process.

Pairing: Trafalgar Law x Fem!reader

Warnings: Discussion of feelings of abandonment, age gap relationship (four years), brief secret relationship, mentions and heavy refences to sex, mentions of alcohol, typical One Piece stuff. Other warnings to be added if needed.

Notes: Hi, it's me again! Another fanfic here for you all! When this goes up, I'll be on my last day of vacation before I fly home, so I hope that you'll enjoy this! I know Straw Hat Reader x Law is popular, and I wanted to write my own, but with the Reader being Luffy's biological older sister. So for this, Reader is three years older than Luffy, 20 at the start and 22 after the timeskip, making Law four years older. I personally like older men, and age gap fics are just delicious reading material for me (within reason, nothing illegal).

Note 2: This is NOT the Law with vitiligo series. That one is actively being planned but will be separate from this one.

“And I’m gonna be King of the Pirates!!”

Luffy standing your tiny dingy boat worries you a little, but you still grin at him and nod.

“Hell yeah you will be!”

“Your turn! What’re you gonna do while we sail??”

Rolling your eyes, you make Luffy sit down while you stand up.

“Easy. I’m gonna chronicle your journey and write the greatest story ever told!”

Your younger brother watches you, tilting his head when you don’t continue. He believes there has to be more you want out of life, and tries to make you say what else is in your plans, what you have on your mind.

“And?”

Taking a breath, you nod. Of course he knew you had more, it’s Luffy, he’s been by your since he was just a few weeks old. Things you’ve said over time, to him and Ace, they’d both known for a long time what you’ve always wanted to find once you went out to sea.

“And find where it is I belong.”

+!+

Your arrival in Sabaody was a trip, in more than one way. You'd been excited to explore the place, hoping you could pawn your younger brother off on Camie, Pappag, and the others so you could have some time on your own to shop the stalls, maybe with Nami and Robin, turn it into a girl’s day. Of course, though, nothing could be so easy when your brother is the captain of the Straw Hats. You all find yourselves at the human auction hall, Nami willing to spend all the money possible to save Camie, but it makes you itchy while being there. You cringe to think about the things that happened in this place, how many people had been sold to Celestial Dragons. Your and Luffy's loss of Sabo due to the actions of one had severely soured your opinions on them.

You scan the crowd in the auction house, scratching at your arms which never seem to calm down while the rest of your crew discusses their plan to save Camie, and you end up locking eyes with another pirate captain there, unknown to you at that moment but somehow familiar.

A furry white, spotted hat, dark hair you can barely see, oddly enough you think his facial hair is attractive, and those yellow eyes that you almost would believe see right through you.

Trafalgar Law simply stares at you, realizing you’re a Straw Hat when he recognizes the rest of your crewmates. After a moment of fidgeting slightly you give him a nervous smile and a wave, which he returns with a nod before turning back to the auction stage as they continue to call bids on people.

Weird girl.

Strange guy.

Although she’s busy watching for Camie to be brought out, Nami still leans into you when you pull on her sleeve and start to whisper. “You see that guy in the white spotted hat?”

“What about him?”

“I think he’s Trafalgar Law, captain of the Heart Pirates. He’s more attractive than his poster makes him.”

Rolling her eyes, Nami pulls her arm away from you. “I don’t have time for you to be horny about some guy.”

“Wha—Nami!! I’m not! I’m just saying.”

She doesn’t listen to you anymore, focusing back on waiting for Camie and sending you to watch for Luffy, just so you don’t get distracted by the attractive enemy captain and defect to another crew.

You swear you never will, but do as you’re told to watch for your brother. Maybe one day you’ll get to properly meet Law, you’re quite curious about the young man.

+!+

“Another one?! Are you kidding me, Dragon?!”

You’re three years old when you wake up to your grandfather yelling at someone in the middle of the night. Normally Garp is sure to keep things quiet so you, his sweet little princess angel granddaughter, can sleep peacefully. He’d leave early in the morning once your nanny showed up for the day, returning before dinner so he had the evenings with you before you had to be off to bed, to do the day over again the next morning. It’s rare for you to stay up late or wake up early, but the few mornings you’ve woken up before he left were some of Garp’s favorites.

You quietly slip out of your bed, blanket in your hand as you rub your eyes and go to the door, opening it just enough to see what’s happening. Garp is there with someone in a green cloak, you can’t see the other person’s face, but listen anyway.

“He’s the last one, there won’t be anymore.”

“You said [Y/N] was going to be the only one!”

“Things happened.”

“Obviously something happened, babies don’t appear out of thin air!’

You tilt your head, the man in the cloak catching your eye, which makes you shy away behind your doorway, glancing away before back to him as he looks to Garp again.

“Take care of them.” He goes to leave and is gone before Garp can even stop him.

“Dragon, wait--! That…damn idiot.”

“Grandpa?”

Garp is surprised to hear your voice, turning around once he closes the door, giving you a smile while you start to focus on the bundle he's holding.

“Hey there, princess, what are you doing up?”

“I heard yelling…”

Nodding, Garp apologizes as he picks you up, letting you settle on his free arm. “Sorry about that, angel. Just… an unexpected visitor.”

“Oh…”

Garp sees you staring more at the bundle of blankets in his arm than at him, and he sighs a bit, taking you to the living room and setting you on the couch, before showing you how to position your arms as he sets the now squirming bundle in your arms.

“[Y/N], this is your baby brother. His name is Luffy.”

How unexpected! You’ve never thought about having a sibling, just enjoying your childhood and life with your grandpa, but seeing this tiny little boy in your just as small arms makes you grin while you look at him. Dark black hair and just as dark eyes, scrunched up little face and tiny hands in fists while he starts to fuss and whine.

“Luffy…”

+!+

Luffy…

You hope your prayers aren’t going unheard, that Luffy will return to you safely. Ace’s death has long passed, but you’re more worried about your little brother than anything else right now. You’d both been sent off to Amazon Lily by Kuma, but after they’d all agreed to let you both stay, and Boa Hancock seems to have fallen in love with him, Luffy left you there to go rescue Ace, that was nearly three weeks ago now, you think. You want him back, both of them, but want to see Luffy more than anyone else.

“Luffy’s returned, [Y/N]-san!”

“He has?!”

Marguerite nods and you quickly get up from your seat and run after her to wherever Luffy is. The newspapers kept implying he was dead, you were terrified you’d lost him and Ace that day, no updates from anyone apart from the papers cheering for the Navy’s alleged victory, for the deaths of Ace and Whitebeard. The Amazons, all so kind to let you stay while Luffy went to try and rescue Ace, were unsure of how to help you the last two weeks once Ace’s vivre card burned to nothing in your hands and made you nearly inconsolable.

Despite that, your prayers hadn’t gone unheard.

Once you’re at the beach that Luffy should be at, you notice immediately the big yellow submarine with the word DEATH on it and it freaks you out more than anything. You don’t know who owns it, but when you catch sight of someone you’ve only seen in person once, you worry that he’s done something to Luffy. You don’t say a word, but someone in a jumpsuit (boiler suit you think?) calls out “captain” just in time for him to turn towards you as you shove the older boy to the ground, placing yourself on top of him and your knife to his neck.

Part of you wishes it was poisoned right now, just in case this Trafalgar Law has done something to your brother.

“Where’s Luffy?!”

The knife you have at his neck doesn’t phase Law even a tiny bit, it’s the fact that someone so much shorter and smaller than him was able to catch him off guard and shove him to the ground the way you did. You’re angry for some reason, giving him a nasty glare but look like you’re about to cry on top of it, as he just stares at you, his crewmembers shouting for you to get off their captain before he raises a hand to stop them.

“Who—”

“Tell me, where is my brother?!”

Oh so that’s what’s wrong, that’s who you are. Whether you’re related to Luffy by blood or by ritual cup like Ace was, Law doesn’t know, but he’s sure you want reassurance you haven’t lost two brothers in one day.

“Are you [Y/N]?”

You turn your head to look over your shoulder at Jinbei, still glaring. “Who’s asking?!”

“I was friends with your brother Ace, he told me about you and Luffy while we were in Impel Down.”

“He…did?”

You’ve calmed down so quickly hearing Ace’s name, retracting your knife just slightly, while Jinbei explains things to you. You don’t move off of Law though, listening quietly, fighting the desire to cry more. You’ve done enough of that, you don’t want to anymore today.

Law doesn’t even try to move you off, knowing, like Luffy, you’re emotionally hurting right now. He doesn’t want to risk you slicing his neck either, even as Jinbei finishes telling you everything Ace did, and you still don’t move or look at Law.

“Ace hopes you find what you’re looking for.”

You clench your jaw a bit at first, before smiling sadly and nodding, thanking Jinbei for the information before Law speaks up.

“If you get off me, I can take you to Straw Hat-ya.” 

You blink, finally looking back to Law, and you feel your face burn with a blush when you realize your position and scramble to get off him, apologizing the whole way while he shakes his head. Once he’s on his feet, Law let’s you onto the Polar Tang and leads you down the hallway to the infirmary, updating you on Luffy’s condition the best he can with the knowledge he has.

“If he pulls through this, the most you’ll have to worry about is his mental health.”

“Mm.” You nod, grabbing Law’s arm as he stops to open a door, making him look back at you. “I apologize for shoving you down.”

“I’ve been through worse,” Law shrugs, you could tell just from looking at him, though he does smirk a bit at you, “Never had a girl push me down and hold a poisoned knife to my neck before though.”

“It wasn’t poisoned,” you almost shout, but keep your voice down to not wake Luffy, “…this time…”

He almost laughs, but when you see Luffy finally, you’re instantly but his side, taking his hand and trying to keep yourself from crying seeing him in such a state. He’d been injured badly before, but never like this, never this close to death.

“Luffy…oh Luffy, I’m here, Lu,” you brush his bangs away from his face before kissing his forehead, “I’m so sorry I wasn’t there, I should’ve come with you…”

Law doesn’t bother you for the next several minutes, stepping out so you have some privacy while you make sure Luffy is all right, your quiet prayers that he wakes soon and heals quickly don’t go unheard by the surgeon of death, who thinks back to his own sister and the prayers he’d once prayed for her health as a child.

As an older sibling, he gets it. While he still doesn’t know yet if you’re related by blood or sworn siblings, he does see how much you care for Luffy, and for your sake he hopes your captain wakes sooner rather than later.

+!+

You spend the next two weeks in and out of the Polar Tang, checking on Luffy and praying over him to wake soon, Law being the one to take you in and lead you back out most of the time, even though you’ve memorized the path already. The next time you leave Luffy to continue recovering, the friends you and Luffy have made from Amazon Lily have shown up in the time you’ve been with him, bringing food and drinks for you all. As you walk over to where he’s seated, Law offers you a drink that you reject with a shake of your head, sitting on the other side of the tree and bringing your knees up to your chest, hiding your face in them.

“Any signs he’s waking up?”

Shaking your head, you sigh and lean back, looking at the people around to distract yourself from worrying over Luffy.

“That your crew?”

“Yep. All twenty of them.”

You smile a bit, watching the Heart Pirates goof off while some have their meal and share drinks. It almost reminds you of the Straw Hats and makes your heart ache from missing them deeply.

“You have a nice group there.”

“They can be a handful.”

It makes you laugh a bit, nodding before you decide to stop wallowing and get back up, standing beside Law where he stays seated.

“Think you should hold this for now.”

Law tosses Luffy’s straw hat to you, and you grit your teeth a bit while you stare at it. You had wondered where it was, seeing it wasn’t around when you were with Luffy. You hold nothing but the highest regards for Shanks, he'd been an inspiration for you and Luffy when you were children, he helped end the war and helped Law save Luffy, but how you wish he’d shown up sooner. Maybe he could’ve helped Ace too.

“Thank you, for holding this.”

“Seems important to him, he’s not Straw Hat-ya without it.”

Smiling a bit, you nod. “He’s certainly not.”

“How do you—”

“I’m his big sister. I was three when our dad dropped him off with me and grandpa. We’ve been together almost every day since.”

“I see.”

You’re not entirely sure you trust Law, despite his saving Luffy, but you’re willing to give him a shot. At least let him know a bit about your history with Ace too, since he'd been there when you hadn’t been. Where Luffy asked you not to go.

“We met Ace and another boy when I was ten, and become sworn siblings with them soon after. The other boy died a few months later,” you grip the straw hat a bit tighter, but loosen your hold after being stabbed in the hand by sharp bits of straw, “a Celestial Dragon did it, we’ve not been fans of them since, so Luffy punching that one in Sabaody felt like some payback.”

“That makes sense.”

After a few minutes of silence, you finally realize something and turn to Law, sticking your hand out for him.

“Never introduced myself. Monkey D. [Y/N]. I don’t really use my last name though.”

Law takes your hand after a moment, nodding. “Trafalgar Law.”

“Thank you for saving my baby brother.”

“Don’t thank me until he wakes up.”

As if almost on cue, the door comes flying off the Polar Tang and you both whip your heads over, Law running ahead of you as you follow, and Luffy’s the next thing to almost fly out of the ship.

“Luffy!!”

You’re about to run to him before Law grabs hold of your arm, pulling you to himself and holding you still, even while you thrash around and listen to Luffy call for Ace. It breaks your heart to see him so upset, and you just want to console him, have him do the same for you, while you both continue to grieve for Ace. But Law won’t let you go to him, fear or concern your brother might hurt you while he fights through pain and raging emotions, before he disappears into the forest.

“Luffy, come back!!”

You barely register Jinbei asking what’ll happen if Luffy continues to flail and run off like that, before Law speaks and your heart almost drops to your stomach at the thought.

“If he continues to move around like that he could reopen his wound and bleed out. He’ll die.”

Quickly you turn around and Law isn’t at all shocked to see the tears welling up in your eyes as you grip his shirt, still holding Luffy’s straw hat.

“Don’t let that happen!! Please!! He’s all I have! Luffy is my whole world, I can’t lose him!!”

Unsure of what to do, especially once you lay your head on his chest while you cry, Law hesitantly wraps his arms around you and watches Jinbei go off to Luffy. Maybe he’ll be able to calm your brother down before he really hurts or kills himself.

You’ve both been through a lot the last few weeks, losing Luffy would break you more than losing Ace did to him.

+!+

“I’m sorry I got snot on your shirt.”

“Don’t worry about it. It’ll wash.”

You glance away and keep your eyes averted while Law changes shirts, having taken you onto the Polar Tang while Jinbei attempts to calm Luffy down. He didn’t fully mean to bring you into his room, but he never let go of your wrist while he led through the ship, making you sit down to hopefully calm you down. You do catch sight of his tattoos, wanting to say something but you don’t want to sound like a creep or a pervert at the same time.

“Why don’t you use your last name?”

Law surprises you once he’s changed shirts, this one almost the same as the yellow one he’d been wearing, but now a dark blue with a furry, feathery collar that you really want to pet, it looks soft. But again, you don’t want to seem like a creep.

For a moment you’re quiet, before you cross your arms and lean against the wall, shrugging.

“Why should I use the name of someone who abandoned me? I only have one memory of my father, and it was when he dropped off Luffy.”

“Your grandfather is Garp, isn’t he?”

“I love my grandpa like he’s my dad…but I don’t want to use my last name.”

Law nods a bit, seeming to understand. You felt abandoned, and wanted nothing to do with your biological father, instead viewing Garp in that light, which makes sense.

He'd viewed Corazon in the same light at one point.

“Your mother?”

“I know nothing about her. It’s like…” You start to bury your head in your knees again, almost digging your nails into your arms, “Like I don’t know who I am half the time…”

He gets that too, the same feelings after Flevance, after losing Corazon and leaving the Don Quixote family, leaving Doflamingo behind. Many times of looking in the mirror and asking “who the hell am I”.

Law is about to respond, before one of his crewmembers yells for you both that Luffy and Jinbei have returned to the beach, and you’re out the door so fast he isn’t able to believe it. He follows you out, not all surprised to see you and Luffy hugging each other tightly once he exits his ship.

Your bond with Luffy would be on full display the next few days, Law truthfully does wonder if he and Lammy would’ve been the same.

+!+

“I met some people who are friends with our dad.”

“You what?”

Luffy nods, giving you this information during dinner one evening, while you stare at him with such a blank look that Law thinks you’ve completely shut down. You didn’t say too much about your dad while you relayed some of your childhood to him earlier that day, apart from your perceived abandonment, but the look you have isn’t a very happy one.

“They’re were some cool people! They helped me escape that prison and…tried to help me save Ace.”

“So they were revolutionaries.”

“Yeah, they…they said they didn’t even know we existed.” Luffy scrunches up his face a bit while you frown, then pat his head.

“I’m not surprised, Lu.”

Luffy makes a face now, one that’s almost disgusted but annoyed but upset maybe. Law swears he isn’t trying to eavesdrop, you two are sitting too close to him anyway, you’re practically pressed up against his side. You both appear to have problems with your father, after the little bit you’ve told him and how you confessed to feeling abandoned by your parents. He wonders briefly is Luffy feels the same, even as your younger brother leans against you, pushing you fully into Law’s arm and making you glance up at him apologetically. He doesn’t move, once again doesn’t push you off, instead shifting his arm enough for you to be comfortable.

When Luffy falls asleep, you finally speak again.

“Luffy met our dad once, in Loguetown”

“Oh yeah?”

“Neither of us knew until grandpa told us…he didn’t even stop to say anything to me…”

“…I’m sorry.”

You shrug, watching Luffy. It still stung to know that, to know that Dragon didn’t even seek you out when he must’ve known you were on Luffy’s crew, that you’d never leave him to do this alone. When Garp told you he’d been in Loguetown that day, it felt like a knife in your heart that you didn’t even get to see or speak to your father.

Law, while he watches you start to drift off to sleep yourself, thinks about his own dad and Corazon at the same time. He had two fathers in the end, who both cared about and loved him deeply, both wanting to protect him as long as they could. He had his mother and Lammy too, you had Luffy and Garp, but it wasn’t enough for you, and it makes sense. To not have that connection with the people who gave you life, Law can’t even imagine how difficult that must be.

He ignores the slight snickers and comments from his crew when they see you leaned against him, even has he slightly tilts his head towards yours, not going all the way to lay his against your own. Even when Shachi makes a small comment about ‘love’ being in the air at Amazon Lily, Law doesn’t open his eyes to respond or even Shambles his friend away.

You won’t see each other again for a long time after this, most likely, so he’s willing to give you some comfort and allow his crew to see him a little softer than normal.

+!+

“Bye, thanks for your help, Traffy!”

Law tries not to grimace at the nickname Luffy’s given him over the last few days, nodding to you both as his crew also shouts goodbyes and wave to you both, you personally sad to see them leave. You’d spent so much time getting to know them while taking care of Luffy, that it felt like you were losing friends again. You’d probably see them one day, maybe as friends but maybe as foes, yet, you’d like to see more of Law and learn about him like he had you.

Luffy notices your face, the sad look it has, then looks back to the Heart Pirates as they start to disappear below deck. You’ve already chosen to stay on Amazon Lily the next two years and learn from the women there how to fight, but even watching you the last couple days, he could see your heart wasn’t in it. You more so loved using your knives and making poisons, he remembers the one he and Ace mistakenly drank thinking it was lavender tea from Makino. You weren’t an archer or a swordswoman, you much prefer close combat and paralyzing your enemies. Your work during Enies Lobby earned you your $25 million berri bounty, the Navy having trouble recreating antidotes from the one you’d left with a knocked out marine, they knew you’d be trouble one day.

With all that in mind, Luffy sneaks up behind you, wrapping his arms around you in what you first believe to be a hug, before he lifts you up and you look at him. He’s got a grin that concerns you greatly as the color drains from your face.

“Luffy.”

He giggles a bit, nodding at you to brace yourself.

“Luffy, don’t you dare.”

“Have fun with Traffy for two years!!!”

He doesn’t give you anymore room to argue, flinging you towards the Polar Tang, making you yell for Law to pay attention, and he barely does in time to catch you, knocking both of you to the ground, several Heart Pirates making sure both of you are all right and that Law didn’t hit his head on anything.

You’re up and holding onto the railing, yelling at Luffy, “You’re an idiot!!!”

He pretends he can’t hear you, waving widely and shouting another goodbye, but to you this time.

Once Law is sitting up, realizing what the hell has happened, he sighs a bit while you look back to him.

“I’m sorry, Trafalgar. You can turn back and I’ll beat some sense into him!”

One of his crewmembers, you’re pretty sure it’s Shachi, leans down to ask him, “Should we? Kinda seems like Straw Hat wants us to take her along.”

He sighs, taking his hat off and running his hand through his hair, shaking his head.

“You can stay.”

“…huh?”

You tilt your head in confusion, Law doesn’t think it’s cute at all no matter what that weird feeling in his chest is, while he stands up and nods at you.

“The Amazons might get angry if we return without permission, so we’ll just…take you along…and then bring you to Sabaody.”

Blinking several times, you’re still confused while some of his crew laugh, Penguin coming up to pat you on the back.

“You’re a temporary Heart Pirate! We’ll take care of you!”

Nodding, Law turns to go below deck.

“Say your goodbye, we’ll be going under shortly.”

While the rest of them follow after their captain, you turn back and see Luffy still waving at you, which makes you sigh and shake your head. You do smile though, you had wanted to continue getting to know Law and his crew, this was a perfect opportunity, and maybe he could help you with creating effective antidotes for your poisons.

“Luffy! Love you, see you in two years!”

“Okay!!!!”

Once you go below deck, Penguin being the one to wait for you in order to close the door properly, he starts to show you around a bit, the rest of the crew happy to see you’re staying with them for now, while Law keeps a slight distance unless he’s asked about something. You looking around and being so impressed by the submarine caused another weird feeling in his chest, and he fights to ignore it, especially when you thank him for letting you stay with a smile, which he waves off with an “It’s nothing”.

It's going to be an interesting two years.

[mysecretlittlelibrary]

Prettiest Sight

Pairing: Stucky x Reader

Word Count: 1.5k

Warnings: really just cockwarming technically, sort of exhibitionism/voyeurism, Bucky has a filthy mouth even in such a casual setting, honestly this isn't much compared to some of my others lol

Genre: fluff and smut

Summary: Steve wants to draw you and Bucky and you plan to let him

***

You stride into your room humming to yourself as you finish a text. When you enter, Steve and Bucky are lounging around, Steve at the desk, and Bucky on the couch watching TV.

"Oh hey guys. I didn't realize you'd be back already." You say.

"We just went on a coffee run." Steve reminds you, tapping your coffee cup with his pencil.

"Well yeah I know but sometimes that shop gets busy." You shrug.

"Where did you get off to princess?" Bucky asks.

"Just had some laundry I thought I'd take care of while you were out. I just sat up there til I could put them into the dryer so I didn't forget." You explain grabbing your coffee from the table and taking a sip.

"Oh okay."

"What ya doin Stevie?" You ask looking over his shoulder where he's hunched over at your desk.

"Just some sketching." He mutters.

"He's been at it most of the morning. Even at the coffee shop, he was doodling away while we were waiting." Bucky tells you.

"Really?" You hum. "Can I see some of them?" You ask.

"They aren't like- great or anything just, trying some things." Steve mutters handing you the sketchbook. You flip through the drawings with wide eyes. Some of them are simple, outlines and such some barely more than shadows, but other pages are much more detailed, vivid depictions of places and things and the occasional person.

"These are impressive Stevie. You shouldn't sell yourself short." You tell him sitting down in Bucky's lap.

"Are these just strangers?" Bucky asks peaking at one of the drawings with an arm wrapped around your waist.

"Yeah- I don't draw people a lot but every once in a while I'll try." Steve shrugs.

"Well you could always draw us if you want the practice." You say with a wink. You're pretty sure he'll never actually take you up on the offer but you're not joking.

"Wanna draw us like one of your French girls Stevie?" Bucky smirks resting his chin on your shoulder.

"Don't tease. I was being serious." You lightly smack Bucky's thigh in reprimand.

"Actually- I did have this one idea." Steve mutters his cheeks tinged pink slightly.

"Really?" Bucky blinks at him.

"You wanna draw us?" Even you're surprised.

"If you guys don't mind."

"Of course we don't. What's the idea?" You ask. Steve doesn't answer immediately, but the tint in his cheeks is spreading in the space left after your question.

"Oh shit he really does want to draw us like Jack's French girls." Bucky laughs.

"Stop it." You roll your eyes. "Is that it Steve?"

"Well kind of. Unfortunately, my recollection isn't great otherwise I would just draw it from memory but- it's just that you always look so beautiful when Buck or I am filling you I thought it'd be a nice moment to immortalize." Steve explains and the revelation sends a shiver down your spine and has your core clenching slightly.

"Oh." You breathe out.

"You- wanna draw us with her sitting on my dick?" Bucky asks and you almost squirm at his words, the imagery now vividly at the forefront of your mind.

"It's a real pretty sight." Steve says.

"I mean I know it is Steve I'm just- surprised. You've never been one for that kind of exhibitionistic interest." Bucky says.

"Whatever man." Steve rolls his eyes. "Y/n? What are you thinking?" He asks you hesitantly.

 "I mean I'm not- against it. You just want me like in Bucky's lap?" You ask.

"Yeah pretty much."

"Well if Bucky's fine with it-"

"You'll never have to convince me to do something that involves you on my dick." Bucky shrugs.

"You are so vulgar." You roll your eyes.

"You had no problem with my vulgarity last night princess." Bucky kisses the back of your neck.

"Down boy." You joke. "Stevie you wanna give this idea of yours a try or what?"

"Now?" He blinks.

"Yeah why not? We're all here and you've got your sketchpad." You shrug. "Just tell us what to do and we can make it happen."

"O- okay, well you'll need to strip." Steve says.

"Risque." Bucky jokes as you climb off of his lap to tug off your shorts and t-shirt.

"You too Bucky." Steve says.

"Can do." Bucky winks at Steve shuffling down his jeans and pulling his shirt over his head.

"Actually- y/n put on one of our shirts that you've highjacked." Steve says.

"Hey you guys leave your clothes in here half the time." You protest but you grab one of Steve's shirts from your drawer anyway. You put it on and walk back over to Bucky on the couch.

"And the other half of the time you just go into our rooms and take things." Bucky says tapping your butt lightly. You stick your tongue out at him in response and he chuckles.

"Anyway, do you need a little warm-up y/n?" Steve asks.

"A warm-up?" You ask.

"Well yeah- you'll be sitting for a little bit, you both need to be somewhat comfortable." Steve says as if it's obvious.

"Oh." It's all you can come up with in response.

"Come here doll, let's get you ready hm, although- I'd bet you're already dripping for us like always." Bucky spins you to face him, a hand wrapping around your thigh, fingers settling incredibly close to your center. Close enough that if he stretched the digits he'd be touching, but where they are now it's just enough for you to be hyperaware of the closeness.

"Now's really not the best time for one of your games Bucky." Steve cautions.

"There's never a bad time for those." Bucky winks. Steve rolls his eyes which only makes Bucky's smirk widen as if he has every intention of riling you both up.

"This is supposed to be about me drawing you two babe, can't do that if you're just gonna make a mess of her til she's begging for both of us." Steve says and you almost want to abandon the drawing in favor of that when he says it.

"Alright I'll be nice." Bucky concedes tapping against your thigh lightly. The action instinctually has your legs spreading enough for him to slip two fingers between your slick folds. "Just like I thought, so wet before anyone even had to touch you. Always so ready for us." Bucky hums as he pumps his fingers in and out of you slowly, stretching you. You can't help the small whimpers and moans that fall from your lips at Bucky's ministrations with both men watching intently. A few minutes of playing your body like a custom instrument have you unsteady on your feet and that's when Bucky withdraws. "I'd say you're ready." He says sliding his fingers into his mouth to lick them clean and the action makes your walls clench. You take a deep breath before speaking again.

"Do you want me facing you Stevie? Or should I be facing Bucky for this?" You ask.

"Face me sweetheart." Steve says. You nod and climb onto Bucky's lap straddling him with your back to Bucky. You take Bucky in your hand and he hisses but he can't dwell on the sweet grip of your fingers because in the next moment, you're sinking down onto him, the molten heat of your core envelops him like the sweetest torture. You take your time settling on top of him, 'unintentionally' grinding further against his erection until his hands squeeze warningly against your hip. "Behave you two. I'm serious about drawing you." Steve warns.

"Of course baby." You smile innocently at him.

"Alright- Bucky get comfortable but your legs need to be spread so I can actually see where you're joined oh and slip your hand into her shirt, cup one of her boobs. And you can put your other hand on her thigh." Steve gives you a series of directions which Bucky follows quickly. "Y/n you can lean back against him." Steve adds and you settle against Bucky's chest, and his head rests on your shoulder. "Good girl. Now you guys can just sit there while I draw."

"Do we gotta be quiet and still or-" Bucky trails.

"I mean as long as you don't move too much it's fine, and you can definitely talk, at least until I'm drawing your faces but I'll let you know when I'm at that point." Steve's already started sketching, his eyes darting from you and Bucky to his sketchpad. Bucky swipes his thumb across the nipple of your breast that's in his hand and you gasp at the sudden stimulation.

"Bucky-" You warn.

"Sorry doll, you're just impossible to resist." He hums pressing a kiss to your neck that makes a shiver run down your spine.

"You're insufferable." You scoff at him.

"You say that but I can feel you squeezing me at my teasing." He says.

"Settle down Bucky." Steve warns him although you doubt Bucky will listen. If you're lucky he'll save the teasing for after the drawing is finished but chances are you'll end up doing way more than sitting on his dick within the hour. Bucky can be quite patient but when it comes to you neither of them is particularly good at managing their insatiability. You'll be seriously surprised if Steve manages to finish his drawing before one or both of them decides this time is better spent forcing orgasms from you.

***

[isa-loves-you]

♡Michael Schmidt has a crush♡

You were a sophomore in college, even though you live in an apartment off campus you still visited your mom almost everyday to check on her and to eat.

One night while you were visiting your mom she brought up the people who lived a couple of houses down "the young man knocked on my door this morning, asking if I would or If i knew someone who can babysit his sister at night". The reason why she brought this up is because you were looking for a job, with being a college student you needed the money and nights were perfect since you only have three classes a week. "He's a cutie, he would be perfect for you" you mom called out as she walked into the other room "cute doesn't matter I just need a job".

It's been almost a month since you started watching abby. She was the best kid you have ever babysat for, and she loved you which made your job so much easier.

"Hey y/n, can I ask you a question" "what is it abs" you stopped coloring to look at her. "Will you marry Mike, so you can live here and I can see you everyday"

You were a bit taken back by the question, how did she know that you liked mike?. "I'm really flattered that you want to see me everyday, but I don't think your brother likes me like that" you flashed her a smile to ease the tension but she just shrugged her shoulders and went back to drawing.

Ever since you started watching abby you found yourself infatuated with Mike. He wasn't a very open person but for some reason mike would open up to you, your mom was right he was a cutie.

It was almost midnight until you heard keys jingle and the front door unlock. Mike threw his keys on the small table by the door before looking for you. "Hey I made peanut butter stir fry, do you want me to make you a plate" you asked while already making a B-line to the kitchen."oh no it's okay, I can get it myself you already do almost everything here" you turned to Mike grabbing his arm and pulling him to the table "oh please making a plate is not going to hurt me, now please sit down".

Mike sat down and watched you shuffle around the kitchen to make him some to eat. Mike would never admit to himself but he liked having you around, he loved that abby adored you, sometimes he thimks she likes you more than him. He really wouldn't know what he would do without you, you now became his reason to get up everyday, too look nice, and too be happy.

After mike ate he walked you to your car while talking to you "I get my paycheck tomorrow so would it be okay if you stopped by after class to pick it up?" "Yeah no problem I'll stop by around 6". You stod there justing looking into his eyes, even though Michael's face told a story of a hard life, his eyes showed compassion. You would be a fool to not fall in love with him.

Once you left, Mike got ready for bed. He took the pills he always takes, replayed the tape he always plays, and looked at the Nebraska poster he always falls asleep looking at, but something was different. You were the only thing he could think about before the sleeping pills kicked in.

His dream started out like it always does, his mom spills her coke and tells him to keep track of Garrett. As soon as he sees Garrett in the back of a strangers Cadillac he takes Chace after it. No matter how hard he runs, he can never catche up with the mysterious car.

Mike stops to put his hands on his knees and catches his breath. Giggling. He hears Giggling.

Mike looks back up to now see a field of grass. This wasn't his dream, this is different from his normal nightmares. There in the field stood a happy abby, laughing holding hands with a happier y/n. Mike feels his heart pick up speed.

"Mike!" Abby ran towards her big brother with open arms. Mike catches his sister while y/n walked twords the two of them. He flashes a smile in y/n's direction "I've missed you mike", you kiss his cheak and hug the siblings tight . If he didn't known that this was a dream he would have thought that he died and went to heaven.

"Mike Wake up, I'm hungry". Abby jumps up and down on her brothers bed until she hears him grown,"okay okay abby give me a minute". He stands up and makes his way to the bathroom while abby returns back to the living room where she watches her cartoons and color.

Once mike sets abbys plate in front of her she immediately digs in. "Abby would you be okay if I started to date someone?", the young girl replies without even thinking about it "only if its y/n, she likes you". Mike looked at his sister shocked "well who else would it be, because I like her too" he says trying to play it like he knew this whole time.

It was almost 8 when you entered the house and abby ran up to give you a hug. "Hey hun I'm sorry my class ran later, I tried to call but no one answered" Mike came out of abbys bedroom with a relieved yet anxious look on his face. "Abby go to your room, I need to talk to y/n about grown up stuff" she looks at you with big eye to try to get you to let her stay "it will only take one minute, I'll come in there to say goodnight before I go".

Abby walked to her room with a sad and betrayed face. "Um here's you're payment, you'll be here tomorrow right" "Yeah, couldn't miss it for the world.".There it was, your smile. Oh how he couldn't wait any longer once he seen your million dollar smile.

"I know this might be sudden and very out of line, but could we maybe go out sometime"

You were surprised. "Yeah that sounds great, I would love to" you were stumbling over your words a little bit from being flustered. You two stood there with awkward smiles on your face, if you weren't in his house you would have been screaming from happiness.

"I better go say goodnight to abby before I go it's getting late" you stepped closer to Mike to get to the bedroom. "Y/n '' before you could respond to him, he placed his hand on the back of your ear and placed his lips upon yours.

It felt like a thousand minutes passed by in those five seconds, and you didn't want it to end. It wouldn't have ended if a certain someone spoke up.

"Yay I was right, y/n does like you mike!"

[knavesflames]

transfem arle gagging us cause we being too loud while she destroys us??🥰🥰

Hi anon! The thought of that…. Oh…

Anyway, please enjoy☺️

Word count: 777

Contents: semi public sex..? In her office. Gagging you to keep you quiet.

[scheduled post]

Nsft utc!

Not once did you think you’d be sat on Arlecchino’s desk in the Fatui headquarters with your head buried in her shoulder, with her fingers buried in you. You’ve never been one for this, so why does it have you with a burning pit in your stomach? You can’t quite understand it, nor do you have any time to try to understand it when her fingers are curling inside of you every few seconds, drawing out mewls and whines without even properly trying.

“Be quiet.”

Her voice cuts through your thoughts like ice, her dark eyes piercing into yours. Of course you have to be quiet, there are people all over the fatui building, and the walls aren’t exactly soundproof. Soundproofing is the least of the Tsaritsa’s problems, very much more focused on reviving the third descender. Still, they protect you from others hearing your heavy breaths but you can’t count on the fact they protect you from much else.

Just as quickly as her words come out of her mouth, her fingers curl again. Despite her straight and unbothered face, she’s teasing you and you know it, the way her eyebrow quirks every time she hears a squelching sound coming from your cunt, the one that so greedily sucks in her fingers like it’s been starved. She finds that one spot inside of you, the one you know makes you unravel (she knew where it was, she didn’t need to find it, she was simply avoiding it), and a sound so dirty leaves your mouth that she finds herself rolling her eyes and sighing. She knew you couldn’t stay quiet. She loves it, really. It affects her in ways she’ll never tell you, how she’s throbbing and wants nothing more than to take you on the desk with the strap you love so much. But she cannot. Not today.

Her fingers pause in their ministrations, her frame moving from sat upright to bending down. She returns with something black and you recognise it immediately. The panties she practically ripped off of you earlier.

You wonder what on earth she’s doing holding those but—

“Open your mouth.”

“What?”

“You can’t be quiet, and I’m going to make you cum if it’s the last thing I do today. So, open your fucking mouth, doll.”

Something about her voice makes your jaw drop before your mind can even comprehend it, and the fabric is soon shoved into your mouth as a gag. She’s never done this before, gagged you. And yet, sitting on her desk at her mercy, unable to make a sound, sends shoots of electricity through you with every twitch of her fingers.

She eyes you for a few seconds, just watching. Waiting for any protest, a tap on her arm to say ‘stop, I don’t want this’. Nothing comes. You can almost swear her lips curl up in a smile, but it fades as quickly as it appears. Her fingers move again, harder, faster, and she attacks the spot inside of you relentlessly, not once leaving it or avoiding like she has been this entire time. For you, you’re practically screaming from how utterly good she makes you feel, but all that’s heard is the smallest of grunts, and barely even that.

Your hands clutch the desk harder, so hard, in fact, that your knuckles turn white and your nails leave crescents in the wood. Arlecchino will cherish that, you think, whether she says it or not. And she will. She’ll run her fingers over the dents when you’re not here. For now, though, her eyes don’t leave you for a millisecond, not when your eyes roll back and you begin twitching. Not when your hips start pathetically jumping up to gain more friction and her hand pushes you firmly down.

“Stay still. Good girl, nice and quiet. You look so pretty all gagged for me.”

Her whispers drive you further, and if you weren’t wearing shoes she’d see your toes curling as you unravel completely. Her eyes flit down almost imperceptibly, admiring the creamy ring formed around her fingers. Once she’s sure you’ve come down from your high, she pulls her fingers out with a pop and another squelch and pulls your underwear out of your mouth. You release them with a gasp, and then a breathless laugh. Arlecchino returns it with a small smirk of her own as you drag the now wet material up your legs, making yourself look presentable. When your hand turns the handle to leave, she speaks quietly, a hint of amusement only you can detect.

“Thank you for bringing my lunch, dear. I may have to forget more often.”

[darkficsyouneveraskedfor]

Summer Breeze 2

Warnings: age gap (reader is 22, Andrew is mid 40s), dad’s friend, Andy being Andrew, other dark elements. As usual, be mindful of your content consumption.

I also beg of you to leave me some tuppence in the form of a comment and/or reblog. You are cherished!

Enjoy, my loverlies.

You sit on the edge of the dock, watching the ripples as the sun drifts up the horizon. You forego the Adirondack chairs so that you can dip your toes in the coolness of the lake. It’s peaceful. The crisp water in the glass adds to the subtle coolness in the air. 

The dirt mulches as you hear someone descending from the house. You can assume who it is before they tramp onto the dock. You continue to watch the sky as you hear Andy sit in one of the chairs. He sighs as he so often does. 

“So, you don’t drink coffee,” he breaks the calm with his gravelly timbre, “how do you wake yourself up for all those early morning lectures?” 

You turn your head and glance over your shoulder. You shrug and look back out at the lake, “I guess I just get through it.” 

“Mm,” he hums and you hear him slurp from his cup. “Bad habit. Better not to have too much caffeine.” 

“Sure,” you agree, “guess I just never had the desire to try.” 

“Sounds like you have self-control,” he tuts, “definitely don’t get that from your dad.” 

You nod and reach for the glass of water. You’re not sure what to say to that. Your dad has a couple beers each night, you know it’s not great, but he’s harmless. 

“It’s nice that you can come up here. I know he was nervous about it. Didn’t think you’d like it,” Andy continues. 

“Oh, yeah, er, thanks for letting me.” 

“No problem,” he replies swiftly, “don’t mind. I’m more concerned about Jacob and his buddies. You let me know if they give you any trouble.” 

“Um, I don’t think they will,” you turn the glass in your hands, “but thanks.” 

“Mm, well I know how boys that age can be,” he intones. 

His statement tweaks your brow. You’re not sure what he means. Jacob and his friends are harmless. They’re like most guys you deal with in college; they talk a big game with each other but in reality, they’re not doing much more than staying up playing video games or some roleplaying table game. None of them are frat material. 

“So do I,” you balance the glass as you stand up, “I’m gonna walk around a bit. Explore before everyone else gets up.” 

“Right,” he sits back and sips his coffee, his shirt still open, exposing his hairy chest as he pays little mind to it, “be careful of bears.” 

“Bears?” You echo, “right.” 

You leave him as your sandals clap loudly. The ominous warning has you on edge. You forgot there would be more than cottage folk up here. You try not to think too much of it. You’ve heard bears usually avoid people. 

You stop by the back deck to leave your glass there for your return and trod back down the steps. You head off around the side of the cottage and to the dirt road behind the vehicles parked in the lot. You peer into the trees that line the way in and swat away the buzzing bugs.  

After another year on campus and with your last one ahead of you, you can’t help but bask in the remote serenity of it all. Your dad promised you a beach day and while your sad not to have friends of your own there to sunbathe with, it will be a good opportunity to do some reading. You continue on your trek until you feel like you might get lost and turn back. 

As you come back in sight of the porch, the morning birds tweet their good mornings. You hate to go back inside. You’re usually a homebody but up here, you could never put another foot indoors and be content. 

You climb the stairs of the deck and follow it around to the back. You grab your glass and the last mouthful of now lukewarm water. A distant splash draws your eye and you stare out at the empty dock, the water ringed and rolling towards the horizon. 

You stare out, trying to find the disturbance. It breaks through the water as Andy’s head pops up from the water and he pushes back his dark hair. He wades around, stretching his arms wide as he kicks himself through the shallow. 

You should go inside but the soft pink sky keeps you hypnotised. Your eyes flick past the body in the water as the sun warps the sky in shades of violet and pink through the stringy clouds. It’s like a painting. You peer up at the hues and grip the glass as the subtle blue slowly edges out the other colours. 

The water stirs loudly again and your gaze is drawn back to the thud on the deck. You gulp back a gasp as Andy turns his naked back to you and stretches his arms wide. From there, you can only make out his form, grateful that his finer features are left vague. 

You quickly retreat from what you shouldn’t have seen. You should’ve just gone inside. You go around the front so that you don’t give yourself away with the door.

Forget it. No big deal. It’s just a mistake. As long as he doesn’t know, it’s nothing to worry about. 

[strawbeelemonade]

PLATONIC HEADCANNONS: being miles morales best friend but your also a bit insane (Part 2!)

i'm gonna try to remember to start specifying when something is intended to be platonic or romantic.

🕷- I was literally unable to cram everything I wanted to say in the first one.

🕷- Miles is really only comfortable showing you his drawings.

🕷- He's an incredibly awkward guy, but the words come so easily when he hangs out with you. he doesn't choke up like he does with other people at school.

🕷- When he gets his powers his first instinct is to call you. He’s literally halfway through punching your number into the keypad until he stops and decides against it. He knows your number off by heart now.

🕷- You appear and disappear like a ghost its so random.

🕷- Honest to god, he lowkey thought you were homeless until you invited him over to watch Barbie Mermaidia.

🕷- “Bibble is so me.”

🕷- He’s the only person you let over at your place. its small and in the basement of an old apartment complex. the landlord couldn’t get anyone to pay to live there. you live alone.

🕷- You struck a deal, and they let you crash there as long as rent was on time and you fixed their washing machine for free.

🕷- Miles asked how you got to live there for so cheap. You tell him it’s because someone died on the couch he was sitting on.

🕷- He sits on the floor.

🕷- Miles is so eager to share his new powers with someone.

🕷- No seriously, between all the stress and lying and anxiety its nice to let himself get excited about it. To let himself have fun and see what he can do.

🕷- You guys TOTALLY video tape him trying out his new powers for the first time.

🕷- I can imagine you finding an abandoned alleyway on some random ass street after school and filming Miles Trying to do a backflip LMAO.

🕷- You gotta fish him out of a trashcan after he tries to spider climb up the wall.

🕷- You know that thing where a group of friends duck tapes one of their friends to a wall for fun? You get miles to do that to you.

🕷- You guys can’t stop laughing, The best memories of your lives are in those videos.

🕷- He’ll take you up to the top of buildings to show you the graffiti art he painted!! he’ll let you sign it off with a dick and balls or a heart if you want. You guys do homework up there together as well.

🕷- ’M & (Y/I) were here’ has been painted on every available surface of New York.

🕷- You both have the bright idea to hop on his back and go web slinging around the neighbourhood. He can carry you easily.

🕷- Miles decides If you don’t tell him to slow down, then he’s not going fast enough.

🕷- You NEVER tell him to slow down.

🕷- “Faster!!!“

🕷- Now that he’s got super strength he can put you in an inescapable headlock, he doesn’t do it too tight but he holds you there until you tap out.

🕷- He takes you to the coolest spots with the best views.

🕷- You regularly cover for him.

🕷- “We were at Jamba Juice the whole time officer I swear.”

🕷- Miles side eyes you knowing damn well he was no where NEAR a Jamba Juice.

🕷- ’Thanks’ he’d mouth.

🕷- You and Petter B will get along like a house on fire.

🕷- While Miles is extremely unimpressed by him, you don’t seem to care about any pre-existing expectations one might have when you think of the guy behind the mask of Spider-Man, your cracking jokes and feeding your pet rat a couple of French fries while the three of you sit in the diner, planning your next moves carefully.

🕷- Peter B can tell you’re a good kid. He’s at an age where a lot of your batshit tendencies don’t really faze him as long as your not hurting yourself.

🕷- Speaking of which.

🕷- When him and Miles get the chance to talk alone he warns him that he needs to be careful.

🕷- He tells him that normal relationships aren’t possible anymore. And stresses to him what a life like this can mean for your loved ones. especially since you found out his secret. This line of work isn’t just dangerous for Miles, but for you as well.

🕷- Miles is a little shaken after the conversation, no matter how gently Peter tries to put it. But what he’s implying is clear. He tries to shake it off and enjoy the time you both spend together. He won’t admit to himself that Peter is right just yet.

🕷- It’s just so easy to tell you everything and rely on you.

🕷- There will be a moment sometime in the future when reality sets in, but for now Miles makes the same mistake every Spider-Man does.

🕷- He has a best friend. :(

🕷- On the other hand, Peter comes to the staggering realisation that your actually extremely prone to accidents and danger all on your own. And he appropriately does a complete 180 from ‘casually distant bum-uncle' to ‘I am your dad now’.

🕷- It’s Nothing personal, kid. now stop trying to get in the middle of fights with dangerous criminals and let the adult— or at least the guys with super strength, stamina, speed and resilience— handle it.

🕷- He demands you stay out of the crossfire, but, to no one’s surprise you don’t listen.

🕷- You’re willing to throw yourself in front of Miles to shield him from anything, much to your best friends terror.

🕷- You hold your own surprisingly well against opponents that would be considered reasonable threats otherwise. You’re resourceful, grabbing anything and everything you can get your hands on. you get a terrifying look in your eye.

🕷- No matter how impressed Peter is, He will slingshot you around with his web-shooters to propel you out of the way of oncoming attacks. He will do this for both of you, but feels the need to do it less for Miles. He knows he can take what’s on the other end of the punch. But No matter how untouchable you make yourself out to be, you can’t.

🕷- “Do I want kids?”

🕷- He takes you on as his responsibility just as much as he does Miles.

🕷- Spider-Gwen also looks out for you in battle.

🕷- She’s more laid back, and even a little suave about it too.

🕷- She secretly wishes she had someone like you in her universe. What she wouldn’t give to decompress with you after a long day of patrolling New York.

🕷- She’s actually the most normal about you having a pet rat. You know, the one you grabbed out of a garbage can in a subway station. Yeah, That rat.

🕷- Miles watches you both get along like a house on fire and just quietly falls behind you both since he’s not sure what to do or say.

🕷- He’s so awkward, poor guy.

🕷- Your tendency to go off for days at a time ignites everyone’s curiosity. it’s a concerning habit, and Gwen even endeavours to follow you to see where you disappear to so often.

🕷- She’s unsuccessful.

🕷- It's never said out loud, but when she’s facing the one-way ticket home she finds herself wanting to stay just a bit longer. Not just for Miles, but for you to… She wonders what you’ll get up to while she’s gone.

🕷- …

🕷- Peter Porker vibes with you so hard.

🕷- no wait don’t scroll away wait

🕷- he WILL gift you the freakishly large cartoon mallet. Sorry, but miles didn’t appreciate it for what it was.

🕷- He would be cracking jokes and doing bits with you through out the whole goddamn movie.

🕷- Miles can usually let you do your own thing without sparing a second glance, but the looney tunes laws of physics that Porker exhibits WILL rub off on you at least a little.

🕷- It’s contagious. And when you start flattening eachother into to perfect discs it freaks everyone out a little.

🕷- He’s got enough to worry about in the plot,,, Damn,,

🕷- Spider Noir teaches you how to throw a good punch

🕷- in exchange you let him mess with your phone as much as he wants

🕷- "how the hell do you work this thing?"

🕷- He likes you, he thinks you got a lot of guts.

🕷- You were actually the one to design Miles’ suit. He took inspiration from one of your drawings in your school notebook.

🕷- You've always believed in him, and that made him believe in himself too.

[thatdammchickennugget]

Smoke Slow

pairing - lorenzo berkshire x fem!reader

warnings - fluff, mention of an argument, smoking

wordcount - 2.5k

a/n - I was looking through my concert videos from this year and it made me listen to Smoke Slow by Joshua Bassett again (still kinda obsessed with this song because he looked me in the eyes and touched my hand while singing it) and I couldn't stop thinking about Enzo while hearing it. So here's a little Enzo songic inspired by it :)

“She asks for a light As our secrets spill on the window sill We're buying more time While we kill ourselves as we both inhale”

Enzo was wondering what was taking Theo this long. The other boy had asked him to join him and then instantly left him, telling Enzo to wait and throwing his pack of cigarettes into his lap. Now Enzo was awkwardly sitting in the designated corner of the Ravenclaw common room where the smokers perched on the windowsills during parties, all by himself and trying to look like he belonged there.

Sure, he has had the one or other cigarette before, but he had never really understood what exactly it was that his friends found enjoyable about the little cancer sticks. He was not really a fan of the way they were carelessly polluting their lungs, but unfortunately, he was also an enabler. So, of course he had agreed to keep Theo company.

He was so focused on the crowd of students dancing and milling about the room, trying to find a familiar face to wave over and keep him company, that he did not notice the girl climbing on the windowsill next to him.

"Can I borrow a light?" Your soft voice startled him, as he turned his face to realise he had company. You were sitting facing the opposite direction, your legs dangling off the edge of the sill, a cigarette tucked behind your ear. You reached for it, taking in between your pointer and middle finger as you shot him a wry smile. "I left my wand in my jacket and I can't be bothered to get it right now."

The way the moonlight reflected in your eyes made his heart skip a beat. Noticing he had not actually responded to you yet, feeling like a creep sitting there and staring at you, he quickly nodded. His fingers hurried to open Theo's pack of cigarettes he was still holding, knowing his friend always kept a lighter in there.

Passing it to you, he used your moment of distraction while lighting your cigarette to take another look at you. Dressed casually in a pair of jeans and a sweater, you seemed a little out of place. Not that Enzo thought there was anything wrong with your choice of outfit, but the girls he usually talked to at parties loved to take every little opportunity to dress up.

His eyes wandered back to your face only to find you already looking back at him. "Keep staring and I might do a trick," you told him with a grin, taking a drag from your cigarette.

“Making believe there's a future Is it naive to think we could work? The second it's out, then I lose her We're already here, so one more won't hurt It won't hurt”

Enzo felt his face heat up at being caught, clearing his throat as he averted his gaze. "S-Sorry," he stuttered out, his fingers nervously fidgeting with the pack in his hands. "I was just trying to figure out if we've met before. I don't recognize you." 

He heard the awkwardness in his own voice and frowned. Why was he acting like this? Normally he had no problem talking to people, no matter who it was. But you had to be the most beautiful girl he had ever seen at Hogwarts. It was apparently throwing him off his game quite a bit.

You let out a small laugh, bringing your hand up to cover your mouth. "It's okay," you said softly. "We haven't, at least not officially. You're a year above me so we don't share any classes. I would have been surprised if you knew my name."

"So, how do you know what year I'm in if we've never met?" Enzo adjusted slightly, drawing his legs up and turning to face you, Theo completely forgotten by now.

You let out a breath of smoke, watching the cloud dance out into the windy night. "Well, everybody knows who you are. Your group of friends has quite the reputation actually. Also, you're on the Quidditch team which means every person in this castle has heard your name before."

Enzo chuckled lightly, leaning his head back against the windowsill. "Okay then, I think if you already know who I am, I at least deserve to know your name?" he said, his signature charming smile spreading across his face.

You told him your name after blowing out another cloud of smoke, feeling slightly guilty about the flutter in your stomach when he repeated it. Your name sounded perfect coming out of his mouth and you could not help but hoping he would say it more in the future.

Enzo was about to ask you more questions about yourself, when he spotted Theo's tall frame break through the crowd. He caught his friend's eyes over the top of your head, trying to convey the silent message to make himself scarce and leave him alone with you. Theo's eyes slowly wandered from Enzo to your smaller frame, understanding crossing his face.

Enzo's face flushed again when Theo sent him a cheeky wink before turning to get himself a drink, leaving the two of you to talk.

“But all that we are is all that we'll ever be 'Cause he's the one waiting at home She holds my guitar as I pluck out a melody There's only so far we can go Next to you, but I'll never be close So take your time while you're mine And smoke slow”

Enzo scanned the room, hoping to catch a glimpse of you at the next party. His heart skipped a beat when he spotted you, but his excitement turned to disappointment as he noticed you were with your boyfriend. 

He had done his homework throughout the week following the Saturday he had met you for the first time. By now, he knew what house you belonged in, who your friends were and that you could be found in the library as soon as you had free time to yourself. Unfortunately, he had also learned that you were in a relationship.

Enzo couldn't help but notice the lack of joy on your face, and a pang of concern tugged at his heart. He watched from a distance, observing the interaction between you and your boyfriend. Enzo couldn't shake the feeling that you deserved more happiness than what he saw in that moment.

He had been keeping an eye on you all week and was already confused about why you were with the guy. When the two of you were together, the look on your face dampened, the bright smile he had seen on that windowsill gone as if it never existed in the first place.

As the night went on, Enzo found himself unable to focus on anything else but you. He discreetly kept an eye on your interaction with your boyfriend, noticing the subtle signs of unhappiness as your boyfriend's grip on your hip tightened as he talked with his friends, you standing by as if you were merely there to observe.

“Breaking away For the hell of it Started innocent I'm telling you things that I've never said Hope I don't regret this”

Finally, an opportunity to talk to you presented itself when your boyfriend excused himself to go get a drink, you immediately starting to make your way to the smoking area. Enzo had been sitting on the same windowsill all night, sometimes joined by Theo or Mattheo who both made fun of him acting like a lovesick puppy over a girl he had spoken to once.

A bittersweet smile played on your lips as you spotted him there, almost as if he had been waiting for you. Enzo's heart swelled with hope, but he remained composed. Maybe you had been looking forward to seeing him as well? 

"I wasn't expecting to run into you again," you greeted, your hand resting on the stone window frame, your fingers tracing the smooth surface. "But I'm glad. Seems I don't have my wand on me once again."

He happily reached into his pocket, pulling out the lighter he had bought in Hogsmeade just that morning, hoping you would ask him for a light again. You thanked him with a smile, settling into the space beside him, cigarette held between your pointer and middle finger.

"Want one?" you offered him your pack. Even though he would not enjoy the scratch of smoke in his throat, he found himself accepting, taking back his lighter, skin tingling where your fingers brushed against his. If it meant you would stay here at the window with him for a while longer, he would smoke as long as you wanted him to. 

“Making believe that we're clueless One little spark that we won't put out Makin' a million excuses 'Cause isn't it fun just for now?”

Enzo's heart sank as he watched you and your boyfriend engaging in a heated argument at the party. He could see the pain etched across your face, and it was evident that tears were threatening to spill from your eyes. 

From the look on your face, you had no idea what had set your boyfriend off in the first place and Enzo shared in your confusion. From where he was once again sitting at the windowsill, waiting for you to come over to have a smoke, it had looked as if everything was perfectly fine a moment ago.

You covered back from the guy as he got closer into your face, his words too quiet for Enzo to hear but he was jumping to his feet anyways. Before he was able to reach you, your boyfriend was gone already, leaving you behind in the middle of the Ravenclaw common room with tears in your eyes.

With empathy in his voice, Enzo approached you, gently asking, "Hey, would you like to get out of here?" His eyes conveyed his sincere concern, offering you an escape from the prying eyes and judgmental stares of the other partygoers.

You looked up at him, your tear-stained cheeks reflecting the soft glow of the party lights. Grateful for his offer and more than ready to get away from all the stares, you nodded. Enzo extended his hand, a silent but much appreciated gesture.

As you took his hand, a sense of relief washed over you. The two of you moved away from the party, leaving behind the noise and chaos, as he led you through the silent castle hallways and out into the courtyard.

Finding a quiet bench nestled beneath a tree, Enzo sat down beside you, creating a safe space for you to gather your thoughts. He didn't pry or ask any questions, instead offering a comforting presence as you allowed yourself to finally release the tears that had been building up inside.

“But all that we are is all that we'll ever be 'Cause he's the one waiting at home She holds my guitar as I pluck out a melody There's only so far we can go Next to you, but I'll never be close So take your time while you're mine And smoke slow”

Enzo's gentle understanding and compassionate nature provided you with the support you desperately needed in that moment. With him by your side, the weight of the argument and the judgement of others seemed to lift, leaving only a sense of solace and understanding.

Sitting outside, the gentle breeze caressed your face as Enzo began to tell you about how Draco fell down the stairs earlier that day, the image of Malfoy falling on his face finally bringing back the smile on your face. Enzo's witty storytelling skills effortlessly lifted your mood, making you forget your troubles for a moment and allowing laughter to fill the air.

By the time the tears on your cheeks had dried, Enzo's curiosity got the better of him and he asked about the argument he had just witnessed. Taking a deep breath, you turned to face him as you spoke. "I just asked him to dance. He didn't want to, so I said I would go back to my dorm then and that I don't understand why he always drags me to these parties if he's just going to ignore me the whole time."

"That's why he was screaming at you?" Enzo asked, surprised. By the look this guy had on his face, he had assumed something seriously bad had happened. "Because you wanted to dance with him?"

"Well, he called me childish and embarrassing. But I just wanted him to pay some attention to me. But it doesn’t matter, he just broke up with me anyways."

Seeing the hurt in your eyes, Enzo quickly got to his feet. "He's a dickhead and he doesn't deserve you. If you were my girlfriend my attention would never not be on you."

This time it was your face that turned red when he offered you his hand again. "Still up to have that dance?" he asked.

“Addicted to illusions of a love that never was And never will be anyway, ooh And nicotine don't taste the same If I'm not with you, savoring every breath we take Play with fire, take me higher”

At first, you hesitated. "There's no music, Enzo," you told him, letting out a small laugh. 

But you stood up anyways, taking his hand in your own. He led you a couple steps away from the bench, gently placing his other hand on your waist. In the absence of music, he whispered lighthearted melodies, creating an imaginary rhythm that only you both could hear. With each step, the weight of the hurtful words lifted, replaced by a fluttering warmth in your stomach.

You twirled and spun, lost in the moment, as Enzo's infectious laughter filled the air. The world around you blurred, leaving only the warm shine of the moonlight and the sound of your laughter intermingling with Enzo's. 

As the dance came to an end, you found yourself smiling genuinely, feeling lighter and more uplifted than you had in a long time. A comfortable silence fell over you as he stopped humming, his bright eyes meeting your own as you looked up at his face.

Slowly, his face leaned closer to yours, not breaching the space entirely yet. He was leaving the decision to you, afraid of reading this wrong and pushing too far. With his thumb tracing patterns into the skin of your waist, you made up your mind, breaking through the little space left between you and pressed your lips to his in a soft kiss.

“All that we are is all that we'll ever be 'Cause he's the one waiting at home She holds my guitar as I pluck out a melody There's only so far we can go Next to you, but I'll never be close So take your time while you're mine And smoke slow”

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[gezelligs-world]

I'm Sorry That I Hurt You

(Bada Lee x Jam Republic!Reader)

"Why does Y/n's team suddenly become viral?" Mina Myoung said while looking at the performance on her phone, along with her crew members.

"I heard that Bada already announced their relationship." Locker replied.

"Heh?! Bada Lee must be so confident!" Downy said.

"Jam Republic and BEBE might work against us, isn't that unfair?" Soll added.

"This show may be about having no respect against one another but we must respect the thought that all of us worked hard to be in this show." Downy replied.

"Should we speak up about this?" Minny asked their leader. All eyes on her.

"Sure, why not?" Mina Myoung said with her head tilt and a little smirk on her face.

"Goodluck." Y/n said while fixing Bada's hair. Bada smiled and put her head on Y/n's shoulder.

"Where's my kiss?" Bada said, pouting her lips and leaning in at Y/n.

"Idiot, we're in public." Y/n whispered shouted.

"Our relationship are now announced in public!" Bada whined.

"They are not thinking of this as a competition anymore." Waackxxxy said while looking at the couple.

"Bada and Y/n?" Yoonji asked when she heard Waackxxxy's voice.

"Yeah, they are not even joining their team to stretch. " Both of the girls just stared at the two figures in front of them who are busy teasing each other.

Daniel, the host finally entered the set. He started his speech and turned to Deep N Dap.

"I heard that Deep N Dap has something to share from the rest of the crews." Mina Myoung grabbed her mic and began her speech.

"It's just... Being in a relationship with your rival is not forbidden in this show, right?" Some of the crews nodded but Y/n and Bada just stared at Mina, knowing what she was gonna say.

"I'm just concerned that if one of us gets into a relationship with other groups, they will forget the responsibility they are obligated to do. All of us worked our blood, sweat, and tears to maintain where we are standing. It feels unfair. That's all." Mina Myoung put the mic at its rightful place. The atmosphere is tense, no one dared to speak. All of the crew here knows that the concern is regarding Y/n and Bada's relationship.

"Kirsten and Bada, leader of Jam Republic and BEBE. May I know your insights about this concern?" Kirsten grabbed the mic because she can sense that Bada's statement will not be good, she can tell it because of Bada's clenched jaw and fist.

"Loving someone is not a sin, it will never be. Bada and Y/n are both adults already and know how to act as professionals when needed. I know they know how to draw the line." Kirsten replied.

"Bada?" Bada grabs the mic and begins to speak.

"I don't really see a problem with my love life but I do see problems when it comes to people invading it. Like what Kirsten said, me and Y/n are adults already meaning we already know what's right and wrong due to past experiences. My life, my choice." Some members are in awe because of Bada's response.

"She's so badass." Rena said, whispering to Akanen.

"Right?" Akanen replied.

The battle began instantly as if the tension had never been there. Lucky for Y/n, no one challenged her for a freestyle battle. This gives her a chance to think deeply.

"Hey, you look stiff like a tree." Y/n turned to her right and saw Ling sitting beside her.

"I don't even have leaves yet." The girls both laughed and went back to watching the battle.

"I know you're in a state of insecurity but whatever happens, fight for the both of you." I smiled at Ling and nodded.

"Of course, I don't wanna lose her." I replied.

"I can already see the effect on both of you if you happen to leave each other." I chuckled.

"That will never happen." Ling nodded in satisfaction.

Across the room, Bada stared at Y/n with affection. She knows how Mina Myoung's words affected Y/n's mind. Bada made a mental note to check on Y/n every now and then.

The battle ended and everyone already left the set, including the judges. Y/n was last to go to their private room but was pulled by someone.

"What-" Y/n's words got cutted off by someone's arms. She immediately recognized the scent and hugged Bada back.

"I'm fine, don't worry about me." Y/n whispered, Bada caressed her hair and buried her head on Y/n's neck.

"It only makes me worry more." Bada replied. They broke the hug with Bada's hands holding Y/n's.

"What Mina said is just an opinion, don't let it affect you. Our love will never be a disturbance for both of our careers, okay?" Bada said. Y/n is unsure of Bada's statement, she knows something will happen whenever one person in the society disagrees with one's relationship.

"Y/n, did I make myself clear?" Bada asked, leaning down with a tilted head to look at Y/n's face.

"Y-Yeah." Bada sighed and hugged her lover tightly.

The crew mission begins and Y/n is in the rookie class group with Emma, and one of the group with the largest member. The group are on a break and Y/n is on her phone. She scrolled on a post, it's an article about one of her accomplishments. She hearted the article but her mood changes when she sees the comments.

"It's only because of Bada."

"Why post this shit 🤬🤮"

"Stop using Bada for your own desires!"

"Bada's reputation = Y/n's reputation."

Y/n gripped her phone and turned it off. She sighed and closed her eyes to relax herself.

"The filming is about to start in 5 minutes. Please be in your position!" Y/n opened her eyes and sighed. The filming started and the flow went well. Not until Y/n began to feel pain on the back of her right foot but she knew she had to finish the filming so she just endured the pain.

"Y/n! You're bleeding!" Emma screamed causing everyone to turn to Y/n's direction. Her right foot is already drenched in blood and Y/n was not able to walk properly anymore.

"The medics will soon arrive." One of the staff said while taking care of Y/n's foot.

"Why does she need medics? It's just a cut?" Y/n clenched her jaw.

"Just wipe the blood and bring me a new pair of shoes." Y/n told the staff. The staff looked at her dumbfounded but just remained quiet because of Y/n's stare.

The filming ended and everyone began to leave the set. Y/n is in the dressing room, wrapping a cloth on her feet when she hears voices from outside of the door.

"Why is Y/n in the rookie group section? I expected her to be in the sub-leader."

"Me too."

"It must be embarrassing for Bada, her girlfriend is in the rookie group while she is in the leaders."

"Y/n should've at least made herself the main dancer. It must be embarrassing~"

"Hey! How's the filming?" Bada said excitedly, watching Y/n go inside the car.

"Not bad." Y/n replied coldly, putting her seatbelt on. This action confused Bada, Y/n always lets her put the seatbelt for her.

"Not bad, really? You know you can tell me anything." Bada said.

"Not now, Bada." Bada nodded sadly and began to drive the car.

Throughout the silent ride, both lovers are in deep thoughts. Bada is trying to figure out what's wrong with her girlfriend while Y/n is fighting with her own insecurities, if she is good enough for Bada. Bada looked over at Y/n's side and saw that she is leaning over the window, she must be asleep. Bada caressed Y/n's thigh as a sign of affection and comfort until they got home to their apartment.

Weeks passed by and Y/n continued to act distant around Bada. Y/n being in a rival team only makes Bada frustrated because she doesn't have to much time to talk to Y/n. Meanwhile, Y/n is relieved that her foot finally healed.

"Did something happen between the both of you?" Kirsten asked looking up at Y/n, Jam Republic is sitting at their seats at the main battle set.

"Nothing, why?" Y/n replied.

"Don't lie to us, Bada keeps on trying to approach you yet you always avoid her." Audrey said.

"You're too young to understand adult talk." Y/n pinched Audrey's cheek.

"We just got busy because the K-Pop mission is around the corner." Y/n lied.

"Is it just me or Bada is a little pale than usual." Ling said making Y/n looked towards BEBE. Bada is looking down but you can see that her lips is so pale.

"How many weeks do we have until the K-Pop mission?" Y/n asked still looking at her lover.

"3 weeks." Kirsten answered.

One week later, Jam Republic are practicing their cheography for the upcoming mission when the door got slammed open.

"Y/n unnie, please follow me! It's about Bada unnie!" Lusher said panicking. Kirsten gave Y/n a nod and Y/n followed Lusher through the door.

"What happened to her?" Y/n asked.

"Bada unnie already has a fever since last week but she insisted on continuing to practice. It got worsened when she decided to practice everyday." Lusher stopped walking, making Y/n do the same also.

"I don't know what happened between the two of you but it greatly affects Bada unnie. I already considered our leader as my sister, please take care of her." Lusher and Y/n continues to walk towards the BEBE's hideout.

"I'll give you both some privacy." Lusher said and walk way. Y/n pursed her lips still unsure on what she's do when she faced Bada. Y/n stayed at Kisten's apartment throughout the days they both haven't talked to each other. Y/n opened the door and saw Bada laying on the couch with a banner covering her face.

"Lusher, I said I don't need medicine." Bada said with a husky voice.

"Looks like you need one." Bada quickly removed the banner when she heard her lover's voice. When she confirmed it's Y/n, she puts back the banner on her face.

"If I knew that me being sick will be the reason for you to talk to me again, I would've done it earlier." Bada said. Y/n approached Bada and sat on the chair near the couch.

"Will you finally tell me the reason why you didn't talk to me and didn't even come home in the past weeks?" Bada asked.

"I'm sorry." Y/n whispered but enough for Bada to her.

"You know, your sorrys are lame." Bada replied while sitting up. Y/n sighed and began to tell her true feelings to Bada.

"You have a personality that doesn't care about other people's opinion, I don't have that. It only makes me insecure that you and I's reputation are so different." Bada stared at her and sighed.

"Come here." Bada pulled her to strangle on her lap.

"Idiot, you're sick-"

"I don't care- Our reputation has nothing to do with both of us loving each other. They can talk bad about us but what do they know about us? Nothing right." Y/n looked down, processing the words.

"It's so easy for you to ignore them." Y/n whispered.

"It's because I mainly focus on you. They do not own my body. That's why I told you last time to not let it affect you." Bada explained.

"I don't want this to happen again, understood?" Y/n nodded with tears in her eyes that threatening to fall. Bada pulled her head and hugged her. Y/n hugged her back with the same emotions.

"I'm sorry... I'm sorry... I didn't mean to hurt you..." Y/n whispered while sobbing on Bada's neck with Bada shushing her.

"Come home to me and everything will fall back to its rightful place." Bada whispered, kissing Y/n's temple.

[dontexpectmuch]

“hello, i am jude bellingham and today i will be interviewing my partner in crime, the love of my life, the straw to my berry, the-“ judes long and exaggerated introduction was interrupted by you, who was sitting next to him on the couch, “don’t overdo it, bellingham.” rolling your eyes and trying to hold back your smile, you lightly hit his shoulder, thus, a smile creeping on his lips.

“right.” he clears his throat, “sorry, darlin’”, shortly looking at you, jude leans closer and softly headbutts you, like a cat would to show its affection to someone.

“today, jude has the opportunity to ask me anything he always has wanted to know.” you continue to explain, not fighting back the smile on your lips anymore.

“this is brought to you by 1&1.” he quickly adds, before looking down at the questions he wrote on the card in his hands .

after dating for one and a half year, your relationship finally public, judes football club, bvb, asked if you two wanted to do a couples video, the football club known for always doing something to bring footballer and fans closer together.

jude was really excited, he finally had an excuse to ask you everything he never really got a clear answer to, while your leg was shaking, nervous from what your boyfriend would ask.

“okay, love.” jude begins, quickly adding, “be honest, though.”

“promise.” you replied, looking at his face as he smirks.

well, fuck.

“wait!” you cut him off before he had even started, “why is he the only one asking me something? what about me?” you look at the people behind the camera, all of them looking at you with an apologetic smile.

“it was judes idea.” daniel, the video director answered.

“judeth.” narrowing your eyes, you look at your boyfriend, him not being sorry at all.

instead of saying anything, jude decides to begin with the first question, “who, besides me, is your football crush?”

“pedri gonzalez.” you answer without any hesitation.

jude, thinking you wouldn’t say a name, looked at you with shock writing over his face. “that was fu- i mean, really fast, babe, like, straight out.”

“you wanted me to answer honestly.”

“i thought i was your football crush?” he, being the oh so well-known drama queen he was, placed his hand on top of his heart, eyes wide.

“well, you can’t be my crush now, can you? you’re my boyfriend.” is all you say, shrugging with your shoulders. “i have thing for spanish men, like, have you seen him?”

“moving on!” jude tries to change the topic as fast as he could, “we will talk about this later, though.” he mumbled under his breath.

“pardon?”

“what would be a break up reason for you?” he asks, putting the question sheet down, legs crossed and upper body turned to you.

“you mean, like, with you? or in general?” you ask, head angled to the left, as you look at his face.

“in general.”

“easy,” you start, sitting up properly and facing the camera to explain everything, “i really like the movie trilogy ‘how to train your dragon.’ like, so much, i can’t even explain it, you just have to put it on whenever i have a bad day and i immediately feel better. but, if the person i’m dating says something like, ‘oh, ew why would you watch this blablabla.’ i’d immediately leave them, i don’t care.” your face was serious, eyebrows knitted together.

“nah, for real.” jude nods, agreeing with you, “that film is an absolute banger.”

“i know, right!” you know turn to face him, happy that your boyfriend seems to enjoy the films just like you do.

“but that’s a child movie.” someone behind the camera voices out, causing yours and judes head immediately to snap to the direction the voice came from, offended looks painted on your faces.

“take it back!” you exclaim.

“for real, i even cried when i saw that scene in the last part.” jude quickly comes to your aim, his hand sneaking behind your waist to draw faint shapes on your hip/waist area.

hearing him say that made you giggle, leaning against his side and putting your elbow on his knee.

and it is true, you guys really were partners in crime, he was the apple to your pie, the smoke to your high.

—————————————

hiccup could like, get it fr

[writingsfromhome]

If you Love Something

A/N: this has been an idea sitting in my drafts for a while. You and Harry had a brief but intense relationship as teenagers, were forced to make a serious decision then, and it’s aftereffects have lingered for the rest of your lives. It deals with some heavier topics so read with caution (alcoholism, depression, unwanted pregnancy etc). I’d describe it as sad but hopeful.

Part 2

—————————————

Age 17.

It started in secret. We’d found each other on the roof of a house party. Truth be told, I saw him sneak out of the window where people were crowded around the TV watching some controversial music video I hadn’t heard about. And I’d followed.

I knew who Harry was. Had him in English, Maths, and Biology last year. He was well spoken, thoughtful, and silly. I never spoke to him once though. Only admired him from afar.

Tonight I had my first drink and then another. I was feeling buzzed and despite being painfully shy for most of the time I’d known everyone here, I was suddenly gripped by the realization that we were approaching the last year we would all be together. Why had I waited this long to pursue someone I thought was cute?

I snuck out after him, when my friends weren’t looking. I even tilted the window more closed than usual so no one would suspect anything; I had the attic room at home so I knew how to maneuver the angled roof to get comfortable.

“You need any help?” Harry’s voice is clear in the silence.

“I’m alright.” I stand up to peer at him. He’s climbed near the top.

“Sure? You don’t seem steady.”

“Oh I’m steady,” I prove it to him by climbing up to where he was. “See?”

“I’m mistaken. My bad.” He holds out a hand to help me sit beside him and the night sky flashes brighter for an instant when I grasp his hand. My stomach is in knots.

“Harry. Styles.” I don’t know why I say his full name but I was nervous.

He repeats my full name back to me. I don’t know why I’m surprised he knows it. It’s not like we went to a big school.

“What brings you out here?”

I try to be bold about it, “You?”

“Party was getting too much.” He says. I stare at him in confusion while he complains about something his friends had gotten up to.

I replay my answer and realized it sounded like I’d skipped answering his question and asked the question back. Bugger.

“You know my name.” I interrupt him, forgetting he was telling me a story. Awkward.

“Yeah? Of course I do.”

“We’ve never talked.”

“We talked. Once in Maths. We had to grade each other’s answers.”

Oh yeah. I burn when I remember the 4/10 he’d given me with a smiley face saying that maths was masochistic.

“Barely.”

“I know you though,” he says with a softness that makes my heart stutter.

“Do you?” I look to him, resting my chin on my shoulder. He gazes down at me and I swear I could taste the colours around us.

His eyes draw me deeper as he inches closer. Was he going to kiss me? Oh my god.

I look back out to the roof and he jerks away. Omg.

“I do.”

“Oh,” I don’t know what to do after that awkward moment.

“I know you’re really quiet and shy but your smile is so loud you can see it from across the room.” He says and my breath catches as he continues. “You’re yourself with your friends, you really like Harry Potter and field hockey. You would kill Mal Adams if you could get away with it and you hate Maths just as much as you love art. You’re dating Oli Graves but your smile is only ever shining half as bright when you’re around him. Can I go on?”

I stop breathing completely halfway through his declaration of knowing me. All this time I had my eye on him, I didn’t know he was watching me too.

“I didn’t ask you for your opinion on my relationship.”

“You didn’t. I didn’t give you one either.”

I glare at him. He was right. He smiles knowing he was. I’m mad that I’m not mad at him. That he was right.

“What are you doing with a guy like that?”

Oli and I had been dating for 7 months now. He was loud and fun in a way I wish I could be. That’s why I liked him so much. That’s why I was at a party like this to begin with.

“He’s a good guy.”

“That’s all?” He asks. I look over but he’s looking up at the sky. I follow his gaze and get lost in the great expanse of nighttime.

“I think you deserve someone who sees you. Don’t you?”

“Did Ally see you?” I ask with a hint of aggression I didn’t mean to have.

“Ally and I broke up during Easter. So there’s your answer.” He’s unbothered.

“Well what do you want?” I ask.

“Right now? Or in life?”

I shrug. “Both?”

“I want to explore the world and meet all kinds of people. I wanna make the world a better place by being in it. It’s cheesy as shit so if you ever said I said this I’ll deny it and you’ll look like-“

“My lips are sealed.” I turn his way to promise him that. It makes me laugh at how serious he looks saying it all and when I do his face relaxes.

“You laugh is nice too. I forgot to mention that.”

That quiets me very quickly.

“And right now,” he continues. “I’d really like to kiss you.”

My ears ring. Did I hear him right? Could you get so drunk you hallucinate? I swear the cold air had sobered me-

“Did you hear what I said?” Harry’s moved in closer to me. Did I? I don’t know.

“What d-“

“I’d like to kiss you.”

I nod, afraid to talk and realize I’d hallucinated him saying that.

The world melts away when he kisses me. It’s tender, nothing like Oli and his jagged pushy kissing. In the nighttime air it’s warm, and soft, and easy.

“I know you,” Harry says when we part. I’d nearly climbed into his lap and I try to edge away, embarrassed, but he keeps a hand firm on my thigh.

“I know you too Harry,” I breathe. He smiles and it crinkles his luscious eyes.

I think I was falling.

***

We keep it a secret after I break up with Oli. For months, until mid-August when I invite him over for dinner after my mom insists on meeting “the boy I was all doe-eyed over”. The night with my family goes so well—Harry is the picture of a courteous gentleman that even my sister is swayed by him despite saying boys were gross. I ask him to hang out, in public, the next day. He doesn’t hesitate to say yes.

That’s what I love about Harry—yes love. He’s not pushy, he lets me go at my own pace. He respects me and sees me for everything I am and loves me anyway. I wanted to spend my whole life with him.

It was so intense and relaxed at the same time. It felt like no relationship I’d been in before. I felt different being with him, even my friends noticed.

When final year started, Harry and I were official but we didn’t flaunt it. We didn’t need to. My friends knew about us and they were happy for us, they told me I was more me. Whatever that meant.

Life was phenomenal and I was living in a dusky haze. Nothing could touch us.

Until one day in February. I was out with my sister, mum didn’t want to take her out and since I recently got my driver’s license with plenty of lessons from Harry, I was driving her to the mall. She needed Valentine’s Day cards.

“I thought you said love is stupid.” I remind her on the way.

“It is.”

“So why the hell am I driving you to buy cards for a made up holiday?”

“Because!” She crosses her arms and stares out the window. I flick her arm at a red light.

“You have a crush.”

“I do not!”

“Do too. Who is it? James? Mattie? Hamid?”

“Ew! They’re freaks.” My sister continues staring out the window.

“Why do you want to buy cards so bad!?”

“I just want them! For my friends!”

“Okay then,” I didn’t believe her. But I couldn’t bring her home crying or mum would ground me.

A lot of places have slim pickings. Wandering the aisle of Waterstones I catch sight of a family friend. She was my dad’s uni friend’s daughter, a few years older than me but by the time I got to secondary she had dropped out after getting pregnant. I remember the buzz when everyone found out.

I avoid her and find an aisle to occupy myself.

Harry and I were always careful, mum had already given me the talk and he never pressured me to do anything I didn’t. I imagine Harry as a dad. He would make a good one I think.

As one thought leads to another I go cold as I realize something. My last period was during the holidays.

I feel like I’m walking in a swarm of locusts as I walk to the edge of the aisle, scanning for my sister. Maybe I can pop into a pharmacy before she’s done. Maybe…

This was crazy. It was probably just a missed period.

But if it isn’t, another voice asks. I felt it in my gut. I had to do this.

I don’t remember getting home. I don’t remember anything about the rest of that day except two faint lines, and then two faint lines again, and a third time. I fall asleep before dinner that night and shut the world out.

***

“I know something’s wrong.” Harry’s walking me home after school. It’s Valentine’s Day and he’d been nothing but sweet. He bought me chocolates, flowers, and we planned to cook dinner together after school. I had bought him chocolates too, and had written him a heartfelt note with a bunch of photos of us weeks ago. The box was in my room, waiting for tonight. “Do you not like the flowers? Or is it dinner? We can go out somewhere instead?”

“No everything’s lovely.” I’d never heard Harry this desperate before. It gets under my skin even though part of me knows that’s not really it. But having him hover over me all week trying to figure out what was wrong was too much.

I’d spent every night this week with a hand over my belly. Thinking about it. I hadn’t told anyone. I didn’t know what I wanted to do. All I can think of was Jenny and I didn’t want that life. I couldn’t. I couldn’t be a mother.

“Please. What’s the matter.” Harry asks again, tugging at my hands but I pull them away.

“I just need some space!” I shout and he flinches. “I’m sorry Harry. I just need space right now.”

“Right now like…” he scratches his head. “I don’t get you. It’s Valentine’s Day, we’ve been talking about this day for weeks what do you mean you want space?”

“I can’t do this right now. Please.”

“Are you-are we…”

“I’m not breaking up with you.” I look at Harry with tears in my eyes, I didn’t want to cry out here. But every time I look at him I remember the reality. What’s growing inside me. I can’t take it. “I just can’t do today.”

I go inside my house. Leave him without further explanation. I feel awful, I can’t hold the tears in long enough to get to my room.

***

“Hey love?” My mum and dad knock on my door at half past 5. I lay in the dark, having cried myself dry. “We’re worried about you. Can we talk.”

“I can’t.” I say, voice stuffy.

“I thought you and that boyfriend of yours had plans,” dad says. He liked Harry but he rarely called him by his name. “Did something happen?”

“No!” I wanted them to leave me alone. “I just. I had to cancel. I’m fine.”

“Don’t sound fine to me love,” I feel the mattress dip as mum sits down. Dad strokes my hair. They whisper something I can’t hear and a pair of footsteps pad out of my room.

“Mum just leave me alone.” I try again.

“I’m not.” She pushes me further into my bed and leans down, tugging my blanket down. When I finally look at her she smiles kindly and kisses my forehead. That fills me up enough to start wailing again. “Oh love, what’s wrong?”

“Everything!” I sob into my blanket. Mom lays down beside me and I let myself be cradled like a child. God, I had a child. This was so fucked.

“Talk to me. We can figure it out together.”

I don’t know how my parents would react. They were never particularly strict, especially after what happened with Jenny I remember them always being sympathetic. We even visited her in hospital with a gift.

Mum strokes my hair and whispers that it’ll be okay. Slowly my sobbing eases into light sniffles. I had to tell her. She would know what to do. And if she hated me for it, I would just have to deal with it.

“Mum don’t be mad-“

“I won’t honey I-“

“No. Mum.” I cut her off. She moves back on the pillow so she can see my whole face, moving a strand of hair so I couldn’t hide. “Something…messed up. Happened. And…I was careful. We were always careful I don’t know what happened but I-“

I watch her face changed. Like she knew. She knew what was coming but she waits patiently as I muster up the courage to say the words that felt too real once I said them.

“Mum I’m…I’m pregnant.”

Her eyes fill with tears and she bites her lip. What was she thinking? Was she crying for me or with me? Why wasn’t she saying anything!?

“Mum-“

“C’mere.” She wraps me in her embrace again and kisses the top of my head. My body feels drained and limp. I finally told somebody. It was real. This living thing inside of me was real.

“What happened?” She asks next. And I tell her what I think happened. When. How I found out. She listens, holding my hand in hers. When I’m done and it’s poured out of me she smiles supportively. “This isn’t a bad thing okay? It’s okay. Any decision you make is up to you. I’ll talk to your dad but just know you call the shots okay? I love you.”

This is what carries me. The love.

She asks me it I told Harry yet and I tell her the truth. She urges me to tell him. I tell her I wanted to so bad but I was scared.

She leaves shortly after that, I hear her talking softly outside my room. Nobody calls me for dinner until 7, a soft knock on my door. My sister would never be so soft, I assume it’s dad so I tell him to come in. I was scared to face him.

It’s Harry instead.

“Harry!” I cover my splotchy face with my blanket, why was he here? Did mum invite him? This was soo embarrassing.

My heart pounds and Harry is silent until he takes a seat where mum had previously been.

“I came over, your mum invited me. She explained.”

She did what? For a moment I feel betrayed.

“She said you weren’t doing so well. Stressed? I could make you some tea if you’d like. But I told you y/n, you’ll get into unis. You don’t have to worry so…”

I sigh. Mum had told him a half-truth. But he had come. Of course he had.

I couldn’t even think about uni right now because that lead me down a road of what if I couldn’t go because I had a baby. And that life felt so bleak it made me depressed.

“Harry.” I inch my blanket down a little and his eyes go round when he looks at me.

“You look…awful.”

“I know.” I cover my face with my hair but he brushes it away and kisses my forehead.

“No. I’m worried about you. I brought dinner-“

“Oh Harry.” I spot the bag he brought with him.

“I made it all for us. With my mum’s help but mostly me. I packed it to bring to you.”

I didn’t deserve him. And I had to tell him. And he was going to break up with me. What high school boy wanted a child?

“Harry it’s not uni.” I close my eyes and take a deep breath. I was carrying another living thing. It was the size of a seed but I was carrying it inside me. Like a living breathing pot. I was a potted plant.

“Then what is it?” His brows crinkle. “Is it us?”

“No!” I rush to tell him. “I…I don’t know how to say this. And I don’t know how you’re going to react but it’s okay either way.”

“What are you talking about?” His hands slide up my lap. “What is it?”

“Harry. I’m um, I’m pregnant.”

I watch him freeze and stay exactly how he is, his brows pinch ever so slightly. I knew this look. He looked still on the outside but his mind was racing. And I was scared what was racing through it.

“Pregnant?”

“Yeah. From…the holidays.”

“How did-I thought we-“

“I guess it’s not foolproof.” I whisper. Mum had told me to go on the pill, and I hadn’t listened because all my friends told me it made them gain weight. If only I had listened. Now I was gaining weight anyway.

“What are we going to do?” He asks next. And I never realized six little words could weigh the world. If I could cut those words out and surgically implant them into my heart I would. Just to remind me the equal parts relieved and comforted they made me.

I hold his face in my hands, new tears springing to my eyes. He was in this. With me.

He kisses me and pulls me into a hug. I cry into his shirt again and he holds me so tight I swear I could break.

“I don’t know if I can keep it Harry,” I finally whisper to him.

His hands fist in my shirt, he holds his breath and after a long minute he lets me go with it.

“Okay.”

“Okay?” Was he really okay with all this?

“It’s…I can’t make you keep it.”

“You’d want to keep it?” I couldn’t believe it.

“It’s…” he swallows his sentence and keeps his gaze on my stomach. I tug his hand and lay it over it. When his eyes meet mine I see a hint of heartbreak. We were going to break our hearts either way I think.

Not once did I think he might want to keep it.

“It’s okay.” Harry finally says. “We’re so young right? How would we keep a baby and go to school, and do everything we always talk about?”

“Yeah I don’t…I don’t know.”

“I love you.” He says with such a sudden passion. I wrap my arms around his and return the sentiment.

Eventually we lay down and just talk about everything. Truthfully, my head was telling me not to keep the baby but everything else felt dead thinking about it.

Maybe that’s why it took me until April to finally make a decision. It was the size of a plum by then, and a tiny bump was starting to show but only when I stood naked in front of the mirror. With clothes on, nobody was the wiser. But the longer I kept it, I think the more Harry fell in love with it. The idea of it.

We have a long talk during our Easter holiday. We talked in my bedroom until the sun comes up. I tell him I was sure of my decision.

I’d gotten accepted to Cambridge by then. Harry was staying in London. We knew it wasn’t feasible. To live the life we always wanted, we had to get rid of this new life we never knew could happen.

I don’t know why but I don’t tell him the day I go to do it. I go with my mum. Mum drops my sister off at school—she didn’t know. Mum said she had a big mouth.

We drive in silence. When we park mum asks how I feel.

“Sad.” It was the truth. I knew this was right. But it felt like shite.

“Yeah.” She rubs my hands. “Want to go in?”

“I just want to sit here for a bit.” I tell her.

“Okay. I’ll go sign you in.”

She takes my purse and hers and leaves me there. I take the moment to ground myself. Say goodbye to the other future.

When mum knocks on my window I jump.

“Yn? Is everything alright?”

“Yeah yeah I’m coming in.” I open the door.

“You know you’ve been sitting here half hour?”

I pause, one leg out the door and one still in. “I…I must have got lost in my head. Sorry mum-“

“Look. Do you want to do this?”

“I don’t know…I have to.”

“There are other options love-“

“But how can I give it up and live my whole life like that?”

“We can help raise her. You can go on and live your life-“

“I’d be a horrible mother.” Mum and I had this row so many times before. It always ended in me storming away but I couldn’t here.

“You don’t need to make the decision today.”

“But I do.” I tell her. “Otherwise it’ll drive me insane.”

I tuck both feet back into the car and rest my hand on my belly. I’d allowed myself to do that only in my room, when I was alone. Doing it out here made it feel even more real. Suddenly I couldn’t imagine going through with the decision.

“I can’t do this.” I tell my mum.

She smooths my hair down and kisses my temple. My door closes and a few seconds later she climbs in beside me.

“Think about it.”

“I can’t. But I can’t keep it either.”

“Okay.” Mum pulls me into her and I think I should cry but I can’t. I’m calm, maybe I know I’d made the right decision. Or just a decision. I was going to stick to this.

“I can’t raise it. I’m just a child I…maybe someone out there wants a baby and can’t have one maybe-“

“I’ll look into it for you.” Mum promises. “You set the rules remember?”

And that’s how it goes. Mum looks into it, we decide to go for adoption. We go to the hospital on the first warm day of the year. By then I’d taken to wearing jumpers over flowy dresses and been thankful for the first time in my life that I wasn’t skinny like other girls. At most angles you couldn’t tell my belly was so perfectly round.

By then too, Harry had accepted the decision. He seemed relieved. Thinking aloud he’d said maybe he could raise it, but quickly turned around when I asked him what he’d do about uni.

“Someone out there can take care of it better than us. Someone will love the baby like we do.”

During the summer, I tell all my friends I was staying with family in midlands. And I do go up there, that’s where the couple who was adopting lived. Harry and I meet them with my mum and his. It’s awkward, we run out of conversation fast. But their house is big and they already have a 2 year old from an adoption last year. My baby was going to be loved here. And have a sibling.

“We did want to discuss one last thing,” they’d said before we left. We all listen intently. “We…find it best when it’s a no contact adoption. We’ve had a lot of friends who keep contact open and it gets messy-“

“What?” I hadn’t really thought about this until now. Hearing I’d have to give the baby up and go on like it didn’t exist felt wrong. Harry’s hand slips into mine.

“This is typical,” Harry’s mum says from his side. “Let’s hear it out.”

“Right. So just to prevent future complications, we do no contact. Of course when baby’s older and wants to seek out the real parents we can’t stop them. But until then…”

“Thank you.” My mum steps in when it goes silent. I could hardly wrap my head around what they were saying. When it gets older?

Pretty soon mum is ushering me out and Harry’s hand is still clutching mine. We don’t let go until we reach my Uncle’s where we were staying until August. The baby was due in September. I was going to miss the first week of class.

“I can’t do this.” I tell them later. “How can we just have no contact.”

“I thought you knew.” Mum says. “I explained that some parents want this when they adopt.”

She might have. Ever since I hit the third trimester like my doctor said, I’ve had a hard time listening and understanding what someone was saying after they spoke too long. I was glad school was done—for obvious reasons, but also for not having to sit in a class and learn.

“We have no other choice.” Harry says from beside me. He rubs my back and slowly, I zone back into the conversation. “We can find another family but they might want the same thing.”

“What if the baby never looks for us?” I turn to him, our heads press against the other’s. “What if we go our whole lives just wondering?”

“What’s the other option?” Harry whispers. He was right. I just didn’t want to get it.

Acceptance slowly creeps into me over the course of the summer. It was always hot carrying another person around, I was always hungry and thirsty, and very cranky. Harry came up to see me every other weekend when he could, mum stayed with me and that summer was one I could never forget.

It was September 1st, a particularly hot day. Rain fell in the afternoon and by the time the unforgiving sun set, the cool air was heavenly.

I sat by the bedroom window, moisturizing my belly like mum had shown me, talking to the baby. I wrote it a letter last week all about me, that I loved them and hoped the best for them. I told the baby about my family, how Harry and I met, and then I sealed it in an envelope with a picture of Harry and me. It was taken last Halloween when we’d both dressed up as each other. I tell mum to give it to the new parents. In case the day came the baby wondered about who we were.

As I spoke softly, I felt a gush of something wet down my leg.

“What?” I stand up, confused. “I…”

It takes me a second. I was going into labour.

“Mum!” I shout. “Mum! Come here!”

She rushes in and confirms it. It was happening.

“But it’s supposed to be next week!” I try not to panic but that’s all I can do as mum grabs our things and my aunt rushes to the car. “Does this mean something’s wrong? Is the baby o-“

I freeze as a contraction forces me to fold. I’d felt the kicking and the nausea and everything in between but these. These were a bitch.

Somehow we make it to hospital. Somehow I lay on a bed and push when the doctor tells me to. I nearly pass out. I just wanted Harry here with me. He didn’t know his kid was being born.

With a final push that felt like I was ascending my body and leaving it behind, I hear a wail and I cry. The baby was out, they cried and everything was okay.

“Okay congratulations mummy,” a nurse crouches down to me. “We’re going to clean you and baby up. She’s healthy and looks okay.”

“What?” I can barely see with my hair in my face and the nurses around me. It was a she? I had a baby girl?

We were never told the gender, so we wouldn’t get attached. But I had a baby girl. The nurse just called me mum.

I feel the tears on my cheeks, I was crying too. I try to look around me but a new nurse is talking in hushed voices to the doctor.

“…outside…call…adoption…shouldn’t or….contact-“

“What’s going on?” I can barely get the words out. “What?”

“Oh my love,” suddenly mum’s in the room and things are a bit better. A bit better.

“Mum what’s going on?”

“The baby’s born. The parents are outside they’re going to meet her soon.”

“What?” I look at mum’s face and it’s shining with tears. Why was she crying?

“Oh she’s beautiful love, she’s perfect. But your job’s done now. You should rest.”

“Mum,” I cry. “Where is she? Can’t I hold her?”

“No love,” mum moves my hair out of my face. I feel something break in half inside of me. I couldn’t even hold the baby? The baby girl? Mine and Harry’s baby girl?

“Why? Mum why? I just want to see her-“

“I’m sorry,” mum says through tears. “It’s just the way it is. She’s going to a loving home okay? She’s good. You’re okay.”

I can’t stop crying. I was going to lose her last April and I stopped that but I lost her anyway. My baby, I was never going to see her.

I remember when my sister was born. I was 5 and I was angry she’d taken the attention away. But when I saw her with her perfect toes and angel face I was obsessed with her. I even remember her first steps, she’d taken them at a park with mum and dad and me together. I was never going to know these things about my own baby. I was never going to know her.

I must pass out soon after. I remember waking up to the nurses instructing me about something. I’m half asleep and barely remember what I did when I get up. When I do wake it’s morning and there’s a figure on the chair beside me.

“You’re up.”

Harry. Relief washes over me knowing he’s here.

“Harry they took her,” I tell him.

“I know. I know yn.”

I move aside and he crawls into bed with me. I must look disgusting but he watches me with love brimming in his eyes. I can tell he’s been crying.

“I feel empty,” I whisper. Like someone had carved me out like a pumpkin. Something I’d had with me all year was gone. “How can I just move on? Start uni and all that when I…they just took her.”

“I keep thinking that.” Harry says. “Khalil invited me to a party to meet some blokes from uni and I just sat in my car the whole time. I couldn’t even go in. She…she was never going to be ours.”

“I feel awful.” I burrow into his neck as he strokes my hair. “A baby girl.”

“A baby girl,” Harry echoes.

***

I head to uni a week later. My body still feels like it fought a war and lost. It’s like it still thinks there’s a baby there. I produce milk for a few days, continue to have contractions, my belly is saggier than usual and I can’t stop crying about everything.

My dad drops me off to uni. He tells me he was proud of me, that I was always his baby girl. I cry then just like I cried at home when I said bye to mum, or when my sister hugged me which she never does. I can’t stop crying.

When I move into my dorm I feel like a completely different person than I thought I was going to be. My dormmate fills me in on everything she’s learned, complains about a boy and a party and it just feels so irrelevant to me. Did I used to care about those things? I had a baby. And now I didn’t.

By October, Harry and I are in different worlds. We hadn’t broken up but we talk weekly. Each week there’s less to talk about. When I visit home in October, being around him just makes me sad. He tries to cheer me up, make it like old times, but I know he’s hurting inside too.

I decide to do the breaking up. And at first he’s angry, insisting we could make it work. He actually refuses and walks away. We don’t talk for a whole day.

But at a house party in South where his uni mates were from, he accepts the end.

Through tears we kiss each other one final time, we whisper sweet nothings, we pour into each other all the hopes and wishes we had for each other.

When he hugs me for the last time I leave something behind. It’s similar to waking up the morning after my delivery and knowing something was gone. I really feel the shape of the loss. It sits in my sternum, a hole that grows smaller with time, but not just yet.

I fall into a depressed state for most of my first semester but my dormmate doesn’t give up on me and eventually I go to my first uni party. Eventually my brain fog clears and I actually go to all my classes. Eventually my life, on the outside, looks like it could be back to normal but inside I ache with the loss. So much that it becomes part of me. I don’t know where it ends, and I begin. It lives in me.

Age 23.

“The first of many hey?” Mal clinks his bottle to mine. I barely knew Mal but we were both friends with Khalil and therefore both at his stag.

“Before you know it we’re all going down,” one of Khalil’s friends joins in. “Stag after stag, suit after suit, it’s gonna be a blur man.”

“Let’s enjoy it while we can!” Someone cheers and everyone raises their beers. I toast with a smile; blokes loved to act like being in a relationship was the last thing they wanted when I knew most of them were mush in their girlfriend’s hands.

I also smile knowing I bought an engagement ring a few weeks back. I wanted to propose to Shannon, we met on her 22 when a friend invited me along. I couldn’t keep my eyes off the birthday girl. We’d been together since.

“Who do you think’s next?” The bets start going and nobody bets on me. Everyone always thought Shan was too good for me, they were counting on us breaking up. I was going to prove them all wrong.

The night gets sloppier until we all head back to the air bnb we’d rented for this. Tomorrow we were all supposed to go play golf like we were cosplaying old money bastards when we all knew we were just broke blokes from East. But I guaranteed they’d all be too hungover. We would get to the club and just drink the hangovers away.

And I’m right. I update Shan that I’m right when the boys stay in the dining area of the club. They decide on lunch and I step out to talk to my girlfriend.

“No birds allowed this weekend,” someone pipes in when I excuse myself.

“That’s just cuz you’re miserable Eli.” I brush past as the boys laugh. At me. And him.

I catch up with Shan. It was a bright day for September and I stay a little longer after the phone ends. Shan was in med school, she was always stressed or sleep deprived. I tried to support her the best I could—right now she needed moral support that she was going to get an internship she was applying for.

“Mummy doesn’t like when I have sweets,” a small voice says to my left. I look at a father with his daughter. He’s crouched down zipping her sweater up while she rambles on.

“Well it’s going to be our secret.” The dad says. “Sundays are for sweets aren’t they?”

“I love sweets.” She responds.

The father catches my eye and I shoot him a smile.

“Her mum’s going to hear every detail when we get home,” he says as he stands. “Can’t keep a secret to save her life.”

I laugh. The way she was rambling on, I didn’t think so. “How old’s she?”

“6.” He says, smiling down at her fondly. My heart aches.

“Almost 7.” She corrects her dad.

“Birthday’s in the spring.” He says more to me. “But almost 7 sure.”

I see them leave with one more shared smile, like we’re in on something. I imagine that’s how it would feel to be a parent. Always knowing something your kid doesn’t.

My daughter was 6. Wherever she was.

Thinking about the daughter I never had, the girl I lost always leaves me a little winded. Today’s no different.

Yn and I both made an agreement and it had been the hardest thing I’d done. Letting her go. It took me a proper year to even think about moving on.

I liked to think about yn, doing everything she wanted to do. But when I thought about the baby I spiralled into a dark pit. Sometimes when I drank too much, it pulled me in too deep to get out of. That’s what Shan liked to call my depressive drinking. She’s limited me to 3 drinks since.

Before I go in I take a minute to think about yn, where she might be. I hear from friends in high school random facts about her life. But I wonder how she’s doing. If she thinks about our baby like I do. How life would have been if I’d been here, calling her on the phone instead, asking if our baby girl was doing alright.

Age 29.

I stare at the nape of the man in front of me. It couldn’t be, but I’d memorized the back of his head—amongst other things, nearly 2 decades ago and I would bet £1000 I knew who this was. But I continue staring until the cashier rings him up.

In the same voice I remember, the one from my memories and my fantasies, I hear him say: “debit.”

I wait for him to pay before saying, “Harry?”

He turns so quickly he drops his card, wallet, and keys.

“Hi!” I laugh awkwardly and crouch down to help him pick his things up. There’s an awareness that the people in the queue behind me are witness to a moment that feels more intimate than a grocery store chat and it makes me shrink a little in my shell like a spooked turtle.

“Hi I-uh,” Harry short-circuits in front of me as the bored cashier holds his receipt out and stares at him with eyes that have worked one shift too many.

“I’ll just bag-“

“Yeah we can talk later.” I give him what I hope is a reassuring smile but it feels watery. I couldn’t believe of all the places I’d run into him, it was a grocery queue. How intense in such a mundane place.

As I watch my total rise on screen I risk a glance at Harry. His hand hovers over a white reusable bag, I wonder if that was his. Or his wife’s. If they did their weekly shop in a mismatch of bags that looked like that or they were the type of couple to have a set.

His eyes are on me though, somehow here and not here. I feel the same way.

I look back to the cashier asking me how I was paying. She glances between Harry and I. I don’t look back at him. Or the growing queue a few feet away.

I take my groceries—just some items my mum asked me to pick up, and stuff them into the tote I’m wearing. Harry waits for me by the exit.

“Hi.” He says as his eyes scan my face. I do the same, taking in all the ways time had spent with him. It must have been good—he looked good. “I can’t believe-“

“A Whole Foods of all places.” I laugh. A grin splits his face but his eyes stay on me.

“That smile, that laugh. God I’ve missed you.”

“I…missed you too.” How I could miss someone I’d known for one year and then never again for nearly two decades…I didn’t realize it was possible until now.

“Are you busy?” He asks. “Maybe we can grab a drink or?”

“I don’t…drink.” I hated that I had to announce it to people. I was still at the stage where I was figuring out how to say it confidently, or find a way around saying it.

“Oh.” Harry glances down at my belly and I realize he’d misunderstood but it’s too unspoken to correct him. “Cafe?”

“Yeah. That sounds lovely.” Honestly going anywhere with him sounded lovely right now. I wanted to cancel all my plans for the day and just sit with him. Stare at him and catch up. I couldn’t believe he was here.

We walk in a comfortable but waiting silence, like taking a cold drink out to a park with the anticipation it’s going to be good , and no desperation to open it as soon as you get it.

“Usual? Tea?” Harry asks when we step into a nearby cafe. It’s big for a cafe but has enough students working on laptops to not feel empty. I nod, unsure how to feel that Harry still knows what I order at a cafe. Or that my order hasn’t changed since 17.

I find us a booth and pretty soon he’s sliding into the seat across from me. The two of us can’t stop smiling.

“Hi,” he says again.

“Hi…”

“You look good, the same but better.”

“I was going to say the same thing about you!” I exclaim. More smiling.

“How’s…I mean, how are you? How is everything? What-“

“There’s so much to ask-“

“I don’t even know how to ask what I want to know!” Harry laughs and I’m warmed from the inside out at the sound of it.

“This shouldn’t be hard!”

“No.” He scrubs his face. “I’m really buzzing that we’ve run into each other.”

“Me too. It’s a bit unbelievable.”

“I know.” He continues gripping his cup and not taking his eyes off of me. It’s the exact way he used to look at me when we were teenagers. It nearly takes my breath away. “You look good—but I already said that. Sorry.”

“No,” I laugh. “That’s all that’s running through my head.”

“Oh—I remember hearing you were engaged a few years ago-“

“Yeah.” I turn my hand so he can see the ring. “Married now. You?”

“Yeah,” he looks down at his own hand. He had so many rings on I couldn’t tell from a glance. “Coming up to 5 years now.”

“Wow. It’s only 1.5 for me but Tatum and I—my husband, we’d been since uni.”

“Took him a while.”

“Mhm,” it had been a sore subject way back then. Harry says it casually but he studies my face. I know he wants to ask more but he’ll politely maneuver around it.

“Are you happy?”

I let out a breath. “That’s more complicated than anything else you could ask!”

“Is it?”

“Yeah I-“ I shrug. “I don’t know if I am. But I also have no idea what I could do about it. So. There’s that.”

“I’m sorry to hear that.” My stomach curdles with his words. I didn’t want pity, least of all from Harry. Harry. I can’t believe he was here. “I get it though. Everyone says your 30s are even more glorious than your 20s. We’ll see soon enough if they’re right.”

I meet his eye, they always intimidated me to look too long into. Even now, I glance back down at my drink. When I look up again he has a wry smile twisting his lips. He knew.

I was sorry to hear life hadn’t been as good for him. And then I understand, it wasn’t pity he was giving me. He truly was sorry like I.

I thought about Harry often. Of course I did. I liked to imagine him living out his dreams like he always talked about. I liked to imagine him happy and thriving.

“Do you ever think about us?” I have to ask. “If we did it all differently?”

“We would have had a 12 year old with us.”

Hearing him say it feels like someone had taken a screwdriver and opened me up. Raw and exposed. But looking at him I know he thought about her as much as I had. Both of us were apparently mourning a future neither of us had fought for.

“Yeah,” I breathe but I just sound winded.

“We were trying, at one point—Shan and I.” Harry fiddles with his ring. “Did all the tests and the trials and the shite. But no kids. It put a real strain on my relationship. I think we cracked instead of bending. And I don’t think either of us know how to make it right again.”

I grasp his hand and squeeze. “I know what that’s like. It’s hard. I…a couple years ago. I lost a baby. A baby boy. I felt like it was a punishment for-“

“Don’t.”

We hold onto each other, our drinks long forgotten. He holds my hand and it feels like being known again, like I wasn’t such an awful person. That someone could see everything I’ve done and still choose to have love for me.

“I’m sorry.” He tells me.

“Me too.” I bite my lip. With a sigh I let him go and lean back. Here we’d been so excited to bump into each other but we’d both been carrying sorrow and grief. It wasn’t very hopeful.

“So I guess you’re not drinking because you’re-“

“No.” I say, surprisingly without feeling awkward. “I’m just sober right now. Trying to figure out life without a drink.”

“Sounds like torture but I respect that. Sounds hard.”

“It was at first. I like the feeling now of thinking clearly. But I miss a glass of wine I do sometimes.”

We smile at each other.

“So do you live around here?” Harry broaches talking again after both of us had lapsed into silence for a while. I blink away the fog of the past.

“Yeah. You?”

“Nah. Shan’s out of town and I was feeling lonely. Came over to visit my sister. I’m just staying with her for the week.”

“Lucky me then.” I smile.

“Lucky me too.” He smiles back. It’s soft. We’re soft. It felt impossible to me after all this time the tenderness was still the strongest thing between us.

We chat a bit more, much about nothing. What we did for a job, anyone we still kept in touch with from school. Nothing that meant a lot.

“I need to head off now,” I say when my phone buzzes for a second time. “I was on my way to my mum’s. She keeps calling me.”

“Yeah. Don’t want to keep you.” Harry says but he stays seated. So do I.

We continue just studying the other until my phone rings again and I laugh. “It was…I really loved seeing you.”

I slide out and Harry mirrors me. I still come to his chest, he still smells the same and stands the same and looks just as handsome.

“How about uhm, how about dinner some time?” Harry asks. I knew it was coming, it’s still painful saying no.

“I…can’t. I…we can’t just do dinner, can we?”

“No,” Harry bows his head. We had too much history to just do dinner. From what he said—and I knew, both our lives were too complicated to add the allure of each other into the mix. I couldn’t do that to my life as tempted as I was. Especially not sober.

“Yeah.” He stands straight again and gives me space to head to the door. “Good seeing you. Give your mum my best if she doesn’t hate me.”

“She doesn’t.” I assure him. We stand awkwardly not sure if a kiss, a hug, or a wave was appropriate. We settle for a hug.

I remember the last time I was enveloped in his arms, tucked away into his tall frame. When we said goodbye forever, agreed to live our best lives separately. We’d both been too scarred to be anything together. Too much grief.

“Maybe we’ll run into each other again.” Harry smiles at me when we part.

“Maybe,” I say knowing full well I wouldn’t do groceries on the weekend anymore.

With a final wave we both part ways again, this time it doesn’t feel as much like closure.

Age 35.

“Graduation’s graduating, what a mouthful.” I say to Andie. We sit in the parking lot of a local pub back home. Both of us had avoided reunions after going to the first one 10 years ago and being reminded of how much people liked to remind you of who you used to be. But this year Andie found out an old flame was going and single. And this is the first year I saw that Harry had checked off going. So we’d decided to go together.

I could have easily reached out to him. Asked him about meeting up there. But I didn’t want to come across any way. I remember our run-in 6 years ago. We felt the same way—we would do anything for each other, and I didn’t want any affect over him coming. Last I heard he was still in a relationship. Just cuz I was didn’t mean I had to ruin another.

“Okay. We going in?” Andie passes me her flask.

I’d taken to drinking again. Originally I stopped after a particularly bad night when I was 28. It nearly cost me my wedding back then.

I stopped to get sober. To feel what it felt like not to rely on alcohol to keep from feeling my emotions. I had a lot of grief I never processed. And unfortunately being sober, and processing the grief and depression, had ultimately cost me my marriage. But I was better for it. I knew what unconditional love and support was. I didn’t want to settle for someone who only loved me at my best.

Now I felt in control when I drank. I knew when to stop.

“Let’s go!”

“Do you think he’ll remember me?” Andie asks as we walk up to the place.

“You comment on so many of his posts. I think he does.” I tease.

“Gah. It would have saved me so much heartbreak if I just told him back 18 years ago how I felt.”

“Maybe,” I think about my confessed love 18 years ago and the heartbreak that ensued.

“Well at least I would have gotten him outta my system. Oh god I see him-“

“Hi ladies,” we’re stopped near the front and given name tags, making small talk with the girls working the booth. I vaguely remember them from a club but I have to read their name tags to pretend I remembered them at all.

Andie ditches me pretty quickly but I don’t mind. I find some friends I saw a couple times a year. Guess this was the couple time this year.

The whole time my eyes scan the room. People had brought their partners and I wondered if Harry would do the same. Deep down, I prayed he didn’t. I just wanted to see him.

I spot him halfway through the night. He’s leaning against the bar talking to Khalil. I remembered they used to be friends, he was always nice to me while Harry and I dated.

I watch him talk and drink. I lose him for a bit and then catch him leaving. Shite.

I excuse myself and rush out but nearly trip over myself slowing down. He was just outside for a smoke break.

“When did that habit start?” I ask. He nearly jumps out of his skin.

“Fu-y/n you scared me.” He shakes his face dramatically, like he’s getting something off of it. I bite back a smile, he was pretty drunk. “When did you get here? I didn’t know you came to these things?”

“I don’t.” I correct him. I couldn’t tell him I came for him. “It was just the name of this reunion, Graduation’s graduating. How could I pass it up?”

This earns a laugh. Eases the air between us. “Did you see Oli in there? He’s gotten bald.”

“He looks like his dad actually,” I remember his dad was always coming to Oli’s football matches, screaming at his son to run faster.

“Glad you didn’t end up with him?” Harry smirks.

“Oh yeah. I heard last reunion he just kept going up for the karaoke sober. If I want my bloke to embarrass me, at least give him the excuse of being drunk.”

“Shit,” Harry laughs. “I remember that! I remember! Wish I could forget!”

I laugh with him. “Harry you’re getting pretty close to drunk yourself.”

“Ah yeah. More than 3 drinks that, I’m being naughty tonight.”

I scrunch my nose, no idea what he’s talking about.

“I can’t believe you’re here tonight,” Harry says again. “I thought I wasn’t going to see you again for another 12 years after our last time.”

“Thought I’d halve the time.” I watch Harry squash out the butt.

“Glad you did.” He looks at me and I’m 17 again. Why couldn’t we both be single? Why did I come here knowing I couldn’t have him.

Maybe I was as masochistic as the person who invented maths.

“Yn?” A voice calls out to me. “Oi! It is you I thought I was dreaming you up! What a sight!”

I’d been avoiding Oli all night. Not anymore.

I glance at Harry and he hides a smirk. Oli notices Harry then and his face hardens a little.

“Oli! Long time!” I go in for the hug he’s reaching for, unsure why he was so sweaty on an autumn night. “You alright?”

“Yeah,” he grins at me. “You look good! Not a day over 25.”

“Don’t flatter me Oli,” I roll my eyes. “It’s not going to get you anything.”

“I’m not looking! I swear it!” He says earnestly. “I’m just paying you a compliment. It’s good to see you. Hey, I’m actually in a good relationship. Gonna propose to her.”

“Are you? What’s she like?”

I stand in the brisk evening as Oli tells me about his girlfriend. I’m happy for him, what we had in high school wasn’t really a relationship but I never wished him bad. He was a good guy, I was glad he found his person.

I change the subject when he asks about my love life, tell him I was getting cold. We head back in and I tell him I’d catch up to him later. I’d lost Harry and wanted to find him again. I had more I wanted to talk about.

“Khalil,” I interrupt him playing pool. He goes in for a hug and I engage in polite small talk until I tire of it. “I’m looking for Harry.”

“Of course you are,” he wags a finger at me. “I saw him leaving ten minutes ago?”

“Jeez really?” I couldn’t believe I missed him! After coming here just for him. Maybe he had to get home, maybe he had a kid by now. Had to tuck him in.

“He’s not doing so well since the divorce-“

“What?” I stare at Khalil like he’s spoken gibberish. Why hadn’t I heard about that?

“Ehm yeah. He’s pretty private about it.”

“I didn’t know.”

“Yeah. He’s been separated a few years now but he just signed the papers a couple weeks ago. I dunno. He gets kinda depressed around this time of year. Probably the weather.”

It was September. It wasn’t the weather.

I had to find him.

I brush past the people I went to school with. I followed Harry outside to a roof 17 years ago and today I follow him out to find him again. We needed to talk.

I look both ways, hoping for a miracle.

I spot a figure slumped on the far end of the road. I recognize the church, it was where we went every Easter and Christmas growing up.

I walk towards the figure until I can make out the hair. It was Harry. Thank god.

“Why’d you leave?” I ask him when he looks up to my approaching footsteps.

“I drank too much,” he hangs his head again. I sit beside him.

“I heard about the divorce. I’m sorry.”

Harry shrugs. “We separated a while ago. It was coming for a long time.”

“Yeah. Still.” I say.

We sit in silence, the only sound is our breathing and the faint noises from the pub down the road.

“She’s in her last year by now.” I say without further explanation. I know he’d know.

“Our baby’s 17.”

Our baby? I feel choked up. All these years we’d been apart, built our own lives, and there was still an our even when there hadn’t been.

“It’s always been us hasn’t it?” Harry says. “Nobody understands.”

“They couldn’t. We were so young, making such a big decision.”

“Oh y/n.” He leans into me and I wrap my arm around his shoulder. He’s cold, his jacket pooled on the steps around him. I gather it to spread over his shoulder but he stops me. “How much heartbreak can you have in one lifetime?”

I sit, aching for the pain Harry was going through. Knowing it was mirrored in me.

“I’ve had enough for a lifetime. I know that.”

“Me too.” Harry sighs. “I miss you.”

“I’m right here.” I intertwine our hands. They still fit the exact same, all these years later. I examine them, but they looked the same too. I wonder if our baby girl ever looked at her hands, wondered who she inherited them from.

“D’you think she thinks about us?” Harry asks what I’m thinking.

“Maybe.” I say. “I like to think so. I just hope she doesn’t hate us for giving her up.”

“Yeah me too I think…” he hangs his head. I hear him sniffle. Seems like Harry hit the point of drinking where all you could feel is regret. I remember those days. I knew where he was.

When he doesn’t finish his sentence I fill the silence; “Me and Tatum split uh…four years ago now.” I update him. “You probably heard something about it. I remember my mum saying she ran into yours when it was happening. They probably talked all about it.”

I wait for Harry to give confirmation but he stays the way he is.

“I went sober a few years before then. Almost ruined our wedding cuz I was exactly where you were. Unprocessed grief and all I could do was drink about it. I’d given up a baby at 18, then lost a baby a decade later. It feels silly to say out loud, that something that never really came into this world—something the size of a fruit could act like the rock you push up the hill every morning. The grief you fight at your darkest times. How could we be haunted by something that didn’t even exist—not technically. But that’s just the way it was. And that’s the way it had to be when we were 18. I’m not always sure I made the right decision overall but I know it was a decision we had to make at the time. I’ve had to find my peace. So do you Harry.”

“Yeah. I-I have to. Y’know? Sometimes I wonder if I would have made her proud.” Harry sniffles. I had similar thoughts. My throat feels tight remembering. “I don’t think, right now, I would be.”

“She’s so loved. She is so loved Harry. Whatever…wherever she is.”

“I love you.” Harry turns to me. His face is raw with grief and emotion. “Never stopped loving you. But I don’t want to give you this version of me.”

“I’ll take any version of you Harry.” I reassure him. “I think we’ve seen too much of each other to be able to hide anything away.”

He tips forward slowly until his head rests on my chest. I hold him there, just like he’d done for me so many years ago. I tell him the type of thing that meant everything to me back then and I hope it helps him to hear it: “We’ll get through this Harry.”

***

“I don’t remember getting here.”

I look up from my book, Harry stands in my kitchen with a confused look on his face. It was weird seeing him here in my flat. But it was so right too.

“We walked home. I thought you sobered up.”

“Nuh-uh.” He takes a few steps towards me, hesitant.

“Coffee?”

“Maybe I’ll take a shower first?”

“First door on your right. Extra towels in the cupboard.”

“Thanks.”

We look at one another for a beat before he moves back. I make another pot of coffee and clean up from breakfast while he showers.

Next time he walks back in he looks a lot better. Smells nice too.

“Black please.” He says when I hold the coffee up.

I pour him a cup and watch him sip it.

“Thank you for last night.”

“You don’t have to thank me,” I tell him.

“I remember what you said to me. You’re right of course. I think I knew it, I just didn’t have anyone to talk to about it with. Nobody knew about us…”

“You didn’t have to keep it a secret ‘til this day Harry.” I was surprised he had. “You didn’t even tell any of your friends?”

“The only people who knew were my family, a-and Shan. But. Year after year it didn’t mean the same thing to her. I stopped talking to her about it pretty quickly. Think it made it worse because her and I couldn’t actually…”

“Yeah.” I understood.

“But I realized. I think it was losing both of you. I feel like you were taken away too. We just went from being around each other all the time to cold turkey. That was a loss too so…”

“Yeah.” Again, I understood.

“I’m 35. I’ve gotta…get my head on straight.”

I examine him. “Looks okay to me?”

He smiles and puts his cup down.

“I’m sorry to hear about your divorce.”

“Meh that was years ago. Hard then. Fine now. For the best.”

“I agree,” Harry moves around the table to stand where I am. My heart pulses just like it always does around him. He rests a hand on my hip, dragging it up to wrap around my waist. He must feel how hard my heart’s beating. “Did I tell you? That I love you?”

“Maybe?” I feel myself growing more present. The hole that always lived inside of me growing even smaller in this moment. It allows me to settle on the floor better; less air, more weight.

“Well I do. I love you. At 17, or at 35.” He says this with a soft kiss on the corner of my mouth.

“Well. I love you.” I return the kiss, relish in the way his hand grips my tank. “At 17, or 35.”

“Sometimes I wish I held on tighter at 17. But I look at you now and I’m excited to get to know you again.”

His words pour over me like honey. It was sweet we were still on the same page.

“I’m not letting you go this time.” Harry whispers in my ear. He pulls me in tight, swaying from side to side. “I want to spend 41 and 50 with you. I want all of you, every side.”

“Perfect,” I peer up at him. “That’s exactly what I want too.”

“And maybe one day,” he continues in a hush voice. “We’ll get a call from a young girl. She’ll tell us all about her life in a town up north. About a picture she has of her mother dressed like her father and her father dressed like her mother.”

“She’ll tell us she’s had a good life, and she’s thought about the people in the picture. She’d tell us she wants to meet them.”

“We would be able to show her the love we kept for her. Our love’s like a venn diagram, the bit in the middle is just for her. She’d know why she was born in the first place.”

“Closure,” I whisper to him. “We would know closure.”

I remember the day she was taken, how the loss of not even being able to see her felt bigger than the loss of her itself back then.

I think of a 17 year old girl, with green eyes and brown hair. With my smile and Harry’s dimples. My hands, and Harry’s height. She was loved by people, families, that she didn’t even know existed yet.

They say if you love something, let it go. If it’s meant to be it’ll come back.

As Harry and I stay intertwined in the kitchen of my flat, I send out a wish into the universe for her like I did most days. That she was healthy, happy, and one day curious enough to seek us out. That one day, she would come back.

Right now I focus on the man in my arms. The one I never thought I’d get to hold again. For now this was all I needed. I’d loved him, let him go, and after so many years apart, we were back.

[nipuni]

Hello! Time for another blog post! I think my last one was two months ago and a lot has happened since 😊

We have been attending a ton of historical recreation events so I still have many photos to share, hope you don't hate those! It's been really fun! We are exhausted and all out of social battery however so we are taking it easy this month. Another thing that's been happening a lot is that even when we are not dressed in historical clothing we keep getting stopped by strangers on the street because of our everyday outfits, it's been like that for a couple of years now so we are no longer startled or nervous about it but it's happening more and more often now and it's so nice! we always end up chatting about the events we go to and our jobs and hobbies and exchanging contacts or they ask for photos and stuff! people are really kind and excited about it and I still find it so surprising in the best way. We grew up in a very hostile city and environment and that makes you paranoid and cynical so these interactions and response has been healing really. I know their words will stick with us for years to come 😭 Sadly the unbearable heat is starting though so that means our outings for the next three months will be limited to the crack of dawn and after sunset 😞 but at least the summer brings a lot of fruit with it so we can sit at home and eat pineapples and strawberries while we wait for autumn.

My family came to visit a few months ago too and we made them watch most of Doctor Who's season one to four and some of our favourite episodes from all the other seasons lmao. And much to our delight they really enjoyed it!! They both loved Ten the most and my step dad is now in love with Martha 🥰

We have also been watching the current season and it's been so fun keeping up with fandom theories in real time and talking about it and speculating with friends in person, it's the first time we get a chance to do it since we got into the series and we are enjoying it a lot!

We also watched season one of Jessica Jones and we loved David's performance as Kilgrave!! He stole the show for real. Kilgrave is such an incredible villain, one of the best I've seen and DT does such an amazing job portraying every aspect of him. He's detestable and volatile and frighteningly powerful and has such an intimidating terrifying presence in the narrative while also being pathetic and vulnerable and ridiculous and childish and so human with all it's worrying implications. It was just so gripping and I wish he had stayed for the rest of the show honestly!! Now we have to pick our next David Tennant series to watch! 😊

Also!! Dragon Age is back!! AHHH I wanted to thank everyone that commented on my last DA pieces, it has made my month to read the comments, I didn't expect so many people to remember my art or my character after so many years and it's so touching and flattering you have no idea 😭💘 I look forward to making more and sharing them with you all, I'm truly grateful for the kindness you've shown me both back then and now I hope you know.

I feel so spoiled lately with all these franchises that I love releasing new content!! I've never been in these many fandoms at once!! I have so many ideas to draw and keep jumping back and forth between drawings from different shows and games AAAAA it's a good and welcome change honestly, keeps me busy and inspired!

Anyway that's all for now I think! I hope you are doing well and this summer/winter is kind to you all ❤️