#but it feels good to finally get something done after a while

[ggukivrse]

THE ART OF PRETENDING - JJK | 06

summary. when you and jungkook show up to your much anticipated graduation trip and realise neither of you had the guts to tell your friends about your recent break up, there’s only one thing you can do to keep the trip from falling apart: pretend.

but somewhere between fake kisses and real feelings, you start to wonder if letting go was ever the right choice at all.

pairing: jeon jungkook x f!reader

genre/warnings: exes to lovers, fake dating, idiots to lovers, mutual pining, swearing, fluff, angst, arguing :’(, jk’s an asshole in this i’m sorry, (eventual) explicit sexual content, ft. seokjin, namjoon, hoseok, jimin, taehyung, yoongi + four female ocs

word count: 4.6k

notes: okay first of all, i’m SO sorry for the wait. second of all, this chapter was meant to be much longer but i split it into two :< anyways, likes, comments, reblogs, asks and feedback are sooo appreciated!! enjoy (?) reading my angels <33 (and pls don’t hate me </3)

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⤷ chapter six — tv

“and i’ll be in denial for at least a little while / what about the plans we made.”

The kitchen is quiet, only filled by the soft buzz of the fridge and the distant sound of waves. You take a slow sip from your mug, fingers curled around the ceramic.

The coffee's still warm, just the way you like it — strong, slightly bitter, just enough milk to soften the edge. You’d made Jungkook’s the same way you always have. You didn’t even think about it. Just moved through the motions like you’ve done a hundred mornings before.

But that was nearly half an hour ago.

His mug is still sitting on the counter. Steam long gone, surface barely warm. You glance at it for the third — maybe fourth — time, as if expecting it to have vanished. It hasn’t. It’s still there, untouched.

And so is the space beside you.

You haven’t seen him since waking up.

You’d stirred sometime around eight, alone. No arm slung over your waist, no weight shifting the mattress beside you, no sleepy grumble against your shoulder. Just cold sheets and a quiet room. The fan was still spinning overhead lazily, and the only thing on the nightstand that hadn’t been yours was a single bottle of water.

You’d stared at the ceiling for a few minutes after that.

It would’ve been easier if you hadn’t let yourself get used to waking up like that again. If you hadn’t let it feel like something.

But you did, because you always do, with him. Even now.

So when you eventually got out of bed, you made two cups of coffee. One for you. One for him.

You tell yourself it was just habit. But that’s only half-true.

Because the other half — the part you don’t say out loud — is that you were kind of hoping he’d show up.

That you could sit across from him, trade casual conversation, build your way back into something steady enough to finally ask the things you’ve been swallowing down since the breakup. Finally ask the things you wanted to ignore last night when you kissed him.

What happened?

What changed?

Why did it feel like he was ready to spend the rest of your life with you, and then suddenly, he wasn't?

You’ve been sitting with those questions for weeks. Letting them settle into your bones. Last night had started to smooth out the edges. That kiss, the way he held you, the weight of him tucked against your back — none of it felt like someone who’d let go for good.

But this morning?

This morning feels like the reset button was hit again. Like you’re back at square one.

And it’s starting to scare you.

You take another sip from your mug.

It’s not just that he left. It’s the fact that you have no idea where he went, or why, or when he’s coming back. It’s that your questions are still sitting in your chest, unanswered. It’s that his coffee is still sitting in front of you, lukewarm.

It’s that you keep hoping for something that keeps slipping away.

And sure, it could be nothing. He could walk into the kitchen any minute and prove that all of your overthinking was for nothing and place a kiss against your temple as he silently confirms that you guys are finally okay again. But as you stare down at nothing in specific, eyes unfocused on the ground, you can't ignore the feeling that it's not going to be that easy.

A hand waving in front of your face breaks you out of your thoughts.

“Hello? Earth to ___?"

You blink and turn to find Kiara standing in front of you, one brow raised, one hand waving dramatically in front of your face.

“Fuck,” you mutter, pulling back a little, caught off guard. “You scared me.”

She grins. “I said your name twice. Thought you died standing up.”

You force a breath through your nose, trying to ease the tension from your shoulders. “Sorry. I zoned out.”

“Clearly,” Kiara says, folding her arms as she leans back against the island across from you. “You were staring at that coffee like you were possessed or something.”

You glance back down at Jungkook’s mug. The coffee inside has gone a dull, murky brown. It's oddly fitting.

“Just thinking,” you murmur.

Kiara gives you a long look, tilting her head slightly. She doesn’t say anything at first. Just watches.

You expect her to pivot the conversation, maybe ask what time you’re heading to the beach, or what’s for breakfast.

But she doesn’t.

Instead, she says, softer now, “Is everything okay with you and Jungkook?”

Your stomach drops, and you're too slow to catch the surprise on your face before it shows.

She doesn’t look accusatory. Just curious. Maybe a little concerned.

You think about what Jungkook said — that your acting sucks.

Clearly, he was more right than you gave him credit for if this is the second time someone has thought that something was off between you two.

You give Kiara a tight smile, trying to play it off. “Of course we’re okay. Why wouldn’t we be?”

Your voice cracks slightly at the end and Kiara’s face shifts. Her eyes narrow, expression flattening just a little.

God. You suck at this.

She doesn’t say anything. Just looks at you.

And when you glance past her, you realise Ari and Yasmine are both in the kitchen now too. You didn’t even hear them come in. They're hovering by the counter, not pretending they didn’t hear the conversation. Yasmine raises her eyebrows at you as if to say, Really? That’s the best you’ve got?

You laugh, the sound a little too loud and a little too fake.

“No, seriously. There’s nothing going on. We’re totally fine,” you insist. You try to make it sound breezy, like it’s the most obvious thing in the world. But there’s this edge of strain in your tone that even you can hear now.

Yasmine exchanges a quick glance with Ari. Ari raises a single brow.

“____,” Kiara says, and her voice almost sympathetic. “We love you to death. If anything if going on, you can tell us. We will fight that man if needed.”

You snort at the ridiculousness of the offer, trying to ignore the way they're all watching you.

“Okay, maybe don’t plan my best friend’s murder right in front of me,” Jimin says around a half-yawn, wandering into the kitchen. His hair is a mess — flattened on one side and fluffy on the other — and his hoodie is inside out. His expression, though, is amused as hell.

You let out a breath you didn’t know you’d been holding. It’s half a laugh, really — short and quiet, but enough to break the tension hanging over you. Your shoulders drop just slightly.

“No one said murder,” Kiara replies, looking entirely unbothered. “We said ‘fight.’ With fists. Maybe knees.”

“Maybe a little arson,” Yasmine adds, chewing on the edge of a strawberry she pulled from the fridge.

Jimin walks past them and reaches up to grab a granola bar from the top shelf. “You know I’m contractually obligated to defend Jungkook’s honour,” he says through a yawn, unwrapping the bar. “Even if he’s being an idiot. Which, to be fair, is frequent.”

“Then maybe pass that message along,” Ari says, deadpan.

He finally glances toward you then, eyes briefly scanning your face. He doesn’t say anything — and thankfully, he doesn’t ask — but something in his expression softens. Like he can see the way you’re slightly curled in on yourself, even if you’re trying to fake calm.

The semi-circle of concern around you shifts a little to make room for him, and he steps into it without hesitation, granola bar still in hand. It’s oddly comforting, how casually he folds into the space — like maybe if he acts normal, things will be normal.

And you’re grateful for it. The way attention slides off you and onto Jimin’s sudden presence.

You sip your coffee again, and it tastes slightly better now. Or maybe it’s just that your heart’s not pounding against your ribs anymore.

“Actually, I actually need to tell you guys something,” Jimin says once he’s halfway through the bar, mouth still kind of full. “Before everyone disappears into the sand for the rest of the day.”

You tilt your head, turning slightly more in his direction.

Jimin finishes chewing, wipes his hands on the front of his hoodie — inside-out tag flipping up in the process — and leans casually against the counter.

“Okay,” he starts, tone turning slightly serious. “This doesn’t leave this room. At least not yet.”

Immediately, all of you perk up.

“Oh my god,” Kiara says, leaning in. “Are we finally getting the tea?”

“Someone’s pregnant,” Yasmine whispers like it’s a wild theory, eyes wide.

“Wrong group,” Ari deadpans.

You snort.

“No one’s pregnant,” Jimin says. “But something is happening. And it’s big. So, swear you won’t say anything to Haeun.”

You all nod in varying degrees of seriousness. A chorus of “obviously” and “duh”s.

“Seokjin’s proposing.”

There’s a moment of stunned silence. Not because no one saw it coming — but because even when you expect something, hearing it said out loud hits differently.

“No way,” Ari breathes.

“Finally,” Yasmine grins, clapping once. “She’s going to lose it.”

“I knew it,” Kiara says, not even pretending to be surprised. “He’s been acting weird since we got here.”

“Super obvious,” Ari agrees. “He kept spacing out yesterday during volleyball. I asked him if he was okay and he just said, ‘Just picturing things.’ I thought he meant, like… strategy?”

You set your coffee down, half-smiling. “That man has never strategised a day in his life.”

Jimin nods, serious. “Exactly. So, the plan is— he’s doing it the day after tomorrow. Right at sunset. On the back deck. He wants to keep it lowkey but still romantic. Just the group, nothing flashy. He’s got this whole thing with the fairy lights and stuff. It’s very... Jin.”

Yasmine clasps her hands together with a little squeal. “Do we get to be part of it?”

“Yeah,” he says, glancing at her. “Actually, he wants you to take pictures. Nothing major. Just candids. And the rest of us just need to, like, not make it weird.”

“What do you mean not make it weird?” Ari asks.

“I mean like… don’t swarm them,” Jimin says. “Don’t make it a whole scene. Just let it happen and then we can scream after she says yes.”

You all nod.

“God, they’re gonna be so annoying and in love,” Kiara sighs. “Good for them. Can’t wait.”

Jimin’s expression softens as he talks — and you can tell how much this means to him. How long he’s probably been sitting on it. How relieved he is to finally let it out. He’s one of Jin’s closest friends — the fact that Jin looped him in says everything.

“Wait, does Haeun know anything?” Ari asks.

“Not a clue,” Jimin says, grinning. “She thinks she’s just getting a sunset drink on the deck with Jin tomorrow before dinner. Meanwhile, he’s been carrying around the ring like it’s a live bomb.”

“She’s gonna be a mess,” you say quietly, voice warm.

"They're both gonna be a mess," Kiara replies, and you smile.

Honestly, it feels good to think about something else — to imagine someone else’s future for a while. One that's good and certain.

Not murky. Not lukewarm. Not tangled up in old habits and unfinished questions.

And just as that lightness settles in — just as you feel your chest unclench, just a little — the glass doors behind you slide open with a low hiss.

Everyone freezes.

The sliding door clicks back into place, the sound of it too sharp in the sudden stillness. Jimin’s eyes dart past you. Kiara, mid-sip of her drink, lowers her glass. No one says anything.

Your breath catches as you look over Yasmine's shoulder.

Please not Haeun, you think. Pleasepleaseplease.

Jungkook.

Helmet in one hand, motorbike keys hooked around two fingers on the other.

You're heart tugs with relief.

You’re glad he’s here.

Not because things are fine. Not because you know what you’re going to say. But because not knowing where he was all morning had started to eat at you, slow and annoying and persistent. Like something you couldn’t scratch out of your skin.

Jimin’s the first to speak.

“Fuck, man,” he says, twisting toward the door. “You scared the shit out of me. I thought you were Haeun.”

Jungkook’s mouth twitches, the barest hint of a smile. “Sorry.”

He steps further into the kitchen, the door soft-clicking shut behind him, and sets the helmet down on the island with a dull thud. The keys land beside it with a jingle. The whole group relaxes and the conversation starts backs up, but you’re barely tracking it.

Your eyes stay on Jungkook.

And his eyes don’t quite stay on you, but they flicker. Once. Then back down.

He moves to the cabinet and pulls out a mug from the same shelf you used earlier.

You pause, glancing at the mug still sitting beside your own on the counter. You hesitate for a second before you slide it toward him with your fingertips.

“Here,” you say. “I made one for you already.”

He pauses mid-motion, the clean mug in his hand, and his eyes drop to the one you nudged forward, then back up at you.

“I’m fine. Thanks though." He gives you a tight-lipped smile that doesn't reach his eyes.

Oh.

Okay.

Maybe he just wants tea or something. You've never known him to be a tea person, but you don't dwell on it that much.

You're already moving to shrug it off when you catch a glance — just over the rim of your mug — of him moving back toward the coffee pot, and you watch, with a slow-burning disbelief, as he starts making the exact same cup of coffee that’s still sitting in front of him.

Same brand. Same scoop. Same splash of milk from the fridge. He reaches for the sugar and adds the same amount.

You stare.

Seriously?

You don’t say it out loud, but it hovers in your expression. Long enough that Ari, who’s been half-listening while peeling a clementine beside you, gives you the smallest nudge with her elbow.

You don’t even glance at her.

Your eyes are still on Jungkook.

He doesn’t notice. Or if he does, he doesn’t care.

The air shifts around you and it feels like you’ve suddenly dropped into a scene you weren’t given the script for. Because it’s not about the coffee, really. It’s never just about the coffee.

It’s about how easily he dismissed it. Dismissed you so easily, as if you were nothing more than a stranger.

And maybe it’s petty, but come on. You made that cup for him. It wasn’t some random gesture. You got up, went through the routine, thought about what he’d want, even left it sitting there like a peace offering. And he’d rather go through the whole process again himself than take what you’d already done for him?

Fine.

You sip your own drink again, and try tune back into the conversation.

Jimin is talking about how Seokjin tried to smuggle the ring through airport security without Haeun seeing. Kiara makes a joke about hiding it in his shampoo bottle. Yasmine laughs so hard she nearly drops her bowl of strawberries.

And for a moment, it’s fine.

You even smile a little. Force yourself to pull your eyes away from Jungkook and land somewhere safer — like Jimin’s dramatic re-enactment of Seokjin’s TSA panic face.

But when your gaze flicks back, just for a second, you find Jungkook leaning against the opposite counter, sipping his freshly made coffee like he didn’t just say a whole lot by saying nothing.

And you don’t say anything either. Because what are you going to do — call him out for rejecting your cup of coffee?

So you let the conversation keep moving. You nod along. You laugh in the right places. You keep your expression neutral. Maybe a little too neutral.

But your jaw is just the tiniest bit tight. And your fingers wrap around your mug a little firmer than before.

Guess you weren't just overthinking after all.

The rain starts as a mist before quickly turning into a steady downpour.

You and Haeun are halfway back from the beach by the time it hits properly. She doesn’t bother running, and neither do you. You just glance up once at the thick, grey sky and laugh a little under your breath. She grins beside you, jogging lightly as she shakes water out of her ponytail.

“I told you it was going to rain,” she says, smug.

You’d been adamant about it, insisting that it would be warm as usual when you asked Haeun to come swim with you. She’d shown you her weather app and you’d waved it off with a dramatic, “Those things are never right.” Now, soaked halfway to the bone and blinking through the drizzle, you’re starting to eat your words.

"Yeah yeah, whatever."

By the time you step inside the house through the glass sliding doors, your legs are lightly dusted with sand and your hair is sticking to the sides of your neck, still damp from the ocean, and now slightly tangled from the breeze.

It’s warmer in the house, and for the first time since the trip started, everyone is inside. No one has slipped off to the beach or disappeared with a book to some random corner of the deck.

You brush your fingers through your hair absently as you kick off your flip flops near the threshold. Haeun’s already moved toward the kitchen, mumbling something about tea, leaving you to linger for a second by the open space where the wooden floor transitions into the living room rug.

Jimin and Taehyung are on the floor by the coffee table, throwing popcorn into each other’s mouths with miserable aim and laughing at their failures. Ari’s curled up with Namjoon on one end of the abnormally large couch that takes up almost half of the room, the two of them watching something muted on the TV while Kiara and Yasmine scroll through their phones on the floor beside them, bickering about which photos to post later.

And there's Jungkook.

He's sitting on the other end of the couch, knees propped up, thumbing idly through something on his phone.

He looks calm. Not relaxed, exactly — Jungkook doesn’t really do relaxed when he’s spaced out, but his shoulders aren’t hunched like they were this morning, and his jaw isn’t clenched. He just sits there scrolling.

You hadn’t seen him on the beach. You’re not even sure where he’d gone off to all morning, after the coffee exchange that had been awkward enough to replay itself in your brain on loop.

It’s not that you’re trying to obsess, but it’s hard not to notice when someone you used to know inside out starts moving like a stranger.

You take a slow breath, brushing your hand down your thigh once — a nervous gesture you don’t bother disguising — and cross the rest of the living room, stepping carefully over Taehyung’s outstretched legs as you make your way toward the couch.

There’s an open space beside Jungkook and you decide take it.

But before you can even properly sit down or bring up your knees to get comfortable, Jungkook's already standing.

You watch as he crosses the living room and drops down into the armchair beside Yoongi without a single word, disbelief painting your features for a second before reel your expression back to neutral.

You don’t look at anyone.

You definitely don’t look at Jungkook.

Instead, you keep your gaze pinned to the muted television in front of you — some vaguely familiar movie playing with the subtitles on — and try to ignore the way your heartbeat has picked up in your ears.

It’s not a big deal. Not technically. Maybe he just wanted to sit by Yoongi. Maybe you’re reading too much into it. Again.

But still.

Still.

You cross one leg over the other, trying to breathe through the stiffness now crawling up the back of your neck. You can feel a strand of hair clinging to your collarbone. You reach up and tuck it behind your ear just to do something with your hands.

“Hey,” Jimin says suddenly from the floor, glancing back toward you, “you two get caught in the rain?”

You force your mouth into a small smile. “A little.”

“Dumbasses,” Taehyung says fondly, tossing a kernel of popcorn that smacks Jimin square in the cheek. “Told you it was gonna pour.”

“It’s barely even raining,” Haeun calls from the kitchen, voice slightly muffled from the distance.

You hum in agreement, mostly to say something, but your voice barely makes it out. You don’t think anyone notices.

Except maybe Kiara, who glances at you briefly from the corner of her eye. She doesn’t say anything, but it’s enough to make you shift in your seat.

You try not to look again. At him.

You fail.

Jungkook’s posture hasn’t changed — one arm resting on the armrest, the other slung low in his lap. He’s facing the TV, but his gaze isn’t fixed on anything in particular.

This isn’t normal. Not even close.

Not that anything has been normal since the breakup, but this is different. Cold in a way he’s never been with you — even when you fought. Even when you broke up.

It’s the kind of distance that doesn’t come from anger. It’s more deliberate than that.

And you really don’t know what you did to deserve it.

The rain doesn’t last. It trails off sometime after the movie ends — not that you can remember a single scene of it — and by the time it does, the sky outside is starting to dip in colour.

You keep your eyes on your hands, loosely folded in your lap, while the rest of the group starts to migrate back outside into the pool and the beach. Someone tugs open the back door and lets the salt-heavy breeze rush back in. Kiara walks past and ruffles your hair lightly, says something about joining them soon. You nod, even though you’re not sure you will.

You don’t even register Jungkook until he’s moving past the arm of the couch.

“Jungkook,” you say.

He stops just in front of the door to the front.

He doesn’t turn fully. Just glances over his shoulder, enough to let you know he heard.

You stand before your courage can second-guess you. “Can we talk?”

A beat of silence passes. He shifts his weight from one foot to the other, but doesn’t look at you.

“I don’t think there’s much to talk about.”

It takes you a second to process his words.

“What?” you ask, brows knitting.

“I just—” Jungkook shifts, hand flexing at his side like he’s trying not to clench it. “I think we’re handling things fine. Everyone still believes us, right? That’s the whole point.”

You stare at him.

“That’s not what I meant.”

He exhales, but doesn't respond.

“I’m not talking about the deal. I’m talking about you— us— and the fact that you’ve been ignoring me all day.”

“I haven’t—”

“Yes, you have,” you cut in, voice firmer now. “You wouldn’t even look at me this morning. You’ve barely said more than three words since last night.”

“I thought you wanted space,” he says quietly, finally turning around to face you. “I figured, after yesterday, that it’d be easier if I just gave you room.”

“Easier?” you echo. “For who?”

He swallows. His gaze drops. You can see the tension in the way his shoulders pull in slightly, like he’s trying to fold himself smaller.

“I’m just trying not to make this harder than it already is."

Your chest tightens, something sharp rising behind your ribs. There’s a line between being careful and being cowardly, and you don’t know when Jungkook crossed it — only that he’s already miles past it now, still walking away from a conversation he won’t even let you have.

“And moving when I sit beside you— what’s that supposed to be?” you ask. “Because if that’s you being careful, it really fucking sucks.”

His jaw twitches.

“It’s not like that.”

“Then what is it like, Jungkook? Because you’re not talking to me. You won’t even look at me.”

His lips part like he wants to say something before he stops himself.

You wait, but he doesn’t answer.

He just stands there in silence, eyes unreadable, like he’s scared whatever comes out of his mouth next will be the wrong thing.

And that frustrates you more than anything else.

Because you just want the truth, not silence. Even if it hurts. Even if it means hearing him say that he doesn't love you anymore. Because at least, then you’d know.

You cross your arms slowly, swallowing the lump that has started forming in your throat.

“You can’t just fucking kiss me one day and ignore me the next.”

“Look, I’m—” He exhales harshly. “I’m sorry the kiss didn’t mean anything, okay?

You freeze.

Something inside you falters, buckles under the weight of it. You try to breathe around the burn clawing up your throat, but the room suddenly feels too stuffy.

You press your nails into your palms. You can feel your pulse there — quick, shallow, and it’s the only thing anchoring you to the moment. You don't trust yourself to speak, so you don't.

Jungkook's voice is soft when he eventually speaks. “We only have to do this shit for one more day. That’s it. I’ll stay out of your way until then, and when it’s over, we can pack our bags, go home, and you never have to talk to me again.”

You stand there for half a second too long. Long enough for the silence to feel thick again. Long enough to think — maybe he’ll take it back, or stop you. Maybe he’ll say something else.

But he doesn’t, so you turn.

You walk away, footsteps too loud against the hardwood. Your throat is tight, your chest worse. You make your way outside and up the stairs into you room, shutting the door with a quiet click — not because you're calm, but because slamming it would mean he still matters enough to make you angry.

And right now, you're trying not to let him matter at all.

You sit on the edge of the bed, staring at the blank wall, trying to will yourself not to cry.

You don’t win that one. Not completely.

But you wipe away your tears before they can stain your face, because if anyone comes looking, you’ll lie. If he comes looking, you won’t open the door.

Still, you wait for the sound of footsteps outside the room.

None come.

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[pineconepie]

CHARACTERS: Vincent, fem!reader

WARNINGS/TAGS: Parental yandere, light infantilization, fem+afab reader, periods, period comfort, embarrassment from periods, non-sexual nudity, reader implied to be younger, cuddles, Vincent doting on Reader

WORD COUNT: 1.7k

AUTHOR'S NOTE: This is the other part of a commission that was done with Octavian!

You're sure you've never felt as miserable as you do now; your cramps feel like they're going to kill you, you've been nauseous all morning and you just want to stay curled up in bed all day, hiding under your covers.

Unfortunately for you, however, today Vincent is off work. Normally you'd love that, because then you could spend more time together. But right now, it feels like a curse; because how else are you supposed to hide this from him?

You're not ready to deal with it, nor do you want to.

To seem as least suspicious as possible, you try not to clutch your stomach as you descend the stairs towards where he sits, drinking his morning coffee.

Vincent looks up at you with a warm smile. "Good morning, sweetie."

Despite everything going on inside of your body and mind, you force yourself to return his greeting. "Hi."

You walk past him and quickly gather some cereal for yourself. You can tell Vincent notices, because he watches you with curiosity. "What's wrong? No 'good morning, Dad'? Just 'hi'?" He chuckles, but you can tell he's going through a million different possibilities as to what's wrong.

Instead of answering verbally, you shrug, pour yourself a bowl and grab a spoon. Then you make your way over to where he sits, taking a seat beside him instead of across.

Maybe that way his gaze won't be fixated solely on you.

Unfortunately, your plan fails, because he's still staring at you when you glance over.

"I was gonna ask if you wanted pancakes or waffles," he says finally.

"Nah, its fine, I'm alright with cereal this morning," you reply.

Vincent raises a brow, raising a hand to feel your forehead. "Are you sick? Getting a fever?"

"No, no," you stutter. "Nothing like that. I just, um, didn't sleep well last night..."

"Really?" Vincent asks. "Did you have any nightmares? Anything you want to talk about?"

Great. Now you're cornering yourself and lying even further than before. You're pretty sure part of him can tell you're lying, because he's so used to working with other liars. He reads people better than most could, which is probably part of his profession.

Knowing that just makes you more anxious.

For all you know, he probably sees through your facade completely and is waiting to call you out on it.

"I dunno... maybe? I don't remember my dreams," you say quickly.

"Hm." His expression shows that he's not entirely convinced by your answer.

You try changing the topic to distract him, and hopefully yourself. "Do you have anything specific planned for the day?"

Vincent blinks, then smiles fondly at you. "I'm going to leave it up to you. If you want to go shopping or go out to eat, that'd be fine with me. Or we could have a lazy day watching movies together. Anything you like, princess."

You feel nervous at his choices of options, considering you'd prefer not leaving the house today if you can avoid it. Maybe watching films together sounds nice, though even that gives you anxiety.

"I guess some movies would be nice," you mutter.

Vincent smiles, much to your relief. "Sounds good to me. Why don't you pick one for us to start with?"

So you do.

You get settled down on the couch after turning off the lights in the living room and opening the curtains for maximum viewing experience, snuggled tightly beneath a large fleece blanket. Vincent joins you moments after setting things up.

He wraps a strong arm around you, pulling you closer to his side.

Throughout the movie, he glances down at you occasionally as if checking up on something. Which makes sense since he seems worried about you for whatever reason. You pretend to pay attention to the screen while your mind races on elsewhere.

Every now and then there's a painful twist in your lower abdomen causing you to flinch slightly, although you try hiding these reactions from Vincent.

About halfway through the film, you start getting fidgety, wanting to switch positions constantly.

When you decide to curl up into a ball and bury yourself deep within your blankets once again, Vincent shoots you another glance. "(Y/n)?" he asks quietly.

"Huh?"

"What are you doing, honey?"

"Oh..." You look down embarrassedly. "Just getting comfy."

Vincent pauses for a moment before continuing. "Are you sure nothing is wrong? Nothing you want to talk about with me?"

Your heart pounds faster than normal and butterflies swarm your stomach. Your fingers tighten their grip on your sleeves as you answer: "Positive."

"Okay."

The movie continues playing, but neither of you speak anymore during the remainder of it. At certain points you catch Vincent giving you concerned stares again, especially whenever your hands wander absentmindedly underneath the blanket to press against your belly. When the credits roll around, however, he breaks the silence.

"I don't buy that."

You laugh nervously. "You love buying things," you attempt to joke.

He usually always finds amusement in your jokes, even the bad ones, but now he just looks frustrated. Its a rare expression on him, and definitely not one you like. "I'm serious."

You shrink back. "Sorry..."

Vincent's expression goes from stern to guilt-ridden immediately at your scared reaction. "I'm not mad. I'm just worried about you. Please talk to me."

"There's nothing to worry about." Your voice shakes as you say those words.

"(Y/n)." His tone sends shivers throughout your body. "You're lying to me." A pause. "Please don't lie to Dad."

You chew on your bottom lip anxiously. "...I... I don't wanna talk about it... please." Your voice cracks. Tears build in the corners of your eyes.

Vincent coos at you, pulling you into his lap. You bury your face in his chest as you cry softly. He rocks you gently, kissing your head every few seconds.

"Its okay, it's okay, sweet girl. Shhh..." Vincent hushes you soothingly. He keeps rocking and swaying slowly. One hand rubs calming circles along your upper back. His other cradles the back of your neck tenderly.

After a couple minutes of crying like this in his arms, he leans away slightly to lift your chin. With a thumb, he wipes the tears streaming down your face away carefully.

Then he smiles brightly down at you. "Hey there, kiddo."

You hiccup and sniffle. "Hi." Your voice quavers. "I feel so gross."

Vincent grabs a tissue from the tissue box on the coffee table, using it to clean off your runny nose and damp cheeks. "Much better now, huh? Crying is healthy for the soul. Even if it breaks my heart to see you cry, I'd rather you cry than hold it in. Just means I get to comfort my baby." He teasingly squishes your cheeks, which manages to bring a smile to your face. "There it is," he chuckles fondly. "How's about I go draw you a nice bath?"

That sounds appealing, honestly. "Yeah... sure," you agree.

"Perfect. Up we go." He hoists you into his arms and carries you upstairs, setting you on the counter in the bathroom.

He rolls up his sleeves before leaning forward and switching the faucets to get the perfect temperature.

You watch as the water fills up the tub, making little splashing noises when it hits the ceramic.

Once he gets satisfied with how full the basin is, he turns the knobs off.

Vincent hums as he searches through various cabinets, grabbing some scented bubble bath bottles. "Orange mango or watermelon?" After you give your answer, he tosses the opposite bottle back into the drawer, pouring the other into the bath. He stirs it in, letting the suds rise. "Let me know if it should be warmer or colder, kiddo."

He turns to grab shampoo and conditioner, giving you the privacy to step in. It feels nice, easing your cramps ever-so-slightly.

"Feels great," you sigh dreamily. "Thanks, Dad."

"Anything for my favorite daughter," he sing-songs.

"Your only daughter," you snort.

He laughs at that, placing the shampoo and conditioner in convenient reach. "Still true." He grabs a cup. "Now tilt your head back so I can..." he trails off.

You're quick to realize why. The water is a brownish-red hue.

To your relief, Vincent doesn't freak out. A look of realization spreads across his face, only after the initial shock. He chuckles in relief. "Oh, thank God. It's just your period." His expression turns to serious again. "Right? You aren't injured, are you?"

"No," you squeak out. "It started this morning. I'm sorry."

He holds his hand to his chest in further relief. "I was just a few minutes away from calling a doctor, you know that?" His expression softens. "Why would you hide this?" His voice seeps with genuine confusion and worry.

"...'cause..." You pause. "Because its embarrassing." You hug yourself anxiously. "And gross."

Vincent looks heartbroken. "Princess... you know periods are natural, right?" When you shrug, he frowns deeper. "(Y/n), I promise its okay." He rubs your shoulder. "Its nothing to be ashamed of. I'd never judge you for anything, let alone this."

"Thank you," you murmur. "It just feels so awkward."

Vincent laughs softly. "I've been preparing for this conversation for a while. Not really a fan of how we ended up here, but I'm just glad you aren't hurt." He sighs fondly. "I'll order you some pads, and when bathtime's done, there'll be a heating pad with your name on it."

You smile gratefully. "Thanks."

"Of course. My little girl is not allowed to suffer," Vincent says lovingly. "No, sirree. None of that allowed under my roof. Got it?"

"Got it," you laugh back. "Um, can we continue our movie marathons after I'm done washing up?"

He smiles warmly. "Of course. Since I'm such a good dad, I'll even let you pick one extra movie."

"Only one?" You groan dramatically. "All your movies are boring."

"They are not."

"They absolutely are. They're either the same 80's comedies over and over again, or the same superhero action movies over and over again."

"You're just saying that because you're a baby with a baby brain, and I have good taste." He sticks his tongue out playfully, showing he isn't actually upset. "Real movies, made for people who know good cinema."

"Yeah, yeah, whatever," you roll your eyes. Your face softens. "Thanks, Dad. For being not-awkward."

He beams proudly. "Anytime, kiddo. I'm just cool like that."

You roll your eyes.

[sparrowwithaquill]

Pt 2 of Popstar!Reader x Saja Boys

Here's part one!

Summary: It’s been months since you first met the boys with them rising in popularity and you coming back from your hiatus you hardly have time to spend with them, but when you finally do you find them hungry for something more than fame.

A/N: y’all gave so much attention to my first post omg I was not expecting it to gain that much attention 😭 here you go my lovelies. Listening to pied piper while writing this was heavenly

Word count: 2.2k

Part 3 will include smut! Please be patient with me, I've been busy with work and some personal issues.

Tag list: @floredaqueen @bleufu1 @brights-place @crescent-z @gremlinartstudio @xiaopeepee @puppyminnnie @ri-eveowe @calmmell @lysira340 @wishiwaswritingrn

“Ah I’m exhausted!”

Another successful dance practice, it’s been months since you first met the Saja Boys and it’s been wonderful!

They’ve grown so much in such a short amount of time, they have their own fan base, have done variety shows, the even have their own light sticks! The only problem is that you’ve hardly had any time to see them with your own concerts and shows and it’s starting to weigh on you a bit.

You’re sure you’ll be able to see them again, in person that is. You’ve been messaging them as often as you can so it hasn’t been completely unbearable.

You currently find yourself in your practice room, shirt off, sports bra on and flat on the floor with your shorts on. The comfiest you can be in a hot room. You get your next song set up and ready to go on the speakers when you hear a knock on the door, you let the music play out as you open the door to be greeted by the Saja Boys.

“Guys! Oh my goodness! Come here,” you hug the nearest one, that being romance who eagerly takes in the hug and leaves one arm wrapped around your shoulder, with a smug grin that you’re unable to see.

“I haven’t seen you all in so long! Sometimes I really hate my schedule,” you complain but now getting a burst of energy, you’re oblivious to the stares that are thrown your way. Not really at you, more at the arm around your shoulder, they can feel coils wrapping in their chest, hot and blistering at wanting it to be their own.

You remain unknown to their feelings as you’re bringing them into the practice room, eager to speak with them after it being so long. Thank goodness you were just practicing by yourself so you don’t have to worry about your wonderful backup dancers having to wait for you!

The boys make themselves comfortable as you walk through the room after closing the door.

“I wasn’t expecting to see you guys! I was just practicing a bit before you knocked, what’s going on?”

The boys were in various seating position, Mystery sitting on the floor next to Baby who was sucking on a lollipop. Romance was leaning against the wall staring in your direction while Jinu and Abby were near the speaker that was still playing music.

You pause the song to better pay attention to the boys, but Jinu just shook his head.

“Just wanted to see our favorite girl, you can keep practicing, pretend we’re not here,” Jinu smiles at you while you give a nervous smile.

You’re happy to see them but this particular song you were gonna… choose a position, well it should be fine right? You smile and rewind the song pausing it before going back to practicing.

“Only if you’re sure…” you nervously smile, giving him a last chance.

Abby just shakes his head at you, “yes we’re sure, princess.”

Oh he does not know what that does to you, a shiver goes down your spine as you sigh before turning back to the mirror in front of you. The layout of the room lets it so that there’s one floor to ceiling mirrored wall which you’re dancing in front of. The boys being leaned up against the wall in the back, letting you see the boys as you start dancing and singing along to the song.

“Don’t have to tell your hot ass a thing, oh yeah you just get it.”

Baby looks up from his phone as Romance nudges him with his foot.

“Whole package, babe, I like the way you fit, God bless your dad’s genetics, mm,” you sing, missing the way that the boys eyes darken at the verse, but do catch the way they seem to be watching you a bit more intently as your eyes quickly flit away. Gotta stay professional.

“You make me wanna make you fall in love, oh, late at night I’m think ‘bout you, ah.”

The boys are thoroughly enjoying the performance, Abby’s gaze watching the way your hips move, Mystery letting his eyes watch your legs. Jinu looks you up and down as you sing, “Wanna try out my fuzzy pink handcuffs? Oh, I hear you knockin', baby, come on up."

Jinu imagines just what they could be doing with said pink hand cuffs, as you continue no longer paying attention to the boys. You miss the way Baby and Romance readjust themselves in their sitting positions.

“I know you want my touch for life. If you love me right, then who knows? I might let you make me Juno,” you slightly dip down with one leg posed out. Romance follows the curve of your leg as you stick it out.

You continue dancing and singing while the boys watch on. They watch until you hit one specific line.

“You make me wanna make you fall in love. Oh, late at night, I'm thinking 'bout you, ah-ah. Wanna try out some freaky positions?”

You get down on your knees, turn to the side and stick your hips up, curving your back so you’re in doggy position while looking in the mirror. Gulping before saying lowly, “have you ever tried this one?”

Jinu and Abby take in deep breathes before letting out slow breathes, nearly scruffing the other boys to keep them from grabbing you. Mystery does his best to keep heat from going down his face, but his lip wobbles as the position you were in flashes in his mind.

Baby and Romance aren’t doing much better, imagining you bent over while their hands roam your hips. Gripping your flesh and kneading it while they have their way with you.

You are none the wiser as you continue, getting off the floor. Continuing in the song while the boys barely restrain themselves from stopping and going to have their way with you.

"Adore me, hold me and explore me, Mark your territory, tell me I'm the only, only, only, only one," you sing calmly now kneeling on the floor bringing one hand up the middle of your chest to rest on your neck. Jinu's eyes briefly flash to his demon eyes as he clenches his jaw and crosses his arms to keep a hold of himself.

"Adore me, hold me and explore me, I'm so fuckin' horny," Baby clenches his jaw so hard, he swears a tooth cracked, "tell me I'm the only, only, only, only one," You slowly drag the hand from your throat down your chest and navel before getting off the floor.

You continue until you finish the last chorus of the song, slightly out of breath before you sit on the floor with your legs out and head tipped back.

"Ah, I'm so tired," you mutter out while gulping down some air, "that song is so dirty," you laugh a little bit with your eyes closed.

You fail to notice the way the five men are looking at you. The way they rake their eyes over your form, to the way your head is tipped back, to the way your chest rises and falls. Watching how you really are in almost the perfect position for them to grab your head and use it how they want.

Jinu is the first to move, walking silently to stand just behind where your head is. You only notice he's there when the light dims behind your eyelids, cracking them open and blinking in surprise as you look up in surprise.

You make a slight noise, now seeing how this position is not exactly the most innocent looking. Now moving so your head is looking in front of you. Heat crawls up your face as you look at the other four and they are in different states after the dance.

Coughing a bit to ease the tension you smile a little at the boys deciding to tease them.

"Enjoy the dance, boys?"

You say in a teasing voice, not expecting a serious answer, not even expecting any answer at all. It's not until you look towards Mystery and see him shudder a bit at what you said that you feel a little awkward. It's not the first time you've danced like that in front of men, hell not even the first time you've danced in front of attractive men, but something about them is just different.

Something about them just makes you feel different.

"You guys are being oddly quiet, what happened, was it silly?" Now a little self-conscious, you swallow your spit.

Jinu, still the closest towards you bends a little and pushes your head so it tips back to look him in the eyes.

"Quite the opposite, actually," he mutters, eyes lidded as they watch the sweat drip from your chin down to between your cleavage.

"The opposite, huh," you respond back not daring to break the eye contact between Jinu and you. Not until you see movement from behind him and watch Abby move to stand in front of the door blocking anyone from looking in.

Romance is the next to move, nearing you as he crouches down next to your ear and whispers, "we quite enjoyed it actually, especially that little pose of yours."

Your face heats as you clench your jaw when you can feel how close he is from how his breath is hitting your ear. You dare to look away from Jinu and look towards Romance, noting how his eyes are looking across your face wondering just how flushed he could make it from putting you in other positions.

"Do you do a different position each time or the same one?" Baby asks as he walks to move in front of you. Standing in front while looking down, scanning your face.

"I do- I uh choose a different pose each time, that's kind of the- the gag," wincing a bit at your word choice, " behind it, that there's a lot of positions," you respond back suddenly very aware of where you are. Baby hums a bit, his eyes going up as if in deep thought.

"So that means you know more positions? Hm?"

Mystery pipes up still seated against the wall.

"How many do you know?"

Abby asks, his head tilted up as he watches through the door for anyone coming down the hall.

You think briefly about getting up, but before you can make any move Baby is crouched down on his heels between your legs, looking you in your eyes. Smirking a bit, he watches your face in some satisfaction at how bashful you get.

You’re caged on essentially all sides, Jinu behind you, Romance to your right and Baby crouched in front of you. You couldn’t move even if you tried, if you wanted to move that is.

“I uh,” you clear your throat feeling it get dry at the gazes that are on you, “yeah I, I know a few more.”

"Yeah? Show us."

Abby all but demands from you, still positioned in front of the door, occasionally flicking his eyes out. You can feel your heart stutter as your mouth drops open at his words, "I, you don't really want that. It ruins the surprise!"

You awkwardly laugh out, playing with your hair nervously. Romance takes your hand from your hair and rubs the back of it slowly. Breathing heavily, your eyes flick to Romance's and you swallow as your face flushes.

Jinu chuckles behind you, leaning down to your left ear before breathing out, "don't feel like you have to, you can say no, princess."

Your chest rises and falls quickly at the sound of Jinu's voice breathing huskily in your ear. Just as you go to move, Abby whistles from the door alerting the guys to someone approaching from down the hall. In just a second, all the boys move away from you, leaving you with your eyes blown wide and feeling heat pooling in your lower belly.

You curse whoever was coming down the hall for stopping this from going even further.

It's now been a week since that moment in the dance room and things have slowly been progressing ever since. There have been lingering touches, like Jinu placing his hand on your waist when going behind you to grab something. Abby pulling your hair to the side to purposefully speak into your ear, putting his arm around your shoulder. Baby will speak directly into your ear sometimes, breathing into it leading to you getting shivers down your spine.

Let's not even start with Romance, he is regularly grabbing your waist and grabbing the back of your neck and rubbing it, calling you names like 'sweetheart' and 'babe' while looking into your eyes. Mystery is the only one who's been more subtle with his affection, bringing you your favorite drinks and snacks. Though he can get touchy sometimes, but not often.

They've slowly been getting closer and closer to you, it's now that you guess they've finally had it as you're surrounded by them in your apartment after inviting them over to finally spend some time with them.

You think you've definitely gotten into something you can't get out of.

[natsheadrest]

🥥 mixed feelings with white dresses

analysis. your mother breaks the news to you that you’re being wedded off to some heir to a jewelry company. you have no knowledge on who she is in person, only that she’s rich and rather cold to anyone who approaches her. but when she walks you down the aisle after the vows, you find out she’s more of a sweetheart than you thought.

pairing. natasha romanoff x fem!reader wordcount. 4k

no other way masterlist

warnings. angst, arranged marriage!au, mentions of family abandonment (Father abandonment), many mentions of missing said father, slightly mean steve (makes fun of readers issues and reason why she's marrying Nat), some fluff at the end.

taglist. @natashasmuse @dvrkhcld @im-lesbianics authors note. the wedding section of this might be very poorly done, especially considering I have only been to around 3 weddings in my life and two of them was when I was a little kid. 😓 -- I did do plenty of research though so..

Your phone was settled on the counter after you recently checked your moms location, you sparsely sat on it due to lack of data and internet. Not wanting to waste it in case you needed it. for emergencies as you settled to make yourself coffee. You never liked the bitter taste of just, black coffee but you and mama couldn’t waste a single penny just for creamer. You were never one to waste any of your hard earned money, you’d rather spend it on your brother or mother whenever you are able to.

The house you lived in was small, having to share a room with your twelve year old brother while your mother sleeps on her own. Freezing in the winter and so fucking hot in the summer. The AC and heater don’t work and your family just can’t get enough money to fix it. Rather paying the bills to have a roof to live under was enough. Your nose scrunched as you hesitantly nursed at the coffee, the bitterness taking over your tastebuds. The coffee shop that mama and you love to go to had offered you a position this morning after an incident with a trainee and you were offered to be trained starting as of tomorrow.

The front door wiggled, keys jingled as it was pushed open. The hinges were rusty and old, creaking in complaint at being opened like it usually does. The familiar slim figure of your mother showed up in the doorway, coffee in hand as she settled down, eyes soft as she turned to you, “Hey sweetheart, you sleep okay?”

You smiled, walking over to give her a hug like you would always do whenever she came home. The childish grin found your face as you hugged the woman, nose pressing into her shoulder as you breathed in her scent. Motherly. That’s all you remember, the woman who raised you since you were crawling, the woman who had stuck around with you forever.

“I slept okay mama, but I’d like to tell you something,” You hummed excitedly, it was good news. Really, the excitement and enjoyment of the news for your mother that you so eagerly wanted to share died down on your tongue as she gently pushed you down onto the chair, she gave a shaky smile. The familiar smile that you saw when you caught her wine-drunk on a Tuesday after you came home from school as she promised to not drink anymore, “let me tell you something first, okay?”

You nodded, feet kicking off the worn-down stool you had perched yourself in. What would she possibly have to tell you that made herself look covered in guilt, what was wrong? You were genuinely worried, suspicion and a bit of fear sunk into your gut. Waiting to rip you apart.

“I met someone today, very nice, she was very sweet,” Mama continued on, her hand settled atop of yours. Gently squeezing your hand, four times. The usual, ‘I love you, sorry’ that was known within your family, “And she offered me something, well proposed something now that you’re finally an adult,”

“Mama, what’s going on?” You cut her off, her hand found your cheek, gently reassuring you that everything was okay. You relaxed in her touch, settling yourself ever so slightly.

“She’s the current CEO of that company, the jewelry company, I think it’s something along the lines of The Red Room?” She seemed unsure, lost a little bit, but before you could cut her off her finger found your lips and shut you up so she could continue on, “Her eldest daughter is your age, the heir to the company and she offered me to give you her daughter’s hand in marriage to help with Bennett’s future, and our future,”

Your heart sunk at that, engaged? Is that what you would call it, after everything you went through together. The drawing with chalk on the driveway just to play hopscotch, the catching lightning bugs and pill bugs. The affirmation that you two would be best-friends, she was there when you got your first period, your first breakup. And now? She was handing you away to a stranger right after you claimed that you were scared about marriage?

“So you’re throwing me away?” You let out a sniffle, body shuddering as tremors made their way through. Your throat tightened, it felt hard to swallow all these emotions, and as she reached out to reassure you, you snapped.

“You’re throwing me away just like dad threw us away? That’s not fair, why would you do that?” The small hint of anger that wrapped around the fear and sadness lashed out. Like a bullet piercing the air as you mentioned the man that left after your brother was born, the man who you believed to be your hero.

“Do not go there,” She warned, tone growing firm as she took a sip of her coffee. Her brows pinched, she sighed. Adjusting herself, before adding on, “You are not only just a daughter I raised, you’re the woman I brought up into this world. As much as I want to be there for you, it cannot continue to work like this, the universe has given us a hard life Y/N and if this is our light to help us shine like we were meant to, we will take it. But do not think this is me throwing you away, I will always love you, you’re my only daughter and I will not let the world rip you apart like it did me,”

Her words hurt, you felt guilty for lashing out. For acting like that so suddenly, you stood up. Giving her another simple yet comforting hug, before she patted your back and stepped away.

“You need to get dressed though love, an appointment was already booked for your wedding dress, your soon to be mother-in-law will be paying for everything you need,” She informed you softly, pressing a soft kiss to your forehead before you were ushered into your room. You took in the silence, so many emotions raced through you as you rushed to get dressed. — Your phone was settled on the side table, you had tried on four different dresses by now. You didn’t even know what you wanted, especially with thinking a wedding wouldn’t be happening right now. The girl who was helping you with decisions had her eyes linger on you too long, as if she was jealous of whoever had your hand in marriage because you were rather gorgeous.

Yet, uncomfortable with her stares. It wasn’t like you knew who you were marrying either, you learned what she looked like. A quick google search of the company, the people who founded it and the upcoming heir. Her name was in bold letters, her age and appearance listed with a photo that made her look elegant. Her hair was curled, jawline sleek and eyes narrowed in an icy look that could kill. You couldn’t tell if you were afraid or about to go head over heels and blush over your soon-to-be wife. You read reviews, anything to gain knowledge on who this woman was. All that had come up was that your father-in-law to be is a jokester, a funny man and your mother-in-law to be was a sweetheart and very focused on the customers while Natasha? Natasha was focused on the company, not that interactive with the people but the user ‘StarkHasAHeart’ was very insistent that he had an interaction with the heir and that she was cold and unpleasant.

“Ms.L/N, what dress will you try on next?” The girl asked you, her voice soft but the hint of impatience was there. You thought quietly, back to your mother who was sitting in the front room. You used to want a specific dress, but that was when you were a kid. You thought quietly as you started to unzip the dress you were wearing. It was too big, too puffy for your liking and the zipper itched your back in an uncomfortable manner.

“How about a v-neck dress with bell sleeves?” You blurted out, the first direct ask from you yet from this appointment. The girl simply nodded and went back into the storage to find something similar to your request. When she came back and handed you it, you went into the dressing room and shut the curtain. Your movements were rough, but you precisely took off the current dress and gently put on the dress that was just grabbed for you. It was gorgeous, really. It sparkled and showed off your curves nicely, yet it matched the spark in your eyes. The softness that still remained in your face after childhood, you looked in the mirror. Admiring yourself, it reminded you of when you played dress-up with your father. Before he left. You would be in a blue ball-gown replicating Cinderella’s dress and he’d have messy ruined make-up over his face after you did it for him with plastic fairy wings on his back. You felt like crying now, the realization that your father wouldn’t be there to walk you down the aisle. He isn’t going to be the man to hand you away, your throat tightened. You and your mother had a tight bond, but with the time spent with your dada? Nothing could compete against that, he wasn’t the best at doing girly things. Hell, he didn’t even know how to put your hair in a ponytail when you were a kid but he tried his best. When your mama was at work, he’d let you stay up and sit on his lap while he sat on the couch with an xbox controller in hand while playing an old game of Call of Duty with friends. You exactly remembered the first time he let you play for him, touch the controller. When you grew old enough to play on your own, he’d play against you and every time he beat you a puff of rage went through your tiny little head as you stamped your feet before he let you win once. You honestly only played because you loved the dogs, and you would start bawling your eyes out every time one of your dogs died.

But you would remember the times where you sat atop of the stairs listening to your parents argue over the littlest things, the pure bouts of rage. The screaming at the top of their lungs and the front door slamming. It was usually your father that left the house during these arguments, you’d go hide in your room every time he left and cry into a pillow with the thought of him leaving. Although, you also remembered the time you went down the stairs early one morning, your old man was sitting at the counter with his phone in hand and a hand covering his face to hide the tears. He was hunched over and crying, that was the morning where your Pops died. You remember running into his arms to hug him, not knowing anything close to the grief he had about his father dying, but you tried your best as you snuggled into his chest for the rest of the morning.

After your brother was born, your father hardly showed up to the house after work. You would set up the xbox every night in hopes he’d come sit down with you to play and every night you sat there alone or playing a round by yourself. You were only ten, you still didn’t understand the concept of abandonment of a family member. Yet, you learned it the hard way when your mom broke it to you that your papa wasn’t coming back and he left you behind. Your mama wanted him to be seen as the bad guy in your eyes, and you never believed it. Before and after school you would sit at your window looking at the empty parking space where your fathers white Camry would sit. It took you two years to realize that the father you loved wasn’t coming back, and two more years to accept it and not think about where he is now.

You couldn’t tell if you wanted to laugh or cry, but this was the dress for you. “I’ll go for this dress Denise, thank you,”

You yelled out. Not wanting the woman to see the dress on you, or your mother. Not yet, you eased out of the dress as you settled back into the light grey sweater you wore with black leggings. You breathed out softly, adjusting yourself as you had the dress hung over your arm as you walked out of the dressing room.

Surprisingly Denise didn’t pout like you expected her to when you announced you were fine with it and didn’t bother to show. A sigh left your lips as she handled the payment that your soon to be mother-in-law did for you. Dress in a bag to prevent casualties from happening. Once you were given the signal to leave, you grasped your phone and went to the front door. Not waiting for your mother as you slid into the front seat, opening your phone to look at the picture of the woman you’ll be marrying. Your eyes bore into the green ones that didn’t seem to have a spark, pushing down the negative feelings to your gut as you looked out the window as the car began to drive. — It felt wrong. You, the dress that you wore, the fact that you were standing behind the foliage with the flowers of the pathway that would lead you down the aisle and towards the altar where the redheaded woman you had not seen at all in person. This shouldn’t be you walking down the aisle, it should be another girl with elegant features and a wealthy family. You already cried this morning into your mother’s abdomen, you couldn’t start crying now.

Your uncle stood beside you, he wasn’t tall for a man but he had the muscle. His hair was neat, his black suit fit him well. The only thing he was really missing to bring out his personality was the black glasses he wore inside or when reading. As a kid you remembered playing around with him, or taking a nap in his bed just to mess around with him sitting next to you while reading Lord of The Rings. He would turn his head to look over you, black glasses pushed down as his eyes peered at you over them and he would mock you for your bedhead. He tries his best to help you and your mom out, being a dentist isn’t a hard pay. But he lives out of state, caring for his pregnant wife and two year old toddler.

Your arm was looped into his, awaiting it to be your turn to walk on down. It wasn’t until a soft teasing voice interrupted your thoughts, “You know, you’re supposed to think about everything after the wedding,”

A soft nudge to your side had you letting out a small smile, the feeling felt weird. Why are you smiling? You’re about to be wed off to some stranger you never met, but, in the face of it all he was lightening you up a bit.

“It’s not that bad, I promise you that,” He started off, eyes turning to look over at you as his expression was soft. A hint of pride yet understanding met your fearful ones, “It may seem scary, for you especially since you don’t know her but all you gotta do is think on how life will be after that. Don’t let this catch you up on the freight train just yet, enjoy the peace now. You don’t know if she’ll end up being the nicest thing to happen to you or the meanest, and you will let me know how she treats you after a few months because I will not tolerate my eldest niece getting stuck in a marriage with a bully,”

“I’m your only niece,” You giggled out softly at his protectiveness, fingers squeezing the soft flesh of his bicep as the music shifted. Giving the indication for you both to start heading down, with a gentle movement you both started walking down the aisle. Everyone was standing, but it wasn’t a lot of people, only secluded for family and close friends. While you recognized a few familiar faces you kept your looks on the redhead standing down at the altar waiting for you. She was in a light-grey, collared, buttoned up vest with a notched lapel with a button down white blouse beneath it. Light gray trousers covered her legs and black boots, it matched the tight bun she had in her red hair as her green eyes met yours and you had to fight the blush rushing to your cheeks at her stare and appearance. Her outfit surprisingly matched yours well, you swallowed before you stopped at the end of the altar. Arm leaving your uncles before you took him into a tight hug, throat tightening before you whispered your delayed response, “You’ll be the first to know if anything goes wrong,”

You stood there for a second longer, before you let him go to his destined spot as you moved up to stand in front of Natasha. She was taking you in, did she think poorly of you? Was she angry she had to marry a low-life like you? Your hair neatly styled in a half-up half-down hairstyle, front pieces framed your face well enough as you took her in as well. She has a well-built stature, only a few inches taller than you and she was gorgeous. You started to believe that this woman could, in-fact hurt a fly but not only with her words but with her looks. It wasn’t until the officiant cleared his throat.

“Welcome friends, family, and loved ones. I am Steve, a friend of one of the partners here today that are joining together in marriage,” He announced, tone smooth and clean but all you could focus on was the woman standing in front of you.

“Yet, we are all gathered here today for the marriage of Natasha Romanoff, and Y/N L/N,” He continued on, her name sounding smooth coming off of his lips. Although you had never said it, you’d wish you had whispered it to yourself for the confidence boost before standing in front of such a powerful woman. Maybe she was the heir for a reason, breathing in as you finally settled on listening to Steve.

“Although these two lovely women had not had much of an experience together yet, we know that it is a great thing in the future for them to have. No matter the issues at home, the brave step to come into this marriage is a wonderful thing and who knows, maybe this relationship will bloom to be a lovely thing,” He added on, finishing his speech with that and it had not but only stressed you even more.You subtly flickered your eyes to your uncle, who didn’t look too pleased himself but you focused on Natasha after it was mentioned for you two to share your vows. You had stayed up most of the night planning yours, one to not be too romantic but enough to share your devotion.

It wasn’t until she said her vows first, and honestly? You might have melted, her voice was soft, sweet like honey, “On this day, I give you my heart, My promise, That I will walk with you, Hand in hand, Wherever our journey leads us, Living, learning, loving, Together, Forever,”

It was sweet, brows furrowing as you felt your stomach churn with an upcoming feeling of nervousness. You took a moment to process, were your vows good enough as hers? She executed it perfectly, it was just the right amount to give to someone that you’re marrying without even knowing them. You adjusted your stance to get more comfortable, before you finally shared your own vows, “I, Y/N, take you to be my wife. I promise to love you, support you, and cherish you through everything we will face together,”

Her eyes held yours as you said them, it wasn’t until your brother showed up to the altar with both of your wedding rings. Natasha had picked up yours, gently picking up your hand as her thumb brushed against your knuckles. Body leaning in close as you felt the warmth she was radiating, the cool metal of the ring slid onto your finger as you felt your eyes wander to the jewelry on your hand. Shakily, you lifted the only ring left in the hold of your brother before he was coaxed back to his spot. Your hand took Natasha’s, feeling the softness of her skin. The callouses in her fingers and you couldn’t help but let your fingers brush against hers before you slid the ring onto her finger. You felt like you were in a trance, not hearing Steve declare you both wife’s. You didn’t even feel her hand find your face as she leaned in, forehead brushing against yours at the close contact. It wasn’t until you felt her nose bump into yours that you snapped out of it right as her lips lightly pressed into your own. The kiss was sweet, soft, nurturing as she pulled back.

People were clapping, and it was getting overwhelming. You took everything in your might to not recoil back before a hand slithered around your back and rested on your waist. Natasha began to lead you down the aisle, and took a left instead of a right. You were confused until you saw the black car sitting in a parking lot as she opened the passenger door for you. Your bags were already packed and placed at her place to be ready to be unpacked, she buckled the seatbelt for you before she slid into her driver's seat.

“You’re visibly stressed love, I’m not going to put you through all that with the reception afterwards, we can go home and settle now,” Her voice smoothed out her plan, you felt a bit of gratitude for her consideration as the car pulled out of the parking lot and drove through the city. You leaned your chin into the palm of your hand as you looked out the window, breathing out softly into the tense silence afterwards. You couldn’t help but think back on the empty seat beside where your mother sat. You knew who that spot was for, Melina probably even handed the invite to the man you adored. He didn’t show up. He broke that promise of seeing you walk down the aisle in a pretty dress that he would love to see you in, and he didn’t even get to see you at all.

As you thought in your solitude the car pulled into a driveway into a decently sized house. It was unique, not a mansion but it was rather grand. You could tell that the redhead had money, the house was practically the queen of the subdivision. You watched her open the car door and leave, your fingers unbuckled the seatbelt before reaching to pull the handle before the door opened for you, Natasha helped you out of the car steadily. Her hand found your waist again to guide you up the steps. You had to admit she was rather polite, it was something you were beginning to adore as you looked at the front door as she started to unlock it.

Once it creaked open, no hinges complaining, no creaking. She led you inside as you noticed your bags settled at the bottom of the staircase in the house, it was huge inside. You couldn’t even believe you were standing here, it wasn’t until you snapped your head to look at Natasha when she spoke out with a soft rasp.

“Welcome home,”

[thewinter-eden]

You Live Like This? - PT IV

Series master list PART 2 INFO

pairing: Bang Chan x fem!reader rating: mature, dark themes summary: home invader!Chris makes good on his promise to rob your ex to avenge your painful breakup, only to find that you're already there trying to collect your belongings. In order to keep your ex-bf from including you as an accomplice in his inevitable police report, you have to pretend you don't know the robber who keeps flirting with you. (plus like a lot more)

warnings: camping, murder, Ateez mentioned, mature

word count: ~7k

The second campground is bigger, more wooded, and far more secluded than the first one. After spending the whole day finding familiar faces nearly every time you stop for gas, you’ve finally adjusted to the idea of losing the solitude of your journey.

The people in the campsites on either side of yours are strangers, which supplies you with some comfort as you set up your gear and get a fire started.

Every time you find yourself getting lost in your routine, you realize how much you’ve been enjoying this experience. depending on yourself for your own place to sleep and a place to rest, trusting in yourself to see that you have food to eat—it’s such a stark contrast from the way you lived with so much doubt and worry so many months ago, that you can now rely on yourself and see that you are taken care of.

You’re proud as you put your tent together. The heat of the summer hits your skin harshly but you take it in peace. You will have shade. When your work is done, you will be fed and satisfied, you’ll have something to drink, you’ll have a book to read, you’ll have the sunset to watch.

When your equipment is all up and ready, you stand back with a glad smile. This is the work of your hands and the product of your own financial effort.

While your spirits are high, your energy has diminished quite a bit since yesterday, a second full day of driving wearing on you. This time, you plan to get dinner out of the way first thing and then head straight to bed. You’ll need to get as many hours of sleep as possible for the rest of the trip to be able to keep yourself alive on the road, and the necessity of stopping for the night during daylight hours should afford that without issue.

“You’re Chan’s friend, right?”

Or so you thought.

You’re in the middle of dumping a can of soup into a sauce pan when someone scurries into your campsite. He’s not exceptionally tall, but he has a muscular build and a full face with soft features that stand out against the thick biceps that strain the sleeves of his black t-shirt.

You lift an eyebrow, setting the pan on the grill. You don’t actually mind the intrusion, now that you’re comfortable with your routine and confident in the face of being somewhere so far from home. “Yeah, I guess? And you are?”

“Jisung,” he supplies with a cute smile. “Channie Hyung sent me to make sure you’re not being bothered by an annoying ex boyfriend?”

Huffing a short laugh, resentfully touched by Chan’s thoughtfulness, you spread your arms indicatively. “I’m good, thanks. You can report back the all clear.”

He laughs politely and takes in your humble camp. “I like your setup. I bet it takes you, what, ten minutes to unpack?”

“Twenty,” you say. “I’m getting faster though.”

He nods appreciatively. “Our mega camp takes like an hour. Minho is our camping enthusiast and he has all this bougie gear. A ton of tables and shelves and a portable shower stall and shit. It’s crazy.”

Despite his intrusion on your peace, you find that you don’t feel stressed by his friendly company.

He’s polite and respectful, and doesn’t come with a shared ton of baggage. Compared to finding Chan or Woosung suddenly in your personal space, this new guy is like a breath of fresh air.

“That sounds nice, though,” you comment kindly. “I rely on the public campground showers.”

Jisung shrugs. “I usually do too. There are eight of us and it takes too much time and too much water to wait around and take turns.” He shoots you another sweet smile. “I’ll go report back to my benevolent leader now, so he can come say hi. He said he had some caustic experiences with the guy that he doesn’t want to exacerbate.”

That’s nice.

It’s thoughtful of him.

Even going so far as to send a friend ahead of him to keep from causing problems with Woosung.

“Before I go, do you want any help with anything? The guys over there have our camp handled, so I really don’t have anything to do until dinner.” The man rubs his hands together in anticipation, but you just shrug.

“I really don’t have much to do. I pretty much just have to get my fire going, that’s it. But thank you, you’re very kind.”

Your compliment, though nothing short of polite, seems to go straight to his head. He grins, cheeks flushing pink. “I can help you get it going? Unless you’d rather me get out of your hair, then I’ll scoot—no worries.”

He’s not overly intrusive, and he seems genuinely willing to back out of your space if you want him to, which puts your mind at ease about a complete stranger suddenly appearing in your area. If you’re totally honest with yourself, he’s kind of adorable, and it’s not at all an imposition to spend a few more minutes chatting with him.

“Actually, if you have any idea how to do this properly, I’ll let you give it a go. I’m still learning the camping thing.” You gesture to the fire pit almost bashfully. You can start a fire on your own, of course, but if he has any tips from experience, you’re happy to take them.

Jisung’s face transforms into an expression of dutiful focus, his entire body jumping forward with a start to take on his new task. “Oh, for sure, I got you.”

The burst of energy amuses you, but you just stand back and let him go.

He crouches next to your pile of wood and kindling, confident movements arranging some of the pieces into the fire pit. “Have you been camping before?” He asks conversationally.

You try to stay out of his way, pulling up your chair to sit a few feet to the side instead of kneeling down where he’s working. “I’ve done a few single nighters just to introduce myself to things. It was so new to me that I actually went to a couple of classes to learn the basics.”

He chuckles with you, but doesn’t make fun of you like you halfway expected. “Oh, so you’ve been doing this on your own the whole time?” When you nod, he looks impressed. “Wow, it’s so cool that you jumped into something like this by yourself. I’ve only ever gone camping with friends, usually the whole group of eight. This is your first long trip then?”

You chat easily for a few minutes while he gets a good blaze going, and then smile gratefully as he steps back with a grin.

“There. You can put more on once this starts to go down. When the bigger pieces of wood burn most of the way up, that’s the best time to start cooking. You’ll get more control and consistent heat that way.”

You make a mental note of the information, reminding yourself to write it down in your binder after he leaves. “Thank you, I appreciate it.”

He dusts his hands off and shrugs cheerfully. “No problem, happy to help.”

Before you can decide if you should politely offer for him to stick around or just wait for him to excuse himself, he rubs a hand over his arm and turns to you with a sheepish upturn of his lips. “So, apparently there are some cool ruins here.”

You’re reminded of the gas station cashier and the obnoxious interaction with Chan, your face immediately heating. “Oh, yeah, I heard that. Some famous ghost story or something.”

Jisung’s expression brightens at your recognition. “Yeah! The Kingston Steps. None of us are really followers of that sort of thing, but a few of us were gonna go check it out after dinner, since we’re here anyway. Do you want to come with us? We were just gonna go see it and come back, no big deal. I think it’s by the lake.”

The self-isolating part of you reflexively stirs up a number of excuses for not going, but you stop yourself before you can refuse the invitation. You are already here, and while you’re not invested in the merit of any ghost stories, you would value having photos of the experience to go in your collection.

Going with him and his group is a good way to keep yourself from psyching yourself out about going alone and feeling ridiculous about it, the way you always do when you convince yourself to try something new.

“Yeah, that would be great, if you guys don’t mind. I can always go by myself, though. I’m not all that cut up about my ex, you don’t have to babysit me.” You shoot him an awkward chuckle, carefully delivering the response in a tone that should allow him to rescind his offer without any discomfort.

But he just shakes his head quickly, eyes widening in earnest. “No, not at all. You should come with us, it’ll be fun. You can meet the guys. Show Chan we’re not all heathens.”

You blink. “What?”

He rolls his eyes with a snort. “Channie hyung just spent like the last half hour telling us not to bother you. Like we would trample all over your camp or something. He’s protective, but he warned us off like we were gonna embarrass him.” Jisung seems to realize what he’s telling you, and abruptly puts his hands up reassuringly. “My point is, if you want to be left alone, we’ll respect that. Just kick me outta here and I’m gone.”

Squinting in confusion but not at all concerned about Jisung or his friends approaching you, you struggle to connect the dots. “But he sent you to check on me?”

Jisung’s hands drop to his sides, eyebrows lifting in an attempt to appear casual. “He thought we would get along.” His tone hitched slightly, like that’s not the whole story. “He said you and I are pretty similar, and would probably click quickly.”

You watch a redness rise in his ears, and suddenly you’re remembering this morning—Chan’s voice telling you he’s not good for you.

Realization of the situation settles in with a trace of disappointment. He still thinks he’s not good for you, and he’s pushing Jisung in as a replacement.

Your smile falls, but not enough for Jisung to notice. “He’s right,” you say quietly, politely. “It’s good to meet you, Jisung.”

His cheeks flush to match his ears. “Yeah, you too.”

You don’t want to accept this newly arranged replacement, no matter how kind he is. It feels like being shoved along the line, pushed on to be someone else’s problem.

Like he won’t feel bad about not returning your texts or reaching out to you if he hands you Jisung as your consolation prize.

But if he’s going to play this game, seeing if he can just pass you off like it means nothing, it gives you a chance to read him from a new perspective.

If he really doesn’t return your interest, you’ll find out while you’re spending time with Jisung.

You can play this game.

Pulling yourself together, you shoot Jisung a friendly smile. “See you after dinner then.”

Your acceptance pulls his posture high instantly. The excitement on his face is contagious, and your shoulders relax with an easy breath.

Before he leaves, he spins back with a start. “Oh, and if you want one of us to walk you to the restrooms after dark, just in case, we’d be happy to lend an escort. You’re like all the way across the grounds from them. If you don’t want to risk running into your ex alone, we’ve got you.”

You’re surprised by his offer, but touched. “Why?”

He shrugs, like it’s the most obvious thing in the world. “You’re hyung’s friend.”

Blinking slowly, you can only nod and mutter a soft thanks.

He tips a playful salute and disappears down a path that cuts through the trees.

Maybe there are benefits to traveling with a few extra people. You hadn’t realized that you were so far away from the camp restrooms, and the thought of trying to find them in the dark by yourself doesn’t comfort you.

By the time Chan meanders over to your campsite, you’ve run into another problem. Your fire has burned through all of your wood, and your soup isn’t warm yet.

You’re standing at the side of your car, peering inside at the stack of books you keep in the floorboard, wondering which of them you can bear to sacrifice to your cook fire when he appears next to you.

“Oh, your fire’s gone out.” Chan mutters, picking up a stick and poking through the ashes. “You got more wood?”

You shake your head, embarrassed. You have a system of buying a bundle of wood at a gas station every day, along with a fresh gallon of water and a new canned option for dinner. “One has always been enough before. That’s all I bought.”

He straightens, turning to you. “Do you camp a lot?”

When you don’t answer, Chan chuckles under his breath. “Okay, look, this happens. You should always get a little more than you think you need, just in case.” He notices you poking through your book collection, and makes a noise of surprise, pulling your head out of your car with a hand on your arm. “No, no, no, burning your books is a medieval and inefficient way of salvaging a fire.”

The smirk he hits you with makes your cheeks heat with embarrassment. “I don’t have more wood.”

He closes your car door before you can set your library on fire. “There’s a camp host around here somewhere, he’ll have firewood for sale. Sit tight, I’ll be right back.” He leaves you with a reassuring squeeze to your shoulder.

You slump down on the picnic table bench, mood effectively dampened. Obviously there’s a learning curve to trying something new for the first time, but you hadn’t wanted to be witnessed while you worked out the kinks. It’s good for you, you suppose—and better to be in the company of people who are willing to help you than completely stranded by yourself.

You pick up your trusty film camera and snap a demoralizing shot of your dead fire.

If you’re going to make a fool of yourself in front of people, you might as well keep a momento to remind you to buy more fucking firewood.

The next person to invade what little peace you have left is Woosung.

Because of course it is.

“Having trouble with your fire?” He snorts, sitting himself at your table.

You scowl. “Go away, Woosung.”

“My girlfriend and I use a camp stove. Propane. Works on a dial. Never fails. You’d know that if you had any idea how to run a basic campsite.”

You fight the urge to defend yourself. You’d chosen not to dole out money for an expensive camp stove, or even a cheap single burner, when you could expand your repertoire of skills and learn how to cook over a fire.

Trying to make a stand for yourself to him is a waste of breath. You have nothing more to invest in him or his opinion of you. “That’s nice.”

“Who are you kidding? You live on your couch. You eat instant ramen. It’s not like you can cook on a regular stove. And what’s that? Progresso? Why am I not surprised?”

Not bothering to answer, knowing you only have nasty things to say to him, you turn away and focus on stirring the tepid pot of soup as though it’s still cooking. You want to make a snarky comment about how if his girlfriend is so inspiring, she must be missing him back at his camp, but you don’t want to give him any invitation to rib you about being bitter about him being in a new relationship.

Especially when you couldn’t care less.

In fact, you’re hoping his new girlfriend will distract him from seeking you out.

But alas.

He remains.

“What have you been up to all these months? I haven’t heard from you since that crazy burglary.” His voice hits you with an odd edge that tenses your shoulders.

The last time you’d seen him, you’d been running out of his apartment under the pretense of sheer terror. You hadn’t prepared yourself for discussing the incident so long after it happened, when you’re not actually as shaken up about it as you acted.

This is delicate territory.

“This and that,” you say vaguely.

“You meet anyone? Reconnect with any old friends? Got any fun stories to share?”

You glance at him over your shoulder, watching him trace the grain of the picnic table nonchalantly. You’re paranoid.

He’s not fishing for a confession, he’s just being a dick.

“That’s none of your business. Please go.”

He snorts, shoes scuffing as he leans forward. “I just keep thinking about that day, you know? How crazy it is that some whacko broke into my apartment in broad daylight.”

You turn on him sharply, face burning with anger. “I don’t feel like reminiscing with you. I want you to go. Just leave me alone.” You have to get him out of here before you let yourself act guilty, before you give yourself away when he’s just trying to make you uncomfortable.

Chan chooses that moment to appear with an armload of firewood, wide gaze flashing between you and Woosung.

Your ex clocks him instantly, twisting himself to assess the man. “So this is the guy. Good for you, finding a new boyfriend.” He says with a sneer, like he hasn’t brought up his yet unseen girlfriend every chance he gets. “I hope he can cook. This is what you’re feeding him?”

“He’s not my boyfriend.” You say abruptly, snatching Woosung’s attention back to you. Even if he doesn’t suspect your involvement in the robbery, you don’t need him discovering Chan’s. “Please leave, Woosung.”

Chan puts his head down and moves to your fire pit, arranging some of the wood in a log cabin formation.

“You know she’s helpless with all this, right?” Woosung directs this to Chan. “I’ve never seen anyone less suited for the outdoors.”

That stings, especially considering you’ve been enjoying your new hobby.

He’s trying to hurt you.

He doesn’t know whether or not you’re capable of camping.

It’s just bullshitting to get a reaction.

Chan doesn’t answer, busily pushing some small kindling into the open spaces between the wood. His eyes flick to you, assessing your reaction, and when you lift your chin reassuringly, he angles himself away again.

You don’t need rescuing.

But you get the distinct impression that the moment you do, Chan would be on his feet in the blink of an eye.

Woosung glances at you. “Is he deaf? Dumb?”

“Fuck off.” You snap instantly, appalled by his behavior—by the question. You know why Chan isn’t talking. He’d been wearing a mask in front of Woosung all those months ago, but his voice could be recognized.

He won’t speak, not when it puts both you and himself at risk.

You have no intention of making that a difficult task for him. “Don’t talk to him. Get away from my camp.” Your words are delivered quietly, dangerously low. “Unless you want to be kicked out by the park rangers, you can get lost.”

He shrugs and lifts himself from your picnic table. “Whatever. Enjoy your Progresso.” He shoots another rude laugh at Chan and shuffles away, hands tucked carelessly in his pockets.

Like an afterthought, he pauses and turns back to you. “I’m so glad that lunatic didn’t hurt you that day.” His eyes flash from you to the man crouching by your fire pit, lips curling in a smirk, and then he spins on his heel and saunters on down the road.

Chan rises, watching him leave until he’s out of sight. When he’s sure that your ex is gone, he turns to you. “I’m sorry, I just—”

“I know.” You cut him off, sliding your legs out from the bench and joining him at the fire pit, trying to put the odd interaction out of your mind. “Thanks for getting this for me. I’ve got matches, I can light it from here.”

He steps back, standing silently until you crouch and reach for the rest of the wood that he’s acquired for you.

“Wait, hold on.” He blocks your hand. “That’s why you burned through your supply the first time. You wanna get your fire started first with a few small logs, and then throw the biggest pieces on once you got some good heat. It will burn longer.”

He takes your matches from you and lights the kindling, talking the whole time, showing you how to efficiently get a hot flame burning. It’s the same way Jisung did it, but he takes care to warn you to burn your supply more gradually.

When you once again have a roaring cook fire and a few extra logs to keep it going later, you focus on stirring your soup. “Thanks for this,” you utter quietly, still embarrassed. “I’m still learning. Like he said, I’m not experienced with any of this.”

He squats next to you in the dirt and plays with a few twigs. “The guy’s a jerk. You’re doing great. Don’t let him rattle you.” He touches a hand to your shoulder and then points at your soup. “If you really want to blow some smoke in his eye, so to speak, I can show you a staple camp breakfast. Once you master that, no one can question your camping skills.”

You stare at him blankly, trying to reconcile the apparent agreement he has with Jisung with this extraordinary effort to help you. “All I have is hash.”

He shakes his head with a quick smile. “I’ll bring you the stuff. You’ve gotta get away from the canned crap. Trust me. It elevates your whole experience.”

“I only buy canned food so I don’t have to mess with fresh ingredients. I can’t keep them cold driving all day anyway.”

“A cooler and a bag of ice fixes that. Seriously, it’s worth the cost of groceries. I can have you going tomorrow morning. Don’t you want to see the look on his face when he walks by and you’ve got a feast of bacon and eggs? Also, if you haven’t eaten bacon and eggs that are infuse with woodsmoke, you haven’t truly camped.”

The only egg you can imagine is the one that’s gonna be on Woosung’s face, and it’s enough to convince you. Plus, Chan is offering you a valuable wilderness skill. You’d be foolish to turn him down. “I’ll pay you for the groceries and the wood.”

He waves you off. “First lesson is free. Don’t worry about it.”

You’re already feeling better about the whole trainwreck of your first solo roadtrip. “Thank you.”

Chan grins at you, rising to his feet. “And the firewood was free. Woosung said they have a propane stove, so they didn’t need it anyway. Don’t give me that look, you already gave me permission to rob him.”

You just stare at him in dumb silence.

How long had he been listening to your conversation before he revealed himself?

He surveys your site with hesitation before glancing back at you. “I really don’t like that he found your camp. You sure you don’t want to squeeze into ours for the night?”

Your response is a hard frown.

“No, I’m serious. You’re all the way over here alone and he knows it.”

His concern is touching, but you have to be able to overcome this obstacle on your own. Chan won’t be there for you forever. “I’ll be fine, Chan. Your friend already invited me to see those ruins. We’ll go explore, then I’m gonna wash up, and go to bed. Just come back in the morning.”

He pauses, watching you thoughtfully. “I’ll send someone to walk you over there.” He says. “Sun’s going down and you’re like five minutes from the showers.”

You try to protest, but he just zips up his jacket with finality and gives your arm another squeeze. “I’d do it myself, but I’m trying not to make trouble for you with that asshole. See you after dinner, okay?”

All you can do is nod as he leaves you to your dinner. Heart uncomfortably confused, you settle in to eat your sad little bowl of soup and watch the sun begin to go down.

The whole group appears as soon as you’ve finished washing out your pan and stirring up your embers to let them burn out on their own.

Jisung approaches you first, Chan lingering behind him with the others. “The explorers have arrived!” Jisung announces. “Ready to see if we can get ourselves cursed?”

Chan smiles at you, a tempered, detached expression that sends a jolt of insult through your blood.

You look away and focus on Jisung. “I want to get my camera, and then I’m ready.” He waits for you while you get into your car and loop the strap of your film camera around your neck, and then you’re off.

“What do you think of your trip so far?” Jisung asks you as you walk the campground road towards the lake. The group is loud and rowdy behind you, the friends joking and picking on each other to pass the time. “Are you enjoying camping?”

“I am,” you say honestly. “There have been quite a few surprises along the way, but it’s been fun. I like the peace of it.” You glance back at Chan, only to see his eyes dart away from you.

“Channie hyung said he didn’t know you were gonna be here. It’s crazy that you just ran into us like that.”

“Yeah. Crazy.” It bothers you more than it should that you’re getting this lukewarm shoulder from a guy you barely know, but clearly your feelings for him are stronger than you’d wanted to realize. Hadn’t he been sidled up next to you, only an hour ago, taking time away from his friends to help you? Is he still the guy who wants to be ‘good for you’? Or is he just being a friend taking pity on you?

Your mouth sets in a hard frown. “I didn’t know my ex was gonna be here either.”

Jisung continues talking, asking about the situation with Woosung, commenting appreciatively on your vintage camera, but your responses are halfhearted and distracted.

You’d hoped to be gauging Chan’s reaction to you interacting with his friend, but he’s ignoring you.

His apparent sudden disinterest disappoints you more than you thought it would, but you’re not discouraged. If he has no problem with you being close to Jisung, you can prepare yourself to get over him, once and for all.

And in the meantime, Jisung is nice. He’s kind, funny, not at all unattractive, and not in the slightest the consolation prize material you had initially accused him of being. You can be just as happy getting to know him as you were discovering Chan.

At least, you hope you can.

A few minutes of light hiking later, you come up on the ruins that you’d seen all over the postcards in the gas station this morning.

They’re beautiful in a nostalgic sort of way. A solid set carved in stone, standing alone among the over grown rubble of the mansion they once belonged to. Ivy clambers up the sides, moss ornamenting the outsides of each step but worn away from the centers where millions of tourists and campers have stepped.

Despite the obvious age of the ruins, the stairs stand strong, only crumbling at the edges with little affect to the integrity of the structure.

It’s amazing that every other part of the mansion has practically turned to gravel while the staircase remains proud and almost whimsical.

“Wow, cool!” One of the guys exclaims, rushing forward to hop onto the first step. “Who wants to go to the top?”

“No way.” One of them, you think his name is Felix, walks around the edges of the monument. “I don’t play with that shit.”

“You think you’re gonna be cursed for life?” Another, Minho, starts climbing the stairs with a grin. “Or death?”

“This is awesome.” Jisung runs up after him, clutching to the back of Minho’s shirt when he realizes there’s no railing to hold onto.

You lift your camera, peering through the viewfinder as you snap shot after shot.

The guys crawl all over the stairs, with the exception of two.

You realize Chan has come to stand next to you, watching his friends clamber over the stone and play like they’re going to push each other off. “It’s beautiful, right?” He says, taking a few pictures on his phone. “I’m glad we didn’t miss this.”

Your skin prickles where his arm brushes yours. “Glad that cashier gave us such a romantic spot for our honeymoon.” You quip smartly, catching his wide grin in your peripheral.

“Ah, he was just too much fun to play with.” Chan nudges you with an elbow, and then abruptly returns his arm to his side like you burned him. “So, what do you think of Jisung? He likes you.”

What the hell is wrong with this guy?

He’s going hot and cold on you, and it’s exhausting.

“Well, that was your plan, wasn’t it?” You return simply. “As far as stand-ins go, he’s an interesting choice.”

Chan blinks at you, wide eyed and stammering.

Shaking your head, you move away from him towards the stairs. “Jisung is great. I like him. Thanks for the introduction.”

He watches you go.

Jisung turns just in time to see you start up the steps, and hurries down with a beaming grin to extend a hand. “This is so cool—careful, though, the steps are worn super smooth. Hyunjin has already slipped like twice.”

You slap your hand into his and let him guide you up, pausing to take a few more pictures here and there, until you’re standing at the top with Minho and Hyunjin.

Chan remains at the bottom, staring up at you and Jisung with a tension in his jaw that fills you with satisfaction.

It’s his game.

You’re only playing by his rules.

“Come on, Jisung, let’s take a picture.” You slip your arm through his and let your camera hang against your chest, sliding your phone from your pocket and holding it up to catch both of you smiling widely over the abrupt drop off at the top of the stairs.

Jisung’s arm loops around your waist to keep you steady, his other hand throwing up a peace sign. “Let me get one too. Let’s all get in this.”

It’s a treacherous position to group all four of you in the narrow space to take the picture, so when you lean into Jisung, it’s not even an attempt to get under Chan’s skin.

But your eyes flick down to find him as you feel Jisung’s hand curl around your hip, and see fire flash in his expression.

Success.

You’ll have to apologize to Jisung later, but for now, the aggravation in Chan’s posture is exactly the result you wanted.

A figure in the background of Jisung’s picture catches your attention when he shows the selfie to you.

Woosung, standing in the rubble at the bottom, gazing up at you with irritation written all over his face.

You turn so suddenly that Jisung nearly drops his phone trying to catch you before you can trip over the edge.

The only people on the ground are Chan, Felix, and a few other random campers milling through the ruins.

No Woosung in sight.

“Alright, it’s getting late.” Chan’s voice calls up, beckoning for his friends to come back down. “Long day of driving tomorrow. We need to sleep.”

Jisung turns to you with a sweet smile. “Walk you back?”

Chan shoves his balled fists into his pockets and looks away, shaking his head with an inaudible mutter.

You slip your hand back into Jisung’s. “That would be great, thank you.”

He sticks around long enough for you to gather up your overnight bag and change of clothes, walks you to the restrooms as promised, and then leaves you to spend your second night alone.

It’s colder that night, and you have to dig your second sweater out of your car to add layers and flip the edge of your sleeping bag over your face to get warm enough to fall asleep. Your dreams are restless, riddled with charming robbers and cruel exes.

When morning comes, you unzip your tent to find your fire already started.

There’s no telling where the wood came from this time.

Chan’s head pops up from behind the picnic table at the sound of you stirring, and spreads his arms to gesture at the collection of ingredients and supplies on the surface. “Morning,” he says with a grin. “Sleep well?”

Is this ‘I want to be good for you’ Chan or pushing-you-at-Jisung Chan?

You decide not to fight it. You can spend this whole trip giving him terse responses and guarded glares, or you can save your energy and just pretend he’s a normal guy, a friend helping out.

It’s better than wasting your emotional energy on each confusion interaction.

“I slept okay.” You poke your legs through the door, setting your heels on your outdoor rug. “It got pretty cold last night.” Before you can ask him how he slept, the smell of coffee hits you, and your eyes flash to the cook fire. Your blue percolator is sitting on the grill, steaming and gurgling away. “You made coffee?”

The hard shell around your heart cracks.

You’re a goddamn sucker for coffee.

Damn you.

He rises to his feet, grabbing one of your cups off the table. “Yeah, I figured you’d want some. Thought I’d get it going for you to warm you up for sitting through a cooking lesson with me.” He pours you a rich, brown, insanely delicious smelling serving and brings it to you. “Careful, it’s hot.”

You cradle it in your hands, staring at him in bewilderment. “You don’t like coffee but you know how to make it? In a percolator?” It’s a bygone skill for most people, especially those who don’t drink coffee to begin with.

He shrugs. “My friends like it, so when it’s my turn to cook I make the coffee too. Is it good? I notice you drink it black so I tried to make it smooth, but I’m not sure how strong your roast is.”

The coffee hits your tongue with a scalding nutty richness that immediately warms you from the inside out. “God,” you mutter, sinking into the nest of your sleeping bag still bunched around you. “You gotta show me how you made this.”

Chan beams, flushed with your praise. “You like it?”

You nod, inhaling the steam like oxygen. “Mm-hmm.”

For a second he just stares down at you, your chill-blushed face surrounded by a thick cocoon of sweaters and sleeping bag, and the tips of his ears redden.

You scowl under his scrutiny. Him staring at you like he’s about to pinch your cheeks is not good for your plan to avoid catching feelings again. “What are you looking at?”

He shakes his head. “Nothing. I just…” he pauses, head cocking to the side. “Nothing, you’re just cute.”

“You should see me in the mornings.” You shoot back automatically, an ironic grin spreading across your face—because you know you’re not cute. You know your hair is a rat’s nest, your face printed with pillow creases, eyes probably puffy.

Chan’s eyes flash, an expression you can’t interpret. He’s thinking, debating saying something, but eventually extends a hand to you. “You ready to get cookin’, master chef?”

You’re loath to escape your little huddle of warmth, but you don’t want to waste all of your morning hours before you even get on the road again, so you pry a hand off your cup and slap it into his.

He pulls you up, steady as a statue as you sway on legs that haven’t held your weight in nine hours. He keeps your hand firmly trapped, eyes fixed down on you.

You’re in dangerous territory.

Clearing your throat abruptly, you reclaim your hand and skirt around him to set your coffee down on the picnic table. “So, what’s first?” You feel his eyes on you as you stretch the tightness out of your back, but he just joins you and starts organizing the ingredients he’s brought.

As you watch him arrange a small carton of eggs, packet of cheese, package of bacon, and a number of small potatoes and seasoning bottles, your eyes catch on something red, half hidden by a dish towel.

It looks like broken ceramic.

You move the towel, and find a broken mug, shattered into pieces. Fragments of the words ‘downward spiral’ stare up at you.

And on top of the pile of ceramic, slightly crumpled from the weight of the towel, a blue sticky note, with the words ‘You should have just asked for it’ scrawled on top in Woosung’s handwriting.

Your heart thuds angrily in your chest. “Did you put this here?” Terse, vicious, accusing.

Chan leans over to see what you’re staring at. “No? What is that?”

It’s your favorite mug, the one you had gotten from Woosung’s apartment. The one you had left at home.

How the hell did Woosung get his hands on it?

Before you can fly off in a rage and storm your ex’s campsite, you throw the towel back over it and focus your attention on Chan, breathing forcefully through your nose to calm yourself. “Nothing. Go ahead.”

He’s wary of your sudden irritation, but he doesn’t push you, instead reaching for the ingredients again. “Alright, so basically, when you’re camping with an iron skillet like you’ve got here, you wanna keep bacon as a staple ingredient. The grease doubles as your cooking oil for everything else, and it keeps your pan conditioned and makes it easier to clean when you’re done.”

You follow him between the fire and the picnic table staging area and back again, listening intently as he walks you through the motions of breakfast, showing you how to wrap potatoes in tin foil and place them directly on the grill while the bacon cooks.

He never seems to stop talking, gesticulating minutely into the air every time he has to pause to think of a better way to explain what he’s doing or consider his next course of action, checking in with you every so often to make sure your eyes haven’t glazed over.

You’re concentrating, but more on trying to make sense of the shattered mug and the somewhat ominous message than on the recipe for eggs and bacon.

By the time he gingerly pulls the softened potatoes off the fire and cuts them into chunks, dumping them into the sizzling leftover bacon grease with a mess of eggs, Jisung has shuffled his way over to your campsite with another young man, both of them in thick, oversized hoodies and faces scrunched with sleep. They nod half-closed-eyed greetings to you, mumbling good mornings and sliding into one side of your bench.

Chan watches them, unimpressed, his spatula hovering in the air. “What are you guys doing here?” His eyes narrow at Jisung, like the intrusion is an unwelcome one.

“Minho hit the sauce pretty hard last night.” Jisung mumbles sleepily. “He’s not up yet. We’re hungry.”

Your eyes snap to the two potatoes and single package of bacon and only four eggs, and then flash to Chan in a panic. “If the rest of your cult club are gonna come over here we’re gonna be out of food.”

The second newcomer, Hyunjin, slides his phone out of his pocket. “I’ll text Changbin hyung to bring more food.” He slumps over the table, chin propped up on his forearms as he blearily shoots off a text message.

Chan turns to you, an annnoyed upturn to his lips. “Is that okay?”

You shrug. This is all his doing anyway. “Of course it’s okay, obviously they can’t fend for themselves.” You’re mostly teasing, just to get their reactions, but Jisung just gives a drunken-looking smile and closes his eyes blissfully, breathing in the appetizing smell of breakfast.

Back to playing into Chan’s schemes, you suppose.

“Do you guys drink coffee?” You ask, already rummaging through your boxes for the other two cups you keep in your set.

“Don’t give them your coffee.” Chan groans, watching you shake out the dust from your unused dishes. “They’ll drink you dry, please don’t offer them your stuff.” He plucks one of the mugs from you obstructively. “Let them wake up the old fashioned way—a good kick in the pants—”

You snatch the cup back from him. “Knock it off,” You shoulder past him and grab the oven mitt, picking up the percolator and pouring two cups. When you turn back to the two new guys, you set the cups before them with an apology. “I don’t have cream or sugar, but Chan made it really smooth, so it shouldn’t be too offensive to you if you don’t normally take it black.”

“Thank you!” Jisung leans back with an excited gasp, cradling the mug with the same thrill that you had done half an hour ago, and elbows his companion. “Hyunjin. Coffee. Say thank you.”

Hyunjin’s eyes pop open, sucking in a big whiff of the beverage. “Oh yes. Thank you.”

You can’t fight the warm flood of gratification as they both gaze at you like you’ve brought them out of the cold. Just when you thought the best thing about mornings while camping was basking in the comfort of your sleep-warmed clothes and sucking down a hot cup of coffee, you suddenly find yourself watching an attractive man with a pinked nose cooking for you while two of his friends huddle together in massive hoodies with sleepy eyes and pouty lips, inhaling your coffee like there’s no life without it, realizing it’s somehow even better like this.

Two more members of their group arrive soon, with more dishes and more ingredients, immediately putting it on to cook while Chan plates the first round of breakfast. “Sit here,” he puts you next to Jisung with a tight smile, sliding your blue enamel plate towards you. “Try that out,” He says with a tense pat to your shoulder. “See if you ever want to settle for corned beef hash out of a can again.”

There he goes again, pushing you off on his friend.

Jisung scoots over a little as you crawl into the bench next to him, offering a cute smile back when you give him an overly warm grin.

If Chan wants to watch you ignore him, you’re just petty enough to oblige.

Chan tops off your coffee while you give your meal a chance to cool, watching the two new guys prepare an army’s worth of food over your small cook fire. One of them, Changbin, mentions the insufficient amount of firewood, and the other, Seungmin, mentions texting another member of their group to bring some over.

Before you know it, there are eight hungry men milling around your campsite, introducing themselves to you over the sounds of their growling stomachs, squeezing onto the benches all around you. You find yourself pushed against Jisung’s beefy shoulder on one side and Felix’s more angular one on the other.

Instead of feeling invaded and suffocated, you eat your unfairly delicious smoky breakfast with a happy glow, merely listening to the mindless chatter of the young men around you.

The muscular one across from you leans forward, sniffing at Jisung’s mug. “Why does your coffee smell better than mine?”

Jisung shrugs and gestures at you. “Don’t ask me, it’s her coffee.”

“We ran her out of coffee, you assholes.” Chan mutters from somewhere further down the bench. “Most of you are drinking our coffee.”

Before the man next to you, Changbin, you think someone said, can ask you what kind of coffee you buy, a line of police cars drive by your campsite in a rush of whooping sirens. One of them is a truck, hauling a boat on a trailer, kicking up dust all the way down the forest road.

“I wonder what’s happening.” Hyunjin mutters.

It’s only later, when you’ve just finished packing your camp back into your car, that a police vehicle pulls up behind you and you find out what happened.

The officer who steps out of the car calls you by name. He holds out his phone to you, a picture of a familiar face on the screen. “I understand you know this man?”

You glance at the device, expression twisting in unrestrained disgust at a selfie of Woosung. “Yeah, that’s my ex boyfriend. Why?”

A number of possibilities cross your mind, and you wonder how sunk you are. Had he recognized Chan? He’d called the police to arrest the man who robbed him, and informed them that you had been an accomplice?

On top of everything else screwing with your trip, now you’re going to miss Ateez because you’re locked up in a jail seven hundred miles from home.

“He was found murdered this morning. We just pulled his body out of the lake.”

< last part | next part >

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[formulafanfics13]

Lando needing to take out his frustrations from a race that ended badly and so he does in bed. Which reader has agreed to and doesn’t mind. But maybe Lando gets too rough and she uses their safe word but he doesn’t realise because he’s so far gone. And then after many(or few) attempts he finally hears it(maybe she starts crying idk) and then Lando immediately feels bad and tries everything to make up for it ❤️

Brutal Love, Gentle Hands - LN4 🔥

masterlist

Summary After a disastrous race, Lando takes his frustration out in bed — too hard, too fast, too disconnected. You’ve always trusted him with your body, always had a safeword system in place for nights like this, when he needed to burn it all out. But tonight, he doesn’t hear you. Not until you scream red. And when he finally does — when it hits him what he’s done — everything inside him breaks. The story unfolds in the aftermath: apologies, shaking hands, grief wrapped in tenderness. He holds you in the bath. He doesn’t touch you again until you ask. Because you were never just a body to him. You were his home. And he forgot — for one devastating moment — but he never will again.

Warnings dark themes, rough sex, emotional distress, ignored safeword (momentary), panic response, aftercare, sobbing, protective partner, guilt, kink dynamic with safety system, intense emotions, bath scene, domestic softness after trauma, resolution through communication, consensual kink but temporary breach of boundaries, reference to couples therapy, hurt/comfort, no glamorisation of boundary-crossing.

You could always tell when it was a bad race. Not from the way he spoke, because Lando didn’t say much when he was like this. Not from his jaw, even though it was clenched so tight you could trace the shape of his molars through his skin. Not from the slamming of the door or the sound of his helmet hitting the floor or the shower running too long.

You knew it the second he touched you. Because it was different. Rougher. Faster. Less present, more desperate. Like he was chasing something that he couldn’t get from a car and was going to claw it from your body instead.

He kissed you hard in the hotel suite, the scent of race sweat and champagne and engine oil still clinging to his neck. His hands tugged at your waist. His voice, low and flat, was the only warning you got. "Clothes. Off. Now."

You didn’t protest. You never did on days like this. You’d agreed a long time ago that if he needed you to take it, if it helped burn through the frustration, if he needed to fuck the rage out of his system, you would take it. Because he would stop if it got too much. Because you had the safeword. Because you trusted him.

But tonight? Tonight, you should have known.

He didn’t kiss your mouth again after the first time. Didn’t undress you with the kind of reverence he usually did. He yanked your top over your head like it was in the way. Shoved your shorts down your thighs while dragging you to the bed like a possession.

“Fucking bullshit race,” he spat under his breath. “Could’ve had a podium. Fucking strategy fucked me. Always fucking me. At least you’ll take it properly.”

You gasped when he flipped you onto your stomach. Cried out when he forced your legs apart with a knee and buried his hand in your hair to pull your face back. You weren’t wet yet, not really, but he didn’t notice. Or maybe he didn’t care.

He shoved into you anyway. No prep. No warning. Just brute force and blind frustration.

“Good fucking girl,” he growled, setting a brutal rhythm that made your body jolt with every thrust. “You’re the only one who listens. The only thing I can fucking control.”

You whimpered. Fists clenched in the sheets. Tears pricking already. You wanted to be good. You wanted to take it. But it hurt. Too much.

The pace was relentless. His grip on your hair was vice-tight. You tried to speak, tried to say the word, but it came out garbled. Swallowed by the sound of skin slapping skin, by the raggedness of his breathing, by the litany of curses under his breath.

He wasn’t here. Not really. His body was, but his mind was still on the track. Still in the car. Still stuck behind a team radio screaming strategy calls too late.

You opened your mouth again. Tried to say it. Louder this time. “Red.”

No response. Your breath caught. You squirmed, he only growled louder and slammed into you harder.

“Fuck, stay still. Stop fighting me.”

You sobbed. “Red, Lando. Red-please.”

Finally. Finally his rhythm stuttered. You felt his hands freeze. Heard his breath catch, caught the split-second of clarity.

“What-?”

“Red,” you gasped, voice cracking, shaking now under him. “Red. Please- stop- I can’t- it hurts-”

And just like that, it broke. He pulled out immediately. Crawled off you with shaking hands, his own breathing suddenly ragged, terrified. “Fuck. Fuck. Babe- no. No, no, no-”

You curled onto your side, legs drawn in, trembling. A hiccup of a sob escaped you. Lando’s heart fucking shattered. “I didn’t hear you. I didn’t-” his voice cracked. “I didn’t know. Fuck. I didn’t mean- I thought- you always- fuck, I’m sorry.” He wrapped himself around you, completely abandoning his own nakedness. Arms tight, hands frantic as he tried to gather you against his chest without hurting you further. “Shhh, baby, I’ve got you. I’m here. I’m here. You’re okay now. You’re okay.”

You were still crying, too stunned to form words. Lando pressed kisses to your shoulder, your temple, your knuckles. Anything he could reach.

“You used your safeword. And I didn’t hear you. That’s on me. That’s not okay. I’m so fucking sorry.”

You nodded into his chest. Barely. But it was enough.

He shifted so he could look at you. His hands were shaking. “I’ll never do that again. Never. You’re more important than anything else. I don’t care about the race. I don’t care about the podium. I care about you. You’re mine but only if you want to be. You say stop, I stop. You say red, I stop. No excuses.”

He looked broken. More than after the race. More than after any crash. You reached up with a trembling hand and touched his cheek. “I know,” you whispered. “I know you didn’t mean to. You just didn’t hear me.”

“But that’s not an excuse. I should have- I should’ve seen- fuck. I hurt you.”

You shook your head. “You stopped. That’s what matters. You heard me. In the end.”

And he lost it. Head in your neck. Arms tight around you. You both cried, softly now. Together. He didn’t try anything else that night. Didn’t ask. Just cleaned you up, drew a bath, sat behind you and held you while you soaked in silence. He washed your hair. Rubbed your shoulders. Let you curl into him in bed with your face pressed against his chest and his arms cocooning you like a shield.

In the morning, he made you breakfast. Booked a session with the couples’ kink therapist you both used sometimes. Ordered you flowers. Called his trainer and cancelled media duties.

And he didn’t fuck you again until you asked for it. Because you were never just his outlet. You were everything. Even when he forgot, for a moment. He never would again.

[lilliths-story-studio]

CW: The vaguest of mentions towards self elimination in a conceptual sense and not pertaining to the narrator’s internal thought process. Covering bases just in case it could be a problem though.

The return to the cabin is well timed. The only place to stay dry is just in front of the doorway, under an awning roughly the size of a greeting card. It doesn’t do a ton to keep the rain beginning to fall in swiftly fattening drops from pelting us. But the scent is clean and the water is a blessing in the midst of all this heat, so I lean against my side of the doorframe and just watch.

I only check the treetops twice before I finally relax and enjoy the storm.

“Have you found anywhere else like this?” She asks after several minutes of doing the same.

“Up north, there’s a spot called Kilbourn that reminds me a ton of Corbin. Strong riverside community. You’d like it.”

I’d wanted to take her.

“I remember you mentioned it…”

When she was making plans to come back out on the road with me, once her degree was finished. Something that had been extended twice due to her struggles with chronic fatigue, which are starting to make a lot more sense.

“They get real good rainstorms- but like everyone by a river, they kinda just want the stuff to stop flooding their homes, thanks.”

“You still rank them?”

“They’re harder to keep track of one at a time on the road than they were when I was staying put. Oklahoma gets some best ones, but they also go bad the most often.”

“Mild way of putting it.”

I kill off my beer at the same time she finishes hers.

“I’m grabbing another, want me to bring you one?”

“I’d say I can grab it myself, but now that you’ve offered, I’m feeling kinda lazy today.”

She snorts and takes the can.

“You’re lazy everyday.” She pops the door. “That’s why I offered.”

The door shuts, because at the very least she and I agree on wet hardwood and not wanting to skid to our collective death. The wind is picking up, tossing more of the water sideways into my side. I wipe at the water, like it will make a difference, and hiss as I’m reminded of the stinging in my palms.

Right.

Between the storm, the beer, and the conversation, the discomfort had been forgotten.

I should clean those.

As if reading my mind, Cassy reappears with the drinks and a small first aid kit.

“Let me see your palms.” She sets the drinks just next to the door starts unzipping the pouch. “I know I’m not getting you inside until this,” she waves between me and the storm “is out of your system.”

“It’s energizing and relaxing, I can understand that people don’t like being wet outside of a pool, though.”

Her lips press together on a suppressed bit of laughter. I look instead at the wounds as she goes to work.

“Thanks.” I clear my throat. “Sorry I just kinda…left you to do yours alone.”

“The last time you bandaged me up was very sweet- and I had to go and redo it anyway.”

“Nevermind, I retract my apology.”

“Meh, bank it.”

“I hate that you’re counting on it.”

“You doubt one of us is going to say or do something charged and mean again?” She starts cleaning out the really rather shallow scrapes with a wipe that smells like the Vodka I used to steal from Drew during my first run with his crew. It stings about the same.

“I mean, I’m going to try not to…”

“Like I said. Bank it.”

“So, full seriousness, what are you most worried about in those trees?” I hiss as she scrubs harder than she had a moment ago. “Fuck?”

“Way to lighten the mood.” She removes the wipe. “It’s dark, I really should be doing this inside. Since you’re not moving, however, I want to make sure the dirts out.”

“I appreciate it.”

Once the job is done she hands me the drinks to hold while pops back inside to put things away, then comes back, sticking her hand out.

“Beer, bitch.”

“You wanna get yourself hauled out in the rain?” Her eyes widen the slightest fraction and her lips purse. “Then watch the sass.”

I pass her can to her and she not-quite yanks it out of my hand.

“So the Howler is probably the most boring because it’s the most common story and sighting around here.” She says, popping her tab.

“That’s the Beauty and the Beast stunt double, right?”

“Beauty and the..”

“Giant wolf-cat thing the size of a bear with horns?”

She snorts a laugh, immediately covering her mouth.

“I don’t imagine it would go quite so well for anyone out here as it did in the movie.”

“I don’t know, the wolves would argue it hadn’t gone well at all.”

She laughs, head tilting back and full throat exposed. I can’t see much, only faint details illuminated by the glow spilling from the cabin window just past her. But it’s a kind of perfect I haven’t seen in years.

“I’ve never seen the Howler, but E has. She’s jumped at every elk call since.”

“She’s seen it. In person. For real.” I repeat back.

I know I’ve joked about Bigfoot, but there’s no way demon-bear is real.

“In person. For real- we see enough weird shit that lying is kinda pointless now. I believe her.”

“I can’t imagine it cares about my hair, though.”

I wait, uncertain if I’m going to get any more answer than that. Low, rolling thunder rumbles its way along in the distance while gusting wind sweeps itself into a stronger refrain. The trees bend more than they had and a fresh wave of water pelts my uninjured shoulder.

“Every region has its rules, if you take the time to get to know the wilds of it - and the things the wilds will warn you about.” She turns her eyes towards the woods and whatever she believes to be in there. “You know your rules up north and why?”

“Yeah. Thought he was nuts, but every time we’re up there Drew says something about the trees and whistling after dark, then threatens to beat every ass not inside the encampment borders when the sun goes down. I guess his dad grew up in the area.“

“That’s because those rules keep what lives in those trees from getting up close and personal.”

“Have you seen them?” Our boss had told stories of cannibalism and curses. I’d assumed them to be folktales and no more, same as the ones in these woods.

“E saw it, I only heard.” She taps her toes against the ground, still just watching as the branches dip and sway with more enthusiasm. “Fucked her up harder than the Howler by a lot.”

I give her a beat, nursing my drink in the interim.

“So what does that have to do with these woods and my hair?”

“Your hair is one of the rules that helps keep you from getting up close with the things in these woods. Everything out here is incredibly energy sensitive, and you have no actual wards. Just the braiding we can get done, your visualization, and a bandana. So you can’t afford to skip out on any of them, given they’re all meant to be extra on top of proper protection magic.”

“Weren’t you supposed to teach me that?”

“Do your light exercise tonight and let me re-braid your hair.” She says.

“I guess Imagination was the true magic all along.” I shake my head and take a drink. “And what’s going to get me, then? What’s the boogie man?”

“Do you remember the feeling in the caves? That thick, almost aggressive anxiety?”

Anxiety? That word seems entirely too mild.

“Vaguely.”

We all pretend to be tougher than we are sometimes, right?

“It’s alive. Sentient. And it produces these sort of parasitic little spirits that feed off of the same emotion they were born from. In the case of the caves and these woods - fear.”

“The caves we went diving into with only one flashlight?”

“You’re not gonna let that go, are you.”

Between the drink in my hand and the charge of the storm, I’m in a good mood - and the idea that she knew what was gonna be nipping at my heels when she’d walked off with the light threatens to smash that. I take a deep drink.

One. I don’t want to let this ruin my slightly improved night. Two. She’s laughed twice and I like the sound. Three. The rain soothes both the heat and agitation in me. Four. I need answers about what I think I saw. Five. Going after her stunt in the cave again is just going to restart the arguing.

And I just…don’t want to argue.

“Sometime next century, sugar. Keep explaining before I start thinking about it too much.”

She takes the hint.

“When you don’t have any protections in place, that shit can slip right up like you’re an open bar. It fattens up the meal by swelling all of that unease until it pops. The second the lid blows and all that unchecked emotion goes off, it latches on like a frat boy doing a keg stand.”

“Not great, but is that it? Emotion explosion?”

“How hard to I have to beg for you to never call it that again?”

“Answer the questions for now and we’ll see how benevolent I’m feeling at the end.” I offer a smile.

This time when she ducks her head, I don’t bother looking away.

“They’ll latch on if they like the taste, and if you don’t know how to get rid of them, you’re just going to be in that cycle of inflammation, explosion, and consumption until you’re life is ashes around your ears. Typically they’ll move on then. The host often doesn’t survive the separation.”

“What, it kills them on the way out?”

“It just drains everything out from them before it drops them like an empty bottle and leaves. A not-insignificant number…decide there’s no point in getting back up.”

Well.

Shit.

“Fine, braid my hair before bed.”

“How can I resist such a sweetly worded request.” She raises a brow.

I shrug and look back towards the woods instead of the storm. The owl is back. I blink, and it’s gone.

“What is it?” She asks after a moment of silence.

“Nothing…”

She chuffs a humorless laugh and throws back the rest of her drink.

“I doubt that. Something in the woods?”

“Treetop, I think.” I shake my head. “Mind playing tricks after your ghost stories.”

“Don’t be so sure about that. There aren’t a ton of old treetop legends that I’ve stumbled across out this way, mostly caves, farms, and bridges. But I told you, there are newer things that have shown up lately. One of them hangs out in the trees. So far, we’ve never seen one come down from the branches. It just kinda…watches.”

“Like the bridge just says names?”

“Nothing collects names or follows you through the entirety of the woods for no reason. We noticed it about a year ago - just staring at E. Followed her until we left. Never made a noise - we just glanced up and saw a set of these wide, silver circles on a branch about a foot over our head. It had this dark silhouette that seems both spindly and oddly wet for something that lives in the trees. I screamed, but it just kept locked onto her until we were out.”

Okay. No thank you.

“You just saw the one?” Did it turn into an owl and vanish?

I look at my now empty beer.

Maybe I should leave it at that if I’m hallucinating shapeshifting tree spiders.

“I saw a second one last time we were out here. I ignored our rule and went walking alone - we’d fought. I thought it was following me, but I actually caught sight of it from the back. I don’t know what it was following, but it didn’t pay me the slightest attention. Just sat in the tree and leaned in to watch whatever it was closer.”

“You didn’t check it out?”

“I had nothing on me.”

“Didn’t stop you today.”

“And I was alone.”

“You can’t honestly count me as backup, can you? Best I can do is tip toe and yell ‘look out’ if we do stumble into a monster movie.”

“It’s still more than I’d have alone.” She tilts her head. “You good to go in? I don’t think it would come down and out, but I don’t really want to bank on a guess.”

I sigh and wipe at the side of my now-dampened tank.

“Yeah, I suppose.”

Inside I make double certain to lock the door, and a point of telling Cassy I’d done so. She gives me an odd look, but otherwise just grabs my empty from me and heads into to kitchen. I pop into the bathroom with my bag to change into black sleep shorts and the oversized black Felix T-shirt I’d purchased to replace the grey one Cassy had stolen.

The same one she’s in when I emerge from the bedroom and find her perched on the couch with two fresh drinks. I slow; smashing a couple drinks on the porch or over cards back at camp is one beast. Sitting and drinking with my ex seems like a recipe for more trouble on my disaster sundae.

“What time are we getting started in the morning?” I ask, taking the drink reflexively as she passes it into my hand.

“Probably about 8.”

“Alright, I should make this it and get to sleep, then.”

I crack the drink because why would I waste it. And I fold down onto the couch because I’m tired of standing. I don’t move when she shifts ever so slightly closer on the other side, because she’s always been a restless sitter. And I turn towards her to converse because there’s no tv, and I don’t just want to sit in silence.

I swear I can hear Drew groan at my justifications.

She’s smiling, and I can see the dimples properly in this light. Between the drink in my hand and the rain we’d just come in from, my good mood has persisted and I just want to enjoy the sight. I don’t want to smash it this time.

It’s familiar and just a little sour. A tinge dusty. But still better than the animosity we’d been trading.

“Do you like the carnival? When you came out here, you sounded like you hated it.”

“I hated Drew.” I scoff into my can. “Asshole was nosy as hell and wouldn’t get off my back about the drinking…”

“It wasn’t even that bad yet.”

“He knew where it was going.” I sigh, throwing the drink in my hand down my throat to spite the man’s inexplicable give-a-shit about my general health and wellbeing. “I’m not the first foster brat that ran off with his gig straight out of eighteen. Sounds like we share certain patterns of behavior.”

“So you’re looking forward to going back?”

“Yeah.” I hold my hand out for her empty as she tosses it back. “I’ve got a pretty good crew of idiots back there. Jax tries and fails to get me to care about anything to do with the fitness nonsense he’s all up in.“

“I could have told him that was a lost cause.”

I shrug.

“I warned you on day one of ‘come do Pilates with me’ that we had different fitness goals.”

“You had none.”

“Which would be different from you having all of them. Statement stands.”

She rolls her eyes and pushes off of the couch. Turns are taken wrapping up in the bathroom, and then I’m back out on the couch after assuring Cassy yet again that nothing had gone wrong the prior night.

The window over the couch is covered with a single copper panel of curtain. The cloth had been pushed to one side for light whilst we’d been outside, but is now firmly back in its location. The desire to wrench it open is at least marginally lesser than the prior night, and beggars have long since learned that implementing their namesake typically results in loss.

Sleep is slow to claim me, a cruel joke considering I should be more wiped than I had been the prior night. But I can’t stop thinking about that owl or the creepy guy at the grocery store. In all likelihood, the later had just been an awkward jerk and the former had been a stress hallucination. I’ve never had one myself, but I recall Cassy having mentioned similar problems in her own life.

Except maybe she can see things.

Not helping me calm down.

I turn to my side, facing away from the window and looking at the sealed door. She’d advised me to knock on the wall if I changed my mind, and I had promised her she could put in her earplugs without fear. Drinking with her had been a fuzzy enough line, but sharing a bed again…that one seems pretty damn clear.

I scrape my fingers through my hair and return to my back. What Cassy had said about doing that light exercise comes to mind.

Why the hell not. I’m just laying here anyway.

At some point in the middle of Felix’s glowing eyes turning into a low-budget force field, I recognize I must have slipped into sleep, given that ceilings don’t typically morph into open sky. The stars are glittering bright as so many dreams caught in the inky expanse of eternity, and soft music teases across the air to reach my ears. Soft, twinkling sounds that remind me of a babbling brook.

I want to go find it.

How handy that the entirety of a dense and ancient wood welcomes me, the sound growing louder. Distance closes in strides or thoughts, it’s hard to keep the means of movement straight in this shifting landscape.

What had started as babbling water turns to whispering giggles.

Rude.

“Hello?”

Who am I looking for? Not who, what, right? I heard water. Or whispering. I’m not sure which, but it’s growing louder as I push on until I finally glimpse a break in the ground. An erosion of soil framing a humble stream of water. My chest sparks and spasms, like it can’t beat fast enough. Or maybe like it tried to beat too fast and tripped over itself?

The meager trickle sounds loud as baying hound in my ears, deafening almost. Just whispering, giggling, and then it speaks my name.

I jolt awake, sitting up on the couch with my ears ringing loud enough deafening me. It’s a million degrees in this cabin, and the only saving grace is a hastily fetched glass of water. I wrench the tap as cold as it will go, adding ice cubes and hastily gulping mouthfuls. I ignore the faint shake to my hands and the brain freeze begging me to slow down. It wasn’t even a scary dream - just my psyche tripping over all the shit that’s happened in the last 48 hours, easy enough to see.

I just need to get through my water, calm down, and I can get back to sleep.

I watch the kitchen and living space like a hawk as I work through the liquid, slowly calming my pulse. The shadows here don’t move like they did in the cave, but my eyes still swear they see masses shifting. I finish my drink and splash my face with cold water.

All of these stories and witchy talk have gotten to me, and my dreams are just doing what they do to catch up.

The fact that the charm around my throat feels like a hot coal is chalked up to my own body heat and dismissed.

It’s just a damn necklace.

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Start from the top

Prompt #1180

"I'm feeling kinda lazy today."

"You're lazy every day."

[mistyshane30]

You Were Never Mine to Lose (Chapter 26)

Synopsis: The storm rages outside. Inside, glances linger, silence hums, and touch becomes its own kind of confession.

Word count: 5.4K

Warnings: 18+ MDNI, Mentions of alcohol consumption, Sexual tension, Mild language

A/N: Hey guysss😭 I’m so sorry for disappearing for a whole month! Things just got super busy with school, and I couldn’t update as soon as I wanted to. We just finished our 2nd semester (finally!), and in about a week we’ll start enrollment for summer classes. My school is on a trimestral schedule so yes, it gets really expensive and exhausting🤧💸

But while I have these two weeks of break, I’ll do my best to keep writing and giving you new chapters as often as I can💜

So here it is, Chapter 26. I really hope it was worth the wait. Enjoy!!🥰

After your bodies have cooled off from the heat of everything, you both climb into the bathtub, water still warm, steam lingering like a secret. You wash each other off slowly—tender hands, lazy kisses—and when you're finally done, you get out together. Towels drape around your bodies like makeshift robes, and you rummage through your bag to offer her something to wear. She ends up in one of your fitted shirts—it hugs her a little too well—and pajama bottoms that sit just right on her hips. You throw on a loose shirt and shorts. Casual. Comfortable. Dangerous. 

Back in bed, you crawl beneath the sheets and she follows, curling up behind you without a word. Her arm wraps around your waist, her fingers gently brushing your stomach. You feel her exhale against your neck, her breath soft and steady. It’s stupid how warm and right it feels. 

And then—KNOCK KNOCK KNOCK. 

You both flinch. 

It starts as a knock. Then louder. Then banging. 

“What the fuck,” Agatha mutters, voice gravelly and irritated, still half-asleep. “Who the hell—” 

You groan, burying your face in the pillow. “Ignore it. It's probably a prank. It’ll go away.” 

It doesn’t. 

Then comes a voice—muffled, but urgent. Familiar. 

“Y/N! Y/N, open up! It’s Billy—it’s an emergency!” 

Your eyes shoot open. Your stomach drops. Agatha sits up, eyes wide, hair tousled, lips parted in disbelief. “Shit,” she says. 

Panic sets in. 

You leap out of bed, heart pounding. “Bathroom. Hide. Now.” 

Agatha doesn’t even argue—she grabs her clothes off the floor and rushes into the bathroom. You hear the door shut just as you reach your front door, trying to steady your breathing, trying to look like you didn’t just have sex with the Governor of Washington. 

You open the door. 

Billy’s standing there, face pale, brows pinched together in pure concern. “Governor Harkness is missing.” 

You blink. “Wait—what?” 

“She’s gone. No one’s seen her since after lunch. The guards already checked the whole hotel—indoor pool, outdoor pool, rooftop bar, buffet, her room. Nothing.” 

You widen your eyes for effect, eyebrows arching. “Oh my God. Are you serious?” 

Billy nods, running a hand through his hair. “We even called her phone. No answer.” 

Your stomach twists—not just from guilt, but from fuck, you just know someone might’ve seen her enter your room. Or worse—the cameras. 

“Where’s the last place you saw her?” he asks, eyes searching yours. 

Your brain flashes—Agatha’s fingers between your thighs, the way she whispered your name like a promise, the shower, the way she laughed against your skin before you both passed out wrapped in each other. You feel heat crawl up your neck. 

“After lunch,” you say smoothly, calling on every ounce of drama club experience you’ve ever had. “That’s the last time I saw her.” 

He believes you. God, he buys it. His shoulders relax just slightly. 

“I’m gonna check the front desk and see if they can pull the cameras,” he says. “Might help.” 

Your heart nearly stops. 

You nod quickly, pretending to be the calm, logical one. “Yeah—yeah, good idea. That’ll help. I’m sure she’s just… somewhere.” 

He offers you a grateful smile. “Thanks. I’ll see you downstairs?” 

You nod. “Just give me a sec.” 

As soon as the door closes, you spin around. 

The bathroom door creaks open. 

Agatha peeks her head out, amused. “So… I definitely need to get back to my room before he checks the cameras.” 

You laugh breathlessly. “Yeah, you definitely do.” 

She steps out, crossing to you, her hands brushing your sides again like she can’t help it. “See you at dinner?” 

You nod, smirking. “See you at dinner.” 

You lean in and kiss her—quick, but warm. You both linger for a second before pulling away. Agatha bends down, picks up her cover-up and bikini from the floor, then walks toward you again and kisses you once more—deeper, this time. 

Then she walks to your door. 

You follow, heart still racing but for a very different reason now. You open it, and she turns to look at you. 

You nod—go. 

She slips out, quietly unlocking and slipping into her room across the hall. 

The moment you close your door, you exhale. 

And then you grin. Big. Stupid. 

You’re smiling like an idiot. 

- 

Later that evening, you take your time getting ready—just enough to look effortless. A beige button-up shirt, sleeves rolled, paired with dark trousers that sit comfortably on your hips. You tie your hair into a bun, neat but not too polished. A little blush, a dab of lip tint, a spritz of that perfume she once complimented. You check yourself once in the mirror, grab your phone, and leave the room. 

You knock on Agatha’s door. 

It opens a few seconds later, and there she is—hair brushed out, loose waves falling naturally. She’s dressed in a deep wine-colored blouse tucked into high-waisted pants. Casual, but the kind of casual that still makes your stomach flutter. 

She gives you that smile. “Come in.” 

You step inside, lips twitching. “What took you so long?” 

Agatha hums, shutting the door behind you. “Oh, you know,” she says with a low, teasing lilt. “Was just trying to recover from earlier.” 

You blink. “Recover?” 

She walks past you, deliberate, smug. “Mmhmm,” she purrs, grabbing her clutch. “I was this close to finishing again just remembering your moans.” 

You choke. 

She turns to you slowly, clearly enjoying herself. “Though next time, if you’d like to return the favor, I wouldn’t mind switching places... just once.” 

Your face heats up. “Agatha.” 

“Hmm?” she smirks, all too proud. 

You open your mouth to throw something back—something bold, something that’ll make her bite her lip—but her phone rings. 

The sound breaks through the tension like cold water. 

Agatha glances at the screen. “It’s the kids,” she says softly, then answers. 

It’s a video call. 

The moment the screen lights up, two familiar faces fill the frame—Valentina and Nicholas. Your godchildren. You instantly smile. 

“Hi, babies,” Agatha says, her voice gentler now, soft in a way only mothers can do. “Are you okay?” 

“We’re okay!” they echo together, a little blurry but happy. 

“What about you, Mommy?” Valentina asks. 

“I’m okay, sweetheart,” Agatha says, tucking a loose strand behind her ear. “I can’t come home tonight because of the hurricane, but I’ll try tomorrow, alright?” 

You watch her, quietly. The way her eyes crease when she worries. The shift in her tone. She’s warm. Real. And you’re seeing her like this—with her guard down. It does something to your chest. 

Then Agatha says, “Oh—and look who’s here with me.” She turns the camera your way. 

You smile at the screen. “Hey, Val. Nicky. You two holding down the fort?” 

They both squeal your name in excitement. 

You wave, grinning. “Yeah, we’ll try to get home tomorrow, I promise, okay? I’ll take good care of your mom tonight.” 

You glance at Agatha when you say that—slow, knowing—and her eyes meet yours. Heat. Then you look back at the screen, clearing your throat. 

“So, don’t worry about Mommy, okay? She’s in good hands.” 

They believe you without question.  

Agatha turns the screen back to herself, her voice dropping to something gentle again as she reminds them, “Brush your teeth. Sleep early. Be good. Okay?” 

“We will! Love you, Mommy!” 

“Love you too, darlings. Now go eat.” 

She ends the call, her expression lingering for just a moment before she places the phone in her purse.  

When she looks at you again, she’s smirking. 

You narrow your eyes, confused. 

“What?” 

She bites her lip, lets out a breath of a chuckle. “Take good care of me, huh?” 

You blink. 

She smirks. “We’ll see about that.” 

And then—she winks. 

Your brain short-circuits. 

“Jesus Christ,” you mutter under your breath. 

Agatha just laughs, brushing past you as she opens the door. “Come on. Dinner’s waiting.” 

And you? You’re already thinking about dessert. 

- 

The restaurant inside the hotel is softly lit—elegant, quiet, humming with polite conversation and the clink of polished silverware. You’re seated at a round table with Agatha beside you, Billy across, the driver and two bodyguards flanking the other chairs. Everyone looks like they belong here: pressed collars, soft voices, expensive wine glasses sweating gently onto linen. 

You’re playing your part well—composed, charming, laughing at the right jokes, nodding along as Billy mentions something about the revised schedule for tomorrow. Agatha, beside you, hasn’t said much in the last few minutes. She’s sipping her wine, eyes half-lidded, looking devastating in that wine-colored blouse from earlier. You think she’s just tired. Or bored. 

And then you feel it. 

Her hand, sliding slowly under the tablecloth, landing gently on your thigh. 

You stiffen, your breath catching in your throat. 

She doesn’t look at you. Not even a glance. Her face is perfectly neutral, her wine glass tilted delicately toward her mouth. Her fingers, though—those are not behaving. 

They move with maddening slowness. First resting. Then brushing. Then tracing tiny, idle circles right above your knee. 

You choke—literally. 

The sip of water you were taking goes down the wrong pipe and you cough, hard, trying to keep it contained. The entire table reacts. 

“Miss? Are you alright?” Billy is already halfway out of his chair, concern etched across his face. 

You wave a hand, breathless, forcing a laugh. “I’m—hah—I’m fine. Just the wrong pipe, sorry.” 

He hovers a little, unsure, but eventually sits again when you insist. 

You take another sip to clear your throat, and when you glance at Agatha, she’s finally looking at you. 

She raises a brow, amused, eyes glittering with something far too smug. 

Under the table, her hand starts moving again. 

You shoot her a look—half warning, half plea—but she just leans in, lips brushing the rim of her wine glass, and whispers, “Sensitive tonight, are we?” 

You want to die. 

Or kiss her. 

Or grind against her fingers until you fall apart in this goddamn chair. 

But you smile instead. A tight, forced, diplomatic smile. You pretend to listen to the driver telling some story about traffic back in the city. You even nod. You are so proud of yourself. 

But Agatha’s hand? Oh, her hand is not done. 

She slips it higher, fingers slow and deliberate, until they slide just beneath the hem of your beige button-up, where the fabric is loosely tucked into your dark trousers. She doesn’t rush—just brushes the skin of your lower stomach, then glides down to the waistband, slipping under it like she owns the right. 

Then—lower still. 

Her palm flattens against your inner thigh, warm and firm. Her thumb starts stroking in maddeningly slow circles, right where your pulse is thudding hardest. Just high enough to tease, low enough to make you ache. 

You clench your jaw. 

Your heart pounds—deep, thunderous, a caged animal in your chest. 

You cross your legs, trying to get a grip—trying to anchor yourself. 

Agatha’s hand doesn't move far. It slides inward, just a few inches, until her fingers rest at the tender place where your inner thigh curves back toward your body. Not your center. Not yet. 

Then she holds you there. Just pressure—steady and intentional. 

Her fingers don’t grope. They command. 

You feel the weight of her touch, the way her palm firms against your thigh, subtly coaxing your legs to part again—not with a push, but with the quiet force of someone who knows you’ll obey. 

And god, you do. 

Your muscles relax involuntarily. Your legs shift—opening. Just enough for her to slip in further if she wanted. She doesn’t. 

Not yet. 

Your breath stutters. 

You grip your fork tighter, trying to keep your face neutral, trying not to give yourself away. She’s not even looking at you—she’s chewing, calmly nodding along to something Billy is saying about traffic delays and backup generators. 

Then her pinky slips lower. Just barely—just enough to brush the curve between your thigh and your center, right where your trousers start to cling. 

A soft, damp heat is already gathering between your legs. 

And still—no one notices. 

You're going to lose your mind. 

- 

You laugh at something Billy says. You nod when the driver asks if you’ve ever been to Mount Rushmore. You take another bite of food, even though you’re sure your body has forgotten how to chew. 

Meanwhile, Agatha leans toward you slightly. “You’re very quiet,” she says, just for your ears. “Is everything alright, sweetheart?” 

You want to scream. 

You want to drag her to the bathroom and ruin her. 

But you manage a breathless, “Perfect,” through a smile so tight it might crack. 

- 

Dessert arrives with silver spoons, delicate plates, and polite murmurs. You barely register the sight of tiramisu being set in front of you, the glistening dust of cocoa on top, the careful drizzle of liqueur. 

Because Agatha hasn’t stopped. 

Her hand never left your thigh, and now—now—her fingers shift just slightly, and it’s enough to brush the exact place where you're aching. You gasp, soft and near-silent, but it betrays you anyway. Billy glances up. You wave your hand like you’re reacting to the sweetness of the dessert, like that’s what knocked the air from your lungs. 

But the truth is— 

Agatha is touching you. 

Over your panties, through your trousers. Slow, calculated pressure, the pads of her fingers moving in small, lazy circles against your heat. You’re soaked. There’s no denying it now. You can feel it—the warmth spreading down, dampening the seat of your panties, pressing dark into the fabric of your pants. The shame of it makes your cheeks flush—but God, the shame just turns you on more. 

She knows it too. 

She shifts beside you like nothing’s happening, bringing a spoonful of dessert to her mouth, lips closing around it with slow, sultry purpose. And while she does, her fingers press just a little harder. A slow, steady pulse. 

Your thighs clench. She feels it. Her smile grows. 

And all you can do is sit there, barely breathing, trying to hold your spoon steady as you force a small bite of dessert past your lips. You almost moan from the taste—almost, but you bite down on it. Everything feels heightened. Every soft murmur from the others at the table, every scrape of silverware, every brush of linen napkin makes you more aware of the fact that you are soaking wet in public, and Agatha’s fingers are still moving against your pussy through layers that aren’t hiding anything anymore. 

You try not to move. Not to push into her hand. But God, you want to. 

She leans in again, her voice a whisper meant for only you. 

“I can feel it,” she breathes, her words slipping hot into your ear. “You’re dripping for me, baby. I wonder if it’s starting to show.” 

You jerk slightly. You know there’s a patch now. You can feel the moisture pressing against your trousers, humid and dark. Your hips twitch, barely, and her fingers reward you with a tighter circle, a deeper press right on your clit, and— 

Fuck. 

You bite your lip, eyes fluttering shut for a millisecond too long. 

“You okay?” Billy asks again, because Billy is unfortunately very attentive, and you hate him for it right now. 

You smile—no teeth, no joy, just pure survival. “Yeah,” you say, voice shaky, “just tired.” 

“Need some air?” he offers. 

Before you can answer, Agatha, all sweet and motherly again, chimes in: “She’s fine. Long day.” 

Her fingers don’t stop. If anything, they get bolder. Slower. She presses deeper now, right against the center of your wet panties, and starts drawing smaller, tighter circles, teasing you toward the edge, right there, dragging it out just enough to make your stomach knot with tension. 

Your legs twitch again. You’re breathing through your nose, smiling at nothing. You laugh when someone makes a joke about the hotel’s wine list but you’re seeing stars now. There’s no wine. No dessert. No table. Just Agatha’s hand owning your entire body and no one else having a clue. 

She leans back again, cool and smug. “You’re doing so well,” she whispers. “I could make you come like this, couldn’t I? Right here, while they’re all finishing dessert.” 

You whimper—but it’s low, barely audible. Just a hitched breath. 

She pushes just a little harder. You jerk your hand under the table and grip her wrist—not to stop her, but to feel it. Feel the intent, the possessiveness. She lets you. Her fingers grind slow against your soaked center. 

“I could make you come,” she repeats, her tone darker now. “But I won’t. Not yet.” 

And then, cruelly, she pulls her hand back. 

Just like that. The pressure disappears. 

You nearly cry. 

She licks the tip of her spoon, then turns to you and says—out loud, in her usual voice—“Are you sure you don’t want to get some air?” 

Her eyes flicker, daring you. 

Your body is trembling. Your panties are soaked. Your thighs are clenched. Your breath is uneven. 

You glance down, barely, and you can see it—the shadow of moisture on your trousers. Not obvious to others, but to you? Devastating. 

You nod. 

“Yeah,” you breathe. “Air sounds good.” 

She stands first, smoothing her blouse. “We’ll just take a moment,” she says to the table, all casual grace and poise. 

You follow her out, thighs pressed together, arousal pooling between your legs. You don’t look back. You just follow her lead. 

The air in the hallway is cooler, quiet. Muted carpet beneath your shoes, the soft hum of hotel lights overhead. You’re still trembling, your soaked panties sticking to you with every step, your skin flushed with heat. You watch the sway of Agatha’s hips as she walks ahead, calm and purposeful, as if she hadn’t just nearly made you come at a dinner table full of people. 

You catch up to her in just a few strides, your voice low. “Where are we going?” 

She presses the elevator button with one hand, then turns her head to look at you. Her eyes—still sharp, still hungry. 

“My room,” she says simply. 

You blink, trying to ground yourself. “Wait—but what about Billy? And the others?” 

“They’ll be fine.” She shrugs. “Billy has my credit card. I’ll text him later.” 

“But—” 

“They’ll assume I went to bed. And you?” She leans in, whispering near your ear, her breath hot. “You looked like you needed some help walking.” 

The elevator dings. The doors slide open. 

You both step in. 

The doors close behind you with a hush—and the second they do, it changes. 

Agatha moves fast, crowding you into the corner of the elevator with one arm pressed beside your head and the other grabbing your waist. Her lips are on yours before you can breathe. It’s not gentle. It’s not sweet. It’s fire. Her tongue presses into your mouth like it belongs there, and you open for her instinctively, helplessly, your arms clutching at her waist as you kiss back with everything you’ve been holding in all night. 

She bites your bottom lip, tugging, then kisses it better, her thigh slipping between yours, pressing up. You moan into her mouth, low and broken, grinding into her like it’s the only thing keeping you alive. 

“You’re soaking through,” she whispers against your mouth. “I can feel it.” 

You gasp. She doesn’t stop. 

Her hand slips down, squeezing your ass through your trousers, dragging you harder against her leg. “I should’ve fucked you at the table,” she murmurs. “Let you fall apart while Billy smiled at the waiter.” 

The elevator dings. 

You freeze. 

The doors begin to slide open—and Agatha pulls away from you with lightning speed, adjusting her blouse, her breathing calm but eyes still alight with want. You mirror her—barely. You wipe your lips, straighten your shirt, try to not look like you were about to come apart seconds ago. 

A man in a hotel polo shirt steps in, nodding at you both. He presses a floor button and stands a respectful distance away. 

You try not to breathe too loudly. Try not to look at Agatha. 

She’s standing beside you now, hands folded, lips still flushed, eyes focused on the light-up floor numbers as if she didn’t just tongue-fuck your mouth like she missed it. 

But then—her hand brushes yours. 

Casual. A touch. Nothing more. 

And she whispers, so softly you almost miss it, “You’re going to come on my mouth the second we close that door.” 

Your knees nearly give out. 

The elevator dings again. 

The man steps out, offers a polite “Good evening,” and disappears down the hallway. 

The doors begin to close. 

Before they even finish sliding shut, Agatha grabs your hand, dragging you down the hallway with a new urgency, your heartbeat racing. 

She opens her door with practiced ease, card tapping, handle turning. 

The moment you’re both inside—door shut, lock, then turns to you, and something in her gaze—something dark, burning—pins you where you stand. 

“Take it off,” she says, voice low, rough. 

Your eyes widen. “What?” 

“Your pants,” she clarifies, taking a step forward. “Take them off.” 

There’s no room for question. No softness in her voice now. You’re too far gone to argue anyway. With shaky hands, you reach for the waistband, fingers fumbling as you unfasten your trousers. She watches—silent, eyes dragging over every inch of you. When you finally push them down, she catches sight of the soaked fabric between your thighs. 

Her breath catches. 

“You really were dripping,” she murmurs. 

You feel your face burn, your thighs instinctively trying to close—but she’s already there, hand gripping your hip, thumb stroking over the band of your underwear. Her touch makes you shiver. You're still wearing your shirt, your panties, but you’re completely exposed in every way that matters. 

She sinks to her knees. 

Oh god. 

“Agatha—” Your voice breaks on her name, barely a whisper. 

“Shh.” She presses her mouth right over your center, the heat of her breath making your knees buckle. “Let me taste you.” 

And then—she licks you through the soaked fabric. Long, slow, deliberate. 

You moan—helpless, wrecked. Your head thuds softly against the wall behind you as she mouths at you, teasing through your panties, tongue tracing the soaked outline of your folds, nose pressed against you like she can’t get close enough. 

“You smell like sex,” she says, voice thick. 

Then she hooks her fingers into the sides of your underwear and pulls—slowly, torturously—until it slips down your legs. 

The air hits you. Cool. Exposed. 

And then her mouth is on you, directly—no fabric, no barrier. 

You cry out, hips jerking forward. Her tongue flicks over your clit, then presses flat and heavy, licking up your slick with slow, greedy strokes. She moans like it’s her favorite flavor. You thread your fingers through her hair, clutching tight as your legs tremble, thighs spread shamelessly to give her more. 

“Please,” you gasp, “please don’t stop—” 

She doesn’t. 

She licks you deeper, slower. Not fast. Not rough. Just... intentional. She’s savoring you. Driving you mad. And her hands—oh, her hands are gripping your thighs to keep you right where she wants you, her thumbs brushing circles into your skin to ground you. 

You can barely breathe. 

You look down, and she’s staring up at you while she licks—tongue buried deep, eyes locked on yours—and it’s too much. 

You whimper, breath breaking. “I’m—Agatha, I’m gonna—” 

She doesn’t move. 

She just groans into you and sucks your clit, slow and perfect. 

And that’s it. 

Your orgasm crashes through you so fast and so hard you nearly collapse. Your hands clutch at her hair, your back arches off the wall, your legs threatening to give out. You ride it out on her tongue, gasping her name, your thighs trembling as you come completely undone. 

She doesn’t pull away until you’re shaking. 

Then—only then—she rises, lips wet, mouth swollen, eyes dark with satisfaction. 

You’re still panting, brain barely working. 

She cups your jaw, presses a soft kiss to your lips, lets you taste yourself on her tongue. 

And then she says—low and certain: 

“Now take your shirt off and get on the bed. I’m not done with you yet.” 

You do what she says. 

Still breathless, you reach for the buttons of your shirt with shaky fingers, undoing them one by one as Agatha watches, arms crossed, lips parted, pupils blown wide with want. 

You shrug it off your shoulders, letting it fall to the floor. 

You’re left in your bra—thin, pale fabric stretched over your breasts, your nipples already pebbling beneath the material, aching. 

Agatha’s eyes drop. 

And her mouth twitches into something sinful. 

“God, look at you,” she murmurs, stepping forward. “Still flushed. Still wet. And now I get these.” 

She cups your breasts through the bra—firm, full, confident. 

You gasp, back arching instinctively into her touch. 

She groans, low in her throat. “You’re so fucking sensitive tonight.” 

You nod, helpless. 

“Take it off.” 

You reach behind, fumbling with the clasp of your bra, hands unsteady. She steps closer, brushing your fingers aside. 

“Let me.” 

She unhooks you with ease—fingertips grazing your spine—and you shiver at the closeness, at the heat of her breath on your shoulder. 

The bra slips off your arms. 

She drops it to the floor, and now you’re bare before her—topless, trembling, thighs still sticky from her mouth. 

Agatha exhales, slow. Like she’s trying to memorize the sight of you. 

“Perfect,” she whispers. 

And then—her hands are on your breasts. 

She palms them gently at first, brushing her thumbs over your nipples in slow, slow circles. You whimper—a soft, broken sound—and she leans in to press open-mouthed kisses across your chest, down the slope of one breast, nuzzling the softness with a low moan. 

“You like this?” she murmurs against your skin. 

“Yes,” you breathe. “Yes—fuck—please, Agatha—” 

She takes one nipple between her fingers and pinches—firm but careful. 

You gasp. 

Your hips twitch. 

She watches your reaction closely, then does it again, flicking the sensitive bud between her fingers while the other hand rolls your other nipple, teasing, stroking, tugging just enough to make your toes curl. 

You’re melting. 

“You’re shaking,” she whispers, voice dark with pride. 

Then her mouth replaces her hand—she sucks one nipple into her mouth, tongue flicking over it in soft, rhythmic strokes while her other hand keeps playing with the opposite one. 

You moan—head back, thighs clenching, spine arching into her as her mouth toys with you, worships you. Her teeth graze—light, enough to make you whimper—and then she soothes it with her tongue, hot and slick and so good. 

She switches to the other breast without warning, and the loss stings—but then her mouth wraps around your other nipple and your knees nearly give out. 

You clutch her shoulders, panting. 

“I c-can’t—” you choke out. “You’re gonna make me come again—” 

She pulls back slightly, lips wet, breath shaky. “Just from this?” 

You nod, helpless. Embarrassed. So turned on. 

Her smile is wicked. 

“Oh, sweetheart,” she says softly, almost sweetly. “Let me.” 

She brings both hands up now, fingers tweaking, rolling, tugging your nipples in tandem while her mouth kisses up your collarbone, to your throat, to your jaw. 

“You’re mine tonight,” she whispers. “You come when I say. You shake when I say. And you fall apart for me…” 

She pinches both nipples—harder. 

“…right now.” 

You cry out. 

The pressure. The heat. Her voice. Her mouth. Her fingers— 

It breaks you. 

Your orgasm rips through you—just from the way she plays with your breasts—your legs trembling, body arching against hers as your head falls back and you moan, wrecked and open. 

She catches you when you collapse, pulling you into her arms, holding you against her chest while you shake. 

“Fuck,” you whisper, dazed. “Fuck, Agatha—” 

She kisses your temple. 

You’re still trembling—sensitive, bare, breath foggy—when she holds you close. 

Your cheek presses against her chest, your lips brushing the collar of her blouse, and for a second you think maybe she’s giving you a break. 

But then she pulls back. 

She cups your chin, tilts your face up to meet hers. 

And her voice—low, firm, devastating—says, “Now take this off me.” 

You blink up at her. 

She straightens her spine, hands falling to her sides, presenting herself like a gift. That wine-colored blouse tucked neatly into her high-waisted pants, the fabric hugging her waist, her breasts outlined in perfect silhouette. 

You sit up, slowly. 

And begin with the first button. 

Your fingers move carefully, deliberately. One button at a time. The soft pop of thread slipping through fabric feels impossibly loud in the quiet of the room. Her breathing deepens as you go lower, her chest rising and falling more visibly with each undone button. 

You push the blouse off her shoulders. 

It pools behind her like silk, revealing a dark, lace-trimmed bra that hugs her curves too well. Your mouth goes dry. You run your hands over the bare skin of her collarbones, down the tops of her breasts, your thumbs grazing the edge of the bra cups. 

She watches you. Still. Breath controlled. Letting you take your time. 

“Next,” she whispers. 

You kneel in front of her, your hands sliding to her waist, and slowly you undo the clasp of her pants, tugging them open. You press a kiss to her stomach, right above the waistband. Then another. Then a third, slower. 

She makes a sound this time—quiet, guttural. 

You look up at her, teasing. “You’re already wet, aren’t you?” 

Her jaw tightens. 

You smirk and tug her pants down. She steps out of them with slow elegance, left only in her heels, her matching dark lace panties, and that sinful bra. God. 

She’s magnificent. 

“You can worship me now,” she says, half-joking. 

But you take her seriously. 

You rise onto your knees, hands on her thighs, lips brushing the inside of one as you whisper, “Sit on the edge of the bed.” 

Her brow arches. 

But she obeys. 

She sits—legs apart, breasts rising with every breath—and you lean in between her thighs. 

You press kisses to her skin, trailing up the inside of her leg, taking your time, hands smoothing upward to her hips. You nuzzle your face against her clothed center, inhaling the heady scent of her arousal already soaking into the lace. 

She shudders. 

You pull the panties aside—not off, just aside—and look up at her as you drag your tongue from the base of her slit to her clit in one long, slow stroke. 

Her eyes flutter closed. 

You do it again. 

Then again, with pressure. 

And then your mouth is on her, tongue working in slow, deliberate circles around her clit as you moan into her heat. 

She grabs the edge of the bed, head falling back. “F-fuck…” 

You smile against her, then suck her clit gently, your tongue flattening against her as your fingers slide up to toy with her panties—still pushed to the side, barely hanging on. You keep licking, keep teasing, letting your fingers trail up to her thighs, squeezing, grounding her. 

She moans louder now, her hips beginning to move, trying to grind against your mouth. 

But you hold her still. 

You pull back just enough to whisper against her, “Be good.” 

She lets out a breathless laugh. “You’re getting cocky.” 

You grin. “You like it.” 

She opens her eyes, looks down at you with fire. 

And then—your mouth is back on her, this time fast, tongue flicking over her clit while your fingers trace around her entrance, slow and threatening. 

She grabs your hair. 

Hard. 

You moan into her, the vibration making her curse above you. “Y/N—” 

You press two fingers into her—slow, deep, curling upward just enough to make her jolt. 

“Fuck—” 

You smile, your lips sealed around her clit, fingers fucking into her now with purpose. You moan into her again, letting her ride your mouth, letting her lose it, and she does—completely. 

Her thighs tense. Her abs tighten. And then she’s shaking, her orgasm hitting like a wave, loud and raw and hers. She cries out your name, hand tangled in your hair, body arching off the bed. 

You don’t stop until her thighs twitch and she’s gasping—“Okay, okay, f-fuck, stop—” 

You pull back. 

Your mouth is wet with her. Your chin glistens. You lick your lips, eyes still locked on hers. 

She stares at you like she’s never seen you before. 

And then she reaches out, grabs your wrist, and pulls you up. 

Onto her lap. 

Straddling her. 

And she says, voice wrecked, “I’m gonna ride you until you forget your own name.” 

Taglist: @6stolenangel9 @charlottelinlin1 @milflovers4 @claramelooo @loveshineslikethesky @kaymariesworld @marcelinaceciliarose @misskassycollins @greyella @theothersideofthescreen @whitelotus00 @agathaallalongg @psychickryptonitebouquet @sweetmidnights @angel-kitten-babygirl-u-choose @filmedbyharkness @brekker157 @rizzlesregal13 @starbucks-06 @aboutcustardcreams @crescendoofstars @neverfindmegone @mommy-mommy-mommy-hi @theonefairygodmother @isixxxx @hannah-0730 @starryjeongyeon @atlasimagines @whoreforolderfictionalwomen @darlingaura @upsidedowndanvers @iiiheartwomen @cocoever @morgananyx @wifeofmanymilfs @lowlyjelly

[wibben]

IN VINO VERITAS — NANAMI KENTO

↳ Summary: When a mission shared between you and Nanami goes (un)expectedly awry, you're forced to help him overcome a strange illness... and confront feelings you've both kept buried.

↳ CW: smut, vaginal sex, creampie, sex pollen, mutual pining, coworkers to lovers, botany as body horror, semi-public sex, phone sex, improper handling of a cursed object

↳ WC: 17.2k

↳ AN: Well... this has been a dusty WIP for the last eon or so! Thank you again @nanamiweek, for giving me the little nudge I needed to crack at it and finally get it done. And... there will be more of these. Reader, you silly thing...

“Today’s forecast: blue skies, light spring breezes, and temperatures hovering in that sweet spot between sixty-eight and seventy-two—“

You turned the volume down on the news station. 

You were in too good a mood to be narrated at, and you didn’t need some cheery man in a pastel tie to tell you it was a beautiful day. 

You flung open your curtains like stage drapes, chest ballooning with your first real breath of the day and a grin to rival the sun.

It was your day off. Your first in what felt like a decade. You were alive, everything in your apartment was exactly where it belonged, and — miraculously, you scrambled to knock on your wood window-trim — there wasn’t a single cursed thing on the horizon. No wriggling shadows. No haunted hostels. Not even the devastatingly passive-aggressive ping from Yaga calling you in because “you’re the only one available… unfortunately.” 

For the first time in weeks, the sun was shining, your joints weren’t screaming, and your only obligation was to enjoy yourself. 

You floated from room to room in your ugliest slippers and an aggressively soft hoodie, misting every leafy child like a benevolent goddess with a spray bottle. The snake plant by the window got three full compliments. The ficus got a pat. The ivy got a warning — nothing personal, it was just time to reestablish dominance before it swallowed the bookshelf whole.

Outside, the breeze was tender, like the world had finally decided to be kind again. Inside, you were weighing the merits of ordering takeout versus venturing into civilization to seize the day.

Maybe Ginza. You could treat yourself to something unnecessarily soft, floral, and overpriced. You needed new shoes anyways, and you had a very specific dorayaki craving that the plasticky pre-packed itch-scratchers from the conbini just couldn’t satisfy anymore. 

You spun toward the bookshelf. The only thing missing from your perfect day was a new read — something indulgent and a little unhinged, with a cover so tacky you’d be embarrassed to crack it open in public. Maybe you’d even remember to pick up a new umbrella while you were out, since yours had apparently grown legs and buzzed off after the last rain— 

Or maybe it was just your phone buzzing. 

One long, vibrating circle across your coffee table. Then another. 

You watched it, and rather than dread you felt a delightful nothingness. Nothing could bother you or dampen your spirits today, because you were going to Ginza and you would get your dorayaki. 

“Heeellooo!” you sing-songed, wedging your phone between your shoulder and cheek as you carefully resumed tending your ivy. 

“Good morning.” 

You nearly dropped your watering can. 

You did have to scramble to keep your phone from tumbling into your pothos. 

“Nanami!” you chirped way too quickly. “To what do I owe the great honor of your call?” 

You couldn’t see his face of course, but you didn’t need to. You had the whole thing memorized. The precise way he pressed his thumb into the corner of his brow when he was tired. The slight downward curve of his mouth when something was about to annoy him — usually Gojo. Occasionally you. The smile he gave you once in Kyoto when you brought him the last sandwich from the market and pretended you weren’t watching him eat it on the train ride back. 

The point was: he’d called you. On your day off. And now your face hurt with the untempered brilliance of your cheek-paining smile. 

Maybe, just maybe, he’d gotten the day off too. Maybe he was calling because he was in Ginza already and thought of you, and maybe he was going to suggest lunch, and you’d say yes, and that wouldn’t technically be a date, but it also wouldn’t not be a date, and you’d have to find your cute pumps instead of your usual ratty work boots and— 

“Not much of an honor,” he crackle-popped the receiver with the drag of his sigh, “In fact, I apologize in advance.” 

Your watering can tipped slightly to the left, and a chilly autumnal breeze ruffled through your ribcage. 

You continued your rounds, but you were no longer skipping. A shadow loomed over the horizon, you tasted the blood in the water, and you felt the air pressure shift and pop your ears. The world had just tilted one fraction off center. 

You didn’t speak right away. If you didn’t ask, maybe he wouldn’t tell. You were deluding yourself, lingering in that limbo for as long as your slowly jangling and tangling nerves could take it. 

 As always, Nanami waited for you; and you, despite the intuitive wariness that urged you to bury the phone in a pot of soil, were tragically brave. 

“Alright… I’ll bite,” you said. “What’re you apologizing for? Did you use one of my espresso cups in the staff room again? Because I already told you I don’t mind, they’re there to share—“ 

“No.” There was a rattle on Nanami’s end, clinking iron buckles and pulled vinyl — a seatbelt. “Though I did have one this morning, thank you. The hazelnut was good.” 

Your stomach flipped. You beamed. Your plants turned toward an unsolicited sunny grin they did not earn. “Right?! I knew you’d like it.” 

“… I need you today,” he said abruptly. 

For the second time you almost dropped your phone. 

Water kept pouring from your bottle, soaking the same poor plant beyond reason before you remembered what your hands were doing. 

“I’m sorry?” You squeaked and tried not to breathe too heavily into your phone. How long have you longed to hear him say that? 

“My original work partner today is… unavailable,” he said calmly. “I’m sorry to inconvenience you, but I’ve been left with little choice on the matter.” 

Oh. 

You narrowed your eyes at your reflection in the glass. 

To his credit, he did sound genuinely apologetic. You knew how fiercely territorial he was of his own time off — he treated it like scripture. Six o’clock sharp and he wouldn’t be caught dead on a weekend, and you respected that about him. Mostly because you wanted the same, and partially because the idea of him, hair down, reading on a balcony somewhere with a glass of scotch and a focused frown was unfairly attractive. 

You knew he wouldn’t impose if the circumstances left him any other option. 

Suddenly, the sky didn’t look quite so blue, and the pep in your step felt somehow embarrassing even in the solitude of your home. To save your own face, you suavely cocked your hip against the nearby bookshelf and you planted your alibi. 

“Oh, Nanami,” you said mournfully, already layering on the rasp, “I’d love to help, I would, but — ACK—“ you let loose the world's most theatrical cough, thrown in with a nasally sniff for good measure. “I’ve got this terrible cold. Just awful. I’d be a liability… and I’d hate for you to catch what I’ve got.” 

You coughed again, calmly striding to your thirsty monstera. “Been coughing up a lung all night.” 

Nanami was silent. 

Then: “Tsk.” 

You could picture the look of pity in the sound of him kissing his teeth, anticipated the mini lecture about keeping warm and drinking plenty of fluids, and maybe he would deliver you some tea after he wrapped up with work. You hadn’t quite given up hope on there being an ulterior motive for this call. 

“That’s a shame,” he said. 

You nodded pitifully with nobody around to see it. “I know…”

“… How many plants do you have?” he asked abruptly.

“Twenty three,” you answered on instinct. Then you blinked. “Wait. Why?” 

The stretch of silence over the phone had you checking to see if he’d hung up. 

The call timer kept ticking… he hadn’t hung up, and that worried you, because somehow within that silence, you could feel the slow indulgent tilt of his lip in that smile he hardly ever gave away, and never for free. 

“We’ve been parked outside and I can see you through your window.”

You froze. 

A single bird chirped outside. You think your ivy might’ve laughed the last laugh. 

You turned your head slowly, dread creeping up your spine as you stared past your breezy blinds. And sure enough — on the curb just off the street, gleaming black in the sunlight like a hearse sent to collect the corpse of your contentment, was a very familiar Tokyo Jujutsu High SUV. 

You stared at it. You knew Nanami inside stared back. 

You whispered, “Oh.” 

“Mhm,” came the reply, with the exact cadence of someone very pleased with himself. “We watched you dance around your living room for a while. Good rhythm.” 

You whimpered, shrank, and briefly considered hurling yourself through the floorboards and slipping like mortified goo into the heating grate at your feet. 

“I brought coffee,” he bribed, magnanimous and evil. 

“… From the staff room?” You asked, suspicious. 

“Of course not. I bought it. Detoured specifically.” 

Curse him and his foresight and kind gestures, you grieved, he wields them like a fucking weapon. 

“Two pumps of mocha—“ Nanami said. 

“—one cream,” you continued. 

“—and a sugar packet on the side, yes. I remember,” Nanami finished for you. The heat in your cheeks could’ve powered Tokyo. You loathed the oven coil warmth that sweltered beneath your skin at how his memory pacified you.

You squinted at your monstera like it might give you strength. It did not oblige. 

You yanked your curtains closed and stomped off toward your bedroom to the sound of Nanami’s indulgent chuckle humming through the receiver, a raging storm tearing through the path that had once been paved by spring daisies and lackadaisical joy. You pouted into your work shirt in thirty seconds. The socks were a war crime. You nearly cried as you hopped on one leg into your pants. 

You were out the door in five minutes. 

You took the coffee, and you didn’t say thank you. But you did sip it, and you did let it be known — via a very specific sigh — that it was excellent and correct. 

Nanami said nothing, but the amused sparkle in his eye was enough for you to curl up and sulk anyway. 

Misfortune comes in threes. 

You’d counted two already before noon, and if that old superstition held any weight at all — and in this line of work, everything did — then number three was sitting beside you in the back of a government issued sedan, silent as sin and radiating quiet doom like Tom Ford cologne. 

Thunder cracked above the car like bone, startling the world into stuttering stillness. It rumbled through your sternum, down your spine, and rattled the fillings in your molars. Lightning came in hot pursuit, blinding and brilliant, superimposing Nanami’s serene profile into your retinas. 

So much for spring breezes. 

The weatherman was a liar. The skies opened like something divine had been betrayed, and now rain poured in torrents, loud enough to deafen even the airiest thought in your head about how you really wished you had that umbrella right about now. It lashed the windshield with such force the wipers might as well have been twigs for all they could keep up.

Ijichi drove like he’d already made peace with death, his knuckles blanched white on the steering wheel as the car sloshed its way down what had once been a road but now resembled a minor tributary. 

You sat back and let the car pitch you with each wave of water, lips pursed, foam coffee cup cooling in your hands and rapidly losing the power to soothe. You wanted to blame Nanami. Really, really wanted to. He made such a good scapegoat with his suit and his moral compass and the way he’d shown up at your apartment unannounced with machinations to ruin a perfectly promising and well-earned day off. 

But he just had to bring you coffee and remember your order and say he needed you like it was the most natural thing in the world. You wondered if Nanami was secretly a master manipulator, or if he just knew how to read and play you most expertly. 

Now you’re prickly, bristling and jumping like a wet cat whenever a tree off the road nearly explodes as you pass it. 

“We won’t be able to see a foot in front of our faces,” you snapped, gesturing uselessly at the cascading wall of rain beyond the windshield. “And they expect us to exorcise a curse at the same time? And not die?”

“It’ll be indoors,” Nanami said. 

“And it’s only a Third-Grade curse!” Ijichi interjected. 

You and Nanami both turned to look at him in the rearview mirror. He faltered instantly, cowed. As he should. 

Because the last time you heard that phrase, a Second-Grade sorcerer had lost a leg, a young boy his life, and the building lost a roof. You both knew intimately how easily and often the supposedly simple jobs still go sideways. 

The car eventually slogged to a sluggish halt, tires skidding and hydroplaning as you rolled up beside what was presumably a botanical garden. It was hard to tell. The rain sluiced so fast down the window that the outside world blurred into impressionist chaos: glass and steel and spiny outlines of trees, all bent and warping under the weight of the storm. 

A lightning flash revealed it in full for a second in the gasps between atmospheric calamity — a vast glass dome rising like a lung from the landscape, sparkling before darkness swallowed it again. 

Then thunder came — long, close — and the whole vehicle shook down to its suspensions. 

“Are you ready?” 

You jumped.

Nanami had unbuckled, shifted across the middle seat, and was now looming over your shoulder — there, solid and warm and sudden. His voice landed against your neck. You didn’t breathe, and you hoped he didn’t notice how your eyes turned traitor before your brain could intervene, flicking downward, just once. The line of his jaw. His mouth. His breath still smelled like coffee, and his collar like rain fog and expensive laundry detergent. 

You turned sharply back to the window, nodding like your skull was on a hinge. 

You stared through the water-streaked glass. You did not acknowledge the ghost of his reflection there — his mouth level with your ear, eyes meeting the mirror image of your own. 

He reached past you, so close you felt his watch brush your arm, and grabbed the door handle. 

He stayed like that for an eternity (four seconds). Neither of you moved, and you barely found the lung function to breathe, boxed in as you were.

“Three,” he counted quietly beside your ear. 

“Two—“ 

“Wait—!” 

The door flung open with the howl of a banshee, and Nanami’s hand pressed flat to the small of your back and pushed, giving you no choice but to go. 

You hit the rain like a bullet hits water — immediately slowed, immediately soaked, your shoes slipping in the muck as you half-tripped, half-scrambled toward the blurry suggestion of a building. 

You collided with the glass doors so hard your teeth clicked. Then you were inside, the sound of rain barely muting inside the curved, dripping walls of the greenhouse. 

You turned just in time to see Nanami march in behind you, less a man and more a very annoyed and waterlogged gargoyle. His hair was flattened to his scalp, water trailing down his jawline. His glasses had fogged, completely useless. And yet, somehow, he looked considerably less miserable than you did. 

Which was frankly rather offensive and unfair. 

Your shirt clung to your torso like saran wrap. Your socks squelched. Rainwater streamed down your face and collected on your chin like you were trying to nourish the tile. 

“Yeah,” you panted, wringing out your shirt from the hem with a bitter scrunch of your nose at the deluge pouring between your feet, “no, this is great. Really. This is exactly how I wanted to spend my day, I really don’t know how you guessed.” 

“I preemptively apologized if you recall,” he said, removing his glasses to wipe them with a handkerchief from his inner coat pocket. How annoyingly convenient and sensible.

“Well I didn’t accept it, did I?” 

“If you focus on the job, we’ll complete it faster.” 

You made an offended noise that might’ve been vaguely humanoid as Nanami moved to walk ahead, shoes squeaking with embarrassing frequency. You glared daggers into the back of his stupid, perfectly-sculpted head. The nerve of him. The gall. 

Then, without a word, he shrugged out of his jacket.

And, looking somewhere above your head, draped it over your shoulders. 

It was still warm. Dry on the inside. Smelled like sandalwood, bergamot, and the inside of a linen closet. 

“I’m sorry again,” he said. 

Your mouth opened. Then closed again. 

Your entire planned tirade rolled over in your throat like a defeated dog and died on your tongue, buried tight behind the ivory coffin of your incisors. 

He kept walking.

You stood, dripping and quiet, while a single drop of rain raced from your lashes down your nose, collected into the bow of your lips and plinked down onto the lapel. You stared at the jacket like it was sacred. A token. A peace offering, at least. A precious cargo you were now obligated to carry to the ends of the earth. 

… Maybe there was some good to be found in the situation after all. 

Above you, the storm continued its tantrum as you skittered after Nanami. Thunder cracked and tumbled like boulders in the sky, lightning stabbed quicksilver flashes across the glass dome high above. It was like being inside a snow globe turned jungle— sealed off from the world, but not safe. You weren’t so naive to believe you ever really were. 

But when the path curved and the microcosm rainforest opened before you, awe eclipsed discomfort in the time it took for your eyes to widen.

You weren’t sure what to expect of a cursed garden. Maybe ruin. Maybe dead and withered roses and blackened moss, brackish ponds and algae-choked fountains, topiaries withering into gnarled skeletal hands. A cursed garden should look cursed.

But the garden was alive. Not just planted and maintained, but thriving — a riot of color and shape, texture and scent, all packed close in curated chaos and overgrown without intention. Every inhale was wet bark, loam, and crushed green stems, the sweet ozone of water clinging to petals like perfume gone all nectar-sweet and dizzy.

And the flowers. 

They spilled from hanging baskets in jeweled clusters — garnet reds, deep plums, electric sapphire blues. White blooms like starlight clustered in the shadows, flickering as you move past. The lilies by the pond gleamed like melted glass, their petals curling arrogantly as only things that knew they were beautiful could. You passed a sprawl of carnivorous pitcher plants, their throats slick and glistening, and they watched you with the patient air of things used to waiting. 

Leaves brushed your cheeks like the lightest of kid gloves, velvet and silk and gloss, trailing after you as if reluctant to let you go.

You shrugged Nanami’s jacket higher on your shoulders and breathed it all in.

Even the air moved differently here. Steam curled in low twining currents around your ankles, ghosting up in gentle spirals. Mist clung to the slats of the narrow wooden bridge you crossed, only to scatter at the touch of your footsteps.

You slowed at the trellis lining the bridge, fingers reaching out to instinctively trace the gloriosa lilies curling up the ironwork — flame-shaped petals twisting with crimson drama, greedy for the warmth the greenhouse backup generator lights provided. 

This place was beautiful. Unnerving. Exactly the sort of chaos you loved in a garden — the blur between wild and cultivated, nature just barely playing along with human expectations. 

Vines crept into the cracks of the cobblestone path like they belonged there and like they’d always been, pumping green veins through the stone. Your heart swelled with a quiet giddiness you tried to smother beneath even an iota of Nanami’s unmoved professionalism. 

You’d come back here. You had to. Preferably when nothing was trying to kill you. 

You crouched briefly beside a low-hanging plant, one you didn’t recognize immediately — its thick stem bowed under the weight of hanging blossoms shaped like chandelier glass. The petals were curled like calligraphy, a deep azure edged in violet, each bulb pointed like a teardrop seconds from falling.

You reached out. Brushed your fingertip along the edge of one petal. It was cool and slick, soft as satin, smooth as glass.

You smiled.

“We’re not here to sightsee.”

You jolted — hand still outstretched, fingers skimming the bloom that maybe, just maybe leaned subtly into your touch. Nanami stood just ahead, half-turned. His expression wasn’t harsh, but somehow he still managed to look like a sigh made flesh.

“I’m not sightseeing,” you protested. “I’m observing. For clues.” 

“You’re reading a plaque on Strongylodon macrobotrys,” he said dryly. 

You blinked down. 

Oh. So you were. 

You abandoned the jade vine with a flourish of wounded dignity, catching back up with him at the curve in the path.

“How’d you know that?” you asked, eying him suspiciously. “You got a pocket guide on rare tropical flora on you?” 

He didn’t look at you while he walked. 

“I briefly looked into the logistics of the average person keeping some of these at home.” 

He said it so simply that it took a second for the words to permeate your brain membrane, like pollen drifting down on still water. 

You blinked. Thought about it a little longer. Then filed the statement under unexpected things said by Nanami Kento, ranked by baffling specificity. There was a sizeable list. That one had cracked the top ten between surprisingly detailed knowledge of traditional Danish breadmaking techniques and casual explanation of how to launder money through a kombucha business. 

“Didn’t know you liked plants too,” you said, a little surprised and with a toothy grin that clearly fished for more. 

Nanami turned his shoulder, glanced at you over the rim of his fogged lenses, and his thin eyebrows crested in a way that could only be described as accusing. Like you had somehow missed something obvious. 

Then he looked away again. 

Up — toward the glass dome with its streaming veins of rain, as though the heavens might open and answer on his behalf or put him out of his misery. 

“Never mind that.”

And that was the end of it. 

You didn’t think much of it. That’s just how Nanami was — deliberate, reserved, frustratingly unreadable, and you had to pry out the seemingly irrelevant details of him until they were left gouged with the bite of his nails. A man built of reticence and regulation, who folded affection into dry commentary and precision coffee orders. You’d gotten used to it. You were fond of it. It hasn't turned you off yet. 

What you didn’t know — what you couldn’t have guessed — was that he’d read through six niche horticulture blogs and one lightly paywalled academic archive trying to figure out which flowering vine could survive an east-facing window with inconsistent sunlight and a tendency to be overwatered when you were stressed. 

He’d narrowed it down to three. One of them had been that one.

And then there you were, glowing under its shade like fate and smiling at it like it already sat in your home and had a name. 

Nanami said nothing, but he liked the way you’d looked at it. Maybe he would read another blog… buy the plant as a gift after all. *

Outside, the storm continued its tempestuous tirade. Water beat furiously against the glass like it wanted to be let in. Thunder roared and lightning crawled like a living thing through the pitch black clouds above. 

And inside, the plants grew quiet and strange.

Or maybe they’d always been strange, and now chastened by Nanami’s voice and steered back toward focus, you were simply starting to notice. 

Your tendency to anthropomorphize flora had never felt especially peculiar — what plant keeper didn’t talk to their orchid like a beloved, temperamental cat? But this, you understood implicitly, wasn’t projection nor was it mere sentiment. It was acknowledgment. 

These plants were watching you. 

Regarding you regarding them with the quiet intelligence of things that had been growing long before you arrived, and intended to continue long after you left. 

Long after you died, you figured. After the worms bleached your bones powder white, and your ribs made footholds for new roots to grow.

Some recoiled when you passed — deliberately slow, curling inward like sleepers disturbed and monks drawing their robes tight in silent judgment. Leaves turned their pale underbellies to the path, folding with the weary grace of old ballet dancers. Others, emboldened by your energetic attention, bloomed in time with your glance — petals peeling open like theatrically flattered yawns. 

Every step forward whispered behind you in the soft glide of something unseen through muffling moss. Bulbs twitched and blinked in the dark. Nettle-tipped vines bowed from the canopy like chaperones leaning in close, brushing against your hair like blind butterflies antennae. With every breath you took you expected one to reciprocate on your neck — wet and green and ancient as the earth, billowing peat and mire over your nape.

Orange pulled you off track.

Just ahead a blossom snagged your eye. The color of sweet peach flesh bloomed, hovering in a shaft of pale light along the path. It glistened too vividly for the lowlight above. 

It was far from the biggest or brightest thing here, but it was the most obvious.

You watched it warily the closer you came, sidestepped to give it a wide berth. But it didn’t move, didn’t twitch, just hovered.

Your blade moved first, silver-edged and cautious, compelled by curiosity you reached to poke one of the petals—

The bloom snapped shut with a belt-cracking switch. Sudden and whip-quick it reeled into the darkness so violently the air buzzed.

You yelped and stumbled back straight into something solid.

Nanami grunted and caught you reflexively.

One arm banded around your ribs, the other steady at your elbow. Warm palms, big hands, you flustered and reddened at the all-encompassing broadness of his chest against your spine.

You waited for the sigh. The clipped reprimand. Some variation of: “Don’t touch things like some feral, unsocialized child.”

 Hell, you kind of wanted him to scold you… only Nanami could make you feel shame and shamefully aroused in the same breath.

No rebuke came.

But he didn’t let go, either.

His hands stayed exactly where they were, even after you found your footing and stopped shaking. One palm spread across the damp fabric at your side while the other eased you forward, guiding you like a mockery of a man leading his lover through a garden where the only dangers were bees or an overpriced tour fee.

When he finally released you, it felt slow, like his hands were the last to realize you were no longer in danger. His fingers stayed briefly in the creases of your borrowed jacket, and you thought you sensed reluctance in how they lingered before letting go. But the warmth of his hands was still seared onto your skin.

You didn’t thank him. The moment itself and the frenetic energy of this biosphere felt tenuous enough that words would only rupture it.

So you glanced at him instead, surreptitiously through pressed lips and out of the corner of your eye, conveying without words how wrong things had begun to feel here. Not dangerous, exactly, but too aware; and therein lurked the hidden danger. 

It hadn’t declared itself. You hadn’t been jumped, no planty-beast exploded from the undergrowth nor barbed cursed appendage had shot out from a fern to wrap around your ankle and drag you into the dark — the absence of those things was exactly what troubled you. 

Curses didn’t lie in wait. Not like spiders spinning delicate webs and waiting for a footstep. They reacted. They struck. Their danger lived in immediacy — distilled, blunt instinct without forethought or fear. Evolutionary stupidity made them lethal. 

But this didn’t feel stupid. 

You recall going fishing once with your classmates, many summers ago, on a day so bright and careless it hardly seemed to belong to the same world as this one. The lake had been glassy and wide, ringed with reeds and dragonflies. The sun set itself firmly between your shoulder blades and burned there without malice, only a stinging reminder that the season was real and that you, for once, had nothing better to do. 

Some of your friends from that day are dead now. 

You stood on the dock, casting your line again and again as far out into the glittering water as you could throw it, your skin tight and clumsy with sunscreen applied too late. Nanami sat at the edge of the dock with his sleeves rolled and dropped his line straight down into the shadowy water. 

“How lazy, Nanami!” you’d teased him.

He’d only arched a brow, flashing a smirk he’d given away much more 

willingly back then. “Just smart. You only have to surprise the fish to get them to bite.” 

And by the time you understood what he meant, he’d already caught three fish and released them again, while your line stayed frustratingly unbitten. 

You eventually realized curses were the same. 

And this curse could not be surprised, because it had eyes on you from every angle. Slithering surveillance in its vines, tracking your movements, subtly shepherding you along to whatever ends it desired. It was aware in a way that made you increasingly uncomfortable in your dripping clothes…

It was no small fish. 

Your wet clothes felt complicit now — clammy and heavy, making it harder to turn quickly and run. If it wanted to make a move, you weren’t confident you could stop it. Not fast enough. 

A glade of white jasmine grew off the path. The blossoms glowed in the artificial blue light like spilled milk, eerie in their uniformity, heads turning in synchronicity like dusty attic dolls trained to track movement. You stared at them, a strange nausea bubbling in your belly— 

Then Nanami’s hand gripped your chin. 

You startled — but he turned your face firmly forward and leaned close, voice low, breath brushing the shell of your ear.

“Don’t look.” 

So you didn’t. You kept walking, becauses curses didn’t like to be looked at, and the jasmine had started to stand a little taller and rattle their petals like a viper's tail. You didn’t think this garden full of breathing things should be provoked. It wasn’t ready to strike… and neither were either of you. 

So you walked with your eyes forward…

And you pretended not to notice the thing slithering just in your periphery that was making your head swim. The not-snake. A vine in a vivid, 

unnamable color — green but not green, blue but not sky. An alien shade that lived between wavelengths, the afterimage burned into the world by staring too long at something you shouldn’t have seen, the theory of a color more than color itself. It trailed in the gutter, tendrils keeping pace with your steps. 

It had no reason to rush. It already knew where you were going. 

You tried not to shudder as ferns brushed your calves and split before you like frigid ocean waters. The garden pressed in with growing boldness, no longer content to merely observe. Leaves densely draped across the stone path, and thorned branches creaked across the flagstones to form heavy barricades.

And ahead — lit soft and strange as a circus stage — was the new path they made for you. 

A trail bloomed out of the undergrowth, flowers glowing with bioluminescent suggestion. Petals opened to greet you, phosphorescent, beckoning. The air pulsed with perfume. 

It was too obvious. 

You scoffed and stopped short, planting your heels firmly into the damp stone, your breath bursting in billowing fog obstinate as any mule. The beauty of the path, of this whole place, made it worse — something this lovely had to be cruel. 

No forest offered up its heart so readily unless it had already decided what to do with you once you arrived at the final rib. To step forward would be to surrender the narrative, walking willingly into the jaw lined with hidden teeth that had unhinged itself just for you. 

“We shouldn’t follow that,” you said stubbornly.

“Until we find the main body, we have no choice.”

Nanami stopped long enough to look at you.

He was backlit by a pulse of seductive blue, the color of an electric bruise, and then deep rolling violet. A spasm of light rippled over his shoulders, catching the edges of his shirt in a brief shimmer and for a second he looked more nightclub than battlefield. Like a man who might stand untouched at a bar with a fuck-off aura, collar unbothered by curious fingers, catching your eye over the rim of a glass just to look away before you could decide whether to be annoyed or interested. 

You could almost pretend, maybe, that this was a garden rave. Jungle-themed. Exclusive entry. Population: two… or maybe three, curse considered. 

His head dipped, slow and deliberate, just enough for your eyes to meet over the seaglass tint of his green glasses. Light fractured emerald and viridian across the lenses. “You’ll guard my back, won’t you?” 

It wasn’t a challenge but an invocation of faith. Ritual born between companions who bled back-to-back often enough, and who walked into the dark together and hoped not to walk out alone. 

Still, the question stung a little. 

You tilted your head, your expression bland but pointed. “Did you hit your head?” 

Nanami raised a brow. “Just covering our bases.” 

“I’ve guarded your back through curses, cults, and one very agitated goose.” 

“That goose was broody.” 

“And I still didn’t let it kill you.” 

Nanami scowled at you and you scowled back. He seemed to weigh your conviction silently… then he snorted and shook his head. He might’ve laughed outright if not for where you were, and that was as good as it got. 

You could rely on each other — always.

He nodded once, satisfied. “Good.” 

You stepped into the monsters maw with your jaw grimly grit and your sword slick in your grip — whether from sweat or the plaster weight of the air, you weren’t sure it mattered… only hoping that you don’t lose your grip when the time comes for you to swing. Nanami’s fingers flexed around his blade, closing with creaking slowness like he already envisioned a throat in his palm.

Humming surrounded you both, but maybe it was always there. It buzzed, not unseen insects or sixth-sense prickling on your neck, but a very real pulse in the air that only got louder. Beneath your feet the stones and sprouts lit and dimmed, lit and dimmed, lit and dimmed, the circadian rhythm of sleeping titans guiding your feet deeper. Closer, and closer, and closer until the hedges parted like curtains drawn back to reveal an altar. 

And there it lay. 

A wild shrine to a primordial god, tended by hands as gnarled and ancient as its patron saint. It stretched across the clearing like a ritual remembered too late, forgotten and unfinished: a tangle of bloom and body, thick-stalked and high-spined, a reliquary left to rot in the gloom. The earth cracked to cradle it — roots bulged up through black soil, thick as limbs, ivory-veined and burrowing deeper into the earth's viscera. It breathed. Breathed. The mass at its center rose and fell with the stubborn appropriation of something that had not died properly, and perhaps never would. 

It pulsed like a heart, not clean; practiced, studied, a mimicry of learned behavior watched from buried coffins and observed from decaying chest cavities. You saw the thick cords cinching and flexing, a translucent sheath over them pulling taut with each contraction, then slackening with a faux exhale. The ground beneath you moved in time like a belly breathing under the skin — you planted your feet, pitched gently to and fro by the cardiac thumping. 

Petals curled like lips parting to speak — red as garnets and gore, slick as tongues. The color bleeds darker at the edges, dried-blood and rust, and gleamed wet at their coquettish blushing centers. The flesh of it — god, was it skin or was it plant? — was diaphanous and veined, each bloom appearing skinned from some creature still clinging to the memory of its name. 

A sheen stuck to its surface, beaded into drops that hissed when they fell, eating tiny holes into the grass. 

It shimmered, but only the way something poisonous can shimmer; the way oil gleams on water, or an adders back in the sun. 

It was beautiful in its macabre way, the sort that haunted ancient cathedrals long abandoned, where the only footsteps were malnutritioned rats and the air smells of old prayers. The splendor that belongs to bone — clean, white bone — picked dry by wind and time and calls to mind ribs as spires, skulls that smile even as they forget what they once were. 

You stepped forward. Once. Twice. You might’ve taken a third—

—but Nanami’s hand clamped around your shoulder and held. 

Then came the smell.

You sniffed the air again. You expected rot and decay, melting flesh, the sick-sweet stink of fermentation and apples rotted to their cores and riddled with worms. Some cloying perfume that would cling to your soft palate for days like mold in the lungs. 

But it smelled like laundry. Freshly pressed shirts and the hum of a dryer in the room over. Fabric softener layered over sandalwood and thyme, bergamot peel crushed between fingers, and the suggestion of citrus pith. It smelled clean, expensive, intimate in a covert way that didn’t boldly invite but felt tailored to entice you. 

You breathed in again, greedy. 

Maybe it was just the collar of Nanami’s jacket you were huffing — it smelled like his cologne. 

You went soft and sweet and fuzzy. 

Nanami’s chest expanded at your shoulder, you peeled your eyes away from the curse only to find his already on you. 

He smelled something else entirely. 

Shea butter and lavender — the scent that trailed you through hallways, folded in your wake like petals whirled in a coy breeze. Patchouli, orchid. Notes of that one perfume he remembered from the Kyoto train, and that he’d found stained into the lining of his coat when he returned home, and always made his ears a little pink when he walked behind you— 

It wasn’t like you to get distracted. 

That curious thought slammed through your skull half a second after your spine slammed the ground, your breath punched out in a startled, wet gasp when your wing bones hit the earth. 

The curse struck where you’d stood faster than the lightning that streaked above. Vines reared like vipers and slammed down into the dirt with the sound of snapping femurs, earth exploding in shrapnel of clay and debris. You choked, recovering in heaving gasps from Nanami’s arm flinging you clear of the impact.

Before you could blink the painful watering from your eyes, Nanami was already swinging.

Wet, ropey vines fell in thirds, twitching and spraying fluid that stank like sap and rot. It shrieked — a high, metallic wail that shook the canopy and rattled the glass over-dome like exploded cable, splitting the air with a clap of thunder that filled your ears with tin.

You tried to scramble upright. Grass slid under your palms, resisting your handhold with roots bucking and convulsing beneath the surface. Your blade was gone, skittering across the stones and flung god knows where. 

All you could do was watch with dawning horror. 

Nanami threw himself between you and the curse, an aegis of fury and resolve. The petals unfurled syrupy slow, revealing a luminous center — a dandelion bloom made of citrine, gleaming wet like gemstone and runny yolk and radiant as a newborn sun. 

Your lungs seized. Your mouth shaped his name.

He was going to die. You were so certain Nanami was going to die and be reduced to a fine red mist, cudgeled beneath vast spiny trunks or torn asunder by ripping roots and there was nothing you could do to stop it all because you couldn’t fucking stand. 

Nanami had already moved, read the ratios, and already pivoted his stance from defense to offense. 

It was reactionary in a way you’d never seen him before, all reckless compulsion and knee-jerk muscle memory. Not a sorcerer seeing a threat — but a fish, baited and hooked on the threat of harm to you, and Nanami struck not because of the danger — but because killing it had become inevitable the moment it lunged. 

He leapt past the thorns, past the writhing limbs that seemed to just miss with every lash. Geometry and purpose and spurred by determination, his breath didn’t so much as stutter when he drove his blade in deep, cleaving the glittering heart in two. 

And like that— 

It died.

No final shriek, no retaliatory flail, no explosion. Just stillness. 

Vines sagged like marionettes with cut strings, limp and lifeless. One by one the scaffolding stalks collapsed, slamming to the ground with bone-juddering thuds that shook the earth beneath your muddied knees then dissipated into grey ash. 

The petals blackened, curling in on themselves like burned parchment. Roots split and hissed and guttered out in ribbons of steam, but the heart remained. 

Split in two, broken and spilling its golden ichor into the shredded grass, it bled and bled and bled, and wetly thumped and thumped and thumped. Two hearts now in tandem, not one, doubling and deforming. And from that fractured core, the curse would sing its swan song. 

Nanami turned back toward you, chest heaving, steps sluggish and bogged down with relief. He’d barely taken a step when it rose — a second bulb birthed from the broken heart, a sickly green shoot straining upward on a thin, trembling stem. 

Not a heart at all. A womb. 

“Nanami—!” you shrieked, but it was already too late. 

He spun, half a step from safety — then vanished into a choking mushroom cloud of yellow. 

You moved without thinking, panic clawing up your throat, feet slipping on shredded turf and torn roots as you lunged toward the spreading vapor. Panic propelled you forward, blood whistled in your ears — Nanami, Nanami, Nanami, you couldn’t lose him, not him too — you were only half a second from flinging yourself into the mist— 

And then he stumbled out. 

You skidded to a halt, nearly dropping to your knees. He was alive. Staggering, coughing into his elbow, but alive.

His legs buckled beneath him and he crumpled into the grass. Nanami ground his forehead hard into the dew-damp ground. His shoulders heaving with ragged, wet breaths, choking on the remnants of the yellow powder that stained his lips marigold. 

You fell to his side, hands trembling, skimming over him, brushing debris and seeds and grass from his back — a nursing hummingbird in your palms and in your chest as you searched for wounds. 

No blood. No gashes. No visible injuries— 

—the yellow that coated him like chalk faded as it leached into his skin, absorbing into his bloodstream. 

You barely caught his hand snapping up between you, pushing you away with a trembling shove. He sat back on his haunches, eyes closed and teeth gritted in agony. Your stomach dropped in time with the beads of sweat suddenly streaking down his temples. 

“I’m fine,” he rasped. 

You watched, worry planting itself deep between your ribs, as he struggled to stagger upright. It took him far more effort just to stand than it had to even exorcise the curse. Nanami braced his hands on his knees, back to you, the muscles between his shoulders twitching, locking, visible beneath the sweat-soaked starch of his shirt. 

He took one step away from you. Then another. Then he pressed his forehead hard against the bark of a tree and clenched his fists until the tendons in his wrists popped. 

“Nanami, please, just… let me see, I need to make sure—“ 

He swatted blindly at your hands as they ran him over, skimming over his arms, his shoulders, checking for pain or breaks — but it was hard to tell when every little touch caused him to convulse like the bone beneath your fingertips had already been shattered. Everything hurt.

“Shit you’re burning up—“ you whispered when Nanami groaned, uprooted from deep in his aching throat when your palm cupped the back of his neck. You were already patting your pockets, frantic for your phone. “We need to go. I’ll call a ride—no, no, I’ll call Shoko, she’ll come to us—“ 

“No.” 

Nanami kept his forehead pressed to the tree and grunted his monosyllabic objection. 

He tried not to look at you. He didn’t think he could handle the visual, not when all he could smell was you stuck in his nose, embossed into his lungs like a monogram, and that alone was making the edges of his vision fuzzy. But despite his better judgment he risked a glance — only to feel his insides split around the ache planted beneath his diaphragm. 

Because there stood you — wide-eyed, wet, and worried — and that alone would’ve been enough to ruin him on any good day. 

But you stood there, draped in his jacket, the too-heavy waterlogged thing slipping dangerously off your shoulder and your hair plastered in wisps to your throat. And when his gaze dropped — fuck — your pants were soaked through and clung to you like they’d been painted on by da Vinci himself, translucent with rain and sap, outlining every devilishly divine line and curve. Your hips. Your thighs. The sweet, scandalous dip between your legs. 

He stared, shame coiling hot and feral in his gut. 

He hated himself for it, hated how nakedly he ogled you — but he couldn’t look away, his vision tunneled and hunger gnashed through his ribs like a wild dog. He wanted you. Wanted you in a way that should’ve made him blush and did make him ashamed. He could bend you over a tree branch, hang you up like laundry on a line and devour you. Tear the flimsy fabric under his fingers and bury himself inside you until you were more him than you— 

He ground his knuckles into the bark beneath him, welcoming the sting and the wet warmth when his skin split open and bled. Anchor yourself. Anchor yourself. 

You sidled closer, oblivious — one hand outstretched again and heartbreakingly innocent the way you might endear yourself to a scarred and scruffy alley cat… it was devastating. He nearly seized your wrist, almost dragged you down to him, could’ve buried his face between your thighs and drowned himself there, desperate for any relief from the heatwave boiling his brain. 

A low, wounded sound cracked from his throat when you grabbed his waist to feel up his ribs.

“Go,” he croaked. “I’ll… catch up.” 

“Nanami, no, just let me help you—“ 

“Now,” he barked and grimaced like the word had peeled the lining of his throat. 

“No!” you snapped back.

You knew this man — knew his maddening stubbornness and how he’d refuse doctors so as not to be an inconvenience, refuse the last seat on the train just to stand over you while you sat, refuse any kindness unless you forced it into his hands and bent his fingers around it. You weren’t about to let him kill himself here out of some sense of machismo masochism. 

“No.” You repeated. “You dragged me out here with you on my day off, fuck if I’m not dragging you back out with me, too.” 

You charged into his space and felt the way he tensed, rigid like you’d struck him and you prickled. “Oh, please,” you scoffed, “I’m not gonna hurt you. Just… relax. Let me help—“ 

You nudged his shoulder firmer this time, and were surprised when he gave, letting you ease him back against the tree. He sagged, wilted like a sad houseplant, his face flushing deeper even in the dim light and you heard the calloused scratch of his hand dragging up his jaw to cover his mouth with his chin tucked into his chest in shame. 

He wouldn’t look at you despite how close you stood. He wouldn’t meet your eyes even when you tried to duck and catch them. He prayed you wouldn’t look down below the belt.

You brushed his forehead and winced at the scalding heat beneath your touch. Unnatural. He’s boiling. You knew that something was seriously wrong, that time was likely of the essence, and that you couldn’t just stand there and watch Nanami succumb to some fast-acting poison, or wait until something cracked his ribs open and burst from his chest. 

You flattened your palm over his brow, brushing back his damp hair. But what were you supposed to do? Drag him kicking and screaming through the muck? Tackle him to the ground and find something to fix? Your rudimentary medical knowledge didn’t extend past basic tourniquets and Neosporin, and your growing panic would make even that difficult. 

A crack of lightning seared the sky—

—you squeaked and leapt out of your skin when his hand clamped around your wrist like an iron manacle.

Nanami shuddered, breath ragged, his lips parted as he pulled your hand to his face and turned into it, fevered skin branding your palm like it was salvation. His eyes fluttered shut, a broken groan tumbling loose from deep in his chest like an old house settling into its foundations. 

He felt your pulse race through your wrist, wild and unsteady. Fear? Concern? For him… or of him? He couldn’t tell, couldn’t parse the emotion flickering behind the wide mirror-balls in your skull, shock or scare or something else, it hardly mattered — how loathsomely selfish — when the beat of your heart seemed to stall his free-fall into the abyss.

“Nanami?” You whimpered. 

… So he chased it. 

His mouth dragged lower, lips tracing the paper-thin skin of your inner wrist where your heart materialized and leapt beneath his breath. His own stuttered and stumbled to match your hummingbird-beat rhythm. 

You trembled and your lower lip wobbled — he felt the crimson string between you draw tighter, both noose and leash around his neck. Nanami rose to meet it. His lips and teeth grazed your skin as he hunted that delicate blue vein up your arm. Closer, higher. His grip on your wrist tugged you up until your forearm was pressed high near his ear, his head bent low over your elbow where he finally stopped. 

He didn’t bite. He didn’t kiss. His breath billowed through flared nostrils, each exhale scorching hot where it blew across your skin. 

And when you trembled he trembled too — both poised on the same razor's edge; Occam’s, Hume’s, Grice’s, whomever the blade belonged to it was sharp and you both teetered in the stillness before blood-letting. 

What the hell is happening? you both thought in synchronicity, silent save for the sound of crashing breath and your own heart. Your face burned with a confusing mix of terror and untimely arousal. No, now’s not a good time to want to jump his bones, even if he’s looking at you like he wants to eat you alive—

“Nanami.”

You tugged gently at your wrist — and your stomach lurched when his fingers tightened, squeezing the fine bones in your hand… and he growled at you. 

You froze. Unnerved now you gave a harder yank until he finally let go. You stumbled back, nearly falling, but his reflexes snapped quickly — he caught your sleeve, snared you like a hook. 

For a moment you dangled between escape and entrapment, his fist clenched in your borrowed jacket — but then his face twisted. Pain, conflict, a rawness ripped through him with a violence even you could feel in the winded gust of his breath. His brows knitted like cables and he let you go again. 

You staggered back. 

“Tell me what you’re feeling,” you pressed, but your confidence was shaken. “I can’t help you if you don’t tell me.” 

But you didn’t step forward again — you edged sideways, testing a new angle around him. 

He was watching you too closely, and definitely too intently. His eyes pinned you like a needle through soft flesh, locked down like a taxidermied beetle in a frame, tracking every shift and minor twitch of your fingers. Every time lightning shattered the sky you flinched… and so did he; like he was waiting, and ready, to chase you. 

Nanami was on fire. He could see the delicate throb in your throat, that tremble of your pulse hammering under your skin, the steady badump, badump, badump escalating into a frantic thud, thud, thud! 

Animalistically attuned to the vitality in your veins — god, he swore he could feel your heartbeat in the roots of his teeth.

When he touched you — he hadn’t thought you hated it.

You’d gone still and your breath caught but not in fear. Not only in fear.

He tasted the sweetness and wanting on your skin too. The same that fuzzied his tongue at night when his toes curled in his sheets and he muffled the shout of your name with his teeth buried in his knuckles while the other hand pulled him to ruinous orgasm.

You wanted him too. He knew it. Had always known it; subtlety didn’t agree with you when you’d blush so sweetly just from looking at him too long, or the cute way you’d sometimes twine your hair around your finger and sway back and forth when you needed help.

And that was the worst part, that you wanted him — trusted him. Because you weren’t scared. But he was.

He didn’t want your help. Couldn’t want it. He could feel it in his gut, in his bones, in the blood that pumped too fast and hot through his veins. It wasn’t a thing he could squash so easily as lust. It was need, feral and all consuming, and it burned through him like kerosene:

Take her.

Pin her.

Have her until it stops.

If he let you stay — or so much as breathed too deep in your direction — he would burn you alive. He’d grab you and drag you under and fuck the apology right out of his own mouth. He’d worship you like a man possessed and reduce himself to ash in the process like a sage wick.

But if he told you to run— 

If you did— 

Could he let you go?

When his skin barely felt like his own anymore and every nerve was wired to you and every breath he took made him hungrier—

If you ran…

Could he stop himself from chasing you?

He turned away from you like a mirror gone rotten, hoping to outrun the shape of the monster reflected there if only he moved fast enough. 

He would rather die than lay a finger on you. 

He pressed his palms into his eyes until he saw whole galaxies. Tried to remember his name. Yours. Anything good.

He tried to hold onto dignity… what little he had left — and so sought to preserve yours.

 His hand slipped down, quick and furtive, tugging at the front of his pants in a futile effort to adjust the shameful bulge printed in the soaked fabric. 

The outline of him pressed even harder against the inseam, snaking down his thigh and tented with humiliating urgency. As if he could just adjust this away. 

The fabric sucked tight to every inch of him, mortifying in its clarity, and all he could do was stand there, jaw clenched, eyes squeezed shut like willpower alone might magic it gone. It didn’t.

So he shoved through the foliage back towards the path without a word, stiff in every way.

“Hey! Where the hell do you think you’re going?” you yelped, immediately trotting after him. 

“Anywhere but here.” 

“Nanami, we’re rained in in a giant fucking bowl, there’s nowhere to go—” 

“Wherever you aren’t, then.” 

You scowled, glaring daggers into the tense set of his shoulders, but you still nipped at his heels. “Oh, so you’re fine enough to be rude now.“ 

He didn’t answer you. Didn’t look at you. Each step he took was more of a lurch, his gait impeded and uncomfortable, but he still tried to outpace what was clawing its way up — or down — his bloodstream. 

If being rude convinced you to leave him alone, to protect yourself from the hungry thing incubating inside him, then it was a small price to pay… and he would make it up to you when he could think straight.

Because the thing inside him — the grotesque force twining around his nerves, weaving into his blood, and implanting such indecent thoughts as bending you over the nearest stump and fucking you through the earths mantel — was gnashing its chains, and no amount of clenched fists or gritted teeth or good intentions was going to keep it polite. 

You grabbed his elbow, yanking hard. “Stop. Hey—stop. What’s your problem?” 

“Let. Go.” He warned.

“No,” you stood your ground. “Not until you tell me what’s going on.“ 

“Goddamn it—“ He jerked his arm from your grip with such force that it pitched you both off balance. A graceless flail — him stumbling back, you colliding into his chest with a thud that echoed between your ribs and his sternum. 

It was like before but more. The sickness in him hadn’t yet clawed its way fully into his brainstem, muscle memory prevailed. His arm cinched around you hard, a taut coil of muscle and bone crushing you against him. Reflexive at first — just like the first time, except he didn’t let go.

His hand fisted your jacket, pulling the fabric into trembling knots between his fingers and his head dropped low, nose buried in your hair like a drowning man clawing for driftwood, and— he moaned. 

Your palms splayed flat, rigid and useless against his chest. Some dim intention to extricate yourself flickered up, only to short out before it even began. You froze there, blinking up into the wet hollow of his throat, your mind flashbanged a bright white blank and your ears filled with static. 

“Mmph—Nanami, you’re crushing me—“ you choked, laughing reflexively even though your ribs were being crushed in the iron maiden of his embrace. 

“I’m sorry,” he muttered, the words slurred and sloshing over his tongue. But he didn’t let go. You felt the silent quake of him trying to will his muscles to obey. They did — only partially. His grip faltered just enough to slide, the clench around your waist easing downward, fingers seeking lower, dragging across the damp fabric over your spine, cradling your sacrum with a possessive tremor. His hands flexed once, twice, nails scraping at the thin barrier of his jacket bunched between you. 

“I just…” His voice cracked — cracked, and the sound of it made him flinch. His jaw locked tight and he scowled like he could crush the shame between his molars, but it didn’t help. He was flushed and hot and miserable in a way that reminded him, with sick clarity, of being seventeen — exhausted and aching, hard at the worst possible time, praying for class to end so he could run to his dorm and jerk off in the shower with the water scalding.

But this was worse. He’s older now, a man now, and he was wound tighter, needier, more pathetic and vulgar in a way he’d never allowed himself to be even back then. He swallowed, thick and despairing.

“I’m sorry, but—I need…“ 

The words were drowned out in a crash of thunder so loud it left your ears ringing. 

You hardly minded the situation, circumstances aside. His arms somehow felt like the safest place in the world to fall into, and you let yourself imagine, just for a moment, this at any other time. 

Nanami folding you close outside your apartment door. Nanami brushing a chaste farewell kiss to your temple after a lunch snuck between work hours. Not like this — with humid mist numbing your scalp and adrenaline screaming through your veins that he’s dying and your heart drumming a tattoo of oh god, oh god, what do I do between your lungs— 

—and not with the undeniable press of that against the curve of your hip. 

Your breath hitched and you bit down hard on your bottom lip to stop the sound that wanted to claw free. You shifted instinctively, a minuscule movement — and there it was again. The friction, hot and undeniable, catching where his hips canted toward yours. 

You tried to convince yourself it was his phone, his keys, any mundane excuse. But you knew, and he knew you knew. His breath stuttered, caught raw and ragged at the top of his chest, and you swore you could feel the molten napalm of his mortification bleeding through the sodden fabric of his shirt and beating down on you — you had to wonder how he even had the blood to spare for his face. Still his hands clung tighter and wrapped in your jacket like he couldn’t bear to let you slip from him. 

“Nanami…” Your voice was thin, pitched an octave high, you tried for casual but it cracked in the middle. “Are you—“ 

He cut you off. “Don’t.” 

You peeled yourself back enough to look up at him and your heart thudded up into your mouth, twitching like a bloodied thing caught in your teeth. Every cell of you was aware, over-aware, of the warmth and want of him. A million blind butterflies tickled your belly with their antennae and you didn’t trust them not to swarm out of your mouth. You stared up, and he stared down. You saw the pollen stained on his lips.

His jaw flexed; his eyelids slammed shut like it pained him to keep you in his sights. 

Because you were too much. Too bright. Like a match held too long, burning down to blistered fingertips. A sun clutched selfishly in the crook of his arms that would not warm him — only crater through and leave him hollowed and smoking; but to be ruined by you would be a mercy. 

He was unraveling in strands of ash and soot, swimming in greyscale, like a monster that circled just outside the campfire’s reach, silent on its belly, jaws slack — waiting for the singing to stop, for the light to fail, before it would eat its way in. 

His vision tunneled, pulsed, pounded against the backs of his eyes and beat the color from his nerves. Even the flowers — those garish, cloying witnesses to the depravity that incubated inside him had stripped back to black blurs. But you held him sweetly… like a fist gripping the back of his neck and shoving him down into a forge. 

You weren’t touched by the haze, you glowed through it. A wound of color in a world rubbed raw with skin that dared to flush, and lips that dared to part, and eyes that looked at him not with fear but recognition. You stood against him like fire pressed to wax paper and didn’t shrink. You curled. 

He wanted to bite. 

He wanted to drag his teeth down your throat and see if you still glowed on the inside. He wanted to pull you to the ground and pant against your skin until the scent of you blotted out the rest of the world. 

He wanted to snarl at you for it. Or sob. Or grind against you until your marrows mixed. 

Because what else did monsters do when given a saint? 

Every throb in his pocket, the feverish, shameful weight of his cock pinched between his thigh and yours, dampened his briefs and felt like humiliation made liquid. It made him want to press his hips forward and rut himself into the first warm thing that yielded. 

Just need to come, he spiraled. Then it’ll be gone. Sweat it out, vomit it up like a bug. I’ll be better after that. 

He knew his binds wouldn’t hold. No ribbon woven from nonsense and nothing and impossible things: the breath of a fish, the sound of cats feet, the roots of a mountain, would withstand the sordid blaze in his body. 

He would break it. He would tear it with his teeth. 

He would eat the sun. 

She’ll help me, he thought. She always helps. Too fucking kind. She’d let me. She’d take it, anything I have to give her, all of it— 

He bit down on the impulse. He needed and hated and feared, all at once, and he would let you go, he must let you go— 

“I’m trying—“ he muttered, half to you, half bargaining with himself. “But I can’t—can’t think when you’re this close.” 

Your stomach flipped, a wild, traitorous lurch of something hot and heavy settling low in your belly that had been tucked deep beneath propriety and boundary and respect. But it had always been there, this want for Nanami. 

Buried under mission reports and busy nights — always so goddamn controlled, so infuriatingly put-together, even when the world around you both splintered at the seams and you were the half-cracked half-filthy reflection of it. How many times have you caught yourself staring, long after the danger passed, admiring Nanami — a statue, perfect in form, but carved from hollow geode? Not-cracked, but half-empty. Only just surviving. 

And you’d think: I wouldn’t mind helping him live. 

There’d be those times — an empty train tunnel, a mold-eaten library, derelict classrooms turned graffiti gallery with peeling walls — and you’d think: why not? Why not, in the dead spaces between dead things and curses and close calls, make something good out of the ruin? A quick fuck against crumbling plaster, indulge the hedonism that the mice and small creatures that live in those spaces adhere to, a desperate press of bodies just to live — to want something and take it, because tomorrow wasn’t promised. It never was. 

But you buried it deep, because you didn’t mind recklessly burning the candle at both ends, and he was Nanami. 

But with him curled around your body like he’d graft you to his liver given the chance, his arms pinning you to his chest but could so easily pin you to the grass instead… how do you smother that ember now? 

Your stomach swooped, peregrine-pitched in a wild nosedive straight to hell. You clutched hard at his chest, fingernails hooking into his leather harness. It was needy, but you couldn’t help it. You wanted this. 

“You should’ve said something sooner.” 

His laugh was sharp and bitter, a throaty bark that gusted against your temple. “Oh? And what, exactly, would you have had me say?” 

He scoffed, pitched his voice low. It didn’t sound much like him at all. “Should I have said: ‘Excuse me, I’ve got a raging hard-on, please stay back?’ or ‘I want to fuck you blind, kindly allow me a moment to compose myself?’” 

A laugh broke out of you despite everything, startled like pigeons into graceless flight and just on the edge of hysterical. “Jesus, Nanami—“ 

But his head dropped lower, nosing along your hairline to skate your earlobe. You shuddered, goosebumps erupting across your flesh as you wondered what other madness-induced depravities he might spill into your ear. He settled instead into the crook of your neck and groaned, long and low — you couldn’t tell if it was embarrassment, dismay, lust, or the warning creak of rusty hull hinges before giving way under tremendous force. 

Oh. You wanted it. 

“Would that help?” You asked coyly. 

He muttered your name in warning. Shook you once like he could rattle sense into you both… and held you tighter “Don’t. Don’t say that.” 

“I’m asking,” you pressed, turning your head enough that your nose brushed against his hair. He convulsed. “Genuinely.” 

“Would it help, Naaa-naaa-miiii?” 

You curled your voice around his name, more flirtatious than you’d ever dare normally. But it had the intended effect when his head reared back from your throat to stare at you. Lightning flashed, and in the brightness you saw the sweat beading down his forehead, the red flush bleeding up his neck that stained his ears and cheeks. 

Then he was kissing you. Greedy-mouthed, forcing the lip-lock before you could gather the breath to sustain it. 

Your hands sunk into his hair, scrabbling up his neck to scrape through that prickling blonde undercut and into the damp roots, tugging at his hair with his tongue inside your mouth.

It was messy — boyishly desperate like backseat-quickies at a mall, or those clandestine capers in the wee hours before the teenage curfew neither of you ever had. His canines sunk into your plump lower lip, and Nanami tasted the bloom of copper on his tongue. He groaned and took your resulting gasp to pour more of himself into your mouth like it was the only vessel that could hold him. 

You couldn’t breathe. You weren’t sure if you wanted to, when this seemed a much sweeter death than whatever may take you tomorrow or next year. But you yanked on Nanami’s hair, then parted down the middle and heaved a damp inhale of breath. You didn’t want to die yet. 

Nanami took the moment to look at you. His throat was tight and he drank in how desperate you looked. It wasn’t you who’d been afflicted, and yet you harbored something so much more potent than any pollen... and so did he. Desire, real and authentic. Affection, softer than he could offer you now. The belated realization clicked into place. 

He layered litanies of apologies between clicks of your teeth, with every twine of his tongue and dig of his fingers into the soft flesh of your body he imparted another. Blooming blue tulips planted beneath the nails carving cruel crescents into your flesh — he loathed how he damaged you. 

It should never have been this way, he thought as he ducked lower, circling his arms around your thighs, one hand shamelessly under your ass, and lifted you like you weighed two pounds. 

It should’ve been different, he thought as he stumbled forward. He mauled hot and heavy along your jaw and throat, anywhere his mouth could reach. Your head fell back and you whimpered, eyes cast skyward to watch the rain pound on the dome overhead. This was your world now, your jungle, and you were the animals in it. 

He fumbled you forward until his thighs hit the edge of something hard and wooden behind you. A gardener’s workbench — splintered, paint-stained, and the perfect height. His palms flattened on the table, caging you in with his body.

Your fingers flew to his shirt and yanked at his tie and collar, popping buttons and pulling threads in your haste to have him bare. Nanami’s teeth dragged along the shell of your ear, humid breath panting over your helix, only feeding the conflagrating inferno he’d kindled within you. And the sweetness on your tongue… 

You disconnected just long enough to shuck his shirt from his body, it fluttered down to the mud and you looked up at Nanami, dazed, light rippling strange. 

There was yellow on him. 

Smeared along his lower lip and brushed across one cheekbone. It passed from his mouth to yours when he kissed you again, a shimmer of gold imparted on your tongue that you accepted gleefully, like LSD swapped from one mouth to another in seedy nightclubs. You would not let him burn alone. You moaned into it, half-laughed against his lips when he nipped at the corner — you understood now. 

Heat flared and blossomed low in your belly, slow and syrup-sweet. Your skin tingled at every point of contact and you squirmed, needing more of it. 

“Mmmn—anami! ‘S’th’pollen—” you gasped. 

He grumbled something vaguely like: “Mmhm—“ into your mouth. Of course he already knew. 

He grabbed your thighs and shoved them apart, but you splayed open with ease, heels hiked up onto the table. Your pants were gone — ripped open, the wet fabric sheared from your body. You felt sweet pleasure throb between your legs, to not only be wanted but so utterly needed by him that all decency had fled and covered its eyes and ears. 

You were fuzzy and warm, your skin prickled and Nanami dropped to his knees — only briefly — tongue dragging a wet and hungry stripe up the seam of your soaked panties and let out a sandy growl. He traced the shape of your pussy once, twice, he sucked hard on the fabric and made you cry out, your fingers twisting in his hair when he abruptly stood. 

“Later,” he promised. 

He yanked your panties aside and gripped his cock — when had he even gotten it out? your head swam, you didn’t care — slick with precum and pulsing a furious purple, already lining up against you. His other hand cupped the back of your neck, tilting your head and guiding your gaze downward like he wanted you to see it. 

“Talk to me,” he rasped, forehead pressing hard against your crown. “Don’t let me be selfish.” 

“I want you,” you pleaded. 

His hips snapped forward, spearing you open on his cock without fanfare or preamble, none of the pristine bedroom fantasy or lit candles. You howled, scrabbling at the rolling muscles of his back and he shushed you softly, the hand on your neck directed you into the crook of his to muffle your hiccup when he thrust again. 

You thought it should’ve hurt, but it didn’t. You felt stretched to the edge of your life and still you begged for more. 

Nanami’s jaw slackened, eyes glossy and unfocused, the scalding heat of you nearly buckling his knees. His nails bit into the table and he moaned into your ear in a way he distantly knew was undignified, but you only tightened around him and rolled your hips forward while he froze and recalibrated. 

“You—fuuu-aaa—“ he groaned and aborted the curse before it could form on his tongue, his body rewired. Then he moved, setting a brutal, unrelenting pace that jarred both of your bones. 

Your blood sang, sonnets sizzled in your veins as he dragged against you again and again, like Nanami had lit the match to the kindling the curse snuck into your blood. Every push of his hips jolted the table beneath you, rattling the rusted tools with every slam of his thighs against the edge. The pollen purred within you, satisfied and sated well before it could drive you to madness. The same could not be said for Nanami.

Every movement felt at odds with the next. He fucked you with an aggression that felt wholly departed from who you assumed Nanami to be, he pounded into you like he may die without it… you hadn’t ruled out that he still could.

Wood splintered and cracked under his fingers, brutally destructive just so the hand that held you could stay tender. It coiled in your hair, stroked you softly and smoothed circles behind your ear, and supported you when your spine arched so beautifully you would’ve toppled over without him.

A particularly hard thrust jolted the table and your heel slipped. You whined, but Nanami’s hand caught your thigh mid-slide. He adjusted you without breaking pace, hoisting your knee over his hip in one smooth motion and opening you deeper to his plunging cock. You keened and curled your other leg around his waist, digging your heel into the taut, dimpling muscle of his ass to spur him even deeper. 

You clenched around him instinctively, massaging him with the slick gushing of your cunt, and the way his cock jerked and the way the hiss punched out of his chest in a sputtering gale against your forehead felt like a reward. 

“Harder, Nanami—!” you sobbed, breathless and starving, tugging at his hair just to feel more of him when you dragged your lips over the thundering carotid in his throat. You nipped at his collarbone, his ear, lapped at the sensitive shell until he shuddered and bore down on you. 

He made a sound. You couldn’t tell if it was a choke or a laugh but, ever your servant, he obeyed. He snapped his hips into yours, sharp enough to drive you up the table with a startled, delighted cry. The next was rougher, meaner, like he sought to fuck you through the planks completely. You muffled your ecstatic hiccups and moans by biting his shoulder, grounding and soothing the itch in your games sated only by the firmness of his flesh. 

“Harder?” He breathed into your hair. 

He laid you back, one hand cushioning your head, the other bruising into your hip as he yanked you to the edge of the table and drove in deeper. He slipped down, buried his nose in your cheek and murmured. “Harder… okay. Harder? Is this harder?” 

You answered in the scrabble of your damp fingers in the gutters of his back, the flexing muscles carved up by your nails. You babbled curses that evaporated into pleas for more, every stroke of Nanami inside you devastated and shorted every neuron in your system. They snapped and sizzled and lit sporadically, galaxies swam behind your eyes.

Nanami’s precision was not confined only to his blade.

Every slam into you drove home the weeping head of his cock straight into the spot that reduced your brain to soup and static, knocking thoughts 

clean out of your skull to the applause of his soaked thighs smacking against your ass. You nodded, frantic as the nails that carved welts into his skin. 

“Wasn’t supposed to be like this,” he gasped into your temple. “Supposed to take you somewhere nice. Feed you… hold your hand. Tell you I—fuck—“ 

He should’ve taken you out first. Wined you, dined you, talked with you more, kissed you like a gentleman at your doorstep. Should’ve told you he fucking liked you. But he hadn’t, and now he was buried inside you, soaked in sweat and sin and rain and pollen, pounding into you like he’d perish if he stopped. 

But you were still smiling up at him, up at the quicksilver-lit canopy above whenever you flung your head back, your teeth bared to the heavens like you dared something to take this from you too. And you laughed between the cries that chipped from your chest, delighted in the ruining of you both. You welcomed the purple fingerprints tattooed on your hips. You relished the mercilessness Nanami took you with that you’d only ever seen from the sidelines with weapon in hand and with your lip secretly bitten between your teeth. 

Because you’d always known sorcerers don’t get forever. They barely got now. So you took what you could while you could, unlike he who rejected all those ephemeral indulgences as they came. But not this time. 

Because he wanted this. Nanami’s consciousness flickered, reeling deeper inward to the parts of himself the curse couldn’t steal. He’d always liked you, always been fond, he’d always privately held a candle for you and waited for you to notice. He called it respect. Retrospect called it cowardice. 

If he were better he would’ve founded a future on subtler hungers. The desire to see you smile over a note snuck into your purse, to be the one to light your face every day when he remembered your coffee order, to peel mandarins with his thumbs and offer you the slices, he’d hold your bag while you tried on coats you didn’t need because you’d just steal his anyway, and tell you you were beautiful without urgency gnashing at his throat compelling him to do so like an apology. 

You were supposed to have said yes to dinner first before he had you. He was supposed to have asked. 

And the worst part was that it was perfect, even like this. Even compelled by a curse, when his skin was so sensitive that he shook with agony with every buffet of your breath, he wanted you. 

And now that he had you, not gently or sweetly or after flowers or quiet dinners far away from the life you both lead, it felt like a theft committed by his own hands, and Nanami didn’t know how to reconcile how good it still felt. 

“Say it again,” he begged. 

“I wa-aaa-ant you!” You barely whimpered the words while he fucked the air from your lungs. 

You turned your head and he met your mouth like he needed to swallow the declaration, his tongue twined with yours and devoured every humid pant of breath puffed between you. 

You allowed him to use you. You thrilled with the knowledge that he did and you were helping. All the while Nanami kept trying to slow down, to hold back — to touch you gently and kiss you soft — but it always turned into grabbing and teeth. He cursed himself every time he thrust too hard or made you scream out too loud. 

He wanted to be better, and you never asked him to be. 

“Should’ve—hah!—taken you home. Would’ve made you breakfast. Let you sleep in my bed—I’d’ve stayed on the couch—“ 

His hand slammed onto the table beside your head and he bore down on you harder, his cock plowed into you frantically and with a tempo that had already begun to soak his thighs and turn the curled hair at the base of his cock dark. 

You mewled and writhed and begged, you looked at him with your heart in your eyes, and Nanami whimpered. He would’ve been embarrassed under any other circumstance, but under any normal circumstance he wouldn’t be here, and any regret that reality might inspire washed away with each moan he pulled from your throat. It couldn’t compare to the exquisite silk of your pussy, or the way you held onto him like you needed him, or how his balls drew up so tightly to his body that they’d begun to ache. 

The confessions cracked out of him in time with his hands skating down your calves. He gripped them and bent you in half, pressed your knees nearly to your ears so that your ankles rested on his broad, claw-scratched shoulders. 

“…Was going to kiss you on the train platform,” he panted, driving into you again. The angle made you feel him in your ribs and sprung shameless saliva to the corner of your mouth. “Was going to… gonna ask you to dinner next week—”

Nanami didn’t know if either of those were true, but god, he wanted them to be. He thought that they could’ve been, that good intentions could make up for this utter collapse of everything he thought you deserved. 

Your mouth dropped open in a raw, drawn-out moan. Your head tipped back away from him. He couldn’t bear it. 

His hand came to cradle your skull again, drawing your face back toward his; like holding you close might tether him back to time and sense. His forehead pressed hard against yours, eyes wide, glassy. Feverish. He saw it in your gaze, too — the same edge-of-the-cliff wildness. He wanted to exorcise this feralness from you both, he would set it right— 

Sweat rolled off his nose and landed on your cheek. You licked the next drop from his lip. 

He faltered. His brutal pace broke apart — sharp, erratic strokes as his hips stuttered against yours. His forehead fell to your shoulder and he growled your name into your skin, the syllables wrecked nearly beyond recognition. He wouldn’t last. 

The thing inside Nanami snapped taut — a final, fraying thread that gave way all at once, crashing with a violence that stole what little breath he still had. The thought of pulling out surged up like a scream, the responsible thing whispered the tiny kernel of coherence left to him, but it was inconceivable. Every instinct inside him recoiled from it. Unthinkable. He couldn’t leave your body. Couldn’t stop or finish anywhere else. 

He had to stay in. Had to finish inside you, or else it wouldn’t count. That was the shape of the madness now. The curse demanded its payment in gold and filthy glory. 

All he could do when his throat constricted and his spine bowed was stare at you, wrecked beyond reason, desperate — begging without words for understanding and permission you’d already given.

Your nails dug deep into his hips, pulling him deeper and dragging him home. 

“Pleasepleasepleasestay,” you whimpered, hot and humid against his cheek, your lashes suspended with tears. The sight of you like that, desperate with him, for him, unmade him. 

Nanami’s brow pulled tight with concentration, chasing the molten knot unraveling in his belly. It twisted and twisted tighter with every increasingly frantic thrust—

And then he came. He choked on his own tongue and sank his teeth into your shoulder to keep from sobbing your name; like it were some private, holy thing he didn’t deserve to taste. 

His arms crushed you to his chest and he rutted through each pulsing wave of his release, gasping helplessly against your spit-slick and heaving throat. You felt every hot rope of him spill, hips jerking with each contraction. 

He stayed buried until his whole body trembled with it and there was nothing left to give — and you followed him over. You tightened, sucking him and his spend deeper where it was meant to be, your functions hijacked to ensure optimal pollination. Your jaw hung loose and you panted, gasping and shuddering as you came in Nanami’s arms, every limb winding tight around him in a full-body embrace he was quick to return. 

Nanami’s voice broke apart in your throat — apologies, thanks, worship murmured and shaken into your skin between the flimsiest kisses to your cheeks and eyelids. You gentled him through it, fingers stroking through sweat-damp hair, whispering soft lines of praise and nothing-words down the length of his spine. 

You didn’t try to move. You wouldn’t have, even if you could. 

Pinned beneath him, sticky, raw and trembling, you felt a greater peace than you’d ever known. He was warm. He was alive. He was breathing steadier. 

Your fingers swept through his hair again, scratching gentle circles at the nape of his neck. You held him, because he let himself be held, too drained to resist your kindness. You would be selfish and clutch this moment jealously to your chest and hold it tight, because it may never come again. 

You were quiet when you finally whispered: “You okay?” 

He murmured in reply, the words muddled by the press of his lips against your throat. You think he nodded too. 

You could’ve stayed like that, snug and corseted to the table and still joined. 

Would’ve, if the shiver in his spine hadn’t given him away. It wasn’t pleasant, not the tremble of a final aftershock or an unwitting quiver from your soothing touch — it was a full-body quake that rolled through him like the thunder crashing outside, dragging a groan from the root of his chest. 

Nanami shifted and promptly froze. His breath caught and held, and you felt him bob and jerk between your thighs where his seed hadn’t even had the chance to cool. You shivered and felt that same warmth spread in your belly — roaring you straight back into reciprocity despite the overstimulated tremors that still quaked in your thighs. 

One time would not be enough. You pulled Nanami in to kiss you — content and resigned to your fate, happy to slake the thirst of the curse that compelled you both as many times as you needed to. 

You made it back to the path sometime before evening. 

Your palms were braced against the decorative iron fence that lined the water garden, slick with condensation and trembling under your grip with every sharp push of his hips. Nanami had you bent forward, forehead pressed to the crook of your elbow, trying to keep your voice even as you answered Ijichi’s twelfth panicked call.

No, you weren’t hurt.

Yes, the curse had been exorcised (mostly).

Yes, you were alive, and would likely remain that way until the roads cleared.

You could barely hear a word of his flustered assurances and apologies over the wet, relentless slap of Nanami’s hips against your ass and the low, rusty growls somewhat muffled between your shoulder blades. 

You thought maybe you told Ijichi to wait until morning… it would be safer for all three of you. You definitely remembered the moment Nanami nailed something so deep and perfect inside you that your vision went white around the edges and your half-formed sentences dissolved into a moan.

The phone hit the ground when you tried to cover your orgasmic cry with your hand. Neither of you reached for it again. 

You returned to the floor eventually, back to the bench you’d first ruined which barely still held upright. Nanami curled around you there for a while, forehead pressed to your nape, kissing your shoulders. 

Sometimes he shuddered and hoisted your thigh up over his hip and nudged the angry red head of his cock in again. Sometimes it was you who pulled him in, still greedy for the way he fit and begged for more. 

By the second hour he could kiss you without shaking. By the third, he asked “May I?” before entering you again. By the sixth, you were both soft with it, unguarded in the tender repetitions of how your bodies locked like freshly formed muscle memory. The gaps grew longer like the pauses between lightning and thunder, the storm — internal and external — grew distant. 

You’d slipped down onto the mossy bank beside the koi pond, Nanami half-draped over you and his brutally thick and red-scratched arm tucked protectively around your waist, his nose buried in your hair. He hadn’t moved in forty minutes. Neither had you. 

His heart beat slowed, no longer galloping in his chest. 

You traced lazy circles over the back of his hand, eyes half-closed. His other hand was still between your thighs, not moving, cupping your mound to keep what remained of him inside.

Eventually you would have to get up. You’d both rinse yourselves with a hose, pluck twigs and moss from your hair, collect what remained of your scattered clothing and your dignity; you’d find your phone and pray it still worked and call it a successful mission. 

But for now, you just let Nanami hold you and sleep. You didn’t rush morning, because with it would come reality, and you weren’t ready to return to it now that you’ve had this. 

There were far worse ways to die than in the mouth of something that worshiped you while it devoured. 

You finally felt like you’d lived.

The curse was declared Special Grade. Not Third, as the initial report had rather optimistically suggested. 

That was the conclusion both you and Nanami landed on — unanimously, unceremoniously, and with the unblinking eye contact that told Yaga not to press for elaboration. He didn’t. You were both unsettlingly united in your silence, offering only the vaguest consensus: it had incited erratic, potentially dangerous behavior in anyone it touched, and any future encounter with it should be treated with the same level of caution one might reserve for radioactive waste or a ticking bomb. 

And that it would be encountered again was the worst and most curious part. Because it refused to die. 

You’d both woken that morning to find the ground littered with soft pink bulbs scattered in the grass around your naked bodies like obscene confetti. It had propagated. Not vanished like a curse should — burned away by the exorcism and dissolved into ash — but spread. 

Spore-puffed and swaying gently in the breeze, those fuzzy seeds had taken root along the destruction wrought in yours and Nanami’s wake. Torn grass, split loam, splintered wood, the obscene clawed path your bodies had carved into the garden blossomed with pink witnesses while you slept. 

It was concerning enough to require a cleanup team which, naturally, turned out to be you and Nanami again; the only two people with any experience with the thing, as if that were a badge and not a fucking warning label. 

Nanami looked stone-carved through the whole meeting, posture rigid, jaw set. You still hadn’t even slept properly and it showed in the dark circles that bruised your eyes. Nanami only blinked back into motion when you offered, unequivocally, to go. 

Yaga nodded, satisfied. You’d return to work in a week. Enough time for your supposed ‘sprained ankle’ to heal. Nanami walked behind you out of the room, far enough to appear casual, but close enough to your back to subtly shield the tender limp that still hobbled your gait. 

“You got it worse than me,” you explained in the hall, already predicting and getting ahead of his dissatisfaction before he could voice it. “It makes sense. I’ll be careful.” 

Nanami grunted. Not disagreement, but far from enthusiastic. You slowed your stride just enough to let him fall beside you instead of behind. 

“I know you’re careful,” he said after a pause. And then after a longer one he continued, quieter. “I need you to come back.” 

You blinked and glanced aside with a smile. “That’s a little dramatic, isn’t it?” 

“It’s not,” he insisted. “Not after that.” 

The hall felt narrower somehow, or maybe you just walked closer together than before. Your shoulder brushed his, and neither of you shifted to make space. 

“I’m fine,” you said. “We’re fine. We’ve been through worse, and I have a whole week off first—“ 

“That’s not the point.” 

He stopped walking and gently touched your elbow, halting you beside him. His face was as stern as you’ve ever known it, but the concern was new. He was stern for you. You were a priority of his now. 

“I know,” you smiled, soft and sweet. “But I think you know why it should be me.” 

His tie was crooked. You reached out to fix it without thinking, fingers brushing the sliver of his throat and he didn’t flinch. 

“That doesn’t mean I have to like it,” he said quietly. 

“You’re right, you don’t have to like it,” you agreed. You dropped your hand and let your fingers graze his knuckles as you turned. 

“But I’ll call you,” you grinned. “Even if I just stub my toe.” 

“I’d prefer if you didn’t stub anything.” 

You snorted and kept walking ahead. “Then I’ll call when I’m done,” you said over your shoulder, “so you can pick me up yourself. Make sure I’m still in one piece.”

You heard him sigh and hearth-fire warmth fluttered in your belly at the sound. It was fond, you could tell the difference now. “Thank you,” he murmured when he caught up to you. “I’d appreciate that.” 

He was like that now — trying not to hover or smother, even when everything in him clearly ached to. You figured he wasn’t above begging for it either if you denied him. You could see it in the way his muscles melted when you let him walk you home, how he lingered by your door like he was debating whether it would still be inappropriate to ask to come inside. 

He still believed he had something to make up for, despite your insistence that he didn’t — none of it was his fault, he wasn’t himself. But you let him carry things for you so he wouldn’t combust with the instinct to provide, walk behind you on stairs, keep pace even when you were limping from the soreness between your thighs — no matter how pleasant you insisted you found it. 

You let him show his affection by fireproofing your life. You didn’t think it was penance really, it was just Kento finally letting himself have something he wanted. 

That thought was what warmed you now, even more than the midday sun hammering relentlessly through the greenhouse panels above and bleaching the once dark world in gold and glare. You could barely see — every exhale fogged your hazmat visor from the inside out with humid claustrophobic air. 

You knelt anyway, slow and aching, fingers clumsy in your inch-thick gloves as you reached into the grass, plucking another bulb loose. It made no protest as you dropped it into the biohazard bin tucked under your arm where it joined twenty seven others. 

You snapped the lid of the bin shut with a clean, hollow click. Twenty eight collected, and one cursed seed line severed. Satisfaction unspooled through your limbs, rivaling the unpleasant wet cling of your suit suctioned to every drenched inch of your skin like a second rubbery epidermis. 

You peeled it down to your waist as you walked and tied the sleeves around your hips. The first lungful of real air hit like cold water, miles better than what you’d been cycling through for hours. 

You’d combed every inch of the place as thoroughly as you could from top to bottom. You peered into every branch, nook, and under rocks, you crawled through shrubs and slogged through the pond, startling the fish inside.

It was done. Cleaned up, secured, and like nothing had even happened here.

Halfway down the main path, right where the pond reeds ended and parted into a low dip in the earth, you found the straggler. 

Nestled in a shallow rut in the mulch, half curled beneath a dead leaf, was one last seed pod, the pink fuzz catching the sun like a guilty blush. Small, soft, stupidly innocent looking. A liar. 

You plucked it gently like it might bruise and cradled it in your gloved palm. It didn’t pulse, didn’t glow or hum or do anything ominous. It just sat there, quiet and perfect and deceptively innocuous if not for the faintest crackle of cursed energy flickering in its core. 

Of course, you knew better. 

You’d spent the entire day retracing the path Nanami had taken you down while under the control of the seeds predecessor. The exact path in fact where he’d torn your pants and bent you over a lichen-covered bench. Where he’d fucked you against the side of a smooth gum tree that splintered under your palms. Where he’d dropped to his knees in the dirt and pulled you against his mouth and begged you to sit and almost wept when you did. 

Every scuff in the dirt and broken branch and shred of cloth you found in your hunt made you blush. 

It should’ve been a disaster. You were prepared to be mortified. Instead… You actually had fun. 

The messy, reckless, potentially career-ending — kind of fun. The mud under your nails, bruises gone yellow in the shape of his hands, and a soreness you hadn’t walked off for three full days — kind of fun.

Laughter was plentiful in between — giddy and incredulous and feral from the high of it all, and when it was over, both of you returned to your rattled senses, stunned, and he’d pulled you close and told you the truth and you’d done the same. The flower had stripped you both naked and away from the boundaries you’d both clung to like cliff edges, but you came out better for it. 

Someday it might grow into something monstrous, a supernatural biohazard just waiting to erupt and wreak havoc over whatever place it took root in.

But today, it was just a seed.

And you couldn’t resent the seed for making your life a little better.

You looked over your shoulder. The path behind you was empty, no Nanami, no higher-ups scanning you for signs of moral degradation. 

You peeled open the seal on your suit pocket and slipped the pod inside. 

You already had orchids, foxglove, ivy, a whole collection of unlikely survivors you’ve lovingly coaxed into life. 

One more wouldn’t hurt. 

Not if you were careful and kept it contained, and not if, someday, maybe you wanted to feel that way again. 

The forecast was probably beautiful again. 

You wouldn’t know for sure. You stopped checking. 

The curtains were already open anyways, not by you, letting summer pour into the room like honey from a warm spoon. Light slid across the hardwood, touched the rug and kissed the walls. Your hoodie had more holes now, sleeves frayed to thready fringe, but was still soft and comforting even after too many washes. Your slippers had made it too — barely, and one had a flap that liked to catch on rug corners. 

You misted your snake plant with one hand and stretched until you popped with the other. The ficus got its usual pat. The ivy, still greedy, still trying to colonize the bookshelf and currently strangling a decorative candle holder, got another threat. But you’re more bark than bite these days. 

The deja vu hit you halfway through rotating your pothos. 

Your eyes darted sideways to where your phone lay on the coffee table, face-down and silent. For a moment you expected it to vibrate that familiar circle across the woodgrain and jolt your heart like a defibrillator, forcing you to leap half-dressed into whatever fresh hell to which you’ve been 

summoned. 

But it didn’t, and you smiled. 

The world would keep spinning — or not — with or without your permission. And you’d decided quite firmly that neither outcome was your responsibility today. 

The front door clicked open behind you, keys jangling a second before quiet footsteps padded inside — their cadence as familiar as the thump of the leather shoes being toed off in the entryway. 

“I thought we were out of coffee,” Nanami said by way of hello. “We were. And they just restocked the one you like.” 

You didn’t turn, still misting but now with a wider smile. “You didn’t have to go all that way on my behalf.” 

“I was awake.” 

You heard the rustle of a bag, the clink of two cups and the familiar glide of his jacket being hung neatly on his hook. 

Nanami passed behind you and pressed a kiss against your cheek. It still sent a spark down your spine like it was new. 

“There’s dorayaki in the bag,” he said near your ear, enticing and flirtatious. “Don’t touch the one in foil. It’s mine.” 

“Noted—” 

“—and don’t lie about it this time—” 

“I make no promises.” 

He hummed and settled off to your left on the couch while you reached for the last pot. 

It was cleaner than the others, the terracotta was still vivid, its surface clean and unmarred by scuffs or mineral streaks. The leaves were shy things, curled at the tips like closed hands, still young enough to be cautious. 

But they were changing. When you touched them they shivered, unfurling just for you. The red had started softening already, bleeding out to 

a more agreeable pink at the edges. 

It took root faster than you expected. Stronger, too. You already had to re-pot it three times. It refused to be small. 

But it would not outgrow this pot. You’d make sure of it. 

Still, as you glanced up at Nanami, his legs crossed, glasses low on his nose, his attention half on the book in his hand and half on you, always, you smiled. 

It could still be plenty of fun. 

As long as you were careful.

[zstartrixxx]

What do you think marriage would be like with Jack’s characters? Cause I headcanon this..

Roy Goode ( fake marriage to get him out of jail / use as an alibi that turns real after a while )

Patrick Sumner ( arranged ) 

Oliver Mellors ( slow burn / like after the war husband dies and he’s the gamekeeper who takes care in more way - emotional, etc. )

Remmick ( reincarnation )

Lion Kaminski ( drunken mistake / like the vegas wedding trope after a fight with Stan )

MY GOD THESE ARE MAGNIFICENT HEADCANONS!

okay, here are mine (i took extra time to make these more detailed, hope you enjoy):

— Roy Goode:

You and Roy Goode bump into each other at a saloon party in Atascadero. After everything he's been through, all he wants is peace and quiet in his new life—but everything changes when he sees you dancing and laughing with your friends. At first he keeps to himself, shy and dazzled by how you smile and joke around, until he finally gathers the courage to approach:

"Hello, ma'am, nice weather we're havin', ain't it?" You stare at him with a big question mark on your face, then burst out laughing—and he laughs too, nervously. You pull him to dance, and from that night on, you're inseparable. Like, he'll insist on taking you home on his horse, learn "these gentlemanly things" from his older brother, and when he discovers you're an avid book lover, he becomes even more obsessed with you, striking up conversations about the latest books you've read.

He writes you letters in his tortured handwriting (poor guy), but you grow increasingly flustered by this man, until the first kiss happens—quick and simple at first, until you start dating and well... you're a virgin. You'd only marry "pure," but desire wins and you decide to just taste a little—I mean, with the wedding scheduled soon, what's the harm in a little preview?

Done and done: you ride that cowboy like there's no tomorrow. When you walk down the aisle, Roy in his all-black outfit, hat and a grin ear to ear, you're certain he's the love of your life.

The wedding itself is simple. Goode genuinely tries to be good to you at all times; if you have kids (biological or adopted), he'll strive to be everything he never had, and life with him will be uncomplicated.

— Oliver Mellors:

Oliver proposes to you the moment you separate from your then-husband. He won't be the "other man" in your life anymore, can't stand being sidelined, and so he's determined to have you by his side as soon as you're "free." Not out of possessiveness or fear of losing you—it's something deeper, almost complex, this need to truly have you, to desire you so intensely he'd celebrate your union immediately.

The relationship itself was slow: it started with discreet glances, then subtle touches, until the big embrace came, the desperate kiss, the guilt-ridden tears, the rushed sex full of whimpers and moans—until finally, the weight of conscience lifts and you both realize how much you want each other.

Marrying Mellors means being well cared for, well treated, very well served in every way. Kept warm on hot nights, cooled on freezing days; with him, you'll feel the freedom of love—that unique feeling where you can be you, screaming and jumping for joy naked or simply collapsing in his arms after bearing the weight of the world. Because he loves you, and sharing his name with you is his ultimate proof.

To truly become one. An incurable romantic.

— Lion Kaminski:

He wants to marry and start a family. He has no doubts—it's right there in his Kaminski Kleaner future plans collage—but Stan's constant interference, his acute possessiveness in dictating right and wrong, what Lion should or shouldn't do with his life, nearly derails it. Until he meets you. With you, Lion finds the courage to say enough, to draw the line and live his life. So one random day, with no glamour or special occasion, he wakes you up whispering: "Hey, let's go get married?" You're surprised at first, but you'll say yes to that madness, and soon you're exchanging vows pulled up on your phones before a judge—sometimes an Elvis impersonator, Lion in a windbreaker and running shorts, you in a bridal dress bought last-minute at a shop nearby.

Stan freaks out, obviously, but what can he do?

As a husband, Lion is... kinda timid? Like, he's always side-eyeing you, waiting for you to make the first move, watching you with starry eyes and an open mouth as you do the simplest things, always making sure you finish first during sex before just wanting to cuddle.

He exudes that kind of husband energy.

— Patrick Sumner:

This man is so traumatized by the whole marriage thing (thanks, childhood) that the first thing he does after you wed is ensure—absolutely ensure—you won't abandon him. To him, that would be the ultimate betrayal. So he takes this institution very seriously.

Serious, centered, pragmatic, and very clinical. Patrick systematizes your marriage like he's dissecting a corpse—because loving you sickens him with its intensity. He sometimes lies about his own state, bottles up feelings and trauma, all to keep you smiling. You don't deserve a madman for a husband.

So Patrick is the serious type of husband, the one who sits beside you smoking, listening to you talk while he writes in his journal, slowly unwinding.

— Remmick:

Here, we'll explore two scenarios:

REINCARNATION You die and revive countless times while he remains immortal—your soul never forgets his, so no matter how, where, or when you're reborn, you'll always find each other again. And maybe, just maybe, you'll discover why you can never stay together. Is it a curse? Some cruel joke by God (or whichever deity)? Or just the vampire's rotten luck to love and be loved, yet never truly have you?

Remmick may die like you, and each time he resurrects, he's cursed anew: vampirism, chronic illness, a world war, madness, some insurmountable obstacle... But he's always drawn to your soul, and when you casually cross paths, his eyes widen—he knows it's you.

The wedding is always poignant, laced with strange nostalgia (you've done this in other lives), and always bittersweet, because separation will come. But sooner or later, you'll meet again. And in every life, he'll say something like:

"I'll love you in this life as I did the last, and as I likely will in the next."

MARRIED TO A VAMPIRE As his wife—human or not (though I prefer imagining a human scenario here)—you'd share an intense marriage with Remmick. Imagine sharing memories and experiences telepathically, feeling what he feels, and how that could amplify every aspect of your life?

Remmick would cling to you, half-desperate, half-famished. Possessive, perhaps, but when he made you his eternal companion, he did it to ensure you'd truly become one.

(And yes, he'd always find a way to drool over you—if you catch my drift—and lick a drop of your blood as an aphrodisiac...)

[lemonadary]

choso never really paid much attention to the cheerleaders performing in the field during his games. this is the first time he's actually going to sit on the benches and watch them perform, and it's all because you, his girlfriend of three months, are a part of the cheering squad.

you didn't ask him to watch the performance for you, no. you actually wanted him to focus on getting well-rested and hydrated during the three minutes that your team would be performing in the field during his football game.

but choso wants to watch. he wants to watch you. and now that he's finally looking at the field and not at his phone, he's noticing all these new things. he should really pay more attention to these cheering performances.

first, how effortlessly pretty you are. your team sported a shirt and shorts version of the university's cheering uniform for the game (and also because of the summer heat). he knows they're tailored to fit, but by god, does he think you look absolutely amazing in it.

second, the way you move. choso remembers you filming tiktok dances in his room while he plays games, and you always thought he didn't pay attention. but he's always been stealing glances when you're focused. he knows you're a great dancer, but seeing you perform on the field, it's like you're on a whole other level from when you're doing silly tiktok dances.

and lastly, the way you charm the crowd. you're great at making facial expressions, and your energy just gets the crowd going. it's no wonder the cheering squad values you so much. even choso feels like he's fallen in love all over again.

after the game, choso waits for you in his car, ready to take you home. you come in, put your things in the backseat, and give him a kiss, praising him and his team for their win. choso has always been a bit nervy. he gets all nervous when you kiss him, or hold his hand, but right now, you can feel something's different with him.

"cho, baby? what's wrong? are you not feeling okay?" you ask, worried that he might have injured himself out on the field. but he doesn't answer. it's not when you're about to ask if he needs to go to the nurse that he cuts you off with a kiss. you're surprised.

he pulls away, looks at you, before he takes his seatbelt off and holds you by the shoulders to go in for a deeper kiss this time. your arms wrap around him, but you're still confused as to why he's suddenly acting like this.

almost as if he heard your thoughts, he pulls away again, breathlessly saying, "you looked gorgeous in that uniform, baby. it's driving me crazy."

so that's what this is about.

you smile, asking him if he really does think that, and he nods against your neck, trailing kisses all over. it's a good thing he's parked in a more shaded spot of the parking lot, or else someone would've caught you two already.

choso brings you to the backseat of his car, letting you straddle him. this isn't the first time you guys have done it, but this is your first look at choso being assertive. he's always been so respectful and sweet, but right now, it's like he hates your fucking guts.

he's got you on his lap, now with your back against his chest, legs held up by his hands as he thrusts up into you, and the feeling has you screaming. well, you would be if you weren't covering your mouth with your hand.

minutes later, he's got you in doggy. one of your hands reaches behind to hold his arm for support, and he lets you, because he's nowhere near done with you yet.

"did such a great job out there, baby. charmed the crowd and all," he says, slurring over his words from how good he feels. "but you're all for me, right?" he pinches at your chest, eliciting a bit more noise from you. you nod frantically, and choso pushes you down to rest your head on the seat as he leans closer to you.

"gotta hear you say it, pretty... you're all mine, right? this cutie's all f'me..." he kisses your neck, and it takes you babbling over and over that you're all his for him to finally let up.

when you two have come down from your highs, choso dresses you back up, driving you to his house so he can make sure you're feeling alright before he sends you back home. gone is that choso who gave you the best however many minutes you spent in that car, and back is the sweet and respectful choso. you'll have to wear that uniform again sometime.

[metallicames]

imagine like 2010s papa het coming home after a rough few years of touring to you, angry and frustrated cus lars wont get off his back- then you let him take his anger out on you (FREAKY DEAKY ROUGH STUFF 😛) ok ty babes im done being freeky xxx

A/n: in this specific era I think James was such a good and caring dad and on the other side a freaky beast in bed 🤪

Home

Warnings: dirty talking, rough sex, crampie, unprotected sex, oral sex (f/receiver), squirting.

Finally, James is home.

God, I still can’t believe it. After years of being away on tour, dropped calls, stolen moments in hotel rooms, he’s back. And not just for one night. He’s back for good.

I watch him as he eats, the warm light from the chandelier casting shadows across his face, tired, but still breathtakingly handsome.

Our kids are laughing, telling him everything he missed: little adventures, drawings, school plays, daily dramas, and he listens, as always, with eyes that sparkle, answering with that perfect smile that made me fall in love all those years ago. But I know him too well.

That smile is forced. His shoulders, even though he tries to relax them, are tense. He has that wrinkle between his brows that only appears when something is really bothering him.

“Are you okay?” I ask quietly, while we clear the table.

He looks at me for a moment. The kind of look that sends shivers down my spine, like he’s reading my soul and finding his reflection there.

“Yeah, it’s just… I couldn’t wait to come home, you know? Between the exhaustion and the usual drama with Lars… I’m at my limit” he murmurs, gripping the glass in his hand tightly.

A little later, he offers to put the kids to bed. He’s missed them terribly, and I know how much he loves to lull them to sleep with his voice until their last yawn. But before heading to their rooms, he gives me a look that knocks the wind out of me. One of those looks that makes me dizzy.

I felt it all through dinner: his eyes fixed on my lips, his fingers brushing against my wrist a little too slowly, that tension hanging in the air like a storm waiting to break.

After the usual bedtime ritual with the kids, he returns to me, his presence heavier than before.

The door closes behind him with a quiet click. And just like that, he’s changed. Gone is the loving, patient father reading under soft lamplight. What stands before me now is raw, undeniably male, every inch of him taut with restrained energy and anger.

He doesn’t speak. The silence between us hums. His eyes lock onto mine, dark with want, a hunger that’s been simmering beneath the surface for far too long. His chest rises with slow, deep breaths, as if holding back a storm.

I take a step toward him, but I don’t get far. He’s already there, closing the space in one swift motion. His hands find me, rough and certain, and then his mouth crashes into mine. The kiss isn’t gentle. It’s claiming. It’s desperate. It tastes like everything we’ve been holding back.

“You’re tense, James…” I murmur after a moment, my voice low and warm as my hand rests gently on his chest. “You need to let it out.”

His eyes darken, as if I’ve just unlatched the door to something wild that’s been caged for far too long. He says nothing, just grabs my arm and spins me around with a force that weakens my knees.

“Let it out, huh?” he growls against my ear, his breath hot and unsteady. “Maybe on you?”

My back meets the hard press of his arousal, and a shiver runs down my spine.

“Sure.. I’m at your disposal…..Daddy” I slowly pronounce the words, especially the last one. In an instant I’m bent over on the bed, ass in the air and face against the mattress, the robe I was wearing hiked up on my hips, my bare skin burning under his gaze. I feel his breathing getting heavier as he leans over me. His hands squeeze my hips with a power that makes me moan softly. Then, without any warning, his lips reach my pussy. There’s nothing gentle about his kiss, it’s ravenous, purposeful. Like he’s starving, like he needs to claim every inch of me with his tongue. My head sinks into the pillow as the moans escape me, helpless, raw.

“I’ve missed you like crazy…” he growls against my skin, his voice rough, almost breaking.

“You need to feel it. Just how fucking much I missed you.”

And god, I do. Every inch of me does.

His tongue is practically fucking me, it pushes so hard against my heat that I have to hold on to the mattress to keep the position stable. Instinct takes over, his hands clamp around my thighs, holding me in place, keeping me pinned to his mouth with no intention of giving me a break.

I feel his moans of pleasure against my wet folds as my eyes roll back in my head and my mouth opens slightly for air. “J-James.. James.. I’m coming.. god don’t stop” I barely manage to speak as James slides two thick fingers deep inside me, his other hand gripping my hip to hold me steady. His fingers start slow, deliberate, each movement teasing, exploring, then quicken, plunging harder and faster until he hits the spot that shatters me. Heat spreads through my body, building until I lose control. In no time I come with a moan muffled by the pillow. James brings his open palm down on my ass with a sharp, punishing slap that echoes through the room. The sting sears into my skin, and my legs buckle beneath me, giving out completely. I collapse onto the mattress, gasping for breath, thighs trembling and soaked, utterly undone.

The sight of my body trembling with pleasure drives James wild. I feel it in the raw urgency of his movements, the frantic way he strips, like he’s seconds from losing control. I feel him above me biting the delicate skin of my back then my shoulders, before sinking inside me with his big cock. His round and swollen tip penetrates deep into my still hyper sensitive pussy, pressing directly on the weak point.

The sensation takes my breath away, I watch him out of the corner of my eye as he presses his large, rough hands into the dimples of my lower back, pressing me against the mattress and moving my body as he pleases, intent on watching the point where our bodies join. I let him take total control, I feel him press me hard against his pubic bone, his thick length sliding deep inside me with every powerful thrust. My moans blend with his while wet, urgent sounds filling the air as our bodies slam together faster and harder, the slick heat between us growing hotter with every brutal collision. Every thrust, every movement shows me just how much James needed this—needed me— to finally let go, pouring into each motion everything he’d been holding back for months. He keeps me pinned against the mattress as he goes down with his chest against my back, his low and rough moans in my ear make me vibrate. “How much did you want my cock?? Tell me mh? How much did you miss being slammed like that?”

I can barely keep my eyes open because he’s fucking me so good it’s almost too much. But through the haze, I choke out loud moan leaves my mouth and in that moment I thank the soundproof walls. “Harder?? Little needy thing.. I’ll ruin this beautiful pussy of yours.. I’ll destroy you”. His hips shift finding the right angle so he can reach the perfect spot to make me come again. The thrusts become stronger and drier his arms wrap around me holding me still.

“God..I’m bout to come again… f-uckkkfuck” my pussy tightens around his thick girth soaking it completely as I reach another powerful orgasm. After just a few hard thrusts, James buries himself deep and comes inside me, spilling thick ropes of seed, filling me up completely. “Ohhhh fuckkkk.. that was a lot…” he says still dazed, panting in my ear.

He flips me over onto my back without giving me time to recover. “I need more…” he says breathlessly, wiping the sweat from his forehead with his forearm.

“I love watching your horny little pussy swallow my fat cock.. it drives me nuts”. As he says it, he grinds his freshly hardened shaft against my soaking folds, slick with both our juices. He moves slow, teasing me, his eyes locked onto mine while he stays kneeling between my legs. I bite my lips looking at his naked and tattooed body and his tense muscles while he pushes my legs against my chest holding them tight by the back of my thighs “I’ll keep you spread-eagled until tomorrow morning.. until you tell me to stop.." he growls while he sinks into me "..I’ll ruin ya".

He drives balls deep hitting me hard as his cock pounds against my cervix, stretching my soft walls with fierce intensity. I moan, breathless, losing myself in the relentless rhythm, going crazy feeling his balls slamming against my ass, and seeing his face lost in the pleasure of the moment. His powerful body drives me harder against the headboard, leaving me barely able to hold myself steady. I stretch my arms above my head, desperate to keep from banging them, every muscle straining under his force.

“Cum for me baby.. soak my cock” his words turn me on like crazy, and when with one hand he starts to stimulate my clit I know it’s the end. My vision blurs in the blink of an eye and I start to shake convulsively, “oh my- god James.. that- that’s too much.. fffuck”

I tremble and feel a hot jet of squirt expand on my lower abdomen, but James doesn’t stop, he continues to pound me and at the same time torturing my swollen clit biting his lower lip until he almost draws blood. “I’m cumming, babe… I’m cumming so hard… again” he groans in a low, desperate voice before spilling inside me once more with a guttural moan. I melt around him, utterly his and completely full.

He delivers a sharp slap to my clit, his eyes locking onto mine with a wicked smirk and a look of pure satisfaction. Then he pulls away from my flushed, trembling body and sinks down into the armchair beside the bed, legs spread wide, his chest glistening with sweat.

“Come here and suck it sweety” he commands, his voice low and husky.

I look at him with a look that is a mixture of amazement and defiance.

I lock eyes with him, a fierce mix of awe and defiance burning in my gaze.

“Fuck… you’re insane” I murmur, a slow smile spreading across my lips as I push myself up from the bed, my body still trembling with the aftershocks of pleasure. I kneel in front of him who gives me a little slap on my hot and red face, then his hand tangles into my hair, pulling it back into a messy ponytail just as my mouth closes over his swollen, slick tip. And just like that, it all begins, again.

[miewriteswoso]

A medal and a place in your heart

Lynn Wilms x reader

Summary: You lose one of the biggest matches of your life, but in the end you got something that a medal can’t replace.

Word count: 1.3K

A/N: its not super long but I liked writing it, hope you guys enjoy ps: the title makes sense in the end

This was the most stressful game you have ever played in your career. It was the European championship final. Netherlands against England. England was currently 0-1 down, and you as a striker were doing everything in your power to get that equalizer in.

You were in the penalty box with the ball at your feet, but just as you were going to shoot, somebody tackled you hard. You fell to the ground feeling a sharp pain in your knee. You knew that feeling all to well. You had ruptured your ACL a few years before when you were making your senior debut for the lionesses. There was no doubt in your mind. You just ruptured your ACL again

You got stretchered of the pitch with tears flowing down your face. You didn’t know who had tackled you in the penalty box, at least not yet.

About 15 minutes later you heard a knock at the door of the medical room. You thought your teammates were there to visit you, but at the door stood the Dutch international, Lynn Wilms with a gold medal around her neck.

“Hi, I don’t know if I am really the person you want to see right now but I just wanted to say I was sorry” she said. “ I shouldn’t have tackled so hard but at that moment the only thing on my mind was the win. That was selfish of me and now you have to suffer because of it. I’m sorry”

You looked her in the eyes and saw that she really meant her apology. “look Lynn, these things happen. If I was you I would’ve also gone all out to save my team from conceding. Its not selfish, it’s choosing your team over the opposition.”

“I just feel bad because it’s not a minor injury. You will be out for at least nine months.” Lynn replied.

“it’s okay. I’ve done it all before if that makes you feel any better.” You laugh. “It really doesn’t. It might just make me feel worse” Lynn said as she smiled at you. “look Lynn, you just won a European championship. I think you should go celebrate with your team instead of standing in the medical room with the opponent sulking.” You said. “okay fine, but I won’t leave until I have your number. I have to make it up to you.” She looked at you with hopeful eyes. You smiled and happily gave her your number.

When she left, you couldn’t stop thinking about seeing her again. The ACL injury you had just suffered because of her seemed to fade to the background for a bit.

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

It had been 3 months since you ruptured your ACL. You had gotten surgery the week after the final. Right now you were kind of immobile, you couldn’t really do things for yourself because you had to walk on crutches. Good thing that most of your teammates were there to help you. And not only your teammates. Lynn was there too.

Lynn had kept her promise and had taken you out for some coffee the week after your surgery. She wasn’t normally in England, but you were lucky. Lynn’s contract at Wolfsburg had just ended and she decided not to renew, instead she opted to move to Manchester City, your home.

Since she was in Manchester a lot, she came to help you out. She would come to your apartment and help you with things you couldn’t do for yourself. Often she would also just come over to hang out with you. You guys would sit on the couch for hours talking about everything and nothing. Sometimes she would just come over to play videogames on your Xbox.

Slowly but surely, you began to fall for Lynn. You didn’t know what to do because spending time with her while you were utterly in love with her was torture. So you went to get advice from your best friend, Lauren hemp. “If you are really in love with her, you should just go for it.” Lauren says over the phone. “yeah, but what if she doesn’t like me back. I don’t want to loose our friendship” you replied. “ oh come on, Y/N. I’ve seen the way she looks at you, there is no way she doesn’t feel the same way. Just shoot your shot” She says. “okay fine I’ll confess” you say as you hang up the phone.

Later that night, Lynn is sitting on your couch playing videogames. “Lynn” you say. “Yes, is something wrong, do you need something?” she asks as she looks at you with concern in her eyes. “ No, I don’t need anything. I just want to talk to you” you say. Lynn looks even more concerned now. “yeah, okay” she says as she pauses the game and takes her headphones of. “I have been thinking a lot lately, more so about us” you say “you are really scaring me right now” Lynn says. You take her hands in your own. “no Lynn, its nothing bad. I didn’t know what to do so I went to Lauren for advice. She said I should just go for it so here I go I guess.”

“ Lately I’ve been feeling like I want to be more than friends. It’s totally okay if you don’t feel the same way, but spending time with you has become harder because of this and I just want to get it out of my system before I start hurting you. I-” before you could say anything else, Lynn takes your face in her hands. “of course I feely the same way dummy” she connects her lips with yours. Her hands grip your waist as your hands link together behind her neck. After a few minutes you two break apart.

“I’ve been wanting to do that for so long” Lynn says as she kisses you again

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

It had been a few months since your first kiss. Lynn had taken you on plenty of dates before officially asking you to be her girlfriend. She had also permanently moved in with you.

Nobody knew about your relationship, so when Lynn got asked why she moved she said it was to help you. Nobody questioned her since for all they know you two were good friends so it wasn’t weird. The only person, well not really a person, that knew about your relationship was biscuit, the dog that you and Lynn got when she moved in so you would be less lonely when she was away.

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

The day had finally come. 9 months after suffering from a ruptured ACL, you were back and better than ever

Today was the day that you would come back on the pitch for Man City, and it wasn’t just a normal game, If you win this game, Man City would be WSL champions.

You came on in the 89th minute, the score was 2-2 so if you could score before the final whistle Man city would be WSL champions.

The time on the scoreboard said 90+4, there were 6 minutes of extra time so you had 2 more minutes to score. Mary had the ball, you saw her and sprinted towards the penalty box. She passed to you, you went right through Chelsea’s defense. You shot the ball  into the back of the net. It felt like a slow motion but once it was in the crowd went wild. Lynn sprinted over to you, she took your face in her hands and kissed you hard.

All your teammates and the fans went wild, but in that moment only you and Lynn mattered. You might not have won that euro final 9 months ago, but now you’ve got Lynn and a WSL championship to make up for it.

[sweetdreamslie]

In the quiet hours

Pairings: Jungkook x Fem!Reader

Summary: “You weren’t answering so I wanted to make sure you were ok.” He hums at that, pulling you closer into his side. He reaches towards the table and opens the lunchbox, eyes scanning the food and drinks you had packed.

Warnings: none

Word count: 772

A/n: requests are open :) - 🪐 Guys! If you’re reading this, take it as your reminder to eat something today, even if it's small! <3 - 🫧

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It had been hours since you last heard from Jungkook. You knew he was working hard at the studio for his upcoming album, Golden, but he was usually good at responding to you. After looking at the clock and seeing that it was 3 a.m. and Jungkook still had yet to come home or even respond, you packed some drinks and snacks for him and went to the studio to check on him.

As you pulled into the studio parking lot, you saw a few cars, assuming they were overnight security and other idols working hard, including your boyfriend's car. As you park next to his car, you get out, grab the lunchbox you packed, and head inside. A while ago, after you and Jungkook made it official, he was able to get you a badge so you could just walk in without any hassle. You found his little studio as you went through the security and the building. It was dimly lit, and you could see his computer on, but no one was sitting at the desk. You knocked on the door, but no answer, which led you to just open the door and see Jungkook lying on the couch with his arm over his eyes.

You go over to him and gently shake him awake, calling his name. He moves his arm from his eyes and opens his eyes slowly to see you with the lunchbox.

“What are you doing here?” He sits up, yawning slightly as he does. You set the lunchbox down on the table and sit next to him. He turns to look at you, eyes soft and filled with nothing but adoration and love. You smile and softly peck his lips before pulling away.

“You weren’t answering so I wanted to make sure you were ok.” He hums at that, pulling you closer into his side. He reaches towards the table and opens the lunchbox, eyes scanning the food and drinks you had packed.

“All this for me?” You nod slowly, eyes moving from him to the food. He first opens the banana milk, drinks half of it in one sip, passes it to you, and offers you the rest. You decline telling him that he has worked hard and needs all the energy he can get. He rolls his eyes and insists that you take the rest since it took energy to pack the box and come all the way over here. You take it and drink the rest after losing a game of rock, paper, scissors.

Jungkook seems pleased as he leans forward and grabs something to eat. He undoes the packaging and suddenly stands, walking over to his computer. You also stand, slowly making your way over to him and the computer.

“Wanna hear some of it?” He glances at you, to which you nod. He smiles, eyes moving back to the computer in front of both of you. Jungkook reaches his hand out, clicking a couple of buttons before one of the songs starts to play.

“I haven’t decided an exact title yet, but I’m leaning towards Hate You.” You listen carefully, humming along when you start to get a feel of the melody. Your eyes move from the computer to Jungkook, who’s already looking at you.

He pauses the music, his eyes quickly darting to the screen before they’re back on you. You lean towards him and softly kiss him. He eagerly accepts, his hands moving to your waist so he can pull you closer. After a couple of minutes, you pull away with a soft smile.

“It was amazing baby.” His eyes light up at the praise, and it’s not long before he’s kissing you again. One of his hands moves to your lower back, where his thumb rubs soft circles into the skin.

“Thank you, honey. I’m almost done. I just have to finalize some parts, and then we can go home. Why don't you go lie down on the couch until then?” You go to object, wanting to stay awake while he works, but the longer you think on it, the more the idea doesn’t sound half bad. You walk over to the couch and lie down, cuddling into yourself slightly before closing your eyes.

You feel a gentle rub on your arm; it's Jungkook waking you up. As you sit up, he sits next to you and kisses you. He then stands up and puts his hand out for you to grab. You grab his hand and the lunchbox that is now empty as you both walk out of the studio into the early quiet hours.

[bullseyelover]

random dex character analysis lol.

i’ve been thinking a lot about dex wearing the balaclava again in season 2 of born again and how strange that choice feels, especially considering everything he’s been through since season 3. in season 1, it makes sense. he was fresh out of the psych ward, still under vanessa’s control, and he believed the job was a one time thing. kill foggy and benjamin, and vanish. it was supposed to be clean, precise. so of course he wore the mask to protect his identity. he even threw a smoke bomb before entering josie’s not just to cause chaos, but probably to avoid being seen. it was meant to be surgical. like a professional hit.

but that’s not what happened. he doesn’t act like a methodical hitman in that scene, we know he is capable of being one but in this scene he’s not controlled. he’s unraveling. phil silvera (the stunt director for daredevil) said it himself that dex isn’t killing for the thrill, he’s killing anything he sees as a threat. at first, it’s just people with weapons. but he’s so on edge, so paranoid, that it spirals. soon, he’s killing people who haven’t even seen him. he’s trapped in this kill or be killed mindset, and the second someone flinches, he reacts. and when he finally snaps out of it just for a second he whispers, “what have you done?” like he blacked out. like he doesn’t even remember doing it. like he’s scared of what just happened because what was supposed to be a clean job had spiraled out of his control. but it doesn’t stop there. he keeps going because his body’s in survival mode. he doesn’t know what else to do.

then in season 2 he’s still wearing the balaclava. and yeah, visually i get it. the suit is striking. but narratively it doesn’t hold up. dex isn’t hiding anymore. everyone knows who he is. fisk knows, matt knows, the public knows. after the trial, his face and name are already tied to everything that happened at josie’s. his escape from prison was probably posted in the papers. there’s no anonymity left to protect. and honestly dex would want fisk to know it’s him. he want fisk to see his face while he tears his empire down. wearing the mask just feels off unless they’re gonna give us an in universe reason why. it can make sense considering the whole storyline with fisk hating vigilantes and people in masks and blah blah but he’d have to recreate that whole suit from scratch too. the old one would’ve been ripped up and in evidence custody.

it would actually be way scarier if dex didn’t wear a mask until he finally puts on the iconic bullseye mask from the comics. because when someone wears a mask to commit a crime, the implication is that they plan on people surviving. they’re hiding their identity for a reason. but someone like dex walking into a room with a knife and no mask, that’s terrifying. that means he doesn’t plan on leaving any witnesses. that means he doesn’t care if he’s recognized. that’s way more unhinged than anything else.

with dex wearing the balaclava you have to factor in his sensory issues. dex never wore a tie in season 3. his collars were always open, even in formal settings. to me, that’s a clear sign of sensory discomfort. and it tracks with him being neurodivergent, which we already know he is. the only time he ever wore tight clothing was the daredevil suit, and even that looked like it was pushing his limits. so wearing something like a balaclava which would be tight, hot, suffocating, that has to be overstimulating as hell. but maybe that’s the point. maybe it’s a way for him to punish himself. or maybe it helps him focus. it could be a kind of sensory grounding or even a trigger that helps him disassociate. like flipping a switch. putting on the mask could help him shut everything else out. turn into the version of himself that can kill then have a milkshake afterwards and not care about potential goodness, just revenge.

it makes sense when you realize he was going through withdrawal at josie’s. we saw the meds. that man was on at least eight pills, probably multiple times a day. a combo of SSRIs, benzos, antipsychotics, and mood stabilizers. not for healing, but for sedation. the system didn’t want to help him, they wanted to contain him. dull everything that made him him, but also what made him dangerous. and it worked. dex in episode 9 was barely responsive. sweaty, unfocused, dissociating out the window. couldn’t even hold a pen. he was being erased. and if vanessa hadn’t pulled him out, he would’ve stayed like that forever. but she didn’t save him, she just reactivated his pain.

dex going off all those meds cold turkey after nearly a decade would’ve been catastrophic both physically and mentally. we’re talking full system collapse. the benzos and antipsychotics alone would cause tremors, nausea, cold sweats, muscle cramps, disorientation, rebound paranoia, and emotional whiplash. his sleep would be wrecked, his coordination off. he’d probably be shaking, dizzy, hyper sensitive to noise and light. on top of that, he’s got to have chronic spinal pain from season 3, which the meds were likely numbing too so now it’s back in full force. and emotionally everything he’d been suppressing for eight years, the grief, the guilt, the rage, is coming back raw and unchecked. no regulation. no buffers. just pure nervous system overload. so when he walks into josie’s, he’s not walking in as a hired assassin. he’s walking in as someone with no brakes left. no filter between thought and action. it’s not all premeditated. it’s survival instinct. he’s scared. overstimulated. furious. and the second things go sideways, his brain goes straight to destroy the threat. and that’s what makes it so terrifying. he’s not in control. he’s reacting to a body and mind that’s been chemically shattered.

that’s what makes josie’s hit so messy. if he were in control, he could’ve just sniped foggy and vanished. clean and efficient. but that’s not what he does. he throws the smoke bomb, walks into the chaos, and kills two people immediately. he clearly dressed for a fight with his suit, knives, gloves but that doesn’t mean it was planned. he probably had less than two days between getting released and carrying out the hit. he had no time to recover. he was still in withdrawal. his brain chemistry was shot. physically, mentally, emotionally he’s fried. he’s walking into that scene running purely on instinct. just go, go, go. self preservation mode. there’s no grand plan.

but he has resentment, he says “hello, karen” like someone who hasn’t forgotten what she did. but that doesn’t mean he came there to go on a rampage. that part wasn’t intentional. it was triggered. and once it started, it couldn’t stop. and all of it. the withdrawal, the sensory overload, the fear, the rage gets projected into that suit. into that mask. into the version of himself who can’t feel anything but violence.

but he’s not bullseye yet. but he’s getting there. and maybe the scariest part is even he doesn’t know if he wants to stop. in season 2, dex wearing the same suit again but this time with a bullseye on the mask feels different. it’s not about hiding anymore. it’s not about the fisk’s orders. it’s about ownership. he’s not wearing the mask because he’s being used, he’s choosing it. and adding the bullseye symbol to the suit is his way of reclaiming everything that broke him. he wore the suit for vanessa at josie’s, but now he’s turning it into his own. whether that’s empowering or self destructive, it’s both. because for dex, violence and identity have always been intertwined. so putting a bullseye on his forehead is like saying fine this is what he is now. the fisks made him into this, so he’s gonna own it. even if it destroys him into becoming fully bullseye because maybe part of him thinks it’s the only identity that ever really fit even though deep down, he still doesn’t know who he is without someone else pulling the strings.

it’s important to remember that none of dex’s trauma, withdrawal, sensory issues, overmedication, or manipulation excuses what he’s done. not in season three, not at josie’s, not ever. he was always dangerous. even before fisk, dex was not an innocent man destroyed by a villain. he was already suffering and already volatile. he was already doing things that crossed lines. but he was trying. he had structure, he had control. he was holding himself together the only way he knew how. at the start of season three he could be considered an antihero. not someone good, but someone trying to be, in his own way. and that’s what makes his downfall so brutal. because fisk didn’t create the monster, he used what was already there. he took dex’s mental illness, his loneliness, his desperation for meaning and connection, and he weaponized it. he groomed him. exploited his pain. and then when dex outlived his usefulness, he threw him away.

but dex was always in control of his actions. he made the choices, even though he was manipulated into them and now he’s living with the consequences of them. understanding his story isn’t about excusing what he did it’s about seeing the full truth of who he is. after the events of season three, the court didn’t send him to prison. they sent him to a psychiatric facility. that tells you everything. they saw someone beyond punishment, someone they didn’t even think could be rehabilitated. not a man who needed help, but one who needed to be contained. to be silenced. sedated. erased.

and that’s what makes his return in born again so compelling and so tragic. because he’s not quiet anymore. season two could show us a man who’s clawing his way back to himself. not fully bullseye yet, not fully lost either. he wants revenge and autonomy. and if there’s a “good” way to get it, maybe he’ll take it. but if there’s not, he’ll burn every bridge without hesitation. dex should become a supervillain, that is what the character of bullseye needs to be. wilson bethel said dex’s arc is about redemption but not in the way you expect. and maybe that’s because real redemption for dex isn’t about being a hero, it’s about being honest. it’s about accepting who he is which is someone the system failed, someone who tried to be good, someone who was broken and used and manipulated but who still gets up. who still fights. but not to be a hero, but to be truly and unashamed in who he is.

[harrysangel23]

Floaty

A/N: Hi guys! I've returned with a new fic that I hope y'all enjoy. I apologize for the long wait for a new fic, unfortunately life has not been kind but I finally got around to this (yay!) Anyway, hope you guys enjoy! (this has not been proofread yet either, wanted to get something out asap)

Pairing: Mean dom H x sub reader

Warnings: fingering (F recieving), spanking, use of safe word, degrading, mean H (don't worry he redeems himself), p in v, and I think thats all?

WC: 3,058

Summary: After feeling floaty all day and having enough, Angel decides to touch herself while Harry is at work... but her actions have consequences.

18+

Angel felt floaty all day. 

It wasn’t necessarily a bad thing, she had it mostly under control…

But it was hard when Harry was at work all day, leaving her with hardly any attention before he left. Just a soft kiss on the lips before he exited the bedroom, where she laid on their bed, still dazed from the previous night. He’d probably be too tired by the time he got home to attend to her anyway.

She tried focusing on other things as an attempt to keep her mind at ease, but it was hard okay?

Especially when her thoughts would continuously drift back to last night. His cock ruthlessly pounding into her, soft grunts pouring from his mouth, and his hands harshly gripping her hips to stabilize her. 

He really fucked her good. Too good. 

She was distracted all day, even only minutes ago she had burned her hand. Her mind was on dirty thoughts crowded her mind, when she snapped out of it, she brought her hand up to rub over her eyes, in an attempt to shake the memories. However, when she thinks of the fact that her hand is on her face, soon her mind is on how his hand tightly gripped her face, forcing her mouth open as he spat on her tongue and made her swallow it. In frustration at herself, (how hard was it to not think filthy thoughts for at least 5 minutes?!) she slapped her hand down on the countertop. But instead of it being their kitchen countertop, it was the stove top, that she had turned on as she was on her way to grab a pan to make a nice dinner for Harry. Now that was blown to shit. 

She let out a string of curses -which she never does- and immediately rips her hand away and turns toward the direction of the sink. Quickly she turns the knob for the cold water to run and places her hand under it while she feels bad for herself. 

She couldn’t even have enough self control of her thoughts, how floaty her mind is, and she winds up burning her hand. She turns the water off, and makes her way towards their bathroom off of their bedroom. She searches through their cabinet, finding the ointment they had, quickly applying it and applying a wrap to keep it covered. 

She whimpered, still feeling sorry for herself, as she made her way towards the bed to lay down. With her back on the mattress, she glared at the ceiling as her hands rest at her side. Despite only wallowing for a couple minutes -she had an epiphany. 

She could just touch herself.

There was nothing wrong with it. She was, simply put, horny. Hence explaining her unusual floatiness. In her mind, she if she made herself cum, and surely it’d go away. 

However, if Harry found out, he would not be happy. Obviously, if she called and asked, explained how she was feeling, of course he’d understand. He’d let her touch himself, if he was feeling really generous, he might’ve driven home and help take care of her. 

But that was just her being selfish, she wouldn’t want to disturb him while hes working, he’d probably be annoyed with that too! Plus, with how worked up she was, she figured she’d be done and satisfied by the time he got home.

Unfortunately for her, she was way wrong on that one. Thats what she figured anyway as Harry stood in the doorway, arms crossed with an scowl on his face and he watched her peel her fingers from her pussy as she avioded eye contact with him. 

“And just what do you think you’re doing puppy?” He still sharply glared at her. She sat up, grabbing the duvet to cover herself as her head hung in embarrassment. “I asked you a question and I expect you to answer me.” 

She tried to speak, she really did! But it was hard, she was so embarrassed and it seemed no matter the situation she thought of, she’s still be in trouble, no matter what she told him. Her floaty head cloouding her mind, even worse now that she wasn’t able to finish. She had just been on the brink of her orgasm as Harry cleared his throat from their doorway. 

She could hear his sigh as he moved towards the bed, she slightly turned her head to try and look at him and she noticed him unbuttoning his shirt. His glorious tattoos becoming more visible as he stripped from it. More of them becoming visible, especially the yummy tiger on his thighs as his belt and pants joined the floor. 

“Get up,” His voice was sharp, leaving no room for argument, so she followed his orders as he sat on the side of the bed, peeling his boxers off, allowing his cock to be on full display. He sat on the side of the bed and she knew without him telling her where she was expected to go. She got on her knees between his legs and sat before leaning forward to mouth at the member. She was excited, although he seemed mad, this was going to help with how worked up she was… until he spoke up. “Nuh uh puppy, no touching, no mouthing.”

“But-” She looked up at him with pleading eyes. 

“Mm, now she can speak?” She opened her mouth to respond but no words came out. “Since my naughty puppy wants to disobey me and play with herself, I’ll play with myself, and she can watch the whole thing,” Her eyes felt watery as she watch him reach his hand reach down in front of her mouth. “Spit.” 

She shamefully did as she was told and watched as his hand began to stroke up and down on his cock. His muscles flexed as he began grunting at how good it felt, especially when he looked at her and noticed her fixated at his hand stroking his dick, her eyes watery. He felt himself getting more worked up by the second, he was hard enough walking in and seeing her plunge her fingers relentlessly working into her cunt, her juices clinging to her fingers. His pants growing heavy as she watched his precum leak from his tip, and finally his own cum spurting onto his stomach. 

“Wanna lick me up puppy hm?” She eagerly nodded before she started to lean forward once again to lick up all his salty release before he tutted at her. “Sorry pet, I just don’t know if you deserve it, do you?” Her tears leaked as she kept nodding. “Mmm, I don’t think you do, get up on the bed, hands and knees.” 

She sat there for a moment in disbelief. He was being so mean, her tears still falling and her mind getting floatier with each moment he wasn’t taking care of her. 

“You not hearing me today pet? I said up, now.” he tapped her cheek before he raised from the bed to grab a tissue and clean himself up. She figured she was in no position to disobey him (again), and climbed on the bed. She got where he wanted her, resting her head on the pillow and sliding her hands under it as well, she didn’t want him to see her injury and be displeased with how careless she had been. 

Soon enough, she felt him climb on the bed behind her, pushing her legs farther apart so he could see her puffy pussy fully. With watching him get himself off, constant dirty thoughts all day, and almost making herself cum, she was messy. Without warning, his own fingers plunged into her cunt. She yelped in surprise as he kept working into her. His fingers hitting the right spot after needing him, it felt blissful. She easily began moaning, and clenching around his fingers, her own orgasm coming quick. 

“I’m gonna cum, daddy.” She felt so happy, finally after needing this all day, he finally wasn’t going to be cruel and she was going to end satisfied. 

That was until his fingers were pulled from her right as she was at the very brink of cumming. 

“Now that’s too bad, isn’t it pup?” She felt her tears leak and soak into the pillow below her as she whimpered. 

“Please?” She whimpered out softly. 

He laid a hard smack on her ass, then another one, and another one. 

“I decide what my naughtly little puppy gets. You disobeyed me, and then you disobeyed me again. You don’t touch yourself without permission, and you certainly need to speak when I’m talking to you. I gotta teach you a lesson, otherwise how will I train my pet, hm?” 

“I’m sorry daddy.” She cried out to him, her own self-pitying returned. 

“Too late for that angel, you need to learn your lesson.” He growled at her as he laid yet another slap to her ass before he thrusted roughly into her. 

She gasped at the abrupt intrusion. Her whole body thrusted forward, similar to last night. She was so worked up and needed this more than anything. His hands gribbed her hips, thrusting her to meet his movements. She felt the familiar feeling in her tummy creep up and she whined once again. Sure, she loved feeling her all over her, his hands and his cock, but the feeling of coming undone from them was like no other. 

He must’ve felt her constantly clenching around him, he pulled out again before slapping her in the ass once again. 

She wept as she her orgasm was ripped away from her for the third time. She felt hopeless and her floaty mind was not doing anything to help her. She needed him so bad, why couldn’t he see that? 

“So close, aren’t you angel?” His condescending tone was hurting her feelings. She was in a soft spot, her whole day she just wanted him, she didn’t mean to go against him, she really just needed him that badly. 

Maybe he read her mind, she wasn’t sure but she did know how good it felt when his cock was plunging into her once again. His constant thrusts, satisfying her and she moaned into the pillow. She whimpered from her own neediness of him. He felt so good, his own grunts making her wetter. 

Her orgasm was reaching her again, she couldn’t believe how quick it approach, she’d feel embarrassed if it hadn’t felt so good. She loved every bit of him, especially how he could make her cum and make it an out-of-this-world experience. He’d always make her see stars. She loved how he also took care of her, despite him being mean he was so loving. 

He was being so cruel, constantly pulling her from an orgasm when all she wanted was him, all of him. She whimpered at the thought of him taking another orgasm from her again.

 So, to help her case, she reached her non-injured hand from the pillow to hold his hand. She just wanted to feel closer to him. Sure his cock plunging into her was as close as it gets, but the intimacy of holding his hand was something she needed right now. She needed a softer part of him- Yes, he was being mean and it turned her on, but he was reaching a breaking point for her. She missed him, and he left her alone when she was not in the right state. Not that he knew that! She didn’t get a chance to tell him, he held her close to him all night, got up before she did, and left before she had even gotten out of bed, how could he of known? He had even done what he normally does to make she sure isn’t feeling floaty like this. But, did that really mean he should be this cruel to her? 

While he was busy pounding into her, watching the way her ass jiggled with each movement, he hadn’t noticed her hand reaching back. However, he did notice when her fingers had lightly grazed his fingers. He immediately snached her wrist before holding it behind her. 

“No touching,” He squeezed her wrist to emphasize him point before releasing her hand. 

She whimpered, it was beginning to be too much. 

“C-can I please hold your hand daddy?” She let out softly. 

“What is it with you huh? Why can’t you listen, I said no touching.” His voice completely stern. 

She was pushed past her limits. She was sad to say the least. She just wanted to hold his hand, she understood he was upset she disobeyed him but he was being too mean. She just wanted him to coddle her, make her feel safe and warm, and of course have the blissful feeling of cuming. Or the very least if she couldn’t hold his hand, to be able to look at him. It wasn’t possible with her face being pushed into the pillow. But it was too much for her now, not being able to have any of that.

“Yellow. Yellow daddy.” Tears leaked down her face, she didn’t want him to stop fucking her, she wanted to cum and she could finally be at ease. But, he was being too mean and with all this thoughts swarming her and how he’s acting, she wasn’t sure it would ever happen. 

His thrusts immediately stopped, his grip on her lessoned as he heard her loud and clear at the word they use as a signal to slow down. He flipped her around and thats when he noticed her teary spaced out eyes. They were red from how much she had been crying. His heart clenched and he felt absolutely gutted. His hand reached to hold to her face, thumb swiping away her tears that kept falling. 

“M’so sorry sweetheart, was I hurting you? Whats going on?” His held his breath, expecting the worse. He hoped to god he hadn’t hurt her, he wasn’t as rough as he normally is, sure he was mean, but that was normally how they played. Then again, he wasn’t sure what was going on as she kept trying to talk while sobbing. “I know you’re upset right now angel, but I need y’to talk to me so I know how to fix it, okay?” He looked at her with such fondness so she knew he wasn’t mad at her anymore. 

“I just- It’s been too much,” She kept sucking in deep breaths as she tried to calm herself a little more and he waited patiently, still softly rubbing her cheek. “I have been feeling a little floaty today, It just got so bad I ended up burning my hand. A-and then I tried playing with myself to make my thoughts go away. I would’ve called you, I just d-didn’t want to annoy you at work. And I thought I could get it over quick and then I haven’t been able to cum. A-and I just needed to hold your hand when it got to much, I’m s-sorry I just am being needier than normal.” She took another deep breath, awaiting his response. 

“Sweetheart, you tell me these things as soon as you feel like this okay?” He lightly scolded her but he needed to make sure it wouldn’t happen again. “You call me when you feel floaty so we don’t end up like this alright? I hate to see you so sad angel, if I had known, I would never of punished you like this. And what's this about you hurting your hand?” She sniffled before showing him the lightly bandaged hand he failed to notice. He softly grabbed her hand before placing a light kiss to the center of the bandage. “My poor baby, M’so sorry honey. You need me to take care of you now? Promise I won’t be mean anymore.” 

“Yes please.” She let out softly before he moved her to lay fully on her back, spreading her legs. His cock in hand before sliding it up and down her slit. 

“You tell me if it’s too much puppy. J’wanna make you feel good.” As soon as she uttered a soft ‘okay’ he cock was plunged into her once again. 

His thrusts worked continuously, loving how she felt so tight around him. She loved how he continuously kept hitting her sweet spot. With his hand on her hip, he moved it to intertwine their fingers, holding her hand sweetly as he squeezed it reassuringly. 

Her moans where making it easy for him to get more worked up. He pounded into her leaking cunt as he leaned down to finally kiss his angel. She let out a breath of relief of how good it kept to have his cock wrapped around her, his lips on hers, and his hand tightly clenched into his. Their mouths moved eagerly together, tongues tracing the others as they become more and more close together. 

“Can I please cum daddy? It feels so good.” She panted aginst his lips. With chaste kiss left to her lips he responded. 

“Of course baby, cum f’me angel.” Their lips moved pastionately against each other, it was messy as their spit mixed together. He felt her clenching around him before she finally came with a loud moan. 

It only took him a couple more thrusts before he reached his own peak, coating her walls. Their kiss becoming more messy as he harshly panted from his peak. 

All too soon for her liking, he pulled out and collapsed beside her. He pulled her to lay on his chest as he kissed her temple, rubbing her back in soothing motions. 

“M’sorry I was so mean to you sweetheart, promise if I had known, I never would have been so cruel to my angel.”

“It’s okay Harry, I know you wouldn’t of, I don’t blame you, you didn’t know honey.” She placed a reassuring kiss on his chest before closing her eyes and attempting to control her breathing. 

“How ‘bout we lay here for a bit, and later I’ll clean ya up and we can order some food, hm?”

“Sounds good to me H, thank you.” He squeezed her tightly before closing his own eyes. 

“Of course baby, anything for you.”  Harry responded.