#but my friend said they were good wallpaper material

[skitskatdacat63]

I wish I could post some of my photography from today, but it's a bit too specific so I don't wanna dox myself shkfkgkg but ahhhh man I love taking pics whenever I go to the city 🥰

[ynsvnte]

My good looking boy ! — Lee Heeseung

pairing: bf!hee x fem!reader — genre: fluff, est. relationship, college au, Drabble — Synopsis: ice cream date with your long-time boyfriend Heeseung. Leads to daydreaming on how the story begun. — Featuring: Jay, Jake, and Sunghoon

word count: 1k (1010)

warnings: pecks, light swearing, pet names

@bywons’s event!

Masterlist

Heeseung holds your hand tightly, not wanting to let go of your hand.

“C’mon! We should totally visit the new ice cream shop” he pleaded, how could you say no to this man? In fact you can’t, with some exceptions of course.

“Fine, we can’t be out too late anyways” you said staring right at him before he pecks your lips, he drags you towards the entrance of the ice cream shop. Upon arrival you’re met with the sight of many flavors, shocked at the many choices laid right in front of you.

Heeseung leads you to a table, he pulls out the chair, taking a seat he says, “I’ll order for the both of us.” You nodded your head as you watched him walk away. Admiring him from afar, the story of how you met wasn’t like any other.

It started as any normal day, classes went well, just your usual routine. A part of that routine was heading to the library, usually studying the material you learned that day. Or for any upcoming test. Opening the door, and entering the library. You take a seat right next to this stranger, surprisingly the tables were stacked with students occupying them. You don’t know how it happened, you got up to look for a textbook like normal. It did take you a little while to find the right one. Before eventually returning back to your seat.

When returning, your laptop was closed for some reason. Odd? You didn’t close yours. The seat next to you was empty. You shrug it off, opening the laptop you’re met with an unfamiliar name. “Lee Heeseung”

“Who is Lee Heeseung?” You thought to yourself. You move the mouse on the touchpad before realizing, wait, you have his laptop? How did this happen? Did he happen to leave with yours? You hear a slight snicker seeing a group of friends laughing. Did they do this? You weren’t one to assume. You just close the laptop before leaving the textbook and just leave for the day.

Heeseung was studying for his upcoming exam. Surprisingly, he never studies, only this time because he wasn’t going to fail this exam, not especially after what happened last time. He would want to erase that moment forever. Heeseung notices a presence next to him. Someone sat next to him. He didn’t mind and just continued to study. He notices the person getting up and watches them leave before deciding himself that this was enough studying for today. He closed his laptop and got up, returning the many textbooks he used in the study session. He comes back to his spot, packing up and finally grabs the laptop. He makes his way out.

The walk back to his dorm wasn’t so long; having to live on campus was one blessing for times like this. Not having to drive home. As soon as he gets inside he unpacks and sets the laptop on his desk. Laying on the bed exhausted. He wants to go to sleep, but he remembers about a question he has and quickly gets up. Wanting to email his professor. He opens the laptop to be met with a wallpaper that he knew wasn’t his. He always had his wallpaper as the default wallpaper. He takes note of the stickers on it too. Something is definitely wrong. This is not his.

He presses the spacebar, popping up the login screen. “Yn..” who is yn? And does this person have his laptop? No!? What if they find out his password!? He panicked a bit before texting his friends.

Hot man🔥: yo chat I need help

Jakey wakey: WHAT HAPPENED!?!

Hot man🔥: I THINK SOMEONE STOLE MY LAPTOP BROTHA!

Snowman ⛄️: nah

Sugar daddy🫦: how did they even steal it?

Hot man🔥: IDK!?

Hot man🔥: maybe it got swapped?

Jakey wakey: how did it get swapped?

Hot man🔥: IDK THAT I WENT TO GO PUT THE TEXTBOOKS UP SINCE I WAS STUDYING BEFORE I GOT BACK TO MY DORM AND I NEED TO EMAIL PROFESSOR YO BUT THEN I SEE THIS!?? 💔

Sugar daddy🫦: okay okay calm down buddy who does this laptop belong too? 😒

Hot man🔥: yn. Who is yn?

Snowman⛄️: WAIT I KNOW HER

Hot man🔥: ITS A HER?? 😨

Jakey wakey: thought it was obvious but alright 😃

Snowman⛄️: stfu anyways she’s in my third class tomorrow.

Hot man🔥: PLEASE ASK HER IF SHE HAS I NEED IT NEOW 😫

Sugar daddy🫦: ok ok buddy calm down you’ll live

So the next day, it was Sunghoon’s mission to ask you if you had Heeseung’s laptop. You sat in your spot like normal before being approached by him. You raised your brow at him. “What’s up?”

“Oh hey yn umm do you perhaps have a guy named Heeseung’s laptop?” You replied fast “yes yes does he have mine I need it quickly I can’t live without it..” Sunghoon looked at your surprise. “Damn you are like the same person I swear.. anyways here’s his number um you can text him anytime you want.” You take the small slip of paper before seeing his number. “Thank you.”

After that incident, feelings were developed along the way. You both continued to talk. Heeseung would even join you in your study sessions. Literally only for you. That happened 2 years ago. So much has happened since then.

“Hello? Sweetheart, are you still there?” A voice cuts off your thoughts. “I-uh huh?” You look at him. “I’ve been calling you for a minute now, what’s up?” You get a bit embarrassed. “Oh nothing, just daydreaming..”

Heeseung smirks while taking a seat in front of you. “Whatcha daydreaming of? Me?” He teased handing you your ice cream. “No never” he sulked, pouting his lips slightly. “I’m kidding, maybe I did” you giggled at his reaction. “You and your so called jokes” he rolls his eyes. “Yeah and you still love me” you keep your eyes on him. “Yes I do and it won’t change.” Heeseung grabs your hand before placing a kiss on it. “Now eat up..”

Author’s note: wrote this in one sitting chat I am BORED!! I was watching love island and like TEA IS REAL. Um anyways yeah I always write around 4-5 am like idk it’s almost 6 am but Ik yall dgaf so 💋

© ynsvnte copyright 2024

[peppermintquartz]

Based on my ask and the reply from @so-that-was-okay

-

By the fourth one, it is clear to everyone that the guys Tommy happens to know are his exes or former dates.

Number 1: Cruise ship cook Mark is tall - six foot three - and as cheerful as a retriever, even when he had to be rescued from a mishap in a professional kitchen he borrowed for a YouTube video. At least he kept his cool and his hand safe - that meat grinder could have caused some very serious damage. And the moment he saw Buck, he exclaimed, "Oh my god, I've seen you, you're Tommy's boyfriend! How is he?" He loved telling Buck about Tommy's favorite dishes and even shared recipes with him. (Also the team got a free five-course meal out of it as thanks.)

Number 2: Geologist Hyun Ki was, again, tall, strong, and had a store of encyclopedic knowledge, specifically about cave structures. He was the guy Tommy recommended to advise if limestone was toxic to humans and also about how to best remove a stalagmite from their subject's posterior with minimal damage to the actual stalagmite, which had been illegally taken from a caving expedition and was to be evidence. Hyun Ki had not been pleased about the offender removing "a marvel of nature that took thousands of years to form and it's a STALAGMITE with a G for ground, you criminal moron, STALACTITES are the ones from the ceilings" to stick into his ass, and tells the team all about his various expeditions.

Number 3: Marine Biologist Bryan is tanned, blond, surfs on his days off, and built like a tank. He also smiles a great deal, greeting both Tommy and Buck warmly at the aquarium and then jumping in to assist when one of the new glass windows exploded. The 118 showed up, helped the aquarium to hustle the shocked visitors out and treat a kid who had been pressing his face to the glass just as it shattered while the aquarium staff did their best to rescue the fish that had fallen out of their tanks.

Number 4: Leg model Stephen had lean and elegant limbs, and was excellent at making jewelry and statues out of scrap metals. That was not the reason for calling on him; he had found his neighbor, who owned the scrapyard where Stephen got his materials, trapped under several steel car chassis, though one was keeping tons of metal from crushing him utterly. That had been tricky for the team, seeing it as high stakes Jenga. Buck and Stephen have a great chat once Stephen sees Buck's phone wallpaper, both commiserating over Tommy's inability to put a damn shirt on while doing something involving sparks or fire when at home.

-

"All those guys you know turned out to be your exes or failed dates," Buck says. He is more amused than anything else. Those guys were interesting and fun. If Buck had gone out with them, he'd have kept their contacts too and stayed friends. "And, Hen says, all are kinda like me. Or I'm kinda like them."

"Like you?"

"Tall, strong, good with hands, cheerful... It appears you have a type, Firefighter Kinard."

"Well, Firefighter Buckley, I honestly have never seen the similarities until this moment.*

Buck believes him. Tommy's only ever been honest with him, even when it's an uncomfortable truth. He props his chin on the middle of his boyfriend's chest and studies his handsome face. "Tommy?"

Tommy smiles fondly. "Yeah?"

"Will I ever be one of the guys you 'happen to know' for something?" He doesn't put in air quotes, trusting that Tommy has listened to him ramble often enough to understand what he's saying.

Tommy's smile softened. "I hope not. I want you to be my guy. The one guy of all the guys."

Buck's heart grows warm and light. "Yeah? What would I be the one guy for?"

Tommy's caress along his birthmark and jawline is achingly tender. "For the rest of my life."

For a split second Buck feels the world stop, and then it rights itself, and the weight of what Tommy's said sweeps joy over him like an unexpected wave.

But for a moment Tommy's smile falters. "I know it's too early for that," he murmurs, a little sheepish, "but I mean it."

Buck lunges forward and kisses the smile back on Tommy's face.

"I know. And, okay, maybe it is early, but for what it's worth? I want to be your guy," Buck affirms. He presses another kiss to Tommy's warm mouth, lingering and gentle, before he adds, "For the rest of our lives."

[daysofyellowroses]

spaghetti

carmen berzatto x reader | 700 words | based on this absolutely adorable request from my love @thecapricunt1616 | no warnings really, just a little cute one

You hummed under your breath as you took a large bowl from the cabinet, placing it on the counter before taking the bag of popcorn from the microwave. Once you had the popcorn in the bowl you took it to the living room, placing the bowl on the table before heading back to the kitchen. Checking your phone, you smiled as you always did when you looked at your wallpaper. It was a picture of you and Carmy pulling stupid faces for the camera, your arms around each other. You always told him it was a privilege to be your lockscreen after a couple of weeks, not just anyone could hold that position. 

Taking two beers from the fridge, you brought them out to the living room and smiling as your phone buzzed in your pocket. You checked, finding a new message from Carmy to let you know he was around the corner. You went to the front door, lightly tapping your fingers on the wall while you scrolled through instagram.  

When the knock on the door came, you tucked your phone back into your pocket before opening the door and smiling as you saw your boyfriend standing on the other side.

“Welcome back,” You grinned, stepping aside. “it's only been..eight hours?”

“About that, yeah.” Carm smiled as he walked, giving you a kiss before you closed the door. 

“Everything is ready,” You gestured to the living room, taking Carmy's hand and leading him over. “I couldn't decide what to watch so I threw on an old Simpsons episode. Hope you don't mind?”

“Not at all,” Carm grinned, unzipping his jacket and draping it over the couch as you sat down. “Sounds great.”

“Perfect,” You smiled, leaning forward to pick up one of the beers and handing it to Carm before standing up. “Be right back, make yourself comfortable.”

You went into your bedroom, walking over to your bed and reaching under your pillow. You pulled out a small bundle of what were essentially rags, before heading back out to the couch. 

“Budge up,” You smiled, sitting down beside Carmy and relaxing against him, his arm draping around you as you sat up on the couch.

You both laughed at the same jokes you always laughed at, you ate popcorn handfuls at a time and drank cool beer.

As you were relaxing, you subconsciously picked at a little bundle at the end of the worn out material in your hands, plucking the knots and gently stroking it. You were lightly brushing it against your cheek when you felt Carm's eyes on you, looking up at him with a raised brow.

“Something wrong?” You asked, touching your cheek.

“No, nothing,” Carmy smiled, gesturing to the material in your hands. “I was just thinking, if you want me to cut off that ball of thread for you I can. I can see how it would be bothersome for you.”

“What, this?” You frowned, holding up said ball of thread. “you can't be serious?”

You got up from the couch, looking at Carm and holding the material out.

“I'm going to pretend you didn't say that. Because I know you didn't just call blankie ‘bothersome.’ Because this,” You shook the material in his face. “Is thingie. And this,” You gestured to the worn out strings of thread hanging off the end of a faded strip of fabric. “he is the original blankie, thingie is his friend. Just his friend. And thingie knows he’s only here because of blankie, so respect blankie, got it?”

“Got it,” Carmy nodded, watching as you slowly sat back down on the couch. “Message received.”

“Good,” You murmured, letting out a soft sigh. You smiled a little when Carm gently pulled you in for a cuddle, his hand stroking your hair.

“I'm sorry for my disrespect,” He murmured softly. “I know he's important to you.”

“It's okay,” You sighed, closing your eyes and clutching blankie to your chest and enjoying the feeling of Carmy's arms around you. “I know it's a little..unusual but I've had him for so long it would feel wrong to just get rid of him.”

“Will that courtesy extend to me one day?” Carmy asked, and you could feel the smile in his voice.

“It remains to be seen,” You smiled, opening your eyes and turning to look up at Carm. “But there's a very strong chance, as,long as you stay away from the scissors.”

[sleepdeprivedactor]

Lovely Chapter 1: Lane’s POV

I looked at the clock on my dashboard and sighed. The road seemed like it stretched on for hours. I looked over at my boyfriend, Jake. He was slumped over, his head on the window. Guess the four hour drive tuckered him out, too. I thought. After a moment of driving, the road became an entrance to a large garage. It was packed full of people. I nudged Jake until he woke up.

“We're here.” I said. Jake looked at me, and then stuck out his tongue. We had been dating for around two and a half years at the time, and had finally saved up enough money to afford a small apartment we were gonna share with our friend Charlotte. Sure, it was hours away from our families in Connecticut, but it was worth it. The apartment we were renting was small, but would suffice to our everyday needs.

“Okay, I'll get the boxes from the trunk, can you get our suitcases?” Jake asked as he opened the door of my 2018 Honda Civic. I nodded, and hopped out of the car. I opened the door to the back, and pulled out our suitcases. 

“Hey, dumbass,” I said, looking at my idiotic boyfriend. “You can't carry four boxes at once, you're gonna drop them all.” I reached out and snatched one of the boxes from his grasp.

“I'm so lucky to have such a caring boyfriend,” Jake said, exaggerating on the caring part. 

“Keep up the attitude and you're not gonna have a boyfriend.” I added with a menacing grin. Jake looks at him with a face of horror. They both burst out laughing. 

“Okay, enough jokes. I'm tired. Let's go inside.” He said. We walk to the door, and check in with the receptionist. Hand in hand, we walked out the stairs and reached our apartment. Jake opened the door.

“Oh my god, this place looks…like a dump.” Jake says. I looked around.

“For once in your pathetic life, you're right,” I say, looking at my lover. “This is not what I was expecting.” I stare at our “new” apartment. There was peeling wallpaper, a leak in the roof, and miscellaneous items the previous tenants probably left.

“Now that I think about it, I'd rather move back in with Ellis and Demi.” Jake mumbles.

“You're not moving back in with your siblings, dummy. Well make it work, we always do.” I said, trying to motivate him. We placed down the boxes and suitcases, and made our way to the bedroom. 

The bedroom was probably the nicest room of them all. The wallpaper was still pelling, but there was a somewhat clean mattress for us to sleep on. 

“I found the box with the pillows and comforter, Lane!” Jake calls from the other room. 

“Okay, bring em’ in here!” I yelled from the bedroom. I  looked at the doorway as Jake entered, carrying two pillows, a comforter, and a bedspread.

“Your materials, good sir.” He said in a British accent. I laughed as I took the sheet from his hands.

“Thank you, my love.” Lane said, blowing him a kiss. 

I plopped down on the bar stool at the kitchen island. I shook his head from the thoughts about my recent struggle of trying to get the sheets on the bed, just as Jake walked into the room. He looks at me with a smile before walking over and sitting next to me. 

“You know when Char’s gonna get here?” He asked.

“I dunno. She was probably having some heart to heart with Alli and Jamie, and knowing her luck her truck got a flat or something. I’m sure she’ll be here soon.”

“Yeah. Anyways, I’m hungry, and we don’t have food in our fridge. So, I say we order pizza.” 

“Shouldn't we wait for Char?” I ask.

“Probably. But I’m hungry and she’s always late for everything. So I say we order without her, and she can have the scraps.”

“Jake, no. She’s our best friend. We’re waiting for her.” 

“But I want food.” Jake complained with a pleading expression.

“But I don’t care. We’re waiting.”

“Why must you put me through such torture?” “Oh, don’t be dramatic.” I sigh. Jake frowns.

“Aw, come on Lane, don’t be mad.”

“I’m not mad. Just slightly annoyed.” Jake got up and pulled me into a hug.

“I’m sorry. I know I’m annoying.” He seemed genuinely upset with himself.

“Don’t be sorry. It’s okay. You didn’t do anything wrong.” I smiled and kissed Jake on the cheek, causing his face to turn bright red. “I’m going to take a shower. Let me know if Char shows up.”

Chapter 2

[gie-gie-gie-gie]

little women, ep. 1

When I first watched the trailer for Little Women, I was intrigued by the premise of struggling sisters navigating the mystery around a huge amount of money, and how it changes the lives of these three “little women” in the midst of big people with power, connections, and wealth. It’s not entirely a new concept, but I am such a sucker for kdrama sister portrayals that this was a no-brainer addition to my to watch list.

Sure, one can first get caught with matching the characters and scenarios with the Louisa May Alcott source material (who’s the Jo? the Amy? the Meg? the Laurie? etc.), but by the second half of the first episode, you get the sense of considering the story on its own.

And it’s good. It’s so good! I don’t expect myself to be able to sustain an entire series review, but I’d like to be able to take notes along the way. It feels like it’s going to be a great watch ahead, and I just want to make something out of my excitement. That said, be warned that the series in itself has a lot of violence, which might come up in these recaps, hence the tw tag.

We begin with our three sisters: the Meg, the Jo, and the Amy. Poor Beth, no counterpart in here. Or maybe there’s more we don’t know, because mysterious baby picture, anyone?

Among everyone, it’s Kim Go-eun that I was really looking forward to the most. I have never watched her past dramas, but I’ve been itching to see any of her work, and I felt that this role might just be too good to pass. I love the seeming naïveté of her Meg, whose Cinderella fantasies of getting married and being whisked away from poverty translates fittingly into our series’ Oh In-joo, dowdy green vest and tacky tulle skirt included. At home with her sisters, though, she can be straightforward and determined behind the smiley and meek behavior she shows outside.

When she cried upon seeing the contents of the duffel bag her friend, Jin Hwa-young (played by Choo Ja-hyun), left her, I felt as if we were witnessing only the initial unraveling of her character.

Nam Ji-hyun as Oh In-kyung is also riveting. This is my third Nam Ji-hyun drama and the other two had her as the childhood-friend-and-fated-endgame of a wealthy amnesiac. Here In-kyung is barefaced, buttoned up, but not quite sober. She’s an investigative reporter with a deep empathy for people, and a righteous understanding of the pitfalls of wealth.

I loved her scene with Great Aunt Oh. They’re just having breakfast and talking, but the way this was set up made me wonder if we’re supposed to look at how In-kyung was influenced by her aunt despite not having had the warmest upbringing.

Great Aunt also meddles in her love life, and we see the Laurie for this series, too. It’s Kang Hoon as Ha Jong-ho. When they met each other under aunt’s ruse of bringing a mistakenly delivered package, we understand that there’s history between them. In-kyung is at the tail of a highly tense investigation, and we can wonder how this might affect their relationship as the series moves forward.

I don’t have much to say about Park Ji-hu’s Oh In-hye just yet, except that I can certainly understand her wanting to make her own money after seeing her sisters toil to provide for their family. She’s ambitious and gritty and I cannot help but wonder where the story will take her character, especially with her association with who seems to be Park Jae-sang’s wife and daughter.

Wi Ha-joon is another actor I was excited to see in this series. I thought his character in Romance is a Bonus Book was compelling enough. His role as Cho Do-il is obviously different so I also cannot wait to find out more about him.

It seems orchids is a recurring motif in this show. From trying to google ‘princess of thieves orchid’, I saw some twitter threads on the repeating symbolism of this flower on the show. Since I’m behind watching, I didn’t read too far and suspended spoilers. Anyway… too many orchids. From the orchids in the office in the 14th floor to…

the blue orchid tattoo…

the wallpaper in Hwa-young’s apartment (excellent mirror-threshold blocking, by the way)…

a blue orchid beside her fishtank…

and a blue orchid brooch on the suit of Park Jae-sang (played by Um Ki-joon). Yikes… Personally, I think orchids are also an appropriate motif in a tight environment of power and wealth. Orchids are expensive and requires a lot of precise care.

I cannot wait for the sisters to tie up the associations together. The context surrounding Hwa-young’s death becomes even more sinister in light of In-kyung’s investigation on the four money-related suicides from the Bobae Savings Bank Case.

Finally, what will In-joo do with the money that landed on her via yoga locker? Director Shin Hyeon-Min is after the slush fund, and it seems In-joo is in it now, too. Not to mention, she signed an account opening form for Hwa-young, so it seems like the money in the bag is not all there is to it.

[siriusblackslut]

One where James, married, mind you, helps the reader out of a dry spell and something more

Pairing: James Potter/Reader

Word: 4664

Warnings: cheating kink, serious breeding kink, infidelity, mildly dubious consent.

Lily was always so bloody tardy. Said she would be home by two and now it was two thirty and where exactly was she? Not home, that was one less place to look for.  

“She’s out on muggle business,” James had said smoothly, hands outstretched in an offer of a glass of scotch, “Did you want to wait for her?”

That was why you were having another tour of the house that had barely changed since your last visit.

Something on a Jason Pollock inspired painting that Lily had put up in their master, and the wallpaper she had chosen for the feature wall behind their bed and you were so bloody bored, throwing yourself face first onto the soft duvets of the bed, a muffled scream into the pillows.

There was a slight pause in James’ rambling, before you felt the mattress sink next to you. “Enough about me, how have you been?”

It was a response into the bed, “Alright, I s’pose.”

“Seeing anyone yet?”

Another muffled groan escaped your lips. “Why does everyone ask that?”

You could almost see the strict look he would’ve given you if you didn’t have your face buried into the sheets. Of course, it was in this archaic society that they would expect a woman to find someone nice, get married, settle down, maybe even pop out a few babies, whilst men like Sirius could go around fooling around for another rest of his life or so if he wanted to.

James sighed at your response, “Lily told me, you know.”

Now that got your attention, and you turned, head snapped up to face him. “What? What exactly did she tell you?”

“You know,” he started apprehensively, “that you were failing miserably finding a partner much less someone to bring home.”

Your jaw dropped in disbelief, “I-- I can’t believe she told you that!” because you didn’t need everyone knowing you hadn’t had good dicking for more than half a year now. You were so going to have a little talk with Lily when she got back.  

“You didn’t have to look very far you know,” James said cryptically.

You huffed in response, “Believe me, I’ve been to near every bar in London, muggle and wizarding otherwise.”

“Still no luck then?”

“Six months and counting,” If Lily was going to air your dirty laundry, you were going to make sure it dried.

“You only had to ask, you know” James said.

“Hardly seems—what?”

“I’m always happy to help out.”

Hands, and oh Merlin, they were strong and calloused and you could feel every bump of every vein brushing against the sensitive skin of you inner thigh and they were certainly not your own slender ones that you had grown so used to feeling when you frigged your own clit panting for something, anything in your dry spell, and your mind drew a blank at hands all steady and warm and masculine slipping under your skirt and the next thing you felt was the tracing of a finger, light and teasing against your panties had your breath hitching.

“I don’t think is very appropria—”

You cut off in a strangled moan before you could finish, James’ finger catching against lace, all shamefully slick, had the material brushing against the hood of your clit.

Only the hood of your clit and you were a mess and so needy and desperate. You tried not to imagine more.

“Any friend of my wife is a friend of mine.”

It was as though James was reminding you, reminding you that he, James Potter, yes the same James Potter who had his finger tracing up and down your clothed slit, was one, married and two, married to your friend, for Godric’s sake.

But you whined, and you whined like a bloody brat because you were so sensitive; it had only been a few months.

James snickered, amused at your conflicted nature where your thighs were trying to snap back together, but your mouth, your mouth was letting out an onslaught of whimpers and no’s and yes’s into one unintelligible string of speech.

“Lily told me everything, said you were getting so desperate,” he murmured. “Told me how you wanted good cock so bad.”

Cock?

Surely, you didn’t want cock, did you?

Alright, yes, maybe you did but certainly not Lily’s husband’s cock, right?

You weren’t that desperate, it’s only been six months since you had cock, not that rubbish plastic stuff you had hidden in your drawers but real hot delicious slab of meat, thick and warm and twitching and alive, sliding into the warmth of your folds and in and out and in and out until throbbing veins were coated with your pussy slick and—

You tell yourself you would happily settle for his fingers, as it that was any better.

Such a horrible horrible thing to do, cumming on James’, who was married, mind you, fingers, but to your pussy, the thought pulls nothing but a rush of blood, and you feel your pussy lips throb against his hand separated by the thinnest, flimsiest piece of lace.

Nothing more than a friend helping out a friend, those were his words.

“Fingers,” you murmured shyly, eyes averted.

A harsh laughter erupted from James’ lips, before he gave a tut, “I ‘spose we can start with ma fingers,” he said, “maybe that’ll convince you to take my cock.”

He didn’t even bother for you legs to fall apart, one slap to your thigh and he had already melded his thumb against your inner thigh.

“Gosh,” he mused with a mocking chuckle, “can see those puffy lips over the panties.”

Your mouth fell open and then promptly closed because what were you meant to say?

Maybe this wasn’t such a good idea after all; it wasn’t too late to apologise for your indecency and go frig yourself on some plastic cock when you go home. 

Your legs began to snap shut, but James’ palm dug even harder into your sensitive flesh even more, forcing them apart.

He continued his musings, ignoring your newfound reluctance, “You know what that means don’t you, if I can see those pretty pink lips basically parted, begging?”

Brain had practically short-circuited and his touch, pads of his fingers pushing lightly, dipping shallow into your slit over your lacy panties.

At the absence of your response, James answered himself. “Means you’re sopping, sweetheart,” he said, “you’re sopping and gushing so hard because you’re getting off on being a homewrecker, and all your girl cum has stained your panties and now it’s all soaked nice and wet and transparent that I can see you clitty all swollen and the prettiest lips just bursting out of you knickers for me.”

“I—” you trailed off and then another squirm, but it was definitely more feeble this time round because, oh just the way those words had tumbled out of his mouth, so lewd and so filthy and the thing was, there wasn’t one bit of lie in any of his words.

James, seemingly quite bored with all the back and forth, didn’t wait for you to respond, and he supposed your sopping pussy trickling all your horny juices were as good as permission, not that you hadn’t already admitted to wanting his fingers so bad.

Taking matters into his own hands, quite literally, James hooked his thumb under your lace panties and yanked them down in one motion.

The sound of expensive French lace ripping snapped you out of your horny daze and your hips squirm, but James didn’t even give you another chance to play helpless victim, calloused palm giving another great shove had your thighs splayed out so wide it hurt, your muscles straining and he goes straight in, makes his way to exactly what he wanted.

“Shut up and enjoy this,” he snarled and before you know it, you felt them, fingers, thick and unforgiving, sinking into your wet pussy folds, and shamefully for you, even the harshness, suddenness of his motion didn’t require any lubrication.

External lubrication, that was; James wasn’t lying when he had commented on your pussy quite positively dripping.

Which begs the question of just how exactly were you even getting off on this? Lily was your friend and Lily Evans, no Lily Potter was your friend and Lily bloody Potter, your friend, who was going to be home any moment--

But your thighs were no longer straining against Lily bloody Potter’s husband’s palm, because Lily bloody Potter’s husband’s fingers were sinking and fucking into your pussy, pussy basically virginal having seen no cock for the past half a year, and the feeling of fullness around Lily bloody Potter’s husband’s fingers were just too overwhelming that you had forgotten to clamp your thighs up to force him out.

“See? Told you you’d like it,” James said so smugly, and with another shove of his fingers into your tight pussy, he had you moaning, throwing your head back against the wall with the wallpaper Lily had chosen, because gosh, this was such good finger stuffing.

James continued the onslaught of dirty words, “All slick and ready already, weren’t you? You like this.”

You gave the smallest shake of your head, as if you hadn’t been moaning only a second ago at his fingers lodged deep inside you.

“Are you sure?” he asked with fake concern, “But look how greedy your pussy is, pretty lips just keeps swallowing up my fingers.”

That could not be true! But when you leant forward to check, sure enough, the obscene sight of his two fingers, all thick and calloused shining glossy and your heart sank when it could only be your pussy slick, sliding in and out of your lips that were stretching with every thrust, straining to fit all of his knuckles because it had been so long.

And what was that?

You gasped at the sight of your hips that seemed to have a mind of their own, giving light shallow thrusts, joining in with the symphony, little pulls away along with the pulls of his fingers, and then the delicious sinks in time with his so that those thick fingers could be fucked as deep into you as possible.  

It was as though your pussy was so resolute on getting off that it didn’t care whose fingers your walls were going to clench around, going to cum on.

James smirked at the sight of your face with your jaw dropped and eyes wide,  all mesmerised by the sight of his fingers pushing in and pulling out of you, “Do you like watching?” he asked, and so conversationally too as if he wasn’t giving you the best finger fuck you had ever gotten, “Watching just how well you take my fingers? How well your pussy can take a stuffing?”

There was no denying it now, your hips were now meeting every single thrusts of his fingers without fail.

He continued in a mocking coo, “Come on, I already know it, ma arm’s dripping with your pussy juice, just wanna hear it from that pretty mouth.”

Would it be so bad just to admit it? I mean, it was rather obvious wasn’t it, he was already stuffing you so full of thick digits, you were dripping and dripping everywhere and the sheets on your arse growing damp was good evidence of that and James’ forearm glistening with your juices…

Your voice was small. “Yes.”

“Good girl,” he murmured, “and since you can admit it, I’m gonna be nice and stuff another finger into you, kay?”

Your head was too quick to give furious nods, throwing them back and forth in between your breathy moans, before a shriek was ripped from your throat at the feeling of more, another one of his thick digits sliding snugly into where they belong.

That was right, your pussy.

Not his wife’s, not Lily’s.

Yours.

Your head drooped down in a sort of pleasure haze and you weren’t even supposed to see it, that wasn’t your intention but it was impossible to miss.

Gold, proud and pure and a promise, it was the glint of his wedding band.

Sliding so mesmerizingly, towards and then away and towards and then away from your glistening pink folds, the cold metal grazing against the heat of your pussy, more specifically that deliciously sensitive bit of skin between your arse and pussy lips with every forceful thrust and that, that was what got you over the edge.

Your trembling legs clamped up as much as they could with James situated between your thighs and you let moan after moan tumble out of your mouth until you were nothing but a whimpering mess, James still driving his wedded hand, ring still on his bloody finger, in and out and in and out and you at an unforgiving pace.

And when he finally decided you had enough, that your dry spell had ended, he pulled them out with a wet squelch filling the room and you could see it once more, his wedding band glistening with your cum juices.

“Ma fingers that good huh?” he said with a smirk.

Still wracked with an orgasm that finally didn’t involve your own fingers, you gave a limp nod.

“Just wait till you get ma cock, darling.”

You scrambled back a little.

Fingers, you could justify, but cock?

James shook his head with an unimpressed look on his face, “Didn’t think I’d let you get off and not give you a bitta married cock did ya?” he said with a tut, and as you pull your eyes to glance up dubiously at him, you knew you were a goner.

His hands, veins pulsing, was fisting at his cock, that looked so delicious, girthy and lengthy, a slight curve towards the tip and looking so alive and you knew you must have it.

At that moment in time, you could hardly care if this was Lily Potter’s husband because Lily got this cock every day and it was so bloody unfair and it was only fair if you had a go cumming on it.

It was Lily’s fault anyways. If she hadn’t gone babbling to her husband, then her husband with his conscience so pure and kind wouldn’t have to go help a friend out.

It happened so quickly even before you could voice exactly what you wanted, James went ahead and took exactly that and exactly that was your six-month virginity. Two strides towards you and he was sinking, sinking and oh sinking, head of his cock with his slit weeping as it pushed apart your folds that you were so sure had clamped shut from your previous orgasm and only six months of disuse.

James snickered, “Weren’t lying when you said it had been half a year huh?

You shook your head, nothing able to escape your mouth anymore except for moans and pants and whimpers and whines because you only had one focus, and that was to capture this beautiful memory, committing every detail of your pussy was swallowing cock that belonged to your friend’s husband.

“Basically virginal,” James grunted, letting each syllable fall from his lips with every thrust and it was at the final one when his hips meet yours harshly at some certain angle and thick veiny goodness hit somewhere deep in your pussy that you didn’t know was even there in the first place.

You practically have a seizure on his cock, another scream pulled forcibly from your throat. You were never going to last long, your first stuffing of cock in bloody ages, but you also didn’t expect your pussy walls to be fluttering already, at that point where you knew it would only take a few more thrusts for you to get see stars.  

James grinned at your reaction, continuing both the unforgiving pace and that filthy mouth of his, “Virginal, just like when I took Lily’s virginity on this bed.”

The mention of your friend, another reminder, was supposed to make you feel horrible, but it pulled nothing but another clench of your pussy because it was simple, you were a slut. 

Still, you tried to grasp at any semblance of control you still had. “Don’t—don’t say that!” you managed to stutter in amidst of your pleasure haze.

“Oh, but it’s true,” he grinned wickedly, “she had her legs spread wide open like you have now.”

Your eyes scrunched in response at his taunt, but it barely lasted a minute before you felt the sharp sting of a slap against your cheek. Eyes flew open in surprise to be met with a wolfish grin on James’ face.

“Watch,” he murmured mockingly, “watch your pussy eat married cock, much less your friend’s husband’s cock.”

You shook your head in defiance, was it all a show? Simply a façade? Because it was happening, you didn’t need to see it to know it, the pleasure blossoming from your pussy letting you never forget what exactly was happening.

James huffed at your disobedience, and with a roll his eyes, his fingers, the same ones that had brought you there moments ago, yes the one with his bloody ring still wet with your juices flying to gripped at your chin. His thumb dug into the hollows of your cheek and there was nowhere else to look but down.

And what you see was downright sinful.

The stretch of your creamy thighs, and the barest glimpse of pink were from your swollen pussy lips, stretched and strained in every way possible as it tugged at the shaft of James’ cock, disappearing and reappearing once more as it continued driving out of you, shiny with your arousal mixing with his precum.

“Tummy’s bulging too,” James’ grunted with each hard thrust, “Just you ‘magine if I just put a baby there.”

You didn’t think your eyes could open any wider, but they did.

James smiled scornfully at the reaction his words drew from you because he knew. “Wanna baby so bad you actually want to carry my seed huh? Lil’s said you wanted to settle down too, you know.”

“No!” You barely make it out through gritted teeth, but it was impossible to hide that involuntary clench of your walls at his filthy words because his cock was lodged so deep in your pussy.

James sniggered at your expression. “You do know you can just get pregnant on this right? Can you feel me dripping into your pussy?”

You let out a sound, somewhere between a strangled moan and a whine as soon as the word fell from his lips because you felt it too, slit of his cock hitting your cervix, weeping right into your womb, so fertile, with every thrust.

“We can trick Lily you know,” he continued with the most evil grin on his face. “She’d never know.”

“James, please,” you begged but the thing was, you weren’t sure what exactly you were begging for, begging for him to stop such mean and nasty and hot words, or begging for him to do exactly that.

You hoped it was the former but judging from the way your pussy was clamping down, happily swallowing each thrust of his married meat and so happy for more, it was probably the latter.

“Don’t lie to me.” And he thrust harder once more leaving you a whimpering mess. “Your pussy is clenching so hard, betraying you.”

God you were so close.

“You wanna little boy or a girl?” he snarled with another powerful thrust.

You shook your head violently in response. Cumming on his fingers was one thing, and then that impending orgasm that was approaching that was surely going to be on his cock with the way things were going was another.

But his seed, and you could see it now, dripping from you, your pink folds all messy with creamy pearly white dripping from your pussy lips. James’ cockhead ramming against your cervix, his sensitive slit so ready to burst and just drown your slutty body with a torrent of his cum all potent.

And it wasn’t supposed to, that image, so vile and so dirty and so nasty was not supposed to but it did it, gave you that little bit more and brought you right there.

You sobbed as your walls pulsate around him, clamping down on married meat as your second orgasm washed right over you, straight up knocked you down off your feet but James, he didn’t care whether you were cumming or not.

Burying his fingers in your hair, adding to the multitude of sensation that wracked your slutty body, and he yanked your head towards his. Breath all hot against your ear and he snarled, “I said,” and another snap of his hips had you screaming in the midst of your orgasm, “you want a boy or a girl?”

“Girl,” you panted, barely registering the question, because this had to stop or you didn’t think you could ever cum on cock that wasn’t taken already.

Another pull of your beautiful hair, harder this time, until your back was curled unnaturally inwards, hurting, but hurting so good, “You wanna have a baby with me so bad huh?”

Legs trembling at the overstimulation, but your walls were still twitching, clamping. It was as though they knew that it wasn’t finished. It didn’t matter that you had already cum, no it wasn’t finished just yet until there was creamy cum trickling into your womb, pearly essence coating your cute little pussy.

But you mustn’t! There came a point where you had to draw a line.

You forced your hips to shuffle back from his pistoning ones in amidst of your pleasure haze but James didn’t even let you have the chance. Another fistful of hair and you were so sure your hair was about to separate from your scalp, your skull.

“Wanna dress her up in piggy tails and cute little dresses huh? Wanna bring her round so Lily can have a tea party with her?

In for the penny, in for the pound.

And you wanted it too, to have Lily fret over your little girl, a child that was fucked into you by her husband without her knowledge and so you nodded furiously alongside those breathy pants.

Another tug of your hair, pulling you closer as he slammed into you so he was even deeper than ever before, “Wanna look at your child for the rest of your life and remember the feeling of my cock inside you greedy cunt,” he snarled.

Fuck one orgasm you were going to have two. Or one humungous one, it didn’t really matter. What mattered was that there was something building, building on top of an already very high wave that you had been riding out, another crest above a crest.

“Want me to breed you.”

“Yes,” a pretty moan fell from your mouth, your pussy walls fluttering.

“Me, your friend Lily’s husband, you want James’ Potter’s cock so bad you would let him into your pussy all raw and let him knock you up and put a little baby girl inside you womb.”

“Yes, yes, yes, yes!” and that was what sent you over the edge once more, or prolonged it or whatever, it hardly mattered because you were screaming, cumming on James’ cock once more.  

James’ thrust, still powerful and unrelenting, slowed, and you supposed it was only a matter of time before the clamping of basically virginal pussy was bound to get him there.

“Let’s just hope she doesn’t end up as much as a slut as her mother, then,” you heard James say.

With one final thrust, he buried his married cock deep inside you, and you forced your eyes open, tears pricking the edges and corner of your waterline but you mustn’t miss it—

And there it was, you watched in glee, balls twitching quite violently and soon you feel it too, spurts of hot white liquid, dangerous, potent, filling you to the brim.

Your body knew what to do, and it also certainly didn’t help that the sight of yourself getting creampied was so hot, prolonging your own orgasm even though your thighs were shuddering but you had to do this.

Another wave of clenches, your pussy walls clamping against James’ cock, drinking all his virile fertile cum, sucking it up so that it went deep inside your womb, not a drop of pearly white wasted but stored safe in your womb as though it was hot liquid gold.

You didn’t think you could be any happier.

Dry spell no longer dry seeing your pussy was so slick with creamy potent cum, James’ softening cock still lodged deep inside you too, just meant none of that good stuff could trickle out on their marriage bed, which coincidentally, was where they had consummated their marriage.

Quite happy, that was, until you heard the slam of the front door.

Lily!

You scrambled up, and James’ cock, limp, but still impressively large, glistening with your cunny juices and any remnants of his cum, slipped out. With nothing stopping the flow, your pussy let out an obscene sound, followed by a glob of creamy cum sliding out of your outer lips, trickling down your inner thigh.

James didn’t seem to be in a rush, picking up the shreds of your lacy panties and shoving them deep in his pocket, whilst you were desperate, trying to find something, some towels, tissues, anything to wipe up the cum now sliding out of your pussy drawing little strings and cobwebs of shiny slick between your thighs.

And even with Lily’s footsteps growing louder and louder up the stairs, James grinned and handed you a pair of cute pretty panties, light periwinkle blue.

My god, they couldn’t be Lil’s pantie--

“Put them on,” he said with a wicked grin, “They’ll stop ma seed from sliding out.”

You do because what else you’re meant to do?

Whilst James smoothed out the sheets, and you were quite proud to say it looked very clean as though the both of you hadn’t just fucked on it minutes ago, not a bit of damp spot because that just meant all of it was nice and full in your cumbelly, you slipped his wife’s panties on.  

The feeling of soft silk, cold, brushing against the heat of your clit and your folds and your entire well-fucked pussy sent a tingle through your pussy – god you could never go back now, could never fuck a cock that wasn’t already taken.

Footsteps grew louder, and before Lily had come into the master, James shot you a wicked grin,” Look Lil’s in the eye when she comes in,” he whispered, “So full of her husband’s cum in her womb, wearing her panties.”

Another flutter of your walls, and not a moment later, Lily, who was James, the person who had just stuffed you full of cock and cum, wife, was at the door.

“Oh my god,” Lily said apologetically at the sight of you, “I completely forgot I was meant to leave early today!”

Her fault.

Her fault that she wasn’t home and her fault that she had told James about your sexual frustration that he had no choice but to help you out.  

“That’s okay,” you managed.

You felt glob of cum slip out of your pussy but it was alright this time round because they pooled safely in the material of Lily’s panties, and you had peace of mind that you could fuck it back into yourself when you got home.

“You showed her the cot, James?” she asked, gesturing to the cute little crib at the corner of their room, “We’re trying for a baby!”

“That’s amazing!” you murmured, and your pussy fluttered once more, more of her husband cum in trickling out of you staining her pretty panties because all you could see was both of James’ children playing together in the garden somewhere.

[atsuwiee]

accidentally confessing to your bestfriend! enhypen.

because, this actually happened to me irl- they ended up liking me back as well so this scenario (?) is purely based on what happened to me lmaoo

warnings: i think i put in some swear words- and slight angst on jay's part lol

also this is kinda long so be rEadY ?? anyways enjoy wie woo

✧･ﾟ: *✧･ﾟ:* 　　 *:･ﾟ✧*:･ﾟ✧

heeseung

it was a normal weekend hangout at your place with heeseung, though he had noticed you were acting a bit strange when he arrived. both of you were at your room and your eyes were glued to your phone, thumbs moving at a fast pace, while heeseung was on the floor playing a video game alone. for the longest time you've had a crush on heeseung and you had planned on telling him countless of times but you didn't know when to- while texting your other friends about him and them persuading you to go on and tell him now- you feel your phone get grabbed out of your hands. "hey give me that!" you say as you reached for your phone only to be pushed back into the bed (playfully) by heeseung. "you're texting your crush, aren't you?" he said playfully as he kept your phone out of reach. "shut up and give it back, lee heeseung!" heeseung didn't listen to you at all instead he got on top of and started to tickle your sides. "tell me who! and i'll stop" he said as he got closer to your face, slowly the redness of your cheeks become evident. "as if!" you scoff as he continued to tickle you. "gosh, okay, okay! heeseung it's you!" you say in between laughter only for this to stop when you realized what you had just said. "i- okay i didn't mean that-" you say as you cover your mouth. "you like me?" "yeah dumbass-" you were cut off by his lips that pressed onto your cheek. "i like you too, cutie"

jay

playing the famous game never have i ever with jay at a literal ungodly hour, out of boredom, you both had been going back and forth at each other for any potential blackmail material you (both) could use. jay paused for a little longer than usual, trying to formulate his question. "aw, did you run out of questions?" you teased him. "no- oh i got one!" he says excitedly. "this is going to be such a cliché question but, never have i ever fallen in love with my bestfriend" jay said with a cheeky smile. "i want to hear your answer first" you say, trying to hide whatever you might spill out of your mouth. "never" he said, this only made your heart ache knowing he doesn't even like you back. "uh-" you paused for a bit making jay raise a brow "what? cat got your tongue?" he said in a playful tone. "well, i have... never..." you say while avoiding eye contact. "are you lying?" he asked as he got closer to your face. "me? lying? why would i be lying about having a crush on..." "crush on?" he asked, prodding into your attempted lie. "you" you say out loud. "you have a crush on me?" jay asked he distanced himself a bit from you. "yeah jongseong, so what? you don't even like me back" you say as you stood up. "i wasn't supposed to tell you until i was ready" you say. "i'm sorry" jay apologized. when you had left, jay wanted to tell you that he really liked you back- but how could he? he said "never" when he actually had a crush on his bestfriend.

jake

jake continued on and on, discussing about the topics you were struggling in physics. you had called him over to tutor you, but when he came to your aid, it appears you had gotten more distracted and jake noticed this as he saw you writing on your journal instead of taking a look at your notes and your textbook. "hey, y/n, are you even listening?" jake said while he snapped his fingers in front of you. "yeah, i am-" you said and quickly looked up from your journal. jake nodded and continued but once he did, your head was in your journal again- eyes glued to whatever you were writing. "okay, clearly you aren't listening, give me that-" he said as he grabbed your journal out of your hands. "i am listening!" you protest, jake was curious on what you were writing so he took a look. "i think i can't focus because of him... why am i even in love with him? wait- you're in love with me?" he asked as he pointed to himself. "stop reading that!" you say as you grabbed your journal out of his hands. your cheeks grew red, and you were quick to grab your textbook to cover your flustered face. you could hear jake giggle and moved the textbook from your face, he kisses your forehead softly and smiles. "well now we got that clarified- shall we continue, y/n?"

sunghoon

"are you free today?" sunghoon asked. "well, i'm not doing anything at the moment so, i guess i'm free today- also are you alright? you sound sad" you say hinting out the tone of his voice. "i just feel tired..." he says. "so uh- do you want to go to the amusement park with me?" he asks. "didn't you say you were tired? you need rest" "please? i just want to unwind with you for a bit" you then said yes later on to his offer. "okay meet you there in twenty minutes" you said as you hung up on the phone so you could get ready. both of you were having fun on the rides and games- not until he pointed to the rollercoaster and practically begged you to go on it. "i-" "pleasee, i'll hold your hand if you're scared" he said with a smile, you couldn't resist this man so both of you went on it. sunghoon knows nothing about your fear of heights so when the ride was about to drop from it's peak you held his hand tightly shouting "i fucking hate rollercoasters- i also wanted you to know i love you a lot, hoon, like a lot lot-!" sunghoon had heard everything and held tight onto your hand. after the ride you both had sat down on a bench. "did you mean what you said?" he asked then faced you, your face growing pinkish. "ah so you heard it... yeah i meant everythi-" you were cut off by his soft lips pressed on yours. "i just wanted you to know i love you too, like a lot, y/n"

sunoo

it was a normal afternoon for you both, sunoo was seated on the couch while you lay down placing your head on his lap, he played with your hair while you played a game on your phone. sunoo brushing your hair with his fingers and at times he'd braid some strands of it too. you were starting to get bored from your game and decided to exit the app to go onto your social media, but sunoo was watching and something on your screen caught his eye. "is that me on your homescreen?" he asked and you were quick to put your phone against your chest. "uh, what?" you asked trying to act clueless. "you used my picture as your wallpaper, you adore that much, don't you?" he said playfully. "ew, who says i have you as my wallpaper?" you asked back while he just scoffed. "i saw it y/n, don't lie~" sunoo said and you sat up from laying down on his lap. "fine" you mumbled out your answer. "do you have a crush on me~?" he asked, more onto the teasing side but you had accidentally spilled your actual answer to him. "haha you bet!" you say with awkward finger guns. "i- uh, need to use the bathroom, be right back!" you say as you quickly headed to the bathroom. sunoo knew what your answer meant, so now he's left there- smiling and giggling on how his best friend likes him back.

jungwon

you had been planning on telling jungwon about how you left through a letter and planned on telling later on the walk back home from school. "y/n" your classmate called before you exited the classroom. "you're a friend of yang jungwon, right?" she asked and you nodded. "could you please give this letter to him? it's regarding the quiz bee thing, i'm one of his teammates" she said as she handed you the folded paper, similar to the love letter (for jungwon) you were holding. "oh okay, i'll give it to him!" you say as you got the letter. "oh thanks, y/n" she said and bid her goodbyes as she left. as you walked beside jungwon back home you remembered the letter from your classmate. "oh jungwon, my classmate said i should give you this letter- its about the quiz bee thing" you said as you stopped walking and looked for it inside your bag. "ugh it's probably another reminder to review" he said as he opened the letter, but then you can see confusion evident in his face. "uh-you give me butterflies every time i see you... uh i don't think this is about the quiz bee-" "what do you mean, let me see?" you say as he shows you the letter. "i- oh my god! i didn't mean to give you that!" you say as you look into your bag again and give the other letter. "here-" "i'll read it when i get home, let me read yours first" he said with a soft smile and intertwined his hands into yours.

ni-ki

"i leave for a minute to use the bathroom and now my phone is missing- riki where the hell did you hide it?" you say, literally flipping all the pillows in your room. "ugh even one of my earbud is missing" you say. "why are you looking at me like that?" riki asks, trying to act clueless. "why are you always hiding my stuff? this isn't even your house!" you say as you walk around your room trying to look for your phone and one of the missing earbud. "please tell me where you hid it" you say as he just laughed and laid down on your bed. "what do i get in return?" he asks playfully. "i'll buy you some bungeoppang" you say, hoping he'll give back what he hid from you. "sounds good! here's your phone now" he says taking it out from under his shirt. "uh, my earbud though?" you say as put your hand out, signaling he give it now. "ah- that's for another deal" he says. "riki just what the fu-" "is jay hyung your boyfriend?" he asked. "no he isn't, where did you get that from?" you asked back. "people were talking about it at school- and i was really offended that you didn't tell your own bff" riki said with (yet again) a playful tone and with a pout. "i don't know why they would say that- because the only guy i'm in love with is you" you impulsively. "you what?" he asked. "i what?" you asked back. "you're in love.... with me?!" riki asks pointing at himself. "you know what- give me back my earbud when i get back, i'll go buy your bungeoppang now- bye!" you ran out the door leaving riki who's a flustered mess now. he then punches the air and you could hear his screams of victory "woo! y/n likes me!" you can hear which makes you more flustered as well.

[swtki]

My Game - Spencer Reid x Reader

This is a part 2 to Teachers Pet

SUMMARY: After Y/Ns little test, she takes Dr. Reid up on his offer. She also takes him back to the apartment. 

WARNINGS: 18+ CONTENT, SMUT, FEM READER, PROFFESOR-STUDENT, TEACHER REID, ORAL (FEMALE RECIEVING), PENATRATIVE SEX, SEMI DOM-SUB

It had been three days since Dr. Reid emailed me. I hadn’t texted him yet, too afraid of not knowing what to say. When I pulled that little stunt at his desk, I expected nothing to come of it. Just seeing his cute and pink face was enough of a reward. But it was obvious to me in the days following, he wanted to cross his finish line.

My phone sat comfortably in my hands, the series of numbers lining the top of my screen. I had not an inkling of an idea of what I would say. Should I go casual? Professional? Sexy? I mean, did anyone ever know how to aproach their crush?

Y: It’s Y/N, sorry I took so long. I’ve been kinda busy.

S: No worries, I was beginning to think I had read the room incorrectly. What are your plans for Saturday night? Theres a great Italian restaurant next to where I’m staying in DC.

Y: That sounds wonderful, actually. I’ll meet you there at 7?

S: Perfect.

I reluctantly pulled my figure from the sofa, and soon eagerly jumping into the shower. When the water hit my face the entire day melted away, and left only the anticipation of that night. I felt so special, I mean I was living my most vivid fantasies and not every woman gets to do it with a genius professor.

With my makeup carefully applied, and my dress matching my shoes, I started down the stairs. As my heels made a clicking noise, I started to feel a familiar flutter in my stomach. I was nervous; First date nervous. Though I had met him many times, and most recently met his body with mine, the event of a first date was a pâté of emotions.

The door of the restaurant was cold against my hand. I didn’t expect a high end dining experience, and when I walked in the entry way I was glad it wasn’t. The entry way was filled with cozy items. The faded rose pattern on the wallpaper complimented the display of family photos.

“Excuse me, I’m looking for a tall brunette man, it was a table for two.” I said to the hostess. She paused for a second, tapping on her tablet as she checks the current table descriptions.

“Ah yes, party of two for Reid?”

I confirmed and she led me through a hallway to our left, which led into a small dining area. The room walls were a burgundy color, illuminated by the candle sitting at the head of each table.

I thanked the woman as I walked toward Spencer. He looked a tad bit cleaner than usual, his hair was combed and tucked away behind his ears.

“Oh, here let me get that for you.” He rose from his seat and rushed over to the chair across from him.

“How gentleman like, Doctor.” He laughed and we both took our seats.

“Please, call me Spencer.” His form was more relaxed than it usually was in class, giving him a calmer and peaceful demeanor.

Dinner progressed, a glass of wine was nursed, and he insisted on paying our check. Though I had been on dates before, this felt like my first real adult date.

“How did you get here?” He inquired as we stepped onto the rough parking lot terrain.

“I took a cab, I’m thinking I may catch the train though.” I said. His mouth spread into a displeased expression.

“Nonsense, please let me drive you home. I would hate for those statistics we learned last week be applied in this manor.” I laughed and rolled my eyes. I hesitated to answer for a moment, instinctually I looked down and shifted my weight on my feet. The thought of him driving me home could end up in a number of ways; Mostly good. But, if I did take the train, it would end in a few ways; Mostly unmentionable.

“Alright, since you asked nicely.” His cheeks grew red as he avoided eye contact with me. I knew right then where our night would likely head.

“Would you like to come up? We can have a drink if you aren’t hell-bent on going to sleep before nine-thirty.” I joked with him.

“Are you sure? I wouldn’t want you to feel forced into anything because I know that theres a certain expectation when-“

“Spencer, if I didn’t want to fuck you, I wouldn’t have asked you up.”

Sure, having to say it in blatant terms is less than sexy, but thats what I adored about our dynamic at that point; I led the relationship.

I leaned into my fridge, purposefully bending over so my skirt lifted to show my ass.

“Well...fuck,” I said, “As it would turn out, someone stole my wine bottle and filled my fucking vodka bottle with water.” I stood up and shut the door, walking over to the counter inches away.

“One time I took the drink turn when it came to our friend-team-dinner-night, the bottle was forty dollars, which granted is the cheap wine more or less. To this day I still have no idea who stole the bottle, because I wanted to take it home.” Spencer reminisced. I laughed at his unusual way of trying to understand.

“Wasn’t really mine to begin with,” I started walking over to the sofa where he patiently sat. “I’m not of legal drinking age. But of course it tastes better when its forbidden, everything does.” I stepped in front of the man, his knees only an inch from my shin. "Can I touch you, Spencer?” I said in a soft voice, the lids of my eyes relaxed in a sweet shift.

“Y-yes.” He gasped, obviously so turned on by the way I stood over him, in power of him. I threaded his hair through my fingers and tugged back, pushing his head as far up as I could. His eyelids fell and he was no longer looking at me.

“Look at me, sweetheart. I want you to see everything.” He opened his eyes, his irises were colored with lust and desperation. I connected our lips in a long a sweet kiss. Rather than just having a mess of tongues, the kiss was filled to the brim with emotion, of pleasure that this was happening again. His lips were slightly swollen when I pulled away to unbutton his shirt. While I fiddled with the garment, he put his hands on my hips firmly.

“Can I- can you sit on my lap?” he asked, a red tint forming on his face. I smiled and obliged, sliding his shirt off of his lean torso. I started kissing him once more, this time I made sure to press my dripping panties against the large tent in his trousers.

“Would you like to take this to the bedroom?” I ask,hands resting comfortably on his neck.

“Please”, I stood and laced our hands together, leading him to my bedroom. Once we both entered through the doorway, I pushed him onto the bed, he fell softly.

I reached my hands behind my back to unzip my dress, as I felt it fall past my legs and onto the floor, I saw his eyes scan every detail of my body.

“One might say you were planning this.” He eyed my matching lace set.

“Wanted to make sure Spencer Reid had the best.” I replied, climbing on top of him so that I would be straddling him. I felt his hands connect to my waist as we kissed, his hands were warm and excited me even more. He pulled away, quickly pressing his lips to my neck and collarbone. My breath hitched in my throat as he bit down lightly on the skin. “Lets get these off, shall we?” I motioned to his pants, which had to be killing him right now. While he does that, I reach into my drawer and retrieve a condom, laying against the plush material of my pillows after I set it down on the table.

He gets on top of me , pressing his lips with mine as he rubs the back of my bra, signaling he wants me to take it off. I ,of course, reach back and unhook it, tossing it onto the floor. He grabs my tit while dancing his tongue with mine, making me more wet than I thought was possible. Usually, these actions signified a need for control, but when Spencer did it, it was like a desperate sixteen year old boy. Its clear he needed me.

“Can I...” he nods down to my cunt, still covered by the thin material of my panties.

“Can you what, Spencer?” I lace my fingers in his hair and pull, earning a soft groan from the man hovering over me.

“Can I please eat you out?” He begged. I smiled and pushed his head down, spreading my legs when his face met my stomach. He started by taking his thumb and rubbing over my clothed pussy. I bucked my hips, desperate for more friction. “Is it okay for me to take these off?” His eyes met mine, searching for confirmation. I smiled and nodded, moving my hands to stroke his hair rather than tug at it.

As his fingers latched onto the last piece of fabric that covered me, instinctually I pushed my hips upwards. He looked at me, silently asking if taking the garment off was still okay. When I bit my lip, a rose hue covered his face. He was flustered by me, by the escalation of us. But nevertheless, he slowly pulled off the last piece of modesty I had.

To re-assure him, I lightly tugged at his hair. Thankfully, he took the hint and licked a long stripe on my clit. My voice was caught in my throat as he continued making flat-tongued movements. I felt his hands slowly wrap around my thighs, pushing my heat into his face more than it already was.

He devoured me without hesitation, but when he pulled away for air he replaced it with two fingers and then when my stomach tensed and my eyes rolled back into my head, he used three. I finished with his mouth sucking on my bundle of nerves and his fingers buried inside me.

“Do you want to keep going?” He raised his head up and his thumb stroked my thigh, which he was still grasped onto.

“Yes, God yes please, Spencer.” I whined, the high fading away. He stood up off the bed and removed his strained boxers. He was beautiful; His lanky form was now a lean masculine type. I smiled at him, to which he obviously thought he was being laughed at. He couldn’t make eye contact with me, resulting to the floor instead. “Spencer,” I crawled towards the edge of my bed and placed my hands on his shoulders, “You are so gorgeous, the reason I’m smiling is because you always hide it in those sweater vests.” he relaxed.

“Thanks” he mumbles, still avoiding my eyes.

“Now please, come back here and let me take care of you.” He climbed back onto the bed while I rested against the pillows. He was nervous, and obviously he wanted to do it right. I could see his hands shaking as he unwrapped the condom and put it on.

“You’re sure?” He asks, the tip of his cock resting on the top of my inner thigh. He was easily six inches, my hand could probably wrap around and be too small.

“Yes, please fuck me.” He slowly inserted himself into my dripping cunt, causing me to let out a lewd string of words. Once again, my hands flung to his hair and tugged harshly, causing his arms to almost buckle beneath his own weight. I could feel his pelvis against mine, his muscular bottom torso pressed up against my clit. “Move, baby, its okay.” I reassure him. His hips pull away from mine, then snap back with a nice pressure. He quickly started to pick up his pace, small grunts escaping through his clenched jaw. “Do you like the feeling of your pathetic little cock inside my cunt? I bet you feel like a special little bitch now.” I moaned into his ear. “Well, are you going to tell me how much you enjoy my cunt?”.

“God, yes! I love it so fucking-“ his moan paused the sentence and he focused on getting his movements right.

“So fucking what? Go on, finish the sentence baby.”

“So fucking good, I love being inside of you so much!” He was practically whimpering in pleasure.

“Be a good boy and make me cum all over that pretty little cock of yours?” I struggled to contain my moans, I could not fall apart this quickly.

“Yes I will!” His fingers reached down to rub my clit, impressively keeping a steady rhythm. I felt the knot in my stomach becoming hotter and hotter as the minutes passed by.

“Oh my god, such a good- oh my god!” my eyes rolled back into my head as the impact of my orgasm was full forced. When my head cleared, I tugged on his hair, pulling his head so he could look me in the eye. “Gonna cum soon? Are you going to cum all inside of me?” his thrusts got off beat, he was close.

“Yes, I’m gonna-“

“Ask permission to cum, Spencer.”

“Can I please cum inside of you? Please?” He whines.

“Of course you can, baby.” With that he makes a strained moaning noise and his hips slowly stop moving. We’re both panting, while he flushes the condom I walk into the bathroom next to him. I turn to the shower and twist the hot water knob.

“We might as well get clean together, yeah?” I said.

“Yeah.” he smiles and kisses me once more.

[sequinsmile-x]

hiiii! 24 or 38 for fluff 🥰

Prompt 24: "This reminded me of you."

Prompt from this list - I am still taking them if anyone wants me to write more about these two idiots in love.

This is dedicated to any of you who love Girl Dad Aaron.

Words: 1.7k (it got away from me a little)

Warnings: So fluffy it might rot your teeth

It starts the moment Eliza is born. Emily was laying there, her legs still up in stirrups, her chest bared to a room full of strangers and her husband, as her baby was handed to her for the first time. She held their daughter, Eliza, to her skin with shaking hands and wouldn’t have been able to stop the tears that streamed down her face even if she wanted to.

Emily stares at her, unable to take her eyes off of her daughter. She was bright red and squawking, protesting at the shock of being born. But she was beautiful. She had a shock of dark hair on her head and her fathers frown.

“Hey, baby.” Emily says, cupping the back of her daughter’s head. “Hi.” She tears her eyes away from the baby to look at Aaron, the tears still falling when she takes in the look of pure adoration on his face. “Aaron, look at her.”

That’s when he says it for the first time.

“She’s just like you.”

____________

Aaron semi-retires not long after the birth of their daughter. An attempt to learn from his past with Jack, and recognition that both parents in the home couldn’t be away for days at a time. It’s an argument that lasts almost the first 2 months of Eliza’s life. Which one of them should leave the BAU. Ultimately he wins, and he stays home with the kids whilst Emily continues to work to bring down the worst criminals the FBI dealt with.

Aaron guest lectures at the academy, running a couple of classes a semester. His stories of the BAU fascinating the students. So many case studies he would never run out of material.

He wakes on a Saturday alone in his bed, Emily away on a case that had dragged on a few days longer than she had hoped.

He sighs as he walks downstairs, stroking Sergio’s head as he walks by, briefly popping his head into Jack’s and then Eliza’s bedroom to see they are empty. He follows the sound of Jack playing video games and finds him in the den, his eyes fixed on the TV screen.

“Morning, Jack.”

“Morning, Dad.”

Aaron smiles when his son doesn’t even look at him. “Pancakes for breakfast?”

“Sounds good”

“Where’s your sister?”

Jack shrugs, still not looking up from his game. “I don’t know, she was playing with her toys last time I saw her.”

Aaron shakes his head at his son.

He hears giggling before he sees her. He enters the kitchen to see his three year old sitting on the kitchen counter, her hand literally in the cookie jar, as she smiles at him with chocolate all over her face. She was still in her pyjamas. The hair he had neatly braided the night before in disarray.

She was so much like Emily.

“Eliza.” He says, unable to stop himself from smiling at her. Aaron was wrapped around her finger and the whole family knew it. Emily often made fun of him for it, playfully teasing him as she correctly said their daughter could get away with anything. “How did you get up there?”

“Daddy’s silly.” Eliza says as if it answers his question, as she laughs at him in a way that is so Emily it makes his chest bloom with love.

He spots the stool from the kitchen island dragged over to the counter near where she is sitting, and realises she had pulled it over to climb up there. He digs his phone out of his sweatpants and opens the camera.

“Come on, smile for Mommy.” He says, pointing the phone at her.

“Mommy!” Eliza says, delighted, hands, covered in chocolate, reaching out for the camera.

He quickly snaps a photo and sends it to Emily, captioned “This reminded me of you.”

____________

Emily’s phone vibrates in her pocket and she pulls it out, smiling when she sees the photo from Aaron. Her heart aches when she sees Eliza, her wide smile as she reaches towards the camera, half a chocolate cookie smashed in her tiny hand.

“You ok, princess?” Derek asks, bringing her attention back to the room. Emily rolls her eyes at him before she puts her phone back in her pocket.

“I’m fine.”

“Are you sure? If you need a break-”

“Derek.” She says, voice firm. “I’m fine. You’re worse than Aaron.”

He raises an eyebrow at her. “Just because he’s not my boss anymore doesn’t mean I want to explain to him why his wife got sick at work.”

Her glare shuts him up, and he goes back to the point he was trying to make before Aaron’s text had distracted her.

____________

Aaron continues to send her pictures throughout the day. Eliza on top form, mischief flowing off of her at every turn.

She insists on trying to push Jack on the swings when they get to the park, and Jack swings himself gently back and forth, letting his younger sister believe she was doing it.

She gets ice cream all over herself, and ends up running the game she plays with the other toddlers when Jack goes to play soccer with his friends.

Aaron takes photos of all of it, sending Emily all of them.

She calls him that evening, her voice laced with amusement and exhaustion in equal measure.

“Which was your favourite?” He asks as he climbs into bed.

“Oh, definitely the one of her half way through Sergio’s cat flap.” She laughs. “It’s already my new wallpaper on my phone.”

“She’s so much like you, sweetheart.”

“You can’t just send me photos of her misbehaving and say that all the time, honey.”

He has the audacity to laugh down the phone at her, and he knows she will have bitten her lip to prevent her smile even though they can’t see each other.

“But baby, that’s when she is most like you.”

____________

When she gets home it is late, so late it’s almost early, and she sighs as she locks the front door behind her, double checking it is secure before she walks further into the house.

Emily walks upstairs, checking in on Jack as she walks past his room. She pulls his covers up around him a little tighter, presses a kiss to his forehead that he would shy away from if he was awake, just old enough now to find his parents uncool.

She briefly frowns when she pops her head into Eliza’s room and finds her bed empty, momentary panic flooding through her until logic kicks in. A smile on her face when she realises where she will find her little girl.

She gently opens the master bedroom door and her smile widens when she sees Aaron and Eliza in the bed, snuggled together facing where she would usually sleep.

He was such a good dad. She’d always known that, had known it before they were even a couple, but something about watching him with their daughter, the love him and Eliza had for each other, made her ache.

Aaron always told her how much Eliza reminded him of her, but all she saw was him. His stoicism and kindness their daughter embodied. His frown that Eliza had whenever she didn’t get her way.

Eliza was the good bits of both of them, and Emily hoped that the world wouldn’t harden her like it had them.

Emily quickly changes into her pyjamas and climbs into bed next to them, the movement of the bed waking Eliza. The little girl turns over and blearily opens her eyes, looking at her as confusion spreads over her face.

“Mama.”

She shushes Eliza, pulling her into her arms. “Mommy’s here.” She presses a kiss to her hair, tucking her daughter tightly to her side. “Go back to sleep, sweet girl.”

Aaron wakes up to find his wife laying next to him, Eliza asleep on her. Emily is awake, her hand stroking up and down their daughter’s back like she used to do when she was a newborn, only able to fall asleep with her mother’s seemingly magic touch.

“Hi sweetheart.”

Emily opens her eyes and turns to look at him, a sleepy smile on her face. “Hey you.”

He moves towards her, knowing she can’t move without waking the toddler in their bed. Aaron kisses his wife and tucks some of her hair behind her ear. He keeps his hand on her face, stroking her jawline gently.

“I missed you.” He whispers before pressing his forehead against hers briefly.

“I missed you too.”

Aaron smiles at her admission, the lack of a humorous response indicating how tired she must really be. His hand drifts down to her abdomen, his palm pressed to the barely there bump.

“Are you ok? Both of you.”

She rolls her eyes at him, but it’s full of adoration. “We’re both fine, honey.” She smirks at him. “Even if Derek almost did annoy me to death, I’m assuming because you threatened him with some awful fate if he didn’t keep an eye on me.”

Aaron smiles at her, caught out just like he knew he would be. “I may have told him I’d recommend him to the academy for firearm training with all the new recruits.”

Emily laughs at that, and it jostles Eliza, who briefly grumbles before falling back asleep.

Emily looks back up at Aaron, a wistful look on her face. It makes him frown, concern for her spreading through him like it burnt.

“Are you sure you’re ok?”

“Yeah.” She says, nodding. “It’s just, I miss her and Jack so much when I’m gone. How am I going to feel with another kid I’m leaving behind?”

“You aren’t leaving them behind, love.” He says, kissing her forehead. “You’re doing an important job.” He feels her shudder, and he knows her emotions are getting the better of her. He cups the back of her head, his lips still pressed to her skin. “And we have about 6 months left before the baby comes to figure things out if you want a change.”

She nods against him, her agreement silent.

“You could do with some sleep.”

He runs his fingers through her hair until she drifts off, her breath evening out against his skin. He pulls back just enough to look at his girls, his beautiful daughter and his pregnant wife.

He hopes their next baby is a girl too, and that she’s just like her mother.

[luvteez]

bassists do it deeper

pairing: yunho x genderneutral!reader genre + tags: smut, band au | kink discovery, exhibitionism, a brief segment of semi-public sex, hand kink, size kink, yunho monster cock bc this deserves a tag, power play, switch dynamics (i think??), dom!yunho pulls through in the end, unprotected sex wc: 6.3k

note: big thanks to my fav babie @lustjoong​ for motivating me to combine the two ideas i had for the prompt into one and motivating me to finish this!! here’s my take on the unspoken obligatory yunho size kink fic every ateez smut writer should have written once but make him a bassist. also, the band au to this pwp is literally just there as an excuse to make yeosang the lead singer of the band bc if kq won’t give yeosang lines, i will 

A lot can happen throughout a single weekend, as your English professor suddenly quitting her job, your brother Yeosang almost burning down the kitchen from deep frying an egg, an influx of voicemails in your inbox all sent from Wooyoung, as well as Yeosang’s punk rock band losing a member. It’s a lot to process when all you’ve done is stay the night at Yuqi’s, even harder so when Wooyoung keeps repeating every five seconds that Seonghwa quit the band. (”Why did it have to be Seonghwa who left Stereowave? He was the hottest one!”)

That being said, you expected to come home to a beyond grumpy Yeosang who was trying to find a replacement asap. A band without a bassist sounds empty, and while Stereowave has garnered a big enough fanbase over the years that wouldn’t mind the band continuing as a trio, it just feels wrong. Besides, branding a group consisting of Yeosang the frontman, San the guitarist, Mingi the drummer, and nobody covering the bassist position a band doesn’t sit right.

You were prepared for the worst; a messy kitchen, Yeosang walking around in clothes he wore for five days straight, possibly the outbreak of World War III depending on how shitty he’s feeling. But instead, you find the kitchen exceptionally clean and Yeosang acting as if nothing ever happened.

“Can you help set up the camera? The guys and I wanna film a new song.”

“Uh, sure,” you answer irritatedly. “Shouldn’t you be more concerned about finding a replacement for Seonghwa though?”

“Oh, we already have a new bassist,” he waves off casually, “What are you gaping at? Shut that jaw of yours before flies fly into your nasty mouth.”

“First of all, rude.” Yeosang rolls his eyes at that comment. For a split second, you’re contemplating letting him figure out on his own how to use the camera because he’s the walking embodiment of a technology illiterate, but your curiosity about the new band member is bigger. “But how did you manage to find a new replacement so fast? It’s been like, what, a day since Seonghwa left?”

Yeosang sighs. “He’s been thinking of quitting for weeks now, so I had enough time to look for a new bassist. It’s not that big of a deal anyway.”

And this is exactly why you should never get dicked down by your bandmate several times in a month, you think to yourself. Seonghwa and Yeosang thought they were slick, but everyone figured they were more than friends. Needless to say, it was only a matter of time until the strain of their relationship wreaked havoc within the band.

“So,” you say as you two walk to the makeshift studio in the basement, “Is the new guy good? What’s his name?”

The change of topic makes Yeosang relax visibly. There’s a sheepish smile on his face and he replies, “You’ll see.”

You arch a brow. For some reason, that doesn’t settle comfortably in your gut. Then there’s the fact that Yeosang is slightly skipping, and that makes you more concerned than relieved. Because Yeosang barely skips, only when he’s being petty and is planning on pranking somebody. (Most of the time, it’s San.)

The faint vibrations of drums and guitars ring in your ears before you step a foot into the basement. Mingi is the first to acknowledge your presence, immediately dampening the cymbals before waving at you. That causes the other two guys to stop playing their instruments and turn their heads around. You greet San like you normally do, and when your eyes flit to the new addition, all brightness drops from your face.

“What. The. Fuck.”

Yunho cocks his head to the side almost tauntingly, eyes challenging. The corners of his mouth quirk upwards, though more with the intention of saying hah you thought you’d never see me again. “Hello to you too, honey. Looks like fate brought us together once more, eh?”

You blink multiple times to make sure your eyes aren’t deceiving you. To your dismay, they sure aren’t. It really is Yunho standing right next to an utterly confused San, and the bass in his hands just confirms it furthermore.

“Since when do you play an instrument?” you gawk. There’s no fucking way he could’ve had time to pick up music, not when his schedule was already jammed with basketball training and student council activities. Then again, that was his schedule in middle school.

“Since I was fifteen,” he drawls, unaffected by your outburst. “Any other questions, honey? Preferably something along the lines of how have you been? I expected a warmer welcome from you, not gonna lie.”

“What does Yeosang even see in you?” you splutter instead, disgust prevalent in your voice.

“Talent. Believe it or not.”

“Guys, no fighting,” Yeosang warns, but you’re too busy sending Yunho daggers and every pg rated curse under the sun your brain can wrack up.

Meanwhile, San shifts his weight on one leg awkwardly and asks in the background as your verbal dispute continues, “Are they exes or something?”

“Nah, just childhood enemies,” Mingi mumbles, clearly used to your interactions to the point where he’s becoming bored of it. He’s heard all the profanities too many times coming out from the same mouth, hence why he isn’t as disturbed as San is.

“Listen up, you piec—“ 

“(y/n), the camera. Help your older brother out, will ya?” Yeosang cuts you off urgently, the warning tone in his words hard to miss.

“Yeah, help your brother out, shorty,” Yunho snickers. Appalled by his blatant shamelessness, you scowl.

“I’m not that short—!”

“Still shorter than I am, shorty. Or do you prefer honey?”

World War III would’ve broken out right then and there if it weren’t for Yeosang’s death glare — you know, the look he has etched on his face whenever he means business and is willing to go so far and expose all of the nasty mishaps you’ve done in middle school, which is definitely something that should never see the light of day.

“I prefer neither,” you mutter after weighing the gravity of Yeosang’s wrath, avoiding any eyes before you set up the camera. Luckily, nobody further comments on that and eventually, everybody resumes practicing their parts of the songs.

Just in time as Mingi takes another short break to chug his water down, you stumble across a problem. “Uh, Yeosang? You should buy a new camera. This is still usable, but you might have to reset every ten minutes or so.”

A groan leaves him, followed by a shrill guitar riff, and you can see that he’d prefer death over spending money for a new one. “Can’t you just stay here during practice and reset it? You also get to hear some new tracks of the upcoming EP!” That fucker, he’s just too lazy to run forward and press a button every few minutes.

“I have to be on standby for the Block B ticket sale,” you lie. Technically, it’s not really a lie because you do plan on going to the Block B concert with Wooyoung, but 1) the ticket sale isn’t even today and 2) it’s always Wooyoung who buys the tickets. Yeosang doesn’t need to know that though. Any excuse is better than having to sit through practice and see if Yunho is as good as he claims.

Seems like Yeosang desperately doesn’t want to keep running back and forth to reset the camera as he suddenly says, “You can do it here too.” You would argue that the garage has its separate WiFi and only the band members have access to it, but then: “You can use my laptop instead.”

And letting you use his laptop is something he never does. You failed to submit an assignment in time because your own laptop broke down and he didn’t let you borrow his computer for even that.

“Fine,” you sigh in defeat. Yeosang thanks you with a smile so obnoxiously sweet it makes you gag. When all he gets in return from you is the middle finger, his demeanor drops and he mutters something inaudible under his breath, pointing to the small table at the side where all their phones and laptops are lying before he goes back to the others.

Once all four of them are in position and ready to play, you press the record button before flipping yourself onto the old patchwork couch Yeosang bought at a garage sale for only thirty quid a few years back. To your surprise, Yeosang’s MacBook is already unlocked, the default wallpaper of mountains and northern lights quite jarring to your eyes.

When given the rare chance to have unlimited access to your sibling’s devices, it’s self-explanatory what to do. You either a) go through all of their accounts and find as much dirt as possible about them that serves as good material for future blackmail purposes or b) sign them up to as many online subscriptions as possible that will make them go crazy. Unfortunately, that doesn’t work on Yeosang because 1) he doesn’t mind online subscriptions, and 2) he never checks his email account, hence why his inbox is filled with over 2000 mails, a third of them most likely unopened. On top of that, his MacBook is strictly meant for work, so if you really wanted to find out his most embarrassing secrets, your only shot is his phone.

That being said, you’re left with option c) which is checking out Block B’s concert merch since that’s the only sensible thing you can do right now. Forget productivity; that isn’t doable when Yeosang’s deep timbre is blaring in your ears along with the instruments. To be honest, you really enjoy Stereowave’s music and that’s on their music, not because your brother is the lead singer. You’ve enjoyed each of their performances and perhaps you’ve been indulging in the privilege of hearing their new songs first.

But now that Yunho’s involved, suddenly the prospect of having a new favorite band sounds tempting. What was Yuqi’s favorite band again? Day6? You should take a closer look at their discography.

As much as you want to mute the sound, from San’s riffs to Mingi’s drum solo, you fail to do so. One moment you’re opening the search browser, and in the next, your eyes are set on the group. They’re practicing like they usually do; fun etched on their faces as they lose themselves in the music. Yeosang is singing as if he was performing in front of a million viewers while San improvises a solo on a whim. Mingi messes up the beat for a split second after failing to catch his stick and somehow, your eyes have zoomed in on Yunho. It doesn’t take you five seconds to realize:

Yunho is good.

While he might not seem as fired up as the other three, he’s visibly relaxed. Just like Seonghwa, he plays smoothly and isn’t overpowered by the others, but he seems to have an easier time gliding his fingers across the fingerboard. The bassline is easy to filter out, not the generic pattern you can find in every second pop song, yet still compliments the other instruments.

He can play, fair game. However, that’s the least of your worries. You’re more attentive to the ratio of his hands to the bass. His hands are larger than Seonghwa’s by far, no doubt. That makes sense given his height, maybe an inch taller than Mingi. But Mingi doesn’t have that big hands. Doesn’t that mean that Yunho’s body is disproportional?

Before you know it, you drag your gaze from his shoes up to his legs and stop at his hands briefly, only to proceed upwards until you see the cocky smirk and amused eyes directed at you. All clogs in your brain come to a stillstand and despite that, that’s when you realize you’ve been 1) enjoying his music, 2) checking him out, and 3) checking him out and caught red-handed.

It feels as if you were living on the sun instead of on Earth as you burn up in embarrassment. Knowing there’s no way you can deflect what you just did, you quickly turn back to the laptop, the Google search bar staring back at you.

You’re about to type in something when the search history pops up, catching your eyes. A gasp leaves you but it goes under the music, everyone too immersed in their own thing to notice the prevalent horror settling on your face.

exhibitionism

getting off in public

best crowded places to have sex and get away with it

You blink, thinking that your sleep deprivation got the worst out of you and that you’ve finally reached the stage where you start hallucinating. Except, you know you’re not hallucinating. After going through the words again and again, you know that you’re really not fucking hallucinating and that your nonexistent sleep cycle isn’t as bad as Yuqi makes it out to be.

When you said you wanted to dig up dirt on your brother, you didn’t mean it in the form of his kinks. Money can’t buy everything, but how you wish it could so you could unsee that shocking discovery.

Since this is Yeosang’s work computer and he’s signed into his Google account, he must make use of the drive to save a copy of his ideas. It probably won’t amount to anything since he’s the walking embodiment of staying unbothered, but writing him a note on his docs about how he’s made your life worse by not clearing his search history is better than staying silent.

You click on the little icon on the top right corner, expecting to see Yeosang’s name right above the email address. But then you see Yunho’s name instead, and suddenly everything makes much more sense.

This was never Yeosang’s laptop to begin with.

To say you’re at a loss of words is an understatement. There’s no way someone could have as little self-awareness and leave their laptop unlocked, let alone Yunho out of all people. Then again, the last thing you expected from him was to play the bass and blend well with the rest of the band as if he’s always been the bassist of Stereowave and not the newly found replacement.

This is absolutely bonkers. But:

You could have fun with it. Maybe it’s for the better that money can’t buy everything.

Besides dozens of articles about semi-public sex and even a blogpost titled Shagging in Broad Daylight for Dummies, his search history of the last 24 hours consists of many forum links discussing the morality of exhibitionism, conspiracy theories, and hand care guides. You wheeze when you see the private playlist he saved on his YouTube account; a collection of videos about filing your nails properly and the best hand cream brands for dry skin.

Yeosang calls in for a break, and everyone’s grateful for it. San lets out a relieved noise as he places his guitar on the stand before catching the water bottle Mingi chucks at him.

“My arms are beat,” Mingi complains.

San sends him an incredulous look and snorts, “All you do is bang! crash! ppang! while my throat is fucked! And so are my legs!”

“Not my fault if you keep doing your high pitched oows! while jumping around like a— like a cricket!”

“A cricket? Are you serious?”

“I’m tired, okay!”

“Then that means we should call it a day and go home and rest, right?”

“Choi San, I think you’re onto something.”

“Absolutely not,” Yeosang deadpans, causing the bickering duo to pout in sync. “We have lots to do especially since Yunho’s now part of the band.” When all he’s met with is an attempt of cute puppy eyes that rather looks like a bad rendition of any horror movie featuring creepy dolls, Yeosang sighs, “I ordered chicken for dinner and yes, it’s on me.”

In an instant, Mingi and San’s faces brighten up and they’re celebrating as if they won a free cruise to the Bahamas. They don’t hesitate to envelop Yeosang in a bear hug, crushing the life out of him. A chuckle escapes you at the sight of your brother wringing for his sanity. Sometimes you wonder how on Earth those three guys are the same three guys who perform in abandoned warehouses, jamming out their punk rock songs while looking all edgy (in a cool way that has at least half of their fans thirsting after them).

Meanwhile, Yunho drops himself on the other end of the couch. Propping his right leg on the coffee table in front, he digs around in his pockets before pulling something out.

“Since when do you file your nails?” You pointedly raise a brow at him. Although your extensive research on his browser history already answered that question, you ask him just for the sake of it.

“Hand care is important, shorty,” Yunho replies, keeping his eyes trained on his fingers as he works the file around a nail. “If Kageyama Tobio files his nails, I can too. But enough with the small talk, what do you want?”

“I didn’t peg you as an exhibitionist.”

His hand stops moving. Yunho looks up at you, irritation written all over his features. “Because I file my nails...? A bold assumption, honey.”

There’s a reason why Yunho has always gotten away with pretty much everything. He’s a good actor who’s able to feign innocence at any time. His posture is relaxed, voice genuinely sounding flabbergasted that not even your shit-eating grin can throw him off guard.

You can’t, but your proof will do the job.

“I never said it’s because of your hand fixation.” You turn the laptop screen his way and once his eyes flicker on it and decipher the words, his face falls. Gone is the faux-confusion; as all color drains from him, his eyes look like they’re about to fall out of their sockets. “Is it really a bold assumption now, honey?”

Yunho inhales sharply when you scoot closer to him and put a firm hand on his left leg, his laptop now closed and long forgotten. Your fingers are placed too high for it to be friendly, skimming lightly on the inside of his thigh. Yeosang and the others are busy minding their own business but the chance of getting caught in the act is still there. The simple realization has adrenaline running a hundred miles an hour in your veins, and with the way Yunho clenches his jaw — a desperate attempt to fight the groan that’s threatening in the back of his throat — you’re not the only one who’s aroused by the setup.

Slowly, your hand inches closer to his growing bulge. Before you can dare yet another experimental squeeze, Yunho’s hand surges forward and holds your wrist in a vice grip.

“Don’t,” he snarls through gritted teeth, but it sounds sadder than it is intimidating when he’s sporting a boner right in front of your eyes.

You cock your head to the side, almost in a mocking demeanor. “You sure? Think about it, it’s a win-win situation. You get to live out your exhibitionist right here in front of your new bandmates, and I get the confirmation that you’re into it. But if you really don’t want to…” you try to retreat your hand but Yunho doesn’t let you budge, hand still enclosed around yours. That won’t do as an answer.

“Which one is it? Say it, Yunho,” you assert, narrowing your eyes. Yunho looks distraught, feverishly biting his lip while he’s internally fighting with himself, but he eventually chokes out a response.

“As long as nobody notices—”

“You either say you want me to touch you or not. I don’t want any roundabout stories.”

“Touch me,” he whispers defeatedly and the grip on your hand disappears completely. “But I swear to God if anyone realizes what you’re doing— hhnh—!” he cuts himself off with a low moan when you cup him over the material of his jeans.

“Yes yes, I get it. I don’t need Yeosang to know about this,” you dismiss. “And oh wow, you’re getting hard fast when I’m just touching you over your pants.”

���Just get to it.”

The snappish attitude causes you to stop dead in your tracks. “You think you’re in the position to tell me what to do? I can be mean too, y’know,” you start nonchalantly, a stark contrast to the way your heart is shaking in your ribcage. The power you suddenly hold is exhilarating. “I could just leave you like this, and then you’d have to try to cover your situation down there while practice goes on. How would the others react if they only knew your dick is hard? Probably won’t take them too long to find out since standing for a long time can be tiring, hm?”

Yunho’s head lolls back in response as he’s struggling to keep his eyes open. His breathing is uneven and the resulting moan that follows suit makes you smirk. You lightly smack the inside of his thigh, causing another wave of arousal to rupture in him. He chokes out a hushed ‘f-fuck’ and at this point, the constriction around his cock must be bordering painful.

“Who would’ve thought that the big bad Jeong Yunho is actually a submissive bitch who’s hungry for attention?” you ask gleefully, delivering another slap before stroking the area. “Who would’ve fucking thought you were a sub?”

“I-I’m not— shit, s-stop that, hngh— a fucking sub.”

“Yeah yeah, say that to yourself.” You rip your gaze away from Yunho’s flushed face to check if the coast is clear before targeting his fisted hands. He stiffens when you pry his hand open and bring three digits to your lips, sticking your tongue out to give kitten licks to his fingertips before pushing them into your mouth. You hum, suck, swirl your tongue around his fingers, giggling when all he does is stare at you wordlessly, unable to form any coherent thoughts. “See? Not even once have you put up a fight.”

That seems to snap him out of his daze. In an instant, his eyes darken and his jaw clenches.

“Oh honey, you know, you really shouldn’t tease me.”

You snicker, seeing through his bluff. “Wow, I’m so scared. What do you wanna do? Leave practice right now? Drag me to my room and pound me into the mattress?”

“Don’t tempt me.”

“You could never, sub.”

Whatever strands of self-control were still residing in Yunho have turned to dust by now. One moment he’s towering over you in full height, looking down on your sitting form in bitter distaste, and in the next, he’s dragging you out of the basement, unaffected by the sudden silence and Yeosang, Mingi and San’s confused expressions.

Once you’re in the living room, Yunho wastes no time crowding you against the wall and crashing his lips against yours. The kiss is a messy clash of teeth and tongues, but it leaves you hot and lightheaded and aching for more. Yunho knows no limits and snakes one arm around your waist to pull you closer to him, the other hand fisting your hair. He tugs harshly and the sharp sting sends all your nerves into a frenzy.

“Bedroom. Now.” The sudden huskiness in his tone catches you off guard and you wonder when his voice has ever sounded so rough. You moan into the kiss, fisting his shirt as you stumble your way to your bedroom.

Yunho pins you against the door once you’re in your bedroom. His lips are addictive, just like the groans he slips in kisses and his hands roaming your body. He gets rid of your clothes until you’re left in your underwear, then forces a knee between your legs to keep them from closing. Your eyes roll back at the friction, growing needier and hotter when he presses his thigh against you harder. 

When you finally pull away, his eyes are hooded and his lips are red and swollen. There’s no trace of inhibitions left in him as he watches you like a predator. With horror, you realize that the tables have turned, and when he easily locks both of your wrists above your head with one hand only, that’s when you know you’re undisputedly powerless against him.

“Who’s the sub now?” he pants, eyes sparkling with glee.

“Still y-you.” The response sounds pathetic to your own ears, but you have too big of an ego to admit it out loud. Yunho doesn’t buy it either if his quirked brow wasn’t telling enough.

“Still in denial, honey? I see. Guess I’ll have to do more then.” His free hand reaches down to tug on the waistband of your underwear, only to let it snap against your skin. The slight sting is enough to render your knees into mush and set fog into your vision. He does it again, and then he actually tugs the fabric down and you finally grab his motives.

“You’re bluffing— y-you wouldn’t put y-your fingers,” you ramble, hyperaware about how dangerously close his fingers are. Just when you think he’s about to shove a digit in, he pulls away completely.

“You know, you keep talking about my hands. It’s always my hands this, my hands that,” Yunho says casually, giving his nails a quick glance before meeting your eyes. “Rather than me having a hand fixation, it’s you who has a thing for hands. My hands specifically.”

You don’t like how every word is true. You don’t want to acknowledge that he’s correct. Verbally, because your body is moving on its own and has betrayed you long ago.

Yunho taps on your bottom lip and you comply reluctantly, letting him shove the same three fingers you sucked before. Mumbling unintelligible words under his breath, he watches intently as you hum around him, eyes fluttering shut when he slowly moves them in and out of your mouth. A whine escapes you when he pulls them out for good, soaked wet with your spit.

“Tell me.” Yunho grins, “Tell me what you like about them. Or else I’ll leave you hanging.” He’s not lying and you know it. The look he sends you is enough proof that he wouldn’t hesitate to leave you high and dry.

You don’t like how he’s stringing you on like a rag doll. You don’t like how he’s stripping you off your dignity step by step. Strangely enough, you feel yourself leaking and wanting nothing but his pretty long fingers inside of you.

“I like how they, agh I— I l-like how—” you stutter, losing all levels of rationality when he suddenly circles around your entrance. Yunho urges you to continue and it takes up all of your brainpower to pick up where you left off, “—they’re so long and big and pretty—”

“So you have a size kink.”

You stare at him in disbelief. Now that, that’s something he shouldn’t have deduced. “W-wha— I don’t!”

“Seems to me that you have one though. You kept stressing how big and bad and tall I was after all.” You stiffen. Did you? Did you really? You don’t recall saying it that many times but it's hard to think straight when Yunho still has your wrists above your head and is looking down at you in a downright patronizing way. It leaves you trembling pitifully, feeling called out and feeling so, so small.

He really wants you to hit your lowest peak because he doesn’t stop there. “Who’s the real sub here? Is it really me? Or is it you who likes feeling so short, small, tiny.” His smirk widens when your breath hitches ever so slightly. “I fucking knew it.”

“You don’t know shit,” you bark back, but to no avail. Your credibility has diminished the moment he caught up to your kinks.

“Say whatever you want but that won’t change the fact that you’re tiny baby,” he pauses, takes his bottom lip between his teeth as he’s giving you a thorough once-over and then enunciates the next syllables with such clarity that forces time to stop, “My tiny, helpless baby.”

The pet name breaks you. It’s the final trigger that takes all your inhibitions away and the pathetic size of an ego that was left in your stubborn head.

“Please,” your voice cracks but that’s the least of your worries. You can’t move, can’t talk back, and won’t get anything in return. Yunho is right in front of you, finding satisfaction in your internal destruction and yet, after all of the things he’s slaughtered you to, he won’t give you anything in return.

“Just a little bit more, baby. I’ll give you what you want if you repeat after me; I’m your—”

“I’m your tiny, helpless baby who desperately wants you to fuck me.” Yunho is mildly taken aback that you were still able to think and get it right before he even finished his sentence. “Now get on to it, Yunho. Please.”

You’re sniffling at this point, begging for any kind of stimulation that shoots you to the stars. You’re fucking sniffling, and that’s all it takes for Yunho to manhandle you on the bed. A gasp escapes you, not expecting this turn of events at all. It all happens in a flash and the next thing you know, you’re on all fours, face buried in the pillow.

“Yunho, I t-thought y-you’d fuck me,” you complain, glancing behind to see what’s taking him so long. Your mouth waters at the sight.

“Patience, baby,” he says as he’s unbuckling his belt, taking his sweet time. You rub your legs together to ease the tension, but you can’t really say you’re not enjoying the show. Yunho’s lean, slightly defined, and once he’s only left in his underwear, you swallow heavily. There’s a large, dark patch on the fabric and the bulge seems more prominent than before.

If your mouth was only watering, you’re drooling by now. Yunho takes off his boxers, revealing his painfully hard cock, tip red and oozing precum. Just like the rest of him, he’s abnormally huge.

You have two thoughts. One: Fuck, you want him. Now. Two:

“That’s never going to fit inside of me.”

“Oh it will,” he says with such confidence it gives you shivers. “I’ll pound you into the mattress and you’ll take it all.”

He grabs you by your thighs to pull you closer to him before positioning himself right behind you. “W-wait!” you cry, heart suddenly feeling heavy in your chest, “D-don’t just put it in without prep— o-oh, hnngh—” your body feels like jelly when Yunho presses two spit-coated fingers past your entrance, stretching you out with finesse.

“I’m not that heartless,” he chuckles amusedly, right at the same time he curls his digits right against your sweet spot, sending you headfirst into bliss. “You’re so small you wouldn’t be able to take an inch without prep.”

You only whine into the pillow, arching your back as he continues his ministrations. Once Yunho deems you stretched out enough, he retreats his fingers and replaces them immediately with his cock.

The difference is like night and day. It’s like his fingers didn’t amount to anything compared to this. The high-pitched cry that escapes you is loud as you grasp onto the pillow for dear life.

“How can you be so big?” you pant. There’s no way he’s past four inches deep inside of you. You’re far from being filled, but your walls are already clenching hard around him.

“Bassists do it deeper for a reason.” The innuendo is tacky but in your current headspace, it sounds like the sexiest thing you’ve ever heard. Yunho stills his hips, letting you get used to him. “How are you feeling?”

“Guh—” he chuckles at your inability to form coherent words, let alone thoughts. “So big.”

“You’ll get used to it, honey.” He leans forward to pet your hair. “Tell me when I can move,” he adds gently, and you swear you could melt right then.

It takes you a moment to get your breathing steady, and then he pushes more of his length inside. Whimpering, you writhe beneath him, feeling as if you’re being torn apart. Meanwhile, he’s breathing hard through his nose, trying his damn hardest to go as slow as possible. At a certain point, Yunho stops pressing for more and pulls out ever so slightly before rocking his hips back forward. It starts out slowly, but he gradually picks up the pace and you lose yourself into him.

“Faster,” you moan, bending your back for an even deeper angle. “Hnngh, so full. Want m-more.”

“You were right, you can’t take me to the hilt.” Yunho readjusts his grip on his hips and you know that bruises are going to last until the end of the week. “God, you’re so fucking small that you can’t take me to the fucking hilt.”

Your vision turns foggy once the meaning gets through you. Now that he’s saying it, how much of his cock is inside of you? Half of it? A third? He’s stretching you out so well, filling you up so impossibly deep and that wasn’t even his everything?

“That’s not— want more of you, all of you,” you stammer, not realizing what you’re even saying. “Baby wants all of you.” God, you’re so drunk and desperate for his cock that you can’t refer yourself in the first person anymore.

Yunho reacts just as perplexed, eyes widening. His hips still once more, and though you’d want to shout at him to keep on moving, you don’t find the energy to move your head, or even lift a finger.

“So fucking greedy,” he growls, pulling out of you completely. Not even a second later, he flips you around on your back so that you’re facing him dead in the eye, and then he pushes back in. The new position has you gurgling on broken words as your arms flail around for dear life.

Yunho throws a leg over his shoulder, creating a deeper angle. You don’t know if he’s actually giving you more if he’s managed to force more of him into you. All you register is the messy squelch of liquids and your moans bouncing off the walls. You can’t even see properly, everything a blur and a mix of different colors.

“I’m gonna cum,” you whimper, sensing your demise nearing closer and closer.

“Then cum,” Yunho orders in between groans, then adds in a louder voice, “You hear that baby? Cum and make a mess out of yourself.”

Your orgasm crashes onto you in a big singular wave as you tremble under his frame, walls clenching around him tightly. His name leaves your mouth like a mantra as you continue to convulse. Yunho pulls out moments later, just to spurt white on your abdomen. His face is flushed and beads of sweat are forming on his forehead while he jerks himself dry.

It’s a miracle that Yunho hasn’t toppled on you once he slowly comes down from his high. The fog in your vision clears up gradually, but your limbs are as good as worthless. You won’t be able to move freely for a good day or two.

As you continue to blink at the ceiling, only finding the energy to breathe, Yunho grabs the box of tissues from your nightstand and wipes himself off before doing the same to you. His touch is gentle unlike before, and you’d thank him if your vocal cords were still functioning.

You’re about to drift to sleep until he suddenly leans down and pecks your lips. In an instant, you narrow your eyes at him and ask, “What was that for?”

“You had some cum on your lip. I wanted to taste too.” Yunho smiles cheekily and runs his tongue against his bottom lip, then grimaces. “It tastes... yikes.”

He cleans you up in silence before plopping onto the bed right next to you. No words are exchanged up until you say, “Yeosang is going to kill you.”

“He can’t afford to kill me. He needs me for the band,” he muses.

“He’ll still kill you.”

“I appreciate the concern, honey.”

“Just scram back to practice.”

“Don’t you want to go to the bathroom first?”

“I can do it myself.”

“Oh really?”

“... Yunho, help me on my legs and then scram back to practice.”

Meanwhile, back in the basement, the guys are waiting for their bandmate to come back so they can finally finish practice and then eat chicken.

“You sure (y/n) and Yunho are only childhood enemies? They’ve been going at it like rabbits if he isn’t back here yet!” San exclaims, throwing his arms up for dramatic effect.

Mingi can’t counter that because San has a point, so he whips his head to Yeosang. “Dude, you sure they’re not in a relationship? They have to be at least fuckbuddies! Or fuckrivals? Fuckenemies? Or…”

“I do not know and I do not care,” Yeosang says blankly, looking like he’s about to bang his head against the wall because he sure won’t walk into your room and curse his eyes for the rest of his life. Damnit, all he wants is to practice and get the band together; their next gig is only a few weeks away. “In fact, I want to unsee what I just saw and unhear what you just said.”

[roman-writing]

bring home a haunting (10/12)

Fandom: The Haunting of Bly Manor

Pairing: Dani Clayton/Jamie Taylor

Rating: M

Wordcount: 18,021

Summary: Dani almost has her life together, when a familiar face arrives back in town after ten years. A childhood friends AU written with @youngbloodbuzz

Author’s notes: you’ll notice that we’ve stopped updating weekly. This is due to the fact that we’ve run out of backlogged material and are now writing in real time. Thank you for your patience with the final few updates.

read it below or read it on AO3 here

X: 1978-1983

—

The summer air was a warm suggestion of a breeze. The curtains trembled slightly in its passing, just a feeble stir that could not quell even the muted birdsong of robins. A bedroom awash in late afternoon sunlight that softened the wooden furniture and the textured wallpaper until everything was steeped to the same pastel shade of the bedsheets.

Dani sat in the chair before her cramped writing desk. It was too small to do any real work, but it was the only thing she could fit into this room – her own space – without her mother complaining. Most days it was used for little more than picture frames, curios, and stacks of clean laundry waiting to be tucked away into drawers, neat and soldierly. Today she had cleared a space and placed on it a blank sheet of paper, a pen, and an envelope with no address.

The heat was such that the back of Dani’s thighs stuck to the wooden chair when she shifted in her seat. She folded her heel atop the chair so she could rest her chin against her knee and stare at the sheet of paper. She chewed at the edge of her thumbnail until the skin there was raised and red and ragged, until she tasted the tang of copper, until she had to tuck her thumb away behind a closed fist and press her knuckles to her mouth.

The summer days were long and mercifully empty. No assignments. School wouldn’t start again for another month. No mother. Karen was out at some work function and had elected to leave Dani behind for once. No obligations. Nowhere to be. Nothing but the slow whittling away of minutes, of hours, of walking down the warm familiar streets and feeling the cold notion wash over her that she had let another day slip away.

Taking her courage into her hands, Dani picked up the pen. She held it over the page, as if in the vain hope her thoughts could flow from the tip of the pen without her input. She sat up straight, squared her shoulders, took a deep breath, began to write.

‘Dear Jamie –’

—

The sharp edges of the walkie talkie dug into her palm as she gripped it with white knuckles. Vestiges of a dream still hovered over her, just as the pale suggestion of diffused moonlight shone through her curtains. Her thumb hesitated over the press-to-talk button, still curled into the same tangle of limbs and sheets she had woken up in, her breath now back to normal from the shallow gasping that had felt like drowning. Usually, there was a comfort in knowing that Eddie was a creature of routine. In bed by eleven, but asleep by twelve after sneaking in another hour of reading. But looking at her bedside clock now, red numbers blinking the witching hour in the dark, deftly ignoring the photo frame just beside it, Dani wavered, knowing he’d be asleep by now. 

Hearing the distant sounds of the television still going through the floor, the hum of the box fan — her mother asleep or awake, she couldn’t really care — Dani exhaled a slow trembling breath, and pressed down on the button.

“Eddie?” Dani murmured softly. She waited for a long moment, pressing her forehead against the plastic, but when he didn’t respond, she swallowed hard and repeated, “Eddie? Are you there?”

She grimaced at the poor word choice, but kept silent, waiting. In the long stretch of silence, she let her eyes slip closed, her throat feeling thick. She sighed and whispered again, “Eddie?” feeling as though she was calling through some distant veil. 

There was still no response. Just as resignation was settling heavy in her chest, exhaustion pressing on her eyelids, static buzzed through the speakers. “Danielle?” came a heavy, sleep-ridden voice.

“I’m sorry,” Dani whispered, “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to - go back to sleep. It’s fine.”

“Are you okay?” Eddie murmured, along with the sound of shuffling fabric. Dani remained silent, worrying her lower lip, guilt whorling in her stomach. When she didn’t respond, Eddie spoke again, sounding slightly more awake, but no less gruff.  “What’s going on?”

“I’m sorry,” she repeated, “I - um. I just - “

“Can’t sleep?”

“Something like that.”

He was silent for a moment, and carefully asked, “Another nightmare?”

“Yes,” she said in a small voice. 

“Do you want to talk about it this time?”

Against her will, before she could even stop herself, Dani’s eyes darted to the photo frame. To Jamie’s broad smile, to her younger self clinging on to Jamie’s back as Jamie held her up in a piggyback. Her breath catching in her throat, Dani blinked and turned on her back to stare fixedly at the streaks of moonlight stretching along her ceiling like slim, ghostly fingers. 

“No,” Dani murmured, pressing a palm to her eyes to banish the burning there, “I just - I wanted to hear your voice.”

Eddie hummed, as though half asleep already. “Won’t your mom hear?”

“She’s downstairs.”

“Okay,” Eddie said, the static dropping quiet briefly, but quickly returned along with the new sound of ruffling paper, “Want me to read aloud again?”

Biting back the embarrassment burning her cheeks, Dani murmured, “Please?”

Chuckling softly, Eddie said, “Are you up for some Lord of the Rings, or something else?”

“It doesn’t matter.”

“Lord of the Rings it is,” Eddie murmured, and then quietly began to recite from where they had left off last time. 

Dani slipped her eyes shut again as she listened, resting the walkie talkie against her chest. For however much she tried, for how many times Eddie had asked for her thoughts on one plot point or another, Dani for the life of her could never remember a single passage the morning after. It was never about the story, nor was it simply just listening to Eddie’s sleep-roughened voice for all the comfort it gave her. If she could shut her eyes, and leave the walkie talkie on the pillow beside her head, she could almost imagine it. Eddie lying beside her, with her head on his shoulder, and for a second she could pretend he smelled of sandalwood instead of sharp soap, the fabric under cheek flannel instead of a woolen sweater, and — 

It wasn’t the same. It’d never be the same. Not with guilt burning like acid in her stomach, not with her chest feeling so heavy and tight. Drawing in a low breath, Dani slowly peeled herself away from her too warm comforter and off her bed to pad quietly towards her open window, keeping the walkie talkie close to her chest. She slipped through her thin curtains that danced in a slight breeze and leaned her elbows on the windowsill, resting her chin on her arm as she looked out into the night of her backyard.

Beneath the low tones of Eddie’s voice, there was the sound of crickets and the whisper of a warm breeze. The neighborhood was dark but for the glow of distant streetlamps and the gleam of the moon and starlight. And just there in the far distance, a plane blinked red and white lights as it passed far overhead in the dark sky like a manmade shooting star. Maybe if it were a few months ago, maybe then she would have pressed her eyes shut and made a silly, small wish. Top marks on her next test. A new dress for her birthday. Her favorite meal for dinner. But her wishes seemed too big these days. Too large to fit in the palm of her hands. Words that felt more like prayer on her tongue. 

Sighing softly, Dani’s gaze drifted slowly towards the tree with it’s thick trunk and long limbs that stretched towards her window, leaves ruffling softly. Eddie was still murmuring diligently, reciting some passage that happened to be some poem or song. 

“He sought her ever, wandering far where leaves of years were thickly strewn. By light of moon and ray of star, in frosty heavens shivering. Her ma — “

“Eddie?” Dani interrupted softly.

Eddie fumbled over the words. “Yeah?”

“Do you still know how to climb trees?”

He was quiet for a long moment. “Sure. Yeah. I mean - I haven’t tried since Tommy dared me years ago, so I guess?”

“Do you think,” Dani started slowly, “that you could climb the one in my backyard?”

“Probably.”

“Would you?”

“What - like - right now?” 

“No, I - I - ” Dani stumbled, and swallowed thickly. 

“Danielle,” Eddie sighed, and there was the sound of a book being shut, “It’s late. I’m tired. I don’t really feel like risking breaking my neck right now, or your mom catching me. I don’t know which is worse, honestly.” 

His voice was starting to trail off in a lethargic slur before letting out a long yawn, and Dani bit back again the guilt that gnawed viciously through her chest. 

“Sorry, I - “ Dani said, standing upright, shoulders rigid, “I didn’t mean to keep you. Go back to sleep.”

“Are you sure?” Eddie asked in a sleepy murmur, “You were upset.”

“I’m fine,” Dani lied, “I’m fine now. I promise.”

“Okay,” Eddie breathed, “Night, Danielle.”

“Good night.”

There came then a long silence. Suffocatingly empty, as though all the air had been drawn from her room. She exhaled slowly, a trembling breath that rattled through her teeth. Leaving the walkie talkie on her nightstand, she crawled back into bed, curling up back into a ball with her knees to her chest and let her heavy eyes be drawn back to the photo. Clenching her teeth hard, she shut her eyes where the memories of that day pressed against her eyelids as though it were a film reel, lulling her back into a restless sleep.

—

‘Dear Jamie,

Last night I dreamt you climbed up through my window sill. You held out your hand and said to come with you, as though you were Peter Pan and I was Wendy. I remember wanting to laugh, I think. I almost expected you to be wearing that outfit and that hat, but you were just you. Smiling at me. That’s all I remember really. 

I don’t think you ever knew how much that meant to me. That time you climbed up my window for real. Just to be here for me when I needed you without ever having to tell you. I think that’s one of the things I’m going to miss the most, how I never had to ask or say anything. You somehow always just seemed to know. I don’t think anyone was ever as good at it as you were. Except for Carson, maybe. 

Are you okay? Is Mikey? Are you eating enough? Is it getting any easier? I can’t stop thinking about it, how tired you looked when I last saw you. I keep thinking of all our time together and how we wasted so much of it at the end. I should have visited more, maybe. I should have tried harder to talk to you, to help, no matter how upset you got with me. I’m sorry. 

I wonder where you are now, where they took you and Mikey. Are you still in Iowa? Sometimes I like to imagine you on a beach somewhere, or in the mountains like you always wanted to see. I like imagining myself there with you, too. Mostly, I like to imagine you back here again. 

It’s getting harder, not having you here. Mom kept saying the most terrible things after you were gone that I won’t repeat here; it’ll just raise your blood pressure. Eddie tries to help, and I love him, but he’s always been scared of mom and I don’t think he knows how to deal with something like this. With losing so much all at once. The only thing he’s ever really lost was the baseball state championship. Judy does her best though, and so does Carson, but they don’t really talk about it. They miss you a lot. They don’t need to say it, but I can see it. 

I don’t know if you’ll ever get these letters. Most of the time it feels like I’m just addressing the side of my bed where you used to sleep when you stayed over. But I hope you know this isn’t some attempt being nosey, or guilt tripping you into something. All this is, is everything I can’t say out loud, all the things I couldn’t. That I still care and always will. That I’m here. That I can wait, however long it needs to be. 

Do you remember when we were thirteen at the cottage, bored out of our minds because the power cut out so we decided to go run and dance in the rain? I hope the next time you stand in the rain, you think of that and think of me, just as I do you.

- Dani

— 

The t-shirt didn’t smell like her anymore. Too many months of too many laundry days, and all Dani was left with now was worn fabric that felt softer than ever and a print of Debbie Harry’s face giving her a sidelong glance with the words ‘Blondie’ in blue cursive type above her head. She ran her hand over the embossed design, and without thinking Dani shucked off her shirt to toss on her bed beside a pile of fresh laundry, and slipped the Blondie t-shirt over her head. 

There was little to no relief in wearing it anymore. Not when it smelled sharp and clean of florals and downy, long missing the faint smell of earth, the practical detergent Nan favored, and just plain Jamie. It was simply a t-shirt now. An article of clothing that she once borrowed and slept in. Something that had been buried, forgotten, in her rucksack until it had been too late to return. No comfort in pretending she could fall back asleep within it, no comfort in hugging a too soft pillow and imagining it was someone else. Standing now in the middle of her room and running her hand over the soft fabric, Dani knew of course that it was fruitless to pretend, to wish. Even so she couldn’t help the thought running through her head every time: it didn’t smell like her anymore. 

The upended laundry basket had been tossed to one side of her room. She moved slowly, folding and setting aside laundry to be put away later. There was a distant ache travelling up the back of her neck to her head, a constant presence now along with the ache in her jaw from restless nights of grinding her teeth. As she bent low to tuck away a pile of pants into a drawer, a twinge pulsed over neck and the crown of her head. She winced, reaching up to dig her fingers into the offending muscles and nerves, gradually moving upright. Her fingers grazed against the cool metal of her necklace and she froze. 

Dani stood quietly with the ache and took stock, slipping her eyes shut and clenching her fist, listening carefully to the sounds of the house. The television laughed through the thin floors. There was the distant heartbeat of the washing machine all the way in the basement on its second load. And her mother, quiet within her own company. She took careful steps towards her door, left open just a crack from when she had swung the door shut with her foot, arms laden with a laundry basket. Music travelled up through the stairwell and through the hall, a theme song jingle for some sitcom. Drawing in a steadying breath, Dani pushed herself out of her room to brave downstairs.

She dodged the floorboards that creaked and groaned predictably on deft, quiet feet. Tendrils of cigarette smoke drifted from the living room as she passed, and even now, the thickness of it still choked the back of Dani’s throat. The kitchen was a reprieve, the windows wide open to let in the late summer breeze, the floor cool beneath her bare feet, and she went about filling up the kettle and setting it on the backburner of the stove to boil. 

She absently stretched and prodded at her neck as she moved throughout the kitchen, pressing against pinched nerves while digging out a tin of cookies to set some aside on a saucer for a late morning snack. Swinging open the cupboard that held all their mugs and glasses, Dani robotically pulled down her favored blue mug with scattered stars and reached further back, her hand darting about looking for a single mug in particular that kept hidden an old yet treasured altoid tin. But as she blindly probed the back of the cupboard, fingers searching for dented and scratched metal within ceramic, her brows slowly knitted when she came up empty.

Pulling her hand back, her frown deepened as she stared deep into the dark cupboard, her eyes darting over every corner. Something heavy seemed to drop and pull violently in her stomach, a tight cinch forming in her chest. Biting at her lip, Dani rose on her toes, shoving around mugs and cups, picking up and setting them aside when it wasn’t what she was looking for. A mug with floral designs, and a tin packed with precious tea, priceless hidden treasures.

Her breath was coming in fast, shallow and panicked and trapped within her chest, embers flaring within her lungs. “Mom?” she called out, her voice trembling, “Mom, where’s -?“

The kettle whistled. Dani gasped, the sound shrill and startling. She whipped around, her arm knocking into something hard, and ceramic shattered on the floor. Dani jumped back, bumping hard into the counter behind her, the corner digging painfully in her lower back. Pressing a hand to her sternum, her heart crashing against her ribs, Dani stood there wide eyed with pained shallow breaths, the kettle’s whistle shrill and loud, and at her feet, the scattered remains of her starry mug. 

“Jesus Christ -!” her mother called out from the other room, “What have you done now?”

Dani was frozen, her heart a claxon in her chest, a sharp whistle ringing through her ears. Out of the corner of her eye, Karen appeared in the kitchen doorway and exhaled heavily. 

“Goddamn it,” Karen said, a faint slur to her voice, carefully stepping around the disarray to pull the whistling kettle off the burner and twisting the knob with a click. “What is wrong with you? Look at this mess.”

Her mother continued on, blustering about in the kitchen, stepping around shards of ceramic, but Dani could barely hear her. The kettle was off the stove, but the ringing in her ears remained, shrill as a train whistle. Her breath shallow, her hands clenched into trembling fists at her side, she stared down the shattered remains of her mug, pieces of stars amongst a blue backdrop scattered along the floor like the big bang, hastily swept away by a frayed broom in her mothers hands. All at once, it felt as though the strained tension along her neck and scalp snapped and went taut, the necklace around her neck heavy like a noose. 

Karen sighed. “Relax, Danielle,” she said, “It was just a mug.”

But it wasn’t just a mug. It was over a decade of memories. It was sharing tea with Jamie during sleepovers. It was her dad’s bright grin when she unwrapped it for her seventh birthday. Dani shook her head, a movement so small that Karen didn’t even notice, dumping the remains of her mug in the trash can. 

“Mom?” Dani croaked, eyes unmoving from the floor, her eyes burning, “My tin - where’s my tin?”

Karen gave her a look of bewilderment, then rolled her eyes. “That old thing?” Karen stepped past her to replace the broom in the hallway closet. “It was an eyesore. I threw it and that old mug away. It had a crack in it.”

Nodding absently, feeling a sharp blow between her ribs, Dani bit her lips hard against the tremble of her chin, her throat growing thick. Her knees wobbled and she slowly sank to the floor, pulling her knees close to her chest with shaking hands. Sucking in a sharp, trembling breath that burned throughout her chest, Dani pressed her eyes shut and buried her face in her knees, digging her fingers into the skin of her shin, willing the floor to swallow her whole. 

Footsteps returned to the kitchen and came to a sudden halt. There was a long, slow sigh. “Honestly, it was just a mug,” her mother said, exasperated, “We can get you another one.” 

Dani shook her head, biting her lip hard until it hurt, until she tasted a coppery tang on her tongue. When Dani gave no further response, the kitchen drew silent and she could only imagine the frightened state of her as her mother made no other noise of moving away to leave Dani trembling on the floor. 

“Danielle?” her mom murmured, soft footsteps drawing closer. 

Curling further on herself, her shoulders hunched, arms wrapped around her knees, Dani turned her head away, trembling from the effort not to cry in front of her mother. There was the ruffling of clothes and movement, her mother’s form sinking down to sit beside her, the smell of smoke and her mother’s sweet morning facial cream permeating the air. 

“Honey?”

Dani squeezed her eyes shut, an ache spreading across her chest, the word spoken so abnormally soft and unsure, and for one long moment, Dani could hardly process it, could hardly remember the last time her mother had spoken to her in such a way. A hand suddenly drifted over her hair, a startled, hesitant touch. Slowly, she went stiff, the room still and quiet as Dani waited for a pin to drop, for a rug to be pulled from under her, only hearing the distant breeze from the open windows, the restless tap of the sink. And then the hand stroked through the tresses of her hair, gentle in a way that made Dani’s heart ache. Swallowing thickly, she turned her head and met her mother’s eyes.

It was strange, to see the glazed glass of her mother’s blue eyes behind her glasses and not find any of the usual hardness, the aimless anger or frustration. Instead, there was faint bewilderment. Instead, there was apprehensive concern. Tears slipped down Dani’s cheeks, and haltingly, her mother’s hand reached up to swipe away one with her thumb. Dani’s eyes slipped closed at the touch, and all at once, she felt something concave within her. 

“I’m sorry,” Dani whispered brokenly, feeling herself lean closer to her mom’s warmth, “Please, just -”

Her mom gradually wrapped her arms around her as though she didn’t really know what to do, but it was enough, and the ache within Dani’s chest burst open. A choked sob ripped through her, a dam of tears spilled over her cheeks, clutching her mom’s clothes as though that was the only thing tethering her together. 

“All right,” her mom whispered. 

Her mom held her tighter until Dani was curled into her lap, body shaking with violent sobs, feeling her mother’s hand run repeatedly over her hair. And it was all Dani could do but to hold on as she fractured into pieces on the kitchen floor.

—

The local grocery store had a new supplier; it was the talk of the town for a week. Her mother and her mother’s book club mused over the topic at length over cups of coffee and fragrant steam. They were talking about it when Dani braved the first floor of her house for a glass of water, and they were still talking about it when she returned downstairs to put on her shoes and go out to meet Eddie for a group project. Even Judy across the street had something to say, complaining about the sudden dearth of this or the wealth of that.

“I don’t see the big deal,” said Eddie without looking up from his notebook. “It’s just groceries.”

Secretly Dani agreed, but she did not say anything. They were seated at the dining table with their textbooks open to various pages. Dani had brought her bag of various colored pens and highlighters, its contents spilling across the wooden surface.

“In that case,” Judy replied, “you can come with me to the supermarket. Come on.”

He blinked up at his mother in befuddlement. “But we’re working on a school thing,” he said, gesturing to Dani sitting beside him.

“And you can work on it when you get back.” When Judy waved at him, the keys in her grasp jangled. “Let’s go. Danielle, honey, you can stay here, if you want.”

“No, I’ll come, too,” said Dani, pushing her seat back and standing.

Eddie huffed, but dutifully rose to his feet and followed his mother into the garage. The three of them piled into the sedan parked there, and Judy drove.

“Don’t see why we need to come at all,” Eddie said from the backseat.

“Maybe I need a few hands to help push a cart and carry bags,” Judy drawled, signalling before she turned down a street. “Or maybe I just want your delightful company, Edmund Kyle O’Mara.”

At the sound of his full name being used, Eddie sank a few inches in his seat and went quiet. Clearing her throat, Dani braved the silence that followed with a tentative attempt at conversation, which managed to get them all the way to the store without further incident. By the time they stepped out of the car and into the shop, Eddie had stopped his teenage sulking and was helpfully trotting off to grab a cart. He wheeled it after his mother, trailing dutifully in her wake.

The air inside the grocery store was slightly more cool than outside. It felt like a dampness on the skin. Dani shivered against it and tugged down the sleeves of the jumper she had stolen from Eddie’s closet earlier that afternoon. She cast a surreptitious eye about the place, half expecting her mother to appear from between one of the aisles and catch Dani wearing something so unflattering in public. No matter how hard Dani tried, she couldn’t shake herself of the feeling, and after a few minutes of idly perusing through the produce aisle behind Eddie and Judy, she removed the sweater and rolled it up beneath her arm instead despite the chill.

“Mom, can we get some of these?” Eddie asked, already holding up a bag of corn chips.

“Sure, honey,” Judy murmured, distracted by the list of items scrawled onto a piece of paper in her hand.

Dani peered over Judy’s shoulder at the list. “I can go get the washing powder.”

“Oh, would you? Thanks, sweetheart.”

Dropping the bundled up sweater into the cart, Dani wandered off in search of the right aisle. She turned down what she thought was the proper one, and blinked in surprise to find that nothing was in its right place anymore. For a brief moment, she thought she must have turned down the wrong aisle, and she craned her neck back to read the sign that hung from the ceiling. In the seventeen years she had lived in North Liberty, the shelves had never been rearranged. With a furrow of her brow, Dani retreated and went down the next aisle and the next again. Finally, she found what she was looking for, but no sooner had she reached the home cleaning supplies section than she froze. 

Before her a wall of brightly colored cardboard boxes and plastic containers loomed. Rows upon rows. Arms wrapped around her midriff to ward off the prickle of cold, Dani’s gaze traced the lines of unfamiliar brand names in a wandering path, trying to find something, anything, that looked even remotely recognizable. But whatever brands the new supplier had stocked were so utterly unfamiliar, that Dani felt herself go stock-still. 

It didn’t matter. She knew it didn’t matter. Any of these would do the trick. It was the uncertainty, the unknowing. Wanting something so mundane — just one thing, just this one thing — to be a mindless decision. And for a fleeting moment, she found herself wondering if this was what all the fuss was about, if this was what it meant. Homesickness. A longing for the return of normalcy. Just for this. Just for a moment.

“Did you find it?” 

Whirling around, eyes wide, Dani found Eddie trundling the shopping cart down the aisle towards her. “What?” she asked.

He stopped, glanced at the wall of washing powders, and reached out to grab a box at random, hauling it into the cart along with the rest of the items. 

“Why that one?” Dani asked, pointing.

Pausing to consider the question, Eddie shrugged. “Who cares? It’s just washing powder.” Then he turned the cart and smiled. “Come on. Mom’s this way.” 

—

‘Dear Jamie, 

I finally had to get rid of that scarf you gave me for Christmas. One of the ends unravelled. I borrowed Judy’s sewing machine and patched it back up, but it only delayed the inevitable. 

On the plus side, I got to pick out a new one at a store in Davenport. The car ride with mom wasn’t great, but I think you’d like the scarf I picked in the end. I actually turned around, thinking mom was you standing behind me to show it to you. Don’t think I’ll make that mistake again any time soon. 

Do you still have the scarf I gave you? Is it cold where you are? Hopefully not. It’s starting to get cold again here. I wish winter would go faster. The only good part about snow is that you liked it. 

Still, it’s not all bad. I finally said yes to a date with Eddie.

Now, I know what you’re thinking, but be nice. It was actually kind of fun. We went to the diner and then for a walk. He gave me his gloves because I was cold and I’d left mine at home. Judy, of course, was thrilled. And mom was — well. You know how she is.  

I miss you. Stay warm.

-Dani.’

—

Her mother had been snooping around in Dani’s bedroom again. Dani could tell. Dani could always tell. There was a delicate balance to every aspect of Dani’s things — the way she hung her clothes, the way she made her bed, the way she left her closet door open just so, the way she positioned a tiny slip of paper into the shut door, so that upon re-entry she could glance around and see exactly what had or had not changed. 

“Just a bit of cleaning,” was Karen’s usual excuse. 

Not that Dani ever confronted her about it. Not really. Simple queries like “Were you looking for something?” were not confrontation. 

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” was the usual reply. 

Or, “It’s my house, Danielle. I can go where I want.” 

Or even, “No. Do I need to be looking for something?” 

Though the latter was usually reserved for the days when her mother was feeling particularly distrustful. As if Dani had something to hide. As if Dani were holding a door desperately shut, while her mother rattled the handle on the other side. 

Shutting the door behind her, Dani leaned her back against it and surveyed the room. Karen had been looking under her bed. The sheet had rumpled from where she precariously tucked it just that morning. Dani’s grip tightened around the plain wooden box in her hands as she took note of the minute changes, cataloguing where her mother had been snooping and inevitably come up empty-handed.

As if Dani would be so foolish as to hide something beneath her bed. Honestly.

For a moment she listened to the sounds outside her bedroom, but there was nothing concerning. Her mother was still downstairs watching television after a day’s work. How she even found the time to go snooping was a mystery in and of itself.

With a sigh, Dani stepped towards her closet door. Pushing it open, she dropped down to her knees and reached behind a conveniently located half chest of drawers. A press of her fingers in just the right place, and the false panel popped open. She set it aside, then reached in to pull out the crawlspace’s contents one at a time.

An old band t-shirt.

A book.

A Zippo lighter.

A necklace.

A stack of photographs bound by a rubber band.

A cassette tape.

Dani sat, cross-legged, on the floor of her closet, surrounded by a fanning array of items as though at the center of a summoning circle. The box she held in her lap. It was plain and wooden with a bronze latch. The plainer the better. Less likely to arouse suspicion, should it be exhumed.

She hesitated to touch the t-shirt, her fingertips grazing the edge of the fabric as though afraid it would disintegrate at the slightest provocation. Her hand moved to the photographs. She peeled back the rubber band and flipped through the glossy pages. At some point in time, she had labelled the backs of each one. 

Here was Jamie in 1976 at an Oaks game with Eddie, eating a hotdog and looking bored while Eddie cheered in the background. Here was Jamie laughing and reaching out towards the camera so that she was blurred with motion. Here was Jamie just a little over a year ago passed out on the couch, while Mikey was fast asleep on her stomach. Here was Jamie. Here was Jamie. Here was –

Nausea coiled faintly in Dani’s stomach. Abruptly, she wrenched open the box’s lid and began to shove all the items inside. It took a bit of furtive rearranging for everything to fit, and then her trembling thumb was pressing the latch shut with a final and resounding click. Her breath was coming fast and sharp. Dani had to close her eyes and steady herself, the feeling of the box beneath her hands, squeezing it shut as though afraid its contents might batter against the lid, yowling to be set free. 

Movements quick and furtive, Dani shoved the box behind the false panel in her closet. And sometimes at night, she swore she could hear it clawing against the wall. 

—

‘Dear Jamie, 

Have you ever felt like you were walking towards something you should be running away from? Everything feels like it’s moving so fast. Homework keeps piling up. Mom won’t stop breathing down my neck about my grades and college. Eddie asked me on another date. I feel like I’ve had a headache everyday just this week alone, and nothing I’m doing to stop it has helped. 

I know it’s impossible, I know I need to stop thinking about it, but I wish you were here. You were always good at slowing things down and helping me relax. Whether we were sneaking out at night to the movies, or just sitting quietly together in either of our rooms. 

I don’t remember the last time I was ever that relaxed. All I can do is smile and pretend that everything is okay. And honestly, I’ll tell you a little secret: sometimes I believe it myself. Sometimes I find myself laughing at something and wondering where it came from. Like all the doors to the rooms within me were slammed shut, and the only one cracked open was this mask I don’t recognize. Has that ever happened to you? 

I’m sorry, I should really stop dumping all this on you. 

In happier news, I have a small job lined up this summer! I’ll be babysitting the Newman's five and eight year olds. They even have a small dog with curly brown hair just like yours. His name is Jax, and he’s very cute. It’s not a lot of money, but it’s something to keep my hands busy after school’s over. Didn’t Nan say something about that once? Something about moral fiber and idle hands? Anyways, it’s something, and certainly better than sitting around doing nothing. 

I hope you’re well. I hope you’re happy. Miss you. 

- Dani

—

The school entrance was nothing short of spectacularly adorned of ribbons, balloons, and a banner that read: Homecoming. Groups of students dressed in fancy attire loitered at the front while slowly streaming inside. In the passenger’s seat of one of the O’Mara’s cars, Dani hid her clenched fists in the folds of her pale pink dress and worried at her lower lip as she watched through the windshield. A hand reached out to lightly grasp her fist. 

“Hey,” Eddie said, gently unclasping her clenched hand to hold over the console, “You okay?”

“Yeah,” Dani rushed out, aiming a weak grin at Eddie, “Of course. Just - nervous I guess.”

He gave her a kind smile. “It’s okay. Me too, honestly,” he said, and chuckled lightly, pushing his glasses up his nose in a way he usually did when he was nervous. “Kind of feels like we’re sitting in a fishbowl already.” 

Dani breathed out an awkward chuckle in lieu of responding, nerves straining beneath her skin. 

“But hey,” Eddie continued, lightly shaking her hand and ducking his head to get a better look at her face in the lowlight of the car, “I’m really happy you decided to come with me.”

“Me too,” Dani murmured, not meeting his eyes. 

And it wasn’t untrue for the most part. It only just took her the long, winding road to get there. Days and weeks of Eddie asking with hopeful eyes and a gentle tone, only to end with a disappointed nod of his head whenever she had told him no or given an indecisive answer. It was too early to decide. She wasn’t in the mood. She was too busy. But finally, he had worn her down with the promise of all the ice cream she could want, and a night away from home.

In the car now, his eyes shone brightly from the distant light of the school entrance, his grin gentle and fond. “I know - I know it’s been hard lately. With everything,” he started hesitantly, his thumb running over her knuckles, “But let’s try to have fun. I really want to give you a night where you didn’t have to think about anything. Not school, or your mom, or - “ he paused, and smiled weakly, his eyes ducking briefly, the jaw of his muscle jumping “ - or anything else. Just us, having fun.”

Drawing in a low breath, Dani nodded, braving a faint smile. “And remember,” Eddie said, “We can bail any time if we’re not having fun. Get some ice cream, find a party to crash.”

Dani chuckled and Eddie grinned broadly, boyishly sweet and handsome in his blue suit. “Okay,” Dani murmured, and exhaled. “Okay. I’m ready.”

It was easy, letting Eddie jump out and round the car to open the door for her with his hand held out. Easy to slip her hand back into his and let him lead her into the school. Easy to let him murmur in her ear how pretty he thought she looked. She plastered on a soft smile in the hopes of coming across as shy at the compliment instead of how abnormally strange it felt hearing those words come from him after all this time. It wasn’t as if she hadn’t heard him compliment her before, but they were becoming more regular by the day along with those long, captivated smiles, and all Dani could do was tuck the uneasiness away and push it aside. 

Instead, she let herself take in the school as they entered, to greet her friends and schoolmates with waves and bright smiles and hugs. To let her eyes scan over the gymnasium when they finally entered, decorated in a bare fairy tale theme. String lights strewn along the walls and above their heads, fake flowers and plants stuck to the walls and placed as centerpieces on circular tables. It was pretty but simple, for all the school budget had to spare, but no one seemed to care. With pop music blaring from the rented stereo system, there was already a plethora of students on the dancefloor and lingering beside a long table of drinks and snacks. 

Eddie nudged Dani lightly and bent low for her to hear him say, “How much do you wanna bet that someone spiked the punch already?”

Dani laughed and shook her head. “I don’t need to bet,” she said, and nodded towards the table, “Look.”

Following her line of sight, they both looked to find none other than Sterling sneaking furtive glances around for any nearby teachers or chaperons before carefully pouring in a healthy amount of white liquor from a flask. 

Eddie laughed and gave her a grin. “You want some?”

Immediately, Dani’s stomach twisted uncomfortably. “Um - maybe later?”

Eddie shrugged. “Sure,” he said, and tugged gently at her hand, “Ready then?”

Taking another long scan around the room, Dani finally nodded and let Eddie pull her deeper into the crowded room. 

There was something to be said with mixing spiked punch, loud music that hammered against your chest, and a crowd of teenagers in one room. The razor facades in school hallways and lunch cliques fading away to awkward but zealous dancing, tears and arguments in gymnasium corners and bathrooms, cheap blue lights that shone above and reflected off of tinsel and sequins. And even as she felt eyes on them throughout the night, even as Eddie smiled broad and proud as her friends complimented how cute they looked together, the facade Dani had painted on remained and she managed to tuck it all away, determined to have fun for the first time in months. Lingering on the outskirts of the dancefloor with Eddie, laughing at his commentary and sharing the occasional dance with him or a cluster of her friends when she felt brave enough. 

She had even let herself share a dance with Roger. Eddie had let them go with a good natured roll of his eyes and broad grin. She hadn’t spoken to Roger much recently, not since long before the summer holidays when Nan’s anniversary had come around, but he was still as friendly as ever while they conversed and danced slowly at a respectable distance. But when his smile slowly faltered, a look of somber hesitance crossing his face, Dani felt her heart sink.

“Listen, um - “ Roger started, “I didn’t get the chance to tell you before. Didn’t know when was a good time really, but I just wanted to say sorry. Y’know, about Jamie - “

“It’s fine,” Dani interrupted quickly, just a little sharply. He blinked and slowly nodded, ducking his head, and Dani said again more softly, “It’s fine.”

Roger nodded again and offered her a faint smile, and that was that. They finished their dance and Roger let her quietly slip away with a thanks and apology. She aimed a weak smile at him and went in search of Eddie. When she found him, he was sipping deeply from a red cup by the table and brightened when he spotted her.

“Want one now?”

Fixing her eyes on the bowl of punch, Dani gritted her teeth through a thin smile and nodded. And just as she had expected, the taste was similar to a sweet, pungent acid that burned on the way down. Eddie laughed when she twisted her face, but gamely she took another long sip.

“Careful,” Eddie chuckled, “Don’t want to end up like Kyle, do you?” He jerked his head towards a form slumped over on a table. 

“Oh,” Dani said, wincing, “I hope he’s okay.” But when Kyle was roughly jostled awake by a friend and staggered to his feet to be dragged away somewhere, she breathed out a laugh and shook her head. 

“Seems fine to me,” Eddie said, and when a fun disco song transitioned to a slow ballad, a look of shy eagerness overtook him. He drew in a slow breath and nudged the back of her hand with his. “Hey - do you want to dance again?”

Dani hesitated. She had been expecting this question all night, but still was not prepared for the way her heart hammered abruptly against her ribs. Swallowing thickly at Eddie’s hopeful eyes, his glasses reflecting bright fairy lights as though they were stars, Dani slowly nodded with a faint smile. 

Eddie blinked in surprise. “Really?” he asked softly.

“Yeah,” Dani lied, feeling her stomach sour, but a broad smile bloomed on Eddie’s face, brightening his features, and she couldn’t help but feel her heart soften at the sight of it. 

Without a word, he took her hand and guided her onto the dance floor, wedging them through couples with their arms around each other, slow dancing. Dani kept her head low, focused on the path they took rather than the room encompassing them, the unnerving sense of eyes watching them returning, settling over her like cold water. 

All their dances so far had been set to upbeat music, spinning each other around and competing on who knew the most popular dance moves, instigated by Eddie in an effort to make her laugh. She had been grateful, but with every slow song that came and went, she could feel Eddie’s shoulders bunch beside her as he gave her careful sidelong glances when he thought she wasn’t looking. 

But Dani was always looking, waiting and anticipating every look or touch of the hand, never having the heart to turn him away, and worse, not knowing why. And this was no different. This was Eddie putting his hands around her waist, this was Eddie giving her a nervous grin as she placed her hands on his shoulders, this was the slow sway they easily fell into, the sound of the ballad pressing on Dani’s eardrums. 

There was a look of faint wonder on Eddie’s face as they danced, as though he had never expected them to end up here when the night began. There was an intensity to it that Dani wondered maybe if this was the part where she was supposed to feel the same way in return, that giddy, lovestruck feeling that all the other girls talked about regarding the boys they liked. As she let her eyes drift across his face, breathing in his fresh and sharp cologne, he was still the same Eddie. Still the same boy who spent most of his time with his nose stuck in a book or rehearsing for a Model UN debate, whose sweaters she stole and whose hugs felt warm and safe. There was a strange sense of both disappointment and relief within her, and in an effort to not think about why, she stepped closer to press against his chest to feel that same comforting warmth. 

As she wrapped her arms fuller around him, she felt more than heard him chuckle, a hand moving to smooth up and down her back. 

“Having fun?” he murmured. Dani nodded against the stiff fabric of his suit, humming affirmatively in response. “I’m glad,” he continued softly, “That was all I wanted.”

Without warning, her throat grew thick and she bit her tongue to quell the feeling, exhaling slowly when she managed to push it away. “Thank you,” Dani murmured, her eyes slipping closed, listening to the rapid thumps of his heart, “I think I really needed this.”

“Any time,” Eddie said, “God knows I needed it too. Have I told you yet how glad I am you agreed to come with me?”

Dani chuckled. “Once or twice,” she said, “But feel free to mention it again if you have to.”

But Eddie didn’t, remaining silent as they continued to sway. It only took her a moment to realize why, feeling his shoulders tense and his chest gradually expand as he drew in what seemed to be a fortifying deep breath. Her eyes flickered open, her breath caught in anticipation. 

“Danielle?” Eddie started, carefully soft.

“Yeah?” she whispered, a pool of trepidation whirling in her stomach.

“Can I kiss you?”

For all the nerves she felt beneath her skin, for the way her heart crashed against her chest, there was a distinct lack of surprise ringing through her. Dani had been expecting this, she had heard of all the ways the other girls expected and hoped their own nights to go with their dates, she just hadn’t been expecting it so soon. This was always supposed to happen, wasn’t it, Dani thought as she slowly pulled back to meet Eddie’s eyes, wide with hopeful anxiety. 

She could say no, she could gently let him down, tell him she wasn’t ready yet, that she may never be. And he’d understand, he’d nod and duck his head unable to hide his somber disappointment. She could keep telling him no until he finally gave up, until he was unable to look her in the eyes anymore, until he was asking for space and neglected to call her back or invite her over for dinner. Until he slipped away like sunlight between her trembling fingers, taking Judy and Carson and the rest of the family with him until all Dani was left with was a cold house that wanted to eat her whole, and her mother, both a ghost and puppeteer in equal measure. 

Dani’s heart was racing, she realized. Panicked thoughts rushing through her mind at lightspeed, a future that felt like a long dark tunnel with no end in sight. She exhaled slowly and met Eddie’s gaze, waiting with increasingly nervous eyes. Offering him a weak smile, she reached up to push his glasses up his nose and cup his cheek, feeling a faint stubble beneath her palm, and finally, she nodded. 

He blinked, a slow look of deep affection bloomed over him, his eyes drifting down to her mouth. “You sure?” he mumbled. 

When she nodded wordlessly again, not trusting to speak, Eddie smiled wide and slowly bent down to capture her lips with his. It was soft and chaste, just as it had been all that time ago at a house party, and Dani found it to be almost pleasant for all the stirring emotion she didn’t feel. He made a soft, happy sound and his hands pressed her incriminantly closer before he finally pulled away, dazed and enamored. 

“Wow,” he murmured under his breath.

This is the part, Dani told herself, where you kiss him again. 

Confetti was suddenly drifting around them, sparkling gold and silver, and a thrilled clamor passed over the room. They both peered around and found confetti cannons on stage erupting with more glittering paper, and Eddie laughed.

“Perfect timing,” he said, his cheeks pink, his eyes bright and happy. 

Dani chuckled in lieu of not knowing what to say, ducking her eyes and easing back into his chest, but then the song changed, transitioning into something softer. Familiar soft harmonies interspersed with sparse instruments. Recognition gradually fell upon her like a slow crashing wave, like the glittering confetti drifting over her. Dani sucked in a low breath and froze, her eyes going wide and her mouth slowly dropping open. The song reverberated around the room and pressed against her chest, squeezing tight like a band until it was hard to breath. 

“Danielle?” Eddie said, feeling the sudden tension in her shoulders, bewildered and concerned, “You okay?”

“Um - “ Dani croaked, a tremble in her voice, easing out of his arms and unable to look him in the eyes, “I just - can you give me a moment? I need to go to the bathroom.”

She slowly backed away, and out of the corner of her eyes she could see him frowning. He called out her name again, but Dani didn’t deign to respond. Her jaw taut and her fists clenched, Dani pushed her way through the crowd at a brisk pace with quick shallow breaths, the song ringing in her ears like a train whistle. She pushed and pushed until she was surging out of the gym and into the hallway, the door clanging open. It was quieter in the hallway, the music muffled now through the doors, but it wasn’t enough. 

There were other classmates loitering around in small groups in the hall, some glancing her way at the sudden noise of her appearance but didn’t linger long. Steeling herself, a desperate thrum beneath her skin that felt like she was being clawed inside out, Dani moved past them further down the hall, her feet heavy like lead, her head ducked with her eyes glued to the ground until she arrived finally to the girls bathroom at the end of the wing. She pushed open the door and let it creak closed behind her. 

A pressure swelled within her in the quiet of the bathroom, bursting from her chest in sharp, quickening breaths now that she was alone. Embers bloomed from her lungs with every sharp inhale, her head spinning so that she stumbled forward to grip the damp countertop with white knuckles, the edge digging into her palms as she squeezed her eyes shut. 

“Fuck,” she whispered in between gasping breaths, her voice cracking from the strain, feeling as though she were drowning on molten lava, burning a path through her chest. 

She pressed a palm to her sternum, sucking in lungfuls of air, fingers digging into the fabric of her dress, and focused to slow her breath, to swallow down the panic swelling within her throat. An inhale, and an exhale, trembling but slow, again and again until she could finally hear past the rush of blood in her ears and feel the walls expand again from where they were pressing on her. And just as resigned herself that the burn in her lungs would remain until she retrieved her inhaler from the car, a door behind her slowly creaked open. 

Dani sucked in a sharp breath, eyes snapping open as she jerked upright, frozen to the spot. Immediately, a heavy stone of dread and embarrassment sank in her stomach when through the mirror, Jackie emerged from a stall, dressed to the nines in a sparkling periwinkle dress with her hair perfectly coiffed and feathered. Their eyes briefly met, and Dani promptly ducked her head, hastily wiping at her burning cheeks, her shoulders hunching. 

The clack of heels sounded behind her in the uneasy quiet, moving closer until Jackie was a few sinks down from her, eerily silent as she twisted open the faucet to wash her hands. Dani swallowed thickly, her jaw clenched and her breath caught in anticipation, her heart a claxon in her chest. Waiting for the usual taunting jeer, for a cruel laugh that never came. Instead, there was a silence between them that Dani was unused to, leaving her feeling as though she was teetering over the edge of a great capricious cliff, waiting for a hand to push her off. 

Hesitantly, Dani’s eyes slowly drifted up towards their reflections. There was Dani, haggard and hollow-eyed with red stained cheeks. And there was Jackie, slowly meeting her gaze with an expression that was both faintly uncomfortable and tentative. Jackie promptly looked away. Rooted to the spot, Dani watched out of the corner of her eyes as Jackie turned off the faucet to dry her hands with paper towels, and without a word, without another glance back, swung open the bathroom door to make a swift exit. Blinking in the silence, utterly perplexed and exhausted, Dani’s eyes slipped shut and her shoulders slumped with a slow exhale. 

She stood there for a few minutes longer, leaning heavily against the counter. Washing her hands with cold water, letting it run long over her fingers and wrists. Splashing cool droplets over her cheeks and neck to cool the burn. Stood there until some semblance of control smoothed over her, until reality shifted back from it’s prism of panic. 

Exhaling slowly, she made to finally exit the bathroom, but when she swung open the door, she paused when she was greeted with Eddie leaning against the opposite wall with his hands deep in his pockets, his brow furrowed with worry. When he spotted her, his eyes lit up with concern and he stood upright. 

“Hey,” he murmured, taking a step towards her, his eyes scanning over her, “Are you okay? You look -“

“It’s -” Dani started, stumbling over the words as she neared him, “It’s fine.”

“Are you sure?” he said, “You got out of there so fast, and now you look exhausted. And then Jackie told me where you were, which was weird. Wait - did she say something to you? What happened?”

Dani was shaking his head before he even stopped speaking. “It’s - it was nothing. Just - “ the words lodged themselves in the back of her throat. “Can we - um,” Dani said in a whisper, staring resolutely at his tie and not his eyes, “Can we get some air?”

Eddie was already nodding. “Yeah, sure,” he said, “Whatever you want.”

He led her down the hall towards the front doors, and Dani followed wordlessly, easily falling into step with him, almost unseeing, her eyes glued to the floor. It was easy to let him guide her, almost a relief that she didn’t have to focus more beyond putting one foot in front of another, to breathe in the cool evening air when they finally stepped outside. They walked for a few minutes longer, and without even realizing it, Dani found herself being guided to sit down on the first row of bleachers of the school stadium. 

Exhaling a slow breath that rattled in her chest, the embers there a dying glow, she wrapped her arms around herself and hunched within her shoulders. A warm suit jacket was strewn over her shoulders, and she shot Eddie an appreciative smile when he sank to sit beside her. He grinned softly and took her hand once again. 

“How’s this?” he asked softly. 

“Better,” Dani murmured, “Thank you.” 

“No problem,” Eddie said, and visibly hesitated. “You want to tell me what happened now?”

Dani clenched her teeth, letting her eyes scan over the darkened field, tracing over the red track, and felt a dim ache in her chest. Her eyes glazing over, her thumb drifted towards her mouth and she bit down hard into the skin and nail until there was the faint taste of copper in her mouth.

“Hey - Danielle. Hey -!” Eddie grabbed her hand and pulled it gently from her mouth to hold in a tight grasp, looking stricken. 

“Sorry,” Dani croaked, and cleared her throat, “Sorry.”

Eddie shook his head, looking at a loss for words, eyes darting over the field for a moment before meeting her gaze. “No, I’m - I’m sorry,” he said, contrite, “I should have taken you to the car instead.”

Nodding faintly, Dani ducked her head. “Sorry I ruined tonight.”

Shaking his head, Eddie shifted closer and wrapped an arm around her shoulders. “You didn’t,” he murmured, “Just means we can go get ice cream now.”

Breathing out a weak chuckle, Dani faintly said, “Yeah. Sounds nice, actually.”

Eddie pulled her closer, his hand rubbing a warm path over her shoulder and arm, audibly swallowed hard, and finally said, “I miss her, too.”

—

‘Dear Jamie,

I visited Nan today. I brought a bouquet of her favorite flowers and cleaned up her gravestone. I hope that’s all right, that I went to see her. I don’t visit as often as I used to, or talk to her as much anymore. Honestly, I wouldn’t be surprised if she’s been rolling her eyes at how much I talk, but I think she secretly enjoys the company. I went to see my dad too. I don’t really remember the last time I visited him, just that mom got upset when she found out and didn’t talk to me for a few days. I haven’t been since until today. It was nice, I told him all about you. I think you two would have gotten along. 

I went to see the house again too. Sometimes I just find myself there without realizing it, driving or walking past, and I’ve done so enough that it doesn’t feel as shocking anymore to see how it’s decayed. The broken and boarded windows, and the overgrown grass. Nan would catch a fit if she saw what happened to it. It’s not pretty inside either. Everything is gone. The wallpaper and paint are peeling and there’s debris everywhere that I could almost hear Nan yelling at us to clean up. The backyard is just as bad as you can imagine. Your bike is still there, but the tire swing is gone. All that’s left is the rope hanging from the tree, just waiting for an accident to happen. 

When I was walking through the old bedrooms when I had the sudden thought: I could live here. Now, look, I know it sounds crazy but it wouldn’t be too hard. Just a bit of elbow grease and a little money for repairs and new furniture. I could live here all alone and no one would ever find me. I’d have my white curtains and blue shutters. A reading nook in the corner with an armchair like Nan’s. A garden of fresh fruits and vegetables in the back. Rooms that smelled of flowers and fresh laundry. My own little corner of the world like I once told you about. But I guess it was just a dream. 

I suppose I just wanted to see it for myself. It’s been a while now since you left, and for so long I hoped to see you again, but seeing the house like that, discarded and forgotten like a carcass in the woods, I think I understand now. There is no going back. Even when I wake up every night and I want to call you to tell you everything and that I can’t sleep, I remember. 

Sometimes I feel like I miss you more than I remember you, and I don’t know what to do with that, or where to put it all. So, I suppose I have to leave it here. At the cottage and in this letter. 

Speaking of letters, I got my college acceptance letters today. It’s not what you had hoped for me probably, not the freedom we had both once imagined, but I like to think you might be proud of me at least. It’s a step towards something, towards teaching like I’ve always wanted, and that has to count for something, right?

I hope you know I’m proud of you too, wherever you are and whatever you might be doing. 

- Dani

—

The party was far too reminiscent of one she had attended years ago. She had not attended many since, preferring to mingle outside of student housing and on the steps of the library. Not unless corralled by etiquette – de rigeur to a fault.

Dani hunched her shoulders and squeezed herself tighter into the corner as someone passed by without so much as a glance in her direction. “Sorry,” she mumbled and clutched her red plastic cup to her chest.

From this vantage point, Dani could see the entirety of the living room, the open back door leading to the lawn, the pillars framing the entrance to the kitchen. A strange house full of strange people. People draped across the couches, people perched upon the armrests of chairs, people grouped up in packs, people talking loudly over the music, people circulating drinks and no food, people stripping off their shirts and lowering themselves into the outdoor jacuzzi beneath a night-darkened sky.

Taking a sip of her drink – hard alcohol mixed with whatever canned pop was stashed in the fridge – Dani scanned the crowd for any sign of the girl who had invited her in the first place. The girl who sat beside her in class. The girl who invited Dani and who only ever referred to Eddie as ‘the boyfriend.’ The girl with dark hair and dark skin and dark eyes, who took every opportunity to lean in close and whisper jokes in Dani’s ear during lectures, who had grasped Dani’s hand warmly upon first meeting and introduced herself as Lila.

It took Dani a moment to find her. There were so many people bunched about. At one point she thought she saw Eddie outside, conversing with a group of students from the engineering department. His glasses gleamed as he laughed. Knowing he was near enough to reach in a moment was enough. Idly Dani glanced towards the far corner, nearest the unlit fireplace, and froze. 

Lila stood in the corner in full view of the rest of the house, very clearly kissing another girl from their year group. Nobody seemed to care or even notice. Nobody except Dani, who stared at the slant of their mouths together, at the grasp of Lila’s hand at the other girl’s waist, at the ease and obvious delight with which they kissed — sloppy yet smiling.

Dani heard more than felt the plastic cup in her hand crumple slightly, and the contents of her cup were abruptly squeezed out, overflowing onto her wrist and the front of her blouse. Swearing under her breath, Dani set the plastic cup down on a side table already cluttered with absent drinks and cans of cheap beer. She shook out her hand and looked down at her blouse. It wasn’t stained, but a splotch of the pale material was now nearly transparent, showing the outline of Dani’s bra beneath. 

With a sigh, she squeezed her way past a few people, apologising as she went, until she made it to an uncrowded hallway. There, she peered into an open door, discovered that the room was indeed the bathroom, and slipped inside, shutting the door behind her. 

She was standing before the sink and reaching for a wash towel when she saw him. A dark and faceless figure in the mirror, looming over her reflection’s shoulder like a shade. Eyes wide, Dani whirled around with a gasp, brandishing the hand towel as though it were a weapon. 

The towel knocked the apparition sideways. It was, she realised, made of cardboard. A life sized cut out figure of Michael Myers. A prank, perhaps. A vestigial decoration from a recent Halloween party, more likely. 

“Jesus Christ,” she muttered to herself. 

Heart still pounding in her chest, Dani shook her head and turned back around. She dabbed at her blouse to very little effect, before resigning herself to the fact that she could do nothing but wait for it to dry. 

Voices outside the door. Then the tramp of footsteps receding down the hallway. There was a knock, and Dani called out, “Just a minute!” 

Checking her reflection one last time in the mirror — and casting a glare at the cardboard cut out for good measure — Dani opened the bathroom door and stepped out into the hallway. The empty hallway. She shut the bathroom door behind her with a click, frowning down the hall towards the main room and the party.

“Having fun?”

Dani jerked around to find Lila leaning against the wall and smiling. “Oh! Hi! Yeah, I – uh –” Dani made a small gesture towards the hallway at large. “I like your house.”

“Thanks. I rent it with, like, six other people.”

“That’s a lot.”

Lila shrugged. “Still better than the dormitories. More privacy.”

“With six other people?”

“Maybe less privacy,” Lila amended with a grin. “More freedom, though.”

“Sounds nice,” Dani agreed. “Which room is yours?”

It was meant to be an innocent question, but the moment it slipped out Dani winced. Lila’s grin broadened and her eyes flicked down to the see-through mark on Dani’s shirt.

“I just meant –” Dani stammered.

“Yeah?”

“It’s – It’s a big house. Easy to get lost in."

Lila nodded. “It is.” Then she pointed down the hallway, further away from the living room. “Mine’s that one on the right. I would invite you in, but it’s a mess right now.”

“Oh, I don’t mind,” said Dani, then went bright red. Perhaps one of those boys in the kitchen had poured more rum into her cup than she’d originally thought.

Biting back a snort of laughter, Lila shook her head. “You really do make this too easy.”

Dani grimaced. “Sorry.”

“That’s all right. I thought you were straight? Didn’t you come here with the boyfriend?”

Dani’s mouth dropped open, but no sound came out. Finally she managed to swallow past the pressure at her throat, and said, “I did. I mean – I am. He’s – around. Somewhere. I think.”

Lila nodded sagely. “Mmm. Yes. Very convincing.”

“That’s –” Dani clamped her teeth shut and cast a furtive look down each end of the hallway, but nobody was coming towards them. Nobody seemed to be eavesdropping. “Did you need something?”

Lila’s eyebrows rose. She cocked her head, still smiling faintly. “Yeah,” she said, taking a step closer. “Actually, I do.”

“Oh?” Dani could feel herself tense, her hands clenching into fists at her side. The air was too warm, cloying, and Lila’s eyes were keen as darts.

Lila reached out and for a brief breathless moment Dani thought she was going to touch her – grasp her gently by the arm, cup her cheek, take her chin between clever fingers and guide Dani by the jaw – only for Lila to turn the doorknob just behind Dani.

“I need to pee,” said Lila. “And you’re standing right in front of the bathroom.”

An unexpected burst of laughter escaped Dani then. She leaned back against the shut door, lifting a hand to cover her face, laughing into her palm. Lila grinned at her as Dani slipped out of the way with a series of breathless apologies.

“Don’t worry about it,” Lila told her, giving Dani a wave even as she shut the bathroom door. “See you in class!”

“Yeah,” Dani waved back and ducked her head, relieved to be heading back down the hall in search of Eddie. 

It wasn’t that Lila wasn’t nice. Because she was. And it wasn’t that people at the party weren’t nice. Because they were. A few tried to engage her in conversation while she crossed the main room to get to the back door. She was just tired, Dani told herself. She wanted to go home. 

It had nothing to do with the thrill skittering beneath her ribs. Nothing at all to do with the fact that Dani had no idea what she would have done if Lila had made some sort of advance. Balked? Probably not. Accepted? Surely not. 

Surely not. 

That wasn’t her. Dani wasn’t that person. 

“Hey,” Eddie greeted her with a smile when she found him still engaged in conversation with a group out back. “How’s it going?”

Dani wrapped a hand around his arm. “Fine. Can we go? Sorry. I know it’s early.”

“That’s all right,” one of the other guys said — she didn’t know any of their names. He winked at Eddie and patted him on the shoulder. “We’ll catch up next week, yeah?”

Eddie’s answering chuckle sounded slightly nervous and he pushed his glasses up the bridge of his nose. “Sure,” then he said to Dani, “Come on. I’ll walk you back to your dorm.”

—

Sex with Eddie wasn't his idea. Only that it was something Dani thought they ought to do. Because it was a step forward, and any step forward was better than looking back.

She wanted to want it. She wanted to think of him and not the way Lila smiled at her in class. The way the cute and curvy barista always brushed their fingers together when she handed over Dani's cup of coffee. The way the older librarian always wore her soft blouse with a button undone so that Dani's eyes could trace her collarbone. The way a female classmate squeezed by her in a tightly crowded hallway with a brief press of her hand to the small of Dani's back.

Most of all she didn't want to be left alone with her thoughts about the dream. About going to her dorm after the party, kissing Eddie good night, only to fall asleep and wake up clutching a spare pillow, knees clenched together. Still haunted by a dream where a faceless figure explored her body with a soft mouth, a roving tongue and sharp teeth. And how she had tried to relieve the slick heat between her legs with her own hands, only to give up after ten minutes of frustration, unable to conjure up a face, unable to feel any sense of connection to herself enough to finish alone. Physicality seemed to jolt her back to herself, away from the jumbled fantasy that existed in the dark and nowhere else, making her feel less real, less tangible. 

Sex with Eddie was easier than she had expected. And exactly as awkward as she had expected.

It took a grand total of fifteen minutes. Afterwards, Eddie rolled onto his side and tucked his head into the crook of Dani’s shoulder with a sigh, an arm still flung across her waist. They had a few more hours until her roommate returned to the dorm. She remained there, carding a hand through his dark hair and staring up at the ceiling, while Eddie sketched little patterns with his fingertips against her skin. 

Sex with Eddie was uninspired. It was lackluster. And it was — Dani thought wonderingly to herself, thinking of all the girls she’d heard discussing the deed with giggling delight — ultimately disappointing. 

She felt him press a kiss to her shoulder, and she blinked down at him. 

“That was nice,” he mumbled.

Dani hummed a wordless reply rather than say something in return.

—

'Dear Jamie, 

You’d be proud of me. I went to a party. All on my own, no less. Well, not alone. Eddie came, too. But I was the one who secured the invitation, and I think that counts for something.

I had the strangest dream afterwards, though. I don’t think alcohol agrees with me much. Must be a family trait.

I wish you’d been there. At the party, I mean. The whole time I was there, all I could think about was how well you’d get along with everyone. How much more fun it would be with you. I miss you. 

All my love,

- Dani

—

It was his face afterwards that had stuck with her. Contorting between bafflement and hurt, fidgeting on his knee after Dani had pulled the rug from right beneath him. 

“What do you mean: no?” Eddie had said slowly, as though he was still parsing out the words in his head. 

“We’re - Eddie, we’re still so young, and - can you stand up, please? The snow is melting into your pants,” Dani said, pulling at her fingers, fighting the urge to run in the opposite direction. 

“I just - “ Eddie started, glancing wordlessly around the quiet park where they stood before finally rising to his feet. Without meeting her eyes, he finally murmured, his breath a white mist, “I thought this was what you wanted, too.”

Words lodged themselves in Dani’s throat, confessions building like bile. Things she had never truly taken into consideration before, but couldn’t possibly say. Not on Christmas morning on an impromptu walk in the park at Eddie’s eager insistence, intent on blindsiding her with an unplanned proposal. He had never looked so serious before, lacking the teasing glint he had worn in his eyes the dozens of times he’d asked before in the past years. Utterly earnest with the way he dropped to his knee with the admission he had no ring, but knew he wanted to spend the rest of his life with her. 

But then she had said it: ‘No.’ The word seeming to come out of nowhere, banging on her ribs to be let out until she was speaking it before she could stop herself. And then there it was, his face. Blinking up at her as though he was seeing her for the first time. 

“I’m sorry,” Dani said, her fingers twitching to grasp his hand, quietly urging him to look at her, “I’m just - I don’t think I’m ready yet. It’s too soon.”

A muscle jumping in his jaw, Eddie nodded and gradually met her gaze. “But one day?” he asked quietly, hope glinting in his eyes.

It sounded like a promise. One she’d have no say in the matter, or opportunity to change her mind. A contract of infinite fine lines. Dani exhaled, the morning air cold and sharp against her cheeks and nose, shifting on her feet in the snow. 

Already tired and the day had barely begun, Dani finally relented. “Yeah,” Dani breathed, smiling weakly, “One day. Just - not now, okay?”

The morning sun cast sharply against the snow, leaving long angled shadows from the trees and their figures, the light glinting off of Eddie’s glasses when ducked his head briefly and nodded. 

“Okay,” he murmured, offering her a brave smile that was more frail and still disappointed than anything. But then, the teasing glimmer was back, the corner of his mouth lifting in a knowing smirk. “It was the ring, wasn’t it? Because I didn’t have one and you want a nice big shiny ring?”

Dani blinked at him and then rolled her eyes hard, thwacking him lightly on the arm. He laughed and wrapped an arm around her shoulder for a loose hug. Dani let him, slipping her arms around his waist and squeezing her eyes shut as she pressed into his chest, the part of her relieved to hear him laugh again suffocating under the guilt clutching at her heart in a fist. 

“Come on,” Dani said, lightly clearing her throat and pulling away to lead him back towards the house, “Before everyone starts to wonder if we ran away.”

“Wouldn’t be a bad thing,” Eddie said, waggling his eyebrows, slipping his hand into hers. 

Dani huffed, and said, “Sure, until my mom calls the police for your head on a spike.”

Eddie blanched, as pale as snow. “Never mind.”

Snickering, Dani shook her head and led him back home. There had been an easiness to him on the way back, his cheeks pink from the cold, chuckling when his glasses immediately fogged when they stepped inside the house. But that had been then, and the hours slipped by with presents shared and lunch had, the easiness giving way to the return of quiet disappointment and dejection the longer they were subjected to the company of Tommy’s newest girlfriend and David’s fiancée. Eddie’s eyes dimming by the hour with forced smiles and hushed conversations in corners with Judy or Mike. 

She inadvertently came across one by accident. Wandering into the kitchen in search of something to snack on to channel the nerves bubbling beneath her skin after escaping small talk and awkward smiles with Tommy’s girlfriend. Eddie with his head ducked and Judy murmuring softly to him. She froze when they spotted her, her shoulders tensing as they both gave her similar warm smiles that betrayed nothing of the conversation they were having. 

“Sorry - um,” Dani said, eyes darting between them, “Did I interrupt something?”

“Of course not, honey,” Judy said, waving her off and returning to her task of putting together a platter of cookies, “Are you hungry again? Do you want me to heat up some leftovers for you?”

The question almost flew over Dani’s head, instead carefully watching Eddie quietly clear his throat before delving into the fridge for a drink. “No,” Dani said after a moment too long and plastered on a small smile at Judy, “I’m fine.”

Fine was one way of putting it, a dim sense of dread washing over her as Eddie merely offered her a kiss on the head and a crooked grin that didn’t reach his eyes when he slipped by, leaving the pair alone in the kitchen without a word. Her fists clenched, she watched his tall frame disappear around the corner.

There was a sigh behind her. “You kids grew up too fast if you ask me.”

Dani choked out a laugh. “Just a little bit,” she replied, biting her lip and folding her arms across her chest.

The kitchen remained silent for a moment, until Judy said, “Sweetheart, are you sure there isn’t anything I can do for you?”

There was a faint eagerness to Judy’s tone that Dani had no idea what to do with. Shaking her head faintly, she turned to be met with Judy’s kind but concerned expression. “I’m fine,” Dani repeated, “I promise.”

Judy seemed unconvinced, stepping closer to press her palm on Dani’s cheek, meeting her eyes with a level of intensity that Dani wasn’t used to. Not from Judy. “You would tell me,” Judy started slowly, “if there was something wrong, wouldn’t you, honey?”

Words banged again within her chest, beating against her ribs. I don’t know how to love him, it said, I’m sorry. I’m so sorry. I’m - 

“Of course,” Dani lied, guilt twisting tight around her neck as she gave Judy a reassuring smile.

With a sigh, Judy gently shook her head. “Then I want you to stop worrying,” she said firmly but gently, slipping into a smile that bordered on teasing, “You’ll both come around. I just know it. I don’t think I’ve ever seen two souls made for each other as much as you two. Well, besides Mike and I, of course.”

Judy laughed softly and Dani couldn’t help but mimic her, invisible strings stretching her mouth into a broad smile. And when Judy finally left her alone to her own devices in the kitchen with the platter of cookies in hand, Dani’s shoulders sagged and her smile slipped away in place of weariness. It took a moment for her to decide, already pulling down a wine glass from the cupboard before she made up her mind. Digging out a wine bottle from the fridge to fill her glass with a burgundy red that settled heavy on her tongue and smoothed the building panic within her until it was reduced back to a simmer. 

It kept her company for the evening, a sip taken for every sidelong glance from Eddie, every encouraging smile from Judy, every stern look her mother sent her way. But when night began to settle and her flushed cheeks began to buzz, Dani quietly slinked away from the festivities to grab her jacket and boots to slip outside the backdoor, exhaling in relief when she stepped out onto the porch. 

Leaning against the railing, her breath was a white cloud as she took in the scene. The air was brisk but still and quiet, the sky an indigo blue with faint stars twinkling above her, and for the first time since waking up this morning, a sense of peace swept over her in the quiet of the dark. But Dani didn’t have it for long. She had only been outside for just a few moments when the backdoor opened. Tensing, she turned around with excuses already on her tongue, but sighed when Carson shut the door behind him with a small grin and joined her at the railing. 

Without a word, Dani returned to staring listlessly into the dark sky and backyard, fidgeting with her fingers. 

“Thought I’d find you out here,” Carson murmured softly, as though unwilling to disturb the quiet, “Mom sent me to look for you.”

Dani snorted humorlessly. “Worried I was going to run off into the night?”

“Nah,” Carson said, and then paused, narrowing his eyes, “Is that something I should be worried about?”

Breathing out a thin laugh, Dani nudged him in the ribs. He jerked away, chuckling with a pleased grin before digging out a rumbled pack of cigarettes from his pocket. He lit one with practised ease, embers glowing bright in the dark, and wordlessly held it towards her. After a beat, Dani took it without looking over at him and took a long drag, welcoming the burn in her lungs. 

“These aren’t good for you, you know,” she murmured flatly, expelling the smoke through pursed lips. 

She felt Carson shrug. “I’ll burn that bridge when I get to it,” he said, lighting up a cigarette of his own. 

Dani rolled her eyes in mild exasperation but didn’t respond, electing to smoke quietly until Carson broke the silence. 

“Look, don’t worry about Eddie, okay?“

She sighed. “Carson.”

“I’m just saying,” he said, turning to face her, “I know he’s acting like a dick right now, but - well you know how he is. His favorite movie is The Graduate.” He twisted his face in distaste as though that explained everything. 

Dani gave him a long look. “Is this why your mom sent you to find me?”

He shook his head. “Just to keep you company,” he murmured. 

It was irritating how quick her eyes suddenly burned with unshed tears that she had to look away to hide them. She took a long drag to settle herself. “Thanks,” she said quietly, smoke billowing from her nose. 

Carson was silent, the air thick with an unspoken question until finally he spoke again. “Are you sure you’re okay?”

“Why wouldn’t I be?”

“Because believe it or not,” he said, “You’re not that hard to read.”

Her breath caught in her chest, staring fixedly at the untouched stretch of snow in the yard, feeling inexplicably like an exposed nerve. Swallowing thickly, she slowly met his eyes, almost expecting to see every single lie, every single confession waiting to stumble between her clenched teeth reflected back at her as though he knew all along. Just waiting for her to slip up and make a mistake and bleed herself dry. She didn’t know which was worse, the justified anger she had been expecting, or the gentle concern she found in his brown eyes instead. 

When she took too long to respond, staring in a faint stupor, his frown deepened and he opened his mouth to speak, but Dani beat him to it. “I don’t really want to talk about it,” she stumbled out quickly, just a little sharply, and then softened when Carson blinked in surprise, the fight going out of her just as fast. “I just - I don’t like hurting him like that.”

Carson grinned softly. “I know,” he said, “But he’s gonna be fine. I promise. Before you know it, he’s going to be bugging you again about it. He’s relentless, remember?” 

Dani nodded, almost unseeing as she took another long drag, weariness becoming a comfortable fixture in her bones. When she didn’t respond again, Carson put out his cigarette on the snow covered railing and wrapped an arm around her shoulders with a sigh. “Maybe you should run away after all,” he said. 

A soft laugh escaped her, a small choked sound. She leaned against him when he chuckled and rubbed her shoulder, recalling a jar of loose change and crumbled bills left forgotten in some corner of her old bedroom with a fond, wistful smile. 

—

‘Dear Jamie,

I don’t know why I keep trying to write these. Why I keep thinking about them. There’s nowhere for them to go, no address to send to. I write one, put it in an envelope, and then a few days later I throw it away. There’s no point in keeping them. Just as there’s no point in putting them in the post box. 

I’ve stopped turning around and expecting you to be there when I have something to say. I guess that’s why I’ve been writing less of these lately. If you were going to come back, or call, or write to me, then you would’ve done so by now. 

I think that’s the hardest part. Knowing that everyone else is moving on, while I’m here. I’m still here. Sometimes I think I always will be.

I like to imagine you going to all those places we talked about. I like to imagine your life is better now. I like to imagine you keep a piece of me with you. 

- Dani

—

The car had seen better days, this Dani knew. No one had to tell her that. No one had to tell her that every door creaked with the screech of metal at every movement. That the gas meter was wrong more often than not, displaying it half full when in fact it was wheezing it's last breath. The passenger's side was slightly dented and scraped, the undercarriage tinted red with rust. But it was hers, and hers alone. 

She’d only had it for a week now, bought just a few days after returning home from college for the summer with the full intention of making the most of it. The steering wheel was solid in her hands, the stereo tinny and staticky, the leather worn and crackling. A contained pocket universe of her own. It had the faint smell of dust and cigarettes, and she had spent the following day cleaning the interior before hanging an air freshener on the rearview window, all too happy to restore it to her liking for the simple fact that no one could tell her otherwise. 

It felt like a taste of freedom, driving it for the first time. The sun was a warm companion as it slanted through the windows onto her skin, the wind from the open window whipping at her hair as she spent her evenings driving through neighbourhoods, watching streets and buildings pass by with aching familiarity and a sweet fondness. 

Nothing could break her spell of gratified happiness. Not even Karen who scoffed and muttered under her breath with scorn and distaste when she laid eyes on it, displeased that Dani spent all her hard earned money on a car that could pass for a junker. Even when Eddie tilted his head in bewilderment, failing to hide his grimace when she had proudly showed it off couldn't diminish the lightness in her chest. Ignoring his mutterings that he could have come along to the dealer to assist in favor of soaking in Judy’s proud appraisals for taking another leap forward into adulthood, and Mike’s patient smile and offer to look over the car for basic maintenance. 

But it wasn’t any of their reactions she had been truly looking forward to. Patiently waiting a full week until finally Carson arrived home from his freshman year at college with slumped shoulders and bags under his eyes to idle the car in the driveway and press on the car horn until he stumbled outside in his new leather jacket. 

When he spotted the car and just who was inside, his eyes brightened and he sped towards her. “Holy shit, you did it!” Dani laughed and stepped out just in time for him to wrap her in a tight hug. “God, I missed you.”

“We saw each other two weeks ago,” Dani said, smiling into his chest. 

“Yeah, but this is different,” Carson said, leaning heavily into her and groaned, “School’s finally over.” Dani stumbled under the weight of his taller frame and they both laughed, teetering off balance briefly until finally he pulled back. “Okay, I wanna look at it.”

Dani bit back a broad grin as he watched him round the car with the expression of a solemn appraiser. Pulling open doors to peer inside with hums of consideration and sweeping a finger over the scratched paint. He rubbed said finger with his thumb as though brushing off crumbs and finally aimed an impressed expression towards her. 

“Well?” Dani said, folding her arms in amusement. 

“It’s a load of junk,” Carson said, and Dani snorted, “But I love it.”

Dani rolled her eyes and Carson laughed, slinging an arm around her neck “I can’t believe you did it, I’m so proud of you,” he said, placing a kiss to her forehead. 

“Thanks,” she murmured with a small smile as she looked over the car. 

“But you do realize though that you’re driving me everywhere from now on, right?”

With a derisive snort, Dani shoved him off, grinning when he laughed again. “In that case, you’re buying gas.”

“Ouch,” he said, wincing and pressing a hand to his chest, “No free rides? Not even for your favorite O’Mara?”

“Nope,” Dani said, her mouth curling with an impish grin, “Though I do have the perfect place in mind for the first drive.”

He brightened with curiosity. “Oh, yeah?”

“Mhm,” Dani hummed, and without any fanfare, she pulled a folded envelope from the back pocket of her jeans and held it out towards him with a murmur, “Happy belated birthday.”

He blinked at her in surprise. “That was months ago.” 

She shrugged shyly. “Wanted to do something special since we missed doing something last time,” she said, “And then I saw this, and well - I couldn’t pass up on the opportunity.”

The look he gave her was warm, fondness blooming from his eyes. Without a word, he took the envelope and peeked inside. He gasped, his eyes going wide. “You didn’t.”

“I did.”

“These are - no fucking way. These are tickets to - ?“

“They are. The show’s in two days.”

“Holy shit. Holy shit, Dani!” He laughed brightly and pulled her into a back breaking hug, lifting her off her feet, murmuring thank yous on repeat in her hair. 

The next two days were spent in anticipation and secrecy, having told no one but Mike their plans for the day. When the day finally arrived, they piled into Dani’s car and rushed down the street with breathless giggles in an effort to not get caught by anyone from either household. Carson, happy and eager for the concert, using her dashboard as a makeshift drum with the drumsticks he brought along, and Dani, relieved to finally have an excuse to drive somewhere that wasn’t drifting aimlessly through streets. 

The road long and narrow ahead of them, Dani guided them out of town towards Des Moines, North Liberty slowly disappearing in the rearview mirror like a mirage. Driving away felt like leaving reality behind, if only for a while. It was the possibility of choice, itself an illusion. A pretty fantasy she could pantomime like an actor on stage. With nothing but flat fields of corn and grass on the horizon, the great blue sky yawning open above her, she teased at the notion of letting her car take her beyond Des Moines, beyond into the unknown. That she might never leave the road until her tires wore down to the rim or she reached the end of the world. 

“How did you even afford all this?” Carson asked over the rumbling of car wheels on tarmac and music hissing from the stereo. “The car and the tickets. It must have cost a fortune.”

“Not really,” Dani said, keeping her eyes on the road, “Saved up a lot from working at that bookstore near campus and years of allowances. And believe it or not - “ she aimed a sly grin at him “ -  the car came pretty cheap.”

Carson snorted and rolled his eyes, slouching back into his seat.

What she failed to mention was the handful of bills and change from a certain travel fund jar that had helped her along the way. The money having been tucked away for years in the dark corners of her room, lingering over her like a shadowed veil. It had added up to nothing more than fifty-six dollars, a small dent in what the car and tickets cost that it might as well have been water vapor for all it contributed. But it was long overdue. There was no leaving North Liberty, no traveling the world like she had once dreamed, but having a car of her own, a whole world of her own — it was as close she was ever going to get. 

The concert, in the end, was bright and loud and the most fun Dani has had in years. Rough guitars and heavy drums that felt like thunder in her chest, it wasn’t the kind of music Dani would ever actively search out, but she couldn’t deny how easy it was to get caught up into it. The stage lights casting along the surging and dancing crowd. Carson beside her, cheering and singing along to every word with the crowd until he was hoarse. And Dani with her shoulders the lightest it’s been in years, an unknown spectre amongst a crowd of hundreds, with no expectations and constraints tangled around her neck. 

On the drive home, loose-limbed and the humid night air thick and heavy as molasses, she kept the windows down to let in the breeze that cooled their skin and ruffled their hair. Carson slouched low in his seat, almost boneless as he fiddled with the radio with a happy grin and lethargic eyes. 

“So,” Dani started, “did you have fun?”

“Do you even need to ask,” he croaked, his voice rough. Dani snorted, sparing him a fond smile as he finally settled on a station and leaned back against the headrest, soaking in the breeze. “Although, you’re on thin ice though for refusing to buy me a drink. And on my birthday, too.” He aimed a disappointed look at her and shook his head with a tisk. 

She gave him a reproachful look. “You’re underage,” she said, “And your birthday is in February.”

Dani laughed as he grumbled beside her. But when he fell silent again, the hiss of the stereo and a distant rumble of thunder, the smell of rain in the air, he turned to her with an earnestly soft expression. 

“Did I say thank you, yet?”

“About no less than a hundred times, I think,” Dani said with a quiet huff of laughter. 

“I mean it this time,” he said, “Thank you for this. Really. I missed you guys.”

“We missed you too,” Dani murmured. 

Instead of saying anything more, there was a look of hesitancy on his face, his eyes drifting down for a moment. “You know who else I miss?” Carson’s mouth curled into a plaintive grin, and without waiting for an answer, he murmured, “Jamie.”

Dani blinked in surprise, her eyes fixed on the red eyes of tail lights ahead in the darkened road, lightning flashing in darkened clouds in the distance as her knuckles went white against the steering wheel. Hearing that name again felt like the unexpected sound of shattering glass, like the first drops of rain against her skin. One she hasn’t heard spoken in a long time, forbidden and forgotten as though it were a curse. It had been years since Carson’s spoken of her, not since the following weeks after Jamie left. Quiet in his mourning like the rest of the family. Solemn whispers in corners and sidelong glances of concern and disquiet, gradually ebbing away until the jagged edges were smoothed with time until the memories were a faceless thing with no name. Swallowing thickly, she glanced briefly at him, at the fond wistfulness across his features as he stared through the windshield.

“Yeah?” she said in a gentle encouragement to continue. 

Carson nodded and murmured, “Wish she was here. She would have loved the show.”

A dim ache spread across Dani’s chest, a fond smile pulling at her mouth. “Yeah,” Dani breathed, “She would’ve.”

Lightning flashed again, sparks of blue hanging low in the sky in the far distance, thunder following shortly in a slow roll. And all too easily, all too abruptly, Dani could hear Jamie’s voice in her head. ‘Looks like a big one, Poppins.’ Could picture her crooked grin and mischievous eyes, eager for another wild storm chase with Dani right at her heels. But they were in Dani’s car this time, and just the thought alone — of Jamie being here next to her, egging her on for another chase, teasing her for being the driver for once — left her feeling strained and bone weary with longing affection.

She found her foot gradually pushing down on the accelerator, urging her car faster down the highway in an effort to vanish the memories and to leave the storm behind them, thunder and lightning growing distant in the rear view mirror.

— 

It was the end of the semester, and Dani had offered Eddie a ride back to North Liberty. A carpool to save them gas. It felt strange having him in the passenger seat. Normally he would insist on driving. Other cars Dani did not drive. Someone else would step towards the driver’s side, and she would shrink away towards the passenger seat. But nobody drove Dani’s car except her. Always. 

Outside the sky had begun to darken, and the fields were a vast, flat silhouette beneath a deepening grey sky. Dani flicked on the headlights to illuminate the road. Beside her Eddie seemed content being in control of the radio station, fiddling with the dials until he arrived at some jazz or folk station that he preferred. The conversation was calm and easy. The two of them drifted from topic to topic, unafraid of the silences in between. Unlike his brothers, Eddie could sit in the silence of his own thoughts with another person for hours. 

It was, Dani thought, one of the things she liked about him best. Being alone, together. 

“Have you heard anything from the twins lately?” Dani asked.

Eddie tapped along to a soft jazzy beat in the background, his fingers gently keeping time against his knee. “Not much,” he said. “David’s still at that accounting job, and Tommy’s wedding is all scheduled for April.”

“Where’s that happening?”

“Cedar Rapids, I think.” Eddie turned his head towards her. “Will you come as my plus one?”

Smiling, Dani kept her eyes on the road. “Of course. What? Did you think I wasn’t going to go? Judy would drag me up there herself.” 

He chuckled. “Yeah, that sounds right.” 

“I’m going to need to buy a new dress, though.”

“Why? Your mom isn’t coming, is she?” 

“Well, I don’t know. Tommy’s in charge of the wedding invitations.” 

“And you think he’s going to send one to your mom?” Eddie asked, incredulous.

Dani shifted her grip upon the steering wheel. “You try telling her she can’t come.”

He made a face. “No, thanks.”

“Coward,” she said, shooting him a grin.

“And proud of it. Your mom is a lot.”

“You don’t have to tell me that.” 

Silence again. The white noise of the tires across worn out asphalt beneath the faint strains of twelve-bar blues. Dani concentrated on the straight of road, while Eddie contemplated the stars dotting the horizon through the window. 

They did not speak again until Dani pulled up to their childhood street and killed the engine in front of her mom’s house. By that time, night had washed over the earth. A few houses on the street burned through their windows with interior lights, bleeding warmth and attracting moths. 

“Thanks for the ride,” Eddie said into the quiet darkness of the car. 

Dani smiled over at him. “Yeah. No problem.”

“You should come over for lunch tomorrow. Mom would love to see you.”

“I’ll be there at eleven,” Dani said. 

“Great.” 

Through the dim light, she could see him smile. He leaned over the center console and kissed her. His mouth was warm and soft, and he cradled her jaw in his palm. When she closed her eyes she could almost imagine she felt something. Could almost convince herself. The kiss was chaste yet lingering, and when he pulled away he stroked his thumb over the bluff of her cheek.

“Wish mom would let you stay over,” he murmured.

“Like old times?” Dani joked.

“Yeah.”

He leaned forward again. A brief kiss. And then he was gone. Opening the door and hauling himself out, striding across the street. Dani watched him all the way, as he fumbled with his keys at the front door, until finally he had entered his house and vanished from sight. 

Her hand was still squeezing the steering wheel in a death grip. With a slow exhale, Dani let go and stepped out onto the street. Unlike the O’Mara house, her mom’s house was dark. When she unlocked the front door and pushed it open, she was greeted with darkness. The smell of cigarettes was familiar and overpowering. Not even a college campus full of hormonal twenty-somethings could compete. 

For a moment she lingered, hand at the doorknob, teetering on the liminal space between outside and inside, between sacred and profane. The house itself was a yawning open space. A muzzle. Something with teeth that needed to be chained off from loss of limb. Snatching her hand away, Dani stepped forward and shut herself inside.

Creak of the floorboards beneath her feet. After so many years, this house managed to surprise her still. New groans, new sensitive spots on the floor to catalogue and avoid. Her eyes flicked towards the ceiling, but she heard nothing from above. Her mother must be dead asleep or otherwise out and about for the evening. Dani did not know. Nor did she particularly want to know.

Slowly, carefully, she crept upstairs. Flicking on the light in her room felt like an intrusion in and of itself. As though she had set something alight, touched a torch to the pyre and a roar of kindling. Shutting the door behind her, Dani changed into pajamas as quickly as she could and slipped beneath the sheets of her bed, book in hand. At first she did not open it, ears pricked, listening for clues, but the house was — as ever — usually silent. 

She had only just cracked the book open to the marked page when her bedside table crackled with a faint voice. Frowning, Dani reached over, opened the top drawer, and found an old walkie talkie there. The radio was scuffed from use, wire mesh scraped and worn and half buried beneath miscellany. She picked it up and leaned back against the pillows, holding her breath for whoever was on the other end to make a noise again. 

It was an irrational thought. A memory. A daydream. A secret. A wish. She clutched the radio to her chest in breathless anticipation, expecting —

“Danielle?” 

The speaker crackled with disuse, louder than she had been expecting. Dani almost dropped it into her lap, had to fumble to keep it in one hand. Swallowing thickly, she lifted it and pressed down on the button. 

“Eddie? Is that you?” 

“Hey,” he said. “You’re still awake.”

“Yeah.”

“Your mom around?” 

“No. But I don’t know when she’ll be back.” 

Silence. It went on for so long that Dani pressed the button down again and prompted, “Eddie?” 

“I’m here,” he said. 

Her shoulders relaxed. She could almost imagine him sprawled out on the bed beside her, his large frame cramped in such a small space. She wished he were here, now. She wished he were warm and solid beneath her hand. She wished she could touch him. She wished she wasn’t alone. She wished -

“Will you marry me?” he asked. 

It wasn’t the first time he’d asked. It wasn’t even the second. It was however the first time Dani hesitated. Swallowing thickly, Dani found herself gazing at her bedside table again, at the photo of Jamie and herself propped there, at that broad blazing smile. 

Dani squeezed her eyes shut. Her hand was squeezing the life from the walkie talkie, and she had to force her fingers to unclench. She pressed her thumb against the button and murmured, “Good night, Eddie.”

—

‘Dear Jamie,

Come home.’

[neonponders]

*sigh* catch me projecting on a Saturday.

I read this post ( @lazybakerart you wizard - ALSO IT’S YOUR BIRTHDAY?????? HAPPY BIRTHDAY!!!! 🌹🌹🌹🌹🌹) and am now thinking about a sugardaddy!Billy with an ace!Steve. (*emphasis on grey ace*)

* Please nobody attack me for writing about leather fashion. I’m vegetarian and it’s fiction. Live a little. *

Read on ao3 ~

🌹 🌹 🌹 🌹 🌹 🌹 🌹

Steve just kind of stared at the box on the restaurant table. It wasn’t a ring box, but it was velvet. Goodness knew how many of these he’d seen in his life.

Steve knew wealth. He knew money, and all of the material variations therein.

He’d gotten pedicures with his mother before his father declared such a thing unfit for a boy coming into puberty. If you look like a man, act like a man. As if men didn’t have feet, or something.

Then he went to the salon. That wasn’t so easy to take away. Ventures with her son seemed to be the only things keeping Mrs. Harrington from being connected to her husband’s hip, so Mr. Harrington let them both have this one. Steve, fresh out of graduation, being given a hairdresser’s chair to accomplish summer-fresh highlights.

Mrs. Harrington was also the type of woman to enjoy shoes. Everyone has a thing. For some, they had bags. Others, jewelry. Vintage furniture. Designer wallpaper. Mrs. Harrington enjoyed shoes. It was where Steve learned to carry a woman’s bags, but he didn’t stay outside of the store. He learned how to clean suede, the difference between a 130 So Kate and an ordinary heel. What fetish meant in terms of fashion. He can convert heels sizes in millimeters to inches faster than a cashier calculating change.

Tommy and Carol had joked about Steve’s father having a different kind of fetish. Nothing to do with fashion, and everything to do with sex. Steve had foolishly let them into his mother’s bedroom and they were having a field day with a shoe closet that cost more than both of their houses combined. Still smelling of Nancy and pool chlorine, Steve as good as ended that friendship right there.

Because they didn’t get it.

Mr. Harrington certainly didn’t get it. Could never have such a sexual inclination because he didn’t understand pampering or indulgent interests.

He understood favors. Material apologies.

Mrs. Harrington had a collection of pearls and diamonds that she never wore.

Steve knew she liked opals and pink, pink rubies, because Steve liked opals too. Because he used his father’s money to buy ruby studs his mother actually wore. Because he gets her oldest, broken bracelet with green amber fixed, and she wears it until it breaks again. And then she presented Steve with a thin, gold chain to go around his ankle. With a gleaming, green amber stone flanked by two opals.

The green goes with our eyes, she said. Someone special will see the green in all that brown. It’s why we look good in reds.

Steve was still looking at the box on the table.

“It’s not going to catch fire, the longer you glare at it.”

His dark hazel, creek water eyes slanted up to the man sitting opposite him.

Billy Hargrove.

Stubborn to a fault. Gorgeous as Lucifer with wings freshly burnt off. And just as dangerous.

“I thought I said no more gifts.”

“And I ignored you. Open it.”

Steve went about it like ripping off a bandaid. He sighed at the window beside their booth, wrenching the thing open to see -

Diamonds.

He shut it with a loud clap and set it on Billy’s placemat. “No, thanks.”

The man’s features froze in tolerant stoicism, but he eased the box inside his suit jacket pocket. “You’re a hard one to shop for.”

Steve’s eyes widened dramatically over his wine glass of water. Not because he was sober - he’d willingly pay for an overpriced red, himself, if the handsome asshole weren’t trying to wave his wallet everywhere. “You can stop trying to buy your way into my pants any time you want.”

“If that’s all I wanted, I would’ve stopped three months ago.”

Three months ago,

When Billy breezed into Steve’s life as easily as he had senior year of high school. The two of them certainly deserved some kind of award for having a bizarre history.

Within a handful of months, Billy had arrived upon a turbulent time in Steve’s life, and then left nearly as quickly. Billy witnessed Steve and Nancy’s break-up, Steve’s fall from Hawkins High grace, and even beat his face a little bit. Because that’s what teenage men with bad emotional processing and even worse communication skills do.

Now, almost ten years later, Billy had some kind of empire behind him and Steve, well, didn’t. He had no idea what Billy’s job consisted of, but he got little hints. Mostly the negative space from Billy’s lack of discussing his job told Steve a whole lot.

Steve, who worked two jobs and occasional gigs wherever he was needed. During one such time, while Steve managed the cables and sound boards for Robin’s band, Billy Hargrove sauntered up to him with just as much charm mixed with hauteur as he’d ever displayed.

It wasn’t like meeting an old friend, because they had never been more than acquaintances, and roughly ten years was enough time for a personality to evolve ten different ways.

Steve couldn’t say how much he and Billy had evolved, really, but there was a point in there somewhere.

Maybe it lived in the, “I never expected to see you in a dyke club, pretty boy,” since it was all the coming out either of them needed.

Or the wanton kisses and fervent hands underneath the neon rainbow on the venue’s wall.

Maybe the point sat in the things Billy wanted, and what Steve was reticent to provide. Because Billy was a king who knew what he liked, and seemed particularly talented at walking into Steve’s personal crises like an anniversary.

Steve craved.

But he didn’t know what he craved. What he yearned for. He knew Billy’s kisses made his brain go molten and fuzzy. He knew Billy’s smell brought him just as much comfort, excitement, and anxiety. He knew finally being outside of sex-crazed high school had deflated something in him. The expectations to perform. He knew losing Robin’s stupid game of You Rule / You Suck gave him a secret gift of relief.

But he still craved. He wanted touch but he wanted to be alone. He wanted companionship but he didn’t want sex. But he did enjoy sex, except he didn’t want the expectation of it.

Well.

That was it, wasn’t it?

Billy Hargrove, who could have anyone he wanted plastered to his stupid, unbuttoned chest, had sought out Steve. Steve, king of mixed signals, Harrington. It was only a matter of time before he got his face beaten again. For wasting Billy’s time. For refusing Billy’s advances even though Steve clearly enjoyed Billy’s lips on his neck, and Billy’s hand on his inner thigh. For wanting Billy’s company and flirtation without the rules that finished in the bedroom.

So Steve refused the gifts. The material favors he could’ve sold for a better apartment. Fucked his way to owning a house that his mom would feel comfortable visiting. Be an unfeeling toy who could pay for his mother’s shoes and his own pedicures.

“Steve?”

He turned away from the window and the city’s electric constellations. “Hm?”

“Where’d you go?”

The back of Steve’s throat ached. He looked down at their appetizer plates and decided, “I think I’m going home.” After a second of them both hearing it out loud, Steve said with more conviction, “I need to be home right now. I’m sorry. Thanks for dinner.”

He almost reached for his wallet to pay for his half of the artichoke dip, but reconsidered. He took his old prom tuxedo jacket off on the way to the elevator, waiting for the doors to close before he pressed his face into the old fibers.

It would be easier if Steve didn’t know money. If wealth were a foreign pillow he had never slept on; could be spoiled into never giving it up again.

Like a true mother with a sixth sense, Steve withdrew a package from his mailbox when he returned to his apartment building. Mrs. Harrington’s versions of care packages were fashion magazines, a subscription to The New Yorker, polaroids of her latest closet pieces, and Steve’s favorite candy.

He loved it all. He didn’t need laminated recipes, bags of rice, or resupplied hair products. He went up to his bedroom, stripped down to nothing, and fell into bed with the hefty parcel. Fruity hard candies fell out like confetti, and he stuck a green apple square inside his cheek while he looked through her baggie of polaroids.

Peach suede 130s. Steve felt a warm tickle in his belly at that. She only wore 130s if she was pissed at his father. A woman in 130s walked with the force of a storm, mostly because the damn things were nearly intolerable to wear without a platform.

Another pair of diamond earrings. One of these days, people were going to realize how boring clear rocks were.

Dark, amethyst Miu Mius with the heel and toe encrusted with pearls. Steve’s dad must’ve really pissed her off to warrant that apology.

The magazine subscription had piled up, so he had three New Yorkers to read, but he opened the tome of Vogue first. His mother dog-earred her favorite articles, scent samples, and spreads. She often favored the androgynous and male fragrances. Steve liked that a whole lot. He wasn’t sure if she did that for him because he liked them, or if he liked them because she did that.

He held the magazine to his face as he went to the kitchen, smelling the first fragrance sample while he reached for his cache of boxed cake mix. It was a funfetti kind of night. He rattled the package of sprinkles in his hand while reading about some summer collection where the runway happened in a Greek ampitheatre. Sounded fun. Sounded like a great vacation. Beach, wine, and then modern art fusing with ancient architecture.

Steve didn’t excel in chemistry, but he knew a different kind of magic.

Which didn’t actually include baking. The cake emerged a little dark, but he cut off the burnt top, iced it to glorious, sugar perfection, and took a slice to bed with him. He turned the parcel upside-down for the last of the candy to come out so he could throw the envelope away -

Two bottles of nail polish landed heavily on the bed. Steve lifted the darker bottle to see a purple so ebony he thought it was black until he opened it to see the paint up close.

Purple and peach. To match his mother’s shoes.

Not many people understood his parents’ methods of producing or avoiding affection. But Steve did. He shook up the poison violet and painted his toenails in between forkfuls of cake.

He didn’t hear from Billy the next day.

Or the next.

As bad as Steve felt, he couldn’t say he minded. Nor would he be surprised if Billy never called him again. The idea brought a lonely peace during the commute to work, reading his magazines on the train before keeping them safe in a folder that he stuffed inside his backpack. Even if Steve’s chest felt like a cold balloon, with its latex worn thin and tired, he had his little things to keep him warm.

Then a knock on his apartment door.

Steve answered it with a cheek full of cake, interrupted from making his grocery list of actual nutritional value - 

Billy had never visited before. Steve stared at him long enough for him to ask, “Are you going to let me in?”

Steve glanced at the box under his arm and turned into his apartment with a sigh. Billy closed the door behind him as he remarked, “You don’t know what’s in it yet.”

There wasn’t exactly anywhere for Steve to theatrically storm off to. His kitchen was also his living room, and a half-wall partitioned the bedroom off to the side. His apartment was one long rectangle, and Steve remained stuck in the middle of it.

“Billy, I don’t know what you want from me that you think you can get from expensive things.”

“I don’t recall asking for anything in return,” he drawled while removing his coat.

“Don’t take that off,” Steve retorted.

“I’m taking it off.”

“This isn’t going to be a long visit.”

“Would you at least open the damn thing first?” Billy presented the box on the flat of his hand like a waiter’s tray.

Steve knew a shoe box when he saw one. He swatted the lid off the box before he even meant to. He was so tired of this game. Of these rules. He doesn’t want to see some snotty designer sneaker that isn’t to his taste. Some item the rules would dictate he accept without complaint. Or some chunky, foamy plastic, glorified tennis shoe that is over hyped . . .

He sees the red first.

It’s not a sneaker.

Hot Chick heels. 100mm. Black suede on top, red bottom. The leather around the heel scallop-cut like minimalist flower petals.

Steve’s breath has stopped in his chest. The pad of his thumb moved across the soft, matte leather before he stops himself. He tries to look stern when he dares to peek up at Billy, but those water-turquoise eyes are steady on him, absorbing his every reaction.

“These don’t exist in suede.”

Because they didn’t. Hot Chicks came in patent leather only.

“They do now.”

“Louboutin sizes down.”

“Then we’ll have them stretched.”

Steve is losing. Billy knows he’s losing. Billy - he -

“How - ?” Steve begins but stops. He closed his eyes and swallowed, only to flinch a little when Billy grasped his chin, holding him in place as he leaned in to lick the corner of his mouth free of icing.

“Will you try them on for me?”

Steve feels a mixture of defeat mixed in with petulance and vulnerable glee as he warily takes the box to his humble couch. Billy looked at his bed, and then to the kitchen on the other side of the apartment. He strolled into it and lifted the knife for a slice.

Steve, meanwhile, took his time. He opened the paper from where it had floated back over the shoes. He lifted the box to inhale the leather. He took one shoe out just to...see it. Look at it. Read the number stamped on the red arch.

Steve had to remove his socks, revealing his lacquered toes as Billy sat next to him with a plate. He eased the coffee table out of the way, giving Steve room to wiggle his foot into the severe 100mm heel.

They were hardly glamorous under his old, cut-off sweats.

But.

He’d never actually seen his feet in heels before. Never bothered to try to find his size.

Billy handed him the other shoe, and stood up with a ready hand. Steve wiggled into it and accepted his hold as he stood up.

How do you walk in those? he’d once asked his mother.

Trust the heel, my love, she’d answered, strolling around her bedroom in her 130s. If you’ve paid enough for it, it better hold up your entire form, and your dating baggage.

Steve had laughed, but listened to her every word. Move like a wheel barrow. You pivot on your toes, like the wheel, and rest on the heels.

“I’ve got you,” Billy purred when Steve teetered. Just a little.

“Why did you get me these?” Steve had to ask while he began to ease his arm off of Billy’s shoulders.

“Might’ve had a look inside your mail,” he admitted shamelessly. “I thought you might’ve ordered something and I could finally see what you liked. Instead, it’s the one thing I’ve seen you accept.”

“You’re a creep,” Steve declared, but he couldn’t look away from his feet as he strolled around the coffee table.

Billy laughed and sat down to his cake. “This is good.”

“It’s from a box.”

“It’s still good.”

Things . . . changed, after that. Billy came over just to come over. And he pestered Steve with endless questions.

“Do you like these?” he asked with his nose against the magazine pages.

Steve towered over him in his heels, but he’d wash dishes in whatever he wanted, thanks very much. And leather needed to be worn, as his mother taught him. Plastic is trash. If it comes from a living creature, it lives on a creature.

Steve snorted beside him. “My mom crimps those pages.”

“But do you like them?”

“They’re fun in magazines, but perfumes were never really my thing.”

“What is your thing?”

“Right now? You, elbows deep in here.”

Billy perked right out of the magazine only to lock onto the sink. “Because you’re having trouble reaching it now?”

Steve meant to have a witty come-back, but he got caught up in his own giggles. “Yeah.”

Then,

“Can I stay the night?”

Something must have flashed across his face, because Billy added, “Not for sex. I’ve taken the hint, all right?”

Steve slowly unfolded his socks where he sat on the foot of the bed. “Why do you want to?”

Billy wiped his hands on the dish towel and padded across the room to sit beside him. “Because I want to taste you before I sleep. And I wanna taste you when I wake up. I want your snark in my ears all the time - ”

“All the time?” Steve repeated, deadpan.

“Yeah, all the time. I can’t believe it either.”

Billy’s features were warm, unbelievably warm as he watched Steve laugh. “Of course I want to have sex with you. But I miss you when... I miss you all the time. It’s embarrassing.”

Steve rolled his eyes onto him, to which Billy defended, “I have things to do.”

“Yeah, ‘cause you’re the big man in town,” Steve babied, pushing his chest so he toppled backward.

“I am, actually,” he crooned, his hands finding Steve’s legs easily when he straddled him. “I’d work better with you on my desk.”

“My hairy legs and scraped up heels?” Steve threatened breathily, holding Billy’s cheek and jaw in one hand while he leaned over him so all Billy could see was Steve.

“All of it,” he exhaled, and pulled Steve’s head the last inch for a kiss.

Billy’s next gift was a pair of slippers. Plush, soft, and perfect after an afternoon in 100s.

Then he gave Steve a massage. Steve could accept those with ease. The balls of his feet hurt and even blushed a faint indigo from being so unused to heels. The warm attention of Billy’s hands on the arches of his feet, heels, and ankles; as well as the cold tennis balls he stored in Steve’s freezer to roll along his feet.

By then, he’d seen Steve’s anklet. So the next shoe box Steve opened were dark green suede, as poisonously dark as his mother’s violet heels. The toe was bare, but the heel was encrusted with opals. The milky stones flashed green and orange as Steve walked in the 120mm heel.

“How do they feel?”

Steve, with far more mastery over heels now, pivoted on his toes and planted one on the couch in between Billy’s thighs. His warm hand cradled Steve’s ankle immediately.

“What if I shaved for these?”

“Then I’d never take my hands off you.”

“So nothing would change,” Steve giggled, teasing gone as he landed on Billy’s lap. The man underneath him hummed his mirth into Steve’s mouth, his other hand burying in Steve’s hair while he let Steve control the kiss, explore his mouth.

“I thought they’d go with your eyes,” he said when the kiss petered off and Steve kissed his nose. Billy touched the pad of his thumb high on Steve’s cheek. “There’s a little bit of green there.”

Steve let Billy fuck him in those shoes.

Because he finally craved all the way, beyond fear of rules. Beyond the existence of toys. He craved Billy deeper than skin, and Billy gave it to him.

And when Billy got him a pair of 130s . . . blood red and spiked with tiny, crimson points, he let Steve fuck him.

[omiscurls]

Lady and The Tramp - sakusa kiyoomi x reader

well hi! It’s been a while since I wrote one of those, huh?

so obviously the volleyball player you’re gonna fall for today is sakusa kiyoomi

the word count: around 2K 

summary: your boyfriend and you go for a winter walk with his dog, and he gets a bit nostalgic. 

and let’s go!

The sun shines a little bit different every season of the year. The winter sun is a tad bit more harsh and refreshing that the slow, dripping summer mornings. And as you look at the white, glistening snow, and the cold sun rays shining directly at it, you just have the urge to go out and do something with yourself, don’t you?

Same struggles happened in Sakusa Kiyoomi’s head that very morning when he woke up to a cold apartament drowning in sun rays, causing him to put a hand over his eyes, to cover them from the merciless light.

“Did I forget to turn the heaters on again?” He whined, and cursed his need to open windows before going to sleep each night. Now it was almost impossible for him to get out of the sheets, considering the temperature in his room was way below zero.

He managed to get one arm outside the warm bed and reached for his phone, charging on the side table. A sight of you in his MSBY shirt, sat on a kitchen counter and showing something you just baked, with a proud grin on your face on his wallpaper greeted him, and the widget above your head told him that it was six in the morning.

So he woke up before his alarm? Impressive, given that it was a Saturday and no practice was planned. He had exactly thirty two minutes before his phone would tell him to “get his ass out of bed” and go for a run.

Sighing, he threw the phone away on the mattrace, and wrapping his blanket around him, he went over to the window.

It snowed last night.

Wait, it snowed last night?

Suddenly, he was a little kid inside, because oh gosh, it never snowed these days! It was all looking so nice, everything covered in a white layer, as if it wasn’t the outside of his apartment, but a picture taken from a children’s book.

After he almost jumped from excitement, the adult side of his has taken over. If it snowed, it meant the temperature went below zero. If it went below zero, the sidewalk would be so slippery that running would be almost impossible.

Well, screw it. He wasn’t going to let a tad little detail like that ruin his good mood. And so he went over to each radiator he had and turned it on, then going to bed again and scrolling through his social media until the temperature around was warm enough for him to leave the sheets. 

And so it took a couple of hours for him to finally get himself up and going, but it was still fairly early when you knocked on the door of his apartment, and heard some shuffling inside.

“Sit already, would you? Fine, okay, I know you’re excited, but-“ your boyfriend’s voice was cut off by a bark, and he was silent for a second, while on the other side of the door, you were barely holding in your laugh.

“Hey! Behave! No!” he raised his voice ever so slightly, but apparently it worked on the poor dog, because soon enough you saw him, leant against the doorframe with both his hands in his pockets, his pet sitting beside him, although almost jumping from excitement upon seeing someone else.

“Oh, didn’t expect you here today” he said nonchalantly, a smirk forming on his lips, as he knew well that he invited you here himself. You rolled your eyes, and passed him by, leading yourself to his bathroom. “Not even a hello?” he whined jokingly, as you shook your head.

“I was in a public bus, let me go wash my hands” you explained, and he nodded, mentally trying to convince himself that’s just something people do. You’re not doing it just for him.

He followed you to the bathroom and once again stood in the door, looking at you with a happy spark in his eyes.

You looked so in place while just casually standing anywhere in his apartament. Like you belonged there. And he was almost certain you indeed, did belong there. He wouldn’t have you any other place, rather than by his side.

“You should really get a license already” he said, quickly looking down at his nails, so you wouldn’t see him stare.

“Mhm” you agreed silently, wiping your hands “I know” you slowly approached him, firstly playing with the material of his shirt, and after a while, curling his hair on your finger. It required staying on your tippy toes, which he found endearing. “And you, sir, are due for a haircut”

“Am I?” he said, touching his curls himself, but not leaving you to check in the mirror. “Can you do it?”

You giggled.

That was kinda part of the plan, since he absolutely loved hearing you laugh. He wasn’t the most funny person on earth, yet he was motivated to become a full comedian just to hear that genuine chuckle you gave his finest jokes.

„I cant cut your hair, silly” you said, rubbing his temple with one finger as you were still playing with the pitch black curls. “You have to go to a salon”

He shivered theatrically, rolling his eyes at you and walking away towards the kitchen. “And here I thought you loved me” he huffed, making you smile in disbelief.

“You’re being a baby!”

“I’ll ask my sister to do it”

“Your sister lives kinda away, you’re aware of that, right?” you continued, following his steps to the bigger room, where he was sitting on the floor and tying his shoes.

“So? She loves me, she’ll do it”

“She has her own kid to take care of, she doesn’t need a twenty two year old one” you shoot back, remembering the last family reunion you attended with your boyfriend. It was a complete mess, but meeting his parents explained... a whole lot of things about his character. 

He really did look like a little kid, reaching for another one of his sneakers, scarf already put half on around his neck, smiling softly, having to pause the process of tying his shoes every time his dog tried to lick his face in excitement. The poorly named Swiss Setter never left your boyfriend’s side whenever he was home, so used to his their very own slow lifestyle. 

You knew damn well she was emotionally attached to her owner, and loved him dearly, as you were the one to babysit her whenever Kiyoomi had an out of town game, and the first couple of times she didn’t sleep at all, and neither did you. It required him staying overnight at your place together with the dog for her to understand it’s a safe place. 

“Now now, calm down, Lady, at least let me tie my shoes!” he giggled childishly. The first time you ever saw him snuggled up on the couch with the dog, watching some crappy Netflix show, you couldn’t believe your eyes. 

THE Kiyoomi Sakusa. On the couch. With a dog. 

You soon found out that Lady, because that’s the crappy name the dog so proudly got by, had been one of your boyfriend’s only friends until the time he graduated. She wasn’t exactly a rescue dog, but his older brother brought her home from his former friend’s house, where she didn’t exactly had the best start in life. 

Kiyoomi didn’t fall in love at first sight, he needed time to adjust to having a dog in the house, but Lady seemed very fond of him, and weirdly enough, only listened to his commands. (The trainer said it’s about his voice, as it is deep and raspy, when he says something loudly enough, she feels respect towards him). 

He was soon in charge of training the dog to be a good pet for a household such as the Sakusas place, a huge, always so elegant and spotless house, where no one is around too often, but frankly, “family friends” came back every other night to drink rosé with his mother, or whisky with his father. 

It was to no one’s surprise, that when Kiyoomi moved away and went to college, his porcelain doll of a mother and distant father couldn’t get a hold of the Swiss Setter, who’s manners weren’t so ladylike. The deal was simple, either kiyoomi takes her to his place, or she ends up in a shelter. 

And as he loved dogs, and secretly had a heart of a four-year-old, he took her in with himself, and, frankly, let her rule over his at-home life all the time. 

She was very well behaved when in public, knew what was on her owner’s mind by the look in his eyes and reacted on the snaps of his fingers, but inside the four walls of his apartment, she could walk all over him, which you found amusing. 

Kiyoomi put her on her leash, and rose his eyebrow at you. 

“Coming?” he asked, having the door opened for you already. You nodded and left, waiting for him to lock the door behind the three of you. 

It was cold outside, but not too cold, and the air was refreshing, even in such a city as Osaka is. Kiyoomi mindlessly tied his pinky with yours, a bit of a hard thing to do in leather gloves, but he was all about the details. 

After two years of your relationship, he was perfectly capable of holding your hand just fine, but sentimentally enough opted to hold your pinky instead, as if your romance was fresh once again. 

You smiled at the feeling and squeezed his pinky back with yours, You glanced over at him staring at his feet, as you walked towards the park in comfortable silence. 

“When do you have the next match, Omi?” you started a casual conversation, and he looked as if you took him out of a trans of sorts. 

“Oh, uhm, next Friday” he answered upsentmindedly. You caught him sparing loving glances in Lady’s direction, an indescribable nostalgy painting his face in cold colors. 

When you reached the entrance to the huge park, where dogs were allowed off leash, you bent over and made a snowball, the throwing it at his back. He turned around to face you and gave you a look of betrayal. 

“You didn’t” he whispered. 

“I think I did” you giggled, covering your mouth with your hands, waiting for his next move. 

He bit back a smirk, trying to remain stoic as he kneeled down to release Lady off her leash, hiding it in the pocket of his black coat, then picking up snow in his hands and forming a round snowball, directing it right at you. 

Lady kept running around the two of you, jumping in excitement, not fully understanding what you’re doing, but happy to be a part of it. 

“Hey, ouch!” you laughed, theatrically covering the shoulder it reached. “You didn’t need to spike it!” 

There weren’t many people at the park that day, considering the fact that it was first snow, and parents don’t usually bring kids, who want to build snowmen, to a park where dogs are allowed off leash. 

“Oh, you wanna see a spike?” a little smile covered his lips, exposing his blushing cheeks, contrasting with the rest of his pale face, and dark curls. 

“Try me, pretty boy” 

“Aight” he put his hands up in an agreeing gesture “Just don’t whine about the bruises later” 

“Same goes to you” 

He huffed, getting back as he gathered snow in his hands and rolled it a bit before aiming at you, jumping in place as you tried to “become a harder target to hit”. He shook his head in disbelief. 

God, I love that dork, he thought, purposely frowning and posing as if he was about to serve. 

Lady kept jumping around him, noticing a round object in his hand. 

“This is not for you, dummy” he laughed, but noticing her excitement, excitement that he didn’t get to see a lot recently, since she was visibly getting older, and more tired, a warm feeling flooded over his chest. He sighed. “Alright, you want it? You want it?” he kept teasing, making her jump around, before breaking the ball and rubbing the snow in her fur.  

She layed down on her back, showing her tummy for pets, which he did obviously provide, tickling that one spot that made her move her leg uncontrollably. 

He got up, and formed another snowball, showing it to her. 

“Watch out, I’m throwing it!” he said to her, before aiming at some free space far from him, throwing the ball from behind his back, watching with a heartwarming smile as she ran after it. 

He seemed to have forgotten about defeating you, watching as his dog kept digging for the “ball” that already disappeared in the snow, so you walked back up to him. 

“You okay?” you asked softly, and he looked at you in surprise. 

“Yeah, obviously” he responded, but something seemed off. You tangled your arms around his shoulder, smushing your cheek against it, and looking at Lady sniffing around the place the snowball landed. “You know, if it weren’t for her, I’d still be too anxious to pet dogs I like when I’m on walks” he started, his mind some place else. 

“Well, many things wouldn’t have happened if it weren’t for her. We probably wouldn’t have met!” you smiled against the fabric of the thick coat, both of you remembering that sunny afternoon when you sat by the river in the park, reading some sort of upsetting news on your phone, frowning, tears forming in the corners of your eyes, when suddenly, you flinched, seeing a snoot between your arms, and when you parted it, you saw a panting, big dog staring back at you. You heard a distressed  “Oh my god, Lady! Come back here!” in the distance, and you lifted your eyes to see a tall like a tower twenty-year old, black curls swept away from his face with hairgel, but getting a bit in the way due to the wind, the guy wearing black t-shirt, with a golden logo, of what appeared to be a... fox? You then thought, only later discovering it’s actually a Jackal, and the letters B and J on the sides of it, and sporty shorts. Apparently, they were on a run. 

“I’m so, so sorry, she never does that. Please don’t get too mad at her, she means no harm! Oh, my god, Lady, come back here!” he hissed, putting the dog back on a leash. “I’m sorry! Hey, I can buy you a coffee, if that’ll make up for her? I’m choosing the coffee shop though, there’s a little one nearby and there’re not too many people in it, the popular ones are a rip off anyway, wait— are you crying?” he panted out, staring directly at your face, with a deadpan look.

“It’s alright, I like dogs. But I like coffee, too”

You smiled upon remembering that afternoon, as the completely different sun shined on you two in that moment, not the exhausting, August-ish one, that makes you want to never leave the nearest pool, but a cool and refreshing February one. Two years passed, and the both of you weren’t just strangers in the park, you were one of these cheesy couples teenage girls look at and get upset because they think they’re never going to be like that with anyone. Although, the bonding dog stayed the same. 

Speaking of Lady, she ran up to Kiyoomi, who was lost in his thoughts and memories, proudly showing off a stick she must’ve found under the snow at some point. 

“Look what you got there!” he kneeled down, trying to get it away from her to throw it. “My good girl” he giggled. 

Some February afternoons could just last forever.

[mirakeul]

making miracles at mirakeul’s !!!

welcome, dear @aizameow, thank you for supporting mirakeul’s! your match will be right with you! just step this way, and you’re good to go! pardon me for the long wait, we hope you enjoy your date ! [reader uses she/they interchangeably]

matchup masterlist || event details [event status ; closed]

"please, don't be mad." y/n hesitantly grinned, looking at her partner, kyoutani kentarou, who was already looking apprehensive at them.

"i'm not helping you hide a body."

"no! that's not--" y/n stopped herself. "my friend just opened a cafe last month and i got a few coupons for it for when we're both free."

"okay, why would i be mad?"

y/n looked at their partner, grinning as the dogs' barks got louder when they saw the two. dogs of all sizes and breeds can be found at the dog cafe y/n's friend opened. they were standing in front, after practice, of course, making her a little bit nervous.

"hehe, surprise?"

kyoutani looked at them, not impressed and playfully rolled his eyes. "you're lucky i like dogs."

before she could comprehend his statement, they were already pulled inside, some of the dogs looking at them curiously. they ordered some drinks first, as well as some treats to give to the dogs. they sat on some beanbags, placing their drinks away from the eager dogs.

y/n's smile widened as they watched her partner who was eagerly testing the dogs' knowledge on tricks. kyoutani was grinning as well, hand gently patting the puppy who came to him, smile widening as the puppy licked his hand. he then heard a click, making him look at his partner who was smiling knowingly.

"y/n, no."

"y/n, yes!"

no, y/n didn't send blackmail material to oikawa and the others to their misfortune. kyoutani was just glad his partner was not that evil, he said as he made the picture of them getting smothered by a puppy as a wallpaper. hah. evil.

reblogs are greatly appreciated ! keep reading for a personal letter !

letter from you ;

hi bebe congrats again for 800 followers milestone 🥺❤️

idk if tumatanggap ka pa ng matchup tho so if hinde na ignore mo na lang 'to HSJSKSJD magsend na me kasi it's kinda fun 😗✌️ copy-paste ko na lang tho 👀

something about me: i'm an aries and my personality type is intp-t. acquaintances told me that i kinda look intimidating so they find it hard to approach me (which is kinda true bc i don't like to look weak to others), but i'm a real softie deep inside and v protective when it comes to my close friends.

congrats ulit!! and ignore mo na lang if puno na matchup mo thank you mwapsxz!

letter from me ;

HI RIELLL HAAKSHA THANK YOUUUU thank u sa support and sa pagsali dito HAASHKHAKA wala kang binigay na date idea so ito naisip q ksahafa binase q matchup mo sa personality mo since wala ka rin binigay na ideal s/o ganern HSHKSAHK pero oks lang ! i do hope magustuhan mo to and maenjoy mo to! ily <333

[pixie88]

New Home

Chapter 1 - Addicted to you.  

A/N: Here’s the first chapter of ATY! It’s set 2 months later and a bit has happened since the last chapter. I hope you like it 😘  

Tagging those who asked to be tagged but if you want to be added let me know!

Read previous chapters HERE!

Warnings: Fluff

Word Count: 2018

Pairings: Laila x Harry

Enjoy! 😘  

2 Months later.

Both their flats had been sold and were going through the process of signing their properties over, they had viewed a few houses, none of which neither of them could see themselves living there.

They were viewing an old end terrace house one afternoon. Which had been recently renovated, as they walked in the stairs were on the left with a door at front which the estate agent said could be a separate dining room. The door opposite on the right was the living room and to the end of the hallway was the door to a spacious kitchen/dining room which had lead into the garden through some French doors.

For a house in London the garden was bigger than usual. Upstairs the 1st floor had 2 bedrooms, a bathroom with a freestanding tub. The loft which was the second floor had been converted into another bedroom with an en suite.

Both Laila and Harry couldn't believe how lovely this property was. It was perfect for them, it was on the edge of London, so not as busy as where their flat were.

It was an extra ten minutes travel time to the salon Laila worked at but this made her consider whether to go self employed. Harry's gym was five minutes closer, so work, travel wasn't an issue with him. They decided to put an offer in, a few days later they got the call saying another buyer had pulled out and if they were still interested the seller was willing to accept their offer.

Everything was going good for them even Vicky had been sent to prison for 3 years for criminal damage.

Remy was taking things super slow with Melissa but they were getting on well.

Moving in day.

"Lift with your legs Rem's." Alec calls over to him. "I....AM....FUCK! Laila, what the hell is in this box?" she looks over to him. "Erm...shoes, I think," she wanders over to him, checking out the box "Nope, Harry's weights!" she laughs, "No, wonder I can't lift it" he says as he's struggling with the box.

Harry wanders over taking the box off Remy and throws it onto his shoulder. "Alright, show off!" Remy calls after Harry as he picks up another box. Laila rolls her eyes at the both of them   grabbing a box herself, following Harry upstairs to their bedroom "So, Miss. Carelli, any regrets?" she looks over to him and laughs as she puts down the box "Just one!" she winks "Really?"

"Yeah, offering to get our friends a Chinese take away after they helped us unpack. When we could have had the place to ourselves and christened every surface." she says, her arms loop around his neck and he sighs, "We were stupid! Why did we do that?" he chuckles.

"We were!" she kisses his lips, he moves them backwards until she's pressed between him and the bedroom wall. He invades her mouth, they hear footstep coming up the stairs and they spring apart "We better get the rest of these boxes in before I won't be able to pull away" he pulls her with him.

Later.

Laila is sat on the sofa with Priya and Katrina "This is such a lovely house. I have house envy" Katrina tells her, "We were very lucky to find this place, some of the other places were awful!"

Priya looks out to the hallway at Harry and Will trying to get their new bed up the stairs "Moving in with Popeye is why I'm green with envy! I bet he just throws you over his shoulder with ease! If Chris tried that with me, he'd end up throwing his back out" Priya laughs.

"Aww poor, Chris!" Laila laughs. "He might not be able to do that, but he certainly is able to do other things!" Priya winks, Laila pretends to gag "Max has no trouble throwing me over his shoulder." Katrina adds "Oh my god! Please stop I don't want to picture my brothers in that way!"

The three girls laugh sipping their wine.

Laila wanders into the kitchen to get a top up, Chris, Arthur and Max are in there filling their plates again "Hey, you three!" Max nods with his mouth full. "Alright, Laila! Thanks for this!" Chris smiles as he nods towards the Chinese takeaway "No, thank you guys for helping us move in," she smiles at the three guys. "If you need any help with anything give us a shout, especially if you guys are going to pay in booze and food," Arthur chuckles.

"Yeah, same goes for me!" Max winks at his sister, Chris shook his head at his brother. "Well, I for one am glad to see you happy again!" he pulls her in for a hug. "Aww... thanks, Chris!" Laila blushes, "I didn't think I'd see you in love again after Josh but just the way you two look at each other. I've got nothing to worry about."

Laila kisses her brother on the cheek "He is a lovely bloke," Max winks over at her. "I just glad he's moved on after that last chick, she did a number on him," Arthur says as he makes his way over to her, he looks towards the door as if to check the coast is clear "The truth is I never liked her, there was just something about her that was..well....off. Even dad didn't warm to her..EVER! Then he meet you as soon as he mentioned you to us you could tell you had him hooked." Laila blushes at his words "He has me just as hooked," she laughs.

After she tops up her glass she goes in search of him "There you are!" he's upstairs with Will putting up their bed "Hey gorgeous, where's the bed sheets?" he looks up at her. "I'm pretty sure they are in a box in here," she starts looking through the boxes. "Harry, you hold it up and I'll bolt this end" Will orders him, Laila watches him lifting the side of the bed that is attached to the headboard while Will bolts the foot of the bed to it.

His arms are bulging while he lifts it, Harry notices her looking "Like something you see?" he smirks at her "Maybe!" she winks at him and he laughs, "Hello guys, I'm still here!" Will shook his head "We better stop or he will and we can't test it out later gorgeous!" Harry teases "You two need to get a room!" Will says. "We do but you're in the way!" Harry jokes.

Laila laughs, "Stop whining him up!" Laila finds the bedding "I'll put this over here, thanks for the helping, Will" she places the bedding on the dresser.

Later.

After everyone had left they climbed into bed "Our first night in our new home!" she says as she cuddles up to him, he strokes her hair as she lays her head on his chest. "First of many," she lifts her head and looks up at him, he claims her lips before flipping her onto her back, his body covered hers.

He grinds his hips against hers, letting her know he isn't ready for sleep just get.

A few days later.

Laila finishes work early because a client canceled, she walks through the front door and can hear drilling coming from the separate dining room. She calls out to Harry confused as he was supposed to be at work, "Harry?" she steps closer to the door when it swings open. "Laila?! You're home early!" he says coming out of the room, closing it behind him "I could say the same to you! What are you doing in there?" she asks.

"Nothing, how was work?" he tries to change the subject "Harry, why are you changing the subject?" she asks him, he shrugs his shoulder, "I don't know what you mean!" she decides to try and push pass him to have a look, but he stops her "OK, you know that idea you gave me about turning it into a home gym...well, I decided to do it. But at the moment it's a bit of a mess in there I want to show you once it's completed, so will you promise to stay out until its done?" she smiles at him "I'm glad you decided to do it and I promise to keep our until you've finished" he sighs with relief.

A Weeks later.

Laila is finishing up at work when Harry wanders into the salon "Hey gorgeous, you ready?" he smiles at her. "Yeah, I'll just grab my bag.”

As they're walking down the road Harry can't stop smiling "Why are you grinning like an idiot?" she asks, "Max and I got the room finished today, so when we get home, I can finally show you," she links her fingers through his "This is where part where I'll hardly ever see you because your working out," she winks at him "Nah, I think you're get more use out of it then me!"

She laughs, "I've told you I don't like working out in gyms." she nudges him "Who said anything about working out," he winks at her and she blushes.

When they arrive home Harry stops her, "Wait, you need to put this on!" he hands her a blindfold "Really? I don't need this for a home gym!" he sighs, "Please? For me!" she huffed "Fine!!" placing it over her eyes Harry leads her into the converted room "Just around this corner."

"Corner? What corner?" she asks, confused "I put in a wall, so when you walk through the door you have to come round to see it. Now stand there" his lips brush her ear, "I'm going to pull it off on 3, OK?" she nods "1.....2......3" the blindfold is off her eyes adjust, but she's confused "Harry....."

"What?....Where's the g..? What's this?" she asks, he smiles "Laila, you have been on about getting your own salon for ages then we found this place and it cut into the money your parents gave you. So, it cut into your dream...I was speaking to my parents when my dad gave me the idea, then I spoke to Max. He did all the work for free, but I had to pay for the materials, Nikki came by one day and caught us, she knew a place to get all the salon equipment at a discount. I didn't ask her but I thought if you wanted you two could run this place together?"

Laila stands there in shock not quite believing he has done this for her "Harry...I.." he sighs, "You hate the wallpaper don't you?" he runs his hands down his face, she cups his face "Harry, I love it...this is the most sweetest, kindest and amazing thing anyone has ever done for me! I can't believe you did this instead of converting it into a gym." He smiles at her "I can work out at work! I just thought you deserved this after what you did, so we could get this place." she grins.

"Have you tried out the chairs yet?" she asks and he shook his head "Why don't you take a sit Mr. Taylor?" she winks at him.

As soon as he sits, she straddles him and runs her fingers through his hair, he grips her hips "Not sure I need a haircut." she looks down at him "Hmmm....we'll just have to see what other services you can use!" she winks, his lips quickly find her as they test out the sturdiness of the chair.

~*~*~*~

A few days later Laila hands in her notice and she convinces Nikki to work with her and Daniel because Nikki can only work part time.

The three of them are excited about this new opportunity.

Will it be a match made in heaven?

Continue reading this story here - Chapter 2.

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