#chemistry doing in there. HES IN HIS 50S TOO

[davidtennantpussytulpa]

i appreciate a quick response but it also scares the shit out of me how fast my PI responds. like FUCK!!! i wasnt prepared to deal further with this for at least a couple hours

[highvern]

endpoint

Pairing: Jeon Wonwoo x f!reader

Genre: fluff, smut, angst, FWB to idiots to lovers

warnings:  cumshot/facial, unprotected sex, multiple sex scenes, oral sex (m & f receiving), rough sex, breath play (choking), mentions of exhibitionism, face fucking, virgin wonwoo mentions, idiots in love, edging (emotionally), impact play, sir kink (brief), alcohol consumption

Length: ~19.5k

Note: thank you to @gyuswhore my love, my life, for suffering through this with me. this fic is set in the same universe as her gyu fic for this collab so check it out (threat). also thank u @haologram and everyone else who beta'd this for me bc im sensitive. follow @camandemstudios for more fics!!! i will come back later and tag the people who commented on the teaser but rn im getting day drunk hehehe

summary: Senior year of college is meant to be full of celebration and smooth sailing. Years of work culminating in the final semesters that will send you off into the real world where clubs, sports, and weekends packed with hungover volunteering to pad your resume no longer mattered. It’d be a piece of cake if it wasn’t for your fuck buddy turned coworker having the same plan. But only one of you can get the department’s most coveted recommendation that all but guarantees your acceptance. Tension rises and the nearly four year thing you’ve had with Wonwoo approaches its endpoint.

collab m.list || m.list

This blog is intended for 18+ only! Minors/blank blogs will be blocked.

“What’s the difference between a proton and an electron again?”

“Shoot me in the fucking head,” Wonwoo whispers harshly.

He’s a seat over, a laptop covered in gaming stickers and a coffee cup containing a lethal amount of caffeine occupying the space atop the narrow lecture desk. It’s a feign to productivity. His screen is split between thesis notes and a countdown to a new video game release that unfortunately hits 0 in the middle of lecture. 

Dr. Wagner’s intro to chemistry  course isn’t difficult – freshman aside – which is why you and Wonwoo agreed to be her teaching assistants. Easy money and a way to get in her good graces come grad school application season. You’ve TA’ed the same course since sophomore year for different professors but it’s all the same; the metaphorical killing field before hopeful freshmen become cannon fodder in the real trial of will: O Chem. 

“Me first,” you whisper back. 

Wonwoo slumps in his chair, opening the shared drive keeping track of problem areas to touch on in lab hours, and typing “check for basic brain activity” under the class To-Do list. 

Fair enough. If they can’t understand the basics this far into the semester then you two are in for a world of hurt for the next practical. You're in for a world of hurt come next study hall when half of them will complain about failing their quiz this morning despite having the answers spoon fed straight from the notes.

[09:48] You:  be nice

[09:48] wonwoo: if they were smarter, id be nicer

[09:48] You: maybe they’re scared stupid

It wouldn’t be too far off. One time a freshman burst into tears while asking Wonwoo to check their practice work during lab hours. Wonwoo swears he didn’t say anything and the kid looked on the verge of a mental breakdown if the wind blew the wrong way.

[09:48] wonwoo: from what?

[09:48] You: the fact ur trying to kill them with your mind

[09:49 ]wonwoo : i wouldn’t kill them

[09:49] wonwoo: just maim or seriously injure so they dont come to class and say dumb shit

Dr. Wagner fields more questions in front of the powerpoint. More ‘dumb shit’ Wonwoo rolls his eyes at with such obvious disgust even you feel chastised. Luckily, no one can see his face from the front row besides you.

[09:49] You: you wonder why they like me more

[09:50] wonwoo: i know why they like you more

[09:50] You: oh?

Stifling an eye roll of your own you throw a glance his way as the next message comes through,

[09:50] wonwoo: nice ass

“Alright, Y/N and Wonwoo will be passing out the study guide for the next exam. We still have a few weeks so don’t worry about the back half but try and review the modules we’ve done so far and bring questions for them during study hours,” Dr. Wagner prattles off.

The gigantic stack of printouts is split in half for you and Wonwoo to disperse around the massive lecture hall. Over one hundred students sit in this lecture; the unfortunate ones who were forced to take a 9 AM course three days a week. Half look like their brain is melting out of their ears, other’s clearly haven’t paid attention at all, and a few are sound asleep. It’s Friday after all. They probably didn’t get back from their Thirsty Thursday night out until a few hours ago.

You wouldn’t even be here if Wonwoo wasn’t a built in insurance policy.

Dr. Wagner collects her things and heads towards the front exit with a cheery, “Have a good weekend!”

“There's a party at Sigma tonight,” Wonwoo shares as you both pack your own bags. The next class is already shuffling through the doors to claim their seats.

“I have work until eleven.”

“After?”

Shouldering your bag, you head towards the door where the next class is already trickling in to find their seats. “Don’t you have a tournament tomorrow?”

“I only have to be at the party for like an hour. I can come and walk you home.”

“Fine,” you nod. “But bring your laptop. I think Chan fucked up the last set of results and we need to fix them.”

It’s not unusual for Wonwoo to spend his Friday nights with you; or another night for that matter. He lives in a dingy frat house on the edge of campus with twenty other guys. It’s an act of mercy. A long standing tradition from the week before freshman year when you two were the only chemistry majors in your orientation group and that turned into a clumsy hook up at an upperclassman’s party. You didn’t know he’d be a virgin and he didn’t know your high school boyfriend dumped you less than twenty four hours before you left for college (but not before you lost your own virginity in the backseat of his car). 

It’d been…not good. 

Wonwoo was awkward and you were unsure. But he was sweet under the bravado; walked you home that night, pretended he wasn’t interested in the fact your roommate never moved in, leaving the suite empty. But he wasn’t a good enough actor to feign nonchalance when you invited him upstairs. Turns out sex was a lot better the second time around, in a bed that didn’t belong to an unknown upperclassman who could’ve burst in any minute. 

Wonwoo isn’t your boyfriend. You’re too busy piecing together the ten year plan concocted since junior year of highschool to even think about such frilly ideas. There’s barely enough time as it is; you’ve got work, a full class schedule, TAing, and all the random clubs you’ve wiggled your way into to pad your resume. 

And he’s busy too. Navigating a sports scholarship and one of the hardest majors left barely enough time for him to wipe his own ass, let alone date. Then came research hours and TAing and the fact volleyball, apparently, wasn’t just a one semester sport, there were scrimmages, workouts, and tournaments out of season. 

It’s been over three years of your arrangement which works best because you don’t have to spend precious brain power deciphering if some random guy you went out with once is playing hard to get or just straight up not interested. You have Wonwoo. He’s simple. 

So what you have now, friends. Who hook up. And work together. Who also happens to be applying for the same PhD program for next year. Not together but at the same time.

The application website stares back from your laptop with horror. 

It’s still too early to submit any materials but it’s been highlighted in bold red in your calendar since two years ago. Everything is ready to go the second it opens—except Dr. Wagner’s recommendation. It’s the sole reason you (and Wonwoo) agreed to be her TAs this semester; she’s one of the program’s most notorious alum, her words as good as gold in securing a spot. 

Someone hacks a cough and shatters the eerie silence of the library. The backtrack of sparse typing and the custodian shuffling around to have been the only company throughout your shift. No one would choose to rot at any of the weathered study tables late on a Friday night so early in the semester. 

With the abundance of free time, you fixed Chan’s mistakes in his set of trials easily, no thanks to Wonwoo who still hasn’t shown up. It’s good though. Your stoichiometry homework is submitted three days before the deadline and the mountain of emails clogging your inbox from hopeless undergrads is in the single digits. Half the labs from last week are graded for Dr. Wagner’s approval, the other half can wait until Sunday night. A long weekend of sleep awaits once the clock hits eleven and you’re free to run home.

Wonwoo stumbless in five minutes before the clock runs out. His duffle for tomorrow is slung over his shoulder and he’s already dressed for bed, rumpled sweats and a hat he definitely wore to the party with high hopes to cut out early. 

“You’re late,” you acknowledge, cramming your belongings back into your bag. He’s close enough to get a whiff of. “And you’re drunk.”

“I am not drunk,” he argues.

The lazy smile tugging at the corner of his lips says otherwise but it isn’t an argument worth having. All you want to do is get home and pass out.

He shoulders you bag, presenting his hand when you insist you can carry it on your own. The dry warm of his palm against your cold is pleasant enough you don’t argue as you tug him towards the automatic doors.

“Have a goodnight, Mr. Lee,” you call towards the security desk.

The guard, old enough to be your grandfather, calls back, “You too, sweetheart.”

Out in the balmy night, you tug Wonwoo down the street in the direction of your apartment. Two blocks and then a right turn leaving you outside the dowdy building with hallways that constantly reek of weed and new paint smell.

A pack of freshmen girls heading somewhere, marked by their matching uniform of jeans and black tops of various coverage, crowd the sidewalk straight ahead. Someone is crying, one is on the phone, and a few others stand dumbly waiting for their next movie like zombies — all incredibly wasted. You barrel through them without acknowledgement. A few drunken bitter ‘bitch’s hit your back but you ignore them to focus on the man struggling to push through the crowd without accidentally shoulder checking any of them.

On the other side, you ask, “Have fun at the party?”

“Some pledge puked on Jihoon’s stuff,” he huffs, nose scrunching.

“May he rest in peace.”

Wonwoo sways from side to side from the weight of your bag but also whatever radioactive mix was served at the party. The stairs provide an extra challenge since the elevator has been broken for weeks but thankfully it’s a short trip to the second floor.

He presents your belongings with routine ease once the front door of your apartment looms ahead. Music from the floor above shakes the walls; hopefully you can make up for the lack of sleep tomorrow morning.

There isn’t much space inside the four walls you call home – the ‘kitchen’ which is a single counter with a stove and fridge you’re barely around to use, fifteen feet away your bed in the corner, bordered by your desk at the foot cramped with a spray of errant papers and books you’ve been too busy to deal with. The monitor doubles as a TV and finally a tiny loveseat with a broken leg replaced by a stack of hard covers completes the room.

You beeline for the bathroom to wash away the filth of a long day and Wonwoo, keeping on trend, follows into the cramped space.

“Can I help you?” you ask, shirt tossed into the bin in the corner.

Wonwoo’s shirt goes the same and then his pants after a brief struggle. “You know I sleep better when I shower.” 

True.

“And I doubt you're gonna let me in your bed if I’m dirty.”

Even truer.

The water is still cold when you step in but the man glued to your back fights the worst of the chill away. Goosebumps prickle along your skin but have nothing to do with the vent that points directly into the stall (whoever designed the apartments must have had a sick sense of humor) and everything to do with Wonwoo’s mouth tracing the curve of your shoulder.

Forcing the heat blooming between your legs down to a simmer, you focus on washing up and getting into bed before it rolls into a boil and you do something stupid that’ll only leave you and Wonwoo struggling for balance. 

Shower sex is a dangerous sport. Shower sex with Wonwoo has left you both with bruises. Drunken shower sex with Wonwoo will get you both killed.

Soft hums tickle your neck as you clean up. There isn’t enough room for two people to stand in the spray at once so you take turns hogging the steamy water and braving the frigid cold until the last bits of soap swirl the drain.

Even when drying off you stay in each other’s orbit until the need for clothes and sleep drive you both out of the bathroom and back into the equally cramped space of your room.

It’s not until you’re laying on the mattress, darkness snug on all sides, that you feel Wonwoo roll atop you with purpose.

“What are you doing?”

“Nothing,” Wonwoo hums into your stomach, fingers crawling up your bare legs.

“That,” you inhale at the nip of his teeth on the curve of your thigh, “doesn’t feel like nothing to me.”

Wonwoo doesn’t answer but gives you plenty of time to brush him off while bruising your skin. You don’t. Instead you sink deeper into the blankets and let him push your shirt up until you're bare once more.

The fuzziness of alcohol lingers in his veins – just enough that he smiles into the strip of skin above your panties as you sigh and arch under the delicious weight of wandering hands and mouth at your nipple.

“Wonwoo,” you sigh and he’s up and kissing you with eager clumsiness.

A familiar prod at your core through his boxers crashes bubbles through your veins. You felt it in the bathroom but now is when you finally get to indulge with subtle grinds Wonwoo meets in his own search for friction. 

“Don’t you need to be up—ugh—early tomorrow?”

He kisses you slowly, tongue dragging along your bottom lip until your mouth opens under his. It burns you from the inside out. Mindlessly you shift your legs to frame his hips better but Wonwoo kisses deeper and all you can think about is giving in to whatever scheme he’s working up to have you both naked and panting.

He leans back a fraction to speak, giving in when you chase his lips before ducking to nip at your ear and mumbling a response. “Don’t worry about it.”

“I will worry about it when you snooze twenty alarms and your team hunts me down because I smothered their star player with a pillow,” you snort but heat under a squeeze of his fingers at your sides.

“Sleep when I’m done with this.”

“And what is ‘this’ exactly?”

A harsh suck at your jaw has your stomach tight. heavy and thick until need drips down your spine to coil in your gut and the emptiness between your thighs becomes unignorable. He hides pleased groans in the curve of your neck until you force a hand under the band of his underwear. Eyes opening, you watch the muscles of his back tense and flex as he rocks against you, fucking your fist greedily.

It doesn’t last long. Wonwoo gets antsy under the taunting pressure of your thumb and descends back down your body with burning lips. “Take your shirt off.”

“It’s cold,” you complain but do as he asks. 

He traces your figure clad in nothing but your glasses and a soiled pair of panties; damp at the crotch from his attention and Wonwoo slips a finger under the hem to tease you that inch closure to depravity.

Wonwoo laves against the hickey on the inside of your thigh from a week ago, it’s yellowed and perfectly shaped like his mouth. It’s tender under his attention, even the gentle tracing on his nose forcing you to wince in discomfort. 

He coos, kissing it before skating back to the hem of your panties, lips vibrating against your skin. “Sorry I didn’t come earlier.”

Why he brings it up now is a mystery. Or the fact he brings it up at all. Life happens. You’ve blown him off more than once for a late night in the library; no hard feelings.

“It’s fine,” you sigh as he tugs the last scrap of fabric off your body and pushes your knees up to display you like a meal.

Spreading you apart, he lands a wet kiss at your entrance before teasing with the heat of his tongue. 

In a beg for sanity you twist a tight grip in his hair; a tangled mess from his drunk endeavors. Wonwoo pushes harder, drowns in your taste with enthusiasm as you moan and sigh. 

“F-fuck.”

He won’t ask if it’s good. He knows it is. Nearly four years of hook ups attunes him to your pleasure, a well rehearsed routine that has you both ache in the best way. 

You lose yourself in shaking breaths, feet planted to drive up into his mouth for more. He sucks your clit and nearly gets his head crushed by your thighs. It doesn’t take much and he knows it. 

You chant ‘gonna cum’ in choked groans that almost die at the edge of your teeth but Wonwoo hears and takes it as permission to pull out the stops, hand at your thing with a harsh grip and fingers sinking home.

He’s memorized all the signs of your want; the wrecked echo of your throat and the sounds he pulls from you a clear tell. He flattens his tongue, holding steady as grind straight into mindless bliss. Spit pools and drips and slips down onto the sheets. Wonwoo hums praise, unintelligible but you vaguely know it’s something that’d make you blush you could hear it over the pounding in your ears.

Back arching, your vision flares white at the edges and when Wonwoo realizes what's happening he makes it last until your fist ball up and you’re floating.

Wonwoo backs down as you twitch through the tail end, sloppy kisses to your clit that could knock into another fit if he isn’t careful. But even as you tremble the only thing you want is the weight of his cock in your mouth, or inside you. You aren’t picky as long as you get to feel him cum too.

You finally manage to pry Wonwoo from between your legs with an ankle to his ribs. You’re not done with him despite the fatigue hanging around your shoulders like dead weight. He angles over top of you for a kiss that tastes too much like pussy for your liking but it’s hot knowing he’s covered in you so you push until his shoulders meet the sheets and you can claim his lap.

His dick strains through his underwear, preening when you rock back into the heat. His nostrils flare when you grab for it, stiff enough to sink onto easily. 

“Oh god,” he groans, head digging back into the pillows to watch you like a goddess.

His fingers web across the tops of your thighs, a harsh grip keeping you flat as he grinds up into the wet heat of your pussy. You whimper and sigh for him; all the sounds he loves to hear. You squeeze your chest, taut nipples framed between the slants of your fingers to entice him until he reaches around and knocks you forward for the sole purpose of taking one in his mouth.

Your eyes roll back, jaw locked open, drowning in the stretch and the bite of his mouth and the hands squeezing your ass so hard it hurts. Wonwoo groans, throaty and desperate. “Gonna cum. Wanna cum in you. Holy shit.”

He gets you on your back. Too absorbed in his own end, he’s dead weight with his tongue between your lips and harsh thrusts that take him right to the edge. It gives that grit against your clit that means you’ll come too, soaked in cum and spit and sweat.

You wish he’d flip you on your front and fuck you with a hand between you shoulder blades and the other tangled in your hair. That’s the kind of fuck that’d leave you satisfied the entire weekend he’s busy but he’s running out of steam just doing this, picking up speed in his thrust, the clap of bodies filling the room.

Chanting his name like a broken record, ‘Wonwoo, Wonwoo, Wonwoo’ breathy but loud enough your neighbors will leave another passive aggressive note on your door come morning, all you can think about is his cum. On you, in you. A sick part wants him to pull out and cum on your face – he hasn’t, not in a long time because priorities and responsibilities and you're usually lucky to have even five minutes alone before someone needs either of you. But you want it. God do you want it.

“Cum on my face,” you whimper. There’s drool on your lips and sweat in your hairline. Even if he doesn't, you'll need another shower anyway.

A strangled noise escapes from between his teeth at your neck. Then he’s driving forward so hard you burn; painfully so, mouth locked in a silent choke. Your orgasm rips through your insides, jagged at the edges where Wonwoo fucks himself into your guts. 

“Fuck yeah,” he grunts, pulling away and replacing the grip of your pussy with a tight fist as he straddles your chest. 

The taste of cock floods your tongue, heady and intoxicating. You get one, two drags against the stiff head and then he’s cumming, dripping his spend over your lips, then your cheek, then your glasses because he’s a sick freak. Even in the dim light from the window he twitches at the sight. You open your mouth and replace his hold, moaning as more comes to the surface. You swallow down as far as he’ll go which isn’t much in this position but it’s the thought that counts.

Wonwoo grinds to halt with an occasional kick of his hips that leaves you choking – rigid limbs locking in place until he melts with sticky satisfaction. 

He’s up and off, your glasses in hand for a thorough cleaning, not even bothering to flick on any of the lights but you hear the sink running in the bathroom before he comes padding back.

“God,” you whimper in disgust. “That’s so gross.”

“You’re the one who asked for it,” Wonwoo snorts, soft passes of a damp cloth on your skin focused on getting you clean enough to sleep.

“Because it’s hot but you aim for shit.”

Wonwoo tosses the rag somewhere, flopping down and pulling you close as possible with a kiss on your forehead. “Next time I’ll aim for your hair.”

“Bitch.”

The sound of music from upstairs pulses through your head as you drift off, Wonwoo asleep on your chest, fingers laced together on the sheets beside your indecipherably intertwined bodies.

Your week is divided into a simple pattern. Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays you wake bright and early to attend Dr. Wagner’s chem lecture and then stay on campus attending every other class you could find to fill the gap between your evening shift at the library. Tuesdays and Thursdays are void of responsibility until your afternoon lab with the freshman near tears while learning basic titration for four hours, followed by office hours where said freshman finally come to actually cry about their grades. Those are the nights you, Chan, Wonwoo and a handful of other lab techs work on research that carries the same threat of waterworks. 

It’s there Dr. Wagner pulls you and Wonwoo aside.

“I know you both are applying to Dr. Collins lab for your PhD studies,” she starts. 

Her office reflects the same disarray as her personality; warm and lived in. Papers and exams are organized in chaos, thick stacks lining her desk waiting for you and Wonwoo to enter them into the online grade book. Books, some leather, some paperback, some the glossy cover of a textbook with cracked spines and yellowing pages are crammed into the bookshelves lining the walls until they threaten to collapse from the weight. It smells like coffee, plants, and the candle she always has burning. It’s a cozy hovel overlooking the rear courtyard of the science building that resembles the sterility of a hospital. 

Wonwoo occupies the other barrel chair with worn upholstery. You’ve barely seen him in the past three weeks, too busy with volunteering and working and classes while his own responsibilities keep him so exhausted it’s truly a miracle he’s even here. Dark stains ring his eyes beneath his glasses and he looks paler than usual. You’ll ask about it tonight when he comes over to work on your most recent stoichiometry project (which will be forgotten in favor of passing out during a movie while you play with his hair if history is anything to go by).

“I don’t think I’ve ever met two students who belong more in his lab,” she continues.

You try not to preen, but academic validation is a hell of a drug to caffeine addicted undergrads. Wonwoo perks up too. Three and a half years of barely being people for this moment and it’s finally in reach.

“However,” Dr. Wagner clasps her hands atop the dark wooden desk. “I’m writing only one recommendation this semester. It might seem unfair but I want to commit to the student that deserves it the most since my schedule doesn’t allow me much free time.”

It’s like being underwater. You hear her words but nothing registers, blinking rapidly in case this is a hallucination from falling asleep in the lab again.

“I know it might not be the news you hoped for but I know senior year is a lot, especially for students as involved as you all, and I thought this could alleviate some of the stress. You two are the only students I’m considering. So please, keep up the incredible work and we can talk again at the end of the semester when I have a more holistic evaluation of your progress.”

She stands to leave, snagging her purse and blowing out the candle with finality before abandoning the shit storm in your lap for whatever else she has to do on a Thursday night. Probably retell the events of the last five minutes to other professors in the department, laughing at the way you’ve turned purple from holding your breath.

“Have a good night you two! See you tomorrow!”

The office, once warm, feels hollow. You feel hollow. 

“What the fuck?” Wonwoo hasn’t moved either, glued to his seat as he stares at Dr. Wagner’s now vacant chair with his mouth wide in shock.

“Did that just happen?” you scoff in disbelief. “Is she serious?”

Wonwoo collapses over his knees with his hands scrubbing at his face like he also might be hallucinating. “I needed that recommendation.”

“Well, so do I,” you argue.

“I know. This is bullshit.”

“Did Changkyun say anything like this happened last year when she wrote one for him?”

“No, all three people who asked her got one.”

“Oh, so it’s just us she hates. Great!” you throw your hands up, sinking deeper in the chair. Maybe it’ll swallow you whole and the entire ordeal will cease to exist.

“She’s probably just trying to get in our heads so we don’t slack off this semester.”

“Have we ever slacked off any semester? I’ve been on the President’s Honor List since freshman year. You’ve been on the President’s Honor List since freshman year. We’re those people.”

Since starting college, since that one night during orientation where you and Wonwoo became a ‘we’. Not in the relationship sense, but in the way two lines merge. Same path, same goals, same classes, same PhD program prospects. There was plenty you two did separately but more you did together. Neither competing, but working together. 

But now that’s over.

Because only one of you can get into Dr. Collins lab, only one of you can get the recommendation, and only one of you can have what you both worked tirelessly for over the past three years.

“Listen—” you stand up and scrub at your own face. “It’ll be fine. We’ll figure it out.”

“We? Only one of us can get her recommendation. What’s there to figure out?”

Your face goes hot. He’s right. “Well, I need that recommendation.”

“So do I,” Wonwoo argues, eyes cold.

“Fine.”

That recommendation is mine.

“Fine!”

We’ll see about that.

Wonwoo stays in her office, flinching as you slam the door and flee.

The issue with fighting with Wonwoo is that as mad as both of you are, there are a million responsibilities you share that require close proximity.

Presently, it’s grading the last batch of exams. Seventy eight packets. And because Dr. Wagner doesn’t believe in convenience, it all has to be graded by the hand of two TAs running on nothing but caffeine and spite.

Which means it’s past midnight and the couch has a permanent impression of Wonwoo’s ass while you both silently fume and scratch through wrong answers with a heavy hand in red ink.

The weather reflects the atmosphere; pouring rain and thunder loud enough to shake the windows. The power has flickered in and out since the rain started but you're both too stubborn to call it quits – if there is nothing to keep you occupied then you might rip his throat out.

Wonwoo doesn’t even ask if you want more coffee before he snags your empty mug and moves to the kitchenette. You don’t look up when he sets it back down, and only grab it and take the first sip of perfectly steaming hot sweetness when he flops back on the couch without another word. 

Then the power goes out again, and doesn’t come back.

“Are you fucking kidding me?”

Using the flashlight on your phone, you search the drawers of your desk for candles. There nowhere to be found amongst the stacks of unopened sticky notes and tangled cords. 

Wonwoo shuffles behind you, papers landing on the coffee table completely abandoned. “We’ve been at this for hours. Let’s just go to sleep.”

“I have them in here somewhere,” you bite, another handful of chargers and a stapled you’ve never used and other things you didn’t even realize you own fill the drawer. You move to the second. “There’s only a few tests left.”

“We can do them tomorrow. It can wait.”

“No,” you spit like a curse.

Whatever Wonwoo was planning to say dies on his lips. “Fine.” 

His shirt lands over your head, you rip it off only to find him half naked in the dark, huddling under one of the throw blankets you keep on the back of the couch. “What are you doing?”

“I’m sleeping.”

“On the couch?” 

“Yep.”

“You’re too tall.”

“Well,” he draws like a pouty kid. “I don’t feel like sharing the bed with you.”

In a way it’s safer to argue about something trivial like this versus the entire reason you’ve iced each other out since that day in her office. Because at least like this, you won’t lose him. It’s stupid and petty but at least you’re speaking to each other; breaking through that wall of silence that’s been steadily growing more and more unnavigable as the inevitable draws nearer.

“Fine, then I’ll sleep on the couch and you take the bed.”

“No.”

“No?”

“No. N. O.”

Fine.

It’s difficult to navigate in the dark. Your knees end up a victim to the edge of the coffee table and you trip over the edge of the rug, but you find the couch. Reaching down, you find his chest, then his shoulder. And once you’re sufficiently oriented you sit on him.

“Ow,” Wonwoo grunts as you flop down, elbow in his gut and his chin hitting your forehead. “What are you doing?”

You wedge in closer, slipping between his body and the cushions, bracing to kick him off by force if needed. “Sleeping.”

“Here?” he asks. Too aware of your plan, he turns as well, grabbing the back of the couch overhead to stay put.

“You’re too tall to sleep here.”

“And we’re both too big to sleep here together. Take the bed.”

“No,” you huff.

“No?”

“No. N.O. I believe you’re familiar with the word,” you spit.

“You’re being ridiculous.”

“If you keep talking then neither of us will sleep.”

“Neither of us are gonna sleep anyway. You move too much to be comfortable like this.”

He’s right of course. Your hips already ache but if you move then he’ll find some way to pull you off. “I’m fine.”

“You’re being ridiculous.”

You do the mature thing and bite him. 

The muscles corded around his pec twitch under your mouth as he flinches. “What the hell was that for?” 

You do it again.

“Stop.”

“Or what?” you ask, muffled in his skin as you move to leave another bite.

Wonwoo also does the mature thing and pins your wrists in one hand, maneuvering until you're sandwiched between the couch with his chest flat to your back.

“I can’t breathe like this,” you muffle into the cushions.

“Oh, how tragic.” You feel his words tickle the back of your neck rather than hear them. 

Wonwoo releases your wrists pinned to your stomach. His hand finds its way under your shirt, his shirt from some stupid frat fundraiser you’d been coerced into attending, flat to your belly with soothing circles. His calf hooks over your own to tangle your bodies together. He kisses the back of your neck, a simple brush of his lips that lingers.

It’s easier to feel everything in the dark. Your annoyance and frustration forged over the past weeks melts away and all that’s left is the need to have Wonwoo close. Just like this. Where there are no deadlines, or responsibilities. Where you both can drown in each others’ presence and everything else is washed away in the heavy drops pounding the windows outside.

Here, everything is uncomplicated.

The next rumble of thunder is loud enough to send you both in the air. Unfortunately, Wonwoo drags you backwards off the couch and to the floor. You land relatively unscathed but he knocks his elbow into the coffee table.

“Are you okay?”

Wonwoo groans and curses, cradling his elbow.

“Aw, tell the doctor where it hurts,” you coo, prodding his side.

He snatches your hand and pins it to his chest but not before lacing his fingers through your own. The gentle rise of and fall of breathing and the thud of his heart reverberates down your arm and straight into your own chest where something frozen softens. “Has anyone told you you’re annoying when you’re tired?”

“Yes. You. Lots of times.”

“Good. Wanna make sure you’re aware.”

Lighting turns everything white, a quick flash highlighting the room. There and gone and leaving you more disoriented than before. Rolling over, you hook a thigh over his lap which he welcomes, tugging you closer and absorbing the proximity like second nature. You’re a glutton for warmth –  Wonwoo’s warmth specifically – even in his sweater and his sweat shorts and his shirt, you still want more of him.

“We can’t sleep like this.”

You don’t want to move – laying like this, in the dark, nose dug into his chest as you twisting your fingers in his, squeezing and glowing pathetically when he squeezes back – all you want is to drown in him a little longer. Until you're forced to come up for breath.

But the sore spot between you two is still raw like a fresh bruise.

“Then sleep in the bed,” his lips drags over your knuckles as he speaks.

“No. You sleep in the bed, you’re too tall to sleep on the couch.”

“Fine.” Wonwoo jumps up from his place on the floor, grabbing your hands once again before dragging you around the coffee table towards the opposite side of the room. It’s ridiculously childish, especially in the dark where he bounces off the desk and the rug roughens the back of your legs.

He shimmies you around a corner and a cloud of laughter puffs between your lips. “What are you doing?”

“I’m sleeping in the bed, and you’re sleeping in the bed with me.”

“What if I don’t want to sleep next to you?”

“Then I’ll cry. Like that time we watched Steel Magnolias.”

“Have mercy,” you whimper.

“Then get your ass in bed.”

Deflating like a balloon, you stand. Wonwoo keeps his hands on you the entire time, guiding you down to the mattress and covering your body with his own just in case of an escape. He bunkers down in the safety of your neck, dragging your hands to his hair, mimicking the motions he craves until you take up the action and gently comb through the tangles.

A part of you wants to cry. Preemptively mourn the end of this – whatever this is. Late nights with Wonwoo, whispering in the dark about clueless underclassmen and annoying professors. Taking turns scrolling through adoptable cats at the local rescue. Cooing over them, rolling your eyes when Wonwoo finds Pixel still listed as available for adoption, a sign to him that he’s meant to have her except he lives in a frat house. Or the nights neither of you can sleep and take a trip to the local diner and tuck yourselves away in a corner booth to watch drunk people cling to consciousness over waffles and hash browns. 

There will be no more of that. Not by the time winter break comes. One of you is getting the gold ticket and the other will be up in the air with the hundreds of other people competing for the same handful of slots. And if one of you doesn't get in? 

“Was that so hard?” he whispers into your collar.

When you don’t answer, he looks up at. In the cast of lighting coming through the window he’s the same Wonwoo. The one you’ve been best friends with for years now. The one who is practically glued to your side whenever possible. 

The one who you’ll have to say goodbye to.

He meets your kiss lazily. Like he still thinks you have all the time in the world.

It makes the urge to cry that much worse.

The rain is gone by morning. 

The room glows from the orange light of the first minutes of sunrise. Sometime in the night you rolled to your side and Wonwoo pressed tight to your back. He’s awake, drawing shapes on your hip beneath the fabric of your shirt.

“Morning.” 

You hum and roll over to burrow in his chest, the crown of your head digging into his neck and away from the sun. “Morning.”

The warmth of his hands trace the curve of your back, pulling you closer; hiding his own discontent with such an early break in the tentative truce that only seems to exist in the late hours of night and earliest minutes of dawn. Days of sleep deprivation with nothing but sterile lighting in the lab leaves you both needy and vulnerable. So he hugs you tighter and sighs when you do the same.

He’s hard against your thigh. Clearly a result of biology more than need because he’s snoring against your hairline. Flashes of dreams rush forward – him beneath you, on top of you, behind you. It’s been weeks since you two last fucked. When you called him an idiot and he called you stubborn and next thing you were on the table with your legs spread for Wonwoo’s hand in a clumsy bump and grind while arguing about which one of you fucked up the biosensor callibration through gritted teeth and needy whimpers.

You’re wet. With his thigh pressed between your own the fact becomes more evident as the urge to curl into it nags.

Taking advantage of the exposed curve of skin beneath your mouth, you kiss and suck with lax intent until Wonwoo tips his chin up and gives a silent green light.

A heavy hand drags down his front, nails scratching bluntly through the fabric until it can slip beneath the waistband of his sweats and the curve of his cock sits pretty in your palm. Commando for convenience and comfort. More the latter because there’s no shot in hell he’s been getting laid lately.

His breath is sticky in his throat, vibrating beneath your teeth from thin pants as you work him through a loose fist. “Can I?”

“Yeah,” he huffs. “Yes.”

Slouching down, your head rests on his stomach, sweatpants bunched around his thighs. The first lick sends his hips up in search of more and you eagerly supply the soft suction of your mouth; lips catching around the flared head. A hand on the back of your skull keeps your hair from interfering as he plumps against your tongue. 

Eagerness fails to penetrate this moment slowed down by the greater need to drag this out. To savor every second because who knows when you’ll both stop being petty enough to just enjoy one another’s presence again.

“Might cum—fuck— don’t stop,” he grunts.

With the sun filling the room even more you’re running out of time, the warmth growing to leave sweat at the small of your back. He pushes harder into the curve of your throat and you let him, gagging wet with a lewd mix of spit and pre-cum that has you both moaning at the choked sound. Jaw slack, Wonwoo fucks your mouth with slow ruts; stomach tightening and the hand in your hair fisting tight enough you moan.

“Shit, babe—c-cumming,” he whines with a pathetic groan you’d make fun of him for later but all you can think about is the thick taste of cum and if there’s enough time for some attention between your own legs before life becomes unignorable. Not enough time for a real fuck but Wonwoo has a few tricks up his sleeve that promise satisfaction.

You bounce back down next to him and Wonwoo pounces, rolling on top of you, thing between your spread legs. He doesn’t shy away from your tongue against his teeth, dips a thumb beneath your chin and slips his tongue right along with it, sucks your lips until the swell, backing off only to bunch your shirt up. Lazy drags of his mouth on yours – not the ‘I need you’ kisses after a late night but the ‘I miss you’ ones after weeks of passive aggressive silence.

He licks down your front, goosebumps blooming from the draft as he sucks a nipple until you arch and twist a hand in his hair. You give a lax stretch and sigh while his hand slips beneath the edge of your panties.

Taking the morning for what it is, you fall into the motions until the blare of the alarm clock signals the beginning of the end.

You push away and swipe blindly at the night stand to make it stop but Wonwoo has other plans. 

He pins your hips down, tongue flat to the crotch of your underwear with a pant. “Ignore it.”

“What?” You look at him and find tired eyes watching back from over the edge of your wrinkled shirt. His hair is a mess, stuck to the side of his head from sleep and your eager hands and all you want to do is comb the tangles out while he pulls your strings like a puppet master.

But you can’t.

“We’ve got class,” you gasp through a hot kiss on your clit.

A groggy groan of, “skip,” vibrates on your skin.

Fingers curling in the sheets, you grasp for disagreement only to find a moan as he pulls your hips closer and works a finger where you need it most.

“We can’t.”

“We can,” Wonwoo grunts, focusing on peppering greedy kisses to the sensitive insides of your thighs. “We’ve been early every time this semester.”

The hand not curling in your guts runs down the back of your calf, bending until it hooks over his shoulder.

“Fuck, Wonu,” you whine over the crude sounds of his mouth. You want to. God, do you want to. But you open your eyes again and they land on the stack of exams on your desk. Ungraded. Because Wonwoo said you could do them this morning. And now he wants you to skip class despite how important it is. 

You close your legs only for Wonwoo to take it as a challenge, pinning your hips in place and celebrating his perceived victory with a throaty moan as he rocks against the bed.

“Stop.”

He pulls back, mouth wet and brows furrowed. “Huh?”

The alarm on your phone pings again. Swiftly silenced this time as you roll out from beneath him and land beside the mattress on unsteady feet. “We can’t skip. We have to give exams back.”

“It’s not that big of a deal,” he argues, flopping down into the warmth you left vacant.

The room is too bright, a clear sign your morning routine is behind. “You think now is the time to start slacking off?”

“It’s not slacking off.” Wonwoo snags his glasses. He looks more annoyed with them. “It’s a break. You clearly need one.”

“What the hell is that supposed to mean?”

“Just forget it. I’m not arguing with you about stupid shit.”

“And what's stupid shit? The job we signed up for? With the professor who controls our futures?”

Wonwoo fixes his pants and rolls out of bed. On the opposite side. As far away from you as possible. “Whatever.”

“Fine.”

“Fine!”

“Good!”

“Good!”

You slam the bathroom door shut with finality. When you come back out, any trace of Wonwoo is long gone.

There aren’t many people in class. A benefit of Halloweekend is the partying starts Wednesday and doesn’t stop until the following week. Even with last night's rain plenty of students are battling hangovers which leaves a third of the usual lecture attendance to witness you and Wonwoo go head to head while Dr. Wagner sits at home with a mysterious illness she announced in an email three minutes after nine AM.

The few that are there snag their papers, lips curled in disgust at the plethora of red ink spilled on white pages. Their own faults for not paying attention during lecture but maybe the scarlet gashes were a little dramatic. Wonwoo’s jaw is tight, pointedly ignoring you except to hand exams over that someone is waiting for with dread in their eyes. 

You could’ve skipped. It wouldn’t even count as skipping because class is canceled and there’s no award for hauling ass at the crack of dawn when your advisor isn’t even here to see it. You could be tucked away in your apartment with him under your skin; firmly in the place between dreams and waking where you liked him best, nothing but warm skin and rough hands with his lips on your hairline and your head burrowed in his chest. 

There are too many witnesses to just drop the act and wrap your arms around him from behind until he gives in. Apologize for the stupid shit he rightfully called you out on. But as your courage grows with each student’s exit, Wonwoo makes to leave before you can make use of it. 

Barely an hour of fighting and it already feels like an eternity.

“Hey,” you call.

He freezes by one of the desks near the back of the room, like he’s shocked you’re even there in the first place. But he doesn’t turn around; just tilts his head so you know he’s listening even if he doesn’t want to.

“Sorry about this morning. I-I think the stress is getting to me.”

And the fact that I can’t be mad at anyone besides the universe for this incredibly shitty situation. And I miss you. Even when you’re right next to me.

“Okay.”

“That’s it?” you fidget with the strap of your bag; a million pounds heavier even without the weight of ungraded tests that Wonwoo snatched before you could divide the remaining work.

He turns around, eying you with an exasperated look. “What else should I say? You called me a slack off and implied I don’t do my job.”

“I didn’t,” you argue but it’s salt in the wound because—

“You did.”

“But—”

“It’s fine. I’ll finish grading the exams over the weekend.”

And then you're alone.

You’re alone in the study room you both usually occupy to work on the Nanochemistry project due at the end of term. The shared document has updates, the blink of his cursor mocking your from wherever he hunkered down. Away from you. The temptation to type ‘I’m sorry’ over and over again disappears once he logs out barely a minute after you logged on.

You’re alone at the circulation desk of the library through your shift, head whipping around to every squeak and cough only to find someone who isn’t Wonwoo. There’s an email from him, to Dr. Wagner with you CC’ed, about class averages and exam questions that should be thrown out.

You walk home alone. Other students in various states of dress and intoxication crowd the sidewalks, a few you recognize but they feel a million miles away.

Alone in your apartment, the two mugs from last night clean in the sink.

The good part of being alone is when you start crying, no one is there to see.

It’s near midnight and the chill of the breeze whipping down the street bites at your exposed skin. Already the should-be-condemned frat house pulses with life, the promise of a long night ahead thrumming through the symphony of drunk screams and music.

It’s not unusual for you to attend frat parties. Wonwoo’s favor guarantees free booze and a perch at the top of the staircase where underclassmen are barred from entering. But you’ll settle for watching drunk underclassman stumbling over the front lawn from one of the couches on the front porch (which are so broken in, no one sinks into the cushions – they just fall straight down until the worn springs catch them) because the inside of the house is too hot, and too crowded, and far too loud. 

A hail Mary apology is the only thing on your mind. Yesterday had been the nastiest spat in recent history between you two; notwithstanding sophomore year when Jeonghan asked you for tutoring and Wonwoo insisted on helping. “Helping” meant cutting off every question Jeonghan dared ask with a series of snorts and huffs until you left and refused to talk to him for a week.

He’d apologized in the most Wonwoo fashion – completing your Thermodynamics assignments for the rest of the semester and before going down on you until you threatened to kick him in the head through sensitive sobs.

Wonwoo is here – somewhere. Shuffling up the past, past the line of eager party goers looking for a way in, you scan the front porch, he’s not in his usual waiting spot to whisk you upstairs where the older members hang out with better drinks and better music. Not that he would be. He doesn’t even know you considered coming to this.

Instead, poor Chan, dressed in yellow and black stripes, mans the door with pilot Jihoon by his side.

“Jihoon,” you greet, before looking at the younger man. “Speed bump.”

Chan mumbles something under his breath but lays on the ground regardless. When Wonwoo went through the same hazing you only got a few chances to enjoy the ridiculousness before he dragged you upstairs and shut you up himself.

“Can you not torment the kids?” Jihoon grunts.

“I could. But, where’s the fun in that?” 

“Your boyfriend is inside. If you see Jun, tell him it’s his turn to watch the door.”

“Got it.”

Stepping over the underclassman still laying on the ground, you head inside and straight for the packed kitchen to get a drink. There’s barely any space between the hoard of bodies, forcing you to shuffle forward everytime there's a gap in the crowd; but it’s more like swimming against a rip tide. 

It’s difficult to see with nothing but a few strobe lights and some strings of Christmas lights to clear the dark. One glance up towards the upper landing of the staircase is all it takes to find him right next to Mingyu. Matching costume, two bean poles standing out from the crowd of shorter men. Mingyu makes a brief nod in your direction but before you can see Wonwoo turn you’re off into the kitchen.

It’s an even tighter fit in here. A pledge pours drinks from a cooler, for a brief second you’re tempted to indulge. The last time you did, freshman year, you ended up crying in Wonwoo’s room mid-hookup. You scan the slim pickings and settle on an unopened beer. The shots you took while getting ready are already catching up.

Forced between anxious isolation and drinking, a few of your friends come up and briefly make conversation. You feign interest, eying over their heads for a familiar mop of dark hair without success.

A few guys stop to compliment your costume. They give themselves away in glazed heavily lidded stares, single minded focus on your legs. They ask what your major is, boast their status as pledges to your disinterested grimace, and move on when you finally put them out of their misery and fib about your “boyfriend” being “president or something” but “I don’t pay attention to those things,” and they all disappear significantly paler than when they first appeared.

You bite the bullet of your pride and turn to leave, only to find Wonwoo barely an inch away.

His eyes burn over your figure, the short toga covering just enough for you to avoid public indecency. Good. It’s the entire reason you wore this stupid costume in the first place. He’s a horny loser for nerdy shit and this is the best thing you could’ve worn other than one of those video game character costumes forcing your boobs in your throat and leaving you at serious risk for public indecency.

It’s not the first time you’ve wrapped yourself in barely enough fabric to constitute an outfit for the sake of his forgiveness and it probably won’t be the last.

Wonwoo pins you to the counter with his hips, hands bracketing your figure on either side. The green hat with an ‘L’ is lopsided on his head but at least he didn’t wear the fake mustache. “So, what is your costume?” he hums into the space just below your ear with a kiss.

“Guess.” You tilt your chin, cocky.

“And if I get it right?” he asks, lips at your ear.

Heart pound, you ditch the beer and reach for his hips with purpose. “Whatever you want.”

“Dangerous words.”

“Think of it as my apology for being a huge bitch yesterday.” 

He sighs into your neck, arms tight around your waist in a loose semblance of a hug. It’s a farce. Your ass meets the counter with minor effort and Wonwoo claims the space between your legs before you can pretend to object.

He still hasn’t kissed you.

You want more than kisses. You want to feel him, all of him. Want to drag him to the living room serving as a makeshift dance floor and sink into the heat of his body pressed flat against your own for everyone to see. You want to pull him into that closet off the main hall, familiar from that hot night of freshman year when a drunk make out turned into a timid fingering and eventually Wonwoo handing over his first time on a silver platter. Or even run back to your apartment, pluck through the leftover Halloween candy you bought on discount and watch whatever horror movie has become his recent obsession. You just want him.

“Mingyu thought you were Socrates.”

Pressed this close on the sticky counter, his body is the only thing protecting what little of your dignity is left. Even then, there's enough of the slippery warmth of alcohol to tempt you into rutting against him right here for those stupid pledges to see. “Mingyu is an idiot.”

“Clearly,” he chuckles. “The rubber chicken gave it away.”

You shake it at eye level. “Behold, man.”

“Lame,” his kissing gets bold down the shaft of your neck, teeth scraping your collarbone.

“Oh please, I feel your boner.”

He doesn’t resist you when you nuzzle along the bare parts of his neck, a tease of soft kissing usually reserved for quiet moments tucked away in your apartment. Even in the chaos of the party, body heat turning the air uncomfortably warm, you crave more of his closeness. 

His hands feel nice on your legs. None of the timid gentleness of years prior when he’d touch you like it’d burn if he wanted it too much; trailing higher and higher but never under the short hem of the bedsheet turned dress. His fingers flex into the muscle at the outside of your thigh, hook behind your knees and drag you to the edge of the counter. 

You're sweating through your own skin when he kisses you. 

The need in your gut blooms at full force. Your mouth loosens, welcoming his tongue and teeth and whatever else he’s generous enough to give while you tug at the loose fabric around his hips to force more close proximity; the zipper of his pants is hot against your core and if you fucked him right here it wouldn’t look that different than the PG-13 make out happening right now. 

“Wanna show me your room?” You blink like some moony eyed freshman, glassy, pupils blown from vivid images of all the possibilities in the solitude upstairs. Wonwoo is fine with the game of whatever your apology entails even if it means you throw cheesy lines like that.

He ushers you off the counter, flat to your back as he pushes through the crowd with you ahead. Even in a drunken haze people part out of his way because of the mastery of resting bitch face only he seems to have despite the complaint putty that lies behind it. A private smile splits your lips. He can’t be that mad. Not with how he pulls you closer, in the protective way he so often does in the buzz of a single minded crowd with more alcohol in their veins than blood. 

Mingyu is standing on the landing. Girls in scraps of fabric eye him up and down, even in his stupid costume with the mustache but he ignores them in favor of pouting straight into a red cup.

“Why is your boyfriend moping?” 

“Fuck if I know.” Wonwoo focuses on sucking another bruise on your neck like no one's watching. 

You’re loose enough not to care about Mingyu’s annoyance as Wonwoo ushers you by. “Cheer up buttercup, I’m sure there’s a Peach here into charity fucks!” 

It’s meant to be encouraging, but Mingyu looks like he’s torn between strangling you and throwing himself over the banister.

Maybe you did lie about being Wonwoo’s girlfriend, but he is president and his room is the biggest and furthest away from chaos. Up on the top floor where the music isn’t as loud and the only people on this floor are other members and their guests for the night.

Wonwoo pushes you inside, kicking the door shut loud enough you wince before crowding you against the wood. You throw his hat away somewhere into the darkness, hand twisted in his hair as he kisses you. Sloppy and gross until he rocks into the softness of your stomach, gasoline on the flame.

“Turn around.”

He barely gives you enough space to do so, pressing you flat once again, cheek squished to the door and a rough pull at your waist. 

“If you’re thinking about touching my asshole, don’t. I have shit to do tomorrow,” you warn. 

On the other side of the door you hear footsteps but they pass by without stopping.

“Noted, but not what I’m going for,” he jokes. 

Your skirt flips up and a draft against the damp crotch of your panties sends a tremor straight through your core. “Share with the class.”

“It’s a surprise.”

“I’m shaking in my toga.”

“And you call me a loser.”

“I can call you some other things,” you grit, pushing back into the heat of his covered cock. “They aren’t as nice though.”

“Yeah, yeah. Take your panties off.” 

He’s a little bit of a freak. Sometimes he enjoys fucking you in nothing but your underwear and others he wants you in everything but. Maybe because of how this entire thing started; when you wouldn’t even take your bra off and he survived on the barest flash of nipple.

The flimsy soiled fabric barely passes your knees before he’s on you again, easily tempted by the arch of your spine. You hum content as he presses a finger into your cunt, then two. His other hand forces the neckline of your dress down and lo-and-behold your lack of bra delights like you knew it would.

Whatever bright idea that fluttered in Wonwoo’s brain is forgotten as he spins you back around for an eyeful of naked skin; a mouthful of your chest and your leg hooked around his hip for a pathetic dry hump into the heel of his hand.

“Oh, fuck,” you moan with extra emphasis and a caved stomach because there’s teeth and he makes it hurt. “Kiss me.”

Another rut into your thigh and his teeth are back at your bottom lip. It’s not exactly what you anticipated when you showed up tonight but there are far worse places than having a doorknob in your back while Wonwoo leaves a hickey below your ear; a perfectly good bed ten feet away but neither of you can be bothered to move much more than forcing Wonwoo’s pants down enough his cock leaks in your grip, head nestled at your entrance.

You surprise him by sinking to your knees. Head tipped back against the door, you tilt your mouth open to welcome him on your tongue. Wonwoo stares down at you; tits out, hand between your legs as you suck his cock in quick motions until he takes over and fucks into the curve of your throat. 

“Holy s-shit,” he hisses and you flatten your tongue to help him along. It feels good; seeing him reduced to so little just from the wet suck of your mouth on him. 

A choked gag forces Wonwoo back into his body, hips curving away so you can swallow air before leaving a sloppy kiss on the tip. Seizing him in a tight grip, you use the spit to jerk him off until he cringes with another pathetic moan. 

Someone giggles in the hallway, close enough you both hear. They’re far enough away you can still whisper to Wonwoo. “Remember that time we fucked in here last year?” 

“When you almost got us killed?”

Last year, at the same party, when you showed up in a skin tight Shego costume, Wonwoo pulled you to the only available room: Seungcheol’s. It’d been hot. Fucking when you aren’t supposed to, having Seungcheol pound at the door while Wonwoo came down your throat (no condoms and no hope to clean up).

“Do it again.”

His hand creeps into a loose collar around the base of your throat. You keep rubbing between your legs, working up a slick slide until your nails dig into the skin of his thighs.

“Really?” There’s no need for muffling the noise when it's his room and the only people at risk of hearing anything have done far worse. He pulls you to your feet, forces your cheek against the door and slides right behind you. Like he was made for you.

“Choke me,” you gasp before digging into the sick part of your brain that likes seeing him strung out, extra breathy just to see his eyes go wide. “Sir.”

Your skin sticks to the door, shamefully squeezed as he drags his cock through the mess of your pussy. “You can’t just say that.”

“Why not?”

“Because—”

“Because what?” you goad. “Gonna punish me?”

“You’d like that wouldn’t you? Show up wearing this,” he grits, tugging at the white fabric bunched around your waist, using the hand on your throat to squeeze your cheeks tight with authority you drool for.  “Asking to be choked and now you probably want me to spank you and call you a good girl.”

You grunt through the raw thrust at your gut, sending your head back from sheer enthusiasm. “N–not my fault you fuck me so good.” 

Wonwoo almost can’t control himself, hearing nothing but praise fall from your mouth as he fucks you limp against the door. “God.”

Someone screams, “Leave room for Jesus!” from the other side of the door and you almost rip it open to kill them if Wonwoo wasn’t dragging you to the bed. 

He folds you onto your front, both standing at the foot of the bed. A deep roll of his hips and you’re filled completely. 

“O-oh, fuck me,” you moan, uncaring if the idiot outside the door is still listening. Wonwoo has a hell of a hand and puts it to use against the curve of your ass. The coil in your gut pulls taunt as he delivers one after another.

He fucks deeper, a the hand not burn against your bottom between your shoulders. “You look so good— ah —taking my cock like this.” His voice waivers with the same stunted rhythm of his hips. 

“W-want,” you choke on spit, drooling into the comforter. “Wanna taste you.”

The animalist need to suck both your flavors off his cock nearly sends you into a fit but Wonwoo’s there, hooking his hand back around the front of your neck with a subtle squeeze. You want the stupid dress off, you want Wonwoo’s clothes off, you want to fuck him where there’s no one around to catcall in the hallway like twelve year old boys. Want. Want. Want.

What you get is enough pressure from his fingers that your mind blanks. Wonwoo gets a tight enough squeeze on his cock that he’s forced to a grinding halt. 

Then his rhythm goes deeper, harder. Course curls against the resistance of your ass until you almost collapse against the edge of the bed. His cock hits that spot like it was made for your body. “Touch yourself.”

You comply without further command. You’re wet, soaked, arousal smeared down your thighs from Wonwoo’s treatment. Your fingers bump against his length as you match the pace of his strokes. “Fuck, Wonwoo — hmmm.” 

“Tell me how it feels,” he gasps like it’s his first breath in hours.

“Wet, so wet,” you croon, arching harder, joints locking. “Gonna cum. Oh my god.”

He reaches low, grabbing your hand from between your thighs and pulling it to his mouth for a taste. His tongue slides between your digits, liquid slick with a soft suction your crave on your clit. 

“Beg for it.” Wonwoo bites your shoulder hard enough you cry. 

Stuffing your hand back between your legs, you play with your clit clumsily. Until pink crowds the edge of your vision and it hurts. “Please, please! I need—Want it. Wanna come for you. Please, sir.”

Wonwoo strains to hear your pleas over the clap of bodies. He’s worked you near the middle of the bed, practically laying on top of you as he fucks in quick succession. 

“Harder, fuck me,” you demand. “Yes, yes, y–yes!”

If you were on top you’d fall straight off, jerking tightly under Wonwoo’s weight, turning your face to greet his tongue between your teeth and mewling sensitivity. He doesn’t show mercy, continuing to fuck you through the worst of it.

“Holy shit,” you whimper, head throbbing. Wonwoo forces you back on your knees and you fight through sore muscles and sensitivity to preen under the weight behind his hips. 

“Can I come in you?” he asks in a shivery breath.

You nod with closed eyes, tugging the hand around your throat to your lips and sucking his fingers like it’s a cock. He finishes with a choked breath, flooding your insides with sticky warmth you’ve never gotten used to in all the months you’ve fucked without condoms. 

His breath fans against the nape of your neck, another swivel of his hips from the sensitivity. Your walls squeeze as Wonwoo pulls away. 

You roll onto your back with a bounce, Wonwoo jostling you when he joins. Shoulder to shoulder, you stare up at the ceiling while catching your breath. “Do you think you’ll pop a boner when your students call you a sir next year?”

Wonwoo heaves a long breath, amusement in his voice. “I come inside you and that's the first thing you think of?”

Immediately you regret the joke. Since Dr. Wagner’s announcement weeks ago neither of you had broached on the topic of what happens after graduation. Mostly from fear. But also because it’s a long discussion you’re not exactly sure what you want out of.

“Answer the question.”

“I hope not.”

The bed shifts beneath your knees as you crowd over Wonwoo, laying with his arms behind him to keep from sinking flat. The tired lines of his face look deeper in the lamp light. He’s nothing more than a big softie that wants to cuddle half naked in his bed while you play with his hair until sleep finds its place.

“It’s our last Halloween party.”

“Wow, just like old times,” you snort. “Should I start crying? Then it’ll be just like freshman year all over.”

Wonwoo laughs, his hand snatching yours and lacing your fingers together. “You wore a bra and bunny ears freshman year so if you’re gonna whip that out too – by all means.”

“God, we were so lame,” you announce matter of factly. Crying in lingerie and animal ears in one of the supply closets downstairs all because—

“Don’t rope me into that, miss ‘crying-because-she-didn’t-know-how-to-suck-dick’.” Wonwoo rolls on top of you, hoping to silence whatever argument bubbling in response with a teasing press of his lips. You're still sticky with sweat and spit and cum, nipples and pussy out and the thought of his dick, limp against your thigh, makes you sensitive all over.

“That’s former miss ‘crying-because-she-didn’t-know-how-to-suck-dick’,” you trail off into his mouth. “And you’re one to talk. Remember the time you cried about how happy you were that we were friends.”

He bites your lip in retaliation. “I didn’t.”

“You did. I have the video from Mingyu.”

“I thought he was an idiot.”

“He is but he’s good for blackmail.”

You might consider staying the night if he keeps tracing his nose along the arch of your collarbone. But a shrill giggle and some pornographic moans ring through the walls of the neighboring room. Not the side Seungkwan occupies. Hoshi’s. And it’s only the start.

“We can’t sleep here.”

Wonwoo collapses, tugging you with him. “I can’t ditch again, I’m on pledge duty.”

“You’re hiding in your room with me.”

“Okay, technically I’m on pledge duty.”

He wouldn’t stay here if he wasn’t required. Wonwoo hates party nights, especially Halloween. Too many variables requiring all hands on deck; too many needy people demanding his presence for some issue that could’ve been handled if they used their brain to think farther than the tip of their nose. Rarely, if ever, does he sleep in his own bed when you have a perfectly good one tucked away in a private apartment without thirty other men tripping over each other. 

“Well, I’m not sleeping with that.” On cue, another whimper, clearly a man’s, breaks through the tentative silence. Are they fuck against the shared wall?

Wonwoo sighs, scrubbing his face before moving for his phone. “I’ll send one of the kids to walk you.”

“Wow, a pledge escort. How thoughtful,” you sneer.

He huffs again, unwilling to start a fight that’ll leave neither of you satisfied. “Text me when you get home.”

You don’t.

There is an unspoken habit between you and Wonwoo that Sunday mornings are spent at the only reasonably priced coffee shop just near your apartment. A charming hole in the wall, with hanging shelves displaying layers of tchotchkes, paintings lining whatever free space between them, and wobbly tables with equally unbalanced chairs. It’s always packed because the coffee is decent and they have outlets. After last night, you hope he’s too exhausted to even think about showing up.

Mugs click against dark lacquered tables, the dull murmur of conversation churns over the music swelling softly through the speakers. The smell of pastries and espresso wake you enough to slide into a vacant table in the corner and set to work. 

Or you would’ve if someone didn’t sit down first.

“Oh.”

Wonwoo already has a mug and a little brown bag as he looks up at where you stand dumbly.

“I can just go…sit somewhere else…” You turn to leave, except there are no other tables. Couples and groups claim every single seat except the one across from Wonwoo.

“Why would you do that?”

“I don’t know, probably because I’m mad at you.”

He unpacks his laptop, shaking his head. “You’re not mad at me.”

“Yes, I am,” you emphasize. 

“You’re a bad liar.”

Neither of you are good at lying. Even worse at fighting. Incapable of committing to real anger when it takes all your energy to stand up straight and not fall asleep in a pile of ungraded papers and half finished assignments. Besides, you're only pouting because he passed up a night at your place to clean up pledge vomit. 

You can’t tame the annoyed grin cracking your face.  “Fine, I’m not that mad at you. Buy my forgiveness in the form of coffee.”

“Too much caffeine will kill you.”

“I can only hope,” you sigh, arms cradling your head against the hard wood of the table while he joins the queue at the register.

Wonwoo orders your drink and a cheesy pastry the size of your head, the smell of greasy carbs first thing in the morning softening the ice in your veins. He knows your weaknesses too well. 

“Is this penance?” 

“Something like that.” He tears the crispiest corner off and pops it into his mouth.

“Did you look at the study guide for Calc yet?”

Two hours later you approach the counter for a second round of coffee and snag one of the jammy tarts Wonwoo likes but rarely buys for himself. Whatever chaffs between you two melts under the constant stream of note checking; Wonwoo’s hand on your knee under the table helps too. 

“If I look at this anymore, I’ll run into traffic.”

“We’ve got the Nano project that needs some work,” you suggest. 

He stretches wide, a sliver of skin visible between the hem of his sweater and the band of sweat pants. “I’ve got practice in an hour. We can do it tonight when I’m done.”

You try not to stare and instead return to focusing on the screen of your laptop burning your retinas.“I’m tutoring Seungkwan.”

“After?”

“He’s gonna be a bitch and the last thing I wanna do is look at more school stuff.”

“Then no school stuff,” he decrees with finality. “I’ll bring mushroom pad thai from that place on Market.”

“Are you trying to bribe your way in?”

“Is it working?”

You hum a dismissal but watch him through your lashes. He looks good – washed in late afternoon glow, hair a mess with glasses and a sweater that hangs off his shoulders. It all screams ‘drag me to bed and nap the rest of the day’ which is trouble for you because you still want to be mad at him if only to see how fair he’s willing to go for your forgiveness.

“We can watch Yellowjackets,” he barters, packing his bag.

Another group eyes your table with hope to claim it the second it’s available. Sadly, your ass is firmly planted for the rest of the afternoon. With or without Wonwoo.

“You’re really trying to butter me up, aren’t you?”

“I cannot sleep in that house,” he deadpans. “Please take mercy.”

“Oh, so you’re just using me for a place to sleep. Even after I wore that stupid Halloween costume?”

He pauses, eyes glazing like it’s a distant memory and not less than twenty four hours ago. “You looked hot.”

“You made that pretty clear.”

“Anyway, I’ll come over after practice. You can bitch about Seungkwan until you pass out.”

“Fine, but if there is no pad thai then don’t come.”

“Whatever my woman demands,” he snorts, dropping a kiss to your lips before turning towards the door.

Two hours and another coffee later, Seungkwan occupies Wonwoo’s abandoned chair. There’s no reason for him to be taking an intro chem class as a Creative Writing major other than the fact he’s a bit of a masochist. He’s not half bad at it and doesn’t really need any tutoring but you get paid for showing up even if it’s complete silence as you pick your nails until he needs something.

You’re marking through his latest attempt when he finally speaks up, “You're dating Wonwoo, right?”

Red pen scratches through the edge of the paper. “What?”

“You and Wonwoo.”

What is the absolute configuration of the two carbon atoms in this compound? More red ink.

“What about me and Wonwoo?”

Seungkwan rolls his eyes with exasperation, like you’re on the outs of some obvious joke. “Dating.”

If an alkene has 24 hydrogen atoms, how many carbon atoms does it contain? Another X.

“No.”

“Oh, I thought—”

“We’re just friends.”

When 10 g of 90% pure lime stone is heated completely, the volume (in litres) of is liberated at STP is… Wrong, again. Which makes no sense because Seungkwan is good at this level. He’s fucking with you on purpose.

“Huh,” he comments, grabbing the worksheet back from your claws.

“‘Huh’ what?”

“I heard a rumor he had a girlfriend last night, that’s all.”

It's not the first time someone assumed there's more between you and Wonwoo then there actually is, your fib last night clearly fanned the flames of even more speculation. But neither of you date; not enough time, willpower, or patience to entertain someone around packed schedules. If you and Wonwoo didn’t have the same life within the chemistry department then you’d never see each other. It’s convenient as it can possibly be. 

Maybe at one point there was. Summer of sophomore year when he studied abroad in Spain and the usual substance of correspondence morphed from memes and jokes to something softer; I miss you’s and you’d like it here’s. Late night phone calls that lasted hours, refusing to hang up first until one of you fell asleep and the other finally canceled the call. 

But the opportunity to tip over the edge came and went without coalescing into whatever was on the other side. 

Seungkwan can pretend it’s an innocent suggestion but he stares you down until you crack with your own curiosity. “Who told you that?”

“Some pledges said they accidentally hit on his girlfriend. I don't even think he knows another girl beside you. Plus you were at the party last night.”

Stupid fuckers, you mutter under your breath. “We’re not dating.”

“But you guys are always together.”

“We work together. You and Vernon are always together, are you two fucking?”

“My room is next to his and it doesn’t sound like work to me.”

“How does me failing you sound?” you spit. 

Seungkwan doesn't so much as flinch at the threat but returns to the practice sheet with a smile nonetheless. 

Typically, fall break is spent hidden away in a pile of blankets with you and Wonwoo alternating movie choices throughout the weekend. Dead Poets Society (him), When Harry Met Sally (you), Over the Garden Wall (him), Fantastic Mr Fox (you), and so on and so on.

This year, you have a strong feeling Dr. Wagner’s favorite pastime is seeing her TAs squirm. It’s the only explanation for the unique brand of humiliation she subjects you and Wonwoo to. Tonight, Friday and technically your first night off for the long weekend, she decides to engage in a new sort of torture. A fancy dinner that neither of you could ever hope to afford, and even as her treat, you still eye the menu prices nervously. 

But Dr. Collins sits across the table, in the flesh, so you pull out the skills you learned in the ridiculous theater class you took freshman year to “diversify” your transcript and smile through the anxiety. 

Wonwoo does a little better; in a button up you’ve only seen him wear a handful of times when his usual wardrobe is sweatshirts and free shirts from campus events, he looks more comfortable than you feel.

“Jill, tells me you both work on Epitranscriptomic mapping in her lab?” Dr. Collins asks after another sip of his drink. Two whiskeys at dinner. 

It’s not an official interview. Not anything close to it, according to your advisor. Nothing is set in stone, even if Dr. Collins laughs at Wonwoo’s awkward jokes and nods enthusiastically to your stories about working in the library (he also worked in the library in undergrad, but used it to nap more than actually work). But it feels like a step in the right direction. 

“Yes, sir.” Wonwoo and you nod in tandem.

Dr. Wagner’s research focuses on how different RNA modifications vary across various cell types and states. It’s high level stuff that no one but Wonwoo understands when you rant about the broken Cellraft machine. And his complaints about NovaSec’s constant crashes that leave him without work fall on deaf ears except when they’re directed at you. 

Half the reason you two started speaking during orientation is because the overly enthusiastic intern asked what people were looking forward to the most during school. You and Wonwoo were the only ones who seemed to think she meant school-related and not where to buy a fake ID. Apparently, the best person to get a fake ID from was a junior in Dr. Wagner’s lab that year. Go figure.

“I’ve seen you two listed down the line as co-authors,” he nods. 

The waiter brings dessert, spiced toffee cakes and ice cream. You’re starving but the knot in your stomach from when you sat down is even tighter and all you can do is pick at the plate.

“Well, Y/N does a lot of the troubleshooting for the RNA degradation issues,” Wonwoo shares. 

Your face heats at the unexpected but not undeserved compliment. Dr. Wagner’s work isn’t cheap and the thought of wasting valuable money, money that could line the pocket of an extra set of hands, forced you to run a tight ship. The other researchers in her lab could say what they wanted behind your back but Dr. Wagner nods with fondness and you try not to preen.

“We’d be a mess if it wasn’t for her,” Dr. Wagner agrees. “The lab techs should write her a card.”

Not wanting to leave him out, you shoot a look to your left where Wonwoo pulls at the napkin in his lap. “Wonwoo is the one that made sure the parameters made sense for the last publication.”

“Also true.” Dr. Wagner smiles. “I told you, Harry, they’re my best students. Excel a mile past my TAs last year. They work together exceptionally well. If I could keep them both for next year, I would.” She says it with finality. There might very well be an opportunity to stay here and continue in her lab, even if your ambition has outgrown the place you’ve called home for four years.

The table is cleared, your plate full of mashed cake and melted ice cream with not a single bite missing. You’re exhausted. Mentally, emotionally; physically from the three all nighters you’ve pulled this week. There’d be an earful from Wonwoo about the dangers of sleep deprivation (hypocrite) but he looks like he’s seen a ghost tonight and won’t sleep himself.

Dr. Collins glances at his watch with a muffled yawn, “My, my! Look at the time! My apologies I didn't mean to keep us all out so late. I know you two probably have far more interesting things to be doing than spending the evening with a couple old timers like us.” He winks at Dr. Wagner, who rolls her eyes and hands the check back to the waiter who can’t be more than nineteen. “It looks like I’ll have some tough decisions to make in the upcoming weeks. Best of luck to the both of you.”

Hands shakes all around, and an awkward shuffle at the door and Dr. Collins and Dr. Wagner disappear into the night, leaving you and Wonwoo alone on the long walk back to campus.

You don’t beeline to your apartment for a debrief. Or even to ignore the obvious awkwardness cracking between. A bench to the side of the campus green is where you find yourselves, across from the fountain that upholds the tradition of drunken seniors taking a dip during finals when they’ve given up. 

You want to drown in it.

“Wonwoo,” you whisper. “What happens if one of us doesn't get in?”

“I–I don’t know.” He peers down at you with what you think is grief and the white noise that follows his quiet admission chokes painfully. There’s no plan B for something like this

If you got in, then Wonwoo did too. An unfounded assumption that wherever you went he’d be there too, based on almost four years of something between you. Too much to be friendship but too scared to call it something else. Something more. All the stereotypical college firsts had been with him or witnessed by him, you assumed grad school would be the same.

But it can’t be.

“Then we should end this.”

The words are out like shaken champagne, a dramatic explosion you can’t take back; a mess in the slimmest inches of space between your bodies on the bench in the freezing air.

“What?” he says.

You can’t swallow back down the idea. Wonwoo won’t let you. Maybe you don’t want to. You stare at the fountain across the green with a twitch in your jaw. 

“One of us is gonna move to Boston and the other is gonna have to figure it out and I’d rather not hate you or you hate me when it happens.”

You won’t take it back but you won’t look at him either. 

“You think I’d hate you?” 

He’s staring at you. You can feel the burn of his gaze on your cheek where embarrassment heats as well.

“I would.” You ignore the break in your voice at the complete lie. “I’d hate it if you got in and I didn’t. Even though you deserve it and I couldn’t be mad about it. I’d hate it. All I’ve wanted since freshman year is to go there, and I won’t ruin it for you just because I can’t have it.”

For a painstaking moment, he doesn’t say anything. His shoulders are still rigid and he props his weight into his knees, head bowed so you can’t even see his face in the stark street light. He doesn’t do anything until you do, until you slump with utter defeat.

“Fine.”

“Fine?” Your voice pinches in your throat.

“What else is there? You’ve already decided for the both of us. That stupid fucking program matters more to you than—”

You heat close to explosion.“It’s not stu—”

Wonwoo rushes off the bench. “It is! It is because we’ve been dating for the past three years but you won’t even fucking admit it! You’ll tell some stupid pledge I’m your boyfriend but everytime I think we’ve worked it out – that you’re finally ready to talk about it – you pretend nothing is happening.”

“That wasn’t—” you shake your head.

“It’s fine. I’ll get over it.” 

You move quicker than he does and find his hand, but he doesn’t want to stay and you can’t stop him from leaving. “Wonwoo.” 

“Stop.” His voice is stoic, whatever emotions previously controlling him locked up tight behind faux dismissal. “Just…stop.” 

If you’re going to lie then the smallest favor you can do is obey his command. You hide your face in your hands, cheeks hot and eyes stinging. Because if you look at him then you’ll break into a million pieces. You’d admit to lying to his face; that you could so much as entertain the idea of hating him.

Wonwoo waits but you say nothing. No argument, no final comment. 

When you finally look up he’s far enough down the sidewalk that the pathetic croak of his name is unheard.

Endpoint: a critical moment in a chemical process where a specific change indicates that the reaction is complete. 

Two days later, when you finally get the balls to call Wonwoo and apologize, to tell him he’s right and that you’re an absolute idiot, he’s already blocked your number.

In a game of passive aggressive pettiness, Wonwoo takes gold.

He won’t talk to you outside of class and lab hours. Even then, he refuses to look at you; talks straight around you. Any form of correspondence you receive has Dr. Wagner’s name attached and anything you send without it is loudly ignored. 

Other people notice too.

In study hours, the students notice, whisper to each other when Wonwoo snubs your attempt to discuss a batch of graded homework in favor of focusing his attention on a cowering freshman who looks like he might piss himself when Wonwoo calls him by name. All the others bury their heads in their textbooks in fear he’ll pick them next.

In Nano, when he shows up just in the nick of time to leave his self-assigned seat next to you empty, and instead sitting next to the door. You feel the eyes on you, hair standing on end at the back of your neck when Dr. Lim stutters through his intro with wide eyes at the scene.

Seungkwan shows up to tutoring significantly less interested in your love life. Or he pretends he isn’t. He doesn’t ask outright and there’s pity in his eyes, thick enough you want to burst into the tears you’ve waited to come for the past two weeks. Instead you feel hollow. 

Even Mr. Lee, the night guard at the library, eyes your solitary exit with something like concern. Even going so far as to call campus public safety to escort you the short walk home.

Your other friends try to take you out, get your mind off the tilt in your world axis. You go. Sit at bar tables and laugh when you're supposed to, make empty conversations with strangers but you don’t care. You want to go home and curl up in your own misery like a blanket and cry until your eyes swell shut and pass out from exhaustion. Eventually, they stop asking if you want to come and just leave ice cream and bottles of wine on your doormat as support.

Your grades don’t suffer, and that’s the only thing you can cling to right now.

In Dr. Wagner’s office, an impromptu meeting under the guise of setting final exam expectations and tinkering the schedule, Wonwoo continues the harsh coldness of silence; content to pretend you don’t even exist. 

You work through it easily enough. You and Wonwoo have the same finals so there's only two schedules (Dr. Wagner’s and your shared one) to coordinate for extra study hours. The entire ordeal takes ten minutes to complete the shared calendar, pack it full of final lab meetings and deadlines for grading.

And when it’s over, you move to rise but Dr. Wagner stops you short.

She looks sheepish which is an odd sight. Immediately, you go to the worst. You grit and swallow and sit back down in the same upholstered chair from the last time she dropped a bomb in your lap. 

This is the bandaid rip you’ve waited for all semester. Whatever is at the end of this meeting means you finally know if you’re good enough or not. If karma does justice and gives Wonwoo the spot in Dr. Collins lab next year because you committed the sin of wanting it too much, sacrificed too much.

“It seems my attempt at friendly competition had some…unintended consequences.”

Where sizzling anger would once flourish and bloom, nothing but empty exhaust stutters to life. “What?”

“Last year, the second my TAs found out I’d recommended them, they slacked off. Missing class, incorrect results in the lab. Now I know you two are hard workers but I was afraid senioritis might set in and I’d have to lay down the law. I don’t like being harsh with my students, not directly anyway. I want the best out of them, and I knew I could anticipate the best from you two. I was always planning to recommend both of you to Dr. Collins. I told him he would regret it if he even thought about not making space for you both next year.”

“What?” you repeat again.

There’s a weight on your knee. You don’t even need to look to know it’s Wonwoo’s hand. He doesn’t look before flipping it over when you place yours on top, fingers knotting together; holds it tight like he’s afraid you’ll vanish if he lets go. You unconsciously squeeze and he mimics without thought.

“So what does this mean?”

“Dr. Collins can’t outright say it but he’s on the admissions board and decides who gets to join his lab. He was adamant that both of you join him in Boston.”

“But we haven’t even—”

“I know, but the application is a formality at this point.” She waves a dismissive hand. “Your work speaks for itself.”

Wonwoo is still there, clenching your hand for dear life. Waiting for the other shoe to drop because there is no way – no way – it’s this easy. Months at each other's throat from the tension and for nothing. You’re sweaty, heart thumping loud enough it might break from your chest and skitter on Dr. Wagner’s desk. She keeps talking and you still haven’t looked at Wonwoo.

“I’m so proud of you both!” she beams. “And I’m sorry if I’ve…complicated things…for the two of you. It was never my intention. Now, go! Rest! Take the day off and celebrate. Send me the links to your applications and I’ll do my part so you can finally relax before finals.”

The pair of you shuffle outside like zombies. In broad daylight, the world keeps spinning and someone drops their coffee a little further down the street and curses a storm; a car honks at a biker, there's packs of students shuffling around where you stand dumbfounded. Your sweater does little to block the chill of late November wind.

Wonwoo still hasn’t let go of your hand.

“Did that just happen?” he asks.

“What the fuck.”

“What the fuck.”

Your laughing, deranged and fatigued cackles that earn several looks but on the cusps of finals it’s not uncommon enough to stop anyone out of concern. “What the fuck!”

You’re not sure what to do. Celebrate? Cry? 

It’s a little bit of both as Wonwoo swoops in, wrapping his arms around you tight enough to squeeze a surprised scream from your lungs. He’s not done, lifting and spinning you around in a quick circle before crying, “What the fuck!”

You laugh, snorting ugly cackles as he almost drops you with both of you gasping for breath. Completely deranged but what just happened that the rift between you momentarily heals.

Wonwoo sets you down gently but keeps close, his hands your waist like he’s afraid to let go. Like he’s missed you just as much as you’ve missed him. You finally look at him, and it’s the first breath of air after drowning for hours. The creases around his eye, the happy wrinkles around his nose. His hair is long enough it brushes your skin where your foreheads almost touch. His hold is like a cocoon of warmth.

“I’m sorry!” you blurt. “I’m so fucking sorry. I’m stupid and stubborn and I’ve been so caught up in this program that I—”

“No,” he shakes his head, arms tightening as you squirm in his hold.

“Let me finish.”

“No,” he says. “I like that you're stubborn and a pain in the ass. And it wasn’t fair that I expected you to just push aside something like grad school for me. I was being selfish and—”

“I love you.”

You might say it again just to see the way he chokes and turns purple; pulls you closer. He’s at a loss for words and you capitalize on the moment.

“I’ve thought about what would happen if I didn’t get in, like a million different possibilities and never once were you not there. I felt like…I don’t know, honestly. Like I was losing you and it was easier to be upset about the program than admit that. It was stupid and I’m stupid, and I’m really bad at speeches so…feel free to shut me up or whatever.”

You wait for him to process what you’ve said – a million emotions swiping across his face. Ridiculous some people act like he’s the embodiment of stoicism because if you know what to look for then they’d realize he’s terrible at hiding the way he feels.

“You love me?”

All that crying you did in the past few weeks means nothing because you could cry right now. But you don’t look away, you don’t ever want to look away from him again because you’d miss the way his face softens.

“Well, we’ve been dating for the past three years. It’s about time I told you.”

Wonwoo doesn’t speak, facing morphing into confusion before he scoffs with disbelief. “You’re so annoying.”

“Hey!” you stomp but Wonwoo pulls you closer, buries his face in your neck and squeezes so tight something feels on the verge of popping in your spine. His ears burn red as he whispers those three words back quietly enough you strain to hear them. He bites your shoulder just to be an asshole.

“What the hell was that for?” 

He does it again.

“Stop biting me you freak, we’re in public.” You pinch his side for good measure and only then does he smash the side of his face to yours and begin walking you backwards, in the direction of your apartment.

���Whatever, you love me.”

He lets you walk normally at the cross walk, your hand in his, both tangled in the warmth of the pocket of his sweatshirt because it’s fucking cold and the wind isn’t helping. Wonwoo drags you straight home, up the stairs, and crowds you against the door and kisses you until you can’t breathe.

“Why are you crying?”

You are. You don’t even realize it had started until you reach up and feel the dampness on your cheeks.

“Probably because I haven’t slept in two days and I missed you, idiot.” Wonwoo kisses you flat on the mouth again at the confession, smiling big enough it’s less of a kiss and more of teeth pressed together. But it’s good. You like it. You speak into his mouth, “I promise I would have really ‘sloppy I love you sex’ but I’m so tired I think I might throw up.”

“You missed me.” he hums, more of a statement than a question.

“Yeah, big head, I missed you. Now let’s sleep.”

“God,” he moans, biting his lip in mock pleasure. Maybe even real pleasure at the idea of a Friday afternoon full of nothing but hazy dreams in silence rarely found in a frat house. “I love you too.”

You undress straight down to your underwear. Cotton with a conservative cut because in no universe did you think you’d end the day with Wonwoo back in your orbit. Wonwoo who loves you, Wonwoo who you love back. But he eyes you like you’re a grand prize and all he wants is to touch you. But the rush of adrenaline keeping you conscious is burning out quickly.

He strips too, nothing but boxers and circles under his eyes but he’s happy. It radiates off him in waves and if you weren’t part of it, you’d throw something at him because it’d be annoying. You might just be glowing too.

You slip under the covers and Wonwoo snuggles up behind you, a second skin with his hand flat to your stomach to keep you from going anywhere. Not that you would. You don’t even remember falling asleep. 

When you wake up, it’s dark outside; which could mean it’s been minutes or hours since the winter sun likes to deep beneath the horizon early in the afternoon. It’s the best sleep you’ve had in weeks.

Everything is warm; your body beneath the comforter, where sweat sticks at your back, the lips dragging across the curve of your neck, Wonwoo’s crotch firm between your legs.

“Good morning to me,” you sigh.

He hums in happy agreement, tongue traces the shell of your ear before kissing across your cheek and chin and finally landing on your mouth with a kiss that can only be described as sappy.

“Got started without me?” Your hands press under his underwear, two palms full of his ass holding him still enough to grind up into. Something about a sleepy make out has you hungry to lay there and take whatever he’ll offer.

“I’ll catch you up, don’t worry.” 

You snicker, “No wonder those freshmen have crushes on you.”

“What do you mean?” He traces your naked sides with his fingers.

“I’ll catch you up,” you mock, then wince from a razor of his teeth as he shifts down your chest. “If you were my TA, I’d try to fuck you.”

“I’m trying to have’ sloppy I love you sex’ and you’re trying to goad me into some student teacher shit?”

He bites your side, just a nip but you flare and blush anyway. “Ooooo, tell me I’m bad.”

“You’re annoying.”

“You love me.”

“As I was saying,” he whispers into your stomach, fingers tugging your panties off. “Sloppy I love you sex.”

“Okay, okay.” You sink a hand in his hair only for him to tug it away, fingers laced together over your sternum as he strokes you to life. “O-oh, that’s—fuck.”

He hikes a leg up over his shoulder, out of the way for the fingers that satisfy the empty squeeze in your gut. Your tongue prickles with another goad but Wonwoo senses it first and swiftly works to silence you with a hot kiss to your clit that makes your vision bleed red.

The cold of the room works in his favor, pinching your nipples tight until you cave to the need to touch yourself. If the light was on then he’d watch and you get the urge to pause the action just for the chance to watch him watch you.

“Don’t stop,” you grunt. 

He eats it filthy, spit and arousal forming a wet mess slipping down your ass. The way his tongue lashes is nothing short of despicable and you know you’re the one that taught him that and you can’t help but flare with pride. “I’m gonna cum, I’m gonna cum, I’m—” you chant blindly.

The warmth between your legs surrounds, suffocates until your thighs go numb and your shoulders pull away from the mattress with a groan rivaling porn; but you mean it. Wonwoo means it too. 

You clench harder, revitalized in the stretch of another finger and a clip of teeth on your clit.  You tug at your still clasped hands on your chest, bite into the meat of his palm and let the flood consume you with stiff legs and tears in your eyes. “Oh, Wonwoo – u-ugh. Fuck. Fuck.”

Wonwoo takes it, mouth waiting for every eager roll of your hips; completely unphased until you melt back in the sheets with a pathetic mewl.

He kisses up your body, mouth and cheeks wet and warm. When he reaches your mouth you resist the urge to lick him clean. Something about that feels decidedly unlike sloppy I love you sex. So you slip your tongue between his lips instead and spread your legs until his crotch is level with the raw sensitivity of your own.

“Roll over,” you pant.

Like an asshole, he laughs. And then he drops his weight behind his hips and you actually see stars. “Wanna do it like this.”

“Make love to me,” you croon.

He doesn’t even pretend to stifle the obnoxious snort. “Don’t ever say that again.”

“What happened to sloppy I love you sex?” 

“Getting to it. You like it when I come inside you?” Now he’s the one goading and you’re blushing like you’ve never fucked him before. To be fair, you haven’t fucked him as the man you’re in love with so it’s a first time for the both of you. Wonwoo’s drunk on the power of having you stutter through something so familiar yet new.

“Love it.” 

“Good,” he agrees with a saccharine peck to your nose that makes you feel like a doe eyed virgin again. “I love you.”

Your need for games and pretense dissolves. You just want Wonwoo, all of him, until you can’t take it any more. 

Wonwoo senses the change, noses against your cheek before kissing you. He’s still holding your hand, the other cupping your jaw, thumb tracing the curve of flesh. It’s vulnerable and soft and something you probably could’ve experienced years ago if you weren’t willfully blind.

“I love you, too.”

You whisper the confession so quietly it doesn’t even make a sound but Wonwoo figures it out because he surges into action, pulling you to the center of the mattress in all your naked glory. The flood light from the side of the building reflects back in through the slats in the blinds and Wonwoo sits up to soak in what he can see in the limited light.

Twisting a hand in his hair, you pull him down for a kiss; forcing all the emotions you have to the surface. He doesn’t make you wait. Instead, he drops flat, flat together from head to toe as he slips inside. You’re still tight and sensitive, squirming at the feeling of being stretched so thin with Wonwoo wrapped tight in your arms.

“W-wonwoo,” you mewl. You know he loves the sound of his name, any time, in desperate moans and sleepy coos. You’ll say it as much as he wants to hear if he kisses you like he is now – with something new at the edge. Something needy. “More.”

He wraps your legs around his hips, folding you clean in half with a heavy rut into your pussy you’ll feel for days. You both want to drag this out – take hours to come apart and come together again and again – but Wonwoo is already working a hand between your bodies; stroking you over hot coals just to hear you moan his name again.

In record speed, you feel that familiar burn creeping along your spine. He fucks you into a wet mess and it’s all you can do to hold on and claw up his back. Breaks you into something limp and pliant, hands twisted together over head; tugs at that loose thread over and over until you unravel beneath him and Wonwoo watches like it’s magic.

“Oh- oh, Wonwoo–” you cry. Actually cry. Tears he swipes away with a thumb before pressing his mouth to yours.

You’re swollen and stiff, muscles taunt while they twitch from a rush of complete bliss.

“M cumming, baby – oh my god.” Wonwoo bucks into the tight squeeze of your legs, deeper, harder, more. “Love you—fuck.”

He hides with soft sighs in your neck, skin sticky where you both slide together. You cradle him to your chest, fingers rushing through the sweaty tangles on his hair gently. A kiss to his head, his brow, his nose that wrinkles from pure content.

But you’re not done yet.

You wiggle from beneath him, peeling yourself off the pillows, lower half still numb from one hell of an orgasm. But you want more, insatiable and doped on years of repressed fondness. “Can you go again?” 

Wonwoo looks like you asked him to run a marathon. “You want me to die?”

“Worse ways to go,” you coo, sinking low enough to take his cock in your mouth. It tastes like you and him and it makes your eyes roll.

“God. I didn’t know sappy sex meant you’d try to kill me,” he moans airly under your ministrations, a hand at the back of your head when you show off with a nose to his crotch before sliding off. “You’re evil.”

“I’m in love with a sexy nerd and I'm horny,” you sigh dreamily, thrilled with the way he pulses in your hold.

“Yeah, well…” he gives up on whatever rebuttal under the weight of your body on top of his. Nothing he can argue with in that statement anyway so you tease him with a kiss, smile when he chases your mouth, roll when you realize he can taste the mix of you both off your tongue.

“You know…I’ll need a roommate in Boston.”

“Huh,” Wonwoo feigns. His focus is on the way your tug at his cock, spit and cum webbed between your fingers. This isn’t the best way to have this conversation but you’re both high on sleep deprivation, love, and orgasms and it encourages loose lips.

“Know anyone interested?”

He shudders back into the pillow, leaving his neck open for your teeth with a choked, “Yeah.”

“Who?”

“Me.” 

“Yeah?”

“Yeah —fuck—wanna wake up to you every morning.”

“Even if I’m a cranky bitch?” Your knees bracket his hips, cunt split on his cock as you grind against the underside.

His stomach caves as he responds with a thin voice, “yeah.”

You like waking up to him too. Falling asleep with him tangled in your body, listening to him hum in the shower when he thinks you aren’t listening. Sometimes he even sings with a little encouragement like those times you were sick and the only thing that got your mind from exploding like thunderclaps was the lullabies from his childhood that he cooed into your hairline.

Starting and ending everyday with Wonwoo sounds nothing short of blissful.

“Okay.” You tangle his fingers with your own, rising on your knees to distract from the sheepish smile splitting your face in two.

“Really?”

“I like having you around,” you admit, sinking down on his cock. “Makes me feel better.”

Weird conversation over the back track of slapping skin and pathetic muffled sobs but you like it. Feels well overdue.

“A-about?”

Everything.

He gives a tender squeeze to your thigh, cradles your face in both hands, eye contact that you fight not shutter away from because it’s terrifying he can see you clearly. 

He’s lost; completely mesmerized by the way you bounce on the length of him, grind back into his lap like you’re possessed.

“Can’t last—” he chokes.

“S’okay,” you press the words into his cheek, his jaw, the bones jutting from around his collar. “Just wanna feel you.”

You bend and strain for his pleasure, to watch it dance across his brow as he cums inside you again, his hands heavy on your ass, your thighs, whatever he reflexively grips in a bid for grounding, nails leaving streaks of color. Twitching and jerking in sensitive painful bliss, his eyes roll back with a quick exhale. “Fuck-k.”

You're sticky and used between the legs but you take comfort in the feeling and bask in the glow on top of him. Nothing but a pile of satisfied boneless goo where you lay with sweaty skin and heat you feel from the top of your head to your toes. “Good?”

“Great,” he hums, pulling into one last toe numbing kiss. 

When feeling returns to your bodies, you spend the rest of the night eating greasy pizza on the couch in nothing but his shirt, drinking wine straight from the bottle in celebration. You kiss Wonwoo whenever you want, which, admittedly, is a lot; a flurry of sappy pecks over his face leaves him blushing and dewy. When you fall asleep after making love once again, the last thing you hear is him saying he loves you too.

Epilogue

4 months later…

There’s a certain level of comfort that comes with receiving an official acceptance email. The words you’ve been waiting to hear since Dr. Wagner all but confirmed your future in a fifteen minute meeting last semester.

On behalf of the Chemistry department, we are pleased to inform you that you have been accepted as a part of…

The big envelope in the mail today helped too.

Wonwoo sends a photo of his, unopened, because you promised to open them together tonight. On your date; which is nothing more than grading assignments and eating leftover take out on the couch like so many nights have been spent already. But this time he’s your boyfriend. And after all the worksheets are graded, and you get to cuddle deep into the worn couch cushions, you get to tell him you love him and he’ll say it back and the flutter in your veins at the thought is nothing short of magical. 

And this time you have a surprise waiting for him and he might just cry. Or you hope so. You’ve got $50 riding on the possibility.

You’re sweating through your shirt from putting the new piece of furniture together for the past three hours by the time he shows up with a bag of takeout, Thai food from the place on Market where they know you by order, and a kiss you’ve been missing since the morning when he left for one of his stupid workouts. 

Wonwoo sets the bag on the counter, immediately pulling you into his arms before sagging like a deflated balloon. “Pixel got adopted today.”

“Really?”

“Yeah.” He’s moping. He accepts your placating kiss with a pout, and starts unpacking the food.

You feel the smallest flutter of guilt but it's worth it.  “That sucks.” 

“She needed a good home.” Wonwoo confirms and that's the end of the conversation.

Even in your final semester, your schedules are still packed. Crammed full with meetings, exams, work, Wonwoo’s volleyball stuff that you attend with posters and sit near the other girlfriends. It’s weird but not because its the same stuff you two were doing for years. But it’s exhausting.

So you don’t blame Wonwoo for not noticing the newest addition to your apartment until he’s inhaled his food and the last third of yours.

“Babe.”

“What?” you ask, focusing on cutting another red slash into the white paper.

“What’s that?”

He points at the gigantic cat tower in the corner next to the couch. It’s cramped in tight but in two months you’ll both be in Boston with a bigger apartment with real bedrooms so it’s only temporary.

You shrug and make another mark. “Oh, just something I picked up.”

“You don’t have a cat.”

“Huh. Weird.” Your eyebrows furrow in mock confusion but you keep grading papers or else it’s game over and the need to watch him puzzle together your plans is all you want. “Then what’s the thing in the bathroom?”

“You didn’t.”

“I did,” you confirm.

Wonwoo stares open mouthed, between you and the bathroom door and back to you. He might pinch himself but he flies off the couch with childlike eagerness and your face hurts from smiling already.

Pixel spends the rest of the night curled up asleep on her new dad’s lap and you’re $50 richer. Mingyu’s girlfriend is already offering to catsit despite Mingyu’s pouts about losing money.

Taglist: @tomodachiii @cvpidyunho @miniseokminnies @ddaengpotate @arycutie

@gaebestie @primoppang @gyuguys @mine-gyu @doremifasire

@missminhoe @toplinehyunjin @crvs4vldtn @prettygyuuu @sliceofwoozi

@writingbarnes @dokyeomkyeom @christinewithluv @minwonfairy @idkjustlovingbts

@wobblewobble822 @futuristicenemychaos @seungkw1 @horanghaezone @jespecially

@scoupsjin @isabellah29 @luvseungcheol @crisle19 @iamawkwardandshy

@lukeys-giggle @aaa-sia @tinkerbell460

[lemonlover1110]

𝐇𝐄𝐀𝐃𝐋𝐈𝐍𝐄𝐒

Toji Fushiguro

Pairing: Actor!Toji Fushiguro x f!Reader

Warnings: MDNI!, smut, oral sex (m. receiving), spitting, vaginal sex, creampie, angst, family fluff, toji has like 50 kids (4) and tries to be a good dad

Summary: Toji's selfishness is getting in the way of your family. When he notices that your family is slowly falling apart, he does what he can to hold it together.

*Actually a long oneshot! for @ayyy-pee's collab

Discord +18 - Twitter - Ko-Fi

“ACTOR TOJI FUSHIGURO SPOTTED GETTING A LITTLE TOO COZY WITH NEW CO-STAR”

The headlines are everywhere, it’s nearly impossible for you to ignore them. It’s not only the headlines but the pictures, the videos, the talk shows, the clear chemistry between them– And if that isn’t enough, the messages and calls you receive asking if you’re okay, are driving you insane. You don’t know how much more you can take of this.

Toji wanted to venture out of his usual villain role, wanting to do something more lighthearted, more fun. Whenever he’d audition for anything where he wasn’t the bad guy, he would get a simple answer: you’re not the guy we’re looking for. Truth is, Toji is too intimidating and lacks the look of the perfect picture man that they’re looking to cast in romcoms. You aren’t going to lie and say that you were bothered by this, because in fact, you were glad he wasn’t.

As selfish as it sounds, you were happy with the fact that Toji was getting stuck in the same villain roles. He’s already famous enough, and you have more than enough money, he doesn’t really need the lead role since it means that he’ll spend even more time away from his family. But you lie to yourself because if he got the lead in any other movie, you’d be ecstatic for him. 

The dreaded day came, and Toji got a call from his agent. An offer for a lead role in a new and upcoming romcom. It was hard for you to be happy for him, even though your husband was so excited to venture out of his usual character. ‘He’s going to kiss someone else’ was the first thought that came into your mind, and then you realized that movies nowadays are so much more explicit than just a kiss. 

Toji wasn’t supposed to, but he told you about a couple of things in the movie. He was so excited, and he couldn’t keep a thing from his wife. He told you of the characters, the plot, the scenes he was most excited about and the scenes he was worried about– The steamy scenes where Toji will be stripped to nothing with his tongue down another woman’s throat. 

Jealousy would consume you for the next months, realizing that your husband is going to pretend to be with some other woman; however, you can’t be too mad, since it’s all just happening in front of a camera. You’re the only woman Toji loves, you know so. You shouldn’t take this too seriously.

Until the relationship came off the cameras because the pair has undeniable chemistry, and the directors thought that hinting they were having an affair would make for great promo. You nearly begged Toji not to do it, but he didn’t listen. He wants to ensure the movie’s success, which you understand but it’s humiliating for you and your family.

You’re upset with him, and Toji knows this, but he’s allowed to be selfish. He’s wanted this, and he’ll do just about anything to make sure everything goes smoothly, he can risk having you mad at him for a few months. Although, he’ll admit that it sucks because you’re so cold with him.

“How about we take the kids and go out for dinner tonight?” Toji asks, watching as you get out of the bathroom with nothing but a towel. He wants to go on a date with just the two of you, but he also misses his kids. It doesn’t matter what Toji suggests either way, because you ignore him. He clears his throat, repeating, “How about we go out for dinner?”

“Huh?” You respond, acting as if you hadn’t heard him before, and Toji doesn’t know whether to laugh or roll his eyes. Toji repeats the question a third time and you proceed to answer, “I’m going out tonight, I can’t.”

“What are you and the kids doing?” Toji questions, wondering why he wasn’t invited. He guesses he knows why, but you should’ve at least tried to make the effort since it involves your kids.

“I’m going out, the kids are staying with the nanny.” You tell him, which makes his eyebrows perk up. Toji stands up from the bed, walking over to you. He hugs you from behind, planting a kiss on your shoulder.

“How about we–” He begins but you proceed to cut him off before he can even finish his sentence.

“I’m going out with friends. Without you.” You answer, removing Toji’s arms from your waist. You walk to the closet to find your outfit for the night, and Toji can’t seem to leave you alone, following behind you like a lost puppy. 

“You don’t have to be so cold.” He argues, and you pay no attention to him. You were clear that you didn’t want this to go this far, yet he let it happen. You can be as mad as you want to be with him. “What are you planning to do anyway? Cause a scandal to get back at me?”

“I’m allowed to have fun, am I not, Toji?” You respond. You simply want to go out without thinking of your husband and all the embarrassment his job is bringing. If it causes a scandal, then so be it.

“Then why are you so set on going alone?” He replies, and you scoff. You can’t believe the audacity.

“I just want to be away from you because you humiliate me.” You finally look at him, shooting him a glare. It shouldn’t hurt because he’s caused his own problems, but it still hurts to hear that from his wife, “I was upset about the movie, sure, but I knew you wanted to do it so I bit my tongue. This publicity stunt is too far, and I told you not to do it over and over again, but you did it. Fine. You’re an adult.”

“And? You know it’s not real.” He argues, which only ticks you off more. You won’t raise your voice because your children are wide awake, and you don’t want them to hear as you yell at their father.

“Do you know how many pity messages I’ve gotten? The amount of calls? I’m just the poor victim to all of them, and also the stupid woman that won’t leave her husband.” You respond, and he opens his mouth to argue that it’ll be over soon. In a couple of months the truth will come to light and everything will go back to normal. “The kids are getting teased about it too. Megumi is old enough to know it’s a stunt, but the other three aren’t.”

“What do you mean the two year old and five year old are also affected by this?” He questions in a mocking tone, which tells you that he isn’t fully believing you. You feel your blood boil, and you take a deep breath to keep yourself calm. You’re not letting him get the best of you.

“Well, considering that the ten year old can’t keep his mouth shut and tells the other two that mommy and daddy are getting a divorce, I’d say yes, they are affected by this.” You try to remain stoic, keeping your voice low and calm. Toji bites down his lip, his eyes going wide at the realization that his ten year old refusing to talk to him wasn’t just a simple tantrum. “I tried to tell him that everything is fine between us, but he didn’t exactly believe me.”

“Is that why they’re refusing to talk to me?” Toji’s demeanor changes, becoming somber in a matter of seconds. You end up shrugging, not really knowing why your son is acting the way he is, but you can only assume it’s because of it. 

“I’m not sure. Probably.” You don’t care to really find a solution to his problems since you’re upset with him too. He needs to realize that his actions not only affect him but also his family. You watch as the man walks over to the bed to take a seat and think of what to do with this new piece of information. And while you’re mad at him, you still love him and want to help him out one way or another. You focus on getting yourself ready while you tell him, “How about you take them out tonight? Explain to them that everything is fine between us and–”

“Will you come with us?” He interrupts you, making you click your tongue.

“I’m going out, you can deal with the issues that you’ve caused, alone.” You answer, and Toji furrows his eyebrows. He knows that he can’t exactly be too mad at you because you’re right, he caused his own problems. “Take them somewhere to eat, watch a movie with them, play with them. I don’t know. I’m laying it all out for you, Toji. You can decide what’s best.”

“What about you?” He asks, and you don’t even care to entertain him, sitting in front of your vanity to do your makeup. Toji has to repeat himself, and you sigh.

“Figure it out.” 

“Ryo, are you ready?!” Toji yells down the hallway, but his ten-year-old doesn’t answer. Toji simply goes ignored, and the man tries to remain calm. Getting mad isn’t going to do him any good, yelling angrily at his son isn’t going to make Ryo any less mad. 

You left around thirty minutes ago, and Toji spent the entire time trying to convince you to stay; however, his efforts were in vain. You didn’t care enough to listen which shouldn’t really shock him, he’s still upset though. After you left, he began getting his daughters ready to go out, telling his sons to put on something comfortable since they’re going out to dinner.

Now that both of his girls are ready, he’s simply waiting on his sons. Toji knows that Megumi is somewhat ready, but he isn’t sure about Ryo. 

“Aimi, baby, can you wait downstairs while I check on your brother?” Toji asks his five-year-old, and she nods in response. Toji has to talk to his son alone, but he can’t do so with the two-year-old that’s on his hip. He knows that Aimi isn’t going to cause any trouble, but the little one that he holds is either going to get hurt or cause a big mess. He’s dismissed the nanny, and he can’t exactly leave her alone with Aimi. 

Before making his way to Ryo’s room, Toji walks over to Megumi’s door. He harshly knocks on the door and puts Emi down in front of it, as if Toji were the stork himself. Emi is about to run after her papa but Megumi opens the door, and she squeals when she sees her beloved older brother.

“What?!” Megumi yells down the hallway when he spots his father. Megumi picks up Emi from the floor, ensuring that she doesn’t run away.

“I’m going to talk to Ryo! Make sure she doesn’t get hurt!” Toji responds, and Megumi sighs. Not that he particularly minds, but Toji could’ve at the very least waited until Megumi had her in his arms. Megumi clicks his tongue, shaking his head in disappointment before telling his sister,

“What are we going to do with him?” And she shrugs in response.

“I don’t know.” She answers, which makes Megumi laugh. He walks out of the room and goes downstairs to join his other sister. 

Toji stands in front of Ryo’s door. He knocks but he’s met with no response. Toji isn’t willing to respect his kids’ privacy, not when he pays for everything they have. Toji opens the door to the room, finding Ryo in his pajamas, playing with his console. Perhaps this would be the perfect time to have a heart-to-heart with his son, explain everything that’s going on– But would Toji really think of that right away?

“Change. We’re going out.” It’s an order, and Ryo doesn’t like it. He’s about to ignore Toji but Toji snatches the console that’s in the boy’s hands. “Don’t act like a fucking brat. Change. We’ve taught you better.”

“I’m staying with mom.” Ryo mutters, angrily getting out of bed to do as his father says. Toji won’t lie and say that the words don’t hurt him, but he remains stoic. 

“Hurry up. Your siblings are waiting.” Toji says before leaving the room, the console in his hand. He has to hide it before leaving.

“No more.” Emi pushes her plate away after taking a few bites of the food she ordered. She’s barely eaten, Toji wants to make sure that at the very least she finishes a chicken tender. 

“Can you at least finish this, please? You’ve barely eaten, princess.” Toji asks her, but she shakes her head. Toji has to find a way to bribe her, but first he has to deal with Megumi and Aimi who bicker about… Something.

“Chew with your mouth closed, don’t be gross.” Megumi corrects her, but Aimi isn’t going to listen to someone who isn’t her mother… Occasionally she listens to Toji, but it’s rare.

“I don’t care!” She yells, and Toji’s face slowly gets red with embarrassment. People are slowly looking at the table– It’s funny because he really thought that having Megumi here would be useful. Instead, he’s yelling back and forth with his five-year-old sister.

“You’re nasty, Aimi!”

“Your face is nasty!”

“Will you two quiet down?!” Toji half yells. His eyes linger on Megumi, “Remind me how old you are.”

“Sixteen.” Megumi answers, reality setting in when he says his age. His cheeks slowly turn pink as he waits for his father to say his next sentence.

“And you’re arguing with a five-year-old? Loudly, in a restaurant, dare I add.” Toji says, and Megumi pushes his plate away because he’s suddenly lost his appetite. Toji hadn’t realized just how hard it was to deal with all four kids without any help– Well, three kids since Ryo isn’t talking. He’s not doing anything. Toji clears his throat before asking, “Do you like the food, Ryo?”

Ryo doesn’t answer, and it’s slowly driving Toji to his limit. He’s talking to everybody but Toji, the moment Toji addresses him, he goes silent. Toji looks at Megumi and points at Emi, “Get your sister to eat.”

“Ryo, talk to me. Your mom and I are fine.” Toji claims, but Ryo doesn’t say anything because things clearly aren’t fine– After all, everyone is talking about it. Toji is essentially ruining the family by running off with his co-star.

“Ryo, do you want my leftovers?” Aimi asks her big brother and he hums in response, taking the plate from her. Toji takes a deep breath to remain calm. Ryo technically didn’t even say a word, he just hummed in response, Toji can’t be mad about that. Then Aimi asks, “Do you think daddy will get dessert? I think they have ice cream.”

“The key lime pie is better, plus we have ice cream at home.” Ryo argues and Toji gets an idea on how to get his son to talk to him.

“Do you really want the key lime pie? I thought you liked cheesecake better.” Toji comments, and Ryo doesn’t answer. He proceeds to talk to his little sister, and Toji can’t take it. He slams his hand on the table and causes a scene, “For fuck’s sake, Ryo! Don’t ignore me!”

If all eyes weren’t on them before, they definitely are now. The cherry on top is Megumi who tells Emi, “See, he’s going to do that to you if you don’t finish what’s on your plate.”

Emi begins to cry her little heart out, and Toji lets out the biggest sigh. Curse the day he decided to have kids.

“I’m not going to do anything to you, Emi.” Toji says, but she’s crying and stuffing her face out of fear. Everyone is looking at him, some people surely recognize him. At least this fits the narrative that his family is falling apart, and while it was all a stunt at first, it’s starting to feel real.

It’s his fault, he can’t blame anyone else but himself.

“Finish up, we’re going home.” Toji sounds defeated, and he is. Taking the kids out to dinner should not be this hard. 

“What about dessert?” Aimi’s voice is filled with disappointment.

“Dessert isn’t happening because you kids don’t know how to behave.” Toji answers, and Aimi crosses her arms, a pout on her lips. Toji wanted to make things better with his kids, but unknowingly, he’s made them worse.

“Night, night, princess.” Toji kisses Aimi’s forehead, but she doesn’t care to even acknowledge him. She doesn’t say anything, turning to her side so she doesn’t have to look at him. Toji sighs, “You’re ignoring me too, huh?”

She doesn’t say anything, which doesn’t really upset Toji. She’s just mad that she didn’t get dessert, tomorrow she’ll be fine with him again. He kisses her temple before telling her, “I love you.”

He knows waiting for an answer is useless, so he turns off the lamp and walks out of the door. Aimi will eventually get out of bed and run after him to apologize because she feels bad since she loves her daddy so much. 

Toji closes the door, and he looks for Ryo’s console. Once the console is in his hand, Toji goes to his son’s room. Toji doesn’t bother knocking because he knows he won’t get a response. Ryo has the lights turned off, trying to sleep since there’s nothing better for him to do. But Toji knows that the child isn’t sleeping, he’s just like you, he tosses and turns a million times in the night before actually succumbing to slumber.

“Here’s the console, kiddo. Thanks for going out with us tonight.” Toji says, putting the console on Ryo’s dresser before walking over to his side to press a kiss on Ryo’s temple. Toji hears some sniffling coming from his son, which makes the man want to fall to his knees and cry as well. 

Toji has four kids, he’s heard them cry many times before for trivial things. He’s never really felt this before with one of them because he really wasn’t at fault. He was doing things for their own good… But this time he’s doing all of this for his own selfish reasons. 

“My baby boy, please talk to me.” Toji kneels down by the bed, hoping that his son will finally say something to him. It’s killing him slowly, he just wants to talk to him. Toji doesn’t want his kid to hate him, but it feels like Ryo is slowly getting there.

“I don’t want you and mommy to get a divorce.” Ryo finally speaks up, and Toji’s heart breaks when he hears him call you mommy, considering Ryo started calling you mom the day he turned eight. Toji stops kneeling, taking a seat on the edge of the bed. 

“Everything is fine between me and your mommy.” Toji says although it’s hard to believe. They’re not fine, but you’re not getting a divorce either. “We just have to talk things out, but we’re not getting a divorce.”

“All of my friends are talking about you and how you two will end up splitting.” Ryo finally sits up on the bed, and Toji doesn’t really understand why this is even a topic of conversation for Ryo’s friends, but it is and Toji has to deal with it. “And it’s your fault.”

It is, Toji can’t really say otherwise. But he isn’t splitting up the family– At least not by having an affair like the news claim.

“Ryo, I promise you that your mom and I are not splitting up.” Toji tries to reassure his son, but Toji isn’t all too sure himself. “We are having some issues, but it’s not because of what your friends are telling you. What they’re telling you is not real.”

“But–” He’s about to keep going but Toji has to cut him off. Toji can’t keep defending himself, he keeps using the same argument over and over again and he doesn’t know how many times he can actually say the same words.

“Did you ask your mommy about this?” Toji asks, and his son nods in response. Ryo has asked a million times and you always have the same answer. 

“Yeah… She said that you two were okay.” He replies, yet he doesn’t believe a single word of it. Toji is growing frustrated, but he can’t let it show. His whole job is to pretend to be someone else, to act out certain feelings and suppress the actual emotions that run through his body, he should be able to do that, right?

“Then why don’t you believe us? Your friends don’t know what’s happening in our relationship.” Toji points out, but that’s not enough for Ryo.

“I know mommy was lying.” 

“What do you mean? Did she tell you she was lying?” Toji’s confused. Ryo is ten, he’s not smart enough to spot a lie, especially from you. You’re a damn good actress, when you show your emotions it’s on purpose, and Toji doubts you were purposely showing your emotions.

“I was going to ask her something and I saw her crying…” Ryo confesses, and Toji furrows his eyebrows. He’s certainly hasn’t heard that, but Toji clears his throat before arguing,

“You do know that your mom has a completely different life and she could’ve been crying for something that doesn’t involve me, right?” Toji is sure that the crying had to do with him, but he isn’t going to let that be known. Ryo nods in response, since what his father says does make sense. Toji ruffles his son’s hair before kissing his forehead, “Next time you’re mad at me, don’t give me the silent treatment.”

“I won’t.” Ryo answers, although neither of them are too sure that he’ll keep up with his word. Toji stands up and gives the gaming console to his son, and Ryo wastes no time in taking it. 

“You can stay up late tonight.” Toji tells him, which puts a smile on his face. Toji also walks away with a smile on his lips, feeling victorious after getting his son to talk to him. Toji exits the room, gently shutting the door behind him.

Toji begins his walk to Megumi’s room, planning to check up on him. However, when his hand touches the doorknob, he feels a pair of tiny arms wrap around his leg. He looks down to find his five-year-old hugging him. He chuckles, “What’s up, Aimi?”

“Papa, I’m sorry. I love you too.” Tears are streaming down her face, feeling guilty about not telling her daddy that she loves him back. Toji picks her up from the ground, wiping her tears away and kissing her cheek.

“My little princess, I’ll get you some ice cream tomorrow.” He assures her, rubbing her back. She continues to wipe her tears because once they begin, they’re hard to stop. He takes her back to her room, reads her a story and puts her to bed once again. 

Toji continues what he was doing, checking up on his kids before going to bed himself. He waits for you, but it gets late. His eyes are closing on their own and before he knows it, he falls asleep. He’s getting old.

“Toji, baby–” You’re calling out to him. It takes a moment for him to open his eyes, but they open rapidly when he feels you kissing his cheeks. It’s definitely nice to feel you kissing him after barely acknowledging him the last couple of days. Still, he can’t help but question,

“Are you drunk?” You keep kissing him. He doesn’t smell any alcohol on your breath, but that doesn’t really answer anything. He feels your hand go down his torso to his sweatpants. You’re just incredibly horny, that’s a good enough reason. Your hand goes to his sweatpants, wrapping around the base of his cock before lazily stroking it. “What happened to you? What have you done to my wife?”

“I just need you. Need you so bad.” You say in between kisses. Your lips are on his neck, and Toji really can’t complain. He misses your touch so much– But what the hell happened to you? You were barely talking to him a couple of hours ago; either you’re on something or something happened to you.

“What happened, baby?” He stops you. Your hand comes out of his hands and you get on top of him. Your lips go on his, your tongue quickly entering his mouth and pressing against his. You’re avoiding the answer, and Toji grows worried. You’re grinding on him, and it’s hard for him to have a clear mind when all the blood rushes to his dick. He doesn’t remember the last time he touched you. You’ve been so mad at him that you shut him down the moment that he initiates something.

Toji wants to enjoy it, and his body is but his mind thinks about the fact that nothing has been solved. He’s not done anything to apologize to you, so he immediately thinks that you’ve done something. It takes every bit of him to push you away even though he doesn’t want to. You’re so gorgeous while you’re on top of him like this, that he doesn’t want to ask the question but he has to, “What did you do?”

“What do you mean what did I do?” You furrow your brows, and Toji clicks his tongue. He can’t believe that you’re initiating something and he’s stopping it. One week ago he would’ve been beating himself up for passing up on this opportunity, but he has to know why you changed your mind. 

“You’ve been mad at me, and now you’re all over me when I haven’t apologized.” Toji points out, and you suck in your bottom lip between your teeth. That confirms that you’ve done something bad, and his heart beat speeds up, thinking of the worst.

“I met a guy…” You begin and Toji’s heart breaks. He doesn’t need to hear the rest of it because he knows. Tears well up in his eyes and he tries to take a deep breath. Yeah, he knew his actions would have consequences but not this. “We flirted a bit, just having fun and then he invited me back to his place–”

“You don’t have to–” Toji is about to cut you off, and he’s reasonably thinking the worst.

“I didn’t go back with him. I remembered the amazing husband I have, how much I love him, how amazing he is at everything he does. I wasn’t going to risk losing you even though I’m mad at you.” You have to interrupt him before he gets into his head. You press a subtle kiss on his jaw before your lips go to his ear, “But if you see some headlines tomorrow, don’t get mad at me.”

“You scared the shit out of me.” He chuckles. He guesses he’s getting a taste of his own medicine, but he’s not mad after his initial scare. Your lips go back on his, but they don’t last long before moving down his neck and torso. Your mouth kisses to his nipple, your tongue circling around it which makes him bite down his lip. 

Toji is sensitive. Just about anything will make him cum. You continue to kiss down his body until his sweatpants obstruct your path. You desperately push them down, while Toji reaches for the lamp to turn it on. He has a particular love for watching you while you take care of him.

Your hand wraps around the base while you spit on his cock. You stroke his cock a couple of times before your tongue circles the tip of his cock. You take your time working him up before you lower your mouth on his cock, taking in as much as you can take.

If Toji had known that this is how his night would’ve ended by letting you go out, he wouldn’t have tried to talk you out of it. A pathetic moan leaves his lips, feeling your warm mouth wrapped around him. He’s missed this, fuck. 

He wants to push your head down, forcing you to take all of him– Which he normally does, but it’s not going to end well. Toji knows well that you’ll stop, and he won’t risk that tonight. This is a sweet treat that he doesn’t deserve, he’s not going to risk losing it. 

You try to take all of him in your mouth either way, tears building up in your eyes as you gag, eventually spilling and messing up the makeup that was already coming apart. This is what Toji loves, watching the makeup that you work so hard on, fall apart just for him. And you do it because you want to. Because you love the taste of him on your tongue.

You take him out of your mouth, using your hand to stroke his cock. Toji’s moaning with your every touch, it’s hard not to. You’re just so fucking perfect with everything you do that it’s hard for him to contain himself.

“Baby, please–” He sounds so pathetic. Toji is usually much meaner in this situation, but circumstances have obviously changed. He just wants to feel your mouth wrapped around his cock. “Use your mouth, baby. Please–”

“How can I say no to you?” You chuckle before your mouth wraps around his cock again. You take as much as you can take, your hand stroking what your mouth can’t reach. He’s shutting his eyes, moaning your name as his climax approaches. 

His cum hits the back of your throat, and you raise your head. You swallow it, sticking your tongue out so he can check it. Toji sits up, his hand going down to your chin, thumb into your mouth. The bit of submissiveness that you had witnessed quickly fades. 

“Who’s my good girl?” He asks, your tongue circling around his thumb. He wants to know what happened that has you so aroused, but as long as you didn’t get physical, he doesn’t care. He takes his thumb out, a string of your saliva connecting it to your lips. He orders, “Open your mouth.”

As soon as your mouth opens, he spits in it. You don’t waste a second before swallowing. Toji lips meet yours again, his tongue messily entering your mouth and pressing against yours. You readjust your legs, knees on either side of him. You’re grinding on him again, and the man pulls away from the kiss, not doing so without biting your lip first. 

“You want me to fuck you, baby? You need me?” He asks as you push your panties to the side. You’re aligning him with your entrance, softly moaning as you push yourself down on him. You can’t wait any longer, you desperately need him. You softly moan as he fills you up, your eyes nearly rolling to the back of your head. You’re sure no one will ever feel as good as Toji.

“Was thinking so much about you, baby. I missed you, Toji.” You moan, throwing your head back. You give yourself a moment to get adjusted to him before moving back and forth on his cock. His cock brushes your sweet spot, driving you insane. 

Toji shuts his eyes, getting lost in the moment. He’s missed you so much too, but he can’t speak right now because he’s groaning. He can’t believe that he’s gone so long without you… He shouldn’t have agreed to doing that publicity stunt in the first place. 

“You feel so fucking good, baby.” Toji moans, his hands going to your hips as you move on him. He hands roam, looking for the zipper of your dress, pulling it down so he can take your dress off you. His lips go to yours, your moans translating into his lips. 

You’re bouncing on him, his lips going down to suck on your neck. You let your moans roam into the air, feeling overwhelmed with how good you’re feeling. Toji barely even tries and he makes you feel euphoric. Maybe you were having second thoughts, but then you remembered just how perfect your husband is.

Toji pulls out, putting you down on the bed. He puts your legs on his shoulders before sliding back into you. He sets the pace, much faster than how you were going. Your hands are gripping the bed sheets, loudly moaning as your husband pounds into you.

“You’re so perfect, baby. You’re everything to me.” He praises you while one hand goes to play with your clit. You’re almost at your limit, and he feels it as your cunt squeezes around him. He says through gritted teeth, “You’re so fucking tight.”

“Oh fuck, Toji– I’m gonna–” You announce, so close to reaching your peak. 

“I know, baby– fuck, I know.” He groans. You’re driving him insane, it’s the effect that you have on him after not being with him for a while. God knows he needed this.

You loudly moan his name, your legs quivering when you reach your high. It’s hard for you to last when his cock reaches deep, and reaches all the right spots. Toji can’t help but praise you when you come, “That’s my good girl, that’s my fucking good girl.”

Toji’s thrusts begin to get sloppy, even though he wants to stay buried inside you for as long as he can. His hands hold on to your hips, nails digging into your soft flesh. 

“Inside of me, baby, do it inside me.” You tell him, knowing he’s nearing his release. You need to feel his warmth in every possible way, and Toji isn’t going to turn you down, certainly not with this. 

Toji comes to a stop, groaning before filling you up with his warm cum. He stays buried inside of you until making sure every droop is inside of you. His lips go down to yours, kissing you as he pulls out. 

“I’ve missed you, love.” He says before you both get comfortable in bed. You’ll wait a minute before going to the bathroom to clean yourself up. 

“For the record, I’m still mad at you.” You say before kissing his cheek, causing him to laugh. You stand up, walking to the bathroom to take a shower before going to bed, and he follows behind because he’s truly lost without you. 

“You’re here late.” He points out, unsure of what to say next.

“When you don’t have the kids with you, things go surprisingly smooth… Speaking of, how was your night?” You get in the shower, and Toji is staring. He’s watching every single one of your movements, even when he tries to tear his eyes away, he can’t. You're just so perfect in every way, how can he look away?

“Why did we have so many kids? They made the night so difficult.” Toji shares, and he hears you laugh. It’s no surprise to you, you’ve handled the kids on your own so many times before, and you always swear that you won’t even think of having another one– But then Emi comes to you with her teddy bear and begs for cuddles which makes you reconsider.

“Welcome to my world.” You respond, and Toji chuckles. He lightly bites down his lip, debating if he wants to go back to bed. He really doesn’t, so he decides to join you in your shower.

“So you’re less mad?” He asks, grabbing your sponge and pouring some body wash on it. Toji kisses your shoulder before he begins lightly scrubbing your body. You hum in response, and he can only wonder what you were up to– But he can’t complain. He couldn’t care less what you were doing as long as you’re not mad at him.

“I’m still upset though, don’t get me wrong.” You say as you take the sponge from his hand and use it on him. You peck his lips before muttering, “My husband has still been misbehaving, I won’t forgive him so easily.”

Toji doesn’t know how to come back from that so easily, so he ponders his answer. He helps you clean up.

“I talked to Ryo.” Toji announces, and you cock your eyebrow. Before you can ask about the details, Toji explains everything to you, ending off his sentence with, “Why were you crying?”

“Life gets tough when your husband is allegedly cheating on you.” You answer, and Toji bites his tongue. You have said a million times how you hate this arrangement, and Toji has been too selfish to consider your emotions. It’s not like you’ve been silent about how much you hate this. He can’t exactly be too mad at the fact that you’ve been ignoring him when it’s deserved. 

“I’m sorry, baby.” Is all he manages to say. You turn off the water, and get out of the shower, Toji following your lead again, even though he’s barely washed himself. You have your towel wrapped around him, while he opts out of getting his towel.

“I think you’ll need a bigger apology, but I guess sex is good too.” You answer, but that’s not enough for him.

“I’ll call my agent and tell him that it’s off.” He says, and you stop in your tracks.

“No! You’ve already done this much, the premiere is soon. Stick with it for now and just clear up your name after.” You’re quick to object. That movie better do great after all you’ve been through for this. You’ve suffered for months, you can put up with some more judgment for another month or so.

“But now I feel horrible.” He responds, and you sigh. “I want to apologize.”

You take a couple of steps toward him, your hands meeting behind his neck. You kiss his lips before telling him, “Another little Emi will suffice.”

“Woman, how dare you?! After the night I’ve had, that thought makes my dick flaccid. Don’t you ever suggest having more kids!” He argues, and you look down. His words certainly don’t match his feelings.

“Are you sure about that?” You ask him, and he sighs. He isn’t going to lie to you, and he isn’t going to tell you that you’re right, so he does the next best thing, picking you up and carrying you to the bed.

You have a long night of apologies ahead of you.

[justlemmeadoreyou]

rain-kissed* (footballer!harry x

nerd!y/n)

summary: y/n and harry, former rivals turned reluctant partners, find unexpected chemistry. heated glances, playful banter ignite a spark. a near-tragedy makes y/n confront feelings, and...will they be reciprocated? ft. lots of mutual pining

words: 6.1k

warnings: Angst, fluff, mentions of a major injury, cursing, kissing, hints of smut, mutual pining.

Y/N groaned as she walked into the lecture hall for her literature class. "Are you kidding me?"

There in the very front row sat Harry Styles - captain of the football team, president of one of the biggest frats on campus, and certified douchebag extraordinaire. His feet were obnoxiously propped up on the desk in front of him as he laughed loudly with his friends. 

"This class is gonna be a nightmare," Y/N muttered, taking a seat as far away from Harry's circle as possible. She couldn't stand arrogant jocks like him.

Class started and the professor cleared her throat loudly, shooting Harry a pointed look until he dropped his feet to the floor with an eye roll. "Alright, since this is an upper-level lit course, we're going to kick things off with a big group project."

A collective groan went through the class. Group projects were the worst, especially when half the group didn't pull their weight. Harry raised his hand lazily.

"What's the project, Millers?"

The prof narrowed her eyes at Harry's casual address but proceeded. "You'll be analyzing the themes and formatting an anthology of poems, plays, and short stories from a particular era or movement. I'll be assigning the groups and topics."

Y/N mentally prepared herself to get stuck doing all the work as usual for her group when Millers started listing off the pairings. 

"Styles and Y/L/N - you'll be covering the Romantic period."

Y/N's head whipped up in horror as Harry scoffed loudly. Of course they'd get partnered up. This was quite literally her worst nightmare.

"Fucking kill me," Harry grumbled, slumping back in his seat rudely.

"I'd rather work alone," Y/N couldn't stop herself from retorting. Immediately, Millers zeroed in on her with a stern look.

"I don't recall there being a choice, Ms. Y/L/N. Unless either of you plans to drop this course, I suggest you learn to work together effectively."

Gritting her teeth, Y/N forced out a tight, "Yes, Professor."

Harry was already texting rapidly on his phone, not paying any attention. This project was going to be utter hell.

The rest of the semester only proved Y/N right about what a nightmare it would be to work with Harry. Their first meeting to divide up the work went about as well as could be expected - which is to say it was a total disaster.

"Look, I don't have a bunch of time for this bullshit poetry stuff," Harry kicked back in a creaky chair, looking entirely too at home in the empty classroom they'd claimed for their work session. "How about you just do the whole thing and I'll, like, proofread it at the end or whatever?"

Y/N stared at him incredulously. "Absolutely not! This is a hugely weighted project, Styles. I'm not doing all the work myself."

He shrugged impatiently. "Why not? You seem like a big ol' nerd who'd be into this."

Biting back a retort, Y/N forced herself to remain calm and reasonable. If he was going to act like a damn child,she had to be the adult in the relationship–or whatever this was.

 "Forget it. We're going to split everything 50/50 whether you like it or not. I'll take the poetry analysis and you can have the plays. We'll swap sections to proofread before compiling the final thing."

Harry made a face like she'd asked him to perform surgery. "Do I have to? Plays are so boring."

"Don't care," Y/N said flatly. "You're pulling your weight on this one way or another."

With a melodramatic huff, Harry finally agreed and they were able to separate the reading materials and due dates before parting ways, both dreading the long weeks ahead.

Except...after trading several heated email chains and a couple disastrous coffee shop meetups, something shifted. Maybe it was the punctuality that struck after virtually living in the library for a week straight. Maybe it was how they both surprised each other by not being complete idiots about the subject matter. But at some point, the bickering and resentful silences turned to a bearable truce and even - dare Y/N think it - a hint of reluctant respect between them.

Y/N had assumed Harry was just another brainless party bro who skated by on his looks and family money. But to her surprise, he actually had intelligent insights into the Romantic poets and playwrights - even if he still whined about having to read "this dramalogy crap." 

And Harry, who had fully expected Y/N to be an uptight, pretentious book nerd, found himself caught off guard by her whip-smart analysis...and her unexpected sarcastic quips that had him stifling laughs more than once during their study sessions. He called her nerd instead of her usual name, but was now slipping back to using Y/n more often.

"Oh my god, you did not just say that about Lord Byron!" Harry snickered as Y/N made another scalding comment about the poet's arrogant womanizing. 

"What? The man was an infamous manwhore by all accounts," Y/N shrugged unapologetically. "Self-important dickhead thought his brooding and philandering made him a genius."

Harry gasped in mock offense. "How very unromantic of you, love! Have you no poetic soul?"

Without missing a beat, Y/N deadpanned, "I prefer to admire poets who didn't give the clap to half of London."

The startled laugh that burst from Harry's lips was so warm and uninhibited that Y/N felt an unexpected little flip in her stomach at the sight. Whoa, what was that?

Shaking it off, she hid her face behind her book again, tamping down an oddly giddy–sort of feeling. Just because she'd managed to find Harry slightly less insufferable lately didn't mean anything.

And so it went, their bickering gradually becoming more lighthearted and playful rather than biting. The weeks ticked by as they somehow formed an unlikely...friendship? Bros? Sure, they'd go with that for simplicity's sake.

At some point, they started expanding their hangouts beyond just study sessions too. Grabbing food after class turned into actually sitting together, Harry regaling Y/N with stories from his frat's latest shenanigans as she pretended not to be entertained. 

On the rare nights Y/N wasn't holed up writing papers, she started joining Harry and his boys at their favorite dive bar, quickly becoming the calm voice of reason trying in vain to talk them out of their next boneheaded plan.

"Come on, PlainJane! Live a little!" Harry teased, throwing an arm around her shoulders at the bar. 

The rowdy group cackled at Harry's horrible attempt at a literary-themed nickname for Y/N, as per tradition when any new face got absorbed into their friend circle. Personally, Y/N thought it was a lame pun, but she secretly loved how easily she'd slotted into their bizarre fratty family...and maybe especially how Harry always seemed to plaster himself to her side whenever they went out.

The camaraderie and effortless banter flowing between them should've been a huge red flag that something was shifting. But Y/N was quite stubbornly oblivious, as was Harry in his own way.

At least, that was until their big group presentation day rolled around. They'd been prepping and quizzing each other for weeks, reviewing notes and analysis essays till they were cross-eyed. Harry had really stepped up, much to Y/N's surprise, retaining way more than she'd expected about the playwrights and their major works.

The whole lit class was spread out in the lecture hall, with bullet-pointed notecards and thick anthologies ready as the first group took the floor. When it was finally Harry and Y/N's turn, they moved to the front in sync, Harry shooting her a subtle wink as he grabbed the microphone first.

"Buckle up, kids - this is how you do a proper literary presentation," he drawled cockily.

Y/N rolled her eyes on reflex, biting her lip and bumping his hip with hers in playful admonishment. "Shut up and just start already."

Neither of them noticed the amused looks being swapped by their classmates at their easy rapport. Or Millers leaning back with a knowing smirk, clearly recognizing the chemistry flying between her formerly antagonistic partners.

For the next hour, Harry and Y/N launched into their meticulously prepared overview of the key figures and works emerging from the Romantic period. Their back-and-forth was flawless yet casual, almost playful at times with little ad-libs and jokes only they were in on.

At one point, Harry lightly mocked Lord Byron's arrogance with a pompous impression that had Y/N doubled over giggling into the mic, barely choking out the next lines through her laughter. When she managed to catch her breath, she shot him a look that was equal parts fond exasperation and...something more heated.

There was a noticeable spark between them that had clearly evolved far beyond the adversarial classmates they'd started as. And if anyone could miss that subtext, it became blindingly obvious at the end when they seamlessly transitioned into their concluding remarks, standing shoulder to shoulder.

"So in summary, while the Romantics may have been a pretentious bunch of melancholic lads-" Harry began.

"-their pioneering works cemented their place as quintessential figures in literary history," Y/N picked up without missing a beat. 

They shared a grin before finishing in unison, "And that's the tea, no cap."

A surprised burst of laughter rang out from their classmates at their cheeky sign-off, even the prof hiding a smile behind her hand. Everyone could see it - the easy chemistry, the almost electric undercurrent between the former rivals.

Everyone, that is, except Harry and Y/N themselves. 

As they moved to return to their seats amid the applause, neither seemed to register the weighted looks and muffled whispers following them. Harry just ducked his head with an almost bashful smile, still riding the high of how flawlessly they'd worked together. While Y/N felt her cheeks flushing under the weight of what she convinced herself was just residual adrenaline.

In the weeks after their wildly successful presentation, that same strain of electrifying connection only grew stronger between them. You'd never know they'd spent the first half of the semester low-key loathing each other based on their current vibe.

Now, when Harry's frat brothers tried to rib him about his "study buddy" at their typical dive bar hangout, he just threw an arm around Y/N's shoulders and proudly declared, "More like my brain twin!"

Y/N would just duck her head with a bashful grin, pointedly ignoring how her heart did a little somersault at both the affectionate nickname and Harry's easy touch.

Or like when they sprawled out on the quad between classes, passing a bag of chips back and forth as Harry ranted about his coach riding his ass over the big rivalry game next week. Without even thinking about it, Y/N would reach out to squeeze his knee consolingly as he huffed out his frustrations. It was such a simple, natural gesture between them now that she didn't even register the slightly stunned look Harry shot her before clearing his throat gruffly.

Even their friends couldn't resist commenting on their respective obliviousness at this point.

"Bruh, Y/N literally lets you call her 'love' without punching you in the dick," Niall pointed out bluntly one night when Harry claimed, once again, he and Y/N were "just friends." His Irish buddy arched a skeptical eyebrow. "Pretty sure she wants to ride your lancer if you know what I mean."

Harry smacked him hard while trying not to get flustered. "Shut the fuck up, asshole."

While on Y/N's end...

"Sooooo, when are you gonna admit you have a huge crush on Styles?" Her friend Riley asked point blank over brunch, making Y/N nearly choke on her mimosa.

"What? No I don't!" She insisted a little too quickly, refusing to meet Riley's all-knowing gaze. "We're just...really good friends."

Riley hummed disbelievingly. "Right. And I'm the Queen of England."

Y/N opened her mouth to protest further before clamping it shut as her mind started helplessly rehashing all her favourite little moments with Harry over the past few weeks. His warm, anthracite eyes crinkled at the corners when he laughed at her jokes. The proud grin he'd get whenever she successfully understood something he'd tried explaining. The way she felt this inexplicable magnetic pull to stay pressed into his side for as long as possible whenever they hung out...

"Oh my god," she breathed out, smile slipping as the enormity of her revelation dawned. "I'm in love with Harry fucking Styles."

That's not to say the smitten epiphany immediately changed anything between the two. Well, maybe it made their lingering hugs and casual touches go on for a few beats too long. Or had them both shyly stealing glances when the other's back was turned.

***

Mostly though, they just continued their cozy, obliviously pining routine of late night FaceTimes and weekends holed up studying together for finals. All while Harry's team prepared for their annual football rivalry game - the biggest matchup of the season that would make or break their championship chances.

The night before the game, Y/N found herself inexplicably anxious as she sat in the stands amid a drunk, raucous crowd. Harry kept shooting cheesy grins and double finger-gunged winks her way whenever he trotted past her section, clearly buzzed on adrenaline.

"Go get 'em, superstar!" She shouted at one point, laughing as Harry blew her an obnoxious kiss before getting back in the huddle.

The energy in the stadium was electric and infectious, Y/N finding herself caught up in the cheers and chants despite not being a huge football fan normally. Something about watching her...Harry out there gave her swirling butterflies low in her belly though.

As the intense game raged on, Y/N was on the edge of her seat, nails digging into her palms whenever Harry took a brutal hit or made a heart-stoppingly risky play. At one point he got absolutely leveled by a linebacker twice his size, his helmet bouncing sickeningly off the turf.The roar of the crowd faded into the background as Y/N watched in horror as Harry's body slammed violently into the turf. She felt her heart stop as he didn't immediately get back up after the brutal hit.

"Harry!" she screamed, her voice drowned out by the gasps of the other spectators. 

The medical team rushed out onto the field as Harry lay unmoving. Y/N's hands shook with fear as she watched them carefully roll him onto a backboard and load him into the ambulance. She felt tears streaking down her cheeks as the ambulance pulled away, sirens blaring.

After what felt like an eternity, she finally received word that Harry was going to be okay. The doctors said he had suffered a severe concussion and possible spinal injury from the whiplash of the hit. He would need weeks of rest and recovery.

Y/N rushed to the hospital, desperate to see him. When she entered his room, her heart broke at the sight of Harry's battered body hooked up to various machines, a cervical collar immobilizing his neck.

"Harry..." she whispered, taking his hand gently in hers. "I'm so sorry."

Harry's eyes fluttered open at the sound of her voice. "Y/N? You're here..."

"Of course I'm here, you idiot," she tried to joke, blinking back more tears. "I was so worried about you."

A small smile tugged at his bruised lips. "I'll be okay, love. Harry is a thick skull, remember?"

Y/N rolled her eyes but couldn't help grinning at his terrible joke. "Don't scare me like that again, Styles. I don't know what I'd do without you."

A look of tenderness crossed Harry's face that made Y/N's breath catch in her throat. But before either could say anything further, the doctor entered to check on Harry's condition.

***

Over the next week, Y/N diligently stayed by Harry's side in the hospital. She helped feed him, kept him company, and supported him through the difficult early recovery stages. Harry quickly grew restless being cooped up, but every time he tried to get out of bed against doctor's orders, Y/N was there to scold him.

"You heard what the doctor said, Harry. You need to rest and let your body heal properly," she chastised him one day as he tried to get up.

Harry groaned in frustration. "But I'm going stir crazy in this damn bed! I feel fine, Y/N, honestly."

"No, you don't," Y/N said firmly. "You could have had a serious spinal injury. You're lucky it wasn't worse. Now lie back down before I get the nurses to strap you in."

Grumbling, Harry reluctantly complied, though he continued to hate being so confined and immobile. Little did Y/N know, he was already hatching a plan.

A few days later, Y/N arrived at the hospital only to find Harry's bed empty. Her heart leapt into her throat as she rushed to the nurses' station in a panic.

"Where is he? Where's Harry Styles?" she demanded.

The nurse gave her an apologetic look. "I'm sorry, he checked himself out against medical advice earlier today."

"What? No, he can't have!" Y/N cried. She knew immediately where he would have gone.

Sure enough, when she ran across campus to the football practice field, she found Harry standing on the sidelines in his gear, acting as if nothing had happened. White hot fury blazed through her veins.

"Harry!" she yelled, storming toward him as the first raindrops began to fall. "What the hell do you think you're doing?"

Harry turned with a cocky grin as he saw her approach. "There's my favourite nerd. What's got your panties in a twist, love?"

"You insufferable asshole!" Y/N exploded, not caring that they had an audience of his confused teammates. "The doctor said you needed weeks of rest and recovery! You could have permanently injured your spine!"

Harry rolled his eyes. "Relax, babe, I feel great. Probably just overreacted with that whole backboard and neck brace nonsense."

"Are you kidding me right now?" Y/N seethed, hands balling into fists at her sides. Rain began pouring down around them, quickly soaking them both, but she didn't care. "You're incredible, you know that? You have zero self-preservation! No regard for your own safety and well-being!"

"That's a bit dramatic, don't you think?" Harry scoffed, though his casual demeanor faltered slightly under her furious glare.

"Dramatic? You could've been paralyzed, Harry! Doesn't that mean anything to you?" Her voice broke with frustrated tears. "Don't you understand how terrified I was watching you lying there, not moving? I thought...I thought I might lose you."

Something flickered across Harry's features then. His cavalier mask slipped for just a moment, allowing a flash of guilt and tenderness to shine through that sent Y/N's heart lurching treacherously. Then it was gone, the wall snapping back into place.

"Well, I'm right as rain now, so you can quit your worrying," he said gruffly, turning his back on her.

That was the final straw for Y/N. She grabbed his arm and whirled him around to face her, not caring that they were getting drenched by the downpour.

"You're so fucking reckless with yourself, Harry! Like you have zero self-preservation or even an ounce of common sense! Do you have any idea how scary that was to see you lying there, not moving? How I thought..." Her voice hitched, throat growing too tight to continue as burning tears pricked the corners of her eyes.

Through the rapidly blurring vision, Y/N registered Harry staring, chest heaving like she'd actually winded him with her outburst. His hands hung frozen at his sides, knuckles going white as he watched her come completely unraveled. And still she wasn't finished.

"You can't just keep putting yourself in danger like that! Pulling stupid fucking stunts and flipping off your own safety like it doesn't matter! Because it does, Harry. It matters so much to...to me," she finished in a thick whisper, finally allowing a tear to escape and streak down her flushed cheek.  

A weighted silence stretched between them, Y/N struggling to regain her ragged breathing as Harry continued gaping at her, utterly shocked by her reaction. Waves of tension rippled through the small space separating them.

Finally, after what felt like an eternity but was probably only seconds, Harry seemed to recalibrate. His expression went utterly blank for a beat before, out of nowhere, his eyes hardened into flashing jade. When he spoke, his tone was laced with a chilling detachment.  

"Why?"

Y/N blinked owlishly. "W-What?"

"Why the fuck do you care so much, huh?" Harry exploded, eyes flashing as he aimed his scathing hostility directly at Y/N. "Last I checked, I'm not your boyfriend or your family. I'm just some dumb jock you study with, right?"

Y/N flinched at the biting sarcasm, feeling tears prick her eyes anew at his harsh dismissal. But Harry was on a roll, fists clenching and unclenching as he visibly wrestled with...what? Anger? Fear? She couldn't tell, but his next words sliced deep regardless.

"So why do you get to flip out and pass judgment every time I take a hit, huh? You think I don't know how to handle myself out on that field?"

"That's not what I-"

"No, clearly you don't think I have any sense of self-preservation or whatever psychobabble bullshit diagnosis you want to armchair next!" Harry barreled over her attempted protest, voice rising in a sharp crescendo. 

He took a menacing step closer, using his full height to loom over her in a move that likely would've been intimidating...if his eyes didn't look so pained and conflicted behind that mask of bitter anger. "Tell me, Y/N - what gives you the right to freak out like that, huh? To look at me with those scared eyes like you have any claim over whether I live or die or-"

"Because I love you, dammit!" The confession exploded from Y/N with the force of a meteor strike.

A stunned silence fell over the field as Harry gaped at her, mouth hanging open in shock. Even the rain seemed to pause in the heavy tension between them.

After several moments where Y/N felt her panic rising, Harry finally found his voice again. "You...you what?"

Y/N took a shuddering breath, bracing herself. She had come too far to back down now.  

"I love you, Harry," she repeated, slower and more sure this time. "I have for a long time, you idiot. But you're always so reckless and careless 'bout your own safety. You take stupid risks and shrug it off like getting hurt is no big deal!"

She stepped closer, feeling tears mingling with the raindrops on her cheeks. "Don't you understand? The thought of you being seriously injured, or worse...it terrifies me. Because I couldn't handle losing you. You mean everything to me."

Harry continued staring at her, eyes blown wide and lips parted as if her confession had utterly short-circuited his brain. Y/N pressed on, needing to finally unleash all the feelings she had kept bottled up for far too long.

"I love your stupid jokes and your kind heart. I love how passionate you are about football, even if it drives me mental sometimes. I love the way you always smell like sandalwood and make me feel so safe when I'm with you. I'm in love with every obnoxious, laddish, reckless part of you and I can't keep ignoring it anymore."

She let out a wet chuckle, wiping futilely at her drenched face, her hands still shaking. "So yeah, that's why I care, you absolute wanker. That's why seeing you get hurt destroys me every single time, because the thought of being in a world without Harry Styles in it is just too much for me to bear!"

The words hung heavy in the rain-soaked air between them. Y/N watched Harry open and close his mouth a few times, clearly struggling to find a response. For once, his swagger and cockiness had completely deserted him as her feelings poured over him in an unstoppable tide.

Just when the silence was becoming too much for Y/N to bear, Harry finally seemed to find his voice again.

"You...you love me?" he rasped out, the disbelief and wonder evident in his tone. "Like, you're in love with me?"

Y/N felt her cheeks flush hot despite the cold rain. She gave a small nod, unable to meet his intense gaze. Her heart was thundering so loudly in her ears, she barely registered the shouts and hoots coming from Harry's teammates who had witnessed the whole emotional outburst.

"Shut it, you wankers!" Harry barked over his shoulder, never taking his eyes off Y/N.

In two long strides, he closed the distance between them until they were mere inches apart. Y/N's breath caught in her throat as Harry reached up with one hand to gently cup her jaw, tilting her face up toward his.

"Y/N..." he murmured, emerald eyes searching hers intently. "Why didn't you ever say anything?"

She let out a shaky laugh, leaning into his touch despite herself. "And ruin our friendship if you didn't feel the same way? I couldn't risk that, Harry. You mean too much to me."

Something blazing and tender flickered across Harry's face at her confession. Slowly, giving her every chance to pull away, he leaned in until their foreheads were resting together. Y/N shivered at the intimate proximity, at the way his familiar woodsy scent surrounded her completely.

"You daft woman," he murmured, the words fanning warmly across her lips and making her shiver for an entirely different reason. "Don't you know there's nothing I want more than for you to be my girlfriend? To be able to love you the way you deserve?"

Y/N's eyes fluttered closed at that, her heart feeling fit to burst from her chest. She had spent so long forcing herself not to hope, not to read into the heated glances and lingering touches she shared with Harry. Could he truly feel the same earth-shattering connection she did?

Her eyes blinked open again at the feeling of Harry's calloused thumb brushing reverently across her rain-soaked cheek. He was staring at her with such naked adoration and longing that it stole the breath from her lungs.

"I'm so bloody gone for you, Y/N," he confessed roughly. "Have been for ages now, if I'm being honest. Thought maybe I was imagining things between us or reading too much into it since I couldn't fathom someone as incredible as you wanting a mug like me."

Y/N opened her mouth to protest, to reassure him that she wanted every infuriatingly charming part of him, but Harry pressed on before she could get the words out.

"Then today, hearing how scared you were when I got laid out...how you thought you could lose me?" He shook his head slowly, curls dripping rivulets of rainwater down the sharp planes of his face and throat. "Don't know how I didn't see it before, love. The way you care about me, put up with all my shite...it's because you love me. Isn't it?"

It wasn't really a question, more like Harry was testing the words out for the first time and savoring the way they sounded. A thrill went through Y/N at getting to be the one to put that Look of rare, hushed awe on his handsome face for once.

"Yes, Harry," she answered anyway, both hands coming up to cradle his beloved face. "I'm desperately in love with you. The good, the bad, the reckless...all of it."

A crinkly-eyed grin stretched across Harry's lips then, brighter and more vibrant than Y/N had ever seen before. He wasted no more time closing that minuscule distance between them, capturing her mouth in a searing, all-consuming kiss.

Y/N gasped against his lips as the dam finally broke, months of too-long denied want and need bubbling over in heated waves. Harry's hands slid into her soaked hair, angling her head to deepen the embrace as he licked hungrily into her mouth. Y/N clung to him just as fiercely, fingernails scraping against his scalp and shoulders as if trying to physically pull him closer.

They were both panting harshly by the time they wrenched apart, sharing the same air in the infinitesimal space between their swollen mouths. Y/N felt drugged by the glazed, predatory darkness swimming in Harry's blown pupils,by the intimate glide of their rain-drenched bodies.

"Fucking finally," he growled against her lips before diving back in, one large hand splaying possessively across the small of her back.

Y/N hummed in ardent agreement, getting lost in his dizzying taste and scent and touch once more.  It felt like a cosmic star had been reborn between them, the force of their crashing inevitability obliterating all the hurt and confusion from before.

Neither was sure how long they stayed like that, trading desperate, drugging kisses amongst the pouring rain. But eventually, Harry pulled away just enough to nose his way along Y/N's jaw, lips dragging hotly up to her ear.

"Let's get out of this downpour, hmm?" he husked, teeth grazing her shell and making her shudder. "Got some making up to do for being such a blind tosser."

Y/N pulled back just enough to catch the incandescent fire blazing in his darkened gaze. Her breath hitched at the onceiled promise flickering there, at the tips of his wicked fingers already slipping beneath the drenched hem of her top.

It seemed she wasn't the only one who had been harboring some pent-up longing and hunger.

Still, there was one loose end she couldn't resist tugging before allowing Harry to whisk them away...  "Does this mean you're finally going to start taking better care of yourself?" she asked archly, arching one pointed brow. "No more stupid, reckless stunts for my idiotically brave footballer?"

Harry audibly groaned, dropping his forehead dramatically against her clavicle as his hands flexed with bruising force against her hips.

"Whatever you want, love," he conceded gruffly. "No more injuries or shite, I swear it. Now can we please get the fuck out of here before I embarrass myself further by ravishing you in the mud right in front of my teammates?"

Y/N gave a squeak of surprise as Harry abruptly ducked to gather her up in his arms, hitching her legs around his waist in one fluid movement. He sealed his wicked promise with another lingering, molten kiss that left her head spinning.

"Now, where were we..." he growled darkly before striding determinedly off the field, Y/N clinging just as fiercely in his embrace.

The teammates' raucous catcalls and laughter faded into the rainy background as Y/N tucked her face into the curve of Harry's neck, savoring his familiar sandalwood and smoke and the feeling of being wrapped in his arms at last.

She was never letting him go again. Not if she had any say in it.

♡~~~♡~~~♡~~~♡~~~♡~~~♡~~~♡~~~♡~~~♡~~~♡~~~♡~~~♡~~~♡~~~♡

tell me if you like this! please reblog or comment if you like, it makes my heart happy :)

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[bluesidez]

GymRat!Miguel Part 1

I’ve seen everyone doing these drabbles/aus and I wanted to join! 🤠

content warning: It gets suggestive towards the end so MINORS BEWARE.

word count: 719 (kind of proofread, I got excited)

Daydreaming about GymRat!Miguel x PlusSize!Reader / Chubby!Reader and the dynamic of big tall bf x shorter chubby gf 🚻

Next ✩°｡ ⋆⸜ 🎧✮ Masterlist

GymRat!Miguel who started off as an awkward, lanky, nerdy teen using the gym to blow off steam. His mom felt that he wasn’t a great influence to his brother, his father wasn’t his real father, and his step-brother was an asshole.

GymRat!Miguel who’s nearly triple his weight by the time he starts college, body full of muscle. His mom has calmed down despite him previously eating her out of a house and a home. His biological dad agreed to help with any leftover college expenses and his step-dad helps him move on campus. He’s tearful when he hugs Gabriel goodbye, promising to call and play their weekly games.

GymRat!Miguel who stays loyal to his nerdy roots and aims for a Science degree with a minor in Robotics for fun. He sticks out like a sore thumb in his classes, body taking up the ends of lab tables. Even though he prefers to sit in the front of classes, he opts to sit in the back so that everyone can see. He’s constantly using office hours and lingering after class so that he can make sure that his notes are correct.

GymRat!Miguel who first meets you in one of his bio labs and is immediately enamored by you. Your clothes hug your curves, you smell sweet, and something on you always matches. Your shoes and your backpack, your skirt and your jacket, your accessories and your nails.

GymRat!Miguel who ends up being in your group for a project and watches in awe as you take the lead, helping everyone decide which parts to complete. You go out of your way to make the powerpoint colorful and creative. You’re ecstatic when he turns in his parts extra early as everyone else has gone a-wall.

GymRat!Miguel who calms you down when the deadline is near and the rest of the group still hasn’t done their part. You two meet late in the library to finish everything. He thinks you’re adorable despite how stressed and tired you are. He makes the last minute decision to delete the other two group member’s names off of the title slide, taking the initiative to email the teacher before hand.

GymRat!Miguel who walks into the lab building on presentation day 50 minutes early and sees you being cornered by the other group members eyes full of confusion. He quickly walks over asking if there was a problem. Seeing him looming over them, the two decide give up, and scramble together a last minute presentation.

GymRat!Miguel who explains everything, telling you not to worry about the others and just focus on you all’s presentation. You two have great presentation, chemistry blooming as you bounce off each other. You both get an easy A and you hug Miguel out of an excitement before the next lab starts.

GymRat!Miguel who imprints the feeling of your body against his in his memory. Your smell, how soft you were, how small you felt in his arms, how tight you squeezed him.

GymRat!Miguel whose dreams of you have him tossing and turning in his twin sized bed that was far too little for him. He scares his poor roommate to death when his body hits the floor with a big boom. The dream of you under him shattering as he collides with the ground. He groans and apologizes to his roommate, pain in his side and his groin.

GymRat!Miguel who takes a cold shower, too aroused to go back to sleep. He bites his fist trying to quiet his moans, not wanting to wake his roommate for a second time. He replays images of you in his mind, pulling at his length until he shutters against the tile walls.

GymRat!Miguel whose heart drops when he checks his phone after his shower. You followed him on Instagram three hours ago. He checks your page and sees that you're private, but your profile picture is a lot. It's an angle from above you, your cleavage on display.

GymRat!Miguel who stands in the bathroom ogling at the photo like an idiot. He clicks the follow back button, watching as it shifts to pending, and stares down at his body again. He sighs and turns the shower back on, banking on his roommate sleeping through everything once again.

You had no idea the effect you had on him.

dividers by @y-onb 🩵

Leave a like and a comment! Let me know how you feel 😶‍🌫️

[miguelsslvt]

friends- chase atlantic

nerd! ex! miguel o’hara x popular! reader college au

word count: 1335

TW: mild smut under cut, overstimulation, smoking, drvg use, manipulative friends.

A/N: so basically, this is my interpretation of a scenario that happened in the nerd! miguel lore!! obviously this isn't 'canon', this is just my interpretation of the wonderful storyline by @nymphomatique !! always go check her out, her stories are honestly the best <33 hope you all enjoy and welcome to the club!!^^

'he's not good for you y/n!' 'he's a freak y/n!' 'he's such a weirdo compared to you y/n!' 'get rid of him y/n!' 'get rid of his ass y/n!'

that's all your 'friends' ever said to you about miguel o'hara. they hated your relationship with him. he was a nerd sure, but all your 'best friends' were adamant that he was no good for you. or your name, for that matter

he was a bit of an outcast and nerd, sure, he used to sit alone at lunch, he would get bullied by the football team, he never got invited to parties, and don't even get started on his glasses.

but, no matter what, you wanted him. you had a reputation of popularity and cockiness sure, but you wanted to introverted freak nonetheless. he was just so.. sweet. and no matter what, you wanted him.

eventually you listened to your friends, cutting off everything you had with miguel so you could stop hearing the constant nagging of 'when are you gonna get rid of him?'

miguel being miguel, he was heartbroken. he cried for days, while you were enjoying your free time partying or sleeping with randomers.

a few weeks swings by, and parker's usual summer party is just tonight. he has one every year, and without a doubt they're the best parties of the whole school year. you were obviously first invite, and you happily agreed. but what you didn't expect, was the conversation in chemistry class that parker and his other 'popular' football friends were saying.

'yeah i invited that o'hara kid, it's gonna be so funny!' peter said, as one of the boys joined in. 'i say we throw him into the pool!' he said, as you chimed in. 'don't be dicks you think you're all so cool and popular bullying a kid? grow up.' you snapped.

peter smirked. 'aw, is little y/n getting possessive over her little ex fuck toy? i swear if you two are gonna fuck in my bed-' 'even if we do i'm sure it'll be better then having another night with your 2 incher. at least he knows where the clit is.' you replied snarkily, the boys laughing as peter went red in the face in anger.

'you're such a slut!' he snapped, you smiled. 'yeah well at least i didn't fuck mandy simpson in the back of english lit last semester.' you said, as peter was livid. he turned around, as you and your friends laughed.

the party arrived, and you wore your favourite black tight dress. it was a spaghetti strap, paired with gold hoop earrings, a gold necklace and some black strap heels. you packed a black and gold bikini just in case the boys decided their usual 2am pool dip.

you grabbed a bottle of vodka, pouring 50% in, mixing it with some coca cola. you noticed the usual hockey boys sniffing some sort of substance you didn't really care, you then saw the pick me girls all over peter and his friends. your friends were smoking back in the garden, beside the pool. you decided to walk over to them.

'hey girl! you want a smoke?' gracie asked, as you smiled and lit a cigarette, smoking it with your friends.

'hey, is that.. o'hara?' kate said, pointing to a corner. you turned around quickly, seeing the boy you oh so fondly missed (but you would never tell anyone that).

he looked more ripped. he had been going to the gym, you noticed that when you stalked his instagram story last week. he wore a pair of black jeans, and a polo shirt that was a little too tight for him. his hair was slicked back, and his glasses were a little crooked as usual.

'what a nerd, who invited him?' grace whispered. 'i heard peter invited him just to take the piss outta him. a little far fetched if you ask me.' maddy said, as abbie chimed in. 'well after making y/n look like an absolute freak for dating him, i'm sure the nicest thing o'hara could do is at least look popular so y/n doesn't look like a complete moron.'

'say that again?' you swung your head to abbie, who immediately shut her mouth. 'you can't talk abbie. i swear you fucked hobie brown during spring break?' you replied, as your friends laughed, abbie nodding. 'i deserved that.'

a few hours rolled by, and you were.. tipsy. your friends were either dancing, drinking or making out with one of the hockey dudes. you however, was searching for miguel. and when you found him, your heart boiled.

'cmon o'hara! we so kindly invited you to our party, why don't you just take a little swim with us?!' peter said, pinning miguel up to a wall. miguel was a shaking mess. you sighed, walking up to peter. 'hands off him.' you said, sternly.

'cmon y/n, you two ain't even together anymore. let's just show this little freak what parties are really about hm?' peter replied, as you smacked him swiftly, causing peter to lose his grip on miguel.

'WHAT THE FUCK?!' he snapped. 'touch my boy again, and i'll fucking end your career. you hear me?! one snapchat story and you could lose everything parker, you hear me?! now fuck off, enjoy your little party, and leave me and MY man alone!' you yelled, as peter's friends were awe-struck. they knew you were mouthy, but jeez.

'stupid bitch!' peter yelled, before walking away. tears welled miguel's eyes, as y/n grabbed his hand, taking him into her car.

she started the car, as the two were silent on the way home. 'w..where are we going?' miguel asked. 'my dorm.' you said in reply. '..i'm not your boy y'know. not anymore.' miguel mumbled. that made you raise a brow. 'i'm sorry, what?'

'you said i was 'yours' earlier, a-and..' tears fell down miguel's face. 'i'm not. n-not adfter y-you dumped me.' he said, as you sighed.

'..you're supposed to be smart, o'hara. why the fuck can't you see why i dumped you?' you said, as miguel looked away. 'i do know. i- i know it's because your friends said so. th-they didn't want you to be unpopular and weird.' he said.

'..i'm.. fuck man.' you mumbled, sighing. 'you know me, miguel. you know i hate saying this. but.. i'm sorry.' you said, that made his heart stop. you're.. sorry?

'i do want you. i've always fucking wanted you. but my friends they.. they just- they were in my ear for so long i-' 'tell me.' he cut you off. 'what?' you asked. 'what were we? we weren't exactly together, b-but we weren't not? i.. all i know is that we weren't just friends.' miguel stated.

he had a point. technically speaking, you two were just fuck buddies. 'we.. we were just fuck buddies.' you said honestly. 'and i stopped that because of my.. stupid fucking friends.' you parked outside the dorm. 'and y'know? i don't give two shits what anyone thinks about us.' you said, looking at miguel. he wiped his tears.

'do-does that make us.. something again?' he asked. '..get out.' you stated, as you got out the car, grabbing his hand and dragging him into the dorm.

---------------------------------------

'm..mistress p-please..' he begged, his legs shaking. you had been sucking him off for about an hour now, not stopping. it was his nth orgasm, and he couldn't feel anything.tears were streaming down his face, but you weren't done. not yet.

'let your mistress please you, yeah baby? i've been neglecting you for so long..' you cooed, stroking his cock as his eyes rolled back. you tutted. 'aww, so sensitive.. is my little dweeb tapping out before even touching mistress?' you teased, as he shook his head.

'n..no.. w-want to feel y-you mistress.. p-lease..' he whimpered, as you let go, moving to sit on his lap.

'trust me baby, we aren't stopping until i say so.'

[timdrakesmissingnotebook]

summary: damian wayne thinks he's never going to be able to compare against his siblings. you have something to say about it

pairing: damian wayne x reader

note: this is mostly inspired by the song Everyone Adores You (At Least I Do) by Matt Maltese! i love this song and thought, "why not make it about damian and his inability of feeling like he's enough?", so here it is! please, forgive any errors (i still don't have a beta reader lol)

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

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At first you thought you were going insane because there was no way in Hell that what you were seeing was real.

Blinking a few times, you see that: Yes, you are not going insane and yes: you just found The infamous (and very attractive) Damian Wayne crying, all by himself, on the dreadful chemistry laboratory you two were about to spend the next 50 minutes in.

You stare at him for a few moments before noticing that his cry wasn't slowing but instead picking up. The boy on front of you was starting to sob before you decide, against your better judgement, to take quiet steps towards him.

"Hey... " You mutter gently, just a few meters from his work bench, "Are you okay?"

Damian startles, jumping slightly while he looks up at you from behind watery eyes. He quickly puts a scowl on and brings his palms to dry his, still leaking, green eyes, "Yes and you didn't see anything."

"Maybe I didn't." Squinting your eyes at him, you act almost on instinct as you flop on the chair next to his. Turning to him, you beam brightly at the boy, putting your hand out for a handshake, "I'm (y/n)-"

"(y/l)." He finishes. Looking down at your hand before grasping it with his own in a meek handshake, "I know, and I have a feeling you know me too. What are you doing?"

"Yeah, I know you." Shrugging, you reply, having the decency to look sheepish, "And I'm just sitting here."

Damian tilts one of his brows and crosses his arms and a voice on the back of your head whispered that you shouldn't find it so hot, "What do you want?"

"Nothing." You say and mimicks his gesture, "I just want to let you know that I'm a good listener. If you want to open up, y'know?"

Damian's face falls for a quick second before he regans his frowny face, "And why should I do that?"

"Because you were crying, so that obviously means that something is bothering you and, as I said, I'm a good listener." You say, counting on your finger. You then smile softly at him, "You may not trust or know me or whatever, but everybody needs to just vent sometimes."

The boy turns forwards, glaring at the board on the other side of the room, and stays quiet for so long you almost decides to give up and sit on the usual bench you share with your friend, but before you could do so, he whispers, almost condemning, "I have a lot of siblings."

You nod, turning to him again, in a way to indicated that he could continue.

"And they-" He starts before breathing deeply, "They are amazing and kind and thoughtful and... I don't think I'll ever be anything like them. Like, come on, Timothy became the freaking CEO of Wayne Enterprises when he was seventeen and I have no idea of what I want to do after I finish high school. Not to mention how they are always out there helping people. They always know how to cheer someone up, be it with a hug, or a conversation. They all seem like they have everything figure out and I can't even decide on what I want to eat for breakfast."

He pauses, rubbing the sleeves of his shirt harshly against his leaking eyes. He then turns, whispering sorrowfully, "How can I even compete with that?"

To be honest, you definetely wasn't expecting that. Sighning, you reach towards his wrist, stoping him before he could scrap the skin off his face. You gently holds his hands on your lap, "You don't have to compete. Also, you aren't being fair."

"How so?" He rolls his eyes, looking down.

"You are only talking about the indecisive part of you. The part that is totally normal because you are a teenager, duh. What about we talk about how much you help too?" That makes the boy glance back up and you continue, "How about that time you stood up for that girl when a bunch of seniors were being a pain in the ass. Or that time you helped Mrs. Johnson gather the rest of the pre-school class that was touring here? Or that one time you-"

Damian cuts you off, a shy, small smile on his lips, "I understood."

"You do good too, Damian." You state smootly, "You just have to see it."

You stare at each others eyes for a what felt like forever before the banging of the lab door announced the entrance of the rest of your class and interruption of your quiet conversation.

Damian quickly straights his back and you two let go of the pleasant hold of hands with a matching set of blushes. Coughing awkwardly, Damian glances at you nervously and nods, "Thank you, (y/l). You- you helped."

"I'm happy to hear." You nod back and spin to stare at the front of the classroom.

You two stay silent, watching the other students and the teacher settle down before you realize something. You squint your eyes again, and turns to look at him, confused, "Wait, how did you know me? I'm pretty sure we never talked before."

For your frustation, the only answer you had was the slight blush on his cheeks and the amused grin on his lips.

[tomssexdoll]

can you do where reader and Tom were best friends and Tom was secretly crushing on her at school like 2003-2005 but then Tom had to leave the school because he got famous and had to go to tour and stuff and school was pretty hard for him but in 2009 he sees reader somewhere like in a restaurant and they talk about old times and then they go to reader’s house and then it ends with smut

i love this idea sm

Gone too long

PAIRINGS: Tom 2009 x Female reader CONTENT: FLUFF + SMUT SYPNOSIS: Y/N and Tom were best friends in years ago, Tom had to leave in 2005 when his career started to peak, leaving Y/N all alone. She didn't know at the time but he had the biggest crush on her and leaving her was one of the worst things that could happen. Later in 2009 he still thinks about her everyday, and then one day sees her in a resturant, eating alone. A/N: ee WARNINGS: dom!tom, sub!reader, p in v (missionary and riding), nipple play, teasing, squirting

When I was around 13, I met this guy named Tom, he was instantly my best friend and we hung out for days on end, every time we'd see each other we'd always work to one specific corner store and order the same thing every time.

But in 2005, his music career started to rise and he got more attention. I'd always helped him and the band with getting gigs at small bars or house parties but they never really became super famous.

He had to leave and I was devistated, 2 years of friendship wasted. Little did he know I had the fattest crush on him.

As the years went by I watched as his career progressed, him turning into a handsome young man. One day I decided to go eat out alone, not let my thoughts get the best of me.

I picked a cute little resturant, a family owned business that had recently opened, everyone I know was saying how good this place was, even celebrities were going.

I opened the swinging doors, greeted by a waiter and being sat at a 50s themed booth. I skimmed over the menu, looking at all the delicious options, things from chicken burgers to beef burgers to nuggets to fries to milkshakes.

I chose a strawberry milkshake and a beef burger with a side of fries, I hadn't eaten breakfast earlier so I was super hungry. I looked around the place, noticing how all the customers looked so happy, couples sharing milkshakes, families bonding and eating.

Then, I saw a guy sitting alone, black braids with a black bandana, I decided to ignore him but I couldn't shake the feeling off that he was staring at me. I decided to look again and my eyes widened, a familiar face, the face I've loved for years.

I realized it was Tom and he had realized it was me, I saw him stand up with his food and rush over to me, sitting down in the booth, we were both speechless, surprised to be seeing each other after so long.

"Hey Y/N..it's been a while" he smiled softly, I nodded, not being able to form words, super shocked that he was actually in front of me after so long. "So..how are you?" he chuckled, munching on his fries.

"Fuck..uh..." I snapped out of my trance, "i'm fine..I have a really cool job and I haven't been able to stop thinking about you..I watched all your interviews in hopes you'd maybe talk about me" I confessed, my cheeks flushing red, turning my head to look away from him.

"I mean, I couldn't stop thinking about you too, I'd try distract myself but you always clouded my thoughts" he chuckled, reaching his hand out and grabbing mine, causing me to snap my head back to him.

"I'm glad I could see you again, you've grown so much" he smirked "you're very beautiful" he teased, sending a little wink. I giggled, "you're very handsome yourself Tom, I love the braids"

For the next 3 hours we talked about old times, what we used to get up to and what we've been doing for the past 4 years. The resturant was near closing, we didn't even notice that we had been chatting for so long, we just had so much to catch up on and so much chemistry, the conversation never went awkward.

"Hey folks, the resturant is closing now, can we ask if you can pay your Bill and leave? We're so sorry" the waiter came up to us, "oh of course!" I smiled, going up to the counter to pay for my meal, "no no, let me pay liebe" I chuckled "liebe? You haven't called me that since 2004, who do you think you are" I said playfully, a smug grin appearing on his face as he payed for my meal.

"Thanks for that Tom" I leaned in, kissing his cheek sweetly and holding onto his hand, our fingers interlocking. I had walked to the resturant since it was so close to my house, Tom of course drived, his black sports car waiting outside.

"You wanna go back to mine? I really did miss you, I don't want our little date to get cut short" he frowned, looking down at me, "of course I want to" I smiled, pulling him with me to his car.

He opened the door for me, "why thank you" I smirked and got into the passanger seat, buckling myself up. He came to the side and got into the drivers seat, starting the car.

He sneakily slid a hand on my thigh as he started to drive. I rolled the window down, the cool breeze hitting my skin, sending goosebumps all over my arms.

I looked at the empty streets, admiring the yellowy glow of the street lights. As we arrived to his house he guided me in, bringing me to the lounge room. I sat on the couch as he dissapeared to the kitchen, pulling out a bottle of champagne for me and him, 2 glasses in his other hand.

He sat down next to me, pouring us a glass. We continued to talk for another hour, sipping at our drinks. Eventually we got tipsy, tension starting to fill the room. I had taken my jacket off, my boobs nearly buldging out of my tank top.

I noticed the way he just stared at my cleavage, a tent forming in his pants. "Tom" I called out, "oh..sorry" he chuckled, scratching his neck nervously.

I smirked and climbed onto his lap, smashing his lips into mine. His hands immediately flew to my hips, holding them tightly, deepening the kiss.

"Mm.." I moaned into the kiss, Tom slipping his tongue into my mouth and bucking his hips up, grinding against me softly. Our tongues fought for dominance, getting heated quickly.

He picked me up, holding me by my ass and walking towards his room, our lips still glued together. He pulled away for a moment, throwing me onto the bed and crawling to me, smashing his lips into mine again, grabbing my hands and pinning them above my head.

"Tom!" I gasped, his kisses trailing down to my neck, sucking roughly and leaving marks everywhere, basically claiming me as his. "Fuck.." he groaned, pushing his erection onto my stomach.

He let go of my hands, tugging at my shirt and pulling it off, along with my bra, revealing my perky breasts, nipples hard. "Ohh my god.." his breath hitched, leaning down and latching onto one of my nipples, sucking harshly.

I whined, "oh fuck! mm Tom!" arching my back, his cock pressing into me harder. He started to take his shirt off, along with his pants and boxers, leaving him completely nude all while kissing and sucking on my nipples.

He eventually let go, dragging my skirt off and rubbing my clit over my panties softly, my hips bucking up "ohh..someones excited" he smirked, peeling them off and throwing them to the side.

I whined, growing impatient, he detected this and smirked, aligning himself at my entrance, slowly pushing in. "Oh fuck!" I cried out, holding onto his biceps as he stretched me out slowly, making sure it didn't hurt.

After bottoming himself out he started to thrust slowly, trying to get me adjusted to his size. "Fuck..Tom you're so big.." I groaned, scratching at his back, he chuckled and started to thrust faster.

Eventually he started to pound into me, hitting my g spot repeatedly, "fuck.." he grunted, leaning down and starting sucking on my nipples again, swirling his tongue around my sensitive buds, little moans escaping my mouth.

I whimpered, his cock slamming into me cruely, stabbing at my g spot desperatly, his cock throbbing in my tight wetness. He grabbed my hips tightly, grazing his teeth over my nipples.

I felt tension build up in my stomach, twisting into a tight knot. He threw his head back, mouth slightly agape, cock twitching in me.

He groaned, feeling his balls tighten as he neared his orgasm. He could feel me clenching around his cock, causing him to lose control, "I'm gonna cum! Fuck!" he groaned, ejaculating and spurting his hot cum into me pussy, filling it to the brim.

I moaned at the sensation of my pussy being filled, my orgasm crashing down, juices spilling all over his cock. "Holy fuck.." I panted, Tom fell down onto the bed next to me, catching his breath.

Before I knew it I was on his cock again, he grabbed me by my waist and easily picked me up, slamming me back down onto his length, making me ride him.

"Oh fuck!" I whined, he grabbed my hips and started to help me move up and down on his cock, "you're so fucking hot.." he growled, slapping my ass harshly.

I yelped and rode faster, his tip hitting all the right spots, "that's right baby, ride my cock like the little slut you are.." he grinned, reaching out and fondling my bouncing breasts, rubbing his thumb over my nipple.

"Ohh fuck!" I whined, bouncing up and down on his cock, chasing another orgasm, my cunt dripping with juices. I threw my head back, the pleasure taking over my body, no thoughts being processed in my head.

He started to thrust up into me, meeting my movements. Hands squeezing my breasts roughly, "taking my cock so well..such a good girl" he praised, I felt my climax building again.

I was drunk on his cock, it was like drugs to me, addicting. He smirked, smacking my ass again, balls slapping onto my ass, hips slamming into mine roughly.

"Cum on this cock again, now" he commanded, I cried out and dug my nails into his shoulders, legs twitching as I came again, a clear stream of liquid spilling onto his abdomen.

"Holy shit!" I whined, collapsing onto his chest as he came deep in me again, fucking the cum into my pussy so it wouldn't spill out. He layed onto the bed, pulling me with him, pulling out slowly and cleaning me up.

"I missed you so much baby..you've been gone for too long.." he looked deeply into my eyes, brushing stray hairs away from my face and kissing me softly.

"I'm so happy I can be in your arms again" I smiled, kissing him back gently.

tags: @itsmealaiah @itsangelll @kaulitzsbabyy @ballhair @bkaulitzlover @estxkios @charliesgoodboy @tomsonlyslut @ge-billsgf

[fuumiku]

Chilcille huh... ngl I was a little suspicious. like why would you do that, huh... hope youre not mischaracterizing anyone in your weird and wacky ship. a little weird. but then you said they both had flat asses and you know what? I salute you and your perfect characterization

The fact you seem to think you managed to not make this ask insulting is baffling. What the hell. Fuck off.

If you actually care to be open minded about the ship, I talk about marchil on my sideblog 24/7. Funnily enough I’m currently 4k words deep into an analysis of their character arc together in canon, but that’ll take some more days to get done. Some notable posts:

Of course without counting the analyses of Chilchuck on his own I’ve made, like my masterpost on his family situation. Or better yet you could also read my fics for them, see how weird and wacky they are here.

Wanna talk about mischaracterisation? They’re literally a comedic duo who interacts 24/7. Marchil is crazy bc ppl are like "did those shipper read with their eyes CLOSED?? They have no chemistry!" Meanwhile canon is like: "She’s obsessed with knowing everything she can about him and she reads him like a book." In her eyes he’s like that extra rare and hard and shiny unlockable dating sim character, that brooding mysterious character trope that’s thrilling to crack open and typically is at the center of the plot. The wife roleplay???? "Hey, did you know his type is blondes. Hey did you know he likes his women pretty and blonde. Hey did you know he likes her hair. Hey did you know that he teases her 24/7 and it’s one of the few things that consistently gets him grinning because he finds her reactions cute." Like a schoolyard bully pulling on the pigtails of the girl he likes.

It’s not like they have any thematic narratives or relevance. It’s not like she’ll live to 1000 and has existential dread about it while he’s logically gonna be her next friend to die at 50 and wether it’s romantic or platonic it’ll terrify her to lose him. It’s not like it’s fear of death x fear of rejection so they’re both obsessed with the thought of loss looming, past and ongoing. It’s not like it’s half-elf x half-foot and there’s an inherent journey that was and still is to dispel prejudices and truly come to see each other. It’s not like he’s painfully real and raw and flawed but still a good man, that he’s not the figure of prince charming that she’s always dreamed of while still being virtuous and worth fighting for. Or you know, her hair being golden and it being the epitome of beauty to him, and his hair turning silver and it being Marcille’s worst nightmare.

Just a weird wacky ship who means nothing but shallow things to people who have weirdo reasons for liking it. Like can you not. If you’re not imaginative enough to think of reasons why this ship may have an appealing dynamic that’s not my issue. But yes, yes, they’re both flat asses to me, thanks.

[barren-heart]

The Hidden Love Story of What We Do in the Shadows: How The Internet Fell in Love with Harvey Guillen’s Guillermo de la Cruz

I think it’s fair to call this show what it is: a comedy.

The actors have said it’s themselves: the show is 50% improv, 50% script. A lot of what we see is a brilliant collaboration of talent, writing, and the actors saying the funniest thing they can say about something in that moment.

According to Harvey Guillen, some scenes would last 30 minutes each if they didn’t cut it down. That improv is what makes the show what is it: the funniest show on television.

What’s interesting about this little Shit and Fart show (affectionate), is the heart of it all: Guillermo.

Originally the show was looking for an older man to play Nandor’s familiar. The character had worked for his master for 20 years, not 10 as we see in the pilot episode.

Harvey got an audition randomly. At a wine and cheese night of a friend’s, he was invited to audition for the part. It was random, but also, it was fate.

Let me explain.

Harvey Guillen auditioning for the role of Guillermo

(I actually have the full audition tape of Harvey’s if anyone’s interested.) Link below!

Harvey didn’t “fit the part” (Harvey’s words) whatsoever of this character and decided to dress himself to look older, putting on what he calls his Harry Potter glasses and parted his hair down the middle.

The Guillermo we see in the pilot was all Harvey’s idea of what that character should be and the costuming department just ran with it. It’s also fun to point out that to those who don’t know, Harvey created Guillermo’s last name even before he knew he’d play the show’s Vampire Slayer.

I mention this because I don’t think they (showrunner, producers,etc) expected Guillermo to become such a fan favorite. Which kinda explains why his character is the punching bag of season one and why it somewhat changes as seasons go by.

I mean, we don’t even see Guillermo in this season one poster (we don’t see Colin Robinson, either. But I feel like I could write an entirely other post about that character and why I think he’s genuinely the best and most consistently written character on the show. But I won’t right now).

I think they expected Guillermo to be a one-note side kick, which is fine. Many of Harvey’s previous roles were nearly background characters (think Benedict Pickwick in The Magicians).

But, Harvey’s take on the character coupled with his talent at being both comedic and dramatic really shined through. And I think that’s where you start to see that maybe they could do more with him than just being the funny guy in the background.

I also think that’s why you start to see some threading of a more serious plot when it comes to Guillermo’s storyline because of Harvey’s range.

Who would’ve known a funny bit like being a Van Helsing descent in a house full of vampires would get you compelling scenes like the familiar fight The Night Market, Nouveau Théâtre des Vampires, and the Nandor and Guillermo fight in The Portrait?

Harvey mentioned having to train for these and wanted to do his own stunts! And he does them well!

Did they imagine Guillermo being such a badass in the pilot? Probably not. But he is and people took to it. The serious fight scenes (even with bits of comedy filtered in) really stand out in their own as excellent action scenes.

Along with badass scenes, Harvey delivered compelling emotional scenes like Guillermo’s coming out (which Harvey actually cried in as well as other cast and crew, and they had to edit it to not make it too serious), the scene he left Nandor for Celeste, and many scenes in S5’s Exit Interview.

I also think they didn’t anticipate his chemistry with Kayvan Novak. It’s brought up a lot in interviews with them and everyone can tell that they genuinely are really good friends in real life, which makes acting together on screen that much better.

(Funny enough, he was supposed to do a chemistry read with Kayvan before shooting and wasn’t able to meet him until they were on set for the pilot. )

I think in some ways, even though the show wanted it to be a funny Gaston and Lefou type relationship, Kayvan and Harvey had undeniable chemistry you couldn’t deny.

And I think that began to grow with their character’s evolving relationship. From master and servant to friends to sometimes the show and network alluding to them being in a romance (Guillermo’s drunk love confession, Marwa liking what Nandor likes, the Network making videos about shipping Nandermo).

And even Paul Simms (the one who is being grilled for That’s His Boss quote), also said “Guillermo and Nandor is the greatest love story in modern television.”

So yeah, I think originally they started the show with the intention that it was supposed to be similar to the movie that shares its name. The Nandor/Guillermo drama of Shadows the TV show would be so out of place in the movie. The whole Guillermo vampire arc, if it was movie inspired, would not be as dramatic as they have made it in the show.

Looking back to the pilot, I can see that they really tried to make it as close to the source material as possible. But I think it took off in a direction that even the creators didn’t imagine it would go. Just a silly little comedy show about silly little vampires. And don’t get me wrong, it still definitely is.

But the show has evolved. And for better or worse, Nandor and Guillermo’s relationship will be one of the most compelling things about the show and I’m curious where they are going to take it now.

I guess this turned into a bit of an Harvey Guillen appreciation post and honestly, why not? Look at that adorable face.

[welcometothejianghu]

Welcome to another round of W2 Tells You What You Should See, where W2 (me) tries to sell you (you) on something you should be watching. Today's choice: きのう何食べた? / Kinou Nani Tabeta? / What Did You Eat Yesterday?

Kinou Nani Tabeta? (which I'm going to abbreviate here to NaniTabe) is a live-action adaptation of a manga with the same name, which tells the story of two middle-aged Japanese gay men as they navigate their relationship, their families, and their professional lives, all while having some good meals.

Do you want something nice? Do you want a show that's just ... nice? Not saccharine, not cloying, not reductive, but just cozy and kind? This! This is what you want. Every episode deals with some events in their lives, and then the action will pause once or twice while someone demonstrates how to make a meal. There's no real overarching plot. You just get to peek in on them every so often and see how they're doing.

...Shit, I'm just going to steal the GagaOOLala second-season synopsis, it's perfect:

Shiro Kakei and his partner, Kenji Yabuki, live a life full of some hardship but mostly happiness together, with Shiro's speciality cooking affordable and delicious dishes. As they turn 50, they begin to experience different changes, but Shiro and Kenji are still gentle with each other as they move on to a new stage in their lives.

So here I am, a middle-aged gay who cooks affordable and (mostly) delicious dishes and treats my partner gently, serving you a five-course meal of reasons that you should watch this show -- especially if you too are a middle-aged gay, in which case I'd say this goes straight from "should watch" to "unmissable."

1. Help, my face hurts from smiling too much

Prepare to get your heart warmed whether you like it or not.

Kakei Shiro, the main character, is a closeted gay attorney in his forties whose main likes are cooking and saving money. He lives with his slightly younger boyfriend, Yabuki Kenji, who is a very openly gay hairstylist. They're an incredibly unlikely couple who somehow manage to make a relationship work, kind of to their mutual surprise.

I called bullshit on the show early on: This relationship is cute, I said, but this is not the behavior of guys who have been together a decade. But as the show unfolded, it became clear that I was so wrong -- their behavior is perfect, because these middle-aged boys actually haven't been together nearly that long. In fact, once you finally get the story of how their relationship started, yeah, it explains a lot of their insecurities and awkwardnesses about one another. Combine that with how Shiro's a neurotic mess who absolutely does not want anyone to know that he's gay, while Kenji lives on eggshells for fear of rejection, and it all starts to make sense.

It helps that the two leads have incredible chemistry. Not in a horny way, mind you (the show is incredibly, and intentionally, nonsexual, but more on that later), but where they genuinely make one another smile and laugh. Nishijima Hidetoshi plays Shiro as an anxious mess who slowly learns to become at least a little more comfortable in his own queer skin. I have a t-shirt that says Oh, Honey and I want to put it on every time he does something.

Meanwhile, it would have been so easy to make Kenji a caricature, but Uchino Seiyou skips right past the stereotype and plays the behavior that the stereotype comes from. He minces his way along as Kenji so perfectly, I was surprised to find out he's married to a lady in real life. He's got to be doing an impression of someone he actually knows, because his faggotry is just too accurate.

Their relationship is far from perfect. They're capable of annoying the tar out of one another, sometimes on purpose. They keep secrets and avoid talking about feelings. They get jealous over completely irrational things. They want things the other person isn't comfortable giving. They get into petty little arguments over petty little shit.

And because of all that, it feels real.

Also, if you're one of those Jane Austen bitches who swoons every time lovers scandalously brush knuckles, well, here you go.

2. Surprisingly educational about the state of gay life in modern Japan!

This is not incidental: Like the manga, the show uses this cute food-based story to present a fairly realistic snapshot of what it's like to be a middle-aged gay couple in Japan right now.

Like the manga it's based on, the show goes out of its way to be incredibly nonsexual, to the point where Kenji and Shiro barely touch, much less kiss or even hint at getting naked together. It is very consciously and deliberately attempting to counteract the stereotype of the hypersexualized, salacious homosexual by presenting two gay men who are delightfully mundane.

It is not, however, homonormalization. There's no attempt here to make an argument that gay people are just like straight people, only with incidentally matching genitals. Every time someone falls prey to the pressure to conform to cishet gender norms, it ends badly for them. While the first-episode conflict establishes that Kenji tops, he's also the fruity hairstylist who does the housekeeping. Shiro's the straight-passing suit-and-tie guy, yet he's the one who cooks and goes grocery-shopping. They have a division of labor based on personality traits, not gender roles. In fact, their relationship as presented challenges a lot of those norms by decoupling gendered expectations from the necessities of everyday living.

(This isn't even just me getting my queer studies goo all over everything! Allow me to be a good academic and send you to two people who've done even more thinking about this than I have: the unfortunately paywalled "Queer Cooking And Dining: Expanding Queerness In Fumi Yoshinaga's What Did You Eat Yesterday?" by Katsuhiko Suganuma, and the more freely available "Queering the Palate: The Erotics and Politics of Food in Japanese Gourmet Manga" by Keiko Miyajima.)

Every so often, one of the episodes' conflicts will have to do with how gay people in Japan do not have equal rights and protections under the law. This doesn't just mean they can't get married -- not having a spouse and children actually messes with a lot of legal stuff, including inheritance and government assistance. Sometimes the show will even take a beat to have one of the characters explain to another what a certain statute says. Changing laws about same-sex partnerships even get factored into the story!

And sure, I don't know these things, but I bet a lot of straight people in Japan don't know these things either. Well, if you watch the show, now you do!

It's important that no one is ever outright shitty to Shiro or Kenji. No one calls them slurs or hate-crimes them or refuses to serve them at a business or anything like that. In fact, the majority of people they encounter are perfectly chill and even outright supportive. The most serious challenges they face are bigger than individual people being dicks. They're about systemic barriers to equality.

That said, there are still plenty of instances of individual people being dicks -- just not maliciously. In fact, most of the homophobic sentiments in the show come from the mouths of people who are otherwise supportive of Shiro and/or Kenji! These nice people seem like they're way okay with the gay ... and then they let slip that, no, they're actually not as okay with it as they think they are.

And I love that the show includes that, because I know that feeling way too well. When these things happen, our boys don't throw a righteous fit or cut the offender off completely. They just ... absorb the blow, sigh quietly, and keep going with the belief that the person in question means well. It just sucks, you know? It sucks to have to know now that your straight lady friend who thinks it's great that you're gay would be uncomfortable if her daughter were a lesbian. You're not going to stop being friends with her, and you're not even going to hold it against her, but it lives in your mind now, and you're going to add it to the I Am A Disappointment To My Parents rotation of intrusive thoughts.

Speaking of parents, Shiro's incredibly fraught relationship with his aging parents is hands-down one of the best parts of the show. They love him, he loves them, but they don't always know how to love one another. As their childless only child, Shiro finds himself having to support them in spite of a lot of hurt they've caused him because of his sexuality. He would in many ways be justified in cutting them off -- after all, many other gay people in the show no longer speak to one or both of their parents! Shiro wants to keep them in his life, though. He'll just have to learn how, for his sake and for Kenji's, to lovingly set boundaries.

This, to me, is the most important lesson a show about boring gays can teach a straight audience: There's always a background level of suck. You can be as chaste and normie and regular as you want, but you'll never be normal, because there's literally nothing you can do to erase the background level of suck.

It's easy to reduce someone else's oppression to Big Bad Events, and then to assume that the absence of these Big Bad Events means that oppression has ceased. That's like thinking there's nothing left that needs to be done about racism because the US had a Black president and you've never personally seen a cross burned on somebody's lawn. Once other people's oppression stops being Big Bad Events, it becomes Everyday Stuff You Can Ignore. And that's worse.

NaniTabe pushes back against this in two directions. The first is to show gays who are not miserable, but are instead living happy, fulfilling, and exceedingly regular lives on their own terms. The second is to give reminders that what gay-related misery they do experience largely comes not from their being gay, but from society's giving them shit for being gay. This misery doesn't destroy the happiness, but neither does the happiness make the misery go away.

By the way, this is true of any non-normative identity! The gays do not have a monopoly here. There's always going to be a level of suck when you don't inhabit an area of privilege, and it's very easy to be unaware of someone else's background level of suck when you yourself do have that privileged status! One of the best ways to become aware is to listen to stories about people unlike yourself! Hooray for empathy and learning!

3. tfw your bffs are straight-up freaks

If you're queer, and especially if you're queer and the vast majority of the people around you aren't, you know all too well that sometimes you wind up being friends with people you'd never associate with otherwise, except that you're queer and they're queer, and buddy, if you thought the queer dating pool was shallow, the queer friendship pool can sometimes be even worse.

That's how you get Kohinata and Wataru.

When I said earlier everything about how nonsexual and normie the show is, I was intentionally glossing over whatever the hell is going on with Kohinata and Wataru, the bizarre boyfriends who become Shiro and Kenji's gay besties. You know that couple where you think, I cannot imagine how this relationship works because if you were my partner I would want you stab you every minute of our lives, but it clearly does, so I'm happy for you both? Yeah, that's these two.

The elder of the pair, Kohinata, is a butch, severe man -- except when it comes to his boyfriend, the much younger and worse-behaved Wataru. Then he's reduced to a complete simp, catering to Wataru's every whim. Wataru knows that throwing a tantrum and being bratty is the way to get anything he wants from Kohinata, so he's just a little shit recreationally. He loves saying bitchy things and pointing out people's flaws, while Kohinata chides him ineffectually.

And I love how much this is totally a sex thing for them, except that when you put it in the context of an otherwise extremely PG-rated show, the kink of it flies completely under the hetero radar. Ha ha, look how generally funny these two weirdos are! While Shiro and Kenji are over here doing the thing where somebody calls their partner "master" in front of you, and you're like, I wish you wouldn't.

Their presence is great for the acknowledgment that gay people can be maladjusted freaks in a whole spectrum of ways! They also make the point that a great deal of your ability to openly be a maladjusted freak is related to your job and your level of wealth. Wataru works from home and Kohinata works with celebrities, both of which bring in high incomes and allow for way more deviance from social norms. They're in positions of privilege that allow them to be themselves, but the price of being themselves is that they're always going to stick out in a society that values harmony in sameness.

By contrast, Shiro's good-but-not-great-paying suit-and-tie job means he has to behave. Because of this, he has plenty of angst about being Not Gay Enough, through which the show reinforces time and again that not all gay existence is about barfing rainbows. You're still a valid homosexual even when you're a dull one.

So just remember: When you feel like you're not queer enough, remember that there are always worse queers out there in the world. Oh, they're not worse at being queer. They're just worse in general.

4. Itadakimasu!

This show, like the Sleuth of the Ming Dynasty and Otoko Meshi, is a food-centered show that is very dangerous to watch if you're hungry, so be prepared! Snack first!

It's also got actually followable recipes! Unlike those other food-centric shows I've done recs for, this show actually gives pretty precise measurements, lists all the ingredients, and walks you through basically the whole process. Aside from a few "add the incredibly Japanese thing I bought premade at the store" steps, Shiro's cooking methods are replicable at home.

...It is here that I should probably put up a warning for the occasional bout of very Japanese-typical and gay-man-typical fatphobia, which can be a heck of a combination. I don't think it's a dealbreaker, but you should be aware of it going in. However, I will say that the show almost always comes down on the side of positive moderation: Sometimes you need to eat like you're an aging homosexual watching your cholesterol, and sometimes it's a special occasion so you should enjoy yourself without guilt. It also never once conflates "eating healthy" with eating disappointing meals. If anything, it's mostly just being honest about what happens to your body's relationship to fried food when you hit your forties.

The other nice thing is that Shiro's not some trained chef. He makes good food, but he's a dedicated amateur at best. There's not a single super-fancy technique in anything he does. Much of the time, he's just winging it, combining techniques he knows with what he's already got in the fridge. Sometimes he uses recipes he found on the internet. Occasionally he cooks alongside other, more experienced people and learns techniques from them. Once in a blue moon he just tries a thing to see how it works. (Of course, he does have the unfair advantage of being fictional to cover for how none of his meals ever turn out bad, which, you know, must be nice.)

Sometimes you even get to see other people cook when Shiro's nowhere around! Some of them follow instructions to the letter, while others just sort of wing it with whatever's on hand. And that's okay! For a show so much about cooking, it is very unpretentious about food. The manga drives home even more strongly the point that you don't need fancy meals and a million perfect side dishes to be content. It's great if you're perfectly happy microwaving a pork bun! What matters is that it works for you and your family.

...Now can we please convince subbers everywhere to translate "Itadakimasu!" as "Itadakimasu!"? Please? I think my favorite bad choice is "Bon appetit!", which, okay, good job, you took an opportunity to teach English-speakers a non-English phrase that has no good English translation, and instead you chose to bank on their extant familiarity with a different non-English phrase that has no good English translation. Just keep it what it is. It's just something you say before you eat. It's obvious from context clues. I promise.

5. Makes you, an aging queer, feel real weird about some stuff!

Over the course of the show, Kenji and Shiro go from their early/mid 40s to pushing/over 50. Their parents age, have health scares, and even sometimes die. They deal with losing eyesight and hair alike. They get promoted. They make household budgets and purchases. They worry about saving enough for the future. They work late. They go on vacation sometimes. They wear the same clothes they wore a couple episodes ago.

However, they do all this while also wrestling with their unequal status as gay men in Japan. All their discussions about retirement are colored both by Kenji's tendency to impulse-buy ice cream and by the fact that they can't get married. The choices Shiro makes about his job rest both on his desire for a good work-life balace and a fear that his profession would react badly to his coming out. They have to make all the normal decisions expected of men their age, and then they have to make all the extra decisions to compensate for how "normal" doesn't account for gay.

To pick one issue running throughout the story: Shiro is an only child who is himself childless. This comes up fairly often, in fact, as various circumstances make him aware time and again that he's not making his parents into grandparents, and he won't someday have someone to take care of him like he does for them.

The first time the show brought this up, I thought it would be a one-and-done thing, where the conclusion of the episode got to be that Shiro learns to be happy without being a parent, the end. Nope! It isn't a constant stressor, but it never goes entirely away. Shiro is happy with his life, but he's also reminded that he's failing to live up to social standards. He doesn't want to be a dad. Or does he? No, he actually doesn't. But he also doesn't want not to be a dad, if that makes sense. He doesn't want to disappoint everyone by not having a wife and children, but at the same time, that disappointment isn't enough to force him back into the closet. But it's always going to be seen as a failure on his part.

As a middle-aged queer with no kids, yeah, I feel that hard. I don't want kids! But I also don't want to not have kids. I know I'm always going to be a little bit of a misfit in my family compared to my siblings, who are all parents now. Besides, I think about all the things I do for my parents, and all the things they did for theirs, and yeah, it kind of scares me to know I won't have that when I get older. And we're just basic-ass white people! Japan takes filial responsibility to a whole 'nother level!

So I really, really like that this show doesn't resolve that tension. Shiro has chosen what's right for him. It just also sucks sometimes. The honesty of that narrative is refreshing. Sometimes your best choice still kinda sucks. Sometimes the only way to get closure is to say, you failed me and I failed you, so we're even.

It's a frequent thing for the show to present the realities of people's lives and choices, and to say, maybe this isn't everyone's perfect solution, but it's the right decision given what the circumstances will allow, and you are still allowed to be happy despite the imperfections. It's not that you need to settle for less than perfection because you're gay -- everybody settles! Everybody makes choices and then has to live with the consequences of those choices. You'll never know if things could have been better if you'd done something different, but that doesn't stop what you have right now from being able to be pretty damn good.

I'm not going to say you must be a middle-aged queer to watch this show, because did you read the whole part earlier where I talked about how you should consume stories from experiences that are not your own? Right? Right.

I will, however, say that if you are a middle-aged queer, a lot of it's likely going to hit real close to home, and often in uncomfortable ways. I've seen a couple people say they had to take breathers after some episodes. I know I've been left chewing over a few things in the days and weeks since watching. There are definitely parts where you're laughing because you know exactly what that feels like, and if you don't laugh, you'll do something else.

But you know what? I like that. It can be nice to see people go through situations similar to yours and emerge realistically happy. It's nice to be able to laugh about things, or to know that you will laugh about them someday. The world is fundamentally hostile, but there are people who love us and watermelons are on sale this week, so instead of despair, let's have lunch together.

bonus: porn!!

I want to make it clear that the mangaka isn't some erotophobic dishrag who fetishizes gay men so long as they don't have any of that icky nasty smex. Oh no. The proof that NaniTabe's sexlessness is intentional is how Yoshinaga Fumi made six fairly explicit pornographic side stories that fill in some of the sexy gaps in the larger narrative. You can read all six volumes scanlated right here! ...though if you want to avoid spoilers, I'm going to recommend you wait to dig in until after you watch the show and/or read the actual manga to the appropriate points.

Enjoy the confirmation that Shiro is a freaky size queen (at least in theory, as is the case with maybe most freaky size queens).

Are you hungry for this show yet?

Tragically, this one's a little hard to watch. If you're in Japan (or you have a VPN that can fake it), you can see the first season on Netflix. Otherwise, the preposterously named GagaOOLala is probably your best bet. The watch order goes like this:

Season 1

the New Year's Special

the Movie

Season 2

While the two movies and the second season require a subscription, the first season is available for free. So if you want to give it a try, you've got a whole twelve episodes to see if you like it!

Maybe it'll get a third season someday? We can hope! After all, there's still much more manga left to adapt! All I know is that I'm very sad that I've run out of new installments of it to watch, and I look forward to going back and starting again from the beginning soon.

...Boy, it's funny to see behind-the-scenes shots and think, wow, they're so much snugglier in real life! That's how not-snuggly the show itself is! You think I'm joking but I'm not!

[ladykailitha]

Can Anybody See Me? Part 2

Holy shit, guys. I have never had such a response to a story before. Thank you guys so much.

Tag list of 50 has now been filled. Any other requests for tagging will be denied. I’m sorry.

Edit: Also if you saw the title as something else? No, no you didn’t. And any reblogs you see with anyone instead of anybody are a figment of your imagination. (*thuds head on laptop* I have the title right on here...in my file *wails*)

Part 1

*

The next morning Eddie got up for school excited for the first time. He had a mystery to solve and his name was Steven Harrington. Probably the third or whatever shit rich people got to with naming their kids. He rummaged through his closet looking for his favorite band tee. But he stopped when he found an old shoe box down at the bottom.

Eddie frowned and pulled it out. It was a bunch of pictures of Eddie when he first came to live with his uncle, Wayne. He looked at the shaved head and bruised face.

His dad had taken one look at Eddie that morning and decided his hair was too long. He had grabbed Eddie by the hair and dragged him into the bathroom and shaved his head. The bruises to the face were from Eddie trying to escape.

Eddie had suffered a concussion and it was then the state had taken notice. They had packed up his stuff while he was in the hospital in a big black garbage bag and told him he would be going home to his Uncle Wayne. In Indiana. So far from the life he knew. But it meant being safe from his dad and that was a plus in Eddie’s book.

It’s how he knew what Steve was going through. Maybe not exactly the same. But he knew concussions and knew they were a bad business.

He put the pictures back in the box and tucked it under his bed. Maybe he didn’t need to know why Steve was hurting. Maybe it was enough to understand. He pulled on his second favorite band tee and his jacket. He grabbed his bag and hurried out the door.

*

Eddie bit his lip. He didn’t have any classes with Steve today and wasn’t able to check up on him. He was tempted to break into the office and pull Steve’s schedule. But that would get him detention and he was still trying to keep his promise to his uncle.

How was he going to do this?

And then the answer literally dropped in his lap. A book was thrown at him by someone. He picked it up and looked at the cover. It was some old homework journal was about to throw it away when a piece of paper fluttered to the ground.

Frowning he picked it up. By some miracle it was Steve’s schedule. He looked up to see if he could see who threw it at him. But it could have been anyone. A lot of people were avoiding his eye, but that could be for any number of reasons. They bought from him and now they can’t look him in the eye because he knows. They want to buy weed and don’t know how to broach it. They think he’s a freak. They have a crush on him. You know, the possibilities were endless.

But at least he knew things he didn’t before. Like holy hell, the kid did a lot of sports. He looked at baseball and swimming and basketball with his mind whirling around in his head. How did he keep all the rules straight?

Math third period Eddie knew. History was Steve’s first period. Which was probably how his messed up brain managed to spew that information at Eddie yesterday. Baseball was seventh. Basketball his eighth. Swimming was second. English fourth. Art was sixth. Art, huh? That was intriguing. Probably thought it was an easy elective. And chemistry was fifth. So it looked something like this.

Odd 1-History 3- Math 5- Chemistry lunch 7- Baseball

Even 2-Swimming 4-English 6-Art lunch 8-Basketball

Huh. Eddie never noticed, but Steve was always in his lunch period. That was certainly interesting. He wondered what Mrs Hall, the guidance counselor would do about all his sports now that he couldn’t play anymore. He supposed swimming was still fine, nothing to hit you in that. But baseball and basketball were definitely out.

Eddie chewed on his lip. The sports weren’t going to get Eddie closer to finding out what happened to Steve. They would close ranks so fast. At least Steve and him had lunch together so that would at least make it easier befriend the guy.

Art, though. He tapped his lip thoughtfully. He had art in his fifth period. He could doing some snooping there. After all art is where true expression lies. And if there was anything going on it would show in his art.

The start of a plan was forming in the back of his mind. Yeah. This could work.

*

At lunch, Eddie slid in next to Steve as soon as he sat down.

“What’s on the menu today, Harrington?” he asked grinning.

Steve looked up at him in shock again. “Um...applesauce and plain toast, with a can of ginger ale.”

Eddie winced. “Still feeling the nausea?”

Steve nodded. “I’m starting to wonder if it’s ever going away.”

“It’ll stick around for about a week,” Eddie said softly.

Steve frowned. “How would you know that?”

“How don’t you know that?” Eddie fired back. “This is your second concussion.”

“Didn’t go to the doctor either time,” Steve mumbled.

“You want to run that past me again, Harrington?” Eddie asked.

“Doctors mean having to call my parents,” Steve explained, “calling my parents means that they’ll have to come back from their trip, coming back from their trip means I get into trouble, getting into trouble is not good for a concussion, so I don’t.”

“Why would you get into trouble for having a concussion?” Eddie asked, furrowing his brow.

Steve started counting it out on his fingers. “Getting into a fight. Hanging out with black people and by extension, siding with said black person. Having to drop out of sports. Watching my grades plummet. Not speaking to Tommy and Carol. I can keep going if you’d like...”

Eddie shook his head. “Holy shit, dude. I didn’t think I’d see a shittier dad then my own, but yours and your mom take the cake.”

Steve looked down at his applesauce mournfully. “It’s not that bad. At least my dad doesn’t hit me like Tommy’s dad does.”

Eddie’s eyebrows went up. “Are all rich dads douchebags?”

Steve shrugged. “I don’t know.”

“Look, I’ve got to eat my own lunch,” Eddie said slapping the table and standing up, “but if you need anything come find me.”

Steve nodded, but Eddie didn’t think he would take him up on it.

Part 3 Part 4 Part 5 Part 6 Part 7 Part 8 Part 9 Part 10 Part 11 Part 12 Part 13  Part 14  Part 15  Part 16  Part 17 Part 18  Part 19  Part 20 Part 21

Tag List: @shrimply-a-menace @strangersteddierthings @throwbackthrowaway @novelnovella @cursedfoxteeth @babyblender @lifeisnotsobadonceyoustopcaring @swimmingbirdrunningrock @steve-the-hairrington @winterbuckwild @spectrum-spectre @matchingbatbites

[gh0stsp1d3r]

Omg I love all your fics and was wondering if I could request a wonka x reader where she is Mrs. Scrubitts child and she secretly takes care of noodle and she falls hard for Willy and try’s to stop him from signing the contract.

Entranced

MASTERLIST

taglist: @kpopgirlbtssvt

I love thissss! Readers adopted, I did kinda change it so that they had some more chemistry ): Might make a part 2, if anyone wants one

You watched from behind the counter, along with Noodle. You both peered through and looked at the new man coming in.

He was attractive, and he spoke with a smile on his face. You both were crouched down, out of sight from your adoptive mother.

Noodle looked to you knowingly.

Scrubitt opened the door up, yelling “Get the man some gin.” She said sharply, you quickly stumbled and stood up, going as quick as possible. Willy watched, feeling bad at the treatment you seemed to be getting. Noodle followed as you got a cup.

You looked down as you handed it to him.

“Thank you.” He looked at you, his eyes with something you couldn’t quite place. You looked up and then walked into the back again.

Noodle looked at you, you looked down at her and you both crouched down again, looking out.

He soon was about to sign when you mouthed the words. “Read the small print.”

“What?” He whispered, leaning in and glancing at Ms. scrubitt.

“Don’t sign it!” You mouthed.

Ms. Scrubitt cut you off, closing it and laughing nervously.

He looked back at the paper, and unfolded it.

He looked back to where you once were.

“Y/n, and noodle. Adopted them both.” She explained. “Lil troublemakers.” She laughed nervously again.

“Go.” You told Noodle, already knowing your fate.

“I’m not gonna leave you-“

“Go, noodle.” You whispered again, she sighed and ran away, you stood up and waited. Bleacher came bursting through the door, grabbing your arm roughly.

"I question why she adopted you." He grumbled out, along with some other insults. He threw you onto the floor, you looked up at him and he sneered at you before shutting the door on your face, locking you away.

---------------------------—————————

“Room service.” Noodle said, knocking on the door.

“Told you not to sign. Should’ve read the print.” You said from behind her. He was staring out at the window, then turned to you both, a small smile.

“Slight problem with that.”

“You can’t read, can you?” Noodle said from besides you.

“I focus my studies almost exclusively on chocolate. I had nowhere to stay, I was going to freeze out there.”

“It’s okay. I know what you mean.” You nodded at him with an understanding smile.

“For everything else, I’ve relied on the kindness of strangers.” He said, smiling back. And he knows he just met you, but he found himself entranced by your smile. And you wouldn't admit it, but you have felt attracted to the man since you saw him yesterday.

“Look where that’s got you.” Noodle said. “The staff quarters.” She said, referring to the room.

“Least you’ve got a bed.” You said, and he was going to sit down on it. The old bed collapsed the second he got onto it. His eyes widened in shock.

“You had a bed. Happen’s to all of them. I’ll get someone to fix it tomorrow.” You waved it off.

“Desk, and a wash basin/toilet. The water comes in two temperatures, cold and colder.” Noodle continued, pouring the colder water into the cup.

“How much do you owe them?” You asked the man.

“Ten thousand.”

“Count yourself lucky. I owe 30.” Noodle said again.

He looked to you, his face in shock at the amount.

“50.”

“What?! How do you owe them money? I thought they found you down a laundry chute. And I thought they adopted you.” He looked to Noodle and back at you.

“Oh, they did. Took me in out of the goodness of their hearts, and charged me for the privilege.” She said.

He looked to you now, interested in your story.

“The hag adopted me but when I grew up, they said that they had regretted it. Charged me 50,000 saying how I had caused too much trouble. I get one sovereign a day, and to pay it off I would have to work for.. roughly 137 years.”

“What a pair of monsters.” He said, arms folded as he leaned against the wall now.

“The greedy beat the needy everytime, Mr. Wonka.” You started, with a shrug as you picked the pail up, carrying it and beginning to leave the room.

“Guess it’s just the way of the world.” Noodle said, finishing your sentence.

“Oh come on. That’s just your orphan syndrome talking.”

You both turned back now, you furrowed your eyebrows.

“Our what?” You both said in unison.

“Your orphan syndrome. And we are not gonna be eating any slops.” He dumped the food away.

“What are you doing?” Noodle asked him, you both entered the room again.

“I’m making chocolate of course. How do you like it? Dark? White? Nutty? Absolutely insane?” He tilted his head to the side.

You shrugged, “We’ve never had it.” You had a small smile on your face as you looked back at the man, he was intriguing. He was handsome, and he had a smile that you felt was the best you’ve ever seen.

“you’veneverhadchocolate?” He said quickly, you couldn’t quite understand what he said. “You‘ve never had chocolate?”

“No…” Noodle and you said.

“What?!” He exclaimed loudly, “You’ve never had chocolate?!”

“Still no.”

“Well, this is unbelievable. This is outrageous.” He mumbled to himself, opening up the wooden box.

“Well lucky for you, Y/n, Noodle, I have a selection of the worlds finest ingredients right here in my travel factory.”

He got to work soon and made 2 different chocolates. While working, he explained how he started his business, how important his mom had been to him.

"She sounded like an amazing woman." You said, offering him a smile. Your smile comforted him.

Noodles was a cloud with a lightning bolt, yours was a heart-shaped one. You smiled at it, and he smiled back as he watched you both bite into it. You watched Noodle, but her smile disappeared.

“I wish you hadn’t done that.” She said, you quirked an eyebrow. You thought it was amazing.

“You didn’t like it?”

“No, I like it. It’s just…” you could tell she was hesitating to say something.

“Now each day I don’t have chocolate will be a little harder.”

You frowned at her, if you knew she had liked it before you would’ve saved up all the money in the world to buy it for her. Willy opened his mouth to speak but you spoke faster.

“I think I have a few sovereigns saved. Next time we go out, I will buy you as much as you want.” You said to her, a smile on your face she looked up at you.

“You already waste all your money on me.” She said, she already felt terrible about it. You did more for her than anyone else had ever.

“No need to.” Willy interrupted, you both turned to him now.

“How would you both like to have all the chocolate you can eat, all day, every day, for the rest of your life?”

“A lifetime supply?” Noodle asked.

“A lifetime supply.”

“What do we have to do?” She asked.

“Not much… just get me out of here.”

Noodle stood up, you remained seated and furrowed your eyebrows. How would you do that?

“Are you crazy?” She said loudly.

“Sh, sh, it’s easy. I’ll get someone to cover my shift, and y/n, you could smuggle me out of your laundry cart.”

You thought about it, and it wasn’t a terrible idea. You both looked at each other for a moment, then he turned back to Noodle when she began to protest.

“Just for a few hours, mind. No one will even know I was gone.”

“What’s the point in that?”

“To sell chocolate, of course! We’ll split the profits and pay off Mrs. Scrubitt in no time.”

“It’s a nice idea, Willy.” You started, he began to walk away to the window again.

“It’s a great idea.” He corrected.

“It is. But, it’ll never work. It would take forever to pay off all three debts. That’s 90,000 sovereigns.”

“It will work. I promise. Even if it does take a while. Eat your chocolate,” he said the last sentence to Noodle.

“And Mrs. Scrubbitts like a hawk. She keeps her beady eye on everything that comes out the wash house except…”

“There was that one time the aristocratic came and she was all over the poor man.” You said, they both turned to you.

“All we have to do is find an aristocrat and slip out while she’s distracted.”

“Where would we even find an aristocrat..?”

He also ate a piece of chocolate, and the lightbulb going off. Literally and metaphorically.

"Huh." he said.

"Huh?

"Huh."

"A double huh."

He turned back both of you now.

"Do you have a pencil and paper?"

"Yes, why?" you asked him

"I have an idea."

[jeonscatalyst]

https://x.com/inkedjkk/status/1831670685305114941?t=JUfQ9UQXLYowW2zfP1KgUA&s=19

Mind you this is some 9k+ followers acct

https://x.com/pinkorangesun/status/1831647803803902094?t=Gl9Z92VsCpcCa5GBQKJdOw&s=19

https://x.com/jikookreports/status/1831664356150386976?t=bWMuICdCMpkc3t7MGBTZng&s=19

I actually don't wish to be like a Tkkrs even on my worst enemy cause the guarantee of you ever turning to a normal human is 0 % there.

You know why I would never take these people seriously? They don’t even believe the things they say. They have spent years calling us jokers, laughing at us for believing in what we believe in and thinking we are gullible and stupid for letting the “company narrative” cloud our judgement of reality but look at the things they do. Why on earth would anyone feel the need to intentionally manipulate sub titles just to make it seem like Jk didn’t want to be there unless they are mighty insecure? I swear I wouldn’t feel the need to do any of these unless I am seriously worried that Jk might have been there because he actually wanted to be and I need to convince myself and my minions that he didn’t want to so we can feel better.

The funniest thing is, taekookers will have a much easier time if they just accepted that Jimin and Jungkook are friends who love each other. Because even if you really believe taekook is real why do you need to try to hard to invalidate the friendship of Jungkook and one of the members he’s known for over a decade? Friends can travel and do shows together can’t they? We know that Jungkook has been on multiple private trips with his friends outside of BTS, they’ve been around each other so much in chapter so why can’t they continue believing in their ship and just regard Jimin as one of Jk’s other friends? Unless they can’t do this because there is a part of them that sees exactly what we see and that frightens them. I have recieved asks from people sending me what some of the taekook blogs on here are saying and it is beyond ridiculous.

Imagine claiming that Jk was on his phone alot because Tae wasn’t in this episode like we didn’t all watch Tae spend 3/4 of his time in episode 4 and 5 on his phone when Jk was seated right next to him. So by their logic Tae has another lover who kept distracting him right? Plus Jk was actually on his phone in the episodes in Jeju too but it wasn’t as noticeable because there were two other people we could pay attention to while he was a bit distracted on his phone but when have taekookers ever cared for logic?

Imagine them also saying that Jk looked like he didn’t want to be there with Jimin in Sapporo Lmaoo. I think these people are forgetting that the trip in NY was the only one Jimin himself suggested. The trips to Jeju and Sapporo were BOTH Jimin and Jungkook’s ideas and from the look of things Jungkook might have been the one who suggested they go to Sapporo together, I mean he said this….

They also seem to forget that Jungkook is the one who spoke about wanting to do this till they are 50 and from the look of things he wasn’t joking because after NY, they went on to shoot in 2 other locations and might have done more if they had more time. Untop of that Jk basically spent this entire episode saying this….

I know they have never been good at listening to Jk but isn’t it common sense to know that if someone really doesn’t enjoy doing something they wouldn’t wanna do it again? Plus this whole travel show wasn’t an idea that came from the company (because I jusy know they would throw in the contract bullshit) this whole thing was only possible because Jimin and Jungkook wanted it to be. Jimin pitched the idea to the company with Jungkook’s approval and they made it happen so if Jungkook didn’t want it in the first place, even the NY trip wouldn’t have happened and that’s a fact.

They can go on crying about how Jk didn’t wanna be there even though we know he was the one who wanted to go back, or talk about how Jimin and Jungkook have no chemistry (we all saw the great chemistry taekook had in the jeju episodes with Tae being more interested in his phone and bed than anything else while Jungkook kept talking and interacting with Jimin mostly) but at the end of the day, when they look at this picture they know Jk was happy af to be there and only wanted to go back with the same person he was there with in 2017……

So let the haters cry. Let them gaslight themselves the way Jungkook was trying to gaslight himself about not liking the spicy braised chicken in Jeju lol. Let them continue convincing themselves that Jk had an awful time and only did it because he was contractually bound to while they have to wake up seeing this big smiles on his face while he is having a kdrama moment in the snow with his Jiminie hyung😌

PS: Notice how Jungkook said he normally doesn’t like walking? But we know that the longest walk he has had in his life was in Japan with Jimin where they even had to walk slowly because Jimin’s feet hurt and here he is in Sapporo again walking with Jimin because he doesn’t mind walking in the snow with his Jiminie hyung🥰

[herejusttosufferalong]

Here are my theories about N/L relationship. I am positive 50% is true, just not sure which 50%! They had chemistry from day 1, became friends and flirty with no feelings showing until the start of S3 filming. They couldn’t help the attraction, everybody on the set saw it and I think J felt it and discussions were had. Up to Sep 22, J referred to L’s mom and sis as MIL and SIL.

L/N were told that feelings may happen due to intensity, long hours, a uniquely shared experience and the roles they are acting. It was recommended for the sake of their careers they should wait and see if the feelings last. So ends, S3 filming. L goes to his Raya, young girl, vacay mode and ends up with A, who is a close friend of S. (I will not bring his SM fiasco from last year. That boy is just not savvy or astute enough to use SM to his professional advancement!) N starts dating E in April of last year. All is relatively hunky dory. Come Jan and PR training. They probably were just told to let go and let their natural chemistry shine, because PR people are not idiots! And boy, did they. A sees this and probably feels it too and starts to make some demands. She wants to be known as his gf and have an increase in her SM #, so she can monetize it. She posts Hotel locations, etc because they get to stay there at a reduced cost at the least. (The Soho vacays are just brag. L is the member, the rest are just friends that can go with him, but not alone). I am sure to a certain degree, A orchestrated the In Style fiasco.

Feelings get more confusing and complicated with N/L during the WT. A surprises L at the NYC premiere. He doesn’t seem thrilled about it, introduces A as a friend. During the A/N ‘intro’ and hug, A says she thinks N is funny! (She is, but an odd thing to say to your bf’s costar at an after party). Have no idea what other things happen behind the scenes, but all of us fall in love with Lukola. If they had had a wedding reception at the end of the London premiere, nobody would be surprised and there would be puddles of goo worldwide from our collective swooning.

Instead we got the pap pix.

Whoever arranged this is the single most evil and unromantic person in the world. We didn’t even get to watch part 2 and we were slapped hard and left confused. A can do whatever she wants, she will never have chemistry with L.

L got the backlash and N came to his rescue with a very sweet declaration. I think the SATC clip which was done during S3 filming was maybe supposed to bring the narrative to the show and funny things? or maybe N was upset by L��s behavior or inaction? I like to think N is not petty, but who knows. She took it down, because the comments went in the direction she wasn’t expecting. (She still needs to learn TT over Insta, they are different beasts.)

Apparently, E exited at some point. Maybe the romantic engagement dinner DM reported was actually a breakup?

Your post on LaLa land, I felt was too on the nose. With this current mess, maybe their professional advancement means no HEA. He did make a post and put LaLa Land?! She has made her career her priority. She is a Hamilton fan, she is not going to throw away her shot!! Is he subconsciously ruining his career? Does he just want to be in her presence and light? Can they work it out?

I brewed more coffee and am sitting at the restaurant with the rest of you. I just ordered a stack of pancakes with strawberries and whipped cream.

Your thoughts?

"Apparently, E exited at some point. Maybe the romantic engagement dinner DM reported was actually a breakup?"

It wasn't until recently that I considered they actual broke up or took a break around Nov/Dec '23 and then rekindled Feb/Mar '24

But that Nic sighting posted by DM was in Jan '24, no?

Maybe they reconnected sooner and then finally parted ways in Mar or early April

I know folks like to say that N wasn't as flirty or obvious until the end of the press tour but the April press junkets and livestream was something else

[dollypopup]

bridgerton season 3 part 2 spoilers

I want to preface this with saying that I have loved Polin for two years. Two years, hundreds of thousands of words, and almost 50 stories. I have loved this couple through fan edits, through fics, through rereads, through songs. I have loved this couple so deeply and earnestly and endlessly

And so my disappointment in Part 2 stems, predominately, from the fact that I just wish it had been better.

I wish it hadn't been as cut through with plotlines that went, ultimately, nowhere. Will and Alice with the tension of 'I don't want to give up the club' 'Well, you should to suit the status quo' 'Oh, okay'. Benedict with his 'I love being free. Let's shag freely!' 'I may have feelings for you' 'I still just want to shag freely, but now I'm opening up more options' (tho, congrats on the bisexuality!) Violet and Marcus who are just being set up for the final season. Cressida, who's story tugged my heartstrings so much, and ended up in the dirt.

But more than anything, I wish Colin had gotten more. There were so many moments where he could have been expanded upon, where his character could have shined, and I truly want to commend Luke Newton, he did a phenomenal job with the crumbs he was given, but was ultimately shoved to the wayside for the Lady Whistledown plot.

In truth, this is a writing problem. The actors are phenomenal. They have chemistry, they have passion, and they are all believable, but the writing fell flat. They gave too much time to side plots and, frankly, to Debling, who was such a nothingburger and didn't even return that it was evident he only existed because the series was afraid to lean fully into Colin's complexities. You know what is more compelling and more worthwhile to explore than 'Oh, I could lose her to someone else?'

Losing her to herself.

Colin spent part 2 ultimately SAD. And he had every right to be. But instead of fully exploring that, he was relegated to the sidelines to support Penelope's storyline. And I understand completely that this season was for the Pen stans, but damn, I wish he got SOMETHING. Kanthony's advice to him was useless, Colin started the series knowing he couldn't open up to his brothers and still not doing so by the end. Colin saying that his ultimate purpose was to support and love Pen was a horrific cop out and a disservice of his character. It's a bad plotline when a woman says so for a man, and it's a bad plotline when a man says so for a woman.

I love these two so much, and I feel like they could have had so much better. Penelope now writing the same gossip, tying herself to Mayfair, but under her name now, thus ensuring that people are aware and being different around her for the sake of her publication is bad. To imply that her dreams are Lady Whistledown is lazy- Lady Whistledown is a plot device the writers are unable to let go, not Penelope's ultimate dreams.

You want me to believe that this woman's biggest dreams are to continue writing gossip? Not novels? Not stories? Not an autobiography? Not to travel? Not to make more friends? But to have a baby and write about parties? They tried giving legitimacy to gossip as if Penelope ever had any peer review, as if she is the be all end all of what is and is not true- she cannot possibly know fully.

I wanted more for her than to be a teenage mum tied to a gossip blog. I wanted more for Colin than to publish a book offscreen and take over an estate until his son comes of age. I wanted more for POLIN. Their beautiful moments were truly BEAUTIFUL. That first time scene was lovely- but how much lovelier would it be after he knew who she was in full and accepted all of it? Their reconciliation felt hollow because he was not truly given the time to process it. The pain of separation, sleeping on the couch as she took the bed, was hardly explored outside of a few quick scenes.

No montage of their letters, no Colin standing beside her, and that Lady Whistledown reveal where everyone clapped? I don't understand it. I wish so much that this show took a good story and made it better, and that's where my bitterness lies. Not because I'm a hater, but because I'm a lover. I wanted to love it so, so much.

And I know it could have been better. My couple is better than this. My couple is better than Penelope's ultimate goal being independence and Colin's ultimate goal being an accessory. My couple is a pair of equals. My couple is a pairing of two people who love one another so damn much they can't even stand it. Where is my Penelope who fights for him? Where is my Colin who announces to the world he loves her?

I guess that Polin ended up on the cutting room floor in the edits, because what we got wasn't enough for me