#dude he is in second grade. give him a break

[speardovich]

some of the stuff i find on here about pump is insane i need you guys to remember he is like seven years old and looks like this

[hannieehaee]

LIKE YOU DO

18+ / mdi

summary: when your brother's best friend suddenly reveals his newfound crush on you, you find yourself at a crossroads, thinking back to your own unrequited crush on him from back in middle school, making you wonder if you should be the better person and give him a chance.

content: brother'sbestfriend!seungcheol, frienemies-ish to lovers, reader is jeonghan's adoptive sister of his same age, mentions of previous unrequited crush, lots of unserious banter, afab reader, they're both inexperienced, smut, penetrative sex, oral (f receiving), etc.

wc: 7.8k

a/n: this one was kinda short sorry T-T i rlly enjoyed the concept though so it was fun to write! hope u guys enjoy!!

masterlist | kofi/patreon

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"Jeonghan?"

"Yeah?"

"Why does Seungcheol keep showing up during my breaks to bring me coffee?"

"Oh. He's trying to break you down so he can ask you out," He responded in the most nonchalant way possible.

"What? Since when does Seungcheol even like me?"

"Are you kidding? he's had a huge crush on you since we were seventeen."

"Dude, what? Where the hell was that attitude back in middle school when I was following him around like a fucking loser?", you grumbled at the memory of your former unrequited crush.

It was pathetic to think about, but it was true. You had sadly had a tendency to follow your brother and his friend around during the majority of your tweens and teens, always carrying the false hope that Seungcheol would one day look your way. As expected, he never even so much as glanced at you during that period of your life.

It's not like you could blame him. You were just a few years behind the rest of the herd when it came to puberty, you were still donning braces and also had a less than favorable sense of style. By all means, you were a bit of a loser up until turning 16. However, it was still sad to know that the guy of your dreams simply saw you as a nuance he had to deal with in exchange for being able to hang out with your brother.

Except that had been well over two years ago (give or take). By the time you were 16 and a junior in high school, you were confidently over your crush. You had stopped following him around by the time you entered the second half of your teens, but your crush would still occasionally show remnants of itself any time he was around (which was often, as he and Jeonghan were practically attached to the hip). However, it was far more lowkey than before and eventually died down altogether. You were long past those awkward years of tweenhood and now had a developed sense of style, along with an air of confidence you now carried with you. Puberty hit you all at once and your entire persona changed along with it. You had an established group of friends and were even a bit popular, no longer needing to hang around Jeonghan and Seungcheol just for a glimpse of the boy's attention. By the time you were 16, you were over Choi Seungcheol.

This carried over to the last two years of high school, now with a completely different dynamic between you and your former crush. Despite attending the same grades at the same time, you did not belong to the same social circles, so you would not see each other too often. However, since your brother (and brother's best friend) continued to attend the same school as you those last two years of high school, you still bumped into Cheol from time to time, specially whenever Jeonghan would bring him over.

Over the years, Seungcheol came to see you as less of a nuance and more of a friend. After turning 16 (upon your glow up and the dissipation of your crush), he would engage in casual conversation with you. He would even seek you out on his own at times, though you were never too enthusiastic about these meetings. Middle school you would've been elated at such development, but you didn't think much of it after having gotten over your crush, now bitter over how it had all played out so fruitlessly for you.

After having gotten over your crush, you came to resent Seungcheol a bit, now realizing the way he used to sometimes take advantage of your crush to get you to be his lackey and how he would even make you the butt of jokes among his friend group (whenever your brother wasn't around, of course). During the years in which you were infatuated with him, you truly believed it was just some sort of inside joke between the two of you; a 'will they, won't they' type of dynamic. However, upon leaving that childish phase of your life, you began to look back at it in embarrassment. After that, you distanced yourself from him. During ages 16 and up, you would even come to avoid him, something which Jeonghan thankfully never commented on despite having also been aware of your former crush.

And now. Now you were being made privy to the fact that Seungcheol had apparently begun to return your crush only a little over a year after you got over yours. At seventeen, Jeonghan said. That's the year you like to believe you truly got your act together. After your glow up at 16 years of age (appearance and personality-wise), you began to engage in new hobbies, new friend groups, and overall went through a full transformation of your former loser self (or at least that's how Seungcheol had made you feel all those years). You had put all relationship related interests aside since your catastrophic crush on Seungcheol left you high and dry. After graduating, you even left the country for a few months, deciding to start college a semester after your brother to explore the world a bit in order to find yourself before starting school back up again.

That period of time proved very useful to you. You mingled in the arts of casual dating in your absence (something which you had never done thanks to your irremovable crush), made friends, took up new interests, and most of all, grew out of any remnants of your former feelings for Seungcheol.

Except that all came crumbling down the moment you came back, suitcase in hand, and found Seungcheol at the door of your brother's apartment upon your arrival for your move-in day with your brother, which now seemed to include Seungcheol in the equation.

You had been less than elated when your brother suddenly informed you that instead of solely moving in with him in order to begin attending his university, you would now be sharing the apartment with an unwanted guest – Seungcheol. This had been the first time you saw him again after graduating, which had also been your last day to see anyone for the past six months over the duration of your trip.

Since your brother had begun attending school while you took a sabbatical from education, he had found himself an apartment so you would have a place to move into upon your return. The agreement had been for the two of you to be the sole habitants, until Seungcheol suddenly decided to attend the same university as you and your brother, promptly moving in with Jeonghan in your absence. It seemed like that had been the original plan, one which died when Seungcheol simply decided to stay, moving his things out what was supposed to be your room and moving them into what then became a shared room between him and Jeonghan.

This was when you first began to have suspicions about Seungcheol.

Although your crush had died down about two years back, you still felt awkward in his presence. His existence was a constant reminder of his consistent rejection of your feelings, something which had not helped your confidence much in the past. But it now seemed like Seungcheol had been the one seeking you out more than the other way around. Even back when you were saying your goodbyes before leaving on your vacation, Seungcheol had seemed even more disappointed at your prolonged absence than your own brother. You hadn't thought much of it at the time, except that this behavior kept up as the two of you became roommates.

Seungcheol would now walk you to class whenever possible, even when it meant going out of his way. He would lend you notes from the classes he had taken the prior semester; ones which you were currently having to take. He would show up between your classes with either drink or food in hand. He'd stop by your workplace at the school's cafe whenever he had down time. He'd stare down any guy that would try and interact with you in any of these instances. You were completely casual about it, trying to not read too much into it, but the worst thing about it all was that you liked it. You liked the attention he was finally giving you.

Though you were suspicious about Seungcheol's intentions, you had never considered the possibility of Seungcheol actually liking you romantically until your brother had so casually informed you just now. Even through your immediate complaint about it, your heart sped up at the thought. Your mind went back to every single memory of your own crush on him, thinking back to every single thing you used to like about him. Up until the moment in which Jeonghan called your attention once more, having answered your question but receiving no response from you due to the extended internal monologue you had gone through due to the sudden revelation.

"Sorry, what did you say?", you finally responded.

He chuckled at your absent-mindedness, taking a sip of the coffee in front of him. "I said that your crush was just puppy love. He can't help that he didn't return your feelings at the time. It's been like what, three years since you got over him? Are you really still mad about it?", replied Jeonghan as he nudged you to eat the muffin he had bought you over twenty minutes ago.

Puppy love? It sure didn't feel like it during all those years in which you pined over him. But maybe Jeonghan was right. Maybe it had simply been interpreted as a harmless crush by both Seungcheol and Jeonghan. Except this did not justify every single remembrance of Seungcheol's constant dismissal and mockery of your feelings through the years, only ever looking your way once you were finally over him.

You took a deep breath, deciding to try and be rational in your response, "He mocked me over my crush for years, Jeonghan. He made me the butt of every joke and took advantage of how into him I was for his own entertainment. He only ever started respecting me when I changed my appearance and personality completely. Why should I even consider giving him a chance?"

"Hey, I'm not telling you to do that. Just keep an open mind, okay? We were kids. I'm sure he meant it all in good fun. You know he can be kind of an idiot at times," he took a pinch of the untouched muffin in front of you, "Is there no part of you that maybe still likes him?"

"Did you come to my workplace to harass me into dating your best friend?", you snatched the muffin away – the muffin he had 'bought' despite getting a discount due to your position as a barista, "I'm not the same loser I was in middle school, I have options."

"Oh, yeah?", he smirked, "Then how come you've never had a boyfriend?"

"I'm only 19, it's not like I've dedicated my entire life to celibacy. If I wanted one I could get one. Easy," you argued, "Are you gonna leave any time soon? I need to get back to work," you began to gather his and your cup to head back to your work duties.

"There's literally no one here," he whined, "And stop dodging my questions. Do you like him? Do you want a relationship or not?", he pushed, "I'm your brother, you're supposed to trust me with this type of stuff."

"Adoptive brother," you corrected as you wiped the table Jeonghan was still sitting at.

"Don't say that. I hate it when you say that," he whined.

"You know what? You're right," you decided, halting your movements.

"I am?"

"Yeah. I should get a boyfriend."

"Oh. You mean someone who isn't Seungcheol, don't you?", he sighed.

"Of course. I'm not just gonna come crawling back to him just because he decided he likes me now. And you're right. Now that I'm over my crush and I'm back home, I should get a boyfriend. Maybe that'll get Cheol off of me," you declared.

"So it is about Cheol then."

"Jeonghan, shut up!"

Things changed for you after that conversation. Or at least the way you looked at Seungcheol shifted.

While you had questioned why he would suddenly begin showing up as frequently as he did, showing genuine interest in your company, you had not once entertained the thought of him liking you. Jeonghan informing you of his crush in such a nonchalant way also made you realize that Seungcheol had been quite obvious about his sudden liking to you, always becoming standoffish when other guys were around and even carrying your backpack for you.

The thought of him liking you pleased you. Even if you wanted to be in denial about it, your crush finally being reciprocated was something you had given hope on back when you were about 15. However, knowing that Seungcheol only started seeing you in a non platonic way after your feelings had finally dissipated also annoyed you beyond belief. How was it fair? He got to tease you and treat you as if you were nothing but a nuance for years, only to turn around a few years later and decide he wanted you? You weren't about to stand for it.

You meant it when you told Jeonghan that you would consider entering the dating scene.

For years, you hoped Seungcheol would eventually like you back, so you never even as much as looked in anyone else's way. When you got over your crush, your pride was too wounded to even think about romance. The only exception had been during your trip overseas, where you dated boys here and there, but it was never anything that lasted over a few weeks. Now was finally the time to begin dating.

Okay, granted. Maybe part of you was doing this just to give Seungcheol a taste of his own medicine, but that part didn't matter too much. You decided you'd just disregard his crush just like he did yours; drinking in all the extra attention but never doing anything about it

~

"Hey, wait up!"

You slowed down without looking back, able to recognize that voice even in your sleep.

"Forget about me? I always walk you to your next class," he chuckled, breathless, "Uh, here. Got you your favorite," he said as he handed you a beverage of your choice.

"Thanks, Cheol," you replied, disinterested as usual.

Even before knowing about his intentions, you had kept a very clear emotional distance from Seungcheol for the past couple of years. You were sure he was aware that your crush had died down years ago, now leaving you completely indifferent towards him, but he never once brought it up. The most reaction you could gauge out of him was the way he deflated a bit every time you spoke to him and failed to show the same enthusiasm you once did.

"So, any plans this weekend?"

"Oh, yeah. Going on a date," you said nonchalantly.

This made him stop in his tracks, causing you to have to slow down your walking once again to turn back and look at him in feigned interest.

"A date? W-what, with who?", he spluttered, a frown making its way on his face.

"Just some guy I met on tinder," you responded, "C'mon, I need to get to class," you nudged him.

He took your instruction to keep walking, still frowning, "A guy from tinder? You don't even know him? I- Is your brother okay with this?"

"It's not really any of his business, now, is it?", you scoffed.

"Since when are you even dating anyway? I thought you needed time to 'find yourself'. Isn't that the whole reason you were gone for half a year?", grumbled Seungcheol.

"Not like it's any of your business, but yeah, I am dating. I'm 19, it's not like I've never dated. I went on dates while I was traveling. It's not that big of a deal."

"You dated? What? And you never told me?"

This made you stop in your tracks, turning to him and making him halt too.

"'Tell you'? Why would you need to know anything about my dating life? We're not even friends."

"Oh, so now we're not friends? I've known you literally since the day Jeonghan's parents brought you home and now we're not friends?", he was beginning to get agitated, you could tell.

Pushing his buttons was fun at first, but now you were also starting to feel frustration at his entitlement over you.

"As far as I can remember, we've never been friends. You just liked the attention I gave you and made a joke of me for years. Is that friendship to you?"

"We- we shouldn't talk about this here, okay?" he looked around to see if anyone was paying attention to the two of you, but saw that only a few other students were walking by, completely unsuspecting.

"You know what, Cheol? Thanks for the drink. I can get to class alone. I'll see you at home," you snatched your bag from his arms and marched away, leaving a confused Seungcheol behind.

"Cheol told me you guys got into a fight," was the first thing Jeonghan said as he walked into your workplace at 7:30 sharp in the morning.

"God, it's bad enough I have to live with the two of you, do you need to gossip about me too?"

"I told you about his crush in confidence! I can't believe you'd betray my trust like this," he said with zero emotion behind his words.

"No you didn't."

"No I didn't", he giggled, "Give me my usual, yeah?", he took a seat on the counter right in front of you, grabbing a nearby muffin to accompany the drink you were now making him.

"So you're really dating now?", he inquired after less than five seconds of silence.

"How much did Seungcheol tell you?"

"He gave me a rundown of the entire conversation."

You groaned at this. Men were truly the nosier gender.

"Yes, I'm going on a date with some guy from one of my classes tomorrow."

"I thought you said he was from tinder?"

"I just assumed it'd annoy Cheol even more if he thought I was choosing some random guy over him."

"That's mean", he pouted, followed by a grin, "Good job."

You handed him his drink and took a moment to sit down from your side of the counter, sighing dramatically at your brother.

"Are you really not interested in Cheol at all?", he rubbed at your arm to show comfort.

"I ... Maybe? I liked him for so long. It's hard for that to just go away, specially knowing he likes me back. But I can't just let him win me over so easily, you know?"

"Maybe you should talk to him? Let him explain his thought process and see if it's worth giving him a chance."

"Maybe," you sighed.

"Not 'maybe.' You're talking to him. Spending a single night with the two of you while you were icing each other out was enough for me. I told him I'd stay somewhere else tomorrow night so the two of you can talk after your date. It's a done deal."

"Dude! Can you stop making decisions for me? I-"

"I'm your older brother. It's in the fine print," he argued.

"Adoptiv-"

He grabbed the muffin and put it to your lips, interrupting your sentence, "That's enough of that."

You opted to just let him win (yet again) and mentally prepare yourself for your conversation with Seungcheol the following day.

Joshua.

That was the name of the guy you'd be going on a date with this afternoon.

He was cute, polite, smart, and seemed to be an overall great guy based on the few interactions you'd had with him during class. He was actually who you used to walk to class with before Seungcheol had intercepted your routine by forcing his way into your schedule.

You weren't particularly excited about going on this date. Joshua was the perfect guy by all means, but you didn't feel any type of spark when you were with him. You were pretty sure he didn't either. It was hard to tell. Nothing really compared to the way you felt for Seungcheol during the majority of your teens. You doubted you'd ever crush on someone so hard ever again.

You had never admitted it out loud, but you were pretty sure your crush on Seungcheol had at some point become love. You didn't just like Seungcheol, you (had) loved him, which made getting over your infatuation even harder. It had also made that unbecoming feeling of rejection much harder to let go of. The reminder of the constant rejection you had gone through was enough to not even entertain the idea of looking at Seungcheol with the same enamored eyes you always reserved for him ever again.

And so now you were getting ready for your date. Whether anything came of it didn't matter too much to you. You needed to show both Seungcheol and your brother that you were truly over Seungcheol. That you wouldn't fall for him when it was finally convenient for him.

~

The date was overall nice.

The two of you had opted for something casual, deciding to an arcade and have a casual meal that consisted of nachos and some convenience store ramen afterwards.

The date felt like an outing you'd have with any other friend. Maybe because that's what it actually was in the end.

It didn't take too much time into your date for both you and Joshua to say what you were thinking – You were better off as friends. You both chuckled at it, finding it comedic how you had both had the same thought, meaning there would be no hard feelings at the end of the day.

The night was spent playing games and bantering with one another. It was a casual and quite relaxing outing between two friends. Which is what left Joshua to inquire as to why you had asked him out in the first place as he walked you back to your apartment.

"There's, uh, this guy I'm trying to get over," you decided to be honest with him. You could really see a friendship forming here, plus he seemed like a trustworthy guy, so lying would be fruitless.

"Ah. Makes sense", he clicked his tongue, "Is it Choi Seungcheol by any chance?"

That caught you off guard. And it must've shown in your face, as Joshua chuckled in return before continuing.

"I've just noticed the two of you together a lot lately, that's all. What's the story?"

If only Joshua had known about the length of the story you were about to tell him, he likely would not have asked, but the simple question was enough to fire you up and let him in on every excruciating detail.

By the end of it, Joshua's face had gone through every reaction. From surprised, to angry (likely in empathy), to apprehensive.

"Well, he sounds like he was a dick in high school-"

"Right!"

"But ...."

"'But'?!"

"Listen. You were what, 15? Guys are so dumb at that age. I did my fair share of dumb things. And having a pretty girl be so into you at that age would give any guy a huge ego. Maybe he's being honest about his feelings," he had reasoned.

"Why is everyone on his side? What, am I supposed to just forgive him?"

"Of course not. But maybe part of you still likes him. You shouldn't let your pride get in the way of finally being with the guy you like."

That last statement had left you thinking.

You already had doubts about your feelings for Cheol, knowing that your conflict towards his newfound feelings was enough indication to realize that you might've still been holding a torch for him.

But it was his comment about pride that really had you reconsidering things.

Was it really just your pride stopping you from even giving Seungcheol a chance?

The way that you saw it, if you gave in to Seungcheol now that he finally liked you back, it only proved how weak you were for him, how easy it was for him to just snap his fingers and have you at his feet once again.

But you also needed to consider the fact that he had liked you since seventeen. You were both nineteen now, going on twenty. He had held back on his feelings for two years, hoping that you'd someday reciprocate once more. Clearly he wasn't hoping to use your old crush against you, or else he would've done so already.

These conflicting thoughts plagued your mind all the way until Joshua hugged you goodbye at your apartment door, while you were unaware of Seungcheol watching the two of you with a frown from the small window behind you, completely misreading the situation.

"Joshua Hong? That's the guy you're dating?", were the first words he said to you when you walked in, fully washed with venom and disdain.

This was starting off well.

"Were you spying on me?"

"You didn't answer my question," he rebutted.

You walked past him and let yourself fall back on the couch, sighing at the conversation you knew was awaiting.

"Cheol. Stop beating around the bush by snooping into my life," you started, the beating of your heart betraying the confidence in your voice, "Jeonghan told me you wanted to talk, so talk."

"Is there even a point? If you're already taken, do I even have a chance?", he chuckled bitterly, taking a seat across from you on a lone loveseat.

Oh.

This was the first time Seungcheol had ever acknowledged his romantic feelings towards you in the two years in which he's supposedly had them. It made you feel weak to admit it, but that statement alone already had your resolve melting.

"I- I'm not taken. Joshua and I are just friends."

"You came back home together at 10. You're wearing a skirt. I saw the two of you hug outside. Am I missing something?", he scoffed.

"Dude, I- What? Those are all completely platonic things. Not like you have any right to complain anyways .." you trailed off.

"Okay, if it's not a date then why did you tell me it was one on Wednesday? Huh?"

"Because I wanted you to know what it felt like!", you blurted, abruptly getting up from the couch.

"What? You-"

"It's not fair, Seungcheol! I liked you. For years. And you never looked my way. You made fun of me, you used me, you ignored me. I was just some dumbass who couldn't take a hint, and now you like me? Now you wanna know who I'm dating and who I like? Hah," you were halfway through your rambles before you realized it.

He got up from his spot and walked over to you, solemn and hurt look on his face. He seemed embarrassed by your statement, though also accepting of it.

"You- you're right. I never took you seriously. I ... I always just saw you as Jeonghan's weird little sister, I-"

"We're the same age!"

"Okay, but Jeonghan was always so protective towards you, I always thought of you as a little kid. I'm sorry, I know how harsh and unfair that sounds, but I don't want to lie to you. I don't know what changed, or when it did, but I- at some point I just couldn't stop thinking about you," he breathed out.

"Hah," you chuckled bitterly, "Was this when I changed my look, Cheol? Are you that shallow?"

"N-no! Listen, I know the timing was bad, but it wasn't that. I always thought you were pretty. I know you probably didn't see it for yourself, and ... I know my teasing probably didn't help your confidence, – and that's something I regret so badly – but you've always been beautiful. It had nothing to do with that, I swear," he held his hand to his chest as if to swear by his words.

You couldn't help blushing at his words, avoiding eye contact for a moment before responding.

"Then what was it?"

"I guess I just missed you", he shrugged sadly, "I got so used to having you around and to knowing how much I meant to you. I took you for granted, and I regretted it the moment I lost you," it was his turn to feel embarrassed, "When you stopped seeking me out, I finally began to see what you were like past your crush. You were so fun and carefree. So nice and, and beautiful. You saw me in rose-colored glasses and I just didn't see you at all. Not until then," he finished.

"What does this all mean, Cheol?" you said, almost exasperated, "Am I supposed to forget the way you'd mock me or just straight up ignore me for years? Yeah, sure, we were kind of beginning to become friends once high school was almost over, but it didn't mean anything to me by that point. I was just over it."

"And are you over me?"

"What?"

He lifted his eyebrow in question, taking a few steps towards you.

"Are you really completely over me? Do you feel nothing at all?", his eyes were confidently following your gaze as he questioned you.

"I- Yes, I am," you gulped unwillingly, taking a few steps back as he took some forward.

"I don't believe that. I mean, you left only for a few months and I never stopped thinking about you ... There's no way you got over me that suddenly, is there?"

"You think too highly of yourself, Cheol-"

"So you feel nothing at all?", he had made his way into your personal space by now, almost crowding you against the wall, "Aren't you curious, at least? Don't you wanna see if there's anything left?", he breathed out.

"I, Cheol, I-"

"Just tell me no. Push me away. Tell me to fuck off and I'll leave you alone," his gaze fell to your lips, slowly making its way back to your eyes again.

"I can't, I ... Cheol ..."

Due to your lack of rejection, Seungcheol closed the gap, gently pressing his lips against you as he let out a breath of relief in his kiss.

You'd kissed a few boys during your time away. Hell, you'd even kissed Joshua earlier today, but neither of those experiences had felt quite like this. During all those exchanges, Seungcheol had always somehow been in the back of your mind, making you wonder what it would've been like if he had been the guy you were kissing instead. Now you finally knew what it was like ... And you were already growing addicted.

It was only a few seconds into the kiss when the two of you let your desire for the other take over. He groaned against your lips as you ran your hands through his hair, pulling his face as close to your own as possible. His hands ran down to your waist and caressed your back in a way far too desperate for the first kiss shared between the two of you.

With no words, he kissed you until running out of breath, eventually lowering his head so he could attack your neck with licks and nips to the sensitive skin on there. You leaned your head to the side, allowing him more room to suck into as he rejoiced in your sighs of pleasure.

It was a mutual exchange. The two of you seemed to be equally desperate for the other, your wandering hands never halting in the exploration of the other's body. His hands eventually dared to venture under your top, slowly sneaking their way towards your breasts. He kissed your lips once more as his hands caressed and played with your tits, moaning against your mouth every time you'd whine at his touches.

"Angel ...", he breathed against your lips, "Are you still sure? Are you still sure you don't want me?", his words were slightly muffled by his inability to disconnect from you for more than a second.

"I need- fuck, Cheol ... Just-"

"I know ... It's okay. You don't have to say it," he pushed his tongue into your mouth once again.

Cheol separated from you and led you to your room by your hand, closing the door before pressing you up against it and kissing you again.

The way he kissed you was nothing but sensual and full of emotion, making you forget any complaint you had against him as his lips connected to yours again and again.

His hands took advantage of your caged in position, feeling up every curve and squeezing at his favorite parts. There was a depraved urgency behind his movements, almost as if he had been aching to do this; burning to finally have you to his full disposition. When he seemingly had his fill of caressing every inch, he pulled away barely enough to speak (which had been a feat, as your lips desperately followed his, and his own were unable to resist yours at first).

"Let me take you to bed," be begged, "I've wanted you for years. Please, let me have you," he plead against your lips, giving you a languid peck as he finished his request.

"Cheol ..."

He pulled away a bit more at the hesitancy in your voice, "I know I was an asshole. I know I hurt you for years. I know I don't deserve you," he took a deep breath before intensely looking into your eyes, "but I can't stop thinking about you. If you ever felt even an ounce of what I've felt towards you since we were seventeen, then I'm so sorry to have caused you such pain. I was a stupid teenager who felt too cool to look your way long enough to realize you were far too good for me. Please. Please, I'll beg if you want me to , just ... Give me a chance," he finished with a pained expression in his eyes, voice wavering by the end of his speech.

"You made me feel like such an idiot, like-"

"I'm the idiot – Me! You're perfect," he grabbed onto your hands and brought them up to his lips, "I love you. So much. Jeonghan's so fed up of hearing me tell him how in love with you I am. All my friends know how I feel about you. I'll embarrass myself time and time again proving it to you," dropping your hands, he wrapped his arms around you again, bringing you closer to him as his eyes dropped to your lips.

That had been a shock.

You had never expected for Seungcheol's feelings to be anything more than superficial, much less did you expect for him to confess to you in such a way. The thought of him gushing about you to his friends was enough to make you blush, but knowing that he was willing to prove his feelings for you as much as you saw fit made you weak at the knees. This was all you had ever wanted, tenfold. If your current reaction to his revelation was anything to go by, then you were now realizing that your feelings for him had never truly gone away. You had carried a torch for Seungcheol all these years, even when you thought you had completely gotten over him. Even when you weren't thinking of him, he was always plaguing your mind.

And so you kissed him.

You put all previous hesitancy aside and followed your desires, pulling him to you as you let passion take over.

He didn't question you, choosing to press you up against him instead, blindly walking the two of you towards your bed and laying you down in it, crawling on top of you once more to keep kissing you.

No words were exchanged for a while, the only sounds filling up the room were made up of your collective moans and the ruffling of the bedsheets – result of the way you were feeling each other up. You were glad Jeonghan had decided to stay elsewhere tonight. Hell, he probably knew the two of you would snap and end up in the way you evidently did.

Pulling away for a quick moment, Seungcheol pulled away and threw off his shirt, causing the cloudiness in your mind to clear up for a moment so you could lean up and run your hands through his bare chest, earning a chuckle from him.

"Like what you see?", he smirked like the cockiest shit you'd ever seen, except it kinda worked on you regardless.

But you couldn't let him have the upper hand here, so you did what any sensible girl would do and threw off your own top, leaving you in a pretty lacy bralette.

The smirk wiped off his face immediately as his eyes lowered to your breasts. To make matters worse for him, you decided to sensually pull off your bra, making a little show out of it just to see how much lust would overtake him at the sight.

"Fuck ...", he muttered, leaning down so he could get his hands on you.

You stopped him before he could, however. Smirking at him, "You have to ask, Cheollie."

"Angel ... Don't play this with me."

"Ask, or else you can't touch me."

"I- Fuck. Please. Can I touch them?," he breathed out, eyes still glued to your chest as you played with your own mounds just to mock him.

You nodded, taking his arms and leading them to your chest.

He took full advantage of this, feeling you up like a starved man devouring his last meal. His mouth joined in on the fun soon after, kissing and licking at your nipples, groaning whenever your hands would pull at his hair.

He undressed the rest of you during the following minutes, making quick work of your shoes, his own, and your skirt. His pants were the last to go, leaving the two of you in just your underwear.

"Help me take it off?", he led your hands to his hardened cock, hooking your fingers on his boxers so you could get them off for him. You pulled his face down to your own and sucked on his tongue as your other hand aided him in removing his boxers. He did the same to your panties, finally crawling on top of you again, with your bare crotches finally facing one another.

"Fuck, I want you so bad," he breathed against your lips, beginning a slow grind against your cunt.

You ground against each other like animals in heat for a while, losing your breaths with the other's lips. The way his hardened length graced your folds with the perfect friction had you getting wetter by the second, making you wail against his lips.

"Can I eat you out, baby?," he groaned into your mouth, a desperate look in his eyes.

"Y-yes, fuck," you cried.

He kissed at your nude body on his way down, licking and sucking splotches of red and purple wherever he could until reaching your thighs, using his strong arms to open them and wedge himself between them.

"God ... Been dreaming of kissing up these thighs for years. You're so fucking gorgeous, do you even know?", he sounded pained as he said so, pressing soft kisses at the softest part of your thighs, "Dreamt about you since were seventeen," he blew cold air into your cunt, causing you to retract a bit.

"Cheol ..."

"Is this how you felt? Huh? Did you want me just as badly as I did you?", he finally gave you an experimental lick, groaning at the taste, "But you never got over me, did you? That's good," he nodded to himself, licking more and more, "That way I get to keep you," and that was all he could say before his mouth became fully occupied by your cunt.

And he was right. Even as your crush died down, you got older and began to have thoughts about him. Thoughts that accompanied you on the many lonely nights while you were abroad and away from him. During all those nights in which you swore you were over him. It was nice to know that you'd had a similar effect on him these past few years.

You didn't have much time to ponder about it as Seungcheol quite literally lost himself between your legs. His arms proved to be as strong as they looked, forcing your legs open even as the stimulation made you try and close them around his head. His groans of pleasure against your weeping cunt did not help matters, simply leading you to your end all the faster.

"Fucking delicious, fuck. No one's ever had this before, right, beautiful? You've been saving this cunt for me? Hmm?", he slurred his words while he made out with your pussy, groaning once more when you whimpered in confirmation, "Need to taste you, angel. Cum for me, fuck. Wanna be the first one to feel you like this," he rambled, delirious on your taste.

And you were equally as delirious, falling apart for him almost as if your body had been following his direction. He continued to make sinful sounds against your cunt as he tasted you all through your high, making you even more lightheaded than you already were.

Giving you no time to recover, Seungcheol climbed atop you once more and made you swallow any words you may have had by sealing your lips with his own, forcing your the remnants on your taste onto your own tongue. You battled each other like this once more, hands careless as they grabbed at one another in desperation.

"C-condom?", be pulled away to ask.

"No, Cheol. I- You don't carry?", you managed to let out.

"I, No. I- I've never ..."

He looked uncharacteristically bashful, making you tilt your head in curiosity. Until it hit you.

"You're a virgin?"

He pulled away at this, sitting up a bit on the bed and creating a small distance between the two of you.

"It's not- I've done stuff before, just not ... this. I, uh, I was waiting for you," he confessed, forcing his eyes away from your gaze.

This broke your heart, but in a good way.

If you had any remnants of doubt in your mind about his sincerity about his crush, they were gone now. He had waited. For you. He wanted you to be his first, so he waited for you to come back. He waited for you to like him again. In the same way you had never seriously dated anyone before, he waited.

"Cheol ..."

He must've misinterpreted your tone, as he continued to refuse eye contact with you, seemingly embarrassed at being a virgin for some reason.

So you took matters into your hands, grabbing onto him with a confident hand and pulling him into you once more. With some unexpected strength, you managed to switch positions with him, now straddling him as his back laid against your mattress.

Before he could question you, you kissed him again, this time with a passion you knew you could only reserve for Seungcheol. He kissed you back with equal want, making you feel like you'd reached a stage of nirvana no one had ever before. Every emotion behind the kiss was far too intense to even describe.

The rest of the exchange was almost wordless, with a few silences being filled by praise for one another. You finally sat yourself down on him, condomless, but not regretful at all for your decision. If you were to ever let anyone impale you without filter, it'd be him.

The bruises he left on your hips were accepted with delight. It was only fair, seeing as your nails also left marks on his chest. The two of you left your mark on the other; a silent way of letting the other know who they belonged to.

You bounced and ground on top of him, almost wailing at the way in which his hands guided your movements in such a desperate way. At some point you began shamelessly humping against each other, filling the space with depraved sounds of pleasure.

Cheol looked down to the spot connecting you, groaning upon seeing the wetness seeping from your cunt, but decidedly bringing a hand towards your mound in order to toy with your clit. The arch of your back and extra tightness of your cunt were enough for his orgasm to approach more rapidly than planned.

"With me," he rasped, "Cum with me ... Need your first time to be with me. Just like this."

You barely registered his words. Your eyes were already rolled back, and your back arched almost to the point of breaking. Your toes completely curled and your nails digging into his reddened chest. But you understood, and your body acted accordingly, bringing you into orgasm as he softly counted you down, leading to an almost perfectly synchronized high.

A few moments of comfortable silence (sans the heavy breathing) went by before Seungcheol carefully pulled out of you with a low groan and did his best at cleaning you up with some kleenex near your bed. He gave you a soft peck after he was done, settling the two of you under the covers and held you in his arms.

"Always wanted this part too."

"Hmm?"

"To hold you like this", he clarified, smiling down at you.

Blushing involuntarily, you agreed, cuddling further into his warm chest, leading him to softly run his hands up and down your back in a comforting manner.

"I meant everything I said. I'll always regret treating you the way I did. There's no reason why you should, but I hope you'll forgive me," he sounded pained at his own words, likely feeling genuine hatred for the way in which he behaved during your early teenage years.

You pulled away from his chest, creating a small distance between you so you could look into his eyes properly.

"Seungcheol, I ... I love you," you started, "And I forgive you. I was wrong to judge you so harshly for not liking me the way I wanted you to back then. I'm sorry for letting my pride get in the way. I shouldn't have iced you out after I got over you. It was the only way at the time to protect myself from the rejection and-"

"Stop," he went to hold your cheeks in his hands, "You have nothing to apologize for. You forgiving me is all I wanted, and ... and knowing you feel the same is more than I was ever expecting. We'll move past all that, okay?"

"Okay," you nodded sweetly.

"Now ... Is it too soon to ask you to be official?"

"You waited until after popping my cherry to ask me out?", you laughed.

"In my defense ..."

"You have none!"

"Okay, whatever! Just say yes so Jeonghan doesn't continue to suffer through my rants about how much I like his sister," he pulled you into his arms again, returning your laughter.

"Fine! Yes! We're official," you feigned annoyance, but were unable to not mimic his own smile.

It had taken far too long, but you finally had the upper hand. He liked you. He asked you out. He was yours. The wait had been worth it.

To read short 2k word continuation u can go join my monthly tier on kofi or patreon!

content: smut, penetrative sex, deprived cheol, banter with jeonghan, etc.

wc: 989 (teaser); 2009 (full drabble)

sneak peak:

"Okay, I need the two of you to get the hell out of my apartment."

That had been the way in which Jeonghan welcomed the two of you upon walking in on you and Seungcheol calmly watching a movie together in your shared living room.

It had now been three months since you and Seungcheol began officially dating. Since you were roommates, this also meant that you were now living with your boyfriend. Despite the fact that Cheol and your brother shared a room together (leaving you with a room of your own), Seungcheol still had the tendency of spending a few nights per week sleeping over at your room.

So far, the dynamic between the three of you hadn't changed too much. The biggest difference was that now you and Seungcheol finally developed more of a friendship than you had during the period of time between high school and college in which you had begun to ice him out in order to protect your own feelings. That, however, died down as soon as you moved in, eventually leading to your current romantic relationship with each other.

Jeonghan had been happy for you, having known that if he forced the two of you (and subsequently left you two alone in the apartment) to talk, you'd inevitably end up confessing your feelings and finally getting together. He had seen it coming since middle school, he had said. It only took about six years for his matchmaking to come into fruition, but it led to some pretty interesting slowburn – his words, not yours.

In these past three months, however, some awkward moments had arisen.

Being your brother, Jeonghan always found it uncomfortable whenever he happened to be around when you and Seungcheol would do couple activities. Seeing you hang out was fine, obviously, but a few weird instances had already left him traumatized.

So far, he had walked in on you making out a total of five times, feeling each other up over your clothes two times, Seungcheol making eyes at you seven times, had come across your discarded underwear three times, and had even walked in on you having sex once. At some point a line had to be drawn, and apparently he had chosen that to he now.

"Dude, you're the one who wanted us to get together," you argued.

"I wanted the mutual pining to stop, not to almost walk in on my sister getting railed every other day. Leave!," he said, though he simply sat down on the couch, forcibly creating a wedge between you and Cheol.

"Let's just go to your room, babe," Seungcheol got up, taking your hand while giving Jeonghan a dirty look, "Nuance," he grumbled.

"You're the nuance," responded Jeonghan, though already immersed with the popcorn and TV he had stolen from you.

Seungcheol led you to your room, closing the door behind you and instantly turning to you.

"Hi, baby," he whispered, holding you close to him.

"Hi," you giggled at him.

He leaned down to kiss you, his hands on the small of your back and pressing you up against him. His lips were basically on yours before Jeonghan's sudden voice made the two of you jump back in surprise.

"Don't have sex! I swear to God, if I hear the two of you having sex one more time, I'm evicting you! Just sleep like normal people!," he had yelled from the living room.

He had a bit of a point. The walls were relatively thin here, and you weren't exactly quiet when you had sex.

Seungcheol groaned and buried his face in your neck, "Baby, will you still love me if I kill your brother?"

"I'll love you even more," you pouted.

He snickered, removing his head from your neck and giving you a singular peck on your lips, "C'mon, let's go to sleep."

~

The two of you had initially thought that Jeonghan's complaint about you having sex had been a fluke. You believed that maybe he was stressed that day and that he hadn't meant what he said when he stated that he did not want the two of you to sleep together anymore. However, his words proved to be more literal throughout the following week.

Any time the two of you were so much as together, Jeonghan would groan and complain, saying that if he caught the two of you doing anything less than PG, he would cause 'any trouble possible to stop it' (his own words). It was beginning to frustrate you, but your frustration could not compare to that of Seungcheol's.

"I'm going to kill him. I'm really doing it this time," he said decidedly, hearing Jeonghan's incessant attempts to interrupt whatever was going on behind your closed door.

"Babe-"

"I just want to have sex with you! It's been over a week since I've had you, I'm going insane", he pulled at his scalp.

"Yeah, I know, but he just-"

"Babe, I don't think you understand. I'm hard every day. Even seeing you gets me going by now. I can't do this anymore! Any time I try to touch you, he's there somehow!"

The manic look in his eyes spoke for itself. And it was true. Seungcheol's constant blue balling this past week and a half had him growing aroused at the mere sight of you in shorts. It was flattering, but it was beginning to affect you too. Knowing how badly he wanted you made you weak at the knees, causing the two of you to grow incredibly frustrated at your brother's antics.

You realized now that maybe you shouldn't have been so liberal in sleeping together while living with your brother. You should have known he would snap sooner or later, no matter how much he had rooted for the two of you to get together.

You wondered how this would end up playing out, because the two of you were already beyond breaking.

...

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[apas-95]

the more well-known the agency confronting you is, the less trouble you're usually in. like if it's the cops at your door, it could just be a noise complaint. FBI might just be there for tweets. obviously, still bad, but... here, a comparison. if you have a run in with the CIA you're probably in trouble, but if you have a run in with the Office of Naval Intelligence then you've definitely fucked up. did you know the USPS has its own investigative force? and you might be thinking like, oh, as in some dudes in baby blue button-ups who search for missing mail - but no, these are uniformed, armed federal agents with all the authority that entails. they've got squad cars and such. and, like, these guys are serious. back in the late '80s to the early '90s, when electronic mail sorting first started to be rolled out, there were consistent issues with the machines having trouble scanning letters. it wasn't a super common problem, but it happened a lot, in multiple states. anyway, the USPS eventually realised two things - first, that the problems persisted even after the machines themselves were replaced (at great expense); and second, that they were really limited to michigan and some surrounding states, with only rare occurrences elsewhere which might be unrelated. anyway, that was enough to get the United States Postal Inspection Service to take interest. if somebody was sending dangerous materials though the mail which were messing with the scanning machines, it was probably endangering postal workers too. this was pre-9/11, so the idea it was terrorism wasn't taken too seriously, and the investigation didn't get much support. anyway, it takes months of waiting for machines to break down, cataloguing the mail they'd been handling, cross-referencing it, etc, to narrow down the source of the mail to somewhere south of detroit. kinda goes cold for a while, since the mail's scanned in big batches and finding the common link takes a *lot* of data and work. anyway it's like october '91 now and they think they've finally got it. they've found a specific batch that's tripping the machines up, and they're going over it with a fine-tooth comb when an agent's pager starts freaking out. after experimenting, they realise that whatever's fucked with the scanning machines has also fucked with the pager, and they realise it might be putting out radiation. biiig 'oh shit' moment. they isolate the whole batch and get a big medical checkup, but they're alright. geiger counter picks up nothing. what they *do* find, however, is that there are like 60 letters in there that are each putting out small amounts of non-ionising EM radiation. so, basically safe to handle, but together they're enough to flip some bits in the janky '80s tech they've got and cause occasional scanning errors. and, get this, they're all from the same address. they track this place down, and it's this guy running a sort of bird sanctuary in his backyard. he's australian, and sells like, courses for avoiding getting attacked by birds - and he spends a lot of time hanging around these birds, right? so they take the guy in for questioning, and they literally can't even have recording equipment on the table with him without it glitching, he's almost cooking popcorn here. they question him, and he tells them about his business, how he like, teaches people specific hand gestures to scare away birds and whatever, and they start grilling him on whether he's been exposed to any chemicals or anything, because of the letters. and the guy, when he hears about the letters, suddenly goes like 'ohhh', and explains. cus he gives people grades on their performance and sends them a handmade certificate after they complete the course, right? so they're like 'why the fuck are your letters irradiated' and he just tells them 'Thats My Crow Wave Gradiation'

[werepuppy-steve]

G | 753 words

written for @steddieholidaydrabbles' prompt: graduation tags: emma verse, modern au, famous corroded coffin, steddie being over the top parents

tagging some of the emma fans: @steves-strapcollection @tboygareth @patchworkgargoyle @steddieas-shegoes @theheadlessphilosopher

@worstsequence @hammity-hammer

"Does she know where we're sitting?" Eddie asks as they shuffle down the rows of plastic seats, his bulky digital camera hanging around his neck by the strap.

(Eddie wanted to bring their tour photographer, Cody, but Steve had to gently remind him that the school already had one hired. Eddie only sulked for an hour.)

Steve levels him a look. "If she doesn't see us, then she'll spot one of these goons and follow the line." He points over his shoulder to their accompanying party.

Wayne is directly behind him, followed by Robin and Chrissy. Jeff, Gareth, Freak, and the kids shuffle in behind them. As much as Eddie doesn’t like flaunting his celebrity status around, he had to call ahead the week before to request an entire row to be reserved just to fit all of them.

His baby is graduating kindergarten, he'll be damned if he doesn't pull out all the stops. They’re even having a little graduation party for her at the house afterwards—a backyard BBQ with everyone and the rest of the tour crew and family who couldn't make it to the ceremony.

Not long after everyone is seated, Pomp and Circumstance crackles out of the loudspeakers and the kids start to walk down the aisle in pairs. It's definitely not perfect, some kids take too-eager steps and some stop to hug their parents, but the teachers do their best to guide them.

Steve starts recording with his phone the second they spot Emma, the digital chime of Eddie's camera shutter clicking away beside him. Her curls are barely tamed in the side pony she asked Eddie to put it in, but it matches the whole 'rocker' vibe she's got going on.

Amongst the sea of summer dresses and pressed toddler slacks, their little girl is wearing her black denim battle vest over a light purple Hannah Montana shirt Steve had gotten at a yard sale, with a pale blue frilly tutu and a pair of silver glitter leggings and her black boots.

She looks nervous, though. Tense. Her shoulders are drawn up and her hands are clasped in front of her. Brown eyes dart this way and that around the room trying to spot a familiar face in the crowd and it breaks Steve's heart to watch his kid be so anxious. Her teacher said she did great at practice yesterday, but that was without the fifty pairs of eyes on her.

Mike is sitting on the end and she finds him easily, her eyes lighting up in recognition, but there's still a worried crease between her eyebrows that doesn't smooth out until she's locking eyes with her dads. She gives them a tiny wave as she walks by.

They both give her encouraging thumbs up and Eddie wishes he could just snatch her up and run out of the building with her.

They eventually get all the kids filed in and the principal stands behind the podium on the stage to welcome everyone. She goes through the awards first (Emma receives one for reading above her grade level, something that Eddie is very proud of) before the kids line back up to receive their little diplomas.

Halfway through the list, Eddie suddenly elbows Steve. "Shit, I didn't hear her name, did we miss her?"

His phone is still recording. "Dude, her last name is M, we're still in the J's."

"Oh, right."

Emma's class is only about 50 or so kids so it doesn't really take that long to get to her name, but Steve and Eddie are still vibrating with the anticipation.

"Emma Munson."

Immediately, their entire entourage is up on their feet and cheering and yelling. It's way too loud for the cafeteria setting they're in, and it echos, and you can definitely tell which of them are in the famous metal band.

Emma's little cheeks turn the same color as her glasses but her grin is big and wide as she holds her certificate in front of her for the picture. Both Steve and Eddie are rapid fire pressing the shutter buttons on their cameras.

Once she's off the stage, the principal clears her throat. "A reminder to please hold all applause until the end of the ceremony, thank you." She gives them a not-so-subtle glare over the rims of her own glasses.

Sheepishly, their group sits back down and is quiet once more.

"We're gonna be worse during her eighth grade graduation, right?" Steve whispers to Eddie.

"Oh, absolutely. She'll want to kill us afterwards."

[solarmorrigan]

(Slight disclaimer: I haven't seen S2 in almost a year and parts of it are hazy, so if some details here seem repetitive/don't quite match up... don't worry about it, I love you <3)

cw: anxiety, mentions of past child abuse

-

Steve had not, for the record, wanted to spend his Saturday tromping around by the stream in the woods searching for tadpoles. He’d wanted to go to the movies, or maybe get lunch, or even just hang out, but Dustin had insisted, and now Steve is slopping through the muddy grass and trying to figure out if there’s any way he can get them home without getting the inside of his car filthy.

(Probably not.)

It’s not that he’s opposed to getting his hands dirty when he needs to, it’s just that hunting for baby frogs doesn’t seem like a need to Steve, no matter what Dustin says. He probably shouldn’t be such a pushover for the kid, but– Steve’s actually a little worried about him.

He’s been in a nasty mood for the last couple of weeks, alternating between snappish and sullen, throwing biting comments at Steve that go beyond his usual know-it-all lilt, or else going silent and only shrugging when Steve tries to ask him questions.

And Steve’s trying not to take it personally; they’d hung out a lot through the winter and on into the new spring, and he knows Dustin isn’t normally like this, and he doesn’t think it’s anything he’s done (Dustin keeps seeking him out, so it’s probably not him), but it’s definitely something. So when Dustin had actually suggested something for them to do, had actually seemed excited about it, Steve had been hard pressed to say no.

Even if it meant mud.

“Hey,” Steve calls as Dustin pulls ahead of him to start climbing down the embankment that pens in the stream. “Watch it, alright? It’s slippery.”

“I know what I’m doing, Steve,” Dustin snaps, and Steve can practically hear him rolling his eyes.

“Fine, sorry for giving a shit if you break your leg or something,” Steve mutters, beginning the precarious trip down the embankment himself. “You don’t have to bite my head off.”

Dustin sighs. “Whatever.”

Steve shakes his head. He really hopes this isn’t just the start of puberty, or something. He doesn’t think he can handle another four or five years of this attitude.

(He doesn’t even question it anymore, the assumption that he’ll be around as Dustin continues growing up; it just seems like kind of a given.)

“So what are we doing here, again?” Steve asks when they reach the stream.

“I told you: we’re looking for tadpoles.” Dustin tosses a glance at Steve. “Baby frogs.”

“Yeah, dude, I know what a tadpole is, I did actually pass second grade science,” Steve snarks back. “Why are we looking for them, though?”

“I need them for school. For a science project,” Dustin says, peeling off to start looking in the shallow edges of the stream.

“Right…” Steve moves off in the opposite direction, looking for the shape of a thing he remembers seeing in a science textbook probably too many years ago.

They search in silence for a little bit, nothing but the sound of the woods and babble of water between them, but Steve keeps half his attention on Dustin even as he looks. If the kid falls in the stream and drowns, Claudia will never forgive him. He twitches a little when he watches Dustin skid over a rocky patch on the bank, but he finds his footing quickly enough, so Steve keeps his mouth shut.

“You’re not gonna, like, experiment on these things, are you?” Steve asks idly, finally tiring of the silence.

“Of course not!” Dustin exclaims. “I’m just gonna study ‘em. I’ll give them a good home and everything!”

“Alright, alright.” Steve holds up his hands in surrender. “Just checking that it’s not going to end up like the last time you brought in something weird from outside.”

Dustin stops walking, going quiet for a long moment, and when he turns around Steve is startled to see that he looks pissed.

“I’m not actually an idiot, Steve!” he barks. “I can tell the difference between a frog and some kind of alien monster!”

“Okay, sorry, I didn’t–”

“It’s not like I saw D’art and thought he was anything from around here!” Dustin goes on, stalking back towards Steve. “I didn’t think he was just some kind of fucked up frog! I knew he was something different, there was scientific merit in wanting to study him, and I’m sick of everyone acting like it was just some stupid mistake!”

“I didn’t mean to– Careful!”

Steve has no time to do much more than shout a warning and throw out a useless hand as Dustin goes skidding back over the slick, rocky patch, then slips and goes down hard, catching himself on his hands and one knee.

“Shit, Henderson, are you okay?” Steve is kneeling in front of Dustin in a blink, already searching for visible injuries; he’s probably fine, it hadn’t looked like he’d hit anything vital on the way down, but it couldn’t hurt to just check.

Dustin doesn’t move, his head still hanging between his shoulders, his back so tense he’s almost trembling, and worry starts to bloom in the pit of Steve’s stomach.

“Henderson?” Steve tries again, and that’s when he hears it – the sniffle.

Shit.

“Hey. Dustin,” Steve says, slipping into the same calm, firm register he uses when he’s lifeguarding, without even realizing he’s done it (honestly, he’d had to deal with a lot more kids with scraped knees than he had potential drowning victims when he’d worked at the public pool); he cups his hand over the back of Dustin’s neck, squeezing gently to get his attention. “I need you to let me see. I need to make sure you’re alright.”

Slowly, Dustin shifts so that he’s sitting with both knees bent in front of him, though he keeps his head bent down – and that’s fine, Steve won’t make him look up just yet. Instead, he does a quick inspection of everything else; both of Dustin’s palms are a little scraped up, and one is bleeding a bit, but it’s his knee that got the worst of it. It looks like it caught and scraped on the sharp edge of a rock, leaving a bleeding strip of skin that curves across the surface of it.

(It probably wouldn’t have been so bad if Dustin hadn’t insisted on wearing shorts in March, but whatever. Now really isn’t the time to argue about practical fashion.)

“Okay, this looks like a pretty shallow scrape. I bet it stings like hell, but it’ll be a million times better once we get it cleaned up,” Steve says, framing the wound with gentle fingers, careful to avoid the drip of blood streaming down Dustin’s shin.

Still, Dustin says nothing. He’s practically trembling now, sniffling again, and Steve frowns.

“Did you hurt yourself anywhere else?” he asks.

Dustin shakes his head.

“Are you sure? Did you hit your head when you went down? You should let me–”

“I’m not hurt, Steve, Jesus fucking Christ!” Dustin snaps, finally looking up; his cheeks are red and his eyes are watery and he’s clearly trying hard to hold everything in, so Steve does his best not to rock the boat too hard.

“Okay,” he says, low and smooth, still stuck halfway in crisis management mode, “then can you tell me what’s wrong?”

“Everything!” Dustin chokes. “Fucking everything is wrong, okay? I keep – I keep having nightmares and I feel like I haven’t slept in weeks and I’m so tired.” He loses the fight with his tears and they finally spill over, running down his face. “And my mom was talking about Mews the other day, like, just stuff he used to do, and she misses him even though we have Tews, and sometimes I feel like I killed the stupid cat, and I just–”

“Shit, dude, I’m sorry.” Steve reaches up and cups his hand right at the juncture of Dustin’s shoulder and neck, giving him another gentle squeeze. “You didn’t kill your cat, okay?”

Dustin gives a congested snort that’s distinctly lacking in his usual derision. “Yeah, I know that about the same as I know there’s nothing coming to get me at night, but I still can’t sleep.” He sniffs again, reaching up and trying to smear his tears away with the back of his hand. “I’m so done with this, I just– I want it to be over. It’s supposed to be over.”

There’s a little tremor in Dustin’s voice, and Steve’s heart breaks a little bit, because he knows exactly what Dustin means – he knows what the nightmares are like, he knows the guilt over things you can’t change, he knows the feeling of jumping at shadows. And fuck, the kid’s still so young.

(Never mind that Steve’s not even scraping nineteen yet. Never mind that.)

He should probably talk to an actual professional, or something—get some real help—but Steve isn’t sure there’s anyone out there that Dustin can talk to about government coverups and literal monsters from a hell dimension beneath their town. He’s not sure if there’s anyone even qualified. And while Steve sure as hell doesn’t feel qualified to do anything, either, he’d been there with Dustin when it happened, and he’s here with Dustin now, so he’s going to do his best.

“Okay, c’mere,” Steve says, giving one of Dustin’s arms a tug.

Dustin doesn’t argue, doesn’t even question him, and that’s almost more alarming than anything else; he follows Steve a few feet over to a grassy patch at the foot of the embankment and leans heavily into Steve’s side when they sit down again. The grass is a little wet, but Steve doesn’t even feel it as he wraps an arm around Dustin’s back and pulls him closer.

They spend a minute with Dustin’s face half buried in Steve’s shoulder before Dustin gives a muffled grunt of annoyance and tries to pull away. “This is bullshit,” he mutters.

Steve quashes the way he wants to flinch at the declaration and looks down at Dustin instead. “What?”

“Sitting here crying my ass off. It’s stupid. I’m being a baby,” Dustin says, trying to wipe his face clean even as more tears replace the ones he’s just dried away.

“It’s not stupid. Crying is normal,” Steve says.

Dustin scoffs, still trying to pull out of Steve’s hold, but Steve keeps a hand in the middle of his back, unwilling to let him go far.

“I’m serious,” Steve insists. “It’s, like, a normal body reaction, or something. It happens. People cry.”

“You don’t,” Dustin shoots back, and Steve can’t help the instinctive huff of this-isn’t-actually-funny-at-all laughter.

“Yeah, man, because I’m kinda fucked up.”

It’s clearly not the reaction Dustin is expecting, and he stares up at Steve with furrowed brows. “What?”

And– well, fair’s fair, isn’t it? Dustin told Steve what’s bothering him, so Steve can open up a little bit in return, can’t he?

Besides, he can’t really think of any other way to convince Dustin that he’s not just pulling some cool, tough guy shit.

No, he doesn’t stop to cry, but it’s hardly even a choice anymore.

“I used to cry really easily, actually,” Steve says, looking away from Dustin and staring out at the stream instead. “Like, over everything. Literally cried over a glass of milk I spilled once.”

Dustin gives a wet huff of laughter, and Steve allows himself the tug of a quick smile.

“My dad fucking hated it. He was always telling me to stop whining, stop crying, stop acting like–” –a little bitch, Steven. Alright, maybe Dustin didn’t need to hear everything his dad had said to him. “He said I needed to toughen up, be a man. The last time I really cried, I was, like, nine, I think? I don’t even remember what it was over, I just remember that it pissed my dad off. And he said he’d give me something to cry about, and, uh–”

Steve can feel Dustin going tense under his palm, as if he’s afraid of what comes next, and that’s fine. Steve has no problem stopping there; it’s not a story he’d relish retelling in its entirety.

“Anyway, after that, I just kinda… made myself stop. Just like he wanted. And honestly?” Steve blows out a breath, still staring hard at the stream. “It just makes everything worse, holding that shit in. Makes you feel like shit.”

Makes you want to make other people feel like shit, too, because at least it’s an outlet.

“So, whatever. ‘Be a man.’ That’s bullshit.” Steve has known for years that his dad is an asshole, that the things he says are shit, and maybe he’s never known what to do in the face of it, maybe he’s never reacted in a way that’s healthy or even safe, but that doesn’t mean he has to spread the disease around. “Don’t be like me, man, be like you. Cry if you have to.”

Slowly, Dustin wilts back into Steve’s side, curling up under his arm and burying his face half in Steve’s shoulder again.

“You’re actually really smart sometimes,” Dustin mumbles against Steve’s shirt, and Steve snorts.

“Yeah, once in a while I might have some shit worth listening to.”

Dustin’s shoulders start shaking again, so Steve slings his arm more tightly around his back, and Dustin wraps an arm around his middle and clutches at Steve’s sweatshirt. At this point, it’s probably beyond stained with mud and snot and the blood from Dustin’s palms, but Steve can’t really bring himself to care. It’s not like it’s his favorite.

It isn’t the most comfortable place for a breakdown; March in Indiana is still chilly, and the grass is still damp, and the ground is hard, and Dustin’s cap keeps jabbing Steve in the collarbone, but Steve isn’t going to move until Dustin is ready. So they stay a while.

(Steve does end up knocking Dustin’s cap off, because it really is annoying, but he can’t help the little trill of fondness that goes through his chest when he realizes that he can faintly smell the shampoo he’d recommended to him.)

Finally, Dustin pulls away with a heavy sigh, snatching his hat back up and placing it firmly on his head, and Steve takes that to mean that it’s time to go.

“Alright, I’ve got a first aid kit in the car, and I think we can at least tape you together long enough to get back to my house,” Steve says, heaving himself up off the ground.

“We didn’t find any tadpoles, though,” Dustin says, looking back at the stream. “I seriously do need some for my project.”

“We can come back tomorrow,” Steve says, even though he really doesn’t want to spend his Sunday tromping around by the stream in the woods searching for tadpoles.

“Yeah?” Dustin aims a hopeful little smile up at him. “Can I stay over?”

Steve shrugs. “If your mom says it’s fine, yeah.”

(They both know she will.)

“Awesome.” Dustin grins, but it’s a pale shadow of its usual intensity; the kid looks wrung out.

Steve glances up the embankment and then looks back at Dustin.

“Hey,” he says. “You want a lift?”

Dustin, who had been preparing to start the climb back up, looks over at him in confusion. “What?”

“Up the hill.” Steve jerks his head towards the incline.

“How?”

“Piggyback ride. One-time offer.”

“Dude, it’s steep as shit. And I just had a growth spurt,” Dustin scoffs. “There’s no way you can carry me up that thing.”

Steve smirks. “Wanna bet?”

“What do I win?” Dustin asks.

“You get to pick the movie when we get back to my house,” Steve offers.

Dustin chews it over for a moment, then nods. “Deal.”

“Deal.” Steve kneels down. “Hop on. And try not to choke me.”

When Steve stands up again, Dustin settled against his back, he realizes he may have slightly overestimated his own abilities; light, Dustin is not (the kid’s almost fourteen now, Jesus H. Christ), but Steve isn’t one to back down from a challenge.

He starts up the embankment.

“When I win, after you drop us both back down the hill,” Dustin says, “I’m gonna pick Ghostbusters.”

Steve groans. They’ve watched that movie a hundred times now, and he has his limits. “When we get to the top, and I win, I’m going to pick anything but Ghostbusters.”

“Dream on, Steve,” Dustin pats his chest, and Steve keeps climbing.

They’re about halfway up when Dustin laughs in his ear, clutching more tightly around Steve’s neck as the incline gets steeper. “Holy shit, you’re actually doing it!”

“Told you,” Steve says, proudly sounding only a little strained.

He does have to drop Dustin’s legs and use his hands to make sure he doesn’t lose his balance when they get near the top, which does result in Dustin choking him, but Steve gets his revenge by wiping the excess mud on his palms off on the front of Dustin’s shorts once they get over the edge of the embankment.

(“Dude, what the hell!”

“You were already muddy!”)

Still, Dustin laughs and chatters all the way back to the car, still a little more quietly than usual, but Steve doesn’t think he’s seen him smile this much in weeks, so the strain he can already feel setting up in his legs and back is probably worth it.

And they will not be watching Ghostbusters (again) when they get back to his house, but maybe he’ll pick one of the Star Wars movies instead.

He can’t fix everything for Dustin, but he can at least make sure they have a good night – and sometimes, that’s good enough.

[Prompt: Piggyback rides]

[cameronspecial]

Mistakes That Can Be Undone

Pairing: Rafe Cameron x Reader

Warnings: N/A

Pronouns: She/Her

Word Count: 1.4K

Summary: After finding an invitation that throws his whole world off balance, Rafe has a plan to get back the love of his life.

A/N: Inspired by "Something Blue" by Voilà.

Masterlist

When Rafe finds the invitation, his world becomes submerged in water, already causing him to feel dizzy. ‘You are invited to join Y/N Y/L/N and Hudson Jones to celebrate their wedding’ makes him forget what he is getting from Topper’s room in the first place. Of course, Topper got an invitation. He isn’t only Rafe’s friend but hers. The black-and-white extravagance of the invitation is not her choice. He knows for a fact she has always dreamed of a smaller wedding. Just their immediate family and closest friends attend the most important day of their life. 

———

Her head rested on his stomach as she scrolled through Instagram. A particular post caused her thumb to hesitate to swipe up. She angled her phone toward him, “Remember, Mrs. Thompson? She got remarried.” His eyes darted toward her screen to see a picture of their third-grade teacher in a wedding dress. “You follow her on Instagram?” he questioned. She shrugged, “I follow her daughter. She was always nice to me.” “Yeah, I remember Monica. She was hot,” he thought out loud, which caused Y/N to hit him with the back of her hand. “Don’t worry. She can never be as beautiful as you. Have you ever thought of what you would want for your wedding?“ She said, “Small wedding, extravagant marriage.” He chuckled, looking down at her with a loving smile. “Aren’t those the same thing?” Her head shook, “No. A wedding, for me, is a party to celebrate the union. A marriage is a lifelong commitment.” His arm wrapped around his waist. “That made no sense, but I will do whatever you want,” he whispered with his lips pressed against her temple. 

———

“Dude, what’s taking you so long?” Topper’s voice pulls Rafe out of his memories. Rafe blinks back the tears and places the invitation back onto the desk. He and Y/N broke up five years ago, yet a small part of him always thought they would find their way back to her. She is the love of his life and all because of one small mistake he made, he never gets to be her lifelong love again. It feels like some mistakes aren’t meant to be fixed. He picks up the second PS5 controller from the dresser and leaves the room with a newfound emptiness. 

———

He knows he shouldn’t be here. It is definitely not his place to be sneaking around the church to look for her. Yet another thing that is wrong with this scene. Y/N loves the beach and it was one of the reasons why she decided to do her graduate degree in Australia. He catches a glimpse of white lace stepping into a room and the door closes after the bridesmaid and mothers of the couple leave the room. He overhears a bridesmaid saying that Y/N needed a moment to herself. His grin struggles to break through his stoic expression. 

The tap on the door causes her to spin toward the sound. She takes a deep breath, already struggling to keep her tears in check so she doesn’t ruin her makeup. “I-I really need a moment to myself, please,” she croaks out. She wants to groan when the person behind the door ignores her pleas and enters anyway. Even though it isn’t her preferred wedding look, she still looks beautiful in the vintage lace wedding dress. The long flowy sleeves make her look like a goddess. The lace reaches up to her collarbone and it is a little too high for his liking. Their eyes meet and he gives her a small smile, “I know you need a second; however, I don’t know if I’ll still have the courage to do this after one.” Her heart stops at not only the sight of him but also the scent of him. Even after all these years, the leathery smell of his cologne makes her feel at home. “What are you doing here?” she questions, fighting the urgent to step forward. He does it for them, “He is the something new, so I’m here to be your something old.” She giggles with a shake of her head. “I think that tradition was referencing objects, not humans,” she advises. “Seriously, though, what are you doing here, Rafe?” His hand falls to the back of his neck. “Do you really want to marry him?” he asks, eyes falling to his shoes. 

“Of… of course, why wouldn’t I? I love Hudson.”

“You don’t sound very sure about that, Honey. Do you think maybe you are getting cold feet?”

“You don’t get to ask me that, not when we haven’t spoken to each other in years.”

Her downcast eyes tell him he is right. He risks taking a step further, reaching out to rest his hand above her elbow. The warmth of his hand has her wanting to melt against it. “You aren’t upset about us not talking, not really. Ask me what you want to ask,” he whispers with his lips touching the shell of her ear. She leans back to look him in the eyes, “Why didn’t you want to leave with me? Why be here now when you were the one to end us because you didn’t want to move to Australia with me?” He brings his palm up to rest on her cheek and gives her a meek smile. Tears begin to well over the edge of his eyes as he thinks about how he is the reason why she is getting ready to walk down the aisle to someone else. “I was an idiot. I was young and thought I needed my father’s approval more than I needed love. And I am so so sorry that I made that decision, which hurt you, Honey. But I promise you if you give me another chance, then I won’t be stupid enough to let you go again,” he vows, his thumb kissing her cheekbone. A deep breath falls out of her mouth, “I can’t, I’m supposed to get married today.” Nails dig into his heart, slowly tearing it apart to leave him for dead until a glint coming from just below her collarbone catches his attention.

He grasps drops to the oval locket hanging on a chain from her neck. Engraved flowers surrounded both of their initials at the front and he props it open to see his favourite picture of them still safe inside. Since they broke up, he thought she would’ve gotten rid of the necklace he gave her on their first anniversary. The symbol that he is serious about their relationship and has left behind his player ways. His gaze burns a hole into his gift to her, “How can I take your words seriously when the symbol of my love is around your neck on the day you are meant to marry the supposed love of your life? Tell me something, Honey, does he know his skin is pressing against a gift from me while he makes love to you?” 

Her eyes widen at his realization and silence falls in the room. He can see her thoughts spin around in her brain. “Is it cold in here?” she whispered, causing Rafe’s head to tilt till a smile craved itself on her face. “I think I need to go warm up in your Benz.” She laces her fingers through his and picks up the bottom of her dress. They both dash out of the room, running in the direction of the car. He tries to be as quiet as possible, except her giggles make their location known. Staff members’ heads follow the couple’s movement as they run down the hallway. Once the breeze from the wind hits their face, he unlocks the door to his vintage blue Benz that he got because she loved how the colour matched his eyes. He jumps over the driver’s side door and leans over to open the passenger’s door for her. Her laughter causes his heart to flutter. As soon as she is safely buckled into her seat, he quickly pulls out of the parking spot. Rafe can’t stop himself from smirking after spotting who he assumes is Hudson, jogging out of the church with an exasperated and confused look on his face. Y/N yells over her shoulder, “I’m so sorry, Hudson. I’ll explain everything later.” 

They drive until the church is out of sight. He chances a glance at her whilst he stops at a red light. The massive grin on her face causes flowers to bloom in his heart. She looks at him and places her hand over the gear shift so he can lace his fingers with hers. He brings her knuckles to her lips. “I’m not growing old with him,” she states. He can’t help but beam himself, “Good because I’m the only one who gets to be your something old and new.”

Taglist: @winterrrnight @loves0phelia @thelomlisrafecameron @wickedlovely121 @thepatriarchykeychain @drewsmusee @starkowswife @maybankslover @forstarkey @loving-and-dreaming @magicalyoura

[morinuu]

LISTWN TO ME I JUST READ YOUR TAMAKI ANGST AND YOU KNOW WHAT WOULD BE SO FICKING GOOD??

A she falls but he falls harder

Reader finally gets over it and stops coming, moving on and focusing on herself, and he notices and starts realizing how he took her for granted

And then its him that's loosing his mind and shit like that. Dude. Dude. I'm loosing my MIND you write so well

first of all ty for the compliment >< so glad u liked it im blushing and giggling!! secondly im not sure abt the reader completely abandoning tamaki's side (i love being delulu), but i do have smth else in mind that's kinda similiar n i hope its satisfactory :3 i changed only a minor part from the og :P i wanna make this a small series..... maybe like 3-4 parts.. anw this is pt 1

☀︎｜tamaki x female reader. almost 4k words. continuation of this. ure sick, yamada hinata & aoko r just some ppl i made up for the plot, tamaki's pretty stupid n emotionally unintelligent, lots of feelings and background information, y'all r childhood friends, there's like one 4th wall break but i thought it was kinda funny so i kept it

you weren't a fan of february.

allergy season was your absolute worst, the wheezing and coughing sucking the life out of you as you struggled to change out of your clothes to get the day started. you didn't sleep much, interrupted constantly by your sore throat aching and squeezing.

sure, it's just hay fever to everyone else, but for a young woman who carried around an inhaler, it's hell. well, almost hell.

what was truly hellish wasn't the fatigue or the sneezing, but your mum dragging you back in the house and forbidding you from going to school until you're well enough to study again. how were you supposed to keep up with chemistry class if you skip?

not that your parents cared for your grades; they knew you could just enter whatever field you wanted with the connections your family held, but it felt nice to be awarded for working hard.

after your personal maid let out a small "pardon me, miss" and carried you back to bed, you realised that the feeling your soft quilt hugging your cold limbs would never be beaten by the jacket you desperately clung on to warm yourself in p.e - which just so happened to be your first period that day and you were dreading it.

"i'll be making you some tea, miss. would you like to breakfast now?" your maid's quiet voice addressed you, hoping you'd just sleep the illness off as you usually did so she could rest too.

to be fair, you weren't a very easy master to please, so could you blame her?

"i'll breakfast la-" a cough and some wheezing "-i'll breakfast later, bring some english breakfast with a slice of lemon." you said nothing else, instead focusing on calming your throat that seemed to intensify in soreness. "a pastille too."

"understood my lady, i'll be right back." she bowed and excused herself from your room, ignoring your groans of annoyance as you buried your face into the pillow.

"damn it." you muttered and extended your hand to grab your phone from your bedside table. unlocking it with the passcode (because you weren't in the mood to lift your head and let your phone scan your face) you squinted as the light mode of a social media app hit your eyes harshly, forcing you to use muscle memory to lower the brightness to its minimum.

you scrolled through, liking your friends' private posts and decided to message one of them.

yn.spam: gm dude, i cant come to school today cus im sick. can u do me a favour n tell aoko to give me her notes? she never looks at her messages.

with your phone back on the table to wait for a response, you lied back comfortably and closed your eyes, because as much as you wanted to watch something on netflix or play a video game, you didn't want to make things worse for yourself.

you grew impatient for the cup of tea your maid was brewing, rotating between wheezing, checking your phone and staring at the ceiling. it seemed like the seconds weren't passing by at all.

soon enough, your maid comes back with some fancy tray carrying a kettle, your favourite mug (the one your daddy drank from when you were a little girl before your parents divorced), a tiny plate with some lemon slices and a small box of pastilles as throat medicine.

you didn't thank the woman when she helped you sit up, nor when she stayed by your side to make sure you didn't choke between coughs and burnt yourself with the hot liquid. just as you took your first sip, your phone lit up to show your friend's response.

thatguyhinata: Ayooo gppd morning. Sry to hear tht. Sure if I see her I'll telm her.

the irises in your eyes rolled upwards at the boy's typos that irked you every time, completely ignoring how he didn't wish for your recovery.

yn.spam: thanks yamada

you never used any of your circle's first names, which your mum always found weird.

'you sure these are your friends, darling?' she would ask often, and your response would always be the same:

'yeah mum. leave me be.'

only tamaki had ever felt close enough to be called by his first name.

after swallowing your medicine, you dismissed the older woman standing over you and pulled your quilt over your quivering form again.

"gods, please let this be over soon."

...

well.

...turns out, you gotta be much more specific with what you ask of gods, because they might not have the same understanding of the word 'soon'.

here you are, three days later, with your allergy having been combined with a virus that'd been going around, intensifying your asthma symptoms and raising a high fever, making your mother and doctor ban you from walking into ouran.

halfway throughout the day, you realise what had been completely slipping your mind while your lungs were occupied inhaling abnormally.

"i have an appointment today!" you exclaimed with wide eyes, raising from the bed like lazarus from his grave.

"...?" the new maid next to you didn't say anything, she was clearly concerned. after some seconds of you overthinking something, she spoke up. "you have no other doctor's appointment today, my lady. he just left 10 minutes ago."

you shook your head quickly, ignoring the dizziness brought by your fever "bring me my phone," the girl was puzzled "now!"

bowing a quick apology, she rushed to your desk and handed you your phone with both hands, not daring to look up. you disliked new maids; they were inexperienced and annoying, but scolding her would have to wait.

"damn it, damn it, damn it!" you murmured under your breath and tapped furiously on your phone, trying to find where the hell you'd written kyouya's business e-mail address.

you had it saved as every other client of the host club had, but you had never actually used it, not once.

you never missed an appointment, and always booked the next one tete-a-tete with the black-haired manager. if you became a no-show without prior notice, wouldn't that look bad? would it annoy kyouya and he wouldn't accept you in the club again?

well no, but you had the habit of overthinki-

'would it annoy tamaki?'

you groaned and murmured to yourself - had you deleted it? maybe it was in your notes app and you erased it? was it on your old phone from a month ago?

"find an e-mail for me." you ordered the maid who looked up at you perplexed, but carried out the order nonetheless.

the girl was embarrassed when she found out her master was asking for a host's email, wanting the earth to swallow her when she dialed the ouran academy's number. 'the stuff i do for money..' she thought and prayed her family never found out.

it wasn't a long process to retrieve the address, but what was, was the rant hitting the maid's ears when your overthinking about what to write left your mouth at incredible speeds.

"should i say i'm sick? but he already knows that- he's in my class! maybe tell him to give my time to another girl? no wait, he would do that anyway... or after i apologise, i'll say that, like, something came up- but that's not believable enough... ugh!" you buried your face in your pillow and, unbeknownst to you, your new maid's eye was twitching in annoyance.

she understood now why your personal maid took the week off just when you got sick - not that she understood how and why your mum allowed it though.

(it's because you can be insufferable and she gets it.)

"my lady, may i help?" the girl let out, clearing her throat when you lifted your head from the pillow. "i can write the e-mail myself, please focus on resting."

after some convincing, you gave in.

and so 10 minutes later, back at ouran, kyouya's phone let out a ting! with your full name on the notification. he'd already guessed you wouldn't show up to your appointment considering you hadn't come to school in three days, and already had someone to fill your place but left it for the last moment in case you did show up.

why? well you were ln yn, and it was painfully obvious you were smitten with his best friend, though he could say it was a bit different from the rest of the clientele.

probably due to the fact that you'd known tamaki for much longer than kyouya had. and yet tamaki didn't seem to have the same fascination with you.

he remembers when he first met you, when he'd heard that you were spoiled rotten and weren't even planning to enroll in ouran until tamaki did. you simply transferred to be with the boy.

literally everyone knew of ln yn's almost freakish obsession with suoh tamaki, except for the victim himself.

so imagine his surprise at the strictly professional e-mail he'd received from you, where not a single mention of your host was included. weird.

after glancing at the french boy in the seat next to him eating his bowl of some-sort-of-commoner-convenience-store lunch, kyouya quickly typed a response and informed the next girl in line that a spot was open 'for tamaki's hosting services at 15:35'.

"one of your appointments cancelled due to a personal issue. we'll have someone else fill it." kyouya told tamaki, just as stated in the e-mail, even though it was pretty clear you were sick, and he couldn't figure out why you'd lie.

"hm? oh, okay!" the brunet smiled and went back to devouring his meal, not thinking much of kyouya's words.

kyouya pondered if he should tell him the client was his loyal friend yn, who would never skip out on seeing tamaki, but he stopped himself, curious as to how it would all play out.

eh, if the twins could have fun, so could he.

"oh! haruhii! daddy's here!"

the hours passed so slow you were almost convinced time was frozen when you weren't glancing at the clock on your laptop.

the drama you'd been watching started to lose its interest after presenting the third plot twist in a row, annoying you with all the plot holes it left gaping.

sipping on your green tea (you'd been drinking tamaki's recommendation, pomegranate, only to throw all of it in the trash when you heard he gave the same advice to haruhi), you paused the show and sighed in absolute, tyrannical boredom.

by now you'd normally have finished your classes and walked to music room #3, your favourite among them all.

you'd be welcomed by a host and walked to a sofa to wait for your appointment, ignoring any other girl in the waiting area trying to pick a conversation with the middle child of the ln family.

and soon enough you'd be approached by your one and only taking your hand in his and kissing it to greet you, with his blue eyes staring up at you innocently like a man in love; a look he gave to any woman nowadays, it was second nature to him.

you got lost in them so often, he sometimes dared to ask you if you didn't enjoy his company and that's why you spaced out so much.

preposterous.

you? disliking tamaki? how could he think that after all these years you spent playing together, with you transferring to his school for his sake, swallowing your pride and becoming the client of a host for him?

truly an absurd notion.

currently, however, you weren't in the host club. you were just a girl with a bunch of germs crawling everywhere around her room, unable to go out and see the man of her dreams kiss her cheek and tell her to 'get well soon'.

speaking of, your mum grew increasingly concerned when she noticed the lack of communication between you and tamaki. you were always attached to his hip like some sort of koala, and the fact that you hadn't reached out to him to inform him of your illness personally so he could visit you made her worry.

but it was only natural that you'd suspect you were being an annoyance to tamaki once you began to notice his eyes shift from you to the newest host a couple of months prior. he'd been a petit brunet boy. a first year who was friendly and of lowly origin. you didn't think much of it.

at least not until the day hikaru asked if you could fetch something he forgot in the back room, completely ignorant to the fact that haruhi had come to the club early that day to ask for another uniform because she'd been accidentally thrown water at by two classmates of hers being stupid.

so when you opened the curtain and saw a small-sized girl with only her panties on desperately trying to hide herself from you, it didn't take more than a couple of seconds to put two and two together.

tamaki wasn't fascinated by the commoner errand 'boy' turnt host.

he wanted her.

you closed the curtain, giving the girl her privacy back and muttering an curt apology, "sorry." before deciding that hikaru would have to get his things himself.

neither haruhi nor you spoke about it again, and she never snitched to the host club about your discovery of her sex.

you liked to pretend it never happened, and that it never changed anything. but just like with tamaki, pretending doesn't go anywhere. the hints were there. his furiously blushed face when he stared at her, his protection of her when the twins teased her, his demands for kyouya to do things for haruhi because she'd like it, not even because she'd asked - well, the stage of denial didn't last long.

shortly after came anger. pure, unexplainable rage and envy. the fourth of the deadly sins was soon rushing through your veins like a drug you couldn't get clean from. 'why her?' you would ask in your rampages.

you couldn't figure it out, and you couldn't ask anyone either, because as infuriated as you were, hurting haruhi by revealing her identity wasn't on your to-do list.

not because you were a good person, god no.

rather, if tamaki knew you hurt his precious daughter - you barfed - like that, who knows if you'd see him again?

and so came the bargaining stage, with your rage never leaving your blood stream, of course. being petty was always one of your main personality traits, one that tamaki would often point out.

what did fujioka haruhi have that ln yn didn't?

'nothing.' you muttered to yourself.

nothing.

nothing?

could you be absolutely sure?

you didn't see her much outside of the club, and there were a couple of times you'd heard the hosts hung out together.

maybe they had a moment? or two, three?

perhaps it was high time you stopped bothering him. perhaps then he'd realise you were the one.

that's why your texts to him had much lessened, coming to a complete stop after roughly two months of your self-doubt and insecurities getting the best of you. so did your occasional visits to his house for studying. you'd even stopped wearing the perfume he got you as a birthday present last year, even though you couldn't find another scent that fit your tastes the same way.

despite your attempts at catching his attention, the bubbling fury in your chest rose once again when you realised that maybe tamaki didn't care about you at all.

he texted you as much as you texted him, he hung out with you only when you asked, and when he came closer to you and noticed the change in your scent, he went: "different perfume, princess?"

and while normally you'd be ecstatic at him noticing, your happiness was immediately destroyed when "the other one was a little old fashioned, good thing you moved to something more fresh."

why couldn't he say what he would have said had he been in an otome game, something among the lines of: 'did you wish to match mine?' or something cheesy like that? ...was your scent not to his tastes?

'did he forget his skills from hosting or what?' you whined.

consequently, now that you were sitting around doing nothing to reach out to tamaki or any of your 'friends', your mum couldn't help but take her phone in her hands to call her friend hitachiin yuzuha.

back in the pink room that is the host club, today's rendezvouses seemed to be going by awfully quickly for tamaki.

in the couple of minutes of break he had between the end of this rendezvous and next the one to come, he quickly found his phone from his back pocket and went over his schedule sent by kyouya.

your name had been crossed out and replaced with another one he recognised, another regular guest of his. he raised his eyebrow at that.

he lifted his head and looked for the shadow king.

"hey, kyouya?"

"hm?" kyouya didn't bother to look up from his laptop, furiously typing god-knows-what.

"why's yn's time gone?" he asked innocently in a curious voice that had you heard, you'd be swooning over.

"i told you, she cancelled due to personal business," his answer was straight-forward "although it's probably because she's ill."

ah, that makes sense, you were the one that cancelled.

wait, huh?

"what do you mean she's ill?" his eyebrows furrow a bit and he cocks his head to the side like a cute dog who doesn't understand anything its owner says.

"what do you mean, 'what do i mean'? she's been absent since monday because she's not feeling well, and she won't come today either. pretty simple." kyouya finally looked up at tamaki with a strange expression on his face. "has she not told you?"

tamaki shook his head a bit, "uhm.. no, not really." and tapped his phone again to check his messages on multiple social media apps to make sure he wasn't missing anything. his emails were empty too, only some spam from a newsletter page that he never bothered to cancel his subscription from.

"how do you know?" he questioned kyouya, but before he could answer, "no wait, don't answer that, you creep. of course you know." he sighed.

after some seconds of quiet thinking, "why didn't you tell me?" tamaki continued his questioning.

"everyone already knows, my lord." an awfully familiar voice butt in making the french boy turn his head around, resting his hand on his waist.

the voice belonged to kaoru, who had his arm wrapped around his twin's shoulders. seems like they also just finished with an appointment.

"what does that mean? who's 'everyone' and why am i not included?" tamaki crossed his arms, feeling kind of left out.

"that guy hayato or whatever who hangs out with yn and her friends was telling someone and we overheard." hikaru shrugged in unison with his doppelganger.

honey's soft voice entered the chat. "you mean hinata-kun? yn-chan's friend? yeah, he told me when i asked where yn-chan is because i thought she forgot to bring the candy she promised." he quickly grabbed a piece of cake from the fridge near where kyouya had been sitting and left the room swiftly.

huh, how convenient for him to enter for the plot.

"and why's it that you two evil bastards didn't bother to tell me?" tamaki exclaimed in disbelief, pointing a finger at the both of them. how could they? his precious childhood friend was sick at home and he didn't know?!

"sorry milord-" kaoru announced with his shoulders still raised, "-but you're always talking to yn-" hikaru joined, "-how were we supposed to know you're not asking her about her well-being?" they delivered the finishing blow together.

what were these lame jerks insinuating? 'not asking about her well-being'? what did they know? just as he went to respond with his usual barking, he stopped himself to instead text you on his own for the first time in a while. not that he noticed.

the twins looked at their king with a confused and weirded-out expression on both their faces, before glancing at each other and shrugging again, already disinterested. kyouya had long gone back to his work and so the twins walked to an empty sofa in an almost isolated area of the club, lying on top of one another to give a nice view to whichever client was into it.

about six minutes of pure silence passed between the two before kaoru's phone buzzed; a text from his mum.

the twins read the text simultaneously, with hikaru raising an eyebrow at its contents. they looked back at the slender boy texting you on his phone at the other end of the club, confused about his behaviour.

"seriously...?" hikaru quietly asked kaoru, referring to the text, only to be met with the other's puzzled expression.

as for the half-and-half boy, his fingers were anxiously tapping kyouya's table and awaiting your response to his message.

tamakiii ♥♥♥♥: Hey darling! Is everything alright? I heard you didn't come to school because you're sick. I thought you just didn't feel like coming. Why didn't you tell me?

he didn't know you let out a deep sigh at his text, even if it was three days late. it gave you hope - false hope. that he'd started to pay attention to you again. maybe being distant worked-

tamakiii ♥♥♥♥: want me to come over?

the question felt natural to him, you always visited his home but seldom did he ever visit yours. since you were sick, it made sense that you wouldn't come over this time.

yn>.&lt; : arent u busy rn tho lol

your name on his phone had obviously been put there by you, his choice of emoji had been party hat for some reason.

"be serious, what does that even mean, tamaki?" you'd asked him one day during a break from your studying in his room.

"you don't like it..?" he pouted like usual and you rolled your eyes.

"here. that's better." you handed him his phone back with a new 'yn >.<' as your contact name.

tamakiii ♥♥♥♥: I can just come after club activities.

wait, he was actually coming? after two months of your only contact being through your rendezvous? it worked?! it actually worked?!

you thought of how to answer him.

at your lack of fast response, tamaki thought of ways to help you feel better through your illness.

'aha! eureka!' tamaki's head echoed.

tamakiii ♥♥♥♥: I'll bring some commoner snacks we can enjoy too! Commoners have incredible food to help alleviate illness!

tamakiii ♥♥♥♥: What are you even sick with, anyway?

of course.

commoner food, of course.

haruhi's food.

yn>.&lt; : lol no its fine i dont want u to get sick. ill just c u at sxhool yn>.&lt; : school* yn>.< : doc said its just a cold but yk w my asthma n shit

tamaki was thoroughly disappointed with your response, what did you mean 'you didn't want him to get sick'? you'd never cared if you caught his cold.

his heart raced with worry, and he decided he would stop by anyway. knowing his next appointment was approaching, he speed walked over to the newest host.

"haaaaruuhiiiiii!" he waved his hand to her and her two clients, smiling widely with all of them smiling back at him.

"yeah? what is it, senpai?" haruhi looked up at him from her armchair.

"sorry to intrude-" he runs his hair through his locks - an action that you told him the ladies would swoon over, "-but i was wondering, do you have any recommendations for commoner food that sick people can eat?"

"...are you serious?"

[amphitriteswife]

📝✂️Ror/ Snv characters as Students📝✂️

Qin shin huang:

🪭 never listens to the teacher. Like ever. He just does a lot of shit and the teacher is fed up with him so they let it slide

🪭 He’s the type of student to never study or show up and still pass with ease. No one knows how, not even the teachers.

🪭’ Qin you have had like 43 periods of missed lesson and it’s not even the second semester. How the hell did u even pass my test’ ‘Sir, i am literally God’s chosen emperor’

🪭 If you’re partnered up with him, prepare to take the lead cause bro either doesn’t know shit or he aint even present to begin with

🪭Even though he doesn’t do much for projects, he still buts whatever you need for it as a way to repay you. Including if he gets food or drinks, he’s paying for them too.

🪭Has very random subjects. Mainly cause they have China in them, including Chinese.

🪭 ‘Alright, what subjects do you wish to choose to take exams from?’ ‘China’

🪭 Violates dress codes. You need to dress in uniform? He’ll wear the most lavish suit you have ever laid your eyes upon. The school has a gala and you need to dress fancy? He’ll pull up w the most casual and basic outfit ever.

🪭 If he’s actually present, which is a rare sight, he’s usually loud. Mainly cause he has lots of friends and basically knows everyone since you can get along with him greatly.

🪭 complains about a lot of subjects. Math? He hates it. Biology? It gives him big brain moment and he doesn’t get it. Literature? Not Chinese? He don’t want anything to do with it.

🪭 ‘Ma’am i’m innocent, why does thou must bestows such suffering upon me?’ ‘Qin i just asked you if you could read page 34 out loud’

🪭 popular with girls. U know how bro rizzed up Alvitr? Yeah he does that with other girls too. He’s one of the popular dudes so it’s not like it’s hard either💀

🪭He’s a kpop stan. You can’t prove me otherwise. He listens to BTS, Straykidz, Ateez, KAI, EXO, Tri.be, Itzy and a lot more.

🪭 has lots of friends to the point he almost knows the whole school. Even the new comers.

🪭He a player actually. You know how bro had like idk 39291819101 concubines? Yeah that doesn’t change here either. ‘Hannah? She was In February. Mao mao? She’s so last week’

🪭Throws house parties. The extravagant ones too. Big house, a pool, big garden, many floors. You name it. Funny thing is: it aint even the main house.

🪭won the vote for: ‘Who will most likely become a stripper at the end of the school year?’ In the year books. Most think it’s not even cause he needs money but because he’ll do it for fun

🪭 passed out during the School Gala cause he heard someone say that Sushi is Japanese.

🪭doesn’t eat cafeterias food. ‘I, Qin Shi Huang, refuse to eat this….stuff…I have my own glorious food. You’ll never catch him eat anything that isn’t Asian food.

🪭Bothers ppl during lectures. As in he turns and just stares. He’ll either smile or just keep staring to annoy you.

🪭 always goes to school functions, yet ends up being the one yall wait for to go back. He just disappears when yall arrive and spawns back 34 min late.

🪭Has started a campaign for trips to China

🪭 Had a lot of baby momma’s. He a cool dad and rich enough for it. Lowkey knows how to be a dad too

Poseidon:

🔱 he’s in the school’s swimming team and even won awards for it.

🔱 straight A+ student. He a boring one okay. He dont party, doesn’t even hang out after school. Straight home and learning.

🔱 You’ll only catch him drinking water during breaks and eating nutritious. He actually enjoys salad’s. Especially when it’s middle eastern ones. Does he know what’s in it? He thinks. But he dont care. If it healthy and it bussing it works for him.

🔱 ‘My body is a temple’ ahh student. It wouldn’t be surprising if his ass did Yoga or some meditation.

🔱 only goes to school trips if it’s on the beach or it’s for a grade. He the type of person that actually does the assignment instead of having fun.

🔱 he doesn’t have many friends and usually sticks to his brothers or has his earphones in. He’s the one that’s usually silent during that time too

🔱 He’s the honor graduate. Didn’t give a speech tho. He just grabbed the diploma and dipped. He did grab some food that was prepared

🔱 actually has a gf??🤨 like legit, and she’s the captain of the swimming team. He lowkey simps but he’s Poseidon so you probably will never notice.

🔱 was at a house party once. ONCE. Bro got wasted. He didn’t know punch contained alcohol, bro thought it was lemonade. Ate too much with alcohol in his system. I think yall can guess that it didn’t end well for em😭

🔱 He wears casual clothes, sometimes blazers. He doesn’t like yoga pants cause they look ‘lanky’ not even during Yoga

🔱 He takes notes during classes. Like every class. Every moment. He either writes them or types it on his laptop. Only shared with ppl likes. It’s always organized too.

🔱 if you’re partnered up with him, it can go two ways. He’s either doing only his part and leaves you to fend for yourself. Or he helps (rare sight) with the difficult parts.

🔱 he prefers communicating in the chat document. That way he can be home and still communicate if he needs to, he doesn’t like calling cause his brothers are loud asf, and he wouldn’t talk until necessary.

🔱 supports the school library. Mostly because it’s quiet and he likes quiet, but also because he wants to read a lot and it’s an excuse to not go home. He usually studies there too.

🔱 goes to waterparks during school breaks and posts pics on insta. Insta only too. No snap, no facebook, no bereal, no nothing. Even if he does have it, he doesn’t want others to know.

🔱 surprisingly has discord. But it’s only to play games. He curses ppl out in voice chat.

🔱 would either never have kids or ends up being a teenage dad. Dw tho, his gf can support him if he ends up being a stay at home husband.

🔱 models for extra money. Mostly tight clothes cause they gotta use that body for good advertisement.

🔱 he also hits the gym regularly, so he posts pics about him at the gym too.

🔱 has an onlyfans?????

Loki:

🎭 probably sees the school therapist. Every month too. They give him candy.

🎭 Actually likes literature, art, music and surprisingly p.e🤨 he likes p.e cause he can get his mind off things and look good

🎭 probably has or is in an emo phase. He has his ear pierced and wears black cargo pants. Might even have some tattoo’s.

🎭 He either annoys ppl or is very quiet. Although ppl are mostly scared when he’s quiet cause he unpredictable.

🎭 He probably goes out for walks with his earphones in after school. Like y’know when it’s raining a lil and you can smell the grass n all while you listen to music? Yeah that’s his nostalgic experience.

🎭 He writes poems in his free times or spents a lot of time in the atelier.

🎭 Had a very messy break up with sigyn and it was the hot topic in the school. It was in the school’s newspaper and everything. Even the teachers knew

🎭 he listens to a lot of music. Mostly during making art or writing. He mostly listens to: Mitsuki, Chase Atlantic, Beach Weather, The Weekend, Tylor the Creator and The Neighborhood.

🎭He either hates or loves school trips. Even if he hates the school trip he still goes, mainly because Sigyn goes. But he won’t talk to her though. Cause he too scared.

🎭 He takes aesthetically pleasing pictures of different things. He has a nature page, a dark royal one and a school one. All of em are on insta though.

🎭 he does sometimes go to parties, but he either spends a lot of time with his friends and gets wasted or goes home early.

🎭He’s friends with Hercules and Ares. Who are mostly concerned for his well being.

🎭 he also might have gotten into heavy metal and vkei. His ass might may have since it cause Sigyn likes it.

🎭 if you pared with him you, he either does stuff ir leaves it and does it on the last moment before tge deadline. His ass likes working alone. Secretly prays to be put w Sigyn

🎭 Legit had a mental breakdown in class once. I think bro is used to having em.

🎭 Got voted to be one of those pissy teachers later on in life in the year book.

That’s all for now💀 might make a part two w more characters.

⭐️tag list⭐️ @miss-seanymph-pani @tinyy-tea-cup @heldril @nicasdreamer @monstertreden @riseofamoonycake @imperfectbloodmoon @salmonpoki @snowmantita @rukia-writes @swallowtail-lotus @brokensenseofhumor @bromeliae

[matchadobo]

KIDD; misconfession

wc: 4269

summary: imagine confessing to the wrong dude.

warning/s: highschool au they're like 12th grade, very fluff no nsfw, afab reader, shojo coded 🎀

note: inspired by this post

you were smart. you have a reputation for being smart among your peers and teachers. so you had no idea why the hell you fumbled this bad. it was one of the biggest moments of your life, but you had the nerve to fuck it up.

you had a MASSIVE if not, phenomenally embarrassing, crush on this guy. he wasn't that popular; he was known to be part of a school band that competes with other years, the band he was in represented your year. he has blond, luscious hair, he was tall, kinda muscular, is really good at playing drums it's making him hot, and is damn good at cooking class. so boyfriend material, right?!

after weeks of overthinking in pure whipped behavior. you've finally decided to prepare him a bento. you woke up extra early so you could take your time pouring your heart out into it. and it was perfect, it looked adorable.

the entire time you were making it, you were happy on your feet. as you shaped the onigiri like a cat and placed a hat made of fishcake on it you were giggling imagining a scenario in your head. you're so silly really.

then you finally wrapped it up in a cute hanky you had, it had some chain designs and lightning bolts. you tied it in the end with a bow and left a note in the end.

hi! i admire you a lot ever since you transferred from scotland ₍^ >ヮ<^₎ .ᐟ.ᐟ you always looked so cool performing ⸜(｡˃ ᵕ ˂ )⸝♡ please enjoy this bento, i hope you like it! from, name ♡

you went to the grocery store after class yesterday, you woke up early, you cooked something up, and you spent hours fixing up his bento. it was all for him. so why the fuck did you give it to that red head next to him?!

"hey, uh, is that for me?" killer spared you a look, eyebrow raised at you. for the record, you stood in front of his table for a good thirty seconds without saying anything. you were too into staring at him you didn't notice that your mouth wasn't moving.

you were about to speak but one of his homies asked for his homework. and you somewhat got embarrassed about this whole thing you have planned out. but you had to say something! anything!

"a-actually it's for...him!" you moved over to the side and placed the bento on kidd's desk. kidd who had his face resting on his chin, elbow propping his arm up. his scowl deepened and he studied you up and down.

kidd looked at his bento and then back at your awfully red face. he didn't say anything which made you feel even more overwhelmed. he just pointed at the bento and questionably looked at you. like why the fuck did you give it to him?

you hadn't had the chance to look over at killer because he was so happy for his best friend. he placed a hand over his mouth discretely to contain his smile and chuckle.

but you were trembling. so you left the room even though the bell for break had already rung, signalling class will continue. you walked as far away as possible. the empty halls did not stop you even though it was a sign that it was indeed time for class.

later that day, you admitted yourself to the clinic. you were feeling nauseous and queasy and your head hurt from thinking about your fumble too much, the nurses gave you ibuprofen and let you rest for an hour.

once you had a good rest, you were reminded once again of the incident earlier. you pinched the bridge of your nose in disappointment. but you had to gather your things and make it back to your last class.

the walk back to your seat was shameful. you don't know who saw your stupid shit, whether they're gonna tease you or what. but you thankfully had no encounters. what you felt though, was kidd's steady gaze on you when he and his group was outside of his room because they seemingly had their last period as vacant. or was it a glare? he truly looks like he's gonna kill you.

you met his eyes and he just casually avoided you, like he wasn't boring holes through your skull. you ran your fingers through your hair and groaned silently. what a fucking waste!

but i mean, what else is there left to do? you just have to suck all the bullshit confusion you caused up. but it ate at you, the fact that you did everything right but confessing to the RIGHT person. it'd be a dick move if you didn't clear this up, giving kidd the wrong idea. you don't even know the guy! he was in the other class with killer, thank god for that. soyou have NO IDEA what he's like.

until valentines' day came up. some part of you thought that this was the perfect time to apologize. you just have a penchant for doing stupid shit. to be fair, when is the right timing to break it up to him? you couldn't catch him even if you tried. he was always cooped up somewhere and you don't want to approach him publicly.

so you bought a cheap box of chocolates and headed to the music room, where he and his mates usually hang during lunch. you were gonna give it to him as an apology for the mismatch your dumbass did. it seems god has given you a chance because you saw him alone, playing the electric guitar. more specifically tuning the chords.

"oh kil, were there cabba-" once he snapped his head up and saw that it was you, his face was unreadably offended. "oh, it's you." he said monotonously.

"yeah, um- there's been something i've been meaning to tell you and..." his eyes shot down to your box of chocolates, clutching close to your stomach.

"no, no, no. don't even think about it." he raised his hand, palm facing you as he winced and turned his head away. "you, stay where you are, okay? i'll let you in on something shortcake. i, unfortunately, don't date. i don't ask anyone out nor do i get asked. now this, whatever freak show this is, i don't plan on moving forward with this shit, okay? so, uh, you got those chocolates all to yourself, aye?"

you furrowed your brows, looking at him with a sour expression. you just got fucking rejected. and it made your eye twitch and your anger issues rise. how dare this motherfucker cut you off?!

"hey kidd, there's some cabbage rolls by the cafeteria do you- want... some..." his friends entered the music room and got stopped with what they walked in on. "we're just gonna be...outside." heat said, gathering wire and killer out the room.

"you're so..." you let out, trying to find the right words for this lump of shit. "just get your damn chocolates!" you walked away, groaning in frustration.

you walked out frustrated whether by yourself for fucking up again or by him who wouldn't even let you speak and rejected you right off the bat. but really it was all your fault, you had the free will to choose who you're gonna confess to yet you picked the asshat.

"damn, what did you do?" wire asked kidd, who got out with an unusually sour scowl on his face, while watching you angrily walk away.

"fucking none of your business."

"not the first time you broke someone's heart." killer mumbled. "wasn't she the one who gave you the bento? it had your favorites in it, didn't it?"

"can we please leave it the fuck alone? the girl's already gone, spare her the fucking dumb shit." he rolled his eyes, walking past them.

"you know that shit made his heart flutter, look at how red his ears are." heat snickered as kidd got farther away.

but boy it did something to his heart. he received bentos before as a romantic gesture of some sort but never has anyone gave him cabbage rolls. it was always the generic shit he soon got sick of. how did you know it was his favorite? he never really says shit about himself.

and those skull-shaped chocolates you gave him, that was his favorite brand of chocolates. it's so cute and it melts in your mouth. how did you find that out? were you stalking him? snooping at him every time he picks it out in the nearest konbini? he somewhat finds you creepy yet mildly cute. mildly, okay?

on your end, you lost the will to even care and give a shit about him. whether you might've hurt his feelings or you gave him the wrong idea. hell he doesn't even care for what you're about to say, so why should you care about what he feels?! forget about your crush with killer, it all evaporated when all you could see now was this stupid fuck.

he was so irritating. him and his annoyingly gaudy red hair that hurts your eyes. how he thinks opening some buttons of his polo with his tacky inner shirts showing looks cool. or that he wears so many shit around his wrists and neck despite the school protocol to not do so. and that rebellious black on his nails that always had his handbook full of warnings. oh, it pissed you off. he had the nerve when he looks like that?!

then come the annual sports' festival where you got assigned as a reserve member for tennis. you were soaking in your own sweat from playing as a substitute for the main player for a good 30 minutes. you sat down on one of the long metal benches to catch up with where your friends are.

you sat down with your arms propped up behind you as you leaned your weight on them, trying to regulate your heartbeat and stop your sweating. you honestly felt starving and thirsty. you were thinking of something to eat, have lunch with your friends maybe.

then your vision went black and you felt a painful thunk on the side of your head, spanning down to your cheek. it took a while for the pain to settle in. but you lost control of your body. the last thing you heard was your friends shouting.

as you try and gain a hold of your fading consciousness, you felt limp yet you also felt supported from behind. almost as if you're being lifted up the metal bench.

you were seeing the blue sky and a patch of red on the side. it was all blurry really. you were very thirsty and you wanted water immediately. you tried moving a lot to try and stimulate feeling in your body, but you felt paralyzed. and now you completely lost consciousness.

causing kidd to panic because he might've killed you. he had you in his arms, as he hurriedly made his way to the clinic.

unbeknowst to you, kidd played in the rugby team. as someone so brash like him who was always on his feet, very athletic and has engaged in physically brutal activities, he fit right into the team. he was loud, lacked hesitation, greedy, and violently aggressive.

so when he was having way too much fun and lost sight of his surroundings, he threw the ball to the other side where his teammate was a little too vigorously. the ball slipped right onto his teammate's hands because it trajected way too fast and he lowkey missed and hit you right on the head.

boy did he ran so fast towards your direction when he fucked up, he ran so fast because he wanted to catch you before you fall completely on the floor because the bench didn't had any backrest. and he successfully caught you, his shin grazing down the sandy ground as he slid down to cushion your fall.

"fuck!" kidd cursed out loud, seeing a red patch on the side of your face foreseeably turning purple.

kidd had to take responsibility. he was an asshat but he was not that evil to leave you like that. so he swept you off your feet and rushed to the clinic.

"don't you dare die, after those damn signals. don't think for a second i'll let you get off easy, shortcake." he mumbled while running, out of breath but all he was thinking about was getting you to safety. or did he just do it so he can get out of trouble?

maybe it's the former, because he couldn't sit still by the waiting chairs outside the clinic. he squatted down the floor, pinching his temples and battling with his own thoughts. was he out of breath from all that adrenaline and running or did he actually felt scared?

"did she get to you?" one of your friends spoke. "you worried about her?" mischief coating her tone.

kidd looked up to spare them a glare, they were seated on the waiting chairs. he was squatting on the opposite side near the door.

"if i fuckin' killed her, yes!" he answered bitterly.

the tension was broken when the doors opened and kidd shot up from his position. thanks to his height, he was able to see over the doctor and see you sitting down and moving. a breath of relief escaped his chest.

"she's okay, she just has a pretty bad bruise. but no signs of alarming trauma. i gave her an ice pack and prescribed her with some painki-"

kidd walked past the doctor, blurring his hearing when he heard the first two words. he came to see you.

"w-why are you...?" you looked at him, cheeks pretty swollen as you held an ice pack on the bruise. genuinely wondering why this asshole is here.

"it's my fault." he sat by the chair beside your bed so he can get closer. "i threw the ball out of bounds and hit you pretty damn hard. so... sorry 'bout that. 's pretty stupid of me." he rubbed the back of his neck in embarrassment.

"huh. jerk." you rolled your eyes, not even wanting to listen to him anymore. but you were too weak to banter and throw him out.

kidd chuckled. "yeah. let me uh- let me make it up to you. 's a bad ass bruise, though." he pointed at you meekly, grinning a bit.

somewhat, your heart was beating a little too fast. the heart rate monitor that was connected from your forefinger exposed you for it. he was being so cheeky and annoying, and the constant beeping of your heart rate pissed you off even more. your friends snickered at you from outside.

"make it up to me? what's your plan, asshat?"

"you name it. i'm down for anything, honestly. just don't wanna be an asshat in your eyes again." he raised his hands in surrender, saying the mocking tone to rile you up.

you were about to speak when your stomach beat you to it. kidd laughed to himself, knowing exactly what to do for you. you just sat there hiding your blushing face.

kidd took you to a hole in the wall type of izakaya, it had dim lights but not so much that the place becomes poorly lit. it wasn't spacious, but kidd got you two a table that was secluded. seems like he visits this place a lot.

he covered the bill, was actually a decent person to talk to; just a bit of an asshole sometimes but it was his humor, and was waaaay different than who you thought he was.

it's when you noticed that his eyes actually had a bright hue of orange evident when he wasn't frowning. or that he smelled really nice up close, he kinda had that metallic fragrance that hangs out by your nostrils for a while. he looked handsome when he takes off his bandana for a bit to fix his hair. or that his laugh isn't that scary, it was actually pretty contagious.

he also walked you home, insisting to do so even though he lives on the other end of the street.

"look, it's fine. it's not even that dark out yet. my house is pretty close by from here."

"aaaah shut it, all the more reason why you shouldn't bother throwing me away."

"are you doing this because i confessed?" you gave up and kept walking, narrowing your eyes at him.

"no." he looked away because his ears were red, his fist tight inside the pockets of his pants.

"hmm, really?" the smile was evident in your voice as you tried catching a look on his face.

"brat."

days went by and passed with lingering touches and stolen glances across campus. there would be times that kidd and his group would pass by your classroom while you were in the middle of a conversation during breaks or vacants, and it'd be almost as if the world will completely stop when your and his eyes met. even during lectures when you go to the bathroom and have to pass by his room, you two would always somehow find each other's gazes.

but neither of you approached nor talked to each other. you just walk past each other. it's like no confession had been made. or he didn't just take you out for a not-dinner-date dinner. and weirdly enough, he was always the first one to look away. does he hate you? thinks you're ugly or what?

it all changed when you almost broke your arms trying to lift a box of broken classroom equipment as it is a general cleaning time of the month. he then took the box effortlessly.

"you can't obviously lift this shit and you still did." he coldly started, snatching the box off of you.

"someone asked me to do it and i tried."

"this box is overflowing with metal and wood scraps, even adults struggle with this."

"and you don't? you're so strong, aren't you?" you caught up with him as he started walking.

"tch." he looked away. he really does avoid your eyes all the time. "where do you even plan to put these?"

"the janitor told me to place it outside by the dumps, said someone will collect the scraps." you shrugged, opening the door for him that leads to the dumps.

kidd groaned in relief as he placed it down near the other boxes of heavy scraps.

"thanks, why don't you carry the other scrap boxes back there too?" you smiled up at him, hoping he'll say yes because you're already tired from previous cleaning works.

"i think the fuck not, i want to go home early."

your weak giggle was immediately halted when you couldn't turn the doorknob open.

"what the hell are you- did you lock us out?!" kidd got in front of you and tried turning (shaking) the knob while kicking the door with fervor.

"i didn't i swear! the door out the dumps fucks up sometimes! why would i want to voluntarily lock myself out?! with you even?!"

"the hell is that supposed to mean?!"

but the thing is, the door didn't fuck up on its own. kidd's group and your group did this on purpose. you two had to talk eventually, it's insufferable seeing you two tiptoe and potentially waste what you two had going on. besides, they unanimously think you two look really good together.

and it couldn't get even better, it fucking poured. the rain was so heavy, there were thunders and lightnings scattered across the dark sky too. and the only shelter you could two be in is the skimpy little roof that covered the doorway. yeah, you two had to fit yourselves under it.

"ever bathe in rain?" you broke out. your shoulders were slowly getting damp with the dripping of the rain at the edge of the roof. you were sitting on your haunches, arms crossed over your knees, and your face resting over your arms. trying to keep your warmth.

"plenty of times. don't tell me you will right now." kidd snickered, his frame leaning by the door.

"on my own, i won't." you looked up at him and he finally met your eyes. ah, it really looks great up close.

"count me out, brat." he shook his head, breaking eye contact as he took his hands out his pockets to cross his arms.

"have you been avoiding me?" you asked earnestly, staring at the puddle of water and leaves before you.

"could say the same to you." he shifted his weight on his other feet.

you hid your smile on your arm, growing shy at his statement.

"i- uh- did a mistake- which i don't normally do in situations like that- but i don't think it's a mistake anymore because-"

"spit it out."

you stood up to face him, fingers fumbling with the hem of your shirt. "i was not supposed to give the bento to you, i wasn't supposed to have a crush on you nor do i plan on pursuing you back then. because... because i originally had a crush on killer and then i fucked up and i gave the bento to you because i freaked out and-"

"woah, calm down." he placed his hands on your shoulders. seeing you become frantic and moving your hands around as you explained. "you had a crush on killer?"

"yes! okay? but that was before, way way before. not anymore."

"why? you like someone else now?" he said in a teasing tone, a grin stretched on his lips.

"yeah." you looked away, trying to hide your red face because one person came to mind.

"might as well tell me now that i'm here, brat." he nudged you a little, implying something.

"what? you think it's you or something?" you answered spitefully, facing him with evident irritation.

"isn't it me?" he matched your height as he leaned down to face closer to you. "come on, it's written all over your face." his smirk wasn't helping, it made you feel more fire in you. whether from anger or from being flustered or from him being so close.

"f-fuck off." you squatted back down to avoid him. but the motherfucker sat by the extra space on the floor on the doorway. he wanted to squeeze it out of you.

"well, i can't blame you. i'm pretty charming, aye?"

you hate that he's right. he's an asshole with a charming personality. and you hated that you liked him. it was more embarrassing than liking killer. because atleast killer was kind. kidd's just an asshole.

"i never said it was you." you scowled at him.

"mhm, no need to, buttercup." he ruffled your hair a little too comfortably. but you liked it, of course. it deepened the red on your cheeks.

and things got much worse, the rain got even stronger and it had furious winds. which means you two got wet in just a second. kidd had the nerve to laugh because you looked drenched. that crush on him will soon evaporate if this keeps up.

"okay, okay. i'll find a way for us to get inside as soon as possible so stop glaring at me." he chuckled, looking around.

luckily, one of the school guards saw kidd banging on the door from the little window and he opened the door for both of you. you were shivering as you got inside.

you two quietly went to your classrooms to get your bags. but as you got out, kidd tossed you his jacket. it draped over your head, obstructing your vision.

"put that on as you walk home, yeah? don't want you getting sick on white day, it's a day away." his back was already turned at you because he had walked far away and he still waved good bye.

and you were reminded all over again. that under that jerk fucking asshat exterior, he had other intentions than to fuck with you. and you yearn to experience more of those with him. and it irritated you. how you view his once gaudy vermillion hair as overbearing to now an endearing sight as you see him run off campus using his school bag as an umbrella.

you pulled his jacket over your frame and nestled in the warmth it brought. his cologne still stayed in it.

"so are you two together now?" one of your friends asked, her voice a little too loud. which caused you to smack her on the head.

"volume...! and no, he's probably fucking with me. i don't buy it."

yes you do. you were totally expecting something today ever since you woke up. today was white day. you checked your phone notifications, nothing. you walked to school, nothing. you passed by him during lunch, nothing he wasn't in his room nor the music room. and now it's finally last period. so maybe he really was just fucking with you.

except that once the bell rung, loud drums and an electric guitar riff could be heard far on the campus courtyard. your friends realized it first before you did and you got dragged out the overlooking balcony of the courtyard.

it didn't take long for kidd to spot you. right, he was the frontman of the band. it really was only killer which you saw at first but now, it's like kidd has his own fucking spotlight.

the entire campus saw their performance. they soon traced kidd's gaze which was glued to you who was covering your tomato face with the lunch bag you were carrying. their band was already acknowledged by the entire school so their performance had a lively crowd.

the song was a love song but they turned it metal. everyone loved it, even the faculty let it slide because it was white day. you could also see some people taking this chance to give their white day gifts to other people.

"oi, name!" kidd called out to you as soon as they finished and the applause concluded. you wanted to strangle him for bringing so much attention to you, you were already shy enough that he's doing all this for you. "catch this!"

homie threw a medium-shaped box at you. a fucking box. you were on the second floor. you almost fell trying to catch it. but you didn't open it yet, you wanted to open it next to him.

so you waited once the crowd died down and the other students finished asking to have a picture with them, you waited by the bench that's not too far away from them. it'll be almost as if his friends kicked him out of cleaning up because you were already waiting there.

"that was flashy, didn't know you had it in you."

"you expect something so simple from me? i have a damn band to serenade you for."

"aren't you offended or something? like about the whole misconfession thing." you shrugged, tracing the edges of the bright red box with a black ribbon.

"if anything, i find it funny. and stupid." he chuckled.

"then why'd you act like an ass when i tried clearing it all up during valentines'?" you crossed your arms at him.

"first of all, do i look like a relationship kinda guy? i just predicted as much that you'd ask if we can go out. why the hell did you even bring chocolates if you're just gonna clear it up? much less give it to me?" he sounded angry but all he really was just flustered, he hated how fast his heart ran and how dumbfounded he feels back then.

"i-i was flustered, okay? it's kinda like a peace offering because i was acting stupid and i atleast didn't wanna make you feel bad."

"yet you got me my favorite shit. how'd you even know i love cabbage rolls? and those cheap ass skull-shaped chocolates? you did some stalking?" he narrowed his eyes at you, face moving closer to pressure you.

"no! it was all just a coincidence!" you waved both of your hands in front of you while shaking your head. "why would i stalk you? god no."

"whatever, just open the damn thing."

the entire time, kidd had his arm on top of the backrest of your seat as you examined the contents of his box. he was leaning in closer from time to time when you say something about the stuff that was in there.

it had some cds of his favorite bands, some kisses chocolates, and a couple pairs of studded and dangling earrings.

"these are a bit much, kidd." you chuckled shyly, running your fingers across the surface of the gifts.

"hm? you don't want it? i can return those."

"no! i do, okay? i just didn't expect these grand things. you already performed in front of everyone and... you even got me these stuff."

"we already performed that set so we didn't even need to practice. i can't just not give you anything, it's fucking white day." he shrugged.

except that his group practiced till midnight last night because they never did a metal cover on fucking love songs and kidd just thought of it on a whim. and those cds? he had to run to the music store because it closes by 6 and your classes ends by 5. he got lucky with the jewelries because they were on sale. he did those last two things the day you two got locked out.

"so we're a thing now?"

"depends on what you consider a 'thing'." he leaned back.

you got a hold of his hand and intertwined your fingers with his. his palms were a bit sweaty and he hesitated a bit. his grip was stiff. "is this a 'thing'?"

he sucked in a deep breath to try and calm his heart down. he was squeezing your hands; but not so much as to hurt you. "fucking brat."

this just me tryna project my highschool shojo fantasy (w/ kidd) i'm going to college tmr pls help

i may be inactive again bc school starts tomorrow TT

[ultimate-shipper-trash-blog]

The Epilogue

It starts off on a simple hot sunny day at the lake.

The kids are giggling and splashing water in each other's faces.

Dustin and Steve are off to the side getting the sandwiches ready. Steve is watching Eddie flip the boys into the water.

"I'm so glad we're all like this together. I never thought I'd even get you an Eddie into the same room."

"Well he's really changed a lot. Definitely since we were kids. I like being his friend, I think we're better for it." He finishes wrapping up the sandwich he's working on and ignores Dustin's eyes piercing into his skull. Behind him he hears another splash and some screaming.

"What."

"I didn't know you used to be friends."

"Friends? It's been a long time since I've been regarded as one of those."

"Be for real I didn't know you and Eddie used to hang out."

"Yeah we used to hang out all the time." Steve looks off into the distance wistfully.

"So what happened?"

"Well, we grew up. I grew up and Eddie grew up and we both grew into different people and Eddie didn't like how different we ended up being. It happens all the time. We didn't have monsters to bond us like you guys."

"Well that sucks, maybe you guys will reconnect as strong as you used to be."

Steve rustles Dustin's hair much to his complaint.

"We'll be fine champ, we're doing well now aren't we?"

"Yeah Stevie we are." They both spin around at the sound of Eddie's voice. He's giving them a confused look. Squinting his eyes at Steve like he doesn't know how to feel.

---

A long time ago

"Do you want to be friends?"

"Why?"

"I think you're cool."

"No you don't you just think I'm cool cause I'm in 4th grade and you're only in the baby 3rd grade class."

"Am not!"

"You are!"

"UGH...I'm Steve by the way."

"Eddie."

Middle school

"Steve there's something wrong with me."

"Don't be ridiculous Eddie, whatever it is we'll fix it."

"This can't be fixed."

"Dude just spit it out I won't get mad!"

"Ok...I have a crush...on a boy."

Eddie's eyes are welling up with tears.

"Hey it's ok Eds." Steve walks closer to him, slowly, like approaching a wounded animal.

"I won't judge you."

"Really?"

"Yeah! So what if you like boys I'll kick anyone's ass who says anything bad. You're still my best friend that's never going to change." He wraps Eddie up in the tightest hug he can muster.

"I love you Steve."

"I love you too Eds."

Before high school

"I just don't know why you're being like this!"

"What Steve? You can't believe I'm mad at you for blowing me off for your other friends?!"

"I wasn't blowing you off! I had basketball practice! Tommy's mom just drove me home dude it's not as crazy as you think it is."

"Oh really?!"

"Yeah! If anything you're being crazy!"

"Oh! If that's how it's gonna be then we don't need to be friends anymore."

Eddie's stomps off. So angry he doesn't hear Steve calling back out to him. The next time they interact, Tommy is pushing Eddie into a locker.

When Steve called Jonathan Byers a queer he remembers the promise he made to Eddie and promptly throws up afterwards.

When Robin comes out to Steve on the bathroom floor he thinks he has a second chance to prove himself. When she ends up being better than he imagines he is so thankful.

God he misses Eddie.

---

"Me and Stevie boy can pack up the car don't worry munchkins."

The two try to pick everything up but Eddie gets progressively angrier by the second. Steve is trying to figure out why he has personal beef with a cooler.

When they reach the car Eddie tries to shove everything in the trunk but it all falls apart.

"What's wrong."

"Me? Nothing, why?" he hastily folds the towels again, shoving them back in.

"Well...you're all huffy."

He spins around, his face getting closer, red with anger.

"You wanna know what my problem is?! I can't believe you told him that like I was the one to break things off, like you ever missed me, like you never hated me!"

"That's ridiculous! I've never hated you! You hated me!"

"No! You're the one who changed. You made the final decision!"

"Yeah because you pushed me away."

"You didn't fight me on it."

"I fought you everyday. Everyday I thought of you. Everyday with the name calling and the lockers, I was trying to get your attention."

"You think I wasn't? You think I stand on tables for fun?!"

"...it's all been a misunderstanding?"

The two stare at each other not even daring to blink.

"We wasted so much time, we could fix that, that is if you still want me"

"I never went a day without thinking of you."

he gets shy, his face darker than his sunburn.

"I know you've changed, I've dealt with that but a part of me still thinks you hate me. For what I am. What you'll hold against me. I don't know if I can handle being friends with you with that fear in my heart."

"I'd never. Ever. Do anything. Besides," Steve flicks his hair back. "Birds of a feather and all that." The blush on his cheeks is high and getting darker by the second.

"The what?"

"I'm uh kind of bisexual."

"Kind of?"

"Definitely. Definitely bisexual."

"Oh."

"Right um...so you won't have any problems from me. I hope that won't be a problem for you."

"No! Never! I'm just...surprised."

"Yeah you would be," Steve grumbles.

"What?"

"Nothing!"

----

Steve is sleeping in his bed when he feels something wrong. His eyes shoot open and he spots a figure standing over his body.

"Jesus Christ!" He shoots out of bed and is ready to grab his weapon when he registers who's in front of him.

"Eddie?" He says softly. "What're you doing here? You had a gig tonight, how did you get in my house? Why are you in my room-"

"Steve." Eddie's face is golden. The moon is reflecting into his eyes, shining so bright. He looks so happy, like he's going to cry. His smile is so bright.

"Steve. I got it."

"You go it?"

"The record deal. I got it."

Steve runs at him and Eddie catches him. Of course he did. He always will.

"Oh my god oh my god," he mutters into his shoulder. Eddie's arms are squeezing his waist tighter. "I'm so proud of you oh my god."

"Steve. I have to tell you something, that's what I came here to say."

"What's going on Eds? You never sound this serious." Eddie lets go of him and sits him down on the edge of the bed. Eddie lingers closer to the door like he's ready to make an exit.

"The recording studio is in Chicago."

"Oh."

"I leave in a week."

"Oh."

"I want you to go with me."

"What?"

Steve feels confusion run through him but he's not complaining. He'd follow Eddie anywhere.

"Yes! Ok! Let's go!"

Eddie smiles but it looks like it's causing him pain.

"There's a condition to you coming with me." He comes closer to Steve but still keeps his distance. "You need to know the truth before you agree to leave everything behind."

"What's going on Eds?"

"Ever since we were kids I've been in love with you. Big. Gay. Feelings. I want to hold you and kiss you and start a life with you. I know you're bi but that doesn't mean you'd be into me, especially considering our history. I was going to keep it a secret, never tell you, but it's not fair for you to be with me and not know my true intentions. I understand if you don't want to speak to me anymore but I'll do anything to keep our friendship. I've tried to forget you but have you met you? You're unforgettable. You're too damn loveable." He chuckles at that, eyes darting at every corner of the room.

"Eddie..."

"I understand-"

"Come here please."

"Um...no."

"Edddiiie," Steve whines. He stands and grabs Eddie's hands and drags him back to his bed laying him down. He crawls on top of him and tucks his head into Eddie's neck.

"I am very confused right now Steve."

"Thank you for telling me, I understand how scary that can be to share your feelings. The only thing is I can't believe you don't see how I feel!" He props his head up until their noses are touching. "I love you you idiot. I've been in love with you since forever. Of course I want to start a life with you and whatever else you wanted-"

"Kissing. I wanted kissing."

"And you'll get it."

Steve giggles into his mouth and the two kiss for what feels like forever. They finally break apart and keep their foreheads touching.

"So...Chicago?"

"Chicago."

-----

Eddie's suit jacket is grabbed and he's thrown into a bathroom stall.

"Oh my god I can't believe you did that."

"Steve how did you even get back here? Bribed a guard. He knew who I was anyway, congratulated me on having such a loving partner." He ends the sentence smashing their lips together shoving Eddie against the wall.

"Mmm well," Eddie pulls away. "I didn't know the next time I'd win a Grammy I wanted to make it count."

"Eddie you confessed your love for me and came out in your speech that was something...something so special. God all I wanted was to see you, be near you. I couldn't go another second not being by your side."

"A bathroom stall was the closest you could get huh?" He smirks.

Steve smirks, sinking to his knees. "What? It's not good enough for you?"

"Nope! It's perfect! Absolutely perfect sweetheart no complaints here.

----

"You want to marry...me?"

"Yeah baby why wouldn't I?"

"I- I...yes! Ok! Yes!"

----

It ends on a simple hot sunny day

seventy years later

"Hello everyone, my husband lived a long successful life. You may know him as the lead guitarist for the many bands he's been apart of during his long career. You knew him as Eddie Munson rockstar but I knew him as much more. I knew him as my love. My husband. An uncle to our little gremlins little gremlins. A friend to all. A supporter of all. He passed away yesterday from natural causes. I was asked by his Manger how I wanted to handle this and I knew I had to do it."

There are tears in his eyes as he stares down the camera but a small smile on his lips.

"He lives on through our friends and family. Through those who have watched him grow. Through his awards and his fans. Through his charity work. Most importantly he lives through his love. He loved so much. So hard. Everthing had meaning to him. Everything had purpose." He wipes a stray tear away.

"I'll see you soon my love."

The final epilougue is the next day, for the sweethearts could not live long without the other. They had already been making up for the time they did not know each other, for they time they spent ignoring each other. They couldn't spend another minute apart.

[shieldofiron]

Vibe Check Part 3: Quid Pro Bro

The Frat Boy Au, Part 3

Read Previous on Ao3 or tumblr.

Steve wakes almost falling out of a chair.

He blinks, looking around the empty lecture hall and then finally looking up at the girl who’s still shaking him.

“Hey, yo, I’m up, I’m awake!” He wriggled out of her iron grip.

“You have to leave.”

“When did I pass out?”

The girl scoffs rolling her eyes hard, “Like halfway through the lecture, dingus. You snore, by the way.”

“I do not!” He snapped. Billy’s never said anything, and they’d roomed together all of last year.

“Oh yeah,” she nodded, crossing her arms. “Drool too.”

Steve just began to gather his books, “Why are you even here? Just let me drool.”

“I’m the TA,” She smirked. “And I didn’t want to be caught grading your absolutely half baked paper.”

“Yeah,” he smirked right back, giving her a little of the patented Harrington sparkle. “A likely excuse.”

She just huffs, heading back to the front of the room and gathering some papers, “you try to help a guy.”

“Want me to walk you home?” He glanced at his watch. “Kinda late.”

“I live off campus.”

“Your car, then.”

She blinks at him, “you’re not getting in my pants.”

“Excuse me?”

“I’m gay.”

“And I’m just offering a walk home,” Steve shook his head, “you try to help a girl.”

She pauses, “you’re serious. You don’t have to do that.”

He nods, “yeah I am, dude, it’s like 9 pm. I’m not gonna let you walk home alone.”

She’s pretty, short hair sort of messy around her freckled face, which morphs slowly from a scowl into a more confused expression.

“Okay, I guess.”

“You thought I would just leave you in the lurch?”

“Not-“ She just laughs and shakes her head. “Fine, dingus. Prove to me that frat boys aren’t all the same.”

“We’re not!”

“Your taking a nap during the lecture non withstanding. Like it wasn’t even during a film day.”

Steve massaged the back of his neck, “My neighbor at the house has this girlfriend, she’s like a banshee. We didn’t sleep at all last night.”

She swung a multicolored patchwork tote bag onto her shoulder, “Can’t you just outbang him? Fight fire with fire?”

Steve’s brows rose as he scrambled to shove his notes into his backpack. “Whoah, I didn’t expect you to say that!”

She giggles, “I’m a TA not a nun.”

“Fair enough. How do you get to be a TA anyway?” He holds open the heavy metal door as she sails past, her tote bag hitting him hard in the solar plexus as she did.

“Sorry,” She says. “You take enough of Herman’s classes that he starts to remember your face. It’s a blessing and a curse, I wouldn’t recommend it to anyone. And the pay is dismal.”

“You get paid too?” He followed her down the hallway and out into the brisk fall air.

“I thought frat boys had all the money for keg parties and togas and house dues and lawsuits…”

“Not all of us,” He scoffs, as if he isn’t absolutely the exact type of guy she’s talking about. “It’s always good to let the brothers know about stuff like this.”

She rolls her eyes, “I can’t believe you actually talk like that.”

“What? Brothers?”

“Yeah,” she raises one shoulder. “Isn’t your boyfriend one of your brothers? Isn’t that a bit creepy?”

At first he thinks it’s the fall wind. That whooshing sound.

“What?” He realizes he’s frozen, locked to the spot in his adidas slides, staring at a tree rather than her.

“Oh,” She falters in her skipping. “Did you two break up?”

“Who are you talking about?”

“Uh, I don’t really know his name but he used to walk you to class last semester for Women in Film? Blonde guy with the curls? He has an embarrassing and frankly dated 80s thing going on?” She blinks at him. “God, you did break up. I’m so sorry, Steve.”

“How… wh… we’re not boyfriends,” he finally manages to stutter after a few seconds of autumn-chilled silence.

“Oh,” Her expression morphs into pity and it’s fucking awful. “I get it.”

“No, no I… we’re not like that at all. Billy and I are roommates. We’re…” he couldn’t bring himself to say brothers, his mind still scrambled. “Friends.”

“Oh.” She tips her chin down. “Sorry. My mistake.”

After another stilted second, they start to walk again with purpose towards the parking garage.

But she keeps sort of glancing over at him. Like she’s checking.

“We’re just friends,” He repeats after a moment.

“Got it.”

“Nothing going on there.”

“Okay.”

“And we’re straight.”

“Interesting how that came up last.”

“I’m fucking serious. We’re just friends.”

“Got it. Broken gaydar. It happens,” She shrugs, and he tries to do it too. Just like… no big deal.

But he can’t seem to stop wanting to say it. They’re just friends. How could anyone read them as anything else.

The more he thinks about it the funnier it seems. Of course nothing is going on, it’s so crazy that she thought so. He’ll have to tell Billy, even though the idea makes him feel like he has a nest of angry scorpions in his stomach.

Finally, they turn sharply for the nearest dorm, just past the garage near the theatre building.

“I thought you said you lived off campus.”

“I thought you might be a serial killer. I don’t know which one of us is more disappointed.”

He laughed through his choked throat. “I’m Steve, by the way.”

“I know. You’re Steve ‘the Hair’ Harrington. You’re the party chair for Theta House and you’re like,” she puts on a silly high voice, “so cute.”

“And straight.”

“And straight, that too,” she giggles a little nervously. “I’m Robin Buckley. We’ve had classes together for two years.”

He rocks back on his heels, “you did the John Waters short for Dr Casey’s class. That shit was legit.”

“That’s me,” She smiled, “sorry about confusing you and you’re friend earlier. You’re just so… anyway. See you next time.”

“See you next time, Robin,” He says.

The whole way back to the house he can’t shake the feeling. Like a leaf blowing on the back of his leg he’s jumpy, sure he’s feeling spiders and skeletons.

He whips out his phone and dials the first number he can think of. Surely it will all just seem like a joke tomorrow. A harmless mistake.

“Hey,” Billy picks up on the second ring.

And it’s like all the words in the world have dried up in his throat and he can’t speak for the corpses. He just makes a little aborted wheeze.

“Stevie? What’s up?” Billy asks.

“D-do… do I snore?” He asks, not even sure where that came from.

“A little. But it’s cute. Why, is some girl giving you grief?”

Steve is so nervous he just up and disconnects the call. The wind blows at the name of his neck and his whole body breaks out in goosebumps.

[himbosandhardwear]

Sneak peek at my next story: Rockstar Eddie, fresh out of rehab, looking to keep his nose clean, returns to Hawkins for some down home realness. Instead he receives temptations beyond anything found in a syringe: single dad Steve Harrington in a cable knit sweater.

Enjoy!

His poor nerves, fried from trauma and years of uppers, jangled under his skin at a sudden frantic knock at the front door.

A muffled, “Wayne? You home?” came next.

Eddie crouched down and skipped over to the door. Someone was trying to peek through the side window, so he flattened himself against the wall opposite and hoped they gave up and went away. If not, he'd use his coffee mug as a weapon.

He quickly chugged the dregs to empty the cup, which was probably the dumbest thing he could've done, seeing as he then did a spit take all over Steve Harrington, and the baby strapped to his chest, when he opened the door without warning.

They both squinted at him in the aftermath. The baby did some sort of delighted, bubbling giggle.

“I shouldn't have smoked with Chris before I left. He’s always sneaking shit into his weed…” That was the only explanation for the current hallucination.

“Eddie?” Steve whispered. Even though obviously, he was looking right at him.

“Uhh,” he answered, articulate and precise.

Steve absentmindedly wiped his kid off with his sleeve, Eddie noted it was a nice, thick cable knit sweater, but didn't even bother to clean his spotted glasses. “I was looking for Wayne,” he said, not breaking eye contact for a second.

Eddie couldn't look away either. “He's still at work for another hour or so.”

“Shit,” he finally looked away to do that little punch maneuver that tugged his sleeve back, to glance down at his watch, “you're right. God dammit! Sorry, love, you didn't hear that,” he muttered to his kid.

His kid! Eddie screamed internally.

“Did you need…” Eddie had no idea how to finish that sentence.

Steve took pity on him. “Holly usually watches her on the weekends but she's out with Karen doing a college tour.” He had a look about him like that sentence just took him out at the knees. Yeah. Holly should not be going to college, she should be in the fifth grade. “Anyway, I've tried everyone there is to try. Joyce is sick, Claudia is in Atlanta visiting her sister. Wayne was my last hope. I- Shit. What the fuck. Sorry, baby.” He placed his huge hands over her tiny ears.

Eddie gulped. “Sorry, dude. Just me.”

Steve blinked at him. “Could you-”

“Absolutely not.” His stomach clenched in horror. “Are you insane? I just got out of rehab.”

Steve had the decency to flinch. “I know. I, uh, I don't have any other options. My appointment is in twenty minutes and it's going to take a few hours. Could you just watch her until Wayne gets home? It won't be long and she can't walk yet so you just have to make sure everything is picked up off the floor while she scoots around. She's changed, fed, you'd just have to keep her entertained.”

Eddie was still stuck on the ‘I know’ so he hardly followed anything that came after. “No. Take her with you.”

“I can't! It's a fucking MRI, Eddie!”

He couldn't help but to flinch. Why did Steve need an MRI? What was wrong?

His upset was the only reason he felt okay blurting out, “Where's her mom?”

A dry chuckle preceded, “There is no mom. Unless you wanna count Robin for giving birth but she's about as maternal as you are.”

“Uhhhh,” Eddie droned.

“Yes, I know she's a lesbian, thanks. It was a surrogacy thing. Obviously. Anyway she's been in Chicago for the last six months. And not having to babysit was part of the agreement. We're wasting time. I know you can do this. You handled Erica Sinclair, you can handle Abby.”

He glanced down. Abby. She got Steve's brown eyes. God dammit. “Erica could walk and talk and feed herself. Probably not lick a light socket.”

He cracked a smile, despite himself. “C'mon man. She likes stories. Are you not a storyteller?”

Eddie's heart broke all over again. “I used to be.”

Something broke for Steve as well. “Please, Eddie,” he said but it sounded like ‘You owe me.’

Which…no? Eddie wasn't the one who-

“Look, just come with me to the appointment. You'll only need to hold her while I'm in the machine.”

That reminder was what did it. “Okay.”

He lit up. “Okay?”

“Yeah,” he moaned. “Just let me get dressed.”

“Oh.” Steve only seemed to register then that Eddie was standing there in nothing but a pair of black silk boxers and a tank top. “Right. Uh. I'll just get Abb back in her car seat.”

“Okay.”

They shuffled away from each other, and as soon as the door snicked shut Eddie was on the floor. He didn't have long to wallow, the hospital was like eight minutes away, but he couldn't help it. Not even in Hawkins for a full day and already he was under Steve's spell.

[bqstqnbruin]

Nate MacKinnon Teacher AU

I have more ideas for this but I am running out of players because I cannot think anymore which is great since I'm back for in-service on Monday

Teacher AU Series

Warnings: None

WC: 753

______________________

“Why are you here?”

Nate looks up from his computer, confused. “What? I work here.”

“No,” Annalisa sighed, inviting herself into his classroom. She puts her bag down on the floor, moving some of his papers off his desk to make room for herself to sit. If anyone else had done something like that, he would have lost his mind, but Annalisa? Sitting this close to him?  “Why are you here this late? It’s nearly six.”

“Oh, whoops,” Nate says, finally looking at the corner of his screen. He told himself this would take him two minutes, not two hours. He shrugs, leaning back in his chair and rubbing his eyes. “I was making a seating chart.”

“God, those are the fucking worst,” Annalisa laughs. “They won’t stop talking or something?”

“I always assign their seats. New month, new seats.”

Annalisa looks at him with her mouth hanging open. “Don’t you teach sophomores?”

“Yes.”

“They’re old enough to drive, they’re old enough to pick their own seats.” 

“So?”

Annalisa shakes her head, crossing her legs. “Too late to argue with you over this. Which class are you doing right now?” 

Nate turns her computer towards her, Annalisa leaning forward to read it, her legs brushing up against Nate. He takes in a sharp breath that she doesn’t notice while he watches her nod at the screen. 

She points at two names on her screen. “Don’t seat them together,”

He looks at the names, Cayden and Lucy. “I thought they were best friends since Cayden moved here when they were in second grade?”

Annalisa nods. “They were. But they’re fighting right now.” 

“I told them they could sit together this month,” he says, the color draining from his face, pulling a laugh from Annalisa. 

“Maybe if you sat them together sooner, they wouldn’t have had that fight,” Annalisa jokes, Nate not getting it. He stares at his screen, looking as if his heart was breaking. “Dude, I’m joking. They’ll be fine in, like, a month.” 

“Ok,” Nate says, leaning forward on his elbows on his desk. “If you know all the drama between the students, who else should I put together?” 

Annalisa laughs again, a feeling Nate couldn’t place running through his stomach. He lets out a sigh as she continues to look at his computer screen. “Oh,” she exclaims, making Nate snap out of the trance he didn’t know he was in. “Cameron and Max like each other, you should put them next to each other.”

“They do? I’ve never seen them talk to each other.”

Annalisa takes his computer in her lap and starts typing. “He’s too afraid to talk to her and she doesn’t know what to say to him when they are together, so you have to give them a reason to talk.” 

“Why?”

“Oh, come on,” she says, not looking up from his screen and continuing to type away. “You remember what it was like to have a crush on someone when you were younger and to barely know how to talk to them.” 

Nate lets out a long sigh, shaking his head as Annalisa glances and him with a smirk on her face that made his mind race. “Boy, do I.” She goes back to his computer, Nate mesmerized by her. “Why were you still here?”

“I was helping Miles with something.”

“Oh?”

“Yeah, he’s trying to make this display for women’s history month.”

“And who better to ask than the only woman in the department?”

“I might as well be good for something to him, right?” she jokes, Nate hearing the annoyance in her voice. 

“So that date you guys went on the other day didn’t go well?”

“If that was a date I’m sorry for whoever he ends up with,” she laughs. “Ok, here.”

Nate takes the computer from her, his hand brushing against hers. He stares at the screen, a seating chart on it that would have taken him another couple of hours, or honestly, couple of months, to get to. No one he knew who had problems with each other were near each other, friends who knew how to sit with each other were next to each other, Cameron and Max were together, Cayden and Lucy further apart. It was perfect. “Shit, this is great.”

Annalisa hops off the desk, picking up her bag. “It’s great enough that we can both go home, now, right?”

“Or,” Nate says, his voice shaking as he packed up his bag. “We could grab dinner?”

Annalisa smiles. “Sure.”

[survivalist-anon]

Log 27: Breaking and Entering

The five, unfortunate, and reluctant Astartes...armored with nothing but their fists and civilian clothing....were now in the middle of a mini coliseum.

"....so....this is it. This...is what these mortal value us as....", Bilhard growled.

An enormous TV screen slowly descends from the high ceiling.

As the lights flicker on, Sleen shows up on the feed. "GOOD EVENING FREAKS! I see you've finally made it! Let's check out your competition! Shall we?"

A large door elevates to the several chaos marines that were originally being held. Although most of them have removed what they could of their armor, some were now equipped with makeshift weaponry. Truly something post apocalyptic in aesthetic nature.

In the middle, there was only one who had worn the bare minimum of protection, wearing a traditional luchador outfit, with reds, blues and whites adorning the mask...was El Nino.

Towering over most of the other Marines, something unusual for a first born marine.

He stood out from the team, raised his handa up, and the crowd cheered. He roared as if he's already won. He looks at the group, with a menacing glare.

Something was different about this Khornate fighter. His bravado had substance, his stance had a purpose....he was lucid.

"Damas y Caballeros! Tonight! You all about watch the bloodiest show on earth!", as he boomed his voice to the mysterious crowd of dubious patrons, he than points to Bilhard.

"And you! 'Toro'! Are about to feel my fists! For I EL NINO, shall bestow the THUNDER!", he then proceeds to flex, posing for the crowd. As he turned around to make sure everyone had a fantastic view of his rippling muscles, a conspicuous set of markings could be seen on his back.... healed markings that once formed the sigil of Khorn...

Bilhard, who had never met this shocking eccentric chaos marine, was understandably confused. "........what in the..."

Sten looked to Bilhard with a cocked brow, "It is no surprise that it would be a World Eater would be the head participant of this....".

"He's showing too much personality that's for certain.", Joe commented.

"NOW! It would not be fair to have such 'honorable' brawlers UNARMED AND UNARMORED!", As he points to more MadMaxian wears. Armor and weapons flashed from scrap metal, old car parts and broken industrial grade machinery. Unwashed to boot.

"Well ....it is more than what many of our enemies were willing to give I suppose.", Toke mumbled, he looked at El Nino....there was genuinely something off about him..."aye, Sten....do you suppose you could take a peak man? See what's making him tick?".

Sten had closed in on El Nino the second he saw him, ".....he.....is doing all of this on his own...chaos has....left him?"

Through Sten's eyes, the chaos marines in the back were merely a mess of darkness and depravity....El Nino was a void in that mess....not a light, or a dark emptiness....but a blank space amongst them....as if he was his own presences.

As the gang reluctantly head to their "generously" given gear, their mind had become riddled with questions....one had remained the loudest....

"where the fuck was Wick and Moors?", Bilhard grumbled as he grabbed what looked like trashed power fists, likely from another unfortunate victim from battles prior.

Sten seeing what little this terrible gladiatorial battle had to offer, he had a feeling their luck was about to change, "hmm...I sense not too far."

"NOT YOU LOBO! You are fighting in the ring with me!", El Nino growled.

Sten was to fight El Nino the way he wanted to fight him; Honorably through lucha.

~~~~~~~~~~

Outside, a set of guards were peacefully keeping watch. Making sure no law enforcement or border patrol officers would come snooping around.

One guard, a rest position was staring off into the evening desert landscape of Nevada.

The other however, was a little more jumpy. "Hey....dude....Pete...."

Rolling his eyes, "what Kieth?"

"It....it happened again....my cousin-", a loud moan from Pete erupted.

"-for FUCKS sake dude....for the last time there's no such fucking things as aliens.", Pete argued.

"But seriously man! My cousin TOTALLY saw one this time! He was driving his truck out in stretch and saw those running light critters! He almost died bruh!", Keith excitedly shouted.

A deep breath spewed from Pete, "your cousin is a desert hick from Arizona who's favorite candy is fentanyl man, get your cousin some help or something that shit is sad a-", suddenly, the headlights of a truck coming towards them.

Raising thier guns. The truck slowly pulled up to their side.

Two men were sitting seated, both wearing rather unrevealing uniforms.

"ugh, hi..ugh... we're here to deliver 60 cases of Snack Cakes?", the driver was doing their best not too look at the guards in the eye.

The two guards began to inspect the truck, "...we didn't get any notice about a snack truck did we Keith?".

Keith inspected the passenger seat, a potent oder of BO emanated from the open window.

"Howdy do!", it was Gus. The driver, Tulio.

The guard stared at Gus, "...bro....why do you smell like shit?".

"Well I was about to ask you the same question! Only instead of shit, it's 20 volts!", the second the guard was about to call for backup, Gus hits him with a high powered taser to the neck.

"Hey what the-?!?", the second shouted but Tulio had swiftly hit him the chest.

"....GUS WHAT THE SHIT MAN?!", the calm demeanor Tulio had put up quickly shifted.

Gus on the other hand was jittery and giddy like a school kid. "Alrighty! Moors! Wick! Show time!", knocking on the back wall of the truck.

"This isn't part of the plan Gus!", Tulio shouted.

"It is now!", he giggled as he prepared his gear and bullet proof vest. "Here! This will protect you from their mind probes!", Gus handed Tulio a small plastic Grey Alien with a little sharpie marked symbol on the back of its head.

"....gringo loco...", Tulio breathlessly muttered.

A loud crash of metal bending had erupted from the back of the truck. A set of thunderous foots steps crunches the dry, sandy ground.

"Gus...you did it again.", Moors voice emanated from the vox transmission of his terminator armor.

Gus, giving his maniac, ear to ear smile. "Juuuuuust like Topeka....", Gus had been referring to an incident where he and Moors had invaded a previously secret government facility.

Tulio looks at the armored Moors, gives a whistle, and nods in approval, "Nice...hey how come you don't gots a beak like Wick's suit?".

A light chortle vibrates from the vox, "preference I suppose, now....let's get drilling.", Moors turns on the power drill on his suit and directly digs at the base of the entrance.

Looking around for Wick, Tulio looked both in the back and the skies for him, "Ugh, say wheres Wick? Wasn't he in the back of the truck?", he shouted over the loud drilling.

Gus has just finished gearing up, "took the back entrance! We're here to distract!".

"oh shit man...", the response was dry and tired.

~~~~~~~~~~~~

Sleen, huffing enough cigar smoke to choke a horse, was monitoring the fight below. "Hehehe.... ladies and gentlemen! Our first event will be a one on one fight with "El Toro" and the fan favorite, PINKIE!"

The second his name was announced, the Emperor Children marine, 'Pinkie', had begun to flaunt himself in such vulgar and sentimental ways. Gyrating his hips, having his long tongue feel his face for him and dancing for the crowd as they cheered.

"OOOOoooohhhh! It looks like I am about to get a little 'warm up'~", he hissed seductively at Bilhard. Giggling uncontrollably, "I hope you like 'em HARD and LONG!".

He takes out his favorite weapon, a makeshift hammer with pink and green sprayed painted imagines. Blood having already stained the bright neon coloring for being unwashed. Pinkie swung his hammer around like a baton, demonstrating an unnatural Grace to the depravity of what he was planning to do to Bilhard.

In the meantime, Bilhard, who has not been reluctantly labeled as "El Toro", likely a name that Señor Mateo had given him earlier, was stoic, focused and ready to lay a beating.

Raising both of his fists, slamming them together like a boxer, he was just waiting for an excuse to let what he knew was DECADES of frustration. "YOU WILL THE WRATH OF MY FISTS SOON ENOUGH YOU FILTHY DEMON!".

"Ooohh! A fisting?! Oh I like you already!", Pinkie filtered with him playfully.

"......I believe for the first time in my life am I.... reconsidering my decisions.", Bilhard had just realized what 'fisting' is in the context of earth slang.

Toke, who has firmly armed himself with not one but two smaller hammers, "Too late lad! I see you have never had to deal with Slenessh's grimiest?", speaking from experience, it was a bit of bad luck that he wasn't mathed with Pinkie for this fight. The best way to deal with them, is to defeat them quickly and efficiently.

Two things Bilhard likely knows.

"Hmf, I've dealt with plenty scum like him!", stomping towards Pinkie, ready to fight, Bilhard begins to focus on his strategy against his corrupted opponent.

A referee shortly appears, surprisingly unshaken at the two towering men about to begin this tournament of horrors. "Alrighty! Listen up. Fight hard, fight dirty! The crowd loves it. Oh and Pinkie please don't violate the guy afterwards at least kill him before you rape him ok? It scares off the paying customers.", speaking with such chilling nonchalance.

Pinkie gave a sickening smile, "Oh stahp it! You know much they love an after show!", he licks his lips, just fantasizing what is going to do if he wins.

"Right...have fun boys", running as fast a possible away from both of them.

Without even the courtesy of a bell, Pinkie landed the first hit with his hammer, sending Bilhard off his feet.

Stumbling a little, there was no time to recover as the chaos marine was mercilessly swinging and landing several good hits.

Bilhard, kept his ground and covered his face and head. "YOU COWARDICE-", the heavy concrete of the hammer head landed on his arms and shoulders.

The chaos marines and Pinkie, were cackling.

The other were shocked to see that the fight truly was supposed to be a dirty fight. As they were about step in a make it an even fight, the projector screen with Sleen's face appears.

"ah ah ah, NO TAG TEAM MATCHES ALLOWED.", he presses a button and a silent dog whistle a of sorts chirps throughout the ring.

Every marine, had come to a stand still from the shrill blasting.

The pain was especially brutal for Sten and Toke, their hearing was twice as powerful as the rest of them.

Pinkie on the other hand, didn't seem care, "ew, such an annoying sound....", he genuinely wasn't effected.

Blocking his ears, Bilhard tried to see his opponent who was just unblaikingly glaring at him, waiting for him to stand up.

The noise itself stopped, "Now, let's get the show rolling!", Sleen roared in the speakers.

Right on que, Pinky swung again, however Bilhard had dodged. Weaving way from the next heavy hit, he successfully lands a punch to this opponent's bare pectoral, knocking him off temporarily off his balance.

~~~~~~~~~~~

In a hidden room, Sleen watches from multiple cameras, his patrons now watching from the box seats near the arena. "Hehehe....looks like bird boy isn't coming back after all....too bad....so sad....", he turned around practically growling in delight.

Selene, who was now forced to wear another outfit Sleen had chosen and sadly with few bruises. She sat there silently, fuming with rage a deepened sadness....where was her crow?

Heavy stomps headed to her, Sleen grinned his toothy ugly grin, "Awww what's the-*hack!*-matter?...don't like the pretty dress?", his now clawed finger headed to under her chin.

Her resolve was breaking, for a single tear slid down.

Sleen took this a sign that he was winning his little mental war against Wick..."hehehe... FINALLY...you get the big picture.".

Suddenly, a small beeping had interrupted the scene. "What the?...", he trumpled to the monitors.

His curiosity had turned to fury.

Wick, in full Raven Guard armor, was standing in FRONT of one of the cameras in front of the door.... staring it down as if he knew Sleen was looking.

"ggggrrrrraaaaAAAAAHHHHHHHH!!!!!!", he stomped quickly to the door, with his enhanced arm, he decimated the door, but no one was there. "WHERE ARE YOU!!!!! I KNOW ITS YOU!!!!", huffing and heaving, he breathlessly turned around. He slowly walked back, "Looks like I'm gonna have to mo-".

Selene, was gone.

The only thing left, was a black feather.

"-.....no....nnnnnNNNNNOOOOAAAAARARRRHHHHHHHHH FIND THAT SLUT AND HER FREAK! KILL THEM BOTH!", at this point, he was frothing at the mouth, he slammed the monitor system, putting the whole show on autopilot.....

Where things were about to get a lot more.... interesting.

End of Log 27

@kit-williams @barn-anon @egrets-not-regrets @gallifreyianrosearkytiorsusan @walking-natural-disaster @starfrost740 @squishyowl @sleepyfan-blog @lawnchair86

[scoops-aboy86]

Had some ideas for some fics that were stuck in my mind. First idea is working at scoops ahoy causes Steve to gain weight. The second one is where in the aftermath of Starcourt Steve is struggling and starts to gain weight #chubby Steve Harrington

Why not both? 

Steve who has recovered from the concussion Billy gave him in November but still forgetful, and it comes out most (because he spends a lot of time on his own this summer while Dustin is at camp, and he doesn’t remember what he forgets) with work. He constantly forgets to bring something for lunch, and ends up eating ice cream or something greasy from the food court or both instead. 

Sometimes he pisses Robin off by accidentally coming back late from his breaks because he misremembered what time the break started, sometimes remembering yesterday’s break time with the odd clarity of hindsight. The only thing that convinces her that he’s not doing it on purpose are the times when he comes back early and argues with her about what time he left because he is so sure, but then she’ll make a good point and something clicks in his head and then he’s like wait, and has a blink-and-you’ll-miss-it mini breakdown over the unreliability of his own brain and now he has to figure out how to concede the argument gracefully which is hard because literally no one in his life has modeled that very well for him so he’s kind of garbage at it. Robin happens to blink less when she’s angry, and Eddie (hiding in the fake foliage outside Scoops) blinks even less while surveilling Steve Harrington, a pastime that all of his friends give him gentle but consistent shit for. 

(“Seriously you guys, something is going on with that dude. First he had some sort of involvement in finding that Byers kid after they had a fucking funeral, and Steve looked wrecked. Then there was the Great Pumpkin Blight of ‘84 followed by that thing about a gas leak and Barb Holland, who everyone said the last place she was seen was at Steve’s house, and he looks wrecked again? And now suddenly Steve is graduated but still in Hawkins and working a minimum wage job even though everyone knows his parents are loaded? Something is up, and I’m going to find out what it is!!” To which one of the guys had said, “Something’s up alright, keep it in your fucking pants man,” and laughed him out of Gareth’s garage. Ingrates. But, he thinks later after popping a boner watching Steve bend over in those increasingly tight blue sailor shorts, maybe they had a little bit of a point.)

So when Eddie turns up at the mall for his usual Staring At Steve shift and Scoops is closed, at first he just thinks that Steve forgot to come to work or something, and maybe he has the keys for opening up (not the best decision on management’s part if true, but that’s Corporate America for you) and Robin got bored of waiting and went home. 

By the second day, when the ice cream parlor is still shuttered, Eddie isn’t so sure. He checks the parking lot and Steve’s car is still out there, Robin’s bike still chained up to the fence near the Employees Only entrance. So where the fuck are they? If his friends wouldn’t absolutely give him more shit about it, he’d recruit them to help solve the mystery. 

Overnight, the mall burns down, the ice cream wonder twins reappear, and Steve… is once again wrecked, but even worse this time. Eddie may or may not have a conspiracy board going; if no one else has seen it, does it really exist? Ask Pavlov’s cat. 

It’s much harder to stalk Steve for clues and spank bank material at Family Video, but Eddie manages. He ups his prices to account for the new drain on his wallet and gets really good at coming up with ways to relate random movies to whatever O’Donnell has them reading in class, bulking up his essay page counts with references and comparisons in ways that actually improve his grades a bit but are still off the wall enough that he doesn’t get accused of cheating to try and pass this time. 

And Steve, for all that he isn’t mainlining ice cream every day (as far as Eddie knows anyway), keeps putting on weight. His clothes don’t really show it that much so he must be sizing up his clothes before truly outgrowing them, but he doesn’t put in the same effort with his work vest. So every time Eddie walks into Family Video (because he only goes in when he knows Steve is working) he gets at least one eye-full of Steve’s belly framed tellingly in unchanging green and the optical illusion that the vest is somehow shrinking and he can’t. Stop. Thinking about it. Steve’s ass is getting better by the day too, and dear god those thighs, but Eddie just wants to press up against the front of him and… never leave, ideally. Wondering what Steve looks like under those clothes drives him to distraction every single night, and most mornings. 

Meanwhile, Robin comments about Eddie’s constant visits to the store. She’s maybe a little paranoid after the Russians, but it strikes her as weird that he never turns up when she works a shift without Steve and almost always when they’re both on the schedule. Steve says that yeah, Eddie turns up when she’s not there too, but isn’t too worried because “It’s just Munson. What’s he going to do, step on our lunches while yelling something about conformity?” Privately, he admits to himself that he would actually be incredibly annoyed if Eddie stepped on his lunch, but other than that he’s pretty neutral about the guy. 

Except now that Robin’s pointed him out, Steve keeps noticing him. And actually listening to Dustin when he talks about him. Kinda forming a picture of the guy, even if Dustin’s impression of a temperamental agent of chaos is at odds with the Eddie Steve has watched trip over literally nothing or bounce of the glass doors because he pushed when he should’ve pulled. It’s endearing. Also, he starts to notice that Eddie has a staring problem that seems to intensify whenever Steve has food in his hand. 

At first, Steve takes this as a challenge. Because yes, he has fielded some comments about his weight. That’s why he lives with the Hendersons now, and it was damn lucky that his BMW was already in his name or that would’ve been a whole thing. Any time he catches Eddie staring, he makes a point of eating faster. Bigger bites, snitching more from the candy rack, asking Robin loudly when his next break is because he’s “starting to feel hungry.” He’s not. Hungry is something he’s decided not to put up with anymore, along with being embarrassed by the forgetfulness he came by honestly in the form of protecting people, on the grounds that life is short and he might as well enjoy it. Sometimes, at home and three quarters of the way through a container of ice cream that was full when he started, he thinks smugly that Eddie is really going to stare at him now. 

Gradually it becomes less of a game and more of a turn on, because Eddie doesn’t stop staring. If anything, the attention seems even more intense than before as all that eating settles increasingly across Steve’s belly, ass, and thighs. He’s slowly gaining a second chin. Robin is growing increasingly exasperated at (a) having to bat Steve away from the video store candy that will come out of his paycheck if Keith finds out and he cannot afford that, and (b) putting up with what she deems “the most egregious eyefucking I’ve ever seen in my life, and I used to watch Tammy undress you with her eyes when you got all gross and sweaty at basketball games!”

Steve sees his chance to do something about it when he comes back from his usual lunchtime diner run. He spots Eddie’s van in the parking lot in front of Family Video with Eddie still in it, and just… opens the passenger door and climbs in, balances the cardboard drinks container with two large sodas and a large milkshake on the dash in front of him. The music is blasting, and Eddie is busy staring at him with wide eyes and his mouth hanging open so Steve reaches over to crank it down. “Are you trying to catch flies, or fries?” he asks with a wink, reaching into the warm paper bag that’s fighting his belly for real estate on his lap and starting to pull out his food. “You’re always watching anyway, so I figured I’d give you a private show.”

“Uh,” Eddie says dumbly, eyes darting around to completely not private parking lot they’re in. He is no closer to solving the mystery that is Steve fucking Harrington, but he’s definitely starting to stiffen in his jeans as he watches Steve take two voracious bites of his first burger before even really starting to chew. Then he remembers himself a little and adds, “Thank you for gracing my humble van with your presence, your highness. I’ve been dying for an audience with King Steve.”

“Who isn’t,” Steve shoots back with his mouth full, even though he hasn’t had a date with anyone but ice cream and his own hand since graduating from high school.

And if he ends up eating Robin’s lunch, drinking Robin’s Coke, and wandering into Family Video approximately seven minutes after his break was supposed to be over with his polo untucked to hide the way his pants button is straining to contain his post-stuffing body, and least he got a boyfriend and a phone number out of it. 

Eddie, driving home with a mess on the inside of his boxers, knows that his friends are really never going to stop giving him shit now. But still, he can’t stop smiling.

[tobiasdrake]

Yukio's introduction kills me.

They want to give her this super cool establishing scene where she shows off her awesome skills but also they haven't really set up Logan in a position where she can do something super cool to establish herself.

Like. He's in a bar full of drunk Canadians, one of whom got his buddies killed by hunting poorly. It's really hard to be a badass anime warrior in a bar full of drunk Canadians who hunt poorly.

So she has this ominous scene where she's like, "I have used my death seeing powers to see that these people suck."

"This is way below your pay grade, The Wolverine. Why are we even starting your movie here?"

But then Doofus McStabbed Hand finally breaks free!

So she expertly vanquishes him with a spin kick.

Look at that badass posture she drops into. Like, she is all set for a way cooler fight scene than this.

All the other doofuses around the bar are like, "Oh no, Bob got kicked, eh!" and shuffle around awkwardly. This one dude draws a gun but the bewildered terror in his eyes says he has no idea if he actually wants to be part of whatever the fuck is happening right now.

"Uhhhhhhhh I wasn't part of the bear thing. Are we cool, man?"

And then she starts monologuing to the drunk Canadians about how cool her sword is.

Why. Why is she doing this. Why is she telling the bar about her sword. XD

Gun dude decides he does want a piece of this, so he gets up from the bar and walks over to her so he can use his gun. Guns are, after all, famously melee weapons.

Look at how disappointed she is that this is her big establishing fight scene.

She bops this asshole down with the scabbard. Then, for absolutely no reason, draws her katana and cuts this man's beer in half.

And also the stool this other guy is sitting on.

They were just bystanders. What the fuck, Yukio.

It's so she can do this cool anime warrior thing where the click of her sword returning to her scabbard causes the things she cut to fall apart. Though she doesn't even time it right.

A full four seconds pass between the dramatic sheathing and this man's beer falling apart. She fucked up the timing on her big anime moment where she attacked random bystanders for no reason.

What a weird introduction to this character.