#god. i could go on about this for a while

[maskedbyghost]

Part 2 of our boy Simon yearning for you.

The ache never eased. It just deepened, settled somewhere behind his ribs and made a home there, like a wound he couldn’t stop picking at. Days turned into nights, and nights into days, and every moment he wasn’t hearing your voice or reading your texts was a slow torture.

It wasn’t just the casual meetups, the flirty messages, or the teasing that made his pulse race. It was the way you’d brush his arm when you were laughing, the way you’d lean into him like it was the most natural thing in the world, the way you’d say his name—not “Riley” like before, but “Simon.”

It killed him. It absolutely destroyed him.

He wanted to be better than this, to be cooler, to be calm, but he wasn’t. He was coming undone at the seams, unraveling every time you were near and aching when you were gone.

He’d find himself waking in the middle of the night, breathing hard, reaching for his phone to check if you’d messaged, to see if you’d thought of him in the quiet hours when the world was asleep. And when you hadn’t, he’d drop the phone on the pillow next to him and close his eyes, trying to swallow the bitterness that rose in his throat.

Sometimes he’d dream of you, and wake up with your name on his lips, the sheets tangled around his legs, his skin burning. He’d lie there for a long time, staring at the ceiling, wondering how much longer he could take this. How much longer could he pretend he was fine, pretend he was just your friend, when every cell in his body screamed for more?

He started pulling away, just a little. Shorter replies. Fewer emojis. He’d leave your messages on read for a little too long, trying to convince himself that if he created a little space, the longing might ease. But it didn’t.

You noticed, of course. You weren’t oblivious. One night, after another one of those meetups where he’d smiled too tightly and laughed a little too late, you caught him outside the pub. The cold bit at his skin, but the look in your eyes made him feel like he was on fire.

“Simon,” you said. “What’s going on?”

“Nothing,” he said, as he looked away.

“Don’t give me that. You’ve been... distant. Did I do something?”

God, you sounded worried, and that just made it worse. Because the last thing he wanted was for you to think you’d done anything wrong. It was all him. All his fault.

“No,” he said roughly, running a hand over his face. “You didn’t do anything. I just... I’m trying to get my head straight.”

Your brows drew together, and you stepped closer, close enough that he could feel the warmth of you through the cold air. “Simon, you can talk to me.”

And for a moment, he almost did. The words hovered on the tip of his tongue, thick and heavy—I miss you so much it hurts. I think about you all the damn time. I can’t stand being near you because I’m falling apart inside.

But he couldn’t. Because if he said it, if he let it all spill out, he didn’t know what you’d do. Didn’t know if you’d pull away, if you’d laugh it off, or if you’d tell him you didn’t feel the same.

So he just gave you a smile and said, “I’m fine. Really. I’ll see you later, yeah?”

And he left you there on the sidewalk, staring after him, while his heart cracked open in his chest...

It was unbearable.

Days passed. He told himself he was getting better at pretending, that if he ignored the ache long enough, it would go away, and that if he kept his distance from you, he’d get over this.

But of course, it didn’t work.

Every time he saw your name flash on his screen, his chest would tighten. Every time you laughed, it was like a fist closing around his throat. Every time you touched him, even casually, even just a brush of fingers as you passed him a drink or steadied him with a hand on his shoulder, he felt like his skin was going to tear open.

And then, one night, it was just too much.

You’d sent him a message—something stupid, really. A picture of your dinner with a comment like “Guess who forgot to buy pasta sauce? 😂” And he’d stared at it, thumb hovering over his screen, the ache in his chest unbearable.

He couldn’t do this anymore. So he called you.

You picked up on the second ring, your voice warm and a little breathless. “Hey, Simon. Everything okay?”

“No.” His voice was rough. “No, it’s not.”

There was a pause, a soft intake of breath on your end. “What’s wrong?”

He dragged a hand through his hair, pacing his living room, his heart pounding so hard it echoed in his skull. “I can’t do this anymore,” he said, his voice cracking. “I can’t pretend everything’s fine. I can’t keep acting like I’m just your friend. I can’t... I can’t stand being near you and not—”

“Not what?” you whispered.

“Not have you,” he said hoarsely. “I want you. I’ve wanted you for so long it’s driving me insane. And I can’t keep pretending I’m okay when I’m not.”

“Simon,” you said softly, “why didn’t you say anything before?”

He let out a sharp, broken laugh, a sound like something cracking apart. “Because I was scared. Because I didn’t know if you felt the same. Because I thought maybe you’d laugh it off, or tell me I was reading too much into things. Because... because it’s you.”

You were quiet for a beat, then said, “Come over.”

“What?”

“Come over,” you repeated. “Right now.”

He didn’t even think, didn’t hesitate. He was out the door before he realized he hadn’t grabbed his keys.

The drive to your place was a blur, the streets smearing past in streaks of light and shadow. He didn’t remember turning off the engine or locking the door. He only remembered the way his hands trembled as he knocked, the way his breath caught when you opened the door, standing there barefoot in leggings and an old sweatshirt, your hair a little messy like you’d been running your hands through it.

“Hi,” you said softly, stepping aside to let him in.

He stepped past you, and the second the door clicked shut behind him, it was like a dam breaking.

“I tried,” he said, his voice rough, breathless. “I tried so fucking hard to stay away. To act like I didn’t care. To tell myself this was enough. But it’s not. It’s not enough. I need you. I need to know you’re mine, that I can touch you, kiss you, be with you—”

You didn’t let him finish. You surged forward, grabbed the front of his jacket, and pulled him down into a kiss so hard and desperate it made his head spin. He stumbled back a step, hands coming up to cradle your face, your jaw, your hair. You were warm and soft and real, and he felt himself falling, falling so fast it was like the world was tilting beneath him.

“Simon,” you gasped against his mouth, fingers threading through his hair. “I’ve wanted this too. I was just... waiting for you to say something.”

A broken, breathless laugh escaped him, his forehead pressed to yours. “God, I’m such an idiot.”

“Yeah,” you said, smiling, your lips brushing his.

He kissed you again, slower this time, pouring everything he’d been holding back into it—all the longing, all the frustration, all the desperation that had been eating him alive for months. His hands roamed, memorizing the curve of your hips, the softness of your waist, and the line of your spine. You were here, you were his, and for the first time in so long, he felt whole.

“Stay,” you whispered, lips against his throat. “Don’t go home tonight.”

“Wasn’t planning on it,” he murmured, and when he kissed you again, it wasn’t desperate—it was everything he’d been aching for.

---------------------------------------------

@daydreamerwoah @kylies-love-letter @ghostslollipop @kittygonap @alfiestreacle @identity2212 @farylfordaryl @rafaelacallinybbay @akkahelenaa @lovelovelovelovelove987654321 @wraith-bravo6 @tessakate @xocandyy @nightfwn @robinfeldt98 @xiisblogs @mad-die45 @readingthingy @actualpoppy @amongthe141 @whore4romance @thatghostlykid @syofrelief @avgdestitute @sheepdogchick3 @echo9821 @imalapdog

[lonely-moons]

⁀✶the bomb | bucky barnes x reader

title: the bomb

pairing: thunderbolts!bucky x avenger!reader (who is also a thunderbolt now yayy trauma bonding family)

warnings: established relationship tension ooOoOOo but then fluff, suggestive language

summary: things have been tense recently with your boyfriend bucky. but now it reaches a new high... when he blows up the limo that you're riding in.

wc: 1,811

notes: wrote this to try and suppress the urge to see the movie a 5th time. didn't work i still wanna go but my god the cinema is expensive

masterlist

you want to scream so badly that your throat hurts with the restraint of keeping it in. your entire body feels ablaze with anger, irritation pounding faster than your heart and infecting your blood so that all you can see is red.

or maybe it's just that you've been staring at the red guardian for the past five minutes.

it's a glare, really, but even though it's firmly set on him right now, he's not your end target. you think he probably knows this, since the two of you had taken a small liking to one another in the past hour. he had come to save you, after all, and even made you laugh with his crude humour. but he's the closest to you, and you're sure that if you let go of this restraint, you might just knock one of the walls down. which would crush all of your tied-up... teammates? acquaintances? you aren't quite sure yet.

what you are sure of is that you can't quite look at the man standing beside you. your boyfriend, but that's a little too endearing of a term for you right now.

you'd woken up in this dilapidated gas station the only one not tied up, other than bucky. the sharp ache in your head and pain in your limbs had demanded all of your attention at first, making you forget what had happened before blacking out. but then bucky entered your vision, all concerned and apologetic in your face before you remembered the events. you'd shoved him away, refusing to even glance in his direction, and thankfully his attention was directed elsewhere when the others began to stir.

you let them do the explaining, fully aware of the glances bucky keeps throwing you. you don't pitch in, not about following your friend yelena since you've been worried about her recently, not about the incinerator, not about the elevator shaft - not even about bob. but eventually everyone's caught up, and you can't be left to scowl in peace for any longer.

bucky says your name now, soft in a way you haven't heard in a while. it reminds you of sleepy mornings, of late nights tangled in sheets and whispers so light they could just be breaths. it used to melt you, but this time it burns.

"look, can we talk? please?"

you try not to react but can't help the scoff that breaks free. so now he has time to talk to you? figures. apparently blowing up a limo with you in it shouldn't deny him the privilege of talking.

"i think i'm good, barnes," you say.

your first words since waking up are accompanied by your first steps towards the others. you head for yelena since she's the only one you're really sure about, but before you can reach her, bucky's arm grabs your wrist. it's not painfully tight, but it is a warning, and you can't help but notice he's used his flesh arm, despite the fact the metal one is closer to you.

it had taken a while, even in your friendship, before bucky became comfortable enough to touch you with it. that almost started anew when you got together. he'd said that it was a symbol tainted with blood and destruction, that he hated the thought of any of that reaching you. you'd taken ahold of his metal fingers, bringing them to cup your face and shifting your head to place a kiss to his palm, effectively beginning your process of wearing him down.

he always refused to let it near you if either of you were angry at the other. said that he would never hurt you, but he didn't want to risk even the slightest possibility of a too-tightly-clenched fist or exasperated hand movement.

it'd been a while since he'd intentionally kept it away. now you feel a sting in your chest but try not to let it move your features.

"oh-ho," alexei laughs, looking between the two of you. "it is lover's quarrel, yes? i had fight once with one of my loves, too. she was beautiful, beautiful woman... the teeth, the hair, the thighs... but she always telling me, 'alexei, you can't keep coming in shower with me if you are going to go toilet -'"

everyone erupts into noises of protest, yelena the loudest of all. alexei looks around, mouth open slightly as if shocked his story is not being met with enthusiasm.

ava, who sits beside him, drops her head. "throw me back in the incinerator."

"what?" alexei asks, offended. "it is lovely story about -"

"i'd even take falling down the elevator shaft," says john, shaking his head slightly.

"we don't have the time for any of this," yelena protests. she looks around the group, but her eyes land on you.

"agreed," you say forcefully, ripping your arm out of bucky's grasp, but you don't make to untie the others again either. you hold eye contact with him when you add, "i think getting blown up knocked us off our schedule a little."

"you know i never would've done it if i knew you were in there," he says immediately.

his eyes are soft, but there's that crease between his eyebrows that deepens the more worried he is. you nearly hate that you have so many times to compare it to, because with a quick glance you can easily tell that this is the most worried he's been in a while. more than the night before any congress meeting, more than waking up sweating from any nightmare. this time he knows that it's not just a job or a few hours of sleep that he could lose. it's you on the line, and the panic bubbles so forcefully that it has his blood pounding in his ears.

it manages to evaporate a little of your rage.

"oh, thank you," says ava, sending a sarcastic nod to bucky. "it's good to know that you have no problem with blasting other people into the sky, very nice."

bucky sighs, running a hand down his face. "please," he says to you again, "just... hear me out. one minute."

your eyes still blaze as you stare him down. while that doesn't crack, something in your heart does, and you find yourself giving a stiff nod. "fine. one minute."

his lips twitch, eased a little by hope, and he guides you to another section of the abandoned gas station, much to the protest of the other four. you give yelena a quick apology, promising to get her out after this, but then hurry up your steps as you hear alexei begin another story about young love. they become background noise by the time you reach the door at the far end.

"i'm sorry," bucky says after you turn to him expectantly. "no, that doesn't cover it, you don't even know how sorry i am, i -" as if sensing that he's about to ramble, he cuts himself off with a sigh. "i never would've done anything to that car if i'd known you were in it. i was always planning on getting the others, but you didn't answer your phone all day, and i thought they might've -"

"shot at me?" you supply pointedly.

"well, i was gonna say known where you were, but... yeah. that too." his smile is small, sincerity preventing it from tipping fully into hesitant. "but i'm not just sorry for all that, i... i miss you. i miss us. and maybe that's not fair since i've been the one not making enough of an effort, but i just..." his arm moves, like he's about to reach out to touch you before he thinks better of it. "i just miss you."

it's as though the tight ball in your chest gets unravelled with each word. you knew, of course, that bucky would never hurt you, would never have blown up the limo if he'd known you were inside. but you've been missing him too, for a while now. with his job in congress and your job as a kinda-avenger, there'd been a lot less time together and a lot more time working. neither of you had managed to quite figure out the work-life balance of the relationship, and the tension of that had finally snapped when you saw bucky coming to save you, only to end up pointing his gun in your direction and shooting.

"i miss you too." you look up at him, into the blue eyes that look different now. they're still tired, evident by the dark circles beneath them, but they have some of that warmth back. you smile, then one side tips higher into a smirk as you say, "but, you know... i think talking about it is a much healthier way than trying to blow up your girlfriend. maybe we should get dr. raynor back, go over some old notes about healthy coping mechanisms..."

he huffs out a laugh. "well, i am planning on making amends."

"oh, are you?" you raise an eyebrow. "and what does that entail?"

"i have a few ideas." he grins at you in a suggestive way, widening when you laugh. knowing he's now in safe territory, he steps forward to cup your face with both of his hands. when you lean slightly more into the metal one, he receives your unspoken message, thumb stroking your cheek. a moment of contemplation soothes his expression into something more tender, and he rests his forehead against yours. "but mostly i'm putting you first. i need you. and i need you to understand how important you are to me."

your hand comes up to his wrist, finger skimming over his pulse. "i do know. we're both just shitty at time management."

he snorts. "yeah, can't argue with that. but i mean it. maybe it had to take throwing a bomb at you..." you smile and, as if it's an automatic trigger, so does he, "but this is a wake-up call."

and then his lips are on yours, slow but strong, like an assurance all on their own. you return it immediately, trying to convey the same unspoken promises.

"i love you," you say when you part, and the words are so familiar on your tongue even though they haven't been used in a while. neither of you part too far, so your lips brush his as you say it.

"i love you, too." then a soft smile graces his face. "hey, on the bright side... i'm definitely getting fired."

you can't help but laugh. "oh, that's a bright side now?"

bucky shrugs, like the answer is obvious. "means i get to spend more time with you."

you're about to reply when alexei's laugh booms from the other room, followed by a shout that finally manages to reach you:

"bucky, we'll give you whatever you want, just please make it stop!"

[sinkuna]

୨୧ ― When Gojo Satoru’s arms are wrapped around your trembling form, when he’s buried so deep you can’t tell where he begins and you end, the world narrows to this- skin against skin, breath mingling in desperate gasps. His hips rolling into you with a desperation that makes your chest ache, each thrust a silent plea to be more than the weapon they made him.

There’s something fragile in the way he holds you, like you might disappear if he lets go even the slightest. Between ragged breaths, he tries to crack jokes, "Guess I really am… hah… Gifted in every way, huh?" But his voice breaks slightly, the joke falling flat as his forehead drops to yours. Those brilliant sky blue eyes, usually hidden behind dark lenses, are completely exposed now and you can see everything he’s been trying to hide.

This is where he becomes human. Not Gojo Satoru the six eyes bearer, not the lonely god on his pedestal- just a man wishing to create something beautiful instead of destroying everything he touches. When he’s moving inside you like this, creating friction and heat and something that feels like salvation… His past, the Gojo legacy, the isolation, the burden of being untouchable… All of it falls away.

"I love you," he whispers against your neck so quietly you almost miss it… The way he say it sounds like an apology, like a promise all at once... His pace becoming more urgent, more sloppy, as if he can fuck away every moment of emptiness that came before you…

Each moan you make, each broken cry of his name, builds something new in the ruins of what his family tried to make him…

As your nails rake down his back he arches into the sting, welcoming the marks that prove this isn't another hollow dream. Inside you, he's molten, complete, every thrust a quiet rebellion against the loneliness that's been his only companion since birth.

And when he finally spills inside you, it's with the desperate hope of planting something beautiful in the ashes of his bloodline. Starting over. Starting clean…

In the quiet of night when everything is said and done, as his cum dribbles out of your well used body, Gojo Satoru holds you like you're the only thing keeping him tethered to humanity…

━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━

The nursery glows amber in the soft light of a rubber ducky nightlight, casting gentle shadows that dance across pink walls. Gojo Satoru, folded impossibly into his newborn daughter’s crib like the world’s most devoted pretzel. All six foot three of him bent and twisted… One arm was draped protectively over the sleeping infant while the other hung awkwardly out past crib bars. His poor knees were tucked up, long legs hanging over rails at awkward angles that would make anyone else cramp.

But he doesn’t care about the discomfort, how could he when he has his precious angel snuggled up to him?

The gold band on his finger catches the duck's warm light, a simple band that represents everything he never thought he could have. His white hair falling across his forehead as he watches her tiny chest rise and fall, memorizing every detail of her peaceful face.

Down the hall, you’re fast asleep in your shared bed with his son curled against your side, small fist clutching at your nightshirt. Two heartbeats, steady and trusting.

Gojo’s white lashes flutter closed as exhaustion pulls at him, but his mind drifts to that conversation with Suguru all those years ago- that question that used to keep him awake: Are you the strongest because you’re Gojo Satoru, or are you Gojo Satoru because you’re the strongest?

For years, he’d never really known how to answer… The question felt like a riddle designed to trap him in endless circles. To remind him he’s built his entire identity around being untouchable, unbeatable, alone at the pinnacle of power…

But now, cramped in this tiny crib with his daughter's tiny heartbeat against his and the memory of your sleep smile when he’d kissed you and his small son goodnight, the answer crystallizes with perfect clarity. He now understands how to answer his old friend’s question.

He’s the strongest because he has something worth being strong for. Not because the world demands it, not because his bloodline cursed him with power- but because this little girl and his photocopy twin -his son- needs their father to come home. Because you need your husband to survive every mission, every fight, every single day…

His daughter sighs in her sleep, and he presses a kiss to her forehead, whispering against her skin, "I'll always come home to you, princess."

For so long, Gojo Satoru carried the heavy curse of loneliness, a weight that seemed unshakable especially after Geto. But now, as his gaze drifts beyond the crib bars to the photography of the family he built, his heart swells with a quiet realization… The curse of loneliness vanished the moment he found you.

[thoughtscout]

I stopped identifying as trans/nonbinary only a few months ago. my dysphoria hasn't gone away. I don't wear bras, haven't in over a decade. but I still struggle to leave the house without something covering my chest, so I use tank tops and strapless crop tops for a bit of compression. my chest is huge, so the thought of someone seeing me walking around and being able to see them jiggle as I move - or, god forbid, see my nipples through my shirt - makes me feel genuinely nauseous.

it doesn't help that I live in an extremely male-dominated, unsociable neighbourhood. I keep my blinds constantly closed, and double-check that I'm hidden from view every time I shower or get changed. it's a constant source of anxiety. a local news archive revealed that a convicted pedophile lived in my neighbourhood within the past decade, and even men as nice as my own father consume pornography. so I never let my guard down.

I remember what it was like to hit puberty: there was a period of time where I'd discovered the simple joy of walking around the house shirtless, but after a certain point, my parents started telling me to put a shirt on any time we had guests over. I didn't understand why. around the time my breasts had developed, I'd bought a sleeveless Summer dress that I was totally in love with. it was very loose-fitting, though, so one time it slipped over my chest without me realizing. my older brother pointed it out to me while covering his eyes to shield his view. I was so embarrassed, I stopped wearing it altogether.

despite all of this, I still wish I could walk around in public braless. I wish I could sunbathe topless - I wish I could lie in the grass on hot days and let my skin feel all of it. I wish I could look at my naked body in the mirror and not find something repulsive or unsightly about it. I spent my teenage years in agony during P.E. classes, trying to hide my figure as much as possible, and suffering rib pain from tight binding. I wish I never had to hear the word "tits" again - because it's what my rapist called my breasts as he sleazily groped them. in that moment, they felt like nothing more than toys to him.

...but none of these things are my breasts' fault. I've stopped resenting them. looking at images of fat butch women and naked older women has completely changed my perspective on them. now, my breasts' existence is radical: they're enormous, they dangle almost crudely, reaching my abdomen, and they spit in the face of the standard of the "ideal breast" that gets imposed on female bodies. to me, they're a symbol of intense, unapologetic female presence and power. I'm not always comfortable with having them. but I love them, and I would never want to get rid of them.

(I've even started drawing my female characters with breasts that resemble mine, to reflect this. I used to just draw them all completely flat-chested!)

I'm never going to blame my body for the way my world has made me feel about it. I'm never going to blame my breasts, or any of my sexual organs, for taking the brunt of the rampant hypersexualization and objectification that infected my brain since I was a young child. instead, I'm going to cope with my dysphoria as best as I can, while continuing to recognize, criticize and spite the targeted, societal misogyny that caused it in the first place.

[venusheartsyou2]

can't reach you | bucky barnes

summary: rooming with bucky barnes comes with its downsides.

pairing: bucky barnes x fem!reader

warnings: explicit. 18+ only, MDNI. afab!reader, mentions of alcohol and drinking, lowkey a little matt murdock x reader, strangers to friends to enemies to lovers (?), bucky barnes is the worst, zero communication, set pre-endgame, mentions of my goat sam wilson, fluff, barely angst, sub!bucky, dom!reader, oral (male receiving), piv sex, unsafe sex, no use of y/n.

wc: 9.8K

a/n: erm so i didn’t think this fic would be so long. got a little carried away… anyway i had a lot of fun writing this fic so i hope u enjooooyyyy!!!!

— MAY 25TH, 12AM

The city exhausted you.

It wasn’t always that way. It had been your dream to move into ‘The Big City™’ since you were a teenager. But god, you could not keep up. You were too timid for the big personalities of New York City. You stuck out like a sore thumb. There had been too many times you had apologized for simply existing around others on the subway. You were too slow and too nice. Also, one time a pigeon literally shit on your head. People tried to say it was good luck, or something, but that’s just a bunch of horse shit. Whatever, you were trying your best to get over that. Guess you haven’t been too successful.

You were trying to scrape by. You had just recently graduated from college with a bachelors in Accounting. Too bad you were nowhere near getting a job in the field, as you were currently a server at a semi-bougie restaurant down a few blocks from your apartment. Speaking of apartments, you had just gotten a text from your roommate, Bucky. He was warning you that he was going to be home late again. Not that this was different from any other night. Whatever, you guess. More time and space for you.

A loud groan exited your mouth as you finally entered your apartment. You lean against the door, hoping it won’t crumble at your weight. Not that it would, but you wouldn’t be surprised if it did. The walk from your work to your apartment had a grueling uphill that nearly killed you every time you had to walk on it. Which was quite often. You’d think you’d get used to it by now, right?

You dropped your long shoulder bag. The handle digs into your shoulder every time you use it, but it’s cute and convenient enough to keep using. You didn’t have the funds to splurge on a nicer bag. Rent ate your money like a gluttonous pig.

Turning on the TV and mindlessly tidying up was a part of your basic routine. Come home, wind down, go to bed, wake up, go to work, then repeat. Well, maybe there was some masturbation with your trusty vibrator thrown into the mix every so often. That’s no one's business though.

Hours pass, and your roommate returns back home. It might be around 2AM, but you haven’t checked in a while. You’re too busy attempting to use a spreadsheet to plan your finances for the month to hear Bucky come in. You’re attempting to be organized, but honestly, you won’t be too surprised if this spreadsheet becomes some sort of lost relic that gets abandoned in the deep trenches of your computer drive.

“You’re up late.” You hear a low voice emerge from the darkness.

“Jesus! Oh— Bucky,” You let out a deep sigh of relief, “You scared the shit out of me.”

Bucky breaking you out of your trance makes you realize just how close you’ve been staring into the bright white light of your computer screen. You blink away the dryness in your eyes. That shit hurts.

“Told you I was coming back late.” Bucky shrugged as you took off his shoes and started walking closer to you.

“Well, yeah. I know that.” You say while giving an annoyed look at Bucky. Bucky simply raises his eyebrows and gives a slight grin.

“Were you out frolicking with your boyfriend Steve? Or.. oh! Or was it Sam?” You joke. Bucky rolls his eyes, simply saying, “Yeah, sure.”

You didn’t know much about Bucky before living together. The two of you had only crossed paths after you had seen a weird Craigslist ad for a wanted roommate. The price of the room had seemed like a scam, at least compared to other prices for shared apartments in New York. The guy was hot enough for you to give him a chance, but you were definitely suspicious. There were a lot of deliberate conversations — just to make sure this guy wouldn’t kill you in your sleep — before you had signed the lease. He seemed decent and quiet enough for you to be on board.

You didn’t quite understand his job. He was an Avenger, kinda? To be frank, you didn’t care much for the Avengers. Yeah, yeah, ‘Earth’s Mightiest Heroes’ and all that, but after they had wrecked your best friend, Isabella’s, car in a battle against the gajillion-th attack against New York that month, you had grown a brewing distaste for them. Tony Stark wrote up a small check for your friend though, so maybe it wasn’t that big of a deal. It was fine that you were roomies with a somewhat Avenger. Whatever. As long as he doesn’t touch your shit, you’ll be fine.

Bucky calls your name, to which you turn over to face him rather slowly. Maybe the sleep deprivation is catching up to you. “Hm?”

“My ‘boyfriend’ Sam wanted to know more about you.” Bucky says, using air-quotes over the word boyfriend. Funny. You let Bucky have a small laugh from you. You had heard about Sam here and there, but you were still a little wary about a guy you never met asking about you. That’s usually never good news.

“Why does Sam want to know more about me?” You ask, cautious.

“I told him about you. He’s a good guy. Annoying, but good.” Bucky assures. You’d heard about Sam’s big personality. It would be refreshing to meet someone genuine, you think to yourself. The service industry has been stripping you dry of all the warmth you had left.

“I’ll be there too. Obviously.” Bucky shrugs, hoping it’ll convince you.

“No shit, Bucky,” You smile as you laugh at his attempt to bring some sort of comfort, “Okay, okay. Fine. I’ll meet your damn boyfriend.”

Bucky gives a grin before saying, “If anything— Steve would be my boyfriend.”

“Alright, smartass.” You giggle as you close your laptop, notioning that you’re going to head to bed soon.

Bucky acknowledges your body language as steps back to his own space, ready to go back to his room as well.

As you walk back to your room, Bucky shouts, “Neither of them are my boyfriends, by the way!”

“The first step is denial!” You shout back.

— MAY 26TH, 10AM

The next morning went by as it normally does. You slept a little past your alarm, as per usual. You put your alarm an hour earlier than you need to be up, to account for the time you’re going to lay in your bed, before actually getting up. You only feel a small gnawing itch in your head to hurry up and leave for work, which differs from the usual loud pounding feel of anxiety. Improvement!

You walk down the hilly route to your work. It’s nice now, but you know the inevitable uphill walk back is waiting for you. Best not to dwell. You enter your work with 10 extra minutes to spare, and you pump yourself up for doing so well today. That lasts up until after you clock in with the POS system at the hostess stand, and you realize that your waist apron that’s required for your work uniform was missing from your bag. Shit. You must’ve forgotten to put it back into your bag after doing your laundry. You’ve already asked for so many different alternate waist aprons from management already, and you didn’t want to deal with their pesky attitudes today.

It wasn’t the end of the world. But you mean, it felt like it. You remembered that Bucky said that today would be his off-day, and you frantically called him. The service was bad around your area, but after a brief waiting period, the call finally went through.

“Oh, thank God, Bucky,” You sigh, “Could you, possibly.. do the biggest favor for me ever?” You ask, the hints of desperation in your tone begging to be let out.

“You know, calling every favor the ‘biggest favor ever’ really dulls the whole meaning of it.” Bucky’s voice breaks through from the other side of the line.

“Okay, whatever. Just help me. Please.” You add, hoping it’ll get your lazy-ass roommate up and on his feet.

“Aw. Okay. Because you asked so nicely.” He replies. You roll your eyes, like he can even see you do that.

“Can you grab my waist apron from my drawer and bring it to my work?”

“Jesus. So far.”

“Bucky—” You try your best not to curse him out, “Just fucking do it.”

“Alright, alright. Easy,” He says, “I’ll bring the damn apron.”

“Thank you. Lifesaver.” You say, rubbing your forehead with your hand. Hopefully that doesn’t fuck up the foundation and contour that had been hastily applied on your forehead.

“Yeah, yeah.” Bucky says, before he’s cut off by the end of the call.

Approximately 9 minutes later, Bucky pulls in front of the restaurant in his fancy little car. Show off. He turns on his hazard lights, then exits the car. He comes up to the restaurant and enters.

The hostess is already asking how many people are in his party, probably spewing words from their internal customer service script. Bucky politely cuts her off, telling them that he’s looking for you.

“Got something for a server here.” Bucky says as they show off the little stupid waist apron. The hostess asks for the name of the server, to which Bucky responds with yours. Before the hostess could call for you, you’re walking towards Bucky with a wide, semi-panicked grin. 

“Lifesaver.” You say, as you give Bucky a hug. Bucky feels the urge to pull back, but eventually gives in.

“Not as big a deal as you made it seem.” Bucky smirks as he hands you the waist apron.

“Everything’s always a big deal.” You brush off as slowly inch back closer to the server station.

“Whatever. Well, okay. Remember, we’re meeting Sam at 6PM, yeah?”

“Pick me up?” You try to score a car ride back home. Bucky laughs. “Sure.”

You fist pump discreetly, but Bucky’s able to catch it. 

“At least try to contain your excitement.” Bucky says, dryly.

“Okay, whatever— See you at 6PM!” You whisper out to Bucky, as you gently push him out of the restaurant, trying to not make the customers in the store notice the exchange between you two.

“See you at 6.” Bucky scoffs lightheartedly. He leaves in his car.

As you walk back to the server station to prepare utensils for incoming customers, your work friend, Zara, inches closer to you. “Who’s the guy?”

“My roommate.” You reply, simply.

“You two dating.. Or what?” Zara asks, looking giddy.

“God, no.” You laugh off her assumption.

“And you not gonna hit that?” Zara asks, looking for permission.

“He’s all yours.” You look at your friend, looking wide-eyed at the boldness of it all.

There’s some more exclamations of attraction from your co-worker. A flurry of ‘girrrllll…’s’ from you follows suit. You mean, if they wanted to, you’re not gonna cock-block. It’s just funny to think about, is all. You promise Zara that you’ll introduce the two of them and you even hand Zara Bucky’s number, as you know his ass isn’t on any social media platforms. Maybe Bucky can finally get some.

— MAY 26TH, 5PM

The smell of garlic on your clothes invaded your poor nostrils. Bucky pulled up at the front of the restaurant, to your relief. Not that Bucky would forget, as you were blowing up his phone around 4:30PM reminding him that he said he’d get you.

As you enter the car, Bucky grimaces at the smell of your work clothes. “You smell like garlic.”

“Shut up. I know, I know.” You say, your head resting against your hand, with your elbow resting on the closed window. Bucky just smirks as he heads back home.

Getting ready to meet Sam was a chaotic speed-run. A rushed shower, a rushed decision of what clothes to wear, and a rushed make-up job. At least you looked presentable. Whatever. Sam isn’t the Queen. Or maybe he is. Anyways, this’ll do.

Central Park smelled better than it did in your hometown. Well, at this time of year, those fishy-ass Bradford Pear trees are usually out and about in your hometown. You traded fishy-smelling trees for awful, warm NYC sewer odor. Sometimes you think you could go back. Until you go back to visit home. The trees smell pretty bad.

Sam was waiting on a simple blanket in the field. How cute, a picnic. You’re glad the three of you guys weren’t going out to eat somewhere. Not a lot of leisure money on you right now. Sam had a spread of assorted snacks for the two of you. How thoughtful of him.

Sam shouts out you and Bucky’s name when he sees the two of you walk closer. “My favorite roommate duo!”

You grin at Sam’s kind energy. “You must not know a lot of roommate duos, then.” You say, as you roll the handle of your bag off your shoulder and lay it on the ground. Bucky grins and rolls his eyes in response. The two of you sit and join Sam. You greet Sam, and he offers a hug, to which you accept after a hint of hesitation.

“Bucky mentions you a lot.” Sam says.

“Does he now?” You ask, your eyebrows raised at Bucky. Bucky looks at Sam, his eyebrows furrowed, clearly confused and a little angry.

“No, he doesn’t. I just wanted to fuck with him.” Sam admits, after no confrontation. It earns an honest laugh from you, and earns an annoyed glare from Bucky.

“A shame then. I’d like to think I’m a good roommate.” You shrug.

“You are.” Bucky assures, rubbing his forehead with his hands.

“He mentions you a little bit.“ Sam leans in and whispers to you, playing it off cool. Of course, Bucky could hear him. He decides to let Sam get away with his shit for today.

You and Sam hit it off immediately. His genuine personality was refreshing. The dynamic you find yourself with you, Sam, and Bucky makes you laugh. You and Sam jokingly throw digs at Bucky, to which he promptly shoots down each dig. Bucky doesn’t stop you guys from making each joke. He’s probably used to Sam’s bullshit anyway. At least that’s what you assume.

“Where’s Steve?” You ask, “I hear a lot about him.” You say, telling the truth.

“He’s busy.” Bucky replies, simply.

“He’s always busy. Doing whatever diplomatic bullshit he’s always doing,” Sam elaborates. “You know, being an actual Avenger— and shit.”

“Right, course.” You say, as if it was common knowledge.

“You don’t gotta worry about that guy. He’ll meet you eventually.” Sam guarantees.

You cock your head slightly to the side and purse your lips. “That’s intimidating,” You note, “That’s Captain America.”

“He’s a loser.” Sam laughs.

You sigh and shrug. “I’ll guess I’ll take your word for it.”

“What’s not to trust?” Sam shrugs as he looks at you. You and Bucky look at each other instinctively with a knowing gaze. The two of you giggle at the unexpected coordination.

“Whatever.” Sam rolls his eyes as he takes a sip of his drink.

— MAY 26TH, 10PM

After having an unexpectedly lovely night with Sam and Bucky, you and Bucky open the door back into your home.

“What’d you think of him?” Bucky asks, as the two of you wind down.

“He’s great.” You respond, earnestly. That earns a discreet smile from Bucky, but you didn’t catch it, as you were already tired and walking back to your room.

“Leaving so soon?” Bucky asks, only a tinge of disappointment staining his tone.

“Aw, you want more of me?” You tease, your smirk growing bigger on one side of your face.

Bucky scrunches his nose, instinctively. “Nevermind, just go to bed.” He grimaces.

“Wait—” You start, but Bucky walks towards you and forcefully pushes you into your room.

“Nope, lost your chance.” Bucky says, unconcerned. A little ‘aw, man’ leaves your mouth, to which Bucky grins.

“Whatever, didn’t even wanna talk to you anyway.” You lie and roll your eyes. Bucky, still grinning, places his hand on your mouth to shut you up. “Go to your damn bed.”

“Okay, whatever.” You say, your voice muffled under Bucky’s big hand. As you push Bucky out of your room, you start lifting your shirt to change. Bucky closes his eyes and turns swiftly to give you privacy.

“Night!” You shout from inside your room.

“Goodnight!” Bucky groans from his.

— JUNE 17TH, 7PM

It had been a couple weeks since you had met Sam; you were glad you had done so, since now, every time Sam would make a surprise visit to your apartment, it was a bit less awkward. You still had yet to meet Steve, but you didn’t mind as much. He was busy being Captain America. You and Bucky became closer due to Sam’s presence. You and Bucky even had plans to have a ‘girl’s night’ tonight. Sam was devastated he couldn’t come.

A while ago, during the first few months after you had moved in, Bucky had mentioned how he couldn’t get drunk. He had a heightened metabolism due to a super-soldier serum he had received while he was the Winter Soldier. You were curious, of course, but you didn’t dare to ask further about his past, as he seemed a little tense when he had explained it to you. You don’t want to pry.

Luckily, for Bucky, he had been gifted a mysterious, potent elixir from Thor. Asgardian alcohol, basically. If Bucky or Steve wanted to get drunk, they would drop a little bit of the elixir into their drinks. Works like a charm. It smells disgusting, so you wouldn’t dare to touch it. Also, you had been shown a video of the aftermath of Clint accidentally drinking one of Steve’s drinks at an Avenger’s party. Safe to say, you didn’t need to be told twice about staying away from that elixir. Not unless you plan on spending a night in the ER.

You pour your wine into a simple glass. Bucky is beside you, carefully adding a drop of Thor’s elixir into his homemade whiskey sour. Bucky is lucky that you used to be a bartender, and you have extra drink-making supplies around the house. The drink that Bucky made doesn’t look presentable at all, but whatever. There’s no one to impress around here.

The plan was: get drunk, watch a bad movie, complain about said bad movie, and go to bed hoping the hangover doesn't kill you in the morning. You had randomly picked a movie. It seemed like a romance-drama film, but you couldn’t necessarily tell from the oversaturated movie poster.

As the movie starts, you and Bucky get comfortable on your shared couch. There’s a big batch of popcorn you had begged Bucky to prep in front of you. You’re cozy underneath your fluffy blanket. You shoot out your hand, with the wine glass in it, gesturing to clink glasses with Bucky. He grins and rolls his eyes, but still clinks glasses with you.

“I hope the movie’s terrible.” You say, taking a drink from your glass.

-

After approximately an hour and a half, you were nearing the end of this god awful film. The alcohol was the only thing pulling you through.

“I mean, seriously,” you groan, “This movie has just been porn, Bucky—” You grimace.

Bucky doesn’t look too invested in the movie, as he’s too busy shoveling popcorn in his mouth. You frown and stare at the movie as you simultaneously grab popcorn to eat. 

You stare at the screen as the main character, who has been juggling between 2 guys and is pregnant by one of them (but is unsure of who is the father), goes on a long monologue about how she is choosing herself in the love triangle. Unbelievable. You laugh at its absurdity, and you turn to see Bucky rubbing his temples for comfort.

“Get a load of this fucking guy.” You mumble as you stuff more popcorn in your face. Bucky lets out an amused breath, looking at you.

The horrid movie ends, to you and Bucky’s relief. As the credits roll, you turn to Bucky, after taking another swift sip of your drink.

“So,” you start, “Debrief time.” You grin, excited to complain about something.

“Is there much to say? It was bad.” Bucky shrugs.

“That’s no fun, Bucky—” You roll your eyes, “What didn’t you like about it?”

“Main character was bad. Awful person.” Bucky says, simply. You give up asking for elaboration.

“You’re so boring. Anyway, I agree! I mean, Jesus. She was just a bad person the entire movie and then suddenly she has that stupid monologue and it’s all okay?” You start to ramble. Bucky listens intently, but only gives mundane responses. Mainly a few ‘mmhm’s’ and ‘yeah’s’ sprinkled throughout the conversation. You continue ranting about the movie.

“And seriously, I wouldn’t complain if Frank was my baby daddy. Better him than Jack.” You laugh, talking about the 2 main male love interests.

The words had already left your mouth before you realized that one of the main characters, Frank, looked eerily similar to Bucky. But.. that’s just a coincidence, right? Surely Bucky wouldn’t read too much into that. Of course, that’s not to say you didn’t find Bucky attractive, because you most certainly did. It would just create a weird dynamic between the two of you. Being roommates and all.

Luckily, Bucky didn't seem to catch onto your Freudian slip. He only scrunches his face and replies, “Frank’s an asshole.”

“I’m not known for attracting people that are good for me.” You reply, honestly.

“Shoot for better.”

“Moving on.” You chuckle off. Bucky simply smirks as he sips his drink.

As moments pass by, you feel the presence of the silence surrounding the two of you. You go up and turn on your semi-busted speaker that lays in the kitchen. 

“It’s so quiet in here.” You say as you pick a song to play. You play an upbeat song you haven’t been able to stop listening to recently. You might as well put Bucky on as you force him to dance.

“C’mon, Buck!” You say as you peel Bucky away from the couch. There’s some resistance from Bucky.

“No— I don’t dance.” Bucky confessed.

“You do now.” You respond, not taking no for an answer. Bucky lets out a gravelly groan. You swore that shit came from his chest. Your hands linger on Bucky’s hands as you force him to dance. Nothing crazy. Bucky’s hands feel rough and calloused. You’re sure your hands are sweaty and gross, but luckily, your buzz from the alcohol stops your mind from overthinking.

Dancing with Bucky feels good. It’s a kind break from the rest of your life. You count your blessings having a roommate that you actually enjoy being around. Even if he’s boring sometimes. Unfortunately, the next song is some sentimental, slow love song.

“Ah, let’s just skip this.” You walk towards your phone.

“Oh, now you’re the one who doesn’t dance?” Bucky teased, “C’mon, it won’t kill us.” Bucky reasons, as he stops you from leaving by holding onto your wrist. He pulls you in, and the two of you start slowly swaying together.

“You want to dance to this song?” You comment, noting that it’s out of character for him.

“Just call it practice.” Bucky shrugs, his eyes fluttering slowly. Bucky’s feet movement is a little scattered. He stumbles from time to time. Must be the Asgardian alcohol. The scent of the alcohol lingers on Bucky’s lips.

The two of you are quiet while dancing. Only the sounds of the soft piano and grainy audio from your bad speaker fill the air. The quiet between you two is a break from the constant teasing and sarcasm. It feels weird, but not bad. You assume it’s just because you’re not used to being like this with Bucky.

As you start to zone out, letting your body start to move mindlessly, you feel Bucky’s rough hand push a thick lock of hair behind your ear.

“Couldn’t see your face.” Bucky says. Jesus, you nearly choke on air from hearing that. Did he mean to sound so sweet?

“Aw, you like my face?” You laugh off, trying to assert some control and lightheartedness in this situation.

“Yeah.” Bucky responds naturally. Your attempt to assert control has flown out the window. Unfair.

Bucky notices your flustered behavior, to which he only stifles a grin. He’s trying to not be an asshole about it, but the way you react from his words only boosts his ego. Bucky looks into your eyes, and it feels like his blue eyes are burning holes in your retinas.

You swear this song has been playing forever. Maybe that’s because Bucky hasn’t ripped his gaze away from you. As the song closes, ending on light piano and strings, Bucky plants a kiss on your cheekbone. Your head rushes with heat, but you try to keep composure. No way you’re gonna let a man catch you like this. As Bucky holds you lightly, he turns your head up to him. Bucky places a light kiss on your lips. Your head rushes with too many thoughts, and you feel yourself push Bucky away.

“It’s getting late, don’t you think?” You dust yourself off, laughing awkwardly. Maybe laughing too much. Bucky’s eyebrows furrow, and his lips look like they’re about to say something. Bucky closes his lips and frowns.

“Yeah. Guess so.” He responds, a sour frown still present on his face.

You run to grab your speaker and phone, rushing to your bedroom.

“Goodnight!” You flash an anxious grin to Bucky.

“Night.” Bucky muttered.

Of all the people you could find yourself flustered over, of course it had to be your goddamn roommate. There’s no way you could let yourself fall down this route. Hooking up with a roommate? That sounded like a quick way to find yourself apartment hunting in a few months. No thanks. What you and Bucky had was good, and there was no way you would let yourself — or Bucky —  ruin that.

— JUNE 21ST, 8PM

You and Bucky hadn’t talked about what had happened 4 days ago. There wasn’t really a good chance to, as you and Bucky had worked so often. There was never an open time to have a serious conversation. Not that you were prepared for a serious conversation, anyway. You’ve still been talking to Bucky, but only during brief exchanges when the two of you pass by each other in your home.

It was inconvenient, for sure. You two don’t realize how dependent the both of you guys are on each other until you’re both gone. Some simple groceries were running low, as Bucky couldn’t bring himself to ask you for  more. You were running on fumes, as you couldn’t bring yourself to ask Bucky to grab coffee for the both of you every morning. It used to be easy, Bucky had your coffee order memorized. It never changed. Now, Bucky’s been going to work without saying bye, and without getting you your coffee.

It was awful compared to how it used to be. You reassure yourself that this was normal. This is just how some roommates live. It’s better to be like this than to feed into your delusions, and inevitably fuck up something good. You want to keep living with Bucky. He’s a good roommate and a good person. You just can’t let him be a good partner either. It’s not worth the fallout.

Bucky sends you a text, more-so of a warning. “Bringing someone over tonight. Just letting you know.”

Hm. Interesting. Maybe it’s a friend? Surely it can’t be a date—

Your train of thought is interrupted by the sounds of the door unlocking. You sit up from the couch in a hurry, to look presentable to whoever is entering. It’s Bucky.. and some blonde. Huh. He really does have the nerve.

Bucky sends you a quick grin as he shows the blonde the place. He’s quick to place his hand on the small of her back, guiding her towards his bedroom. Absolutely shameless.

Bucky peels away from her for a second to talk to you. “I’m sorry, I know this is out of nowhere, but do you have somewhere to be for about.. 4 hours?” Bucky estimates. You shove down a scoff that’s begging to be released from your throat.

“Sure, Buck.” You respond, monotone as you grab your purse and your phone.

“You’re the best.” Bucky grins. You want to smack that shit-eating grin off his fucking face. You call Isabella, hoping to God she’ll pick up soon.

-

After 5 hours, and after you and Isabella get ice cream for some soothing for the soul, you head back to your apartment. Isabella begged to know everything about the situation with Bucky. You told her the bare minimum, as you swore it wasn’t anything. Isabella didn’t buy it, but she let you get away with it, for now.

The apartment is quiet when you enter. Isabella offered to let you stay at her place for the night, but you declined as you had work the next day, and you would be more comfortable getting ready in the comfort of your own home. Bucky’s dumbass isn’t going to stop you from living in your home.

You get ready and head to bed, hoping tomorrow will be more bearable.

— JUNE 22ND, 9AM

As you exit your bedroom, you rub your eyes as they try to acclimate to the bright sun shining through your apartment windows. You stop at the sight of the pretty blonde standing in nothing but Bucky’s red shirt, which is way too large for her. You’ve got to be kidding me.

The blonde grins at you and says your name. “Bucky told me all about you.”

Did he now? 

“Hope it’s nothing bad.” You respond, honestly.

“No, nothing like that. I was just worried since he had a girl roommate, you know?” She shrugs. You nod your head in understanding.

“I’m no threat.” You laugh as you head towards the bathroom.

“I sure hope not.” She responds.

God. A meteor from the sky hitting you at this exact moment would feel better than this.

— JULY 20TH, 9PM

The few days after were no better. The days turned into weeks. You swore Bucky was inviting every girl, and occasional guy, he could find from off the street. Your apartment felt like a warzone. You were constantly worried about accidentally walking in on something you didn’t want to see.

Isabella was down to have you over whenever you needed her to, and you loved her for it. However, Isabella had her own life, and you couldn’t make yourself an unofficial roommate that doesn’t pay a penny of rent. The days you had to spend in your apartment were rough. It was like Bucky knew you were home, and would intentionally be louder on purpose.

Loud moans and incoherent praises from the newest girl invited into apartment room 405 has plagued you for the past hour. The girl was loud. Exclamations of ‘oh, yes, Bucky!’ and numerous ‘fuck, fuck, fuck’s—’ left Bucky’s bedroom. Worst of all, you could hear Bucky reveling in her praises. You could hear Bucky respond with praises like, ‘Yeah, you like it like that?’ and ‘So pretty.. all for me’. You can feel your stomach knot. Noise-cancelling headphones can only do so much. As you head to the kitchen to grab your leftovers, you make a pit stop to bang on Bucky’s door.

“Keep it down, Bucky!” You yell through the door.

— JULY 21ST, 7PM

You lay your bag down as you come back from another long day of work. Bucky had told you that he wasn’t coming back home tonight. You didn’t care, in fact, it was probably the best news you had heard for a while.

The latest girl he had brought in was your co-worker, Zara. You mentally hit yourself for giving her his number to begin with. Once the moaning started, you forced yourself out the house. You couldn’t stomach the thought of it. Giving her number seemed so easy at a different point of time, but now, it seemed like your worst mistake. You didn’t blame Zara at all. She made it clear to you that she liked Bucky, and now she was the lucky lady who had all of Bucky’s attention that night. It’s not her fault the thought of it makes you sick.

As you reheat some food you had brought from work, you revel in the privacy. And quiet. You used to pray for times like these.

An hour later, you find yourself in your bed, consuming your favorite TV show. The main male love interest does have some similar features to Bucky, which you hate to admit. A man with brown hair and beautiful blue eyes hates to see you coming. It’s even worse once the show starts playing a rather graphic sex scene. You turn off your computer, trying to blink away the image of Bucky.

You plant your hands on your face, groaning. Why did everything remind you of him? Everything reminded of his beautiful eyes, his beautiful hair, and the beautiful sounds he makes when he has someone over… What?

Jesus Christ. You’re really losing it now.

The damage had been done. The knot in your stomach could only be released one way. You grab the joke gift your friends had gifted you a few years ago from your bedside table. Behold, the humble, 7-inch purple dildo named Woody. Which paired ever so nicely with your trusty vibrator named Buzz.

You ease up on Woody, who’s slick with lube. A soft moan exits your mouth as you bounce lightly on the dildo. You were letting yourself be louder than you normally would be, as you had the promise of an empty apartment. You were thinking of it as some sort of lewd present towards yourself.

The walls were thin, proven by how well you’ve been able to hear Bucky this past month. Surely the walls were thin enough for you to hear the door opening.

Your face falls flat on your cool bed, as you pump the dildo deep into you. The sounds are god awful.

Bucky comes home earlier than expected. He would’ve texted you, but he knew you were angry with him. His undying stubbornness didn’t let him accept the fact you were angry with him. It made him feel better just saying he was angry with you for pushing him away.

As he unplugged his headphones from his ears, he’s surprised to hear some commotion from your room. Surely you wouldn’t have anyone over, right?

Bucky presses his ear against your door, trying to gauge what was happening. He felt gross and pervish, but his curiosity dragged him to low depths. He heard soft moans from you. He itched as he listened to you fill yourself with your dildo. He can barely breathe, he can’t let himself be caught listening to you. What would you think?

You were greedy and lustful. As you inched closer to your high, you turned on Buzz and lightly hovered it over your clit. The double stimulation nearly draws you over the edge. You’re vocal, and needy.

Bucky can barely breathe hearing you. He doesn’t need to be as close to the door as he is, but he’s greedy as well. He wants to only hear you. He wants to be surrounded by your scent, sound, and body.

You feel your body twitch at the sensation, and your mind can only think about how much better this would be if Bucky was above you, bullying his dick into you. Woody can only get you so far. You wanted to be surrounded by Bucky’s scent, sound, and body.

Bucky nearly feels himself come undone from your sounds.

“F-Fuck, I need it—” Your voice sounds muffled from all the blankets in your face. “B-Bucky.”

Holy shit. Bucky groans at the sound of it. Which he hopes to hell you didn’t hear. He nearly explodes right then and there. He swears he could die happy right now.

“Harder, Bucky—” You moan out. Bucky couldn’t take it anymore. He either needed to join, or he needed this to end. Bucky bangs on your door. 

“Keep it down in there!” Bucky shouts, as he chooses the latter.

You feel yourself stop breathing. Shit, there’s no way he heard you, right? You hope that you start ceasing to exist anytime soon. The intense wave of embarrassment is then filled with anger. Unwarranted, maybe. But enough is enough. Even if Bucky hadn’t heard your pleads for him, him asking for quiet was rich coming from him.

You slide your pants back on, a little disappointed you weren’t able to fully finish. You barge outside, to where Bucky peacefully sits in the living room.

“You’re a fucking asshole, you know that right?” You bark at Bucky.

“Oh, I’m sorry.” Bucky rolls his eyes, “I’m not the one screaming in my bedroom.”

“Are you fucking kidding me, Bucky?” You groan, “As if you’re not fucking some person’s brains out every fucking night? You think I don’t hear that shit?”

Bucky frowns. “I’m just asking for you to keep it down. You ask me to do it all the time.”

You scoff, your anger filling you up, you swear you could light up in flames. 

“Un-fucking-believable.” You say as you slam your door shut. Bucky clears his throat, palming down the obvious tent in his pants.

— JULY 23RD, 8PM

Isabella had the brilliant idea of going out after another shift. You normally prefer to have a fun night-in with your friends, but the idea of getting impossibly drunk and forgetting all about your roommate from hell sounded more appealing as the days passed. 

Your friends and you had planned a small pre-game at Isabella’s, only deciding to drink lightly for now. Maybe at the club you could splurge on a few drinks here and there. The idea of being surrounded by people that weren't Bucky was refreshing. It was about time.

You had gotten a couple of texts from Sam, who had heard about the situation from Bucky. Even with Bucky’s bias, Sam was sympathetic towards you. He would make a joke that he was on your side in the divorce, but the term ‘divorce’ made the whole thing sound more serious. And you and Bucky were never serious. And never will be.

Isabella was obviously on your side. She had planted the idea of finding a sort of rebound from Bucky. That also made the two of you sound more serious than you actually were. However, the idea of getting laid tonight didn’t seem so bad.

-

You were drunk, which was exactly what you had wanted. The club was sweaty, hot, and full of hormones. A perfect breeding ground for horrible one-night stands.

An attractive man had approached you. He had cute red glasses which blocked out his eyes, and his hair was tinged with red. He said his name was Matt. It was interesting; he was blind, but he held himself up like he could see everything. You could smell the alcohol flow from his lips.

The music was loud and the bass boomed throughout the club. You could feel each vibration throughout your body. Whenever Matt had tried to talk to you, he had to basically scream in your ear for you to hear. Matt could always make out what you were trying to say, even if you didn’t shout. He looked severely overstimulated.

“Do you want to go somewhere quieter?” Matt asked, shouting in your ear.

“Please!” You shout back. 

You get Isabella’s attention, and gesture to Matt, who’s started to drag you out of the sweaty club. Isabella gives a knowing look, and tells you to call her if you need anything. You send a few kisses her way, and follow Matt outside.

“I can barely hear.” You laugh, as you and Matt finally exit the club.

“Tell me about it.” Matt strains. “The club isn’t really my scene.”

“Why’d you come then?” You ask Matt, while walking on the sidewalk. It’s starting to drizzle.

“My friend – co-worker, really – Karen wanted to have a fun night tonight. We just started a new business together. Attorneys.” Matt says as he hands you a dingy business card. It reads ‘Nelson & Murdock’ in small, black print and corresponding braille underneath it. What a cute touch.

“So, are you Nelson, or Murdock?”

“Murdock,” Matt grins, “Nelson’s my friend, Foggy.”

“I’ll make sure to call you if I have any legal trouble.” You promise.

“Please do. Our only clients have been paying us in chickens.”

“Chickens?”

“Long story.” 

You let out a small chuckle, pulling Matt in close. Your arms rest on his shoulders and you purse your lips, thinking. Matt’s hand glides towards your waist, as he waits for you to speak.

“You seem like you have something to say.” Matt reads you well.

“I’m trying to think if this is a good idea.” You admit.

“I’m sure there’s a few ways I could convince you.” Matt whispers as he presses an instantaneous kiss on your jawline.

“I can’t be won that easily.” You grin as you shake your head.

“A shame.” Matt clicks his tongue.

-

Turns out, with a few more sweet phrases and corny pick-up lines, you really could be won that easily. You and Matt stumble into his apartment, kissing as you walk in. The neon of the obnoxious glowing billboard from the opposite building fills the apartment with purple and blue light. Free mood lighting. 

Matt pushes you against the door as he closes it. He plants hot kisses on your jawline and neck. He knows where all of your pulse points are, which only drives you crazier. Matt breaks away with a deep breath, grabbing you and dragging you to his bedroom.

The next morning, you wake up naked in Matt’s bedroom. Your phone is nearly dead, but you’re still able to see the numerous texts and calls you have from Bucky. Christ. This isn’t helping your pounding headache. Matt still lays in bed next to you, and he wakes up from your movement.

“In a rush?” He asks, his voice tired and gravelly.

“Searching for a phone charger around here.” You laugh as you pick up Matt’s shirt from off the ground, throwing it on.

Matt chuckles as he takes your phone and grabs his charger to plug your phone in. He either really has his house memorized or he’s not blind. You’re not gonna be the one asking the seemingly blind guy if he’s actually not blind. You’d rather sit in your confusion.

“Last night was fun.” You say, as you find your pants on the floor.

“I’m not the type of guy to sleep with someone the first day I meet them.” Matt confesses.

“Am I the exception, then?”

“Seems so.” Matt shrugs, sitting up from his bed. You grin to yourself.

“I think we should do this again.” Matt proposes.

“So soon? That’s a little desperate, Matt.” You joke.

“What can I say? I go for what I want.” Matt responds. You raised your eyebrows with a grin.

“Two days from now. I’ll be free then.”

“Sounds great.”

— JULY 24TH, 2PM

You finally arrive back home after spending the morning with Matt. The door closes with a small click. Bucky is sitting in the kitchen, his gaze immediately snapping towards you. He gets up from his chair, walking straight towards you. It’s intimidating, you’ve never seen him so serious.

“Where the hell have you been?” Bucky barks, his voice stern. You roll your eyes, as you put your bag and jacket away on the coat hanger.

“Who’s fucking shirt is that?” Bucky says as he notes your new black shirt from Matt. He doesn’t mention how it smells like cologne, though he feels his cheeks burn with fire. It’s a shitty cologne, in Bucky’s not-so humble opinion.

“I’m not sure how this is any of your business, Bucky.” You respond, snarky.

“Don’t get a fucking attitude with me.” Bucky scoffs.

“Me? That’s rich.”

“I called and texted you multiple times.”

“My phone was fucking dead, and it was like— 5AM.” You groan, pushing past Bucky.

“Where were you?” Bucky asks again, his voice getting increasingly more desperate.

“I told you last night. I went out with friends.”

“And you didn’t come back home? And with a new shirt that’s been dunked in cologne?”

“I’m an adult, Bucky.”

Bucky frowns. He didn’t like the way he was begging you for answers, and how you wouldn’t give him anything.

“Whatever.” Bucky brushes past you, walking back to his room. Unbelievable.

— JULY 26TH, 6PM

You wait outside Matt’s apartment, patiently waiting for your date to start. You had gotten encouragement from your friends to see Matt again, especially since you had seemed so excited planning your date. Matt was a charming guy, and he definitely wasn’t bad in bed. Truthfully, you were looking for more ways to get out of your house other than work. You wanted to experience more life, and you definitely weren’t doing that being stuck in your apartment with a roommate who hated your guts.

Matt opened the door, grinning as he did. 

“You look good.” He compliments.

“How can you tell?” You ask.

“Intuition. I’m usually good at these things.” Matt shrugs, which earns a small laugh from you.

“Let’s go.” You say, still laughing. Matt gestures for you to hold onto his arm as the both of you exit his apartment complex.

-

The date was going well. The conversation was easy, which was a relief. You’ve learned more about Matt. He was a Hell’s Kitchen native, and his dad was a boxer. You told him about your small hometown, and your dreams of finally leaving your server job. You weren’t passionate about accounting, but you wanted to live more lavishly than you did now.

You had offered your place for Matt to spend the night. The date was going well, so why not? You send a text Bucky’s way, telling him that someone would be spending the night. He promptly leaves you on read. Asshole.

You and Matt quietly enter your apartment. You tell Matt to leave his shoes by the door. You scan the apartment, searching for any signs of Bucky being home. Thankfully, you can’t seem to see any sign of him.

“Do you need anything, Matty?” You say, dropping a nickname. Matt raises his eyebrows and smiles in response.

“Water would be good.” Matt responds.

As you head to the kitchen to grab Matt a glass of water, Bucky enters the living room from his bedroom. He looks shocked, nonetheless, to see a guy sitting so casually in his living room.

You mutter small curses to yourself, hoping Bucky doesn’t make a scene.

“Bucky.. This is Matt. Matt, this is Bucky, my roommate.” You take the liberty of making introductions. You walk over to the living room to hand Matt his water.

“Bucky. I’ve heard a bit about you.” Matt says as he politely greets Bucky. Bucky returns a tight-lipped grin to Matt.

“You did tell me someone was coming over.” Bucky says to you.

“I did.”

Bucky’s grip on his phone was tightening, his knuckles turning white from the sheer force of his grip.

“Well, hope you two lovebirds enjoy yourself.” Bucky says as he turns back into his bedroom. His bedroom door closes with a click.

“Don’t mind him.” You sigh, telling Matt as you close your eyes.

“Got it.” Matt laughs off the awkward interaction.

-

Later, you and Matt find yourselves in your bedroom. He places soft kisses on your collar bones as you unbutton his nice top. It would be a shame if it were to wrinkle. Matt’s body envelops your senses. Matt rubs your clit kindly and slowly, there’s added friction from your underwear. You can’t help but arch your back, leaning into his touch.

Matt says sweet praises as he preps you with his fingers. He slowly slides your underwear to the side as he thrusts himself into you.

Just as shit was getting good, you hear loud banging at your door. There’s no way. You whine as Matt removes himself from you.

“That can’t be Bucky, right?” Matt whispers, as he furrows his eyebrows.

Matt’s cut off from Bucky shouting your name from outside your door.

“Give me a second. Put your clothes on.” You warn as you get up from your bed. Walking out in only your top and underwear. Matt groans as he obliges.

As you open your door, Bucky pushes through to speak to Matt. “She has a long day tomorrow. I’m sorry, you gotta go.”

The genuine audacity. You scoff, and then you look at Matt, who looks mortified. This is your nightmare.

“What the fuck are you doing?” You ask Bucky in a low, short whisper. Bucky doesn’t respond, only focusing on cock-blocking your night with Matt.

“I’m gonna head out.” Matt says, seeming done with this weird dynamic between you and Bucky. You want to slap the shit out of Bucky, he’s driving away your chances with Matt, and the chance to get fucked tonight.

“I’m so fucking sorry, Matt.” You whisper as Matt grabs his things and heads out of your apartment. Matt shoots you a confused look and turns away quickly. There’s nothing he wants more than to get away from whatever you and Bucky have going on.

As the door closes, you turn to Bucky. You can’t even look at him. You’re shaking with anger. You’re embarrassed of the tears that well up in your eyes from the anger. “What. The actual fuck is wrong with you?”

“You were only going to regret it tomorrow. I’m helping you dodge a bullet.” Bucky replies nonchalantly, not admitting that he just couldn’t stand the sounds of another man making you moan. If it’s not him, it can’t be anyone.

“You have a lot of fucking nerve saying that shit. You’re making my choices for me now, Bucky?” You accuse, pointing your finger at Bucky.

Bucky didn’t like seeing you angry, but he was too stubborn to apologize. You want to shake some sense into Bucky, but your anger paralyzes you, only being able to stare at Bucky. His eyes gleamed in the dark, the only light coming from the dim light from your hallway.

“You two wouldn’t last.” Bucky shrugs. You turn your head towards Bucky with your eyes wide, looking like you could explode any second. He stands, overconfidently. His face is painted with an artificial smugness. In reality, his heartbeat was booming out of his chest.

“Jesus Christ, Bucky.” You scoff. Bucky’s lips part as if he was going to say something, maybe apologize, but he closes them promptly. You couldn’t stand the way he just sat there, looking so pretty. You pushed Bucky into the wall, balling fistfuls of his shirt in your hands. It’s a bold move, attacking someone so much larger than yourself. Adrenaline runs through your veins.

“You’re gonna tell me what the fuck is wrong with you, Bucky,” You threaten, your teeth baring, “What happened to you? We used to be so good, you used to be so good-” You’re cut off by the feeling of Bucky’s semi-hard dick pushing against your stomach. 

“Are you fucking hard right now?” You laugh. Bucky’s eyes are wide, as he pushes himself away from you.

“You were so fucking talkative, now look at you. Cat got your tongue?” You tease, finding this utterly hilarious. Bucky had the nerve to cock-block you twice, you might as well revel in this moment.

Bucky doesn’t respond, being too embarrassed to muster up some snarky reply.

“C’mon, Buck, use your words.” You coo, cocking your head slightly at Bucky.

“Don’t fucking do that.” Bucky mutters.

“Or what? You don’t like it?” You grin. You definitely like it.

Bucky adjusts his pants, making more room for his aching boner.

“Surely you want someone to help you with that, Bucky.” You say as you push Bucky on the couch. Bucky flops onto the couch, too breathless to respond.

“You’ve been so fucking annoying recently, Bucky. You know that, right?” You kneel in front of Bucky, unbuckling his pants masterfully.

“I— I’m sorry.” Bucky apologizes, shallowly.

“You don’t get to get away with that shit. You gotta face some consequences, no?” You purr.

Bucky’s face is flushed, embarrassed with how easily he was able to shut up. Bucky’s dick springs out of his boxers.

“Is this all I had to do to shut you up, James? Should’ve just told me. You would’ve gotten this earlier.” You tease. Bucky’s breath is stolen from him by the use of his first name. It feels too intimate, too personal. It feels right coming out your mouth, however.

“Please.. Please, make me cum.” Bucky pleads, pathetically.

“Gotta wait a little longer, James. You made me wait so long to cum.”

You place short and sweet kisses along Bucky’s dick, making him reel from the light gifts of pleasure. It’s not enough, and Bucky’s getting more antsy.

“You want more? Tell me how much you want more.” You grin, cruelly.

“I need it…”

“Need what? C’mon, use your words, baby.”

“Need your lips.” Bucky breathes out, his head laying on the couch.

“So pathetic.” You tease, as you finally lick the pre-cum that’s been leaking out of Bucky’s dick. Bucky groans at the sensation. You wrap your lips around Bucky’s tip, pumping the rest of his shaft with your hand. Bucky’s a mess under you. His back arches from the pleasure. You take most of Bucky in your mouth, moving your hands to lightly play with Bucky’s balls. Tears prick in Bucky’s eyes.

“Fuck— Please— so good, it feels so good.” Bucky mumbles incoherently. The sounds he makes drives you crazy, and your hand naturally finds itself at your core. You lightly rub your clit, your moans against Bucky’s dick drives him insane.

As you feel Bucky draw closer and closer to his high, you take that as a sign to pull back. The only thing connecting you and Bucky is the string of saliva from your mouth. Bucky whimpers as you leave.

“Why— Why did you do that? I was so close.” Bucky whines.

“You were going to cum without my permission, James. That’s no good.” You say as you place a soft kiss on Bucky’s mouth, letting him taste himself on your lips.

Bucky looks at you, his eyes pleading. 

“Don’t worry, I’ll make you cum, baby,” You promise, “You’re just gonna have to do one small thing for me, Buck.”

“What? Please, I’ll do anything. Baby, please.” Bucky begs.

“Apologize.” You grin, “Apologize for how much of an asshole you’ve been to me lately.”

Bucky swallows thickly. His stubbornness yells at him to keep dying on this hill. However, he can’t ignore the way he needs you. The way he needs to feel himself in you. Your hand starts slowly pumping his dick, urging him to apologize.

“I’m so sorry.” He breathes out.

“That’s not good enough, baby.” You coo, as you stop pumping his dick entirely. The absence of you drives him insane.

“I’m so sorry. I’ve been a selfish asshole. I couldn’t bear the fact that I couldn’t have you. I’m an asshole, baby, I’m so sorry.” Bucky pleads. You grin, happy with his answer.

“Yeah, that’s good, Bucky. You’re so good for me, aren’t you?” You say, slowly restarting your pace on Bucky’s dick.

Bucky nods fervently. “I’ll be good for you.”

You’ve heard what you had to hear. You’ve reveled in Bucky’s long overdue apology, now it’s time to give Bucky what he deserves. You unbutton your pants, sliding them off with ease. Your underwear is hastily thrown behind you, and you straddle Bucky’s hips. As you slide down on Bucky’s length, both of you moan out in pleasure. You bounce lightly on Bucky, the delicious friction nearly pulling you over the edge.

You place warm, affectionate kisses on Bucky’s lips. As you hold onto Bucky’s shoulders for support, your nails dig into his flesh as you feel yourself coming undone over Bucky. Bucky’s lips are pink and swollen from all your kisses, his eyes being clouded with lust and affection.

Bucky places soft kisses on your neck and collarbones. It drives you crazy. You lean your head back, allowing for more room. Bucky plants kisses all over your chest, letting out soft moans as you bounce on him. 

“So good for me.” You whisper.

“Were you this wet when you were touching yourself thinking about me?” Bucky asks, his breath light. So he did hear you. You chuckle in response.

“No, Bucky. You’re so much better.” You praise, being followed by loud moans. Bucky grins as he grabs your ass.

“Could’ve just told me you wanted me, Buck. This would’ve been so much easier.” You groan out.

“I know. I’m sorry, baby.” Bucky replies, trying his best to get his words out, as he’s too busy enjoying the feeling of your wet walls clenching around his dick.

You rest your arms on Bucky’s shoulders for support as you feel yourself getting closer and closer to your release. Bucky cups your jaw, and holds your face up to meet his gaze. His eyes are needy and filled with care. Your lips are parted ever so slightly, allowing for grotesque noises to be freed from your mouth.

“You want me to come inside of you, baby?” Bucky asks. You nod vigorously. You’re too busy being drunk off Bucky’s presence to speak.

“Please— Please, gorgeous boy.” You beg.

“Fuck—,” Bucky groans at your sweet words, “Gonna cum for you.”

“So good.” You croon. You lay your head on Bucky’s shoulder as you bounce faster on Bucky’s dick. “Come for me, baby.”

Bucky’s cum fills you up. Your eyes roll back as you feel yourself release on Bucky’s dick. Bucky groans from the feeling, and the both of you slow your pace as you come down from your collective high. As you pull yourself off of Bucky, the mixture of your arousal oozes out of your pussy. You place kisses alongside Bucky’s cheek, eventually lowering to his chest.

Bucky lies in his afterglow. He brushes your hair lightly as you lift yourself from him. You sit next to him, enjoying his presence for the first time in a while. You’re not sure yet if this is something you’ll grow to regret, but living in the moment sounds a lot better than always expecting the worst. 

–

ok now imagine they talk it out and its all sunshine and rainbows and they all apologize and its awesome and cool. #sorry #lowkeytoolazytowriteit

[pitlanepeach]

Radio Silence | Chapter Forty-One

Lando Norris x Amelia Brown (OFC)

Series Masterlist

Summary — Order is everything. Her habits aren’t quirks, they’re survival techniques. And only three people in the world have permission to touch her: Mom, Dad, Fernando.

Then Lando Norris happens.

One moment. One line crossed. No going back.

Warnings — Autistic!OFC, pregnancy, strong language, death-anxiety (no actual death), Lando being an amazing husband.

Notes — Get the tissues ready. Check out the R.S Pinterest board post-chapter for some visuals!

2024 (Monaco)

Oscar sat cross-legged on the sofa, unwrapping a granola bar. Amelia lowered herself onto the chair opposite him with her notebook.

"What would you do if a child started to projectile vomit in a moving vehicle?" She asked, pen ready.

He blinked. "Sorry—what?"

"Answer the question."

"...Pull over. Make sure they're, like, breathing. Crack a window to get rid of the smell."

Amelia nodded. "Okay." She jotted something down.

Oscar narrowed his eyes. "What are you doing?"

"No concern of yours. Do you know how to sterilise a baby bottle?"

"Uh... no?"

"Do you know how to swaddle a newborn?"

"No, but I could YouTube it?"

She scribbled again, then looked up. "If Lando and I died tragically in a freak accident, would you be able and willing to raise our child?"

He choked. "What the hell?"

"Answer the question."

He coughed. "I—yeah? I mean, if that happened, yeah, I'd step up."

Amelia tapped her pen. "You'd need to cut back on the amount of time you spend on the panel court."

Oscar muttered, "I'd just take the baby with me."

—

Max Fewtrell sipped his flat white while Amelia stared at him, all beady eyed and completely unreadable.

"Do you own a fire extinguisher?" She asked flatly.

"...Good morning to you too?"

"Max."

"Yes. I think. Maybe? I don't know. Why?"

"Do you have a last will and testament?"

He stared at her. "Jesus, Amelia, are you going to have me killed?"

"This is all hypothetical, of course."

"What is happening right now?"

"Final question," she said. "Do you think you could emotionally support a child through the grief of losing both parents in a tragic accident?"

"...Oh my god."

Amelia didn't blink. "You're being considered for the position."

"For what?"

"Okay. I have enough information. Goodbye."

She left him sitting with his untouched croissant, both confused and mildly alarmed.

—

They walked side by side, Amelia waddling more than walking at this point. Fernando glanced down at her notepad.

"You are writing notes about me?"

"I'm evaluating your parental fitness."

"Why?"

"You might be a candidate to become the guardian of my daughter. In the event that Lando and I both die."

He blinked. "That is very grim."

"Statistically unreasonable," she said. "For me, anyway. Lando not so much." She sighed, chewing on her lip.

Fernando rubbed his jaw. "What is the criteria I must meet?"

"Emotional regulation. Moral compass. Childproofing competency. Capability of enduring a preschool dance recital."

He made a considering expression. "That last one might be a difficulty."

"You're top three so far." She told him.

"...I do not know if that is flattering or mildly scary."

"I trust you not to let her become a Red Bull junior driver; should she decide to start karting."

He nodded sagely. "Yes. Very good."

—

Amelia leaned across the table. "I have a few questions."

Max didn't look up from his phone. They were drinking milkshakes at a local coffee shop on the harbour. "Sure."

"If you had to raise a child you didn't birth, what would be your discipline strategy?"

"...Sorry?"

"Say me and Lando die. Hypothetically, if you got custody of our daughter, would you leave her at a petrol station if she disappointed you?"

He finally looked up. "Why would I get custody?!"

"I'm evaluating every available options."

"For a child that isn't even born yet?"

"She already exists. She's just... inside."

Max stared at her. "Zusje, you and Lando are not going to die."

She frowned at him. "You can't know that for sure."

He sighed. "Fine. I guess... No. I would not leave her at a petrol station, or stab any of her mechanics with a fork. But I would teach her how to drive early. Enter her into karting at three. Make sure she is ahead of everybody else."

Amelia jotted that down. "Noted."

"Am I seriously being considered?"

"You have the lowest risk of emotional instability during a crisis." She informed him.

He blinked. "Oh. Really?" He asked. "I feel like I'm a bit... hot-headed."

She shrugged. "Never with me, though. So I think you'd be the same with my little girl."

He stared at her for a beat and then smiled. "Yeah, Amelia. I think I would be too."

—

Amelia had kicked off her shoes the second she stepped into the apartment, now she was curled on the couch, laptop perched on her bump, tongue between her teeth as she typed furiously.

Lando came in behind her, fresh from a shower and still towelling off his hair. "Hey, babe. You hungry or—" He paused. Squinted. "What's the spreadsheet for?"

"Um," she said, not looking up. "It's colour-coded." She said, instead of answering the question.

"Of course it is." He padded over, still shirtless, and peered over her shoulder. "Fewtrell?"

"Yes."

"...And Oscar? Alonso? Verstappen?"

"Mmhmm."

He leaned closer, confused. "What is this?"

"Um."

"...Amelia," he said slowly, his voice pitching higher with suspicion. "What is this?"

She tapped something in the cell next to 'Max Verstappen – discipline style' and replied casually, "I'm compiling an assessment list for potential legal guardians in the case of our untimely deaths."

Lando froze. "I'm sorry— what?"

She finally looked up, frowning. "You're speaking very loudly."

"Because you're interviewing our friends to be our child's guardians in case we die?"

"Yes. Obviously. We'd need someone capable, emotionally regulated, ethically sound."

He blinked. Hard. "What about our parents? Or, like, one of my siblings? You know... our actual family."

She made a face. "Okay, I see your point." She said, completely sincere. "But I'd feel more comfortable having a list of at least five people who would be capable of stepping in."

Lando ran a hand through his hair. "Babe, you asked Oscar if he'd raise our daughter and didn't even think to mention this to me?"

"I was testing him under spontaneous stress," she said matter-of-factly. "He passed."

"Oh my god." Lando dropped onto the couch beside her, one hand dragging down his face. "Baby, we are not going to die, okay? God, maybe we should go to therapy about this."

"You already have therapy," she reminded him. "On Tuesday."

"I meant extra therapy. For both of us."

She turned the laptop toward him. "Do you want to see the rankings?"

"I—No! Wait—yes. Who's top?"

"Right now... Fernando."

He pulled a face. "Fernando?"

"He's extremely competent. Low emotional volatility. Has a very secure apartment and a predictable routine. He is also old, wise, and very rich. He would be able to hire wonderful childminders."

"...That's fair."

"Oscar is second."

"Obviously." He said.

"Max — Verstappen — third."

Lando tilted his head. "Seriously?"

"He would make sure she was loved. She'd grow up with discipline and money. Also, he has very cute cats."

Lando laughed, despite himself. "That's not... wrong."

"I ruled out Daniel because I texted him and he said that he would 'just vibe it.'"

Lando winced. "Yeah, okay, that's fair grounds for dismissal."

"Fewtrell's somewhere in the middle," she added, with a conflicted sigh. "I know we love him, and P, but he's still young and not settled down properly."

"I mean..." Lando shook his head, half-exasperated, half in love. "Babe. I love you so much, but this is mental."

"It's preparation. Contingency is kindness."

He stared at her — tan skin aglow from the laptop screen, expression painfully earnest. "You're... god, you're terrifying and brilliant."

She frowned. "I'm not terrifying."

"You kinda are."

"Do you want me to stop?" She asked, earnestly.

Lando's face softened completely. "No. I want you to keep being exactly you. I just also want to have a say in our daughter's future, you know, if we're both exploded in a tragic yacht fire."

She nodded. "Okay. That's fine."

He pulled the laptop from her lap, setting it on the table, then leaned in, pressing a kiss to her temple. "Can I be honest?"

"Always."

"I get scared sometimes too. About what will happen if something goes wrong. I think about all of the worst-case scenarios. But I know that I can't let myself obsess over 'what if's', or else I'll forget to enjoy the life I do have." He told her softly.

"Maybe that's a good idea," she muttered, but softened when he slid his arms around her and tugged her gently into his lap, belly and all.

They sat like that for a long moment, her head on his shoulder, his hands resting protectively over the curve of her bump.

"You know," Lando murmured, "no one could ever really replace you. No matter how good they are at bottle sterilising."

Amelia blinked hard. "I know."

"And if anything ever happened to me... she'd still have you. And that would be more than enough."

She buried her nose against his collarbone. "Don't say that."

"Okay. But it's true." He said into her hair.

She sniffled. "Our parents would do it, wouldn't they? They'd work together and make sure that she's raised the way we were. With love and care and attention."

"Yeah, baby. I think our family is the best idea." He told her honestly. "But you can still use your spreadsheet to choose Godparents, maybe?" He suggested.

She scrunched her nose. "I'm an atheist."

"Me too. I still have Godparents. They're just like... glorified Aunts and Uncles."

"Oh." She mumbled. "We'll have to have a long discussion about that."

He chuckled into her hair. "Okay, baby. Whatever you want."

—

Amelia sat cross-legged on the bed, half in her pyjamas, a stack of papers pushed off to the side. Her phone was pressed to her ear, the lights dimmed low. The baby kicked once — firm — beneath her ribs. She didn't react.

"Hi, Mum," she said when Tracey picked up.

"Hi, love. Everything okay?"

"No." Amelia didn't bother softening it. "I mean — not catastrophically. But I need to talk about something and I don't want you to tell me I'm overthinking."

"I never would," Tracey said gently. "Go on."

A beat passed. Then another. Amelia closed her eyes.

"If something happens to me. Or me and Lando. What happens to my baby?"

There was a pause on the other end. Not long. But present.

"Darling..."

"I've been making a list," Amelia went on. "Of potential guardians. Interviewing people. Assessing them. I've made a spreadsheet."

"I'm not surprised," Tracey said softly.

"I thought about putting Oscar first, but he doesn't know how to sterilise a bottle. Fernando is high scoring but he's not got much experience for kids. Max F would probably fill her bottles with Monster Energy."

Tracey laughed, despite herself. "What about us?"

"I assumed you'd all be willing to help. But I need a legal designation. If we die, someone has to be named. Officially."

"Sweetheart... I understand. I do." Tracey's voice was steady, but warm. "But it's also so unlikely."

"I know it's unlikely." Amelia's voice was sharp, strained. "But I can't bank on unlikely. That's not how I work. That's not safe."

There was silence again. Amelia's fingers tapped restlessly against her thigh.

"I just—" Her voice cracked. "I don't want her to be scared. Or confused. Or be stuck with someone who doesn't understand her. Especially if she's—like me."

"She'll be loved," Tracey said immediately. "No matter what she's like. Because she'll be yours and Lando's little girl. And because you'll have taught her how to explain herself. Just like you've done your whole life."

Amelia blinked hard. "You think she'll be alright?"

"I know she will be. And not just because you've planned ten steps ahead. But because she'll grow up with people who see her. Who will do whatever it takes to understand her. Just like we did with you."

There was quiet on the line. The baby kicked again, softer this time. Amelia exhaled.

"I don't want to need the plan," she said, very quietly. "But I need to have the plan."

"And that's okay," Tracey said. "You make the plan. You have it in place that me and your dad, or Lando's mum and his dad, will be named legal guardians. But then, when you're ready, let it sit. You don't need to carry it every minute."

"I don't know how not to."

"Then I'll carry a little bit of it for you. So will your dad. So will Lando. That's what family's for."

A long pause.

"Thanks, Mum."

"I love you."

Amelia wiped her cheek. "Yeah. I know."

—

Amelia lay on her side, half curled around a pillow, hoodie bunched over the top of her belly. Lando was pressed close behind her, one hand splayed gently across the curve of her bump.

"She's awake," he murmured, grinning against her shoulder. "I felt her boot me in in the hand just now."

"She likes to kick when I'm horizontal," Amelia said, with a sigh. "She's very inconsiderate."

Lando chuckled and flattened his palm more purposefully, thumb brushing small circles near her belly button. "You think she knows it's me?"

"She reacts to your voice. She kicks harder for Oscar at the moment, though."

"That's rude." He leaned down, speaking directly to her stomach. "You know I'm the one who's gonna be changing your dirty, stinky nappies, right?"

The baby gave a solid thump.

Lando pulled back, eyes wide. "Did you feel that? She literally just responded to me."

"Of course I felt it," Amelia muttered.

Lando laughed again and shifted so he could look at her properly, brushing a few stray hairs away from her forehead. "Okay, okay. What if I..." He pressed a kiss to her belly, then whispered, "You're the coolest little bean in the universe."

Another kick.

"She's gonna be so spoiled," Amelia said. "You're already hyping her up."

"She should be hyped up. Look at her genes."

Amelia laughed. "Lando."

Lando turned to her with a mischievous glint. "What do you think happens if I play a recording of a V10 engine?"

"She might decide to come earth-side early." She said.

Lando snorted.

Amelia shifted onto her back, guiding Lando's hand as the baby rolled again, this time slower, like she was listening.

"She's so real," Amelia said, quieter now. "Still doesn't feel like it all the time. But she is. Real."

"I know," he said. "I think about it every day. That we're... gonna be parents. That I get to do this with you."

Amelia didn't look at him, but her fingers curled gently around his. "You're really good with me."

"Yeah, well," he murmured, resting his forehead gently against hers. "I kind of love you."

She turned her head a little, and he kissed her softly — slow and familiar, the kind that didn't lead anywhere except safety.

Their hands stayed linked over the baby as she shifted again beneath their skin.

"Do you think she'll be scared the first time we bring her into the paddock?" Lando asked.

"No. She'll be too tiny to be scared, I think. And by the time she's old enough, it'll just be... normal for her," Amelia muttered. "But we've got to get her paddock credentials sorted as soon as she's born."

He grinned. "We'll start with a tiny little VIP badge to clip to her baby grow. And some ear defenders."

"Smart," Amelia said. "We'll both have plenty of loud men to block out."

They fell asleep like that, legs tangled, baby between them, and the next morning came soft and golden through the curtains; the first light falling directly across Amelia's stomach, as if even the sun was trying to say hello.

—

It was already warm under the canopy, even though the Monaco sun hadn't fully crested the hills yet. The McLaren paddock buzzed—orange polos everywhere, cameras drifting past on gimbals, mechanics laughing over first-cup coffees that smelled like dark chocolate and fuel.

Amelia stood at the edge of it all, arms folded over her bump, dark sunglasses perched on her nose, clipboard hugged tight against her chest. She'd already rewritten a run-plan line item; now she was waiting—still—for Oscar.

He finally jogged up, bag slung over one shoulder. "You look like an army-recruitment officer," he puffed.

"You wouldn't last a day in the army," she replied, eyes still on her iPad. "You're always late."

"I'm sorry," he groaned. "And I'm only seven minutes late!"

"Seven minutes and you dropped croissant flakes all over the sim consoles last night. They ended up in the throttle pedal housing. I had to get on my hands and knees with the little handheld hoover. Do you know how difficult it is for me to bend over right now?"

"I was hungry. I needed energy!"

She raised one eyebrow. "Energy bars exist and they don't shed pastry all over the priceless simulator equipment."

He pursed his lips, sighed an apology, then nodded toward the interior of the motorhome. "Sorry. Fine. Come on. Tom's waiting."

—

The briefing room smelled of whiteboard marker and fresh rubber. Tom Stallard—clipboard in hand, headset looped around his neck—looked up as they entered. He offered Amelia a polite nod and Oscar a wry smile.

"Morning," Tom said, voice calm, measured. "Figured we could run through hand-over minutiae before first practice?"

Amelia slipped into the chair beside him, dropping her own clipboard with a soft thud. "Good idea. At least one of you is prepared today."

"Hey!" Oscar protested.

Tom chuckled. "I'm fairly prepared, I guess."

"That's good," Amelia muttered, tapping notes on her iPad.

She flicked the screen toward Tom. A colour-coded chart lit up; Oscar's preferred comms phrasing, ideal brake-migration tweaks per track, panic phrases to watch for. Oscar-Handling 101, the header read in dead-serious Helvetica.

Tom scanned it, impressed. "This is on-top of the big folder you've already put together for me?"

"Contingency is kindness," Amelia replied. "I'm not leaving him undefended while I'm off having a baby."

Oscar leaned forward, resting his elbows on the table. "She's terrified you'll let me eat in the sim room."

Tom grinned. "Contraband food noted."

Amelia pointed at the final column. "He also says 'copy, copy' when he's flustered. Means he hasn't copied. Repeat the instruction."

Oscar's ears went pink. "Well you didn't have to put that in writing."

"It's an operational fact," she said simply.

Tom set the chart aside. "We'll be okay, Amelia. I've shadowed enough of your sessions to know how you translate his feedback. Not as well as you can — but enough."

She exhaled—one of those slow, controlled breaths. God, she felt like her organs were running out of room. "I know. My brain just... insists on double-checking." Her hand rested instinctively on her belly. "Can't exactly be on the pit wall at forty weeks."

Oscar's expression softened. "You'll still be in my ear sometimes, right? From home?"

"As a 'consultant'," Tom said, quoting with his fingers. "Team's already approved remote link-ups when needed."

Amelia nodded. "I'll ping in for data dives. But Tom's your primary. Listen to him. Trust him."

"Understood," Oscar said, suddenly earnest. "And... thanks—for all this. For everything. I knew you'd be — all Amelia about this. But you didn't have to be. And I really appreciate it."

She blinked behind the sunglasses, uncomfortable with sentiment. "Just keep running at the top of the field. Keep pushing yourself. Maybe win a race." She told him.

Tom pushed his chair back, easy and steady. "Right. Track walk in ten."

Oscar slapped the table once in mock salute. "Yes, sir."

He turned to Amelia as they headed for the door. "No more croissants in the sims," he promised.

She handed him a protein bar out of her bag. "Here. This is better. More stable energy, less saturated fats."

He grinned, unwrapping it. "Aw. You still love me even after crumb-gate."

"Crumb-gate," she echoed, her mouth twitched upward.

Tom watched the exchange with quiet amusement. As they stepped onto the sun-lit pit lane, he leaned toward her. "He'll be fine, Amelia."

She adjusted her headset, gaze following Oscar's retreating figure. "I know. So will I." A small pause. "But I still hate it when he's late."

Tom laughed. "I'll keep him on military time."

—

The Monte Carlo sun had a way of making everything feel cinematic. White yachts bobbed on sapphire water, the harbour glinting just beyond the paddock gates. Amelia stood by the McLaren motorhome in a clean papaya polo, sunglasses tucked into her collar, bump unmistakable beneath the fabric.

It was Media Day, and the buzz was palpable.

She adjusted her earpiece as the Sky Sports producer counted them in, the familiar voice of Natalie Pinkham coming through her headphones with a bright, practiced warmth.

"We are here in beautiful Monaco with a very special guest — Amelia Norris, McLaren's lead performance engineer and, of course, Oscar Piastri's race engineer. Amelia, welcome."

Amelia gave a nod, her voice calm, direct. "Thanks. It's really hot, isn't it?"

Natalie laughed. "That it is. Listen, you've had a phenomenal season — McLaren's surge in performance, Oscar's consistency, and Lando finally breaking through for his first win. You've had your fingerprints on all of it."

Amelia tilted her head slightly, weighing the praise before answering. "It's been a team effort. Good car, amazing drivers. We've been smart with upgrades."

"And you've done all this," Natalie gestured gently to Amelia's belly, "while also expecting your first child with Lando. How exciting for you both!"

A soft smile played at Amelia's lips. "Yes. She's a very involved team member. Likes to kick during data meetings."

That got a warm laugh from the crew and nearby media.

Natalie's voice softened. "And I believe you have a bit of news for us today?"

Amelia nodded once. "Yes. This weekend will be my last before I step back for maternity leave. Tom Stallard will be taking over race engineering for Oscar post-Monaco until further notice."

A small wave of murmurs rippled through the surrounding press. Natalie smiled at her. "So this is your last race weekend for a while?"

Amelia shrugged, still poised. "For a few months, yes. I'll still be consulting remotely. But I won't be on the pit wall again until later in the season."

Natalie leaned in a little. "How does it feel, stepping away at a time like this? With McLaren doing so well, and you being so integral?"

There was a pause. Amelia's eyes flicked briefly down the paddock — where Lando was laughing with mechanics, Oscar leaning against the wall with a coffee, talking to a camera crew.

Then she answered.

"It's... complicated," she said. "I like control. I like knowing things. And there's a lot about becoming a parent I can't forecast. But the team is solid. Oscar's going to be in good hands. And our daughter—" her hand instinctively brushed her belly, "—deserves my full attention for a while."

There was a beat of quiet. Then Natalie smiled, warm and real. "Well, on behalf of everyone watching — thank you so much, Amelia. For all you've contributed to the sport over the past five years. And congratulations to you and Lando on this wonderful addition to your family."

Amelia nodded again, just once. "Thank you."

The interview wrapped, and as the camera cut away, Amelia stepped back, peeling off her earpiece. She was halfway through unpinning her mic when she felt a familiar arm wrap around her shoulders.

Lando pressed a kiss to the side of her head. "You were brilliant," he murmured.

"I told people I'm going on leave," she said quietly, like she needed to repeat it aloud. "I made it real."

"It is real." He looked down at her bump, then back at her. "But don't worry. You're still the boss. Just... remotely."

Amelia leaned into him, the smell of sunscreen and motor oil clinging to his polo. "You think people will forget me while I'm gone?"

"Not possible," he said immediately.

She gave a small, short laugh, and he kissed her temple again.

They stood there for a moment; in the glitz and the hum of Monaco, wrapped in their own quiet kind of gravity.

—

The hospitality deck was quieter than usual at lunch time, tucked just above the paddock chaos. A few guests chatted softly over sparkling water and pasta, the harbour glittering in the background. Amelia sat at a small table in the shade, half-finished salad in front of her, sunglasses pushed into her hair.

Her dad slid into the seat across from her with a grunt and then a beaming grin. "You're hiding up here."

Amelia stabbed a tomato with her fork. "I'm taking a scheduled break."

"That's what you're calling it now?"

She gave him a dry look. "Better than 'aggressively avoiding small talk with a million people who all want to ask me the same questions.'"

Zak chuckled and took a sip of his iced tea. "Hey, I didn't say it was a bad thing!"

They ate quietly for a few minutes. She glanced at her iPad once or twice, fingers twitching like she wanted to reach for her stylus.

Then her dad leaned forward, voice a little softer. "Your mom called."

Amelia didn't look up. "Yeah?"

"Told me to keep an eye on you. That you're getting anxious over silly things." He said. "She wants you at home. She doesn't think you should be working this weekend."

"I know what I'm doing." She said back, not sharply, just matter-of-fact. "I'm flying to England on Tuesday and then I'm going to start nesting."

"Fine, fine." He said. He was staring at her. "You did an interview this morning?"

"Yeah. It felt strange." She hesitated. "Like I had to tell them that I was handing over part of my identity and pretend that I was fine with it."

Zak nodded slowly, watching her carefully. "You don't need to pretend, kiddo. You're just doing something new. Hard to do both at once sometimes."

Amelia chewed slowly, then asked, "Did it feel like that when you stopped racing?"

He was quiet for a moment. Then, "Yeah. I didn't admit it for a while, but yeah. It was hard. You build yourself around something that has a finish line, and suddenly it's not there anymore. It's just... your life."

Amelia's hand drifted to her bump without thinking. "What if I'm not good at the other thing?"

"You said the same thing when we put you into the advanced classes at school."

"I was eight."

"And you were wrong then, too."

She looked at him.

He gave her a small smile. "You're not just good at this job because you're smart. You're good because you care. And that's not going to change no matter how long of a break that you take."

Amelia stared down at her plate, silent for a moment. "I don't want to hand over Oscar."

Her dad leaned back in his chair, his tone more casual now. "You picked Stallard yourself. You trust him."

"I do." She took a breath. "But I know how Oscar works better than anyone else. How his brain ticks under pressure. And I've done everything for so long — pre-sessions, cooldowns, briefings. It's not just the job. It's him."

He nodded. "That's why you've been so good together. But you're also about to be someone's mum, Amelia. And that little girl is going to need all of that same care. All of that weirdly brilliant attention to detail."

Amelia huffed a laugh. "She's already demanding. She hates when I eat citrus. Just wants cake and tiramisu flavoured things all the time."

"She's got taste." He said. Then he reached across the table and placed his hand over hers."You're not disappearing, Amelia. Nobody is going to forget about you. You're going to have a baby, and you'll fall so deeply in love with her that everything else will fade into the background. But eventually, you'll be ready to come back. Your mom will travel with you, and you'll take over from Tom again, and everything will be just fine."

She blinked. Slowly. Then, she whispers, "Thanks, Dad. That really helps."

He squeezed her fingers. "You'll be back before you know it. And when you are—this place will still be yours. Trust me. You've made more of an impact than you will ever realise."

—

The restaurant clung to the cliffside above the marina, lit by soft lanterns and the shimmer of city lights below. The terrace buzzed with the gentle clatter of cutlery and the low hum of multiple F1 teams converging for one of those rare, off-track evenings.

It was still work, in a way — team bonding, sponsor optics, face time. But for now, it was pasta and mocktails and the smell of grilled sea bass drifting on the evening breeze.

Amelia sat wedged between Oscar and Lando, her hands cradling a chilled glass of pomegranate soda. Her feet were up on a second chair, legs aching just enough to warrant it. Lando kept refilling her glass every time she looked away. Oscar had already stolen her feta-stuffed olives.

When the main course wound down, she spotted Charles stepping out from a conversation with someone in red team gear. He looked relaxed — or as relaxed as Charles ever did in Monaco. Still sharp-edged around the eyes.

She tapped Lando's arm. "I'm going to say hi to Charles."

"You're not about to give him trade secrets, are you?"

She didn't answer. Just rolled her eyes and got to her feet.

Charles noticed her before she even reached him and smiled with something between fondness and humour. "You need a breather from the orange table?"

"I'm trying to be neutral and approachable," Amelia told him.

"You're failing," he replied, but his grin softened the jab. "How are you feeling?"

"Hot. Heavy. Slightly betrayed by my spine." She paused. "You?"

Charles tilted his head. "Nervous."

She nodded. "Understandable."

"It's Monaco."

"I know." She looked up at him for a beat longer. "The thing is, I want my boys to beat you. That's my priority and it always will be. But —" She bit her lip and leaned on the balcony. "But I want you to finish this race. Properly."

He laughed under his breath. "So do I."

She hesitated, then lowered her voice and leaned in, "So, maybe, if on your second quali lap, you just leave a little extra margin at the exit of Mirabeau. And maybe you should adjust your ride height a few inches. And your throttle pedal could, maybe, could be adjusted to the left; specifically for Monaco."

Charles stared at her. "What?"

"You heard me," she said with a faint smile. "Good luck, Charles. I hope you make your home crowd proud."

He smiled wider. "If anyone found out that you—"

"All my father would ever do is frown and me and proceed to tell me that I'm soft for you. Which I am." She smiled at him. "You've been such a wonderful friend to me, Charles. A good neighbour. You always listen to me when I speak, even if what I am saying makes no sense to you."

Charles looked at her, suddenly quiet. "Merci, Amelia. Thank you."

Amelia pursed her lips. "I'm not saying that those changes will make you win. But... They will give you a better chance at a front-row start. And we know how important that is here."

They stood like that a moment — Monaco locals by way of wildly different paths — then Charles glanced back toward the Ferrari table. "Tell your husband that I will be trying to poach you when you return from maternity leave," he said.

"Hm." She hummed. "You and Lewis next year — what a fun idea."

He blinked at her, a bit of hope clinging to the edges of his expression. "Really?"

She leaned in and kissed his cheek. "No."

He huffed out an amused breath and started to turn away, then paused and added, sincerely, "Good luck, Amelia."

"Right back at you," she said, then added, "Leave the barriers alone this year, yes?"

"I'll do my best," Charles said with a wink, and disappeared back into the red sea.

When Amelia returned to the McLaren table, Lando leaned in with a faux-casual, "So, how's your favourite Ferrari boy?"

"He's nervous," Amelia said, sitting again with a sigh. "I hope I gave him some hope. That's the most powerful tool a driver can have." She tilted her head. "Well, that and me."

Oscar smirked and raised his drink. "To questionable loyalty."

"To Monaco miracles," she corrected, and clinked his glass.

—

Later, long after the dinner had wound down and the drivers WhatsApp group had gone feral with memes and selfies, Amelia lay submerged in warm water, her back nestled against Lando's chest. The bathroom was dimly lit, the only light coming from the small lamp over the sink and the soft glow of the candles. Lavender and eucalyptus swirled in the steam.

Lando's chin rested lightly on her shoulder, his fingers tracing aimless lines over the curve of her belly just visible above the surface. The baby gave the occasional gentle kick, more thump than flutter these days.

"She's very awake," Lando murmured, thumb brushing over one of the movements.

"She likes water," Amelia said, closing her eyes. "She always calms down when I'm in the shower. But she loves a bath."

"Maybe she'll be a mermaid."

"Or a diver. Or an aero specialist. Hydrodynamics and aerodynamics aren't that different."

Lando laughed into her shoulder. "That's such an engineer answer."

"You asked."

A comfortable silence settled between them, interrupted only by the lapping of the water and the distant hum of the city outside.

"Have you thought more about names?" He asked softly.

She opened one eye. "You're not letting that go, are you?"

"You said we'd make a shortlist this week."

"Technically, you said that. I just nodded."

"Close enough."

Amelia tilted her head back against his shoulder, thoughtful. "I like Ada."

"Yeah?" He asked thoughtfully.

"It's clean. It has weight. Ada Lovelace was one of the first computer programmers."

"Shocker."

"What — that I want to name our child after a female computing and mathematical pioneer?"

"Sarcasm, baby." He mumbled against her shoulder.

She frowned. "Sorry. Missed it. My brains all misty recently."

Lando gave her a little squeeze, then said, a bit more seriously, "I like Ada. But I also kind of like names that sound like movement. Like... I don't know. Skye. Or Elia. Something with flow."

"Skye Norris?" Amelia mused.

"Eh. It's a good jumping off point," he said.

They lapsed into silence again, his hands slow and steady against her belly, her fingers lazily drawing shapes in the water.

"I'm a bit scared," she said quietly. "To be honest."

Lando didn't move. "Of what?"

"Of getting it wrong," she whispered. "The name, the parenting, all of it. I'm good at engineering because it follows rules. But babies — she'll be her own person, Lando. With thoughts and emotions. And I don't know how to... prepare for that."

He was quiet a moment. Then he said, softly, "Me either."

Amelia blinked up at the ceiling, throat tight.

"But if we mess up—" Lando continued, nudging her temple with his nose, "we'll apologise. Own up to it. And then we'll try again. That's all anyone can do."

She exhaled. "You make it sound so simple."

"Because you overthink everything."

"That's rich coming from you."

He smiled. "Yeah, well. We're both anxious perfectionists with trust issues. Our daughter is doomed."

Amelia laughed — a real one this time. "Shut up."

Lando kissed the side of her head. "She'll have us on her side, though. Always."

Amelia reached down, took one of his hands, and pressed it firmly to the curve of her belly.

Their daughter kicked again, right on cue.

"Maybe Ada Skye," she said after a long pause.

Lando hummed. "Can I suggest something else?"

"Of course." She said quietly.

"What about Rosella?"

"After Rosella Manfrinato?" Amelia asked, voice full of curiosity.

"Yeah. First female engineer to ever work for Ferrari." He said.

She nodded. "Yeah. I know." She pursed her lips in thought. "Ada Rosella Norris." She whispered, trying to get a feel of the name.

"It's strong." Lando said.

"Full of power." Amelia agreed quietly.

Lando grinned against her temple. "Our little rocket scientist."

"Our little engineer," Amelia said, smile tugging at the corner of her mouth.

"Let's not teach her about ERS until she's at least four."

"Three and a half," Amelia negotiated.

Lando laughed.

Amelia thought it sounded like home.

—

The apartment was silent now.

Water drained from the tub long ago, and Amelia was curled beneath the covers in their bed, one hand resting unconsciously on her bump, her breaths slow and even. Moonlight slid in through the curtains, tracing soft silver lines across her cheekbones. Lando stood in the doorway for a moment, watching her — still, peaceful, warm — before stepping back out into the living room and quietly closing the door behind him.

He crossed to the balcony, tugged on a hoodie, and pulled out his phone.

It took three rings before his dad answered.

"Lando? Everything alright?" His dad sounded like he'd just woken up — it was late, and Lando had forgotten the slight time difference.

"Yeah. Yeah, everything's fine. Sorry if I woke you up," he said, rubbing at the back of his neck. "I just... I couldn't wait anymore. I needed to tell someone."

A beat of silence.

Then, with a hint of caution, because he knew his son, asked, "Tell me what?"

"I did it," Lando said. "I bought it. The land."

"What land?" Adam asked.

"The land, dad. Where we got married."

"You mean the—? Jesus, mate."

"Yeah. The field. With the oak tree. The one Amelia didn't stop talking about for a month straight last year." Lando sat down slowly on one of the balcony chairs, heart thudding. "But, like, I didn't just buy it, you know? I've been working with some people — architects, contractors. Builders. Decorators. It's happening. Happened, I guess. The house. Her house. She doesn't know yet."

Adam was quiet, but Lando could hear the smile in his voice when he finally said, "You're building it."

Lando nodded, even though his dad couldn't see him. "Built. Almost. Just, like, a few more pieces of furniture to get delivered. But yeah, dad. It's a real home. Just in time for the first few months with the baby. Maybe longer. It's all eco-efficient and airy — her office, a nursery, a bathtub big enough for the both of us, just like here. And the nursery..." He let out a breathless laugh. "Dad, I had it copied from her Pinterest board. Down to the wall art. She doesn't even know I have her Pinterest boards."

Adam chuckled softly. "Of course you do, son."

"It's got these soft pinks and greys. Planet mobiles, wood textures, soft-glow lamps. She pinned a photo of a reading nook by a window and I'm getting them to build one, exactly like it. I want it to feel like she's known it forever."

"She's going to love it," Adam said, gentle now.

Lando's throat tightened. "I just— When we found out that she was pregnant, I knew that she'd want to have the baby in England, you know? And I know she's more than happy to stay with her mum for a while but — I wanted her to have something that's hers. Ours."

"She already has that in you."

Lando looked out over the dark water, letting that settle. "I know. But, when I can't be there... I just want her to know," he said quietly, "you know? Be surrounded by it. A reminder that I'd give her the whole world. That she doesn't even have to ask."

"She knows, son."

"I'm going to bring her there," Lando said. "Next week. I'm hoping everything will be finished. I was hoping maybe you'd be able to go and check it out, maybe you and mum? Make sure everything's alright?"

His dad didn't say anything right away. "Of course we will, mate. Whatever you need. God, I'm proud of you, Lando. You've become the kind of man I always hoped you'd be."

Lando swallowed, hard. "Thanks, Dad."

"Now go and get some sleep. You've got a race weekend to finish — and a very clever wife to keep from figuring all this out."

Lando laughed, soft and careful, so he wouldn't wake Amelia. "Yeah. That's been the hardest part. But — I genuinely think I've managed to hide it."

They said their goodnights, and Lando stayed on the balcony for a few more minutes, watching the moonlight ripple across the water.

Then he slipped back into the bedroom and under the covers beside her.

Amelia shifted slightly in her sleep, turning toward him. He curled around her carefully, hand resting on the curve of her belly.

In four days, he thought, she'll open the big front-door and find everything waiting for her. 

Everything she'd dreamed of — and more.

—

The sky was a crisp summer blue above the city, the harbour shimmering below. The McLaren garage was alive for the most important session of the weekend—controlled chaos, comms lines tight, eyes on telemetry, hands on buttons.

Amelia stood, headset on, bump cradled behind her clipboard. The engineers around her knew to give her room; she paced with deliberate, rhythmic movements when she was thinking, and thinking was all she was doing now.

Q3.

Tight margins. Traffic chaos. Purple sectors lighting up the screen like fireworks.

"Alright, Oscar," she said into the mic, her tone flat but alert. "Track's evolving fast. Leclerc's just gone purple in Sector 1."

"Copy."

He didn't sound nervous. Just wired in.

Her eyes flicked to the screen. Telemetry humming in real time. Every time she ran data analysis through her mind, Oscar's confidence had grown sharper, cleaner. The car was under him. And he was really, genuinely starting to believe in it.

"Go now. Push out of Rascasse. Clear air."

Silence. Then the rhythm of apex and throttle and millisecond corrections filled her ears like music.

Lando, on another screen, was midway through his final flyer. "He's purple in S2," someone said behind her, low.

"Copy that," Amelia replied. She didn't move. She didn't breathe. She just watched Oscar's delta fall green, then purple—

Then time stopped.

P2.

Right behind Leclerc. Less than a tenth off.

The garage burst into motion, restrained joy quickly overtaken by calculation. Strategy talk. Track position.

Amelia blinked hard and gave her mic one last click. "That's front row, Oscar. Hell of a lap."

"I left half a tenth at the hairpin."

"I'm aware," she deadpanned. "You also just out-qualified Verstappen and Hamilton in Monaco."

His laugh crackled over the radio as he pulled into Parc Ferme. "Holy shit."

Amelia turned in her seat and locked eyes with Lando just as he pulled his gloves off. "P4," he mouthed to her, not too disappointed—energised.

"Nice recovery after that wall tap in FP3," she called across the garage.

"I didn't touch the wall."

"You kissed it, then. Should I be jealous?"

He grinned.

A Sky Sports camera panned briefly to them. Amelia didn't flinch—just shifted her clipboard against her stomach again. Someone behind her passed her a small stool, and this time she accepted, sitting with a quiet exhale.

The top three were headed to press. She watched as Oscar removed his helmet, curls flattened, grinning wide, exchanging a look with her from across the paddock before getting swept toward the media pen.

"You nervous?" One of the junior engineers asked her as they unplugged telemetry cables.

"A little," Amelia said. "But we're front row in Monaco. There are worse problems to have."

And deep in her chest, beneath the clinical logic and mechanical heartbeat of the job, she felt it — a soft, surging pride. Her best friend, on the front row. Her husband, on the second. Her team, alive with momentum.

Their daughter kicked once, firm and sharp against her ribs.

"Yeah," Amelia whispered, rubbing her belly. "Let's make the last one good, baby girl."

—

The paddock was swarming. Engineers debriefed at speed, mechanics wheeled tyres past camera crews, and over it all came the distant call of the sea.

Amelia stood from the stool someone had given her earlier, brushing her hands over the front of her dress. She'd barely moved when she caught a flash of red.

Charles.

Helmet off, suit tied at the waist, damp curls sticking to his temples. He was deep in conversation with someone from Ferrari, nodding tightly — the thrill and heavy burden of taking pole position in Monaco sitting heavy on his shoulders, even under the roaring crowd.

Then his eyes caught hers.

For half a second, she thought maybe he'd just glance and move on. He was always polite, always kind, but this was a big moment for him. He had enough on his plate.

Instead, he paused. Just a beat.

Then — a smile, genuine and boyish.

And a quiet, grateful thumbs-up. Directed at her.

Amelia blinked, then returned the gesture with a small lift of her clipboard. A quiet acknowledgment.

She'd bent a few informal, off-the-record, definitely-against-McLaren-policy rules the night before at dinner. Just a few aerodynamic notes. Not enough to sabotage Lando and Oscar's chances. Just enough to give a driver she quietly admired the best shot he could get on home soil.

And now he was on pole.

Lando stepped up beside her, having just finished media, brushing his knuckles against hers without a word. He was still flushed from the car, hair wild and eyes bright. "Was that Charles just—?"

"Yeah," she said.

Lando gave her a suspicious look. "Is this about what you two were whispering about last night?"

"Nope." She lied.

"You gave him tips, didn't you?"

Amelia stayed perfectly still. "Prove it."

Lando opened his mouth — and then just laughed. "You're ridiculous."

"Am I wrong, though?" She asked mildly. "Oscar's still on the front row. You're in a great launch position. We've got a better long-run setup. I just want Charles to get through the damn first lap this year."

Lando shook his head with affectionate disbelief, still grinning. "Corporate espionage." He accused.

"I know," Amelia said. "How terrible." She joked.

He cupped her chin and tugged her to close the gap between this, kissing her chastely. "Come on. Let's go home."

—

The narrow streets of Monte Carlo felt quieter in the early morning. Calm before the storm. A million yachts bobbed in the harbour, a gull wheeled overhead, and the team trucks hummed with activity behind closed paddock gates.

Amelia stood just outside the McLaren garage, headset around her neck. The weight of the day — and everything it represented — settled into her bones.

Final race.

Final pre-race briefing.

At least for now.

Her eyes stung behind her sunglasses, but she didn't blink too much. If she started crying, she wasn't sure she'd stop. And she didn't want anyone — especially not Lando or Oscar — trying to hug her about it.

Not today.

"Morning," Oscar said behind her, nudging her arm gently.

She sniffed a laugh, turning around. "Morning. I have notes and spreadsheets for you."

He grinned. "Nerd."

She looked over at him — sweatpants, t-shirt, hair still wet from a quick hotel shower, eyes clearer than usual. "You ready for this?" She asked, voice quieter.

He hesitated, then nodded. "Yeah. Think so."

"Good. You're going to get him at the start."

Oscar raised an eyebrow. "Leclerc?"

She didn't answer, just tapped her temple, then pointed at his heart. "Use both."

Oscar's grin turned boyish, proud. But then his eyes dropped to her belly. "You okay?"

"I'm fine," she said. Too fast. Then slower, "I'm fine. It's just... I feel like I'm abandoning you."

He didn't try to give her a speech. Just nodded, understanding threading his features. "It's just for now," he said.

"Yeah," she whispered. "Just for now."

Lando found her a few minutes later, sneaking up behind her and sliding a cool bottle of water into her hand. "Hydration for my queen and my princess," he said, lightly.

She took it with a small smile. "You're annoying."

"You're emotional."

"I'm pregnant."

"Yes. I know," he teased, and she elbowed him. Then he pressed his forehead against hers. Just a moment of stillness in the bustle. "We'll do you proud," he said.

"You always do."

"And when you come back, our little girl in tow..."

"I'll be even smarter, and more terrifying."

"Exactly," he said, grinning. Then, a little softer, "You okay?"

She hesitated. Then nodded. "I'm okay. I'm... not not emotional. But I'm okay."

"Do you want me to find you a crying room?"

"Lando."

"I'm just saying. I'm sure there's an empty space around here somewhere."

Despite herself, she laughed. Then, very softly, rested her forehead to his chest, breathing in the smell of fuel and soap and Monaco air.

She didn't cry.

But her throat ached from not doing it.

And when she finally stepped back into the garage to take her place at the pit wall, clipboard in hand and headset secured, the world narrowed in a way she loved — to data, to pace deltas, to strategy windows.

To racing.

Her last Sunday. For now.

And her boys, Oscar and Lando, were about to make it count.

—

The buzz in the pit lane was razor-thin, and under her headset, Amelia could hear her own breathing.

The lights blinked red.

"Five." Four. "Three."

Oscar's telemetry spiked as his revs climbed.

Two. "One." Out.

The cars launched.

"Good launch," Amelia called into Oscar's ear. "Mode five. Hold your line into turn one."

He did — perfectly. Charles swept clean into Sainte Devote, Oscar tucked in behind, and Lando angled sharp around the outside of Hamilton to defend P4. But into Massenet, there was a twitch.

"Contact," came the warning from race control.

Amelia's eyes flicked to the feed — a Ferrari nudged too close. Carlos.

"Oscar. Status?" She asked tightly.

"I think I touched Sainz," Oscar said quickly, voice calm but clipped. "He turned in — we tapped."

She scanned his data; pressures stable.

"Copy. No damage on our end. Carlos has a puncture," came in from strategy.

"Maintain pace," she said. "You're still P2."

Then...chaos.

A screech; gut-churning and metallic — tore through the live feed. The monitor lit up with a yellow. Then double yellow. Then red.

"Red flag. Red flag. Slow the cars and return to the pit lane," came the immediate order from Race Control.

Amelia's stomach dropped. Another monitor showed Perez's Red Bull obliterated at Mirabeau, tangled with both Haas cars. Carbon fibre everywhere. A front wing clinging to a wall.

Amelia's hand tightened instinctively over her bump.

"Is that... all three of them?" Will asked, incredulous.

"What happened?" Oscar asked on the comms.

"Big collision. Perez, both Haas. There's debris everywhere through sector two. They've thrown the red flag so mode seven please, and come straight through to line up in the pit lane."

He exhaled. "Jesus."

"You're clean," she told him. "You did well to defend against Sainz and keep it as clean as possible. Keep your head in it, ducky."

Oscar didn't respond.

She exhaled, slow and controlled.

She glanced down at her bump and pressed her palm lightly against the curve.

Five minutes later, when all of the cars were lined up in the pit-lane and most of the drivers had climbed out, Lando found her.

"You alright?" His voice came quietly from behind. He'd handed of his helmet to one of the engineers in his garage.

"Yeah. I'm fine," she said. "Just didn't want my last one for a while to start like this."

He gave her a small, lopsided smile. "Still a long way to go."

She nodded once. "Yeah."

"Want to go and find some capri suns?" He asked.

She glanced at Will, who nodded as if to say 'Might as well, not like anything's happening here.' So she got up, took Lando's hand, and let him guide her toward the mini fridge in the back of his garage.

—

The paddock was a knot of tension. Mechanics hovered. Engineers tapped frantically on keyboards. Drivers paced.

Amelia stood in the garage, headphones looped around her neck, one hand resting on her lower back. Oscar leaned against the pit wall barrier, helmet off, sipping from a water bottle.

"Fronts are still stable," she said quietly, scanning the screen. "You were holding well into sector three before the red flag."

He nodded. "Do we go back to the grid, or rolling start?"

"Standing restart," Tom said, appearing beside her with a tablet.

Oscar took a deep breath. "Copy."

Amelia's voice dropped, so only he could hear: "Eyes forward. Don't chase Charles — let him cook his tyres. Lando's breathing down your neck, but he won't dive you into Turn One. You've got space to think."

Oscar gave her a crooked smile. "You gonna miss bossing me around?"

"Immensely," she said.

Back on the grid, the tension returned like a rubber band pulled taut. Cameras swiveled. Engines revved. Amelia's screens lit up again — tyre temps, ERS levels, delta charts. She exhaled slowly.

Lights out — again.

Charles launched clean. Oscar slipped ever so slightly — enough to give Carlos and Lando a sniff. But he held P2 into Turn One, Lando defending hard from Hamilton, who wasn't giving up without a fight.

By Lap 36, the order held steady: Charles, Oscar, Lando. No one risking the undercut — it was Monaco, after all. Strategy would come down to patience, tyre life, and sheer mistake-free laps.

Amelia's voice was calm in Oscar's ear: "Keep him honest. Don't push yet — wait for the window. If Charles blinks, we leapfrog him. Otherwise, you're the threat."

Behind them, Lando was making time. Slowly, surgically. Amelia's chest swelled with pride.

She didn't even flinch when he came over the radio to Will, his own engineer. "Tyres still feel good. Let me know if Oscar drops."

Oscar stayed tight. Impressive, really. This wasn't his circuit — but he'd driven like it was.

Then the inevitable: Charles crossed the finish line in P1. Oscar brought it home in P2, and Carlos crossed in P3. Lando missed out on the podium by a hundredth of a second.

Amelia unmuted. "Box, box. That was clinical. Well done."

Oscar whooped through the radio. "Thanks, Amelia. That was unreal. Thanks for—everything."

She smiled, actually smiled, throat tight. "Gonna miss you, ducky. Drive fast as hell for me, alright?"

"Copy that." He said.

Andrea reached over and squeezed her shoulder. "Good job."

"Thanks." She said quietly.

—

She waited by Parc Ferme for Lando to finish being weighed.

He ran straight to her.

"You're done," he said, breathless, wrapping his arms around her.

"I'm done," she echoed, burying her face in his shoulder. "For now."

He kissed her. "I love you so much, Amelia Norris."

"Yeah," she mumbled, blushing. Because she knew for a fact that there was a thousand cameras pointed right at them. "I love you too."

—

Amelia stood near the edge of the pit lane, half-shielded by the shadow of the McLaren garage. Her headset was off. Her hair was tied back. She looked tired — tired, but finally still.

A rustle of footsteps approached behind her, softer than the usual thud of boots or trainers. She turned, and Charles was there.

In a fresh pair of sweats. His face was flushed, hair damp from his dive into the water, but the light in his eyes was quieter now — grounded.

"Amelia," he said gently.

She blinked, then straightened a little.

Charles stepped forward, wrapped his arms around her, and pulled her into a hug.

It was warm. Steady. Just tight enough.

Not rushed or awkward, but full-bodied and honest.

"Merci," he said into her hair, voice low and thick. "Merci pour tout."

Amelia hesitated, stunned for a breath, then carefully hugged him back, fingers clutching the fabric of his sweatshirt.

"You made it stick," she said. "Finally."

He pulled back just enough to look at her, eyes glinting. "I think maybe... I needed you to tell me that you believed I could."

Amelia's throat tightened. "I didn't do much," she said, voice soft.

Charles shook his head. "You never give yourself enough credit."

She snorted. "That's not true. I know that I'm excellent. I'm just not... sentimental."

His grin spread, warm and crooked. "Just this once." He gave her one more squeeze, then stepped back, nodding toward her bump with quiet reverence. "She's going to be very proud of her mother. One day."

Amelia's smile was small but real. "I hope so."

Charles gave her a parting wink before melting back into the paddock's glow.

—

The restaurant overlooked the water. It wasn't flashy — just candlelight, open windows, and long tables pulled together to fit the team. Plates were passed around. Bottles of wine, soft drinks, sparkling water.

Oscar sat beside Amelia, nudging her knee under the table every so often like he couldn't help himself. Across from them, Lando had changed into a casual shirt, hair still slightly damp from the post-race champagne photo. He kept glancing over at her, soft-eyed and full of pride.

Zak stood and tapped the side of his glass, raising his voice just enough to call the room to attention.

"Right. I think we all know what today meant," he said, smiling faintly. "Charles took the win, but Oscar gave us a hell of a podium and Lando brought it home clean and sharp. Great points for the team." He looked toward Amelia. "But more than that — today was Amelia's last race before maternity leave."

The team clapped — loud and long. There were whistles. Shouts of "legend!" and "go on, mama!" from the mechanics.

Amelia flushed, shifting in her seat.

"She's not just Oscar's engineer," Zak went on. "She's part of why this team found its footing again. You've felt it. I've felt it. She redefined what we thought we could do. And I know — I know — she's going to come back stronger."

Oscar leaned in and whispered, "I'm not ready for Baby Norris to be smarter than me by age four."

"Don't put that pressure on her," Amelia said. "Give her until she's five, at least."

That earned a echo of amused snickers.

Then Tom raised a glass. "To Amelia," he said, smiling. "And to Lando. Congratulations."

Amelia's eyes prickled. She wasn't good at this part. The centre-of-attention part. But she looked around — at the sea of orange and grease-stained fingernails and sunburnt faces. And she felt it. All of it.

Later, when the plates were cleared and the candles burned lower, someone passed her a small envelope. Inside: a card, signed by every team member. Tucked behind it — a folded drawing. A sketch of the McLaren garage. Tiny details included. A crib nestled between the tool chests (which was not going to happen). Her in a headset, baby in a sling. A caption underneath: "When you come back, we'll be waiting with open arms."

She stared at it for a long moment, then slipped it into her bag without a word.

Lando wrapped an arm around her as they left, walking her slowly through the cobbled street, his voice low.

"That was a lot. You doing okay?"

"I'm more than okay," she murmured, leaning into him. "I'm just... trying to remember it all. Every second."

"It'll all be here when come back," he said. "But for now — we've got a baby to get ready for."

She exhaled.

And then she smiled.

—

They were back in England by the Tuesday.

Amelia was sitting in the passenger seat, her iPad on her lap. For once, she wasn't reading sim telemetry or reviewing Oscar's feedback — that was Tom's job now.

She was just... reading. A romance novel. She'd renewed her kindle unlimited subscription for the first time in almost three years.

When the car veered off the familiar road toward a narrow lane nestled between fields, she furrowed her brow.

"This isn't the way to my mums," she said.

"I know," Lando replied, his tone light but unreadable.

"Are we visiting someone?"

"You'll see."

She frowned at him but he just reached over and squeezed her leg.

They pulled up a gravel path flanked by hedges still brushing off their spring blossoms. At the end of it: a gate. New. Black metal. The kind that hummed softly as it opened automatically.

Immediately, she knew where there were.

Could see the blur of the old Manor House in the distance, hidden by the rolling green hills.

Amelia turned to him, heart thudding, eyebrows slowly drawing together. "Lando?"

He glanced at her. Smiled. "Just trust me."

The driveway opened into a wide clearing. Green everywhere. Hills rolling in the distance. And in the centre of it: a house.

A new house.

But not just a new house.

It was...

God.

Holy shit.

It was her house.

Amelia stared at it. White stone, deep-set windows, pale wood accents, red brick roof. A big front-door with a place to kick off muddy boots. Like a conglomeration of the millions of pictures that she'd shown him on sleepy nights.

She was quiet for a long time.

"I don't understand," she whispered wetly.

He got out of the car, came around to open her door. Helped her out gently, hand on her back, then on her belly.

"You told me," he said, "that you felt safest where things didn't echo too much. Where the air didn't feel tight. That you wanted your daughter's first memories to be somewhere soft. This is going to be that place, baby."

She stared up at the house again. "When?"

"When you got pregnant." He scratched his neck, suddenly sheepish. "I— Well, I'd already bought the land. Bought it the first time you sent me the listing. But I only started talking to architects after we found out you were pregnant. Designers. Pietra sent me your Pinterest, by the way. I had to bribe her."

Amelia made a shocked sound somewhere between a breath and a laugh.

"Come inside." He whispered.

Inside, the air smelled like cedar and fresh paint. Light poured through tall windows. There were shelves already filled with books — her books, she realised, when she looked closer. All of the books she'd left at her mom's house in Woking because it would have been ridiculous to ship them all to Monaco. A kitchen with an enormous window overlooking acres upon acres of green, a table big enough for noisy breakfasts and quiet late-night sandwiches. A fireplace in the living room. A crocheted blanket already draped across the back of the couch, ("my nan made it for us," Lando murmured), and Amelia felt like crying.

And then — the nursery.

Creamy white walls. A crib. The exact mobile she'd dreamed of. Tasteful art hung on the walls, pink accents. Calm. Serene. An armchair in the corner. A side table with a lamp that looked like the one from her childhood bedroom — it was, she realised, upon closer look. A window overlooking the hills. Blackout curtains. A chest of drawers packed to the brim with an array of different sizes of nappies and a million packets of wet wipes and a closet that was full to the brim with the suitcases worth of baby clothes that she'd been buying and having delivered to her mom's house for the past seven months.

She pressed a hand to her mouth. "You remembered everything."

"You deserve everything."

Her eyes brimmed with tears. "I don't even know how to..." She trailed off, too full to finish.

Lando stepped closer and placed her hand against his chest. "You don't need to say anything."

"But I—"

"This is for you, baby. All of it. Forever."

Tears spilled silently down her cheeks.

He leaned in, pressed a kiss to her forehead. "Welcome home, baby."

[martygraciesversion381]

2 hands

lando norris x piastri!reader

warnings: smut, pnv, oral(f!recieving), first time for reader at lando's house, detailed description of some parts of monaco (is it even a warning?) and that's all!!!

summary: you're Oscar Piastri's little sister and you and Lando always hated each other. So how did you end up in this weird situation with him? That's what you're asking yourself too

song: 2 hands by tate mcrae

a/n: chapter three!! smut in monaco (hometown) and that's all i have to say on this chapter rlly....thx for all the love that you're showing to cut my hair and sports car it rlly means a lot to me<3

requests[closed for now]

masterlist

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The Monaco warm air hit you as you opened your windows in the morning. As you looked down, you could see some children going to school either alone for the olders or with their parents for the youngers. You smiled at the sight before you went back inside to make yourself a cup of coffee.

As you were drinking your coffee, you recieved a text from lando.

lando morning princess slept well? was wondering if you'd like to come over y'know for some friendly time😉

you hey lannnn!!! sure i'll come over just let me get ready

You smiled and went to your room to get ready. You wore a light blue pair of jeans with a usual white top. You didn't even bother putting on makeup knowing how the morning was gonna end.

About ten minutes later, you were standing outside Lando's appartment door. You knocked softly and he opened, a smile lighting up his face as he saw you.

"Hey princess" he leaned in and pecked your lips before letting you in.

You both spent the morning playing mario kart with you beating him each time. He rested his head against the back of the couch and groaned.

"You're too good at this m'never playing with you again."

You chuckled and moved closer to him to poke his ribs.

"You're just mad cause you lost." you said grinning up at him.

Lando smirked down at you before he pulled you on his lap.

"Wrong I've got a beautiful girl in my lap so I guess I won didn't I?"

God this man and his way to talk. He chuckled as heat made its way up to your cheeks and he leaned in to peck your lips but much to his surprise you deepened the kiss by letting your tongue into his mouth.

Lando groaned as you licked into his mouth greedily and he managed to shift the both of you so that you were now lying under him without detaching your lips.

He slid his hands under your shirt, his lips moved down to your jawline leaving open mouthed kisses before he reached your neck paying extra attention to your pulse point as he sucked it gently leaving a hickey there next to the one that he left last time.

He helped you take off your shirt before he went back down to attack your collarbone with his lips leaving marks there as to claim you. His shirt and joggers soon followed on the floor as he kept moving down your body.

He kissed your stomach, making you arch your back and he took it as an opportunity to unclasp your bra and throwing it on the floor. He reached your hip and nipped at the skin just over your waistband while looking up at you through his lashes.

He pulled down your pants before his lips latched at your clit over your panties. You gasped in surprise and your finger immediately went to his hair making him smirk.

He pulled your panties to the side, too impatient to take them off, before he dove in, his tongue licking arounr your entrance before he moved up to you clit closing his lips around it.

You whined and gripped his hair tighter as his tongue toyed with your clit making you go crazy. This feeling however didn't last long when Lando pulled back and stood up. You whined at the loss of his lips before you realised that he had taken off his boxers and was now climbing over you.

He hoovered over you and captured your lips and a kiss that was way slower than the ones you had shared before. As his tongue made its way into your mouth, he pushed into you making you gasp in surprise. You whined as he started to move slowly in and out of you.

This was nothing like what you did before, it was new and it felt so damn good. You could feel every inch of him going in and out of you as your bodies moved in sync on the couch.

Lando licked a stripe up your neck before sucking on it lightly as his other hand hooked your thigh around his hips making him go deeper. The only sounds in the room where your moans, his low groans and the sound of skin colliding.

You felt that familiar knot tighten in your lower belly and you didn't even need to tell anything to Lando as he brought his fingers down to your clit.

"Cum for me pretty girl....know you can do it" he mumbled.

Your nails digged into his back as you milked his dick with your release before he stopped his movements and spilled into you grunting your name in your ear.

After a few minutes he pulled out slowly making the both of you whine.

"You good?" he asked and you nodded.

You dressed back up ready to go home when Lando walked to the door with you.

"You coming too?" you asked him.

"Yep gotta make sure you get home safely" he grinned and you smiled too.

You both made your way down the Monaco streets passing by Place d'Armes where the morning market was closing and in front of l'Eglise Sainte Devote where the mass had just ended. As you made your way into Place du Casino, Lando was stopped by some fans who also asked for some picutres with you.

You finally reached your bulding, a small one just next to the jardins du Casino. Lando walked you up to your door.

"Well...see ya then lan" you smiled and pecked his lips.

A smile lit Lando's face as he squeezed your hand before walking away. You made your way into your appartment. You couldn't wait to see Lando again.

tagglist:

@cinderellawithashoe @itzzgillianj27 @motorsportbarbie13 @gorgeusreputation16 @swiftlyconehead @g00d--vibes @linnygirl09 @itsleslie1998 @rd14 @safeplaceholland @f1fantasys @rendezvoushn @lilorose25 @softhyunieeee @powerlinevallies @imboredway2much @joannaln4 @mckalala @ln4girlie

[bslfnknstn]

i have a lot to say about the reality war and oh trust me i will be saying a lot about this episode, but big twists aside i’m actually furious about what they did to belinda’s character. she started off as such a fun, stubborn, witty, assertive companion, but that faded away so much over the course of this season, until in later episodes like the interstellar song contest she was just a cardboard cutout companion.

while moments of her determination did shine through in this episode, sticking her in a box with poppy for the majority of the action was so disappointing and it felt so awful to have the doctor tell her the reason they met was so she could be the mother of his child?? I’M SORRY WHAT??? russell reducing women to mothers was LAST EPISODE. SHE’S MORE THAN JUST A MOTHER! god she felt so 2 dimensional in this episode, comparing her to how she was in the robot revolution the difference is night and day. the focus on ruby instead of belinda in the finale of HER OWN SEASON is crazy??

i thought she was going to be one of my favourite companions, but honestly now this season’s done i think i prefer ruby sunday

[mapiforpresident]

20 with patri pls! 💕 you could also do alexia or pina or even claudia+pina+ reader, i don’t mind!

Finally

Patri x reader

~~~

It still doesn’t feel real.

You keep catching yourself looking down at your hand like you’ve imagined it, like maybe you’re still asleep on that beach, the waves still crashing and Patri still kneeling in the sand with that stupidly beautiful little ring box and her voice shaking when she said your name.

But nope. You’re awake. You’ve been awake since 6 a.m., wide-eyed in bed, staring at the ceiling while Patri slept curled around you, ring on your finger, heart still pounding like it hadn’t quite caught up.

She proposed.

Not next month, not during your vacation like she’d been teasing for weeks. Not on the day you thought it was going to happen.

No, she did it last night. On a little private beach, after a stupidly romantic dinner, under a sky that had turned all gold and pink and ridiculous like something out of a movie. You’d been laughing about dessert, something about how the chocolate mousse was better than anything you’d had in Paris, and she’d pulled out the ring in the middle of your sentence like she couldn’t wait another second.

No big speech. Just her eyes, and her voice breaking a little when she said, “I love you. And I want to marry you.”

You don’t even remember saying yes, really. You launched yourself at her. Pretty sure you both ended up with sand in your mouths and tears in your eyes.

And now you’re here. At training. With a ring on your finger.

You tried to hide it at first, just for fun, just to see who’d notice, but that lasted all of 0.3 seconds because Cata immediately spotted it while you were pulling off your hoodie in the locker room.

Her jaw dropped. “Wait. No way.”

You grinned. Couldn’t help it. “Way.”

Claudia shrieked first. Like, literally shrieked. Then Alexia whipped around and grabbed your hand to confirm it, and Mapi straight-up shoved Jana into a bench trying to get a look.

“Oh my god,” Ingrid breathed. “Finally.”

That was the key word of the morning, apparently.

“FINALLY,” Cata repeated, spinning in a circle like she’d just won a bet.

“You’ve been insufferable for three years,” Mapi added, “and now you’re going to be even worse.”

You were blushing like crazy, laughing and trying to keep your hand from getting ripped off by everyone grabbing it. “Wait, worse how?”

“You’re already obsessed with each other,” Claudia said, half-laughing, half-exasperated. “Now we’re going to have to hear you calling each other ‘fiancée’ for the next year like you invented love.”

“I did invent love,” you said proudly.

Patri walked in about five minutes later, fully unaware of the chaos she was about to walk into. As soon as she stepped into the locker room, someone, probably Jana, shouted, “THERE’S THE WIFE,” and everyone absolutely lost it.

She froze in the doorway, cheeks going bright red, then looked at you like, you told them?

You just held up your hand and wiggled your fingers at her.

She smiled, that soft, quiet, head-over-heels kind of smile she only ever saves for you, and walked over, kissed your forehead like you weren’t surrounded by screaming teammates, and whispered, “You’ve already told them we’re obsessed with each other, huh?”

You nodded. “I didn’t need to. They already knew.”

Alexia came up behind you and smacked your shoulder gently. “Okay but when’s the wedding. Because I’m not waiting another three years for that.”

“Oh god,” Patri muttered, already looking overwhelmed.

“It’s fine,” you said. “We’ll elope. Right now. Ingrid can officiate.”

You got booed for that idea, obviously.

And the whole session was kind of a mess, Claudia kept humming the wedding march every time you touched the ball, and Mapi kept saying “mis mujeres casadas” dramatically every time she walked past the two of you, but honestly, it was the best kind of chaos.

Because she loves you. You love her. And now you’re going to marry her.

[urcoolgf]

hey! i would really love it if u wrote this prompt.

basically drew and reader are roommates and best friends since they started filming obx together. a lot of people ship them, but reader kinda does nothing about it and it’s pretty obvious that drew does have a thing for her.

fast forward, it’s the day after drew’s birthday and they’re both eating cake and like talking and stuff. drew switches topics and hes like like “yk i never got what i acc wanted for my bday” and readers like “yea? what?” and then drew goes “good sex” or smth freaky like that

if ur not comfortable writing it, i understand, but i would really love it!! thank you!!

you guys are so creative oml i love this concept

also this ran LONG so i hope you enjoy ! :) so sorry it took so long

‘outer banks’ brought a lot of change into your life. a lot. it was your first big ‘debut’ (so-to-speak), and it also came with many new friends, and… a new roommate. drew starkey—aka ‘rafe cameron’.

the two of you had quickly become friends, not only because you were sharing an apartment with him, but you also just understood each other. the rest of the cast was obviously also amazing, but something about drew just felt more natural—more real.

—

it all started on the day you got your scripts. drew was sat next to you, fiddling with his hands while the director and other important people talked through what was expected, and when. once the meeting was over, and everyone had gone their separate ways, as he was getting up he noticed you—still sat at the table, already reading through your script with your nail in your mouth, deep in thought.

“got any notes yet, boss?,” he chuckled lightly, leaning over the table to look you in your eyes. of course drew had taken notice to how beautiful you were. it was impossible to ignore. your hair, your eyes, your beautiful smile. you were magnetic even when you weren’t saying anything.

“oh! no. no, i’m just thinking how long this is going to take to film, honestly,” your unsure tone had him intrigued. he turned slightly to sit against the table, crossing his arms in front of him, his script crinkled underneath his grasp. you hadn’t really looked at him, just quick glances during the meeting, and even now—you were more focused on your current issue, selfishly enough.

“is there a problem?,” you noticed his eyes narrow, like he was worried for you for some reason—like he cared, even though he barely knew you. it made you feel like you could talk to him without judgement, so you decided to just throw it out there.

“i just… okay, look, this is embarrassing, but i… i couldn’t find a place in the area…,” you started, finally looking up at him long enough to catch his reactions—you watched every tiny movement in his face, waiting for him to prove you wrong, and laugh in your face about it. he didn’t. a soft smile overtook his face instead, but he still didn’t say anything, and now you were starting to overthink it. “sorry! God, i don’t want you to think i was like– trying anything, or asking for help. i just– you asked so, i told you.”

he chuckled, lightly, his bright blue eyes squinting, and his smile lines prominent. he was an image, for sure—a sweetheart. “no– don’t worry, i didn’t think that.” his laugh made you smile, even in your current situation.

“would it be totally crazy if i said i had a free room in the apartment i’m renting?”

—

so, here you were—months into filming, you and drew living together, and tons of fan ‘ships’ of the two of you. it didn’t bother you; you and drew were close friends, filming together, and living together, it was natural for people to like the idea of you two dating.

you thought it was funny, but drew fed into it a little more. he was kind of protective in public, taking you out on ‘dates’ which were really just lunches, reposting stuff about the two of you. you didn’t think anything of it, but what you didn’t know was that the idea of you two being together drove drew crazy. it was hard enough being around you during filming, but at home? on the internet? it was hard for him to get over you when you were everywhere.

the two of you had become undeniably close, even the other cast members could see it. so naturally, you were comfortable talking about anything with each other, which led you to this moment. it was the day after drew’s birthday, the two of you carrying on the celebration by eating leftover cake on the couch.

“so, you have a good birthday?,” you asked, mouth half full of cake. you didn’t realize how close you were sat to him, but it was all that was going through drew’s mind right now.

“yeah, yeah it was good,” he rambled mindlessly, looking at you with those big blue eyes.

“what?,” you laughed a bit, putting your plate down on the coffee table like you didn’t totally believe him, but you also didn’t know why he was looking at you like that—like you had something he wanted.

he took a deep breath, contemplating whether he should really say what he was thinking right now, or if he was mental for even considering it. “just didn’t get what i actually wanted for my birthday.”

“what?! what is it? why didn’t you tell me?,” you were curious, to say the least, scooting even closer to him. your big eyes, and inquisitive smile had his heart beating a million miles an hour.

all he could do was look down at his fiddling hands, trying to find the confidence to just say it. he laughed a bit before answering. “some good sex.”

your jaw went a little slack, a breathless laugh coming from your lips. he laughed a bit more to cover it up as a joke, but part of you knew—knew he wasn’t joking. he looked back up at you, he tried to hide the lust in his eyes, but it was no use. you were sitting there, so close, and your perfume made it hard to think, and the way your eyes darkened would have scared him if he didn’t already know the emotion behind them—want.

“oh yeah?,” it was like something came over you, the way he was looking at you like he could devour you whole. a sudden confidence swept through your body—either that, or a type of lust. without giving yourself a chance to think, you climbed into his lap.

“oh! hey there,” he chuckled—half seductively, half surprised, not knowing what to do—whether to touch you, or keep his hands off. he didn’t know if this was real, or not.

“you can touch me, dummy,” you took his hands into yours, placing them on your hips. your shirt sat just high enough him to feel the warmth of your skin under his fingers—it was intoxicating.

“the birthday boy should get everything he asked for,” you whispered into his ear, making his eyes roll back at the warmth of your breath, and the close proximity. he felt like he was floating. “don’t be scared… i don’t bite,” you moved his hands further back, giving him the courage to grasp the flesh of your ass beneath his fingers.

the action made you mewl just a bit, moving your hips around in his lap, eliciting a groan out of the man beneath you. “y/n… fuck– you’re– you’re driving me crazy,” he breathed out.

“mm good,” you purred, giggling lightly before moving your lips down to his neck. his hips involuntarily rutted up into your core, causing you to whine into his neck.

“gonna give me my present, y/n?,” it was supposed to be taunting, but he sounded so ruined already, like the fact you were even near him was enough to get him off.

“mhm, anything you want… birthday boy,” you chuckled lightly, nipping at his neck softly. he was understanding more and more that this was real, and he got bold. he was squeezing at your ass even more, splaying his hands as wide as possible like he was claiming it—claiming you.

when your lips finally connected with his, he couldn’t help the soft groan that echoed into your mouth. he tasted like a bad decision… and you fucking loved it. you weren’t sure if this was exactly something you had been waiting for, hoping for, or expecting, but you weren’t going to sit here and act like you weren’t savoring every second of this.

you moved your hands from the back of his neck, down, down, down to his waistband, finally pulling back from his lips with a mischievous smirk. he was absolutely reeling. having you like this is all he’s wanted since he first laid eyes on you, and now that he had you? it was going to be a long night. he’d make sure of it.

“you– you sure, y/n?,” he wanted it—wanted you—of course, but he couldn’t help but think you’d leave him high and dry at any moment. he still wasn’t totally convinced you were real right now. your glossed over eyes, flushed cheeks, and dangerous smile. it all seemed too good to be true—to have you like this.

“‘m sure drew. let me take care of you,” you purred, sliding off his lap onto the floor, slotting yourself between his spread thighs. and holy fuck, he could cum from this sight alone.

you shuffled him out of his pants and boxers, leaving his flushed tip exposed to you—you could drool at the image before you. drew whined when you took him into your hand. it didn’t matter how many hand jobs or blow jobs he had been given, didn’t matter that he did it himself to the idea of you, none of it compared to right now.

“f– fuck. holy shit,” he gasped out. you hadn’t even done anything yet—not really, but his reaction gave you the biggest ego boost. you had so much control over him like this.

you worked your hand up and down his cock, relishing in the way he shivered beneath you. so yeah, maybe you’d be lying if you said you’d never thought about this—pictured him falling apart for you like this. denial was never your strong suit.

drew couldn’t even think straight once your tongue darted out to lick his tip. his eyes rolled back immediately, like a second nature, and he knew in this moment he would never be able to be ‘just friends’ with you after this. the way you looked up through your eyelashes—all innocent—while his dick was in your mouth? it was lethal. he was a goner, totally enveloped in you.

“fuck– y’ur mouth ‘s perfect,” he breathed out, his chest heaved as you forced yourself down, taking as much of him into your mouth as you could. he was addictive, and you’d never been the type to like giving head, but the image above you made it much more enjoyable. you’d do it for him any day of the week, gladly.

you made yourself gag on him, since he clearly wasn’t certain enough to put his hands on your head himself. you could tell he was close, his dick twitched against your tongue, and you were ready to take it—take all of him, whatever he gave you… until he pulled out, breathless.

“if i’m cummin’ from anything it’s gonna be your pussy. please, y/n,” the way he was basically whining—begging—for you?

how could you deny him?

you giggled lightly, snaking your way back into his lap, moving your hips against him in a way you knew would drive him crazy. and it did. “please– shit, please y/n… need it. so fuckin’ bad,” his hands found their grip on your hips again, playing with the flesh beneath his fingers while he was rutting up into you, trying to get any sort of contact. you stripped him of his shirt before hunting at him to return the favor.

“go ahead, drew… unwrap your present,” the way you whispered in his ear—the hint of challenge behind your tone—he didn’t waste another second. the sounds of him shuffling around to get you out of your clothes was unmistakable. your shirt came off first—pulling it over your head, and discarding it somewhere in the room. you loved this—making him work for it, making him beg.

he stared at your tits like they were the only thing worth looking at. his pupils blown wide, hands almost carefully moving up to touch them, like they were sacred—like they needed to be worshiped in a way he had been preparing for his whole life. drew swore he would’ve been content just playing with them for the rest of the night, but you were offering sex… so he was going to take it. he’d waited way too long to pass this up.

he latched his mouth onto one of your nipples while he slid you out of your shorts, leaving you in just your panties—your tiny, soaked through panties.

he’d never seen anything like you before.

he toyed with you like you were his, playing with your tits like they belonged to him, but you didn’t mind. the whines escaping your throat only encouraged him more.

“fuck– drew please. stop teasing,” you chuckled breathlessly. there was no humor behind it though, you needed him. now. if this was anyone other than drew you’d be embarrassed how needy you were right now—embarrassed how wet you were, and how even while you were on top of him you felt totally out of control. he had more power over you than even you knew.

you felt helpless in this moment, basically begging for his dick… and you loved it.

you’d deal with that fact later.

“so fuckin’ pretty, holy shit,” his hands roamed all over your body. he explored like he’d already been there millions of times—and maybe in his head, he had. his fingertips came down to play with the hem of your panties, “these are stayin’ on though.”

you rutted against him like a cat in heat. not even three minutes ago he didn’t know if he could touch you, but now? now he had more control over you than anyone ever had. just taking what was his. under any other circumstances he’d make this special—take you to the bedroom, spend time worshipping you, and your body, like you deserved, but he wasn’t himself right now. not with you pressed into him, straddling him like second nature, completely willing to do whatever he wanted.

this was an opportunity he couldn’t risk losing, so quick and sloppy would have to do… tonight.

he pulled your panties to the side, pumping his cock a few times before finally pushing himself into you. you fell down on his hips, almost accidentally taking all of him. he was big enough for it to burn, but you didn’t even care. you’d never felt so full in your life.

you could feel the way he shuttered against you, unable to control his movements like you had taken him over completely. his eyes fluttered shut even though he wanted nothing more than to see the look on your face right now.

“you good?,” he breathed out, silently asking if he could move yet.

“yeah– yeah… fuck ‘m so good,” that was all he needed. as much as he loved the sight of you on top of him, it would have to wait for another night because he was ready—ready to take what was his.

before you could think he’d flipped your back onto the couch, still nestled inside you like he was stuck to you. he wasted no time drilling into you again. you were caged to the couch, his arms trapping you like you’d run away if you could (you wouldn’t—never in a million years).

your head was spinning, he wasted hitting spots inside you you never knew existed. it was all too much… in the best possible way. “drew… oh my God– shit– you’re so fuckin’ deep,” your words were mumbled, and broken by your moans. you were basically sobbing beneath him, and the image only spurred him on more. he went faster, harder, deeper. you didn’t even think it was possible, but he wasted doing it. stars clouded your vision, your back arched so far off the couch you thought it might snap in half. his hands clamping against your sides, pushing you back down.

“aww, baby… don’t run from me now,” he leaned down, whispering—taunting—right in your ear. you had forgotten how to breathe at this point, completely consumed by him. you felt the coil in your stomach tighten—closer, closer—“be a good girl ‘n let me have my present.”

fucking hell.

it was impossible to stop the way your orgasm ripped through you, wrecking you from the inside out—wrecking you for anyone else. your moans made drew’s cock twitch inside you.

“do it,” you said breathlessly, a smug smile on your face. he couldn’t help the groan that slipped from his lips, stuttering inside of you like he was possessed.

“yeah? gonna let me fill you up?,” he cooed. it was almost humiliating—if it were anyone but him. he chuckled lowly, almost like he was mumbling to himself. “greedy little thing.”

“please… please drew– need it. so bad,” you weren’t sure how you were even getting the words out right now, but some part of you knew you needed it—needed him.

“fuck,” he breathed out before spilling into you. warmth flooded your cunt until it was dripping out of you. he crashed right beside you, the couch barely wide enough for your two sweaty bodies. your guys’ heavy breaths broke through the silence as you laid there, wondering what the fuck this meant.

“any chance you wanna give me an early christmas present too?,” he laughed, turning his head to face you, and you doing the same.

you smacked his chest with the back of your hand, but you couldn’t hide your smile.

that stupid grin took over his face, “is that a yes?”

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[naomi-nana]

✎ᝰ itsy bitsy spider . twisted wonderland

in which, you have a pet spider and you offered to put it on top of their hands. how would they react?

featuring : the overblot gang

cw : f!reader, leona's and jamil's are short, bad grammars, added little hcs for idia, and leona!!

a/n : hello, thank u anon for requesting this!! i had sm fun writing this request LMAO especially idia's and azul's(theirs are really long as u can see). i hope u'll enjoy reading this just as much as i enjoy writing this fic!!

RIDDLE ROSEHEARTS

when you invited him to come see your pets on the weekends, riddle didn't thought much of it. you always ramble about how cute your pets back at your dorm were, and how much you miss them whenever you're in class together. riddle thinks it's cute and great how responsible you are to your pets, and he wants to learn more about taking care of animals with you.

so imagine his reaction when he sees a spider cage on your nightstand.

"what in the sevens' name is that?! you're telling me, those 'cute, innocent,' pets you've been keeping in your dorm are spiders?!" he's startled and refuses to come closer to the cage. he would also pull out his phone to search if it's illegal to own a spider or not.

if you take out the spider and try to put it on his hands, chances are, the sentence 'off with your head!' will leave his mouth faster than the spider landing on the palm of his hands.

he was freaked out at first, but began to feel weirdly attached to the spider. it's just a small, harmless(no, who told u that) animal, right? and you're also following all the rules to take care of the spider.

he would often ask you how the spider is doing, and would make sure you're taking care of it well. would also ask, "i trust you've been feeding the little spiders properly?" every single time in the morning.

in conclusion: 8.5/10 reaction. he's scared, but he doesn't mind.

LEONA KINGSCHOLAR

doesn't freak out

if you ask him, "aren't you scared of them?", he would scoff and closes his eyes, seemingly deep in thought. then, after a few minutes, you realized he already dozed off. you then punch his stomach lovingly.

okay, he's awake now, and ready to hear you ramble about your spiders(begrudgingly). if you try to put them on the palm of his hands, he'll blink at the creature and then caress it slowly. he would later reveal that there are many spiders in the sunset savannah, and that him and his brother used to play with it when they were kids.

"they're a lot bigger and dangerous back at home," he says, putting the spider back in your hands. leona thinks that it's endearing how you can act so casual with an animal that many are afraid of. not like he's gonna admit that ever, though.

in conclusion: 3/10 reaction. he doesn't care.

AZUL ASHENGROTTO

are you perchance trying to kill him

he's NEVER seen that thing ever in his whole life. what is that? why does it have eight legs like him? is it fast? oh, god—it's jumping towards his face!

"name, i respect your wishes to take any animal under your wing regardless of their danger. but, could you please not bring that monster closer to me? ever?" he would then force you to sign a contract to put that spider at least ten meters away from him.

you just laugh, of course, brushing it off as you try to put the spider on the palm of his hands. "you—get it away from me, now!" he yells, sprinting away from you immediately while you chase him around with the spider.

after jade and floyd stops you from chasing azul around(they were bribed), azul finally calms down, glaring at the little spider in your hands.

when he realizes how pathetic he's currently acting, he would go on a rant about how octopuses are generally cautious and likes to observe things that are unfamiliar to them. he convinced no one.

as the two of you are busy discussing the fate of your innocent spider, behind you are two eels whispering near each other's ears. "jade~ we should buy a spider for azul next time, aha~" floyd grins, earning a chuckle from jade. "you're right, floyd. i'm sure it will be interesting to see, fufufu."

in conclusion: a restraining order/10 reaction. no explanation.

JAMIL VIPER

pray for yourself because either your spider is going to die today or jamil is the one who dies instead

"why would you bring that stuff here?! don't try to get it anywhere near me." the two of you now looks like you're playing tag in the kitchen(you're not to jamil. this is war.)

if you try to put it on his hands, get ready for you and your little companion to be smacked by a cooking spatula while he lets out an earsplitting scream. because why the hell would you do that? no, don't grin at him. stop it, don't approach him.

in the midst of war, kalim enters the kitchen and saw whatever the hell you guys did and decided to join because, "that looks fun!" jamil is now surrounded.

"for god's sake, just leave me alone!"

in conclusion: you're not friends with him anymore/10 reaction. you do feel bad for him, though.

VIL SCHOENHEIT

no

wouldn't let you get close to him with that spider. he's not that scared of it, he's just absolutely disgusted by that ... thing. he hates how squiggly and small they are. ugh, just thinking of it makes him shiver.

"get that bug out of my sight at once. do i have to tell you twice?" harsh. but once he learned that it's your pet, he began to somewhat accept that it's your decision to keep something as dangerous as that in your room.

if you try to put it on his palms, get ready for him to scream and lecture you for an hour straight about it. why would you put that thing on his skin? what if he starts to have an allergic reaction that he doesn't know about? what if it makes his skin burn, huh? huh?????

if you whip it up when you hang out with him, expect to see him move a little farther from you. just a little. he doesn't like how unpredictable that thing is. one blink and it could already be on his face.

"look, i don't mind that you like bugs. just ... don't put it anywhere near me." he would warm up to the spider thing eventually, and would sometimes asks if your little spider is still doing well to this day.

in conclusion: 8/10 reaction. he's just weirded out by it.

IDIA SHROUD

"WUT. you keep that thing as a pet? are you sick? that's literally the final boss of a dungeon but the smaller version. although it looks a little harmless, so i guess it's more of an elite enemy instead of a final boss? n-no, don't put it anywhere near me ... hey—HEY!"

he's freaked out and refuses to talk to you for a day. don't get him wrong, when he and ortho were kids, their parents used to give them a spider as a gift. although ortho was mostly the one who took care of it.

it's just that, three days after that, the spider crawls out of its cage when the two were asleep. and when idia woke up, it was on his face. so he's understandably pretty traumatized about it, lol.

if you try to put your little friend on the palm of his hands, his soul will leave his body approximately 0.354 seconds before you even move your hands towards his.

after a few minutes of sitting in silence while staring blankly at your spider, idia strangely feels as if the spider is literally him. it's small, and it immediately walks back when he gets a little closer to you.

has he found yet another animal to relate to?

expect him to start talking to the spider when you're not around. "little spider, you're exhausted to be around other people, too? wow. we're so similar it's almost insane. we're like, those stereotypical twins in every single video game ever." (jade and floyd claims to feel their ears getting hotter for some reason)

in conclusion: 10/10 reaction. it's funny to see him talk to animals.

MALLEUS DRACONIA

he's amused at how your eyes seem to light up the moment he accepted your offer of putting your companion on his hands. he thinks the little spider is intriguing, and he wants to know more about it.

he would ask you plenty of questions about spiders. "what does it eat? is it a carnivore? or does it prefer vegetables instead? hmm, bugs are such curious creature. tell me more about it, child of man."

he's really happy that not only does he get to share about gargoyles with you on your night strolls, he also gets to listen to you ramble about your pet.

expect him to show up with foods, cage, and a literal terrarium for your spider the next day. when you say that he doesn't need to buy those things for your pet, he's confused and a little disappointed that he doesn't get to co-parent with you.

although later on you tell him that you were just surpised. you don't mind if he wants to become the second parent of ur spider!!!

"your little companion is very interesting. though i'm much more curious as to what compels you to keep it as a pet. i would love to hear more about it. so, will you come over to diasomnia with your spider next time? i shall wait for your arrival."

in conclusion: marry me/10 reaction. not only is he supportive, he's also as curious as you are with the spider!!

naomi-nana. do NOT repost, do not use (with or without permission), do not recommend or talk about my works outside of tumblr.

[hitomisuzuya]

yandere!hybrid scaramouche x fem!reader. smut. somnophilia. drugging. biting/marking. masturbation/cumming on. desperate scaramouche. this is kinda dark.

here ya go, guys. there will be another part to this. i know i repeat somnophilia here, but this is for build up.

scaramouche is getting desperate. and things have just gotten a whole lot worse for him. times two. yesterday, he started to smell that you are ovulating. it didn't help that always smell so fucking good all the time. now it suffocates him twice as much.

and on top of that, you are going out tomorrow night on a dinner meeting. a dinner meeting that includes two other men coworkers coming. he nearly pitched a fit about it until you told him a pay raise is being discussed.

god, he couldn't fucking stand the thought of you being near two other men. near two other men fucking ovulating. the thought made his blood boil. he even casually mentioned how stupid it for someone to date their coworkers when it was a topic on tv last night, saying it just to bait you into saying whether you would date a coworker or not.

when you said you wouldn't, that wasn't a can of worms that you would ever want, it didn't make him feel better.

scaramouche has to fucking do something before you went to your important dinner meeting tomorrow night. something, anything to mark his territory. even though you have no idea how he felt about you, you are his mate, damn it!

they have to know you belong to him.

you wanted to homemake him something for dinner since you felt bad about leaving him alone. when you went to the store, scaramouche started preparing things. it was easy for him to put a hat over his ears and go into town.

he headed to a more seedier part of town, and it didn't take him long to find someone who could sell him a sedative. now all he has to do is offer to make you a drink, a peace offering for being such a high strung asshole lately. you even told him multiple he is good at mixing drinks for you.

unseen by you, he would slip the sedative into your drink. the fruity tasting alcohol would easily cover up any taste the sedative would leave.

once he handed you your drink, he would lazily lounge around on the couch, being unsuspecting until you felt drowsy enough to go upstairs to bed. he could hear the slur in your words, see the choppiness in your steps as you went upstairs. the sedative is doing its job. you were going to sleep nice and deep all night.

the two hours he waited before going upstairs felt like brutal torture. he could smell you all the way downstairs.

scaramouche has gotten quite good at easing your bedroom door open and closed without a sound. now in his human form, he crawls on your bed. he smirks seeing everything has fallen so easily into place.

all of it, including anticipating that the mix of alcohol and the sedative would make you feel too warm. he knows you hate being too warm. and here you are, sleeping topless and in panties he wants to shred off of you to get at your sweet smelling cunt.

"i hate what you have done to me, you know," he whispers, leaning down to inhale the scent of your soft, pullable looking hair. hair he would like to grab a handful and pull your head back, biting into your neck while he fucks your brains out from behind.

"i am not sorry this time, this is necessary," he moves down to your neck, sighing. "it should be considered a crime for how long i have left this delicate skin unmarked," you are going to look twice as beautiful with his bruise of ownership adoring your neck.

drawing in a shaky breath, your scent overwhelms him as he leans down. his tongue snakes out to lick your pulse, testing how deep you really are sleeping. licking his lips, he scoops a fold of skin into his mouth when you didn't even stir.

he wonders if he can make you squirm, and soak your panties while you slept. his mouth sucks on the fold of skin, that one thought racing in his mind. swallowing a groan, he reaches down between your legs, brushing his knuckles across your clit outside your panties.

after a few long moments, he abruptly lifts his head. he has to stop himself before he bit too terribly hard. his eyes drift down to your breasts. "it's going to be a pleasure to watch your pretty tits bounce while i fuck you," his cock pulses harder swirling his tongue around and around your nipple.

he groans feeling your panties start to dampen under his knuckle. the primal urge to make you wetter consumes him as your scent overwhelms him more. he scoops your nipple into his mouth to suck on.

he is more than happy to indulge you in playing with your nipples.

his tongue tingles as your nipple hardens. "fuck, i love that i am making you wet," he whispers shakily, panting a little as he slowly swirls the tip of his tongue around your nipple.

scaramouche knows he is indulging himself way too much. he is just one step short of pushing your panties aside and just burying his cock inside you right then. your collarbone catches his eye.

"just in case," he murmurs, moving his head up to your collarbone, "they have to know you belong to me. i told you, i am a pretty bad guy," your skin tastes way too good to him, and it makes him suddenly wonder if your blood would taste just as sweet.

"fuck, i can't take it anymore," he groans quietly as he bites down on your collarbone. reluctantly taking his hand off your panties, he hastily reaches down to unbutton his jeans. it's such a relief for him to release his unbearably hard cock from its confines.

his mouth sucks and bites another bruise to blossom your skin, his hand desperately fisting his cock as it throbs. "let me breed you, please," he swallows a quiet, frustrated whimper, "i don't know how much longer i can take this shit."

he releases your skin before he bites too hard, letting out a soft moan as cum spurts onto your chest. he fists his cock until it's empty, admiring the developing bruises.

once he put his cock back in his pants, he grabs a towel from the bathroom and cleans you up before curling up to sleep on your chest in his cat form.

[sweetshuga]

𝑭𝒂𝒏𝒕𝒂𝒔𝒊𝒆𝒔 ✧ 𝑴.𝑺

«𝒅𝒆𝒅𝒊𝒄𝒂𝒕𝒆𝒅 𝒕𝒐 𝒈𝒆𝒏»

𝒃𝒔𝒇.ᐟ𝒎𝒂𝒕𝒕! Trying to act like he didn’t just fantasize about you and got rock hard in the process.

𝒊𝒅𝒆𝒂. «𝑰𝒏𝒔𝒑𝒊𝒓𝒆𝒅» «𝑪𝒉𝒓𝒊𝒔 𝑽𝒆𝒓𝒔𝒊𝒐𝒏» «𝑺𝒆𝒄𝒐𝒏𝒅 𝑷𝒂𝒓𝒕»

𝒘𝒄. 𝟏 𝒌

𝒂𝒏. Alr chat, the long awaited Matt version of Fantasies is finally here!! It took me this long to write it because I didn’t have any motivation to finish it but here it is finally!!

𝒑𝒔𝒂. English is not my first language!

You sat in the passenger seat, fingers idly playing with the hem of your t-shirt as you talked to Nick and Chris—who both sat in the backseat.

The reason you were sitting in the passenger seat instead of Chris was simple; Matt had enough of Chris interrupting him every few seconds and burping in his face like a damned toddler. And so, you had no choice but to switch seats before Matt got seriously pissed off.

Matt was quietly scrolling through his phone beside you, not paying much attention to the conversation between you and the other two. It was clear that he was sulking, his earlier irritation still very much there.

You decided to leave him be, not wanting to make it worse.

As you got more invested in the conversation, you didn’t notice Matt slowly looking up from his phone, his gaze lingering on your lips as they moved.

He felt his stomach flip when your eyes suddenly locked onto his, your head tilting slightly as you looked at him with a confused smile, a small chuckle escaping you—which went straight to his dick.

He wondered how you sound like when you cu—

"You’re staring at me," you observed, your voice cutting through his daydream. "Is there something on my face?"

Matt quickly shook his head, mumbling out a quiet "nothing" before he looked back at his brothers, suddenly so interested in whatever Chris was rambling about.

Thankfully, you didn’t question further and simply shrugged it off, going back to talking to Nick and Chris.

𝟓 𝒎𝒊𝒏𝒖𝒕𝒆𝒔 𝒍𝒂𝒕𝒆𝒓

The minutes passed by agonizingly slowly, almost like it was taunting Matt, testing his self-control—or so it felt like to him.

It had only been 5 minutes or so since he had started to imagine things he definitely shouldn’t be imagining about his best friend.

Matt could feel his pants tightening around the crotch and he desperately tried to think of something- anything to get rid of his erection.

But nothing worked.

𝟏𝟎 𝒎𝒊𝒏𝒖𝒕𝒆𝒔 𝒍𝒂𝒕𝒆𝒓

Nick and Chris went to the store to get some snacks, but you decided to stay in the car with Matt.

You were talking about everything and nothing at the same time, your hands flailing slightly as you tried to emphasize your words with it. Matt simply listened, nodding along and humming mhm’s.

You didn’t notice the way his gaze kept drifting down to your lips before snapping up to your eyes—and repeating. Before he could stop himself, he had already let his gaze travel further down your body.

God, he would do anything to just bury his face in those tits—

"Matt? You listening?" You cocked an eyebrow when you saw the way he flinched, blinking rapidly as if he was caught doing something he shouldn’t have.

"Y-yeah, I am." He mumbled, his words a little too breathless and a little too nervous, but you didn’t seem to catch onto anything yet.

"Mhmm," you hummed, a bit puzzled, but didn’t press on further as you picked up from where you left, rambling on about some crazy experience you had while eating out with Nick.

Matt’s breathing grew heavier with each passing minute, his chest heaving slowly as he took in deep breaths to calm himself down. He could feel his dick throbbing at the sight of your tits pressing together when you crossed your arms.

His attempt to calm his racing heart – and boner – was futile, but thankfully he was wearing a hoodie and quickly took it off and bunched it on his lap, keeping eye contact with you to make sure you didn’t see anything you shouldn’t have.

It would’ve been alright if he was at home, he could just excuse himself and go handle his "problem", but he was in a random parking lot with just you in the car.

One minute felt like a fucking hour. He could almost feel his cock pulsing in rhythm with his heartbeat, so hard that it was hurting just from pressing against his boxers and jeans.

You didn’t really pay attention to how much Matt shifted in his seat; how many times he discreetly pulled uncomfortably at the waistband of his jeans; or how he tried to adjust himself without you seeing it.

And you definitely did not pay attention to how shaky and deep his breaths had become. You didn’t know how much he wished he could just fulfill his fantasies right here in the car.

It was pure torture to have the reason for his hard-on sitting right in front of him. He would probably be considered down bad but everything you did only made him harder and he could feel his precum slightly dampening up his boxers.

Lucky for him, Nick and Chris arrived before he lost his mind, handing you the snacks and drinks you and Matt wanted from the store—already eating the things they bought for themselves.

Matt was ecstatic. And not because he was happy that he got snacks—well, he was, but mostly because he can finally take care of his throbbing boner.

He could finally go home before he got blue balls.

𝟓 𝒎𝒊𝒏𝒖𝒕𝒆𝒔 𝒍𝒂𝒕𝒆𝒓

A shaky sigh of relief left Matt as he put the car in drive, wanting nothing more than to just go home and jerk off.

But his relief was short lived when he glanced at you subconsciously, only to see your eyes locked onto the hard-on straining against the crotch of his jeans. Which was now very much visible thanks to his hoodie having slipped down slightly due to his legs moving to hit the accelerator and brake.

You quickly averted your gaze when you saw that Matt caught you looking, and you turned your head to the side, pretending to look out the window but the flush creeping up your neck and enveloping the tips of your ears gave way to everything you wanted to hide.

Matt’s face slowly flushed into a soft pink hue as he kept his gaze on the road ahead. He was in disbelief that his best friend just saw his raging hard-on.

He wished he could get home faster but he was still stuck driving the car, nowhere to hide from the overwhelming embarrassment.

Just his damn luck.

𓆩♡𓆪

© 𝒔𝒘𝒆𝒆𝒕𝒔𝒉𝒖𝒈𝒂

[dreamersparacosm]

jeon jungkook - off the record (part four)

part four ; prom: white house edition

warnings ; alcohol consumption, oc spiraling hard af, emma and paul ?? deserves its own warning

prompt ; in which you’re paired with your insufferably charming ex-academic rival turned coworker to cover a congressional scandal, and suddenly, professional boundaries becomes the only thing holding you two apart.

note ; *comes out from behind corner, tucks hair shyly behind ear* heyyy.. how yall doing..?

pls no tomatoes thrown at me for how long this part took. mommy was unfortunately quite busy AND this story is taking a complete left turn in my brain. let’s unpack that real quick, shall we? initially, this story was supposed to be a clean ten part fic. however i got inspired by one of abby jiminez’s books and could not restrain myself from exploring a longer slowburn with these two because it fits them SO WELL. so, moral of the story, is you’ll be seeing more of them. how many parts you ask? idk, ask someone else fr

anyways! onto this part — there’s a lot going on here. this whole White House gala is just jungkook circling oc like a hawk and her slowly, sloooooowly softening at the edges (but not too damn much). forgive my girl for not immediately succumbing to him, she grew up in a poor family and doesn’t like to feel the weight of the world on her shoulders (lol see what i did there)

please enjoy to your heart’s content, and read slow (like it’s legit 12k words. what you in a rush for??!!) ALSOOOOSDKD MAJORRRRR MF shoutout to @httpsincity, one of my cutie little beta readers who listened to me spiral about being true to their characters for like an hour and struggled to use box.com😔

playlist here

series masterlist here

The red dress was a mistake of catastrophic proportions. 

You’ll be paying the consequences of it until you’re 85 and muttering about shapewear in a retirement home with subpar pudding. 

It pinches at your hips, digs into your ribs, and you’re walking like someone has a gun to your back. You’re also sweating in places you didn’t know you had sweat glands.

You had pitched every excuse to not attend the gala known to man for the past week. Claimed to have contracted a rare airborne virus (possibly made up), hinted at a tragic scalp burn from a curling iron incident, even floated the idea that you were morally opposed to large public gatherings.

Jenna wouldn’t budge. 

“It’s good optics,” she called it, waving you off like an uncooperative wedding planner. 

You could give two shits about optics. What you do care about is being home in your sweats with a charcoal face mask on and Season 4 of Suits playing in the background while you judge Meghan Markle’s legal ethics. 

Now, you’re trapped beneath an arch of peonies and imported orchids that you're quite certain cost more than your entire salary. You’re lingering — loitering, really — by this floral monstrosity, heels already in mortal pain.

To add insult to injury, three interns glide past you, high on sparkling wine and great expectations. “Did you see the dessert table?” one of them squeals. “It’s shaped like the White House!”

Avoid the dessert table at all costs. Got it. 

You stare after them, slack-jawed. There is simply no way on God’s green earth these interns are going to have a better time at this event than you. You skipped Suits for this.

Pushing off the floral arch, you roll your shoulders back, and decide that if you are stuck here, if you are doing this, then so be it. 

If this is the hand life is going to deal you, then you might as well not bite it off. 

Tentatively, you step into the Hay Adams ballroom like you’re being lowered into a trap. The lighting is spilling warm buttery hues across the room, strategically placed crystal fixtures drawing people under them like moths to a flame. The marble floors are polished so well that when you look down, you can make out every pore on your face. 

There are waiters floating through the crowd, balancing trays of drinks you don’t recognize and appetizers that look too sophisticated to actually enjoy. Some band is playing near the front, but it’s jazz so it mostly just sounds like everyone forgot the melody at the same time. 

You pause a few steps in, eyes scanning the room, instinct already kicking in: assess, categorize, survive. There’s a burn in your chest, a familiar swoop of anxiety that overtakes you. 

You’re mid-gaze into the ballroom, performing what can only be described as an elite-level social avoidance, when something — or rather, someone incredibly clumsy — collides with your left side. 

“Where the fuck have you been?!” Emma’s voice accuses, latching onto your arm desperately, like she’s afraid you might jump out the nearest window. There’s still enough time that you might. 

She smells like a perfume counter had a passionate affair with the open bar. Her lipstick has migrated slightly north of her mouth, body vibrating with the energy of someone who discovered the champagne fountain approximately four glasses ago. 

“Good lord,” you mutter, finding your balance both literally and metaphorically. “How long have you been terrorizing this event?” 

“Unclear,” she grins stupidly. “Time is fake. You look hot by the way.”

You blink at her, absorbing her physical assessment of your appearance. You can't say hot is what you were going for. Scary, maybe. Not hot. “I’ll take it.”

“You absolutely should,” she insists, squeezing your arm. “Wait, did you just get here?”

The way Emma’s looking at you tells you that you probably need to lie, need to tell her you got here precisely an hour ago and she just somehow missed you. However after years of working together, there’s nothing that gets past her. You whine, shoulders slumping, “C’mon, you know I hate this stupid fucking gala.”

She rolls her eyes, yanking your arm as if she’s dragging her reluctant cat to the vet. “You say that every year and still end up at the after afterparty at someone’s penthouse.” 

Okay, it was one time. You were 24, way too drunk off Moet & Chandon, and the man you were with smelled like a mix of bergamot and cedar. It was nice. Sue you. 

Your heels betray you on the slippery marble tiles, sending you forward. “Emma, I really don’t—”

“No, absolutely not,” she declares, voice dropping to a dangerous register that means she’s made an executive decision about your night. “The ‘silently judging everyone’ portion of tonight’s programming has been canceled. You’re not allowed to roll your eyes in corners until you get drunk enough to start socializing.”

You attempt to come up with a plausible defense, but she’s already steering you past the dessert table, which has become a feeding ground for the interns. One of them clutches what appears to be the Capitol dome covered in chocolate ganache. Your soul recoils instinctively. 

“Have you tried the constitution-shaped cookies?” another squeals, eyes wide with wonder. 

“Who the fuck let them in here?” you whisper mostly to yourself with narrowed eyes. 

Emma catches it, laugh bellowing off the walls and above all the chatter as she guides you around the ballroom like her emotional support pet. “Be nice. They still believe journalism might save democracy. It’s adorable.”

You scan the room, heels skidding with each step Emma drags you. There’s the reporter who “borrowed” your framework for his feature, the communications director who used to hook up with Jenna before she remembered she had a Hinge+ subscription, and that insufferable New York Times correspondent who once corrected your pronunciation of ‘bipartisan’ so smugly you considered a career change. 

Several other journalists you recognize make eye contact across the room. Paul also looks over at you, gives you The Nod, a universal signal that communicates professional acknowledgement but could also mean you look hot (based on Emma’s drunken opinion). 

Emma navigates you closer to the bar, halting right in front of two barstools, “Okay. You need alcohol. I need you to have fun. Both seem fairly easy to accomplish with the help of the other.”

“Just so you’re aware, I despise everything about this,” you sneer, fixing the strap on your shoulder that threatens to fall loose. 

“You say that like it’s breaking news.” 

It isn’t. You hate the lighting designed to flatter the undeserving, the artificial laughter, the way everyone pretends to be off-duty while mentally writing Monday’s opinion piece. You hate the performative glamor and calculated smiles and the overwhelming pressure to network when all you want is to dematerialize through the nearest exit. 

Emma’s already ordering you a vodka soda, draped halfway across the bartop, projecting her voice as if she’s sober enough to make decisions for either of you. You catch her saying “absolutely no lime—I can handle my liquor” and you log out of that conversation so fast before you can do something stupid like get involved. Emma gets hot-headed when she drinks, and although it’s not often, you’ve learned to turn a blind eye when the inevitable does occur. 

You let your gaze perform a sweep of the room, mentally cataloguing emergency exits for once it hits midnight and all hell starts breaking loose. 

Paul, three people over. Awkward eye contact, check. You both give the other a tight-lipped smile and move onto the next person in your line of sight. 

Gavin’s talking to his wife enthusiastically, gesturing in a way that suggests he’s either four rum and cokes deep or recounting a professional tale where he singlehandledly saved journalism. His narrative reaches a dramatic pause as he catches your eye mid-sentence. Your internal alarm system flashes a bright, unambiguous absolutely not across your forehead. 

Your eyes glide past the dessert station, beyond another towering floral display that looks like the florist had a meltdown, and land on Sana in the far corner. She’s laughing at something, body angled like she’s engaged fully in what the other person is saying. There’s a soft radiance about her tonight — not that she hasn’t always been stunning — and it reminds you that she’s one of those people who’s universally beloved with no effort. Hell, even you love her when she gives into your interrogations and spills Fox’s insight into certain current events. You take an imaginary sip from your yet-to-materialize drink and mentally file away a good for her with approximately sixty percent sincerity. 

But then, a few strategic inches to her left, you discover exactly who Sana is honed in on.

Jungkook. 

He’s standing with one hand in his pocket, head tipped towards Sana, listening intently. His shirt is white, crisp and fitted, sleeves rolled up to just below the elbow. Enough that you can see his tattoo sleeve — bold that he would do that at White House prom but, whatever, to each their own. 

His tie is loosened, a glass in his left hand, half-full with something dark and his watch catches the light when you look at it. 

Which is not to say you’re looking. 

You’re scanning. It’s a sweep. An environmental awareness thing. Nothing more. 

Except then he nods at something Sana says and mid-turn, his eyes snag on you. 

Those dark brown eyes flick up, mouth relaxing. His brows twitch upward slightly. You nearly step backwards from the intensity. 

His gaze travels downward. A flicker of assessment so understated yet brazenly deliberate that your skin erupts into goosebumps under the fabric of your dress. Suddenly, it feels like your body is operating at a temperature that violates several laws of thermodynamics. There’s also a weird pit in your stomach that feels like you just went barreling 100 miles per hour down a rollercoaster. 

His eyes snap up to meet yours again. Your skin prickles with a wave of awareness that starts at your nape and cascades downward. 

If you’re not totally blind, you’re about ninety percent sure Jungkook just checked you out head to toe. 

Are you drunk? Did Emma somehow magically slip you a roofie when she stumbled across the ballroom with you?

Jungkook, the same dude who got caught re-watching your press briefing, the one who’s been purposefully making your life hell since you were a freshman in college. 

Your breath catches somewhere between your lungs and your throat, suspended in the no-man’s-land of Things We Will Not Be Discussing. Those eyes of yours are getting you into more trouble than you’d like. You swivel your body away from him, redirect your attention back to Emma, who’s now negotiating with the poor bartender like she’s brokering Middle East peace talks, all for a drink you're not entirely sure you want anymore. 

The last real interaction you had with Jungkook was Tuesday, when you discovered him perched on the steps of the west wing, watching your press pool briefing like he was some championship chess player contemplating their opponent’s queen.

Monroe came down with some vague “flu” that’s kept her out of meetings, which — to your luck — means you haven’t had a reason to step into the same room as him since then. Honestly it’s been a little peaceful. No hallway stalking, no press conferences, no internal panic about whether he’s going to pull the rug out from under you with another cheating tactic. 

But still, seeing him here now, in that shirt, sends a weird ripple through your body. Like vertigo. Like nausea. Like—

No. It’s clearly too hot in here. It’s just the combination of societal oppression and your body’s sudden, urgent desire to evacuate itself from your consciousness.

Emma thrusts an overflowing vodka soda into your hand like she just negotiated a hostage release. “It’s a little strong. I tipped extra in cash so he gave me a pour that’s probably illegal in three states.”

You nod numbly. Sip, And then cough because, yeah, it’s mostly vodka. Apparently, Emma’s definition of “a little strong” means “practically moonshine with ice.” 

You take another substantial sip — purely medicinal — and direct a silent, desperate prayer to whatever deity oversees your life that Jungkook has found something more interesting to look at than you. Sana, please, keep that man engaged. 

“So, hear me out.”

Yes, Emma, that is exactly what you’ll do to keep your brain occupied from Sana and those tattoos and the glance that got thrown your way that feels dirty. Borderline explicit. 

“Hm?” you hum, taking another massive gulp of your vodka with a splash of soda, trying to calm the storm of unwelcome feelings swirling inside you. 

She leans against the bar, holding her own martini glass hostage. “We should go talk to those guys over there.”

You squint at the ominous tall figures her nail is pointing towards. She can’t possibly be serious. “What guys?!”

“Those ones!” She tilts her head so aggressively it’s a miracle her earrings don’t fall off. “You know, Paul, his friend in the blue tie.. He’s like, kinda hot.” 

You guess, but refusal is your middle name right now. 

“I do not want to do that.” You deadpan at her, bewildered, sharing a look reserved for work best friends who have clearly crossed several lines of judgement. 

Emma’s basically vibrating with excitement as she studies the two men like she’s just discovered an all-you-can-eat buffet after a week of intermittent fasting. When you follow her gaze, sizing up the two men, you realize… you don’t really know that dude in the blue tie. Never seen him a day in your life. And you happen to know every correspondent that walks through those doors. 

The first thing you notice is his height — six feet tall at the minimum. He has shaggy brown hair, clearly possessing fortunate genetics, and has a wholesome, eager energy about him that just screams “golden retriever.” 

You could probably eat him for dinner.

Emma whines beside you, stomping her heel down, “Come on, what happened to the old [Y/N]? Remember… a few months ago… we went to that bar on 9th street…”

Now that she mentions it, you’ve been actively trying to scrub that entire night from your hard drive until Rosalie brought it up a few days ago.  

“Some memories are meant to remain buried in the graveyard of my brain, Em,” You cut her off, desperately trying to prevent your most embarrassing memories from being aired in public. 

“Just a little fun?” she nudges your shoulder. 

“I don’t—”

But Emma, the hot-headed drunk she is, is already moving, your hand gripped tightly in hers. Your vodka soda tilts over the edge, spilling a little on the marble floor. There’s something admirable about her complete disregard for social conventions, the way she approaches interpersonal chaos. 

She weaves you through the crowd, mumbling ‘excuse me’s’ and ‘pardon me’ at a rate that earns her a few crass side-glances. You find yourself apologizing for each shoe she accidentally steps on.

You’re trying — genuinely attempting to embrace the evening, live in the moment, take a page out of Emma’s book. But your dress has developed its own mind tonight, the air feels thick enough to bottle, and every time you perform a quick pass over the room, you feel like your heart is going to leap out of your chest like a caterpillar escaping its cocoon. 

The entire experience feels like standing in a glittery fishbowl where everyone’s pretending the water isn’t slowly reaching to a boil. 

You begin after another few steps in what feels like the wrong direction. “You know, I really think—”

She barely looks at you over her shoulder, “Respectfully, shut up.”

Yes, sergeant Emma. 

You attempt to reorganize your posture, rolling your shoulders back in a futile effort to project confidence. Trying to breathe without appearing like you’re still actively monitoring those emergency exits (although you did spot one in the far right corner). Trying not to look like you’re not cataloguing every face in the room while Emma drags you through the depths of this crowd, as if it’s some march to your final breaths. 

All things considered, you’re not looking for anyone specific. 

Obviously. 

That would be ridiculous. 

Except… your gaze does go rogue again.

Again, those basic survival instincts are just kicking in. But there is this inexplicable gravitational pull, this soft magnetic curiosity that keeps dragging your attention, past the florals, past the swarm of interns at the dessert table. 

Before you can even think of moving your eyes to that far corner again, you take a sip of your drink forcibly. The vodka burns a straight line down your throat. 

Emma parks you in front of Paul and his blue-tied buddy, releasing your hand almost immediately upon contact. “Heyyyy, Paul. How’s the night treating you?”

Her voice is sickly sweet, completely and totally unlike the Emma you see five days a week in the CNN press room. 

He blinks heavily. “Pretty good, Emma. You doing alright?”

It’s endearing how he’s trying to act all cool, calm and collected while clearly having no idea what to do with Emma’s sudden attention. By all means, he really wouldn’t know how to handle all of her. Her long brown hair cascades down her back, tan skin glowing under the golden tone of the chandelier, eyes piercing into his own. 

You think he might cream his pants. 

“Oh, I’m fantastic,” Emma purrs, leaning in intimately. You want to disappear into the nearest floral arrangement. “You know, I was just thinking — we don’t really talk much around the office.”

Paul blinks again, looking genuinely confused. “Yeah, well, you did say I was weird for listening to NPR during my lunch break.”

“NPR, sh-menPR,” Emma waves dismissively, as if yesterday’s mockery was merely a charming misunderstanding rather than a full-on ten minute roast session about his “geriatric taste in current events.”

Somewhere in the distance, a male voice bellows with laughter. You wish there was something to laugh about at this exact moment.

You’re having trouble processing the fact that Emma — who literally just yesterday compared Paul’s open-toed office shoes to a cry for help in leather — is now batting her eyelashes like he’s the last available bachelor in the D.C area. 

Meanwhile, Blue Tie Guy’s gaze has been ping-ponging back and forth between you and Emma. You can practically see the calculations happening behind his golden retriever eyes: Who’s her friend? What’s the dynamic here? Are we running a two-man?

No, Blue Tie Guy. You are not running a two-man. 

You remain silent while Emma blabbers on, mouth super-glued to your vodka soda, which has become alarmingly depleted despite your memory of only taking a few sips. 

Blue Tie shifts his weight, obviously debating whether to introduce himself to you or stare awkwardly into the distance. You take the final sip of your drink and pray that Emma’s sudden lust for Paul doesn’t require you to participate in whatever bizarre social experiment she’s conducting. 

Paul’s now doing that thing that guys do where he tries to lean casually against something that isn’t there, catching himself before gravity betrays him. “So, uh, what changed your mind? About the whole… talking thing?” 

He’s helpless. 

Emma flashes a smile that could probably power a small grid. “Maybe I’m just full of surprises tonight.”

“Right…” Paul nods. He spares a passing glance at you, an afterthought to his attraction to Emma. “Surprises. That’s… good?”

You’re witnessing what can only be described as the world’s most awkward mating dance… if mating dances involved this much uncertainty about whether anyone wants to be actually participating. 

Emma’s radiating pheromones. “I like your tie.” She reaches out, feeling the fabric beneath her fingers.

Paul’s entire face turns an embarrassing shade of red. “Thanks. It’s, uh… my grandpa’s.”

“Vintage,” Emma hums solemnly. “Very nice.”

You’re so absorbed in this exchange that you almost miss Blue Tie Guy’s approach, an expression of friendliness on his face that means he’s been psyching himself up for this interaction for the past five minutes you’ve stood there. 

Why the fuck did you wear this red dress again?

“I’m Steve,” he says, extending his hand.

You accept his handshake against your better judgment. This wasn’t exactly penciled into tonight’s agenda, which had primarily consisted of avoid making eye contact with anyone who might expect conversation.

“[Y/N],” you respond, and Steve grins, teeth on full display. He definitely had braces in middle school. Professional teeth whitening too. 

Theoretically, he seems charming. Steve (Rest in Peace, Blue Tie Guy) is objectively attractive. He definitely photographs well at family events. 

But the problem is your brain has apparently decided that a pleasant conversation with an attractive stranger falls somewhere below a voluntary root canal on a list of things you want to do tonight. 

“So what do you do for work?” 

Oh sweet, sweet Steve. 

Any man who’s gotten laid before knows no woman wants to talk about work. They want to talk about anything but deadlines, their coworkers, and their boss. 

“Correspondent.” 

That’ll be all for tonight, folks. 

It’s pretty clear he’s Paul’s plus-one, and while you also were afforded the luxury of bringing one, you didn’t really have anyone. Rosalie left mid-week on another voyage with her Daddy, and you were honestly still a little weird with her after your last conversation. 

“Oh, cool. I work in private equity not too far from here.” He tilts his body into you, body language sending you all the signals. Steve puffs out his chest a little, like that’s supposed to have you begging him to bend you over the dessert table. 

“That’s nice,” you tightly smile. “How long you been in D.C?” 

And then your mind drifts off to your cozy little apartment. He’s definitely making sounds, mouth moving with hand gestures involved but you’ve completely dissociated into the land of face masks and Netflix.  

You catch fragments of it: best opportunities in private equity are where the politicians are, passionate about bridging the gap between financial institutions and government (yawn), all the ex-New Yorkers are moving out here (fake news).

You nod politely, ignoring how barren your glass seems now that you’re talking to someone who isn’t Emma. 

“I just think your job is really cool, like, how politics is evolving. Like the digital landscape is changing everything, you know?” 

He has the energy of a paper towel. Like the inside of a dentist’s office. Your brain has started playing elevator music. 

He smiles, pleased with himself as if he thinks he just said something incredibly profound. 

Glancing down at your glass, you stare at the melting ice. Still empty. Fantastic. “Yeah, totally.”

“Paul said you work with him at CNN?” Steve’s eyes light up. 

You shake your head agreeably. You don’t really know when they exchanged information about you but you don’t really want to ask. 

“That’s so cool,” he rushes to say, “I was actually talking to someone at Politico the other day about all this. It’s just like.. your work is so important.”

Damn you, Jenna. This is exactly what you had nightmares about. 

If you’re running right on schedule, the Reuters editor should be appearing at any minute now to perform a drunken rendition of WAP, exclusively singing Cardi B’s verse. 

You open your mouth to say something bitter but close it again. You’re almost certain he’s trying to sleep with you, which is fine, you guess, but you really just want to go home at an acceptable hour. 

You offer a polite smile and nod again, and that encourages him to continue. You are now being held hostage by a man with the least amount of edge on this forsaken planet. 

“Paul says you’re a killer in press briefings,” he lowers his voice, leaning in. “I’d love to see that sometime.”

“It’s… all on YouTube.”

This topic should be completely irrelevant to you. Who cares? Every press briefing has been filmed since the dawn of time. 

And yet, a flash of a distant memory you tried to bury wanders to the forefront of your brain — Jungkook, planted on those West Wing steps, with a notebook splayed open, laptop playing your section of a press briefing. 

The memory crawls up your spine, leaving behind a shiver that you immediately blame on the air conditioning. 

“Right,” his cheeks flush a little. “No, yeah. I meant like.. In person.”

Please, Steve. We don’t have to do this. 

“Hm,” you utter passively. “Maybe at the next briefing.”

Steve chuckles like you’ve made a joke, even though you absolutely have not. “That’d be so fun,” he says as if you just invited him to Disneyworld. “Do you get called on, or is it random?”

“It’s not a raffle.” 

“Oh, obviously, I didn’t mean it like that,” he laughs nervously, rubbing the back of his neck. “I just meant it’d be cool to see you in action. I bet it’s intense.” 

It is. It’s cutthroat. You argue with men on the daily, fight to get your question in. But right now, none of those words are making it past the dull throb in your temple or the vodka-less self-awareness happening inside your head. 

You glance down at your cup. It is, without a question, empty. A ghost of ice. 

“Yeah, definitely that.”

Steve leans in, undeterred. “You ever get nervous?”

Is he really flirting via patronization?

You flash a tight smile. “Not really.”

He laughs loudly at that, beaming at you like he just successfully completed a meet-cute you’ll be telling your kids about. 

It’s obvious to you he’s waiting for something. For what, you don’t know. More insight into the wonderful world of journalism? A Linkedin connection? You’re not sure, and you also don’t want to find out. 

“Excuse me,” you say as nicely as you can manage. Most women have gathered this skill by the age of five; learning how to exit conversations with just the bat of their eyelashes to avoid harsh confrontation. “Gonna go grab a refill.”

You wave your empty cup in front of him, and there’s a gleam in his eyes that suggests he’ll try and follow you to the bar, use this as some kind of excuse to get you nice and drunk. 

But you’re turning around quicker than he can move, and all you hear behind you is “Cool! I’ll be here!”

Of course you will Steve. 

You glance over your shoulder once you’re a safe distance away, ensuring Emma hasn’t been abducted or listening to NPR with Paul. But nope — there she is, giggling with him like they’ve known each other since birth. Her hand is resting on his bicep, and he looks like he might explode if she doesn't remove it soon. 

This night is absolutely fucking bonkers. 

A red dress is getting you in the worst situations, your coworker is flirting with a man she’s spent years publicly ridiculing, and somewhere in the midst of it all, you feel completely out of place. 

You slam your elbows onto the mahogany and slightly damp surface of the bartop, chin dropping into your palms, social battery exploding in a shower of sparks. 

“Vodka soda, please,” you tell the bartender the second you make eye contact with him. “And a shot. Dealer’s choice. Surprise me.”

You’re feeling dangerously open to possibilities. 

The bartender raises an eyebrow but nods. You don’t particularly care if he serves you tequila or rum or battery acid, but at this point, if it burns going down, it’s doing exactly what you need it to do. 

You let out a deep exhale through your nose. You’re fairly certain you came here with some kind of plan — something involving networking, the word ‘optics’ and liquidating the open bar. But the details have become frustratingly unclear after what feels like several hours trapped in a room with too many floral arrangements. 

The bartender returns, sliding both drinks towards you sympathetically. You contemplate the shot — some yellow liquid, kind of fruity — and decide a sip of your vodka soda to cleanse the palate is probably the best way to go.  

And then you feel it. An unfortunate warmth behind your body, the heat of a person near you. You swear to god, if Steve followed you, you’ll call security—

“Wow,” a voice begins, smooth like honey poured over a knife. “So we’re just letting civilians into press galas these days.”

The sigh that escapes you could probably be heard from space. 

One of your hands, the one not clutching your drink, promptly facepalms. 

“Please don’t start,” you mutter into your palm. “I’m one drink away from faking a fainting spell.”

But then your stomach does that thing again. That ridiculous little drop it did earlier in the night, followed by a flutter that feels suspiciously like anticipation wrapped in nausea. Your rational brain would very much like to blame this on Emma’s nuclear-strength vodka concoction rather than acknowledge it as anything resembling interest. 

That would just be inconvenient, and absolutely not something you’ll process while you’re wearing a red dress that’s already testing your limits. 

You don’t turn around. Some survival instinct within you is warning you that eye contact with the origin of that voice would be the equivalent of staring into a solar eclipse.

Hopefully, if you ignore him long enough, he might dissolve back into whatever corner of the ballroom he emerged from, taking with him the reminder that your body now apparently has formed opinions about him that your brain would like to shut off. 

Apparently, peace was not something the universe promised for you tonight. 

He moves around the bar to claim the space beside you, hips angled and shoulders brushing the air near yours. The dark brown liquid in his cup sloshes as he adjusts to the small centimeters of wiggle room. 

The scent of him hits you in waves — first his drink, all expensive whiskey, followed by his cologne that always smells like bergamot and cedar. It’s familiar. Nice. 

You stare down into your own drink and the untouched shot that’s sitting beside you, mocking you. 

“Didn’t peg you for a vodka soda girl,” Jungkook observes. His rings catch the lighting as he raises his own glass. Your eyes stay locked on them. “Figured you were more of a dry martini, twist-of-lemon kinda girl.” 

You refuse to grant him the satisfaction of eye contact. “I don’t want to be perceived tonight. Somehow I feel like ordering that kind of drink is asking for it.” 

He laughs, and the pit in your stomach drops even further you’re certain it’s on the marble floors. “Ah. Hiding in plain sight during this event? Classic CIA. You sure you not a narc?”

You finally turn your head to look over at him. Naturally, he’s already intently looking back. 

His chin is tilted, a little curve playing at the corners of his mouth. His hair is disheveled, top strands doing interesting things near his temples. 

His lips —and wow, your observational skills have apparently decided to become deeply unprofessional tonight— are glossy, something that normally happens when someone’s spent the night drinking liquor. A flush washes over his cheekbones, and you take a peek at the scar you noticed the other day on his cheek. 

You briefly wonder where he got it from. 

“You’re staring.” 

You blink. He is insane. You are not. 

“I’m assessing,” you correct, taking what you can only hope looks like a casual sip of your drink. 

“Assessing what, exactly?” 

My escape route, you think, but instead say, “Whether you’re drunk enough for me to win an argument.” 

His laugh is easier this time. “Not even close. You’ll have to rely on insults other than my appearance or work ethic tonight.”

“Damn,” you mumble, peering into your glass. Somehow, despite yourself, you barely notice you’re almost smiling. “There goes my strategy.” 

“Ah, I’ve missed this,” he begins. “You, snapping at me. The thrill of not knowing if I’ll make it out of the room alive.”

You arch a brow. “You’re a masochist.”

He shrugs. “Maybe I just like watching you be better than everyone else in the room.”

That lands in your chest like a dropped weight. Just drops right into your ribcage and sits there. Did everyone in the room inhale laughing gas before you got here?

But he doesn’t let it sit there too long for you to overthink it. “I mean, not that the bar’s high,” he adds, “Half of any briefing room’s asleep on their feet.”

“Don’t.” you warn, lifting your drink to your lips. You’re not entirely sure what you’re asking him not to do. Don’t be nice? Don’t notice things? 

He continues on, eyes twinkling, “With Monroe out, I haven’t even gotten a chance to try and give you a run for your money.”

You pinch the bridge of your nose, “She’s out sick, not dead.”

“Right. The flu.. Or the plague. Whatever it was.”

“She’ll be back by Monday.” You roll your eyes. “And if not, I’ve got about twenty pages of questions I’m emailing her way.” 

“Mm.” The sound rumbles in his throat as he swirls his drink, and your eyes can’t help but flicker down to his rolled-up cufflinks, his tattoos peeking out underneath. “True.”

A pause unfurls between you two, and you want to crawl under the bar and die. 

“You know..” he says casually. “I thought you'd been avoiding me this week. Which would be adorable, if you weren’t so obvious about it.” 

Literally what on earth is he talking about? The only reason you haven’t run into him is because your only shared project is out on indefinite leave due to the plague. 

You chuckle uninterestedly at that. “Avoiding you implies I think about you long enough to plan my schedule around you.” 

“Right,” Jungkook’s eyes stare into yours, and you immediately fidget with the straw in your drink. “So, you not coming into the Fox room once this week to ask about any new updates to the student visa crisis..”

“Got my own intel.” 

“Didn’t show up at happy hour on Thursday to make fun of my new piece?”

“Calendar management. I had better things to do.” 

His smile unfolds slowly. “Of course. My bad.” 

Your brows pinch before you can stop them. A soundless what leaves from your parted lips. There’s a lag in your brain, like someone forgot to hit play again, and you just… stand there, Processing. 

What you thought was just fortunate coincidences was apparently strategic hiding tactics. You weren’t doing it on purpose, not one bit. It’s not like you sat down with your calendar and a red pen, plotting routes that would minimize Jungkook encounters. But now that he’s pointed it out, you’re forced to confront the uncomfortable possibility that your body has been making decisions about your proximity to him before your brain can. 

You do your best to puff your chest out. “Don’t flatter yourself.” 

“Wouldn’t dream of it,” he quips, but his eyes suggest otherwise. Suggest, unfortunately, that he’s been doing his own study on you and reached some conclusions he will indeed be sharing. 

“Well, clearly, you have been.” You take another sip of your drink, hardly noticing you’re down to your final few sips. 

“Every time I look around lately, I don’t see you or hear your little opinions. It’s hard to miss.” The smile on his face imprints deeper into his skin. 

You snort, placing your drink down. “Congrats, you’ve finally scared me off.” 

“Oh come on,” he leans in, far past your comfort zone, and now you’re inhaling too much of him and your head is slightly spinning. “You’re not that easy to scare. I’d know.”

“Really?” you scoff incredulously. “You’d know?”

“I would,” he tuts, bumping his shoulder with yours. You move your body an inch farther away. 

“I guess it’s not all that weird you think that,” you agree, letting your gaze wander the overstuffed ballroom before landing back on him. “You are practically studying me.”

He crosses his arms over his chest, and that pit in your stomach returns when you realize how big his biceps look from this angle. “Studying you?”

“Steps of the West Wing ring any bells? My voice echoing out into the universe, your notebook wide open..?”

The image burns into the crevices of your brain. And now that you’re rehashing it out loud, you’re admitting something incredibly mortifying. Him, sat upon the steps in the sunlight, has been haunting the halls of your mind like an uninvited guest. 

He has the audacity to smile like this is some charming story you’ll share at the holiday party this year. “Ah,” he shifts his weight onto his other foot. “That.”

“Yes, that,” you echo drily. “Care to explain? Because from where I was standing, it looked like you were trying to copy me for the next press briefing.” 

There’s a flicker of amusement that appears on his features — mixed in with surprise or appreciation for the directness of your words. Like he wasn’t expecting you to address it head-on, which makes you wonder what kind of avoidant people he usually deals with. 

“You want the truth?” He ducks his head towards you, looking around like he’s about to impart the president’s nuclear codes.

“Is that even possible coming from you?” Your pointer finger jabs into his chest. Truthfully, both the alcohol and the way your head is reeling from the proximity of him have the move lacking any real punch, but it still leaves you a little bewildered. 

His laugh comes softer this time. Beneath your finger, the muscles are hard and his heartbeat stable. Then you realize you’re still touching him and withdraw your hand as if you’ve put your palm over an open flame. “I was trying to figure out how you do it.” 

“Do what, exactly?” 

“Make it look effortless.” He gestures vaguely into the open air. “You ask questions that make people tell you things they didn’t plan to reveal. It’s… intriguing.”

You tilt your head and shift your weight onto another heel. A quick glance over your shoulder like maybe someone else heard this too, because surely you didn’t hallucinate whatever the hell just came out of his mouth. 

“So you thought the best approach was to… lurk my stuff? Like a stalker?” 

“When you put it like that, it sounds significantly less charming than I thought it would be.” He takes a final swig of his drink. 

“You’re a fucking freak, Jungkook.” 

His eyes never linger from yours, almost daring you to keep going, like this is some sick, twisted game he enjoys playing every night. 

It feels as if the room is closing in on you. 

“Sounds like it left a bit of an impression on you,” he replies smoothly. 

“Oh I’ve told my therapist allll about it,” you bite back. “Right after we finished unpacking how you got your little paws on Kara Devlin’s quote.”

He pauses for a second before chuckling under his breath. Something involuntary and deeply stupid happens in your chest cavity. You stare down into your melted drink and remind yourself that Jungkook has been unreasonably irritating and easy to look at since you met him eight years ago. None of this is breaking news. 

“So you’re still mad, I’m assuming.” He shakes his head. “Come on, it was nothing. Name of the game. You liked arguing with me before we were paid to do it.”

“Oh yeah, totally,” you deadpan. “You know what really gets me going? Espionage.”

He grins at that, but not with a mean expression. “Same here.”

You side-eye him before turning back to the bartender who’s now juggling 45 drunk orders, “I’m going to need another drink if you’re gonna stand here all night.”

“Make it two,” He downs the rest of the liquid in his cup down his throat and you shift away from him when his elbow brushes against yours.

Emma’s favorite bartender is busy arguing with a New York Times correspondent, so you opt for the girl who seems more interested in texting someone back on her phone than taking your drink order. 

Your mouth parts open to speak when she finally puts her phone down, sauntering over to you while fixing her hair as she spots Jungkook beside you. “Hi, can—”

“Can we get two vodka sodas please?”

He’s far closer than you’d like him to be, warmth radiating off him like a human furnace. Jungkook’s displaced himself behind you — just a smidge, with one hand pressed onto the bar, caging you in — enough for the girl bartender to notice, sigh and nod before pulling up two clean glasses. He’s in your nostrils with that smoky scent of whiskey, in your ears with the hoarseness of his voice. 

God, why is he so close? Why is he standing like that? Why is your skin doing that thing where it feels like it’s been plugged into an electrical outlet?

Please, please let this bartender be the kind of professional who minds her own business. The last thing you need is someone else cataloguing the clear tension crackling between you two like a livewire. 

You fixate on her bartending skills, terrified to acknowledge anything else. He moves behind you again, his other elbow brushing against your back as he puts it somewhere. 

That stupid, treacherous flutter returns. A whole swarm of butterflies or something more like wasps that you immediately begin exterminating mentally. Get away, you absolute pests. 

“Here you go,” she presses her lips in a tight smile as she slides the two drinks towards you both. She takes another moment to eye Jungkook before moving on to her next victim. 

But he’s not looking at her. 

When you turn around to hand him his drink dismissively, he’s staring down at you. “Thanks,” he whispers, taking the glass. 

“Whatever.” 

You whip back around, managing down a few colossal gulps that you’ll remember tomorrow morning as your last ones. A bit of it spills down your neck onto your chest, but all you care about is how it feels going down. 

Setting the glass down, you wipe your mouth and some of the residue with the back of your hand.

When you whip around to make your way back to Emma (and potentially let another lethal comment fall from your lips), you realize Jungkook’s gone. 

No comment lingering in the air like cigar smoke. Gone as if he’d never been there at all. 

You know he was, though, because your whole body still feels like it’s recovering from it. Like standing next to him required physical exertion. 

Somehow your mouth is dry even though you just chugged half a vodka soda. 

You don’t even know why you notice it, or why those wasps in your stomach slowly replace themselves with something else. On the bartop next to you, is the citrusy shot you never ended up taking. It taunts you, condensation melting onto the surface. 

Your eyes dart around, looking wildly. Searching for Emma, duh. But you’re also looking for a sleeve of tattoos that you just spent an abhorrent amount of time with. 

Treason of the highest fucking order.

With that, you swivel back around, wrap your fingers around the shot glass, and down it in one go. It faintly tastes tart, going down like molasses. It’s heavy in your throat and you mash it down with saliva. 

But even with the extra liquor in your body, his absence feels louder in your mind than his presence ever did. 

Four. That’s how many it’s been. 

Four lemon drop shots — because that’s how many Jenna, who has now appointed herself the Chief of Boosting Morale, decided was an appropriate amount. She stopped keeping tally after two. 

After each shot, she says something stupid like “To journalistic integrity!” Declining her felt like admitting defeat in some endurance competition, so you’ve been silently suffering while each shot drags you further and further down the drunk rabbit hole.

Jenna’s husband is too polite to say no to a round so he’s been glued to her side the entire time, whereas Jenna’s arm has been threaded through yours, laughing at something her husband finally contributed to the conversation. Something about a senator using an emoji in a tweet. 

It’s not even that funny, but you’ve reached that point of the night where everything feels a little like a sitcom. 

“Oh my god,” Jenna wheezes, tightening her grip on your arm. “Do you remember when our editor tried to convince us to use ‘yeet’ in a headline?”

You snort into your fifth vodka soda (or is the sixth?), barely dodging a splash up the rim. “No. No. I blocked it out like a traumatic memory.”

“He said it meant to throw??”

“It does mean to throw!” Her husband interjects. 

“Yeah, but the headline was about the debt ceiling,” you giggle. 

Jenna’s husband chuckles politely while his eyes scan the room, probably wondering when it’s socially acceptable to go home and watch a movie.

Jenna is in a very rare form. She’s always put-together, but tonight her dress is perfectly tailored, makeup hasn’t budged an inch, and her nails are a crimson red to match her lipstick.

Tonight, you’re incredibly grateful for her. Grateful she came, grateful she’s kept you busy.

You swish what’s left in your glass and blink through the haze. 

It’s starting to hit, that warm syrupy lag behind your thoughts. Liquid confidence that whispers lies about your ability to be graceful and sophisticated. 

“You know, I don’t know how half those pieces fucking run,” Jenna sips her espresso martini. 

“Don’t you just, like, put a stop to them?” You’ve seen her do it before. 

“I physically intercept like a human firewall, yes,” she grins with all her teeth. 

“We all owe you a medal.”

You both erupt into cackles, and her husband — poor, sweet Greg or Grant or whatever he said his name was — offers a little smile as if he has even the slightest clue of what’s going on.

Your gaze drifts across the ballroom, and Jenna follows your line of sight, brows lifting amusedly in recognition. 

“Would you look at that,” she elbows you gently in the ribs. “They’re still talking.”

Emma and Paul. Paul is upright like a soldier, like he doesn’t fully trust his legs to hold up under the pressure of Emma’s approval, while Emma lounges against the dessert table you swore off.

“I give it twenty minutes before she asks something like ‘can I see your Spotify Wrapped?’” you mutter, rolling your eyes. 

“Ten,” Jenna counters. “And if she sees any NPR podcasts, she’s bolting.”

“He probably listens to Benson Boone. Gives me that vibe.” 

“Maybe he has layers,” she shrugs, leaning her head lightly against your shoulder. “Not that it matters. I’m just glad you haven’t ditched me for a man.”

You turn your head slowly to meet her expression. “Ew. At this event? Literally not a soul worth my time.”

She breaks into laughter, lifting her head up, "Right, right. How dare I?”

“I would never do you like that,” you clutch your chest dramatically. “Who else am I going to split an uber with later while we trash every senator we saw leave with someone who isn’t their wife?”

“That’s why you’re my favorite.”

Your head turns sharply, eyes narrowing. “Wait, what?”

She gives you a sly smile over the rim of her glass, “I said what I said.”

It hits a second later, like a stone dropped into a still lake. A single splash, followed by a thousand ripples. Your chest tightens and there’s a flutter of pride making a home in your heart. 

She hasn’t brought it up again since your one-on-one on Monday. Where she may or may not have hinted at you getting the promotion of your dreams. You’ve done an exemplary job of playing it cool ever since. No prying, no follow ups. 

Hearing the word favorite, however, feels like someone pressed a thumb right into your sternum. 

“I’m touched,” you exclaim. “Even if I know you tell that to everyone.”

She scoffs while looping her arm through her husband’s, “Please. You think I say that to Emma?”

“Fair.”

She takes a final swig of her caffeinated martini, a little tipsier than she was earlier. “Just promise you won’t forget me when you get to my role, okay?”

You snort. “Never. But we still gotta Uber together always.”

“Deal.”

Your eyes wander again around the ballroom. Like clockwork, they land where they always do. On that kaleidoscope of tattoos you can’t miss. 

But you don’t look at him or who he’s talking to for too long. Maybe long enough to question your intoxication but as soon as the moment comes, it goes, and you’re back to Jenna, who’s now talking to her husband sweetly. 

“Well, well, well, if it isn’t the two sharpest women in Washington.”

It’s like the universe has a vendetta against you. Did you accidentally trip over a time traveler or steal candy from a baby in a past life?

It’s an overconfident voice you hadn’t heard in a while that sets off an almost Pavlovian reaction in your brain. 

You and Jenna turn in tandem like a pair of synchronized swimmers. Sure enough — and to your detriment — it’s Mike Montgomery. 

Mike is one of the editors you work with, and has the face of someone who’s probably been told he looks like a young Richard Gere and has never once disagreed. He once unironically told you ‘let’s circle back.’

Last year at the gala, you allegedly had a thirty minute conversation with him near the end of the night where the phrase aesthetic fascism in political media kept getting tossed around freely. But who’s to say. Last year was also the year you had tequila sodas instead of vodka sodas so really, the whole universe was off course.  

“Mike,” Jenna starts, tone flat. She doesn’t even fake a smile, which further proves your love for her. “You remember Greg.”

Greg. Right. Yes — her husband. You mentally file that away. 

“Of course,” Mike sticks out his hand. “Man of the hour.”

Greg blinks back at him like he was plucked straight out of his daydream. “Hey.”

Raising your eyebrows, you tease. “Man of the hour?”

Mike shrugs, letting out a little chuckle, “Well anyone who can keep up with Jenna at one of these things deserves a prize right?”

“He’s had some drinks and a shrimp cocktail. Let’s not get too ahead of ourselves.” She pats Greg’s chest lovingly, and that seems to bring him back to life.

Mike laughs loudly at that. He always laughs too loud, like he wants everyone’s attention in the room. 

“So how’s the correspondent life?” he asks, glancing between you and Jenna like he’s forgotten which one of you he’s more afraid of. “Still dealing with the same old bullshit?”

You purse your lips, cross your arms over your chest. “Are you under the impression the bullshit ended?”

“Fair,” he tries to laugh but it comes out more like a cough, “Yeah, I’ve been currently working on a little passion project, something about profiles of influential parties in media. You two came up, obviously.”

A look is exchanged between you and Jenna. You don't remember agreeing to be profiled. 

“Oh. Cool.”

“Yeah,” he shoves one of his hands into his pocket. “Just really trying to dig into the psyche of the rising class, you know? What drives you, who you look up to.”

Your arms squeeze tighter around your chest. “Sounds like a very healthy exercise.”

Mike smiles at that. You take an extra long sip of your drink and imagine throwing it directly in his face.

Greg, bless him, tries to nod along, although he has no idea who this man is or what series he’s referencing or why Jenna’s throwing daggers with her eyes.

Mike keeps going. “Anyway, just wanted to say hey. You know. Been a while since I edited your stuff.”

“Funny. I’m actually still waiting for the piece you were supposed to factcheck before publishing last May,” Jenna’s smile is poisonous. If looks could kill, he would be floating in a box down the river. 

Mike clears his throat. “Technical error. I think there was a glitch last time..”

“Mmm,” Jenna nods slowly. “Happens to the best.”

Mike readjusts his tie, sensing perhaps this might not be the enthusiastic crowd he’d envisioned. His eyes flit towards you briefly like he’s about to pivot into a new strategy. 

Please, god, let this man go flirt with an intern. 

“So,” he draws out the word for like, four seconds. “I don’t think we ever got to talk. You and me.”

There’s two routes you can go down. Play dumb, which somehow feels like the smarter decision. Or play smart, which feels like the dumber decision. 

“Yup. Tragic that we never spoke.”

Playing dumb it is. 

He bellows out a laugh, like you’ve just made the world’s wittiest joke instead of insulting him. 

“I always read your work,” he clarifies. “Your coverage during the midterm elections was really impressive.”

You glance over at Jenna, whose lips are now pressed together like she's trying to restrain herself from intervening. Meanwhile Greg (and you will not forget his name this time), has spotted someone he knows but is trying to find the courage to approach them. 

“That’s… nice.” You’re unsure what else to offer up. You can’t tell if he’s flirting or awkwardly trying to send you journalistic admiration. 

Mike’s lips stretch wider. “I get it, you know? Women like you don’t always get credit, but for what it’s worth, you’re one of the best out there.”

You nod, already looking past his shoulder at the crowd. Your drink is also damn near empty, and that simply won’t do. Time for drink six (or is it seven?). “Thanks. Appreciate that.”

He leans into you, “If you ever wanna talk shop.. Or, you know.. not shop.”

He’s so goddamn insufferable. 

You frown, not because you’re offended but because you literally have no comprehension right now. “Not shop?”

“Yeah, like… not about work?”

“Oh. Uh..” you blink, glance down at your drink, and then look back into his eager eyes. “I think I’m good.”

A long pause fills the air. Long enough for Mike to register the rejection, though he recovers fast, snapping back into a cocky grin like nothing demoralizing happened. 

“Open invite,” he says with a wink that makes your molars grind. “In case you change your mind.”

You hum noncommittally before angling back towards Jenna, who has a brow raised and a husband who’s gone from her sight. 

Jenna inquires, “You didn’t clock that?”

“Clock what?” You shrug your shoulders, scrambling for nonchalance. 

She shakes her head, smiling to herself, “Nothing. You’re still my favorite.”

And that makes you feel better than anything Mike could've said. 

“Alright, I’ve gotta get a refill before I lose my mind.” You shake your drink at her like it’s going to magically refill itself. 

"I've gotta go find Greg,” she sighs. “Text me when you’re down to leave?”

“Duh.” You flash her a salute, then pivot toward the bar, slipping back into the current of people. You nearly step in a puddle of what you hope is someone’s spilled gin and not a gastrointestinal emergency. 

You snake your way forward, elbow grazing someone’s sequined bag, catching the edge of someone’s shoulder and finally land in a spot wedged between a man in a tux and a woman who shoveled a half-eaten shrimp into a napkin. 

“Vodka soda,” you tell the bartender when she makes brief eye contact, and you lean your forearms on the table. The bartop is sticky again. 

You haven't checked your phone all night. Part of it was intentional. Nothing good happens on your phone at events like this. Nothing you want to deal with, anyway. 

But you’ve got a few minutes while your drink’s being made and your feet kind of hurt and you’re incredibly tipsy and suddenly the soft glow of your phone screen feels too tempting to ignore. 

So you dig into your purse. Pull out your device. 

When your phone boots to life, you lazily scroll through the notifications. A few texts from your college group chat. Texts from Emma asking ‘where are you??’ even though you’re maybe 50 feet away from her. You snort under your breath. 

And then, below that, a message from Rosalie. 

Rosalie❤️: hey, did jungkook ever say anything abt me?? dmed him when i was drunk and never heard back :( lol 

You stare at the screen like it’s displaying launch codes in a foreign language. 

There’s this erratic rhythm tugging at your heart, like someone’s tapping impatiently against your ribcage. 

It’s fine. Obviously, it’s fine. Who cares about Rosalie’s romantic DMs or her apparent inability to handle rejection with grace? You could have predicted this development from three miles away, honestly. Rosalie drunk texting someone tracks with her pattern of impulsive behavior. 

But.. you are curious. That’s all. Curiosity is a natural human reflex. 

Why would she message him despite your entirely fictional narrative about STDs? And why, more importantly, do you find yourself genuinely invested as to why he didn’t respond to her?

You lock your phone and shove it back into your purse. 

“Vodka soda,” the bartender slides the drink towards you and you grip onto it like a life raft. 

You barely get a full step away from the bar before that voice — his voice — is haunting your ears again. 

“Careful. You keep showing up at my favorite spot in the room, people are gonna start talking.”

Mid-step, you pause and inhale once through your nose like you’re gathering patience from thin air. 

Slowly, you swivel to meet his eyes. His tie is long gone, brown hair even more unkempt from when you last saw him. You lean back against the bar with all the theatrical grace of someone who’s had four, maybe five, lemon drop shots and has decided, for once in her life, not to flee when Jungkook starts speaking to you. 

God will strike you down for this. You can feel the lightning forming. But whatever, you’ve had a long week. You’ll repent tomorrow. 

“Are you gonna sneak up on me all night?” you ask flatly, raising your glass to your lips. You’re not even going to try and hide the exhaustion in your tone. 

“Potentially,” he takes a step closer. “Everyone here’s boring.”

You cock a brow. “What? No one here worth your time?”

He tips his glass a little, watching the ice swirl. The liquid is clear. It looks unusually familiar… like a vodka soda. You wonder if it’s the same one from an hour ago or if he ordered one on his own merit. “Nah, you know I like to be intellectually stimulated.”

Your laugh comes out dry. “Oh, so I stimulate you?”

His eyes lift to meet yours. They’re darker despite the hue of the chandelier you’re standing under. “In more ways than one.”

“You’re fucking gross.”

“Mm,” he hums, and it’s definitely not an apology, but moreso an acknowledgement. Like he’s well aware of the filth he peddles and would sell it to you wholesale if you gave him the chance.  “You set that one up.”

“Did not.”

He takes another step closer. The man that was beside you earlier has fled the scene, and Jungkook wedges himself into the open spot. When did it get so crowded in here? 

“Did too.” His fingers tap lazily against his glass. “You know, you always act like conversation with me is a federal offense.”

You roll your eyes. “Because every conversation with you is like stepping into quicksand.”

“You haven’t left me yet, so am I winning?” His eyes are twinkling with amusement. 

Scoffing, you deflect. Deny. “I’m tipsy. I make bad decisions when I’m tipsy.”

“Noted.” His gaze flickers down to your mouth for a millisecond. The gesture lands somewhere in your stomach, sending an embarrassing, vodka-amplified flutter cascading through your body. 

God, you need a priest. Or someone to physically remove you from this ballroom. 

“I saw you talking to Mike earlier,” Jungkook casually says, like he’s commenting on something trivial like the weather or whether or not vodka sodas are his new go-to drink. 

You groan immediately. “God, don’t remind me.”

“That bad?” His lips twitch as he settles his glass on the bartop.

“He tried to flirt with me, I think. According to Jenna.” You want to mentally facepalm at the memory. 

“Mike?”

You give him a look. “Yes, Mike.”

Jungkook whistles softly, shaking his head as if this is genuinely a tragedy. “Wow. I always thought his type was more fresh out of college and terrified.”

“It probably is,” you agree. “I thought maybe he was doing community service.”

“Hmm,” he looks deep in thought. Surveys the room for a beat. “What did you mean by according to Jenna?”

You shrug, lifting your glass to your lips to take a quick sip. “I don’t know. She caught onto the flirting before I did, I guess.”

“Oh.” His expression shifts a little, into one you can't make out. After knowing Jungkook for eight years, you’ve gotten familiar with the faces he has. But this one is unrecognizable. “You always that clueless?” 

“I guess,” you concede. He looks like he wants to say something more to that but decides against it. 

“So, what did he say?” 

“Something about how we never really speak, which is just rich coming from him considering we had a long ass conversation at last year’s gala about fascism.”

Jungkook chokes on his spit. “No.”

“Oh yes,” you nod solemnly. “He also pronounces Kremlin as Krim-lin. I rest my case on him.”

You expect him to chuckle or at least fake one, but it doesn’t come. He looks at you for a second, drinking you in. It almost feels like you’re back on the steps of the West Wing, where he was seeing every part of yourself you bore to the world. Like he’s been listening this whole time, which is somehow worse. 

“You’re funny when you’re off-duty,” He smiles into his glass. 

“When am I ever off-duty?”

“Right now,” he gestures toward you with his cup. “Sort of.”

You narrow your eyes. “You think this is me relaxed?”

“I think this is you after a few shots,” he jokes. “And slightly less terrified of being seen with me in public.” 

“Bold assumption, buddy,” you quip. You need to find your sanity and walk far away as hell from this conversation. 

“Is it wrong?”

You hesitate long enough for that to be a confession, and the look on his face says I win. 

“Exactly.” And there’s that smug tone you know so well. “Maybe I’m growing on you.”

You let something between a snort and laugh fall from your mouth. “Like a tumor.”

But the smile you’re biting back makes it a little harder to sell the insult. 

You clear your throat and straighten up slightly, ignoring how the vodka seems to have settled in your bloodstream like a warm compress. 

“Anyway,” you say, “How’s your coverage going for Monroe?”

He raises an eyebrow haughtily. “Pivoting? And to Monroe?”

“I just don’t think I’m in the mood to talk about how you think I’m growing on you.” 

Jungkook’s smile could light up half of DC. “You started it.”

“Ending it right now.” 

“You always think you’re the one ending things,” he counters. 

You shoot him a look, then echo louder this time “How’s your coverage going?”

He leans an elbow onto the bar, glass resting loosely between his fingers. “Good. Bet you’re dying to talk to her again, though.”

You shrug nonchalantly, pretending to scan the room like you’re searching for someone — Emma, Jenna, literally even Blue Tie Guy at this point — but all you really find are name tags you don’t care about and plates of passed shrimp. 

“Not my fault she came down with that rare plague. But it is weird she came down with it just after we had our first session with her,” you mutter. 

“You sound disappointed,” he points out. To be honest, you are. She has a hell of a story to tell and you want to write it. 

You glance at him again. “What?” 

“You miss her,” he coos at you playfully, “Now admit you miss me too. It’s okay, I won’t tell anyone.”

You roll your eyes, using the motion to buy yourself a few seconds of mental reorganization. “I miss being able to ask real questions.”

He nods, fingers drumming thoughtfully against the glass. “Yeah. You're good at those.”

You gape at him through your lashes. They’re just words that are perfectly arranged in an ordinary sequence that just so happens to reference your competence. But now it’s one time too many that he’s praised you for something, and you're running out of fingers and toes to count on.

It lands in your chest with a quiet thud, like he tossed a coin into a wishing well you didn't realize was inside you. 

You shift your weight and conduct another sweep of the ballroom. Still no Emma, no Jenna. 

“I really should find Emma..” you trail off, eyes darting across the room like a prisoner looking for a fire escape. “Before I start enjoying this conversation and lose all sense of who I am.”

Jungkook leans into your body. His cologne hits you again square in the face. “That would be tragic… if you forgot you hated me.”

You clench your jaw. “Please. I don’t hate you, that’s too much energy. I just think you’re—”

“Objectively infuriating?” he offers. 

“Exhausting.”

“Better than forgettable,” he smirks. 

You grip your near empty cup and wish you had something better to throw at him. Or honestly, something else to look at — something that doesn’t talk like him, look like him, smell like him. 

And as you’re searching in your repertoire for that something, your brain decides to shove Rosalie into frame. 

Her text. That stupid little ‘lol.’ The digital ghost of her face.

The alcohol in your body is doing that unfortunate thing where your filter stops working but your nerve hasn’t quite kicked in yet. And his cologne — Jesus, it’s warping your actual brain chemistry, 

Before you can stop yourself, you blurt the words out. “Have you.. heard from Rosalie?”

“Rosalie?” He cocks his head, scratches his jaw. 

You shake your head up and down, suddenly extremely interested in the ice melting in your cup. “Yeah.”

There’s a pause. Slow furrow of his brows. “Rosalie from college?” 

You aim to keep your expression cool but your stomach does something distinctly uncool. Like a fish flopping on the deck. “The one and only.”

Jungkook blinks at you. His body is still, but his face guards itself. He’s squinting as if he’s scanning you for the motive behind your question. 

You hate how well he reads people. You hate that he’s doing it to you right now.

“Why?” he treads lightly.

You shake your head quickly, “Just tell me.”

He hesitates. It’s pretty obvious to you both this isn’t a nothing question. 

“Yeah,” he says finally, “She reached out to me.”

Your throat goes uncharacteristically dry. 

The lightness from before — his little jabs, the crooked smile — it’s all taut now. Like he’s waiting to see what this really is. You also would like to know what this is. 

You scramble for a reason, anything to make this make sense outloud.

Feeling caught, you busy yourself with one of the bracelets on your wrist. “She’s my best friend,” you shrug like it’s no big deal. “She tells me everything.”

He flinches subtly, a brief twitch in his jaw. “Well,” he utters finally. “I didn’t answer her. If that’s what you want to know.”

And that is when your chest does the thing again. 

It’s an awful, disloyal twist. It heard the words and immediately reached for them, clutching at some fragile thread of relief you didn’t place there.

You inhale, trying to drown it back down. The thump thump of your heart, the tiny voice in your conscious going, good. 

The wasps are back too. Buzzing and furious and unavoidable, even as you swipe at them with your mental fly swatter, one by one. 

You feel regrettably stupid. Now you’re standing there, tipsy and humiliated and flinching at your own internal reaction like a girl in some cheap romance novel where the brooding rival turns out to be a chill dude and your panties fall off in chapter eight. 

No thank you. Not today. You are a professional, a fully grown woman with access to two-factor authentication and press credentials.

You do not feel things when Jungkook says things like “I didn’t answer her.”

Though, clearly you’re having trouble leaving it alone. Clearly, that little skill of yours of asking the right questions — the one people applaud, the one Jungkook complimented an hour or two ago — has decided to clock in right now, under a chandelier and several ounces of vodka. 

You meet his eyes even though your gut is screaming don’t, and say, “Why didn't you respond?”

Air leaves his lungs, barely. His jaw tenses for a fraction of a second. One flicker of thought behind his eyes before he smoothes it all back out. 

The silence looms over you two like an unsuspecting fog. Your stomach starts writing its own obituary. 

You’re about to take it back, about to say never mind ha ha silly me asking about your DMs, when he finally responds with, “She’s not who I’m interested in.”

There’s a hiccup in your brain. Like someone pulled the emergency brake on the subway and your neurons are just stuck, powering down and firing blanks.

She’s not who I’m interested in. 

You don’t dare blink, breathe, or even think, which is crazy because thinking is your whole personality. His pupils practically eat up his entire eye as he peers down at you, 

A whole rolodex of faces spins through your head. Maybe someone new started at Fox? There was that blonde you passed in the cafeteria, maybe that’s his type. Or maybe… maybe he made a move on Sana tonight. He and her always had that weird click, right? They have matching resumes, wouldn’t that just be poetic? Full circle and all that.

Your voice is crawling up your throat again, forming something stupid like oh yeah? Who’s someone you’re interested in? Because apparently vodka and lemon drop shots have taken control of your frontal lobe and are now driving the bus.

But before the words can land, there’s a blur of movement from your left. 

“Where the hell have you been?” 

Emma materializes beside you in a cloud of perfume, cheeks flushed and eyes bright. 

Your neck whips to her. “Jesus.” 

She latches onto your arm immediately. “I’ve been looking for you everywhere,” she’s breathless. “Did you die? Be honest.”

“I was just —” You flick a glance at Jungkook and regret it upon impact. 

Emma doesn’t notice or care, undoubtedly in a bubble of her own. “Ugh, I have so much to tell you, I feel like I’ve been living a double life tonight.”

Right, and that’s cool and all. But your body is still humming, tingling under your skin as if someone left a speaker buzzing in your chest. She’s not who I’m interested in. 

Your brain is dying to ask then who the fuck is?

Emma’s too busy blabbering away to care about any of it; your facial expression, Jungkook’s eyes that haven’t moved from you, the way your hands are slightly trembling as they hang loosely down at your side. “Okay, I know I’ve ignored him for the past few years but Paul is actually so funny. He told me this story earlier about his dog and I was crying. Literally crying. I’m just like, why have I never given this man the time of day—”

She pauses suddenly, looks over at Jungkook. Freezes mid-sentence like she just saw a coworker she drunkenly sexted. 

“...Well.” Her voice drops multiple octaves. “Whatever.”

Words aren’t coming to you as easily as you’d like. 

Emnma clears her throat, forcing her gaze back to you. “Anyway. You’ve been summoned.”

“For what?” you question, but your voice comes out thinner than when you practiced it in your head. 

“Afterparty,” a sinister smile makes its way onto her lips. “Duh. Do you not realize what time it is?”

“No, Emma,” you bite back. “You don’t realize what time it is because you’ve spent the past few hours eye-fucking Paul.”

Emma shrugs. “Okay and? I told you, he’s kinda funny.”

You sink your teeth into your lower lip. 

“And he also knows about the current crisis in Venezuela,” she adds proudly, like that qualifies him for marriage. “Which is honestly more than I can say for half the men I’ve dated.”

You sigh. “I’m not going to an afterparty.”

“Yes, you are.”

“No, I’m not.”

“Yes.”

“Emma—”

“You owe me. For that night.”

You do actually owe her. That night a few months ago, where you went home with that random guy, she went home alone and buried her face in a Dominos pizza while you had mediocre sex. 

Your body is already 40% vodka and 60% bad decisions, and you’re hovering alarmingly close to making another one—

She turns to Jungkook. “You’re coming too, right?”

You whip your head toward her. You absolute fucking traitor, Emma. 

Jungkook’s grin is so infuriatingly cheerful that you’re torn between wanting to punch him in the teeth or seeking refuge behind the bar, anything to avoid that smile.

“I mean…” he replies. “If she’s going..”

Why are you the deciding factor in all of this?

Emma snorts. “Oh, she’s going.”

“I really wasn’t—” you start, but then realize they’re making eye contact over your shoulder like they’ve coordinated to ruin your night. 

“I’ll… see you there?” Jungkook asks, shooting Emma a look you don’t miss.

You can't help but daydream about what it’d be like to toss all your worries out the window, party like there’s no tomorrow, drown yourself in whatever booze is lying around the afterparty, and wake up to the faint memory of a random hookup who’s definitely ghosting you before you even finish your breakfast. 

You, a tipsy bundle of bad decisions, look at Jungkook — his hair a windswept disaster, eyes twinkling like he's just heard the world's worst joke, and those tattoos dancing on his golden skin — and as tempting as it is, you remind yourself you really should just say no and sprint away from this mess, while dreaming of a life where the world isn’t dragging you down like an anchor in a swimming pool. 

But… you have always been dangerously open to possibilities after a few shots. 

You drain the rest of your drink and go, “I’ll see you there.”

masterlist + ask

taglist ; @somehowukook @lovingkoalaface @moroe-blog2 @almatiarau @hanamgi @yooniepot @strawberryberrygirl @rossy1080 @libra04 @kenzierj11 @senaqsstuff @dtownbae @xumyboo @bellefaerie @chimchoom @satisfied18 @arcanekookz @vintagemoonsstuff @brokebitch-101 @taolucha @songbyeonkim @oopscoop @mochibites00 @whatevevrerr @lessthantmr @nesha227 @mar-lo-pap @jazzyb22 @lachesismoonmist @indyuhhhhh @sky-23s-world @swimmingweaselzineegs @jiminshi20 @khadeeeeej @withluvjm @anishasingh1233 @jksusawife @btstrology @youphoriajk @jadestonedaeho7 @diamondjeon @sharplycoldpaladin @annafarrr @tteokbokibyjk @prxdajeon @tatzzz-25 @magicalnachocreator @younhakim29 @purplelanterns @134340-kr @amarawayne

[seungcheorry]

happy burstday to you - cherry version 🍒⚡ | 02. yoon jeonghan - svt anniversary

yoon jeonghan as the boy who accidentally threw the basketball at you, broking your glasses in the process

"oh, shit-", jeonghan flinches, immediately running to you. "i'm so sorry, are you okay?!"

you still have your hands over your face. your friend next to you is half trying not to laugh, half worried about you.

"the ball just slipped out of my hand, it wasn't supposed to even come near you, i'm so sorry!", he apologizes again, and when you finally look up at him, jeonghan also tries not to laugh.

your face is a bit red - he's sure not only from the ball hitting you -, but your glasses is also parted in half, your hands holding the pieces together.

"you broke my glasses", you state, deadly staring at him.

"sorry, i…", what is there to say? why is jeonghan kinda scared of looking at you right now? "are you okay, though? did it hurt you?"

your nose stings a bit, but you're gonna survive… well, maybe not from the embarassment of being hit in the face by thee yoon jeonghan, everyone's crush on school and captain of the basketball team.

"i'm fine", you sigh, getting up from your place. "i just gotta wash my face."

"i'll go with you."

and you wanna say he doesn't need to, that he should go back to practice, that he should go back to his friends who are calling his name now; they need him. you wanna say your friend can go with you - even though she hasn't said anything so far -, but jeonghan grabs you by the arm, gently guiding you out of the court.

it's cute, but also a bit awkward, how he watches you washing your face so closely, broken glasses on the sink. his eyes don't leave your face, like he's waiting for something to happen, and he even looks worried when you groan while washing your nose.

"does it hurt?"

"a bit", you sigh again. "never thought you could miss a single throw, but here we are now."

"well, technically i didn't miss… it hit you perfectly on the face."

jeonghan bites back a chuckle, especially when you look at him with those deadly eyes again. he bows to you, silently apologizing once again, and takes a step back (just to be sure, you know?).

"are you… what are you gonna do about your glasses? do you have a spare one?"

"no, i'll have to buy new ones."

"shit", he rolls his eyes. "i'm gonna pay, don't worry."

"you don't have to-"

"yeah, my dad will never leave me alone if i don't step up to do the "right thing", you know?", he actually uses air quotes. "it's okay, it's only fair. let's go buy new ones tomorrow, is that okay? can you like… see in the meantime?"

you feel the itch to smack his arm, but something or someone holds you back, perhaps god.

"i'm not blind, yoon jeonghan."

"oh, so you know my name", jeonghan smirks at you, grabbing your broken glasses from the sink.

"everyone in this school does."

"yeah, and everyone in the whole world will know it too", jeonghan turns around. "taking your glasses with me so you won't try to mend them. see you tomorrow after class."

you roll your eyes, a deep sigh coming out of your lips, getting ready for the busy day you'll have tomorrow - because yoon jeonghan is always a handful, you know that much.

but the way he texts you later that night, just to know how you're doing (which you answer to after demanding to know how he got your number) is weird and also... nice. or how he says you should get your eyes checked up, just so you can make full new glasses, all on him - aka all on his parents.

or, i don't know, how you agree to his idea and your mom takes you to the "eye doctor", as jeonghan calls it; and how you're surprised to see him outside the building once you finish your appointment.

"still blind?", he asks, playful eyes turning serious the moment he sees your mom behind you. "oh, hello, miss! i didn't see you, i'm sorry."

"perhaps you should get checked too", you say, and jeonghan laughs out loud.

it's also nice how he sits beside you at the court the next day, helping you decide on which glasses you should buy. his friends are calling him, asking him to come play - but he just wave them off.

"shouldn't you be practicing?"

"i will, after school", jeonghan nods. "but not basketball."

"gave up on your career so soon? i was your only victim, you're good."

"no, that's not it. i just... i got into this company, kpop company. i will officially be a trainee soon, i guess. to be honest i wasn't thinking too much of it, just dreaming big, but i met the other boys last week and... they're really nice. i have a good feeling about this."

but jeonghan never mentions his new adventure again to you. he waves it off, focusing on you and finishing his mission with you. he tells you which glasses he liked from the site you're currently scrolling through on your simple phone, rolling his eyes when you say you didn't ask for his opinion.

it's also nice when, through his new busy schedule, jeonghan can finally accompany you to the store, carrying his mom's credit card in his pocket and acting like he owns it all - which he doesn't. he tries a few glasses too, mumbling about how good-looking he is and how a great idol he will be someday. you roll your eyes, pointing at the ones you chose so jeonghan can just pay and be done with it, both of you - but on your way out of the store, he sees this ice cream shop and pays you one too.

"for the whole glasses incident, you know", he shrugs. "my debt with you is paid."

"yeah, but your parent's debt with the bank is not."

jeonghan laughs, but you won't admit how nice that sound is too. you just thank him for your ice cream, turning around on your hills and going home.

he sees you at school the next morning, winking at you and mumbling a "it looks nice" for your new look. you just roll your eyes once again, ignoring the way your friend is trying not to freak out because you're suddenly close to yoon jeonghan. but, to be honest, that closeness doesn't last long...

he disappears for two days, everyone talking at the corridors about what could have happened. a third day goes by, and rumor has it that he's sick; but you know it's not that. on the fifth day, the teachers let everyone know that jeonghan moved out of the city, and will be attending a new school there.

you don't think too much of it, just silently wish the stars that he can succeed on his new adventure - and that's all you do, forgetting him and just moving on with your life.

but years after, as the big kpop group seventeen gives an interview and yoon jeonghan tells everyone about this time at school when he accidentally shot a basketball straight to someone's face, you roll your eyes again, but suddenly remembers that you still have the glasses he - his parents - paid for you, just like he still has the ones he broke.

have you considered tipping me? | ko-fi 🍒

taglist: @babycaratdeul @goodbyetwenty @seungcheolsblackcard @xxr0ck-stxrxx @hazeljisulatte @worldpeaceforyoongi @lixisoul99 @elieanana @supi-wupi @4shypotato @reiofsuns2001 @gohyemi @edwinawrites @dinossaurz @dy-kyeom @cristy-101 @karynnoona @sarabencze @princessjazzyjazz @matchawoozii

[cosmiclily]

domestic cait omgggg... winedrunk chats on the balcony, swimming together, forcing her to go fishing/hiking with u, her dragging you to fancy dinners AHHH I NEED HER

domesticity never looked better on you - caitlyn x f!reader

wc: 3.3k

notes: 😖 i want her!!!! i like cassandra but had to make her mean for the sake of the plot lol

When you first started dating Caitlyn, you were convinced your social status would be a huge problem.

You were raised in a perfectly normal family, in a modest little house miles away from anything even remotely close to a mansion. No housekeepers. No garden parties. No marble foyers or private tennis courts. Just cracked sidewalks, secondhand furniture, and dinners that came out of crockpots—not five-star kitchens.

Caitlyn, on the other hand? She grew up behind iron gates. Old money. The kind of wealth that didn’t need to be flashy because it was so deeply ingrained it didn’t have to prove itself. Quiet wealth. Generational. Silver spoons. Ballroom etiquette. Family heirlooms that were probably worth more than your entire zip code.

So when she started showing interest in you, it honestly felt like a joke. Some kind of social experiment. A rich girl slumming it for the thrill of it. You half expected hidden cameras to pop out from behind the bushes.

“Surprise! You’re on ‘How Long Can the Poor Girl Last?’”

Weeks turned into months, and yet... you never once invited her to your tiny downtown apartment. Maybe it was pride. Maybe shame. Probably both. It just seemed easier—safer—to keep her in her world. Rooftop bars. Sleek restaurants with floors so polished you could see your reflection. Minimalist lofts where dust dared not exist.

But one dinner turned into two, then three, then too many glasses of wine. Then hands—her hands—hungry and desperate, fingers tangling in your hair, lips dragging across your skin like a whispered promise.

Suddenly, your one-bedroom apartment was a lot closer than her fancy penthouse.

Horniness beat shame. Every time.

And when she shoved you against the door of your cluttered little hallway, laughing breathlessly into your mouth, it hit you like a freight train—she didn’t care. Not about the pile of dishes in the sink. Not about the bathroom faucet that wouldn’t stop leaking. Not about the cabinet door that hung crooked and refused to close all the way.

She cared about you. About this.

And God, that was a dangerous thing to realize.

After that, she started coming over more often. It became a rhythm. A routine. A quiet sort of domesticity neither of you acknowledged out loud but both leaned into.

You’d cook dinner together—cheap pasta or something overly ambitious from a YouTube video—and laugh when it inevitably went wrong. You’d split a cigarette on the tiny balcony with the rusty railing, legs tangled together on an old chair that squeaked every time you shifted.

You talked about the future. Sometimes seriously, sometimes just… hypothetical.

"Maybe we should get a bigger place," she mused one night, exhaling smoke through a lazy grin. “Somewhere with a balcony that doesn’t feel like it’s plotting our murder."

"Somewhere with more than one drawer," you grinned back, pretending the idea didn’t make your heart somersault.

She made you feel like the most important person in the world. Like you were the luxury.

The way she’d cup your face with one hand, fingertips gentle beneath your chin, while the other hand held a cigarette between two fingers, the ember catching in her lashes as she looked at you like you were something sacred.

"You know," she’d whisper, her accent syrupy-sweet, "you drive me absolutely insane."

And then she’d kiss you—hungrily, desperately—like she needed you more than air. Pinning you against the kitchen counter. The old leather couch that complained beneath your weight. The rickety dining table. The bedroom door you never managed to fix properly.

She’d sip wine from the fancy glass she bought you for Valentine’s Day—because “no one should drink good wine out of a mug,” she’d scold—and look like a painting. Legs crossed. Chin tilted. Sunlight pooling in her hair like gold.

“You look surreal right now," you’d tell her, breathless, like it was the first time you’d ever seen her.

She’d just smile, slow and knowing. “Good," she’d murmur, sipping her wine. "Because I feel surreal whenever I’m with you."

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Then things got serious-serious. No going back. “Bring her home to meet the family” serious.

Which, of course, meant the annual family hiking trip. A tradition that sounded wholesome in theory but, in practice, was a chaotic mess of your brothers arguing over who forgot the fishing bait, your dad retelling the same “legendary stories” you’ve heard since you were in diapers, and your mom sighing her way through it all with a wine thermos and her well-practiced tolerance.

Caitlyn, in designer boots—boots that had definitely never touched mud before—stepped onto that dirt trail like she was walking a runway. You half expected her to tap out before the first mile. But no. She laced her fingers with yours, smiled like it was the easiest thing in the world, and just… fit.

And then, as expected, came The Story.

Your dad cracked open a beer, leaned back in his folding chair like a king, and started with the classic dramatic sigh.

“You know, girl… there was this one time… I almost took down a bear. All by myself."

You groaned internally. Here we go.

“It was me and my buddies. Middle of the woods. Big hunting trip. They all ran—scared shitless of the damn thing. But not me. I stood my ground. Looked that bear right in the eye and—"

Your mom let out a groan of her own, leaned over toward you, and whispered behind her wine cup, “There he goes again.” Shaking her head, but smiling anyway.

But Caitlyn? Caitlyn sat there with her legs crossed at the ankles, hands folded neatly in her lap, nodding like she’d never heard a more riveting story in her life. Her blue eyes wide, her lips parted just a little, like she was utterly captivated.

"Wow," she said softly when he paused for dramatic effect. “And what happened next?"

Your dad lit up like a Christmas tree. “What happened next? Hell, I scared it off, of course! Big ol’ thing ran like hell. Must’ve known it was no match for me." He slapped his knee, letting out a big belly laugh.

Your brothers exchanged a long, telepathic sibling eye-roll.

But Caitlyn? She just nodded like he’d confessed the cure to cancer. “That’s… that’s really brave of you.”

And somehow, in that moment, watching her charm your family—your chaotic, loud, beer-drinking, fish-failing family—you felt something squeeze in your chest. Something warm. Something terrifying.

She wasn’t just tolerating it. She was choosing it. Choosing you.

Mud, fishing disasters, exaggerated bear stories and all.

Later that night, as you sat together on an old log by the fire, watching the flames flicker against her cheekbones and the stars get tangled in her hair, she nudged your shoulder softly.

“You know… I think I could get used to this."

You turned to her, something huge and heavy and terrifying blooming in your chest. "Yeah?"

“Yeah." She smiled, lacing her fingers through yours. “ I like seeing where you come from. It makes sense now… why you are the way you are."

You laughed, nudging her playfully. “Is that a compliment or an insult?"

"Definitely a compliment." A pause, then softer, like a secret: “A very, very big one.”

And that was the moment you realized… you were so, so in love with her.

──────────────────────

After that trip, something shifted. Quietly. Permanently.

It started with a toothbrush. Then a silk robe. Then a drawer. Then two. Her favorite mug. Her preferred brand of tea—loose leaf, of course, because “You are not putting that cheap microwave-heated water near me ever again.”

"It tastes the same," you argued.

She rolled her eyes. "It really doesn’t. I’m fixing this. For both our dignity."

Mornings became a ritual. You’d wake up tangled together, sunlight pooling across her skin, her cold toes tucked under your calf like they had every right to be there.

"Five more minutes," she'd mumble into your neck. “Just… five.” Always bargaining with time. Always pulling you back in.

She’d shuffle into the kitchen wearing one of your shirts—nothing else—while scrolling the news, groaning dramatically every time a headline pissed her off.

"Your country is insane," she’d mutter, sipping her coffee.

"Yeah, well. We make up for it with free refills."

Even arguments became familiar. Comfortable.

"That’s not how you cut an onion."

"It’s fine. It’s rustic."

"It’s a crime against vegetables."

Some nights you cooked together. Other nights it was takeout eaten on the floor, because the couch was covered in unfolded laundry neither of you were willing to touch.

She started humming. Classical. Jazz. Sometimes stupid jingles that got stuck in her head. And when she thought you weren’t paying attention, she’d sing softly under her breath—barely a whisper.

Sundays became sacred. Farmers markets. Bickering over which wine to buy or what flowers would last the longest in the tiny vase on the kitchen windowsill.

"Get the sunflowers."

"They never last."

"Yeah, but they’re happy. Look at them. They're objectively happy flowers."

She bought them anyway. You never argued.

Even silence became something soft. Something safe. Sitting on opposite ends of the couch—her reading some heavy political memoir, you scrolling through nonsense—but her leg always touching yours. Always.

She fell asleep on you more often than not. Her head on your shoulder. Her breath warm against your neck. You’d lower the volume, pull the blanket over her, press a kiss to her temple without even thinking about it.

By then, it wasn’t a question of if you loved her. It was just… a fact. Quiet. Irrevocable. Written into the very fabric of your everyday life.

It wasn’t grand. Wasn’t cinematic.

It was folding her laundry without being asked. It was her refilling your shampoo before you noticed it was running low. It was kissing you goodnight even when you were mid-argument.

It was love.

Carved softly into the routines of your day.

And God… it was the most terrifying, most beautiful thing you had ever known.

──────────────────────

Everything was great.

Until you met her family.

Her father was welcoming—warm smile, firm handshake, the kind of man who knew how to make anyone feel comfortable. But her mother? No. Her mother had that look. The kind that peeled back your skin and saw every flaw you’d tried to hide. Cold eyes. Tense mouth. Perfect posture.

It hit you like a punch straight to the gut—dragging you all the way back to the beginning. Back to those first months with Caitlyn, when you felt... unworthy. Out of place. Dirty.

Her mother’s gaze swept over you like you were a scuff on her polished floors.

“So,” she started, tone razor-sharp but calm. “You’re the one my daughter has been spending all her time with.”

It wasn’t a question. It was a statement wrapped in judgment, tied with a bow of condescension.

Your throat tightened. “Yeah. Yes, ma’am. I—”

Her eyes flicked over your clothes—simple, nothing designer. Your shoes—practical, a little worn. And then back to your face, where she lingered, unimpressed.

Caitlyn, bless her, immediately stepped in. “Mother,” she warned, voice clipped. “Don’t.”

“I’m simply making conversation,” her mother said, tilting her head with a smile so practiced it felt weaponized. “It’s not every day Caitlyn brings someone... different... home.”

“Different how?” Caitlyn snapped, jaw tightening.

“Oh, darling, you know what I mean.” Her gaze didn’t move. Didn’t blink. “It’s... refreshing, I suppose. To see you… expanding your horizons.”

It felt like acid under your skin. You shifted your weight, suddenly hyperaware of how small you felt in this pristine, echoey sitting room—with its velvet furniture and marble fireplace that probably cost more than your entire apartment building.

Caitlyn’s fingers found yours, squeezing tightly. Her thumb brushed against the back of your hand—reassuring. Grounding.

“I’m not expanding my horizons,” Caitlyn said, steel in her voice now. “I’m dating someone I love.”

Her mother’s smile thinned. “Of course. Love. Naturally.” She stood, smoothing invisible wrinkles from her silk dress pants. “Well. I hope you understand, dear,”—this, aimed at you, dripping in false politeness—“that our family has certain... expectations.”

Her father coughed awkwardly into his glass, choosing silence.

You couldn’t breathe. You couldn’t think. Your stomach twisted in on itself, throat tightening until you felt like you were going to suffocate.

Caitlyn stood abruptly. “We’re leaving.”

Her mother’s eyes barely flickered. “Suit yourself.”

Caitlyn didn’t even wait for her father’s awkward attempt at a goodbye. She laced her fingers with yours and marched you out the front door, heels clicking sharply against marble.

The second you were outside—air hitting your lungs like a slap—you pulled your hand from hers. “Cait, wait—”

She spun around. “No. No, don’t. Don’t defend her. Don’t tell me it’s fine. Don’t do that thing where you pretend you’re not hurt when I know you are.”

“I’m not pretending. I just... God, Caitlyn. What was that? She looked at me like I was—like I was some stray dog you brought home!”

“You think I don’t see it?” Her voice cracked. “You think I didn’t hear every little thing she was implying?!”

You shook your head, backing away a step. “I knew this would happen. I knew it. I don’t belong in your world, Cait. I never did.”

“Stop.” Her hands trembled as she grabbed your face, forcing you to look at her. “Stop. Don’t say that. Don’t ever say that.”

“You heard her! You heard exactly how she sees me.”

“I don’t care how she sees you!” she shouted, voice raw, breaking. “I don’t care how anyone sees you. I love you. I choose you.”

Your lips trembled. “I... Caitlyn, this isn’t just about today. It’s—God, it’s every time I step into your world. I feel like I’m holding my breath. Like I have to... shrink. Make myself smaller. Pretend I fit when I don’t.”

Her breath hitched. “Then let’s stop pretending.”

Silence. Thick. Heavy.

“W-What?”

“Let’s stop pretending we live in two different worlds. Let’s move in together.” Her eyes searched yours, desperate, pleading. “Really move in. No more overnight bags. No more ‘your place or mine.’ Just... ours. A real place. Together.”

You blinked, stunned. “Caitlyn...”

“I’m serious.” Her voice softened, cracking around the edges. “Let’s get a place that’s ours. Somewhere where no one gets to look at you like that ever again.”

Your heart stuttered. “You mean it?”

She exhaled, stepping forward until your foreheads touched. “I mean it. I want... I want a kitchen that smells like us. A bed that feels like ours. A home where you never—never—have to question if you belong.”

Your hands curled into her shirt, gripping tight. “I want that, too.”

She kissed you then. Desperate. Fierce. The kind of kiss that tasted like promises. Like defiance. Like home.

When you pulled apart, breathless, she grinned. “Let’s go apartment hunting.”

“God,” you laughed wetly. “You’re serious.”

“Dead serious.” Her thumb brushed away the tear you hadn’t realized had fallen. “I don’t care where it is. Penthouse, shoebox, treehouse—I don’t care, as long as it’s with you.”

And just like that, the fear—the weight of not fitting, of not being enough—started to crack. Not disappear completely. But crack.

──────────────────────

So, apartment hunting you went.

And, God, it was harder than either of you expected.

Trying to find a place that fit both your budgets was like searching for a unicorn. You didn’t want to drown yourself in extra shifts just to afford half the rent—and Caitlyn, well, she wasn’t thrilled about sacrificing every ounce of comfort and freedom she was used to.

It was a balancing act. A frustrating, exhausting, sometimes hilarious balancing act.

“This one’s cute,” Caitlyn said, scrolling through listings on her phone as you both sat on a park bench with iced coffees. “Two bedrooms, decent commute for both of us. Oh… wait. Nope. No pets allowed.” She tilted her head, frowning. “You do want a cat eventually, right?”

“Obviously,” you snorted. “Non-negotiable.”

She grinned. “Agreed.”

The next place had gorgeous natural lighting but smelled like old cigarettes and regret. Another was perfect—until you saw the price tag. Your stomach dropped so hard you thought it might leave your body entirely.

Then, finally, you found it.

A little apartment on a quiet street, right in the middle between both of your jobs. Big enough for the two of you, with space for her obnoxiously large bookshelf, plus a balcony that didn’t feel like it was one loose screw away from collapse. The rent was… steep. Manageable for her, definitely. For you? Not without sacrificing sleep and sanity.

Caitlyn could see the stress written all over your face. She reached over, lacing her fingers through yours. “Listen,” she said, her voice soft but firm. “I can cover the rent. You can help in other ways. It’s not a problem for me. Truly.”

But your stomach twisted. Your jaw tensed. “It is a problem for me,” you said, sharper than you meant to, pressing the heel of your palm into your eyes like you could physically hold the headache back.

She sighed, squeezing your hand tighter. “Why? Why does it have to be this complicated?”

“Because I don’t want to feel like a charity case, Caitlyn,” you admitted, voice cracking at the edges. “I don’t want to wake up every day knowing I can’t pull my weight. I don’t want to owe you. I don’t want to owe anyone.”

Her face softened immediately, some of the tension bleeding from her shoulders. “Baby.” Her thumb brushed over your knuckles. “Is that seriously what you think this is? Some… some transactional thing? You think I’m keeping score?”

You stayed quiet, staring at the scuffed floor of the real estate office.

“Hey,” she said more gently now, tipping your chin up so you had no choice but to meet her eyes. “Look at me. I don’t care about the money. I care about building a life with you. And that life? It’s gonna look like us. Not like what my mother expects. Not like what anyone else thinks it should be.”

You swallowed thickly. “But it feels unfair.”

“Then let’s make it fair,” she countered immediately. “You handle groceries, I handle rent. You cook, I’ll fix the Wi-Fi when it inevitably dies at 2 a.m. You deal with the plants—because God knows I’ll kill them—and I’ll make sure we always have a bottle of good wine in the cabinet. Equal doesn’t mean identical.”

Your lip wobbled. “That’s… actually not a bad deal.”

A soft smile tugged at her lips. “It’s a pretty damn good deal.”

You sighed, leaning your forehead against hers. “I hate that you’re good at this.”

“I know,” she chuckled, brushing your hair behind your ear. “It’s very annoying.”

A beat of silence passed. Then, grinning mischievously, she added, “So… should we go sign the lease before someone else steals it?”

You laughed, despite everything. “Yeah. Let’s go get our place.”

And just like that, it became real.

It wasn’t just moving boxes and new keys. It was picking out curtains together and arguing over which plates to buy. It was discovering that Caitlyn folded towels like some kind of military operation—perfect rectangles stacked with mathematical precision—while yours looked like abstract art.

It was realizing that her version of grocery shopping involved imported cheeses and $30 olive oil while you were just trying to find the cheapest ramen.

It was watching her struggle to assemble IKEA furniture, muttering under her breath in perfectly enunciated rage, while you tried (and failed) to hold in your laughter.

It was burning your first dinner in the new kitchen because neither of you remembered the oven ran hot. Eating cold pizza on the floor, surrounded by half-unpacked boxes, laughing until your sides hurt.

It was whispered “I love you” in the soft light of the morning, when your voices were still scratchy from sleep.

It was making out, half-tipsy on wine, tangled together on the living room floor because the couch wasn’t built yet—but neither of you cared.

It was falling asleep with her arm draped lazily over your waist, her soft breathing warm against your neck, knowing—really knowing—that this was yours.

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