#going to work on some of the lovely asks i have in my inbox

[f1amour]

「 ✦ F1 GRID — ANGST DRABBLES.

pairings include | max verstappen x assistant!reader, carlos sainz jr. x wolff!reader, charles leclerc x mexican!reader, lando norris x pr!manager!reader

authors note | if you have any requests for some drabbles send them my way! my inbox is always open <3

navigation | main masterlist (coming soon)

— MAX VERSTAPPEN ¹

unrequited love assistant!reader

Becoming an assistant to Max Verstappen was not your plan when you visited Monaco during winter break to celebrate completing your degree. It was a trip you’d been looking forward to all year long after all the long nights of studying and exam taking.

Bumping into Max and getting coffee with him to end up with a one in a lifetime job opportunity was not your plan. You had never imagined going on vacation and ending it with a job.

You also were not planning to fall in love with Max.

Spending two years loving him in the dark was the hardest time in your life. You kept those feelings because he was your boss and you were just his assistant.

But standing here now at the Dutch Grand Prix as Max takes second place you could see the disappointment in his eyes but also the exhaustion. You knew the pressure he has been putting on himself after not having won since June.

"I know it isn't first place but you did amazing out there give the circumstances of how shitty the car is. You made it work." You tell Max while you sit in the seat beside him on your jet.

A few of the drivers were going to join but Max needed space from everyone. You weren't sure why he asked you to stay, you could have given him space as well and booked a flight with everyone else.

A small part of you hoped maybe he needed you and nobody else.

"I just...I don't want to talk about that right now. I'm sorry." With a frown on his face, he traces circles on your thigh; a habit he had for awhile now when he felt upset or anxious.

It wasn't the right place or time to confess your feelings but would there ever be a right time? You figured this was your chance to say it before you fell into a deeper hole of keeping this in.

Maybe he will feel the same way. Maybe.

"Okay we won't talk about that...we can talk about something else? Something I have been wanting to tell you for awhile now."

You take a deep breath, "Okay we won't talk about that...we can talk about something else? Something I have been wanting to tell you for awhile now." Bracing yourself for the confession that is about to come.

Max knew just from the look in your eyes that what you wanted to say was something he had been trying to avoid. But now in the air with no where else to go he would have to hear you out.

"Please y/n don't. Don't say it." His pleas come out almost pathetically. He did not want to hear those three words come out of your mouth when he knows he won't say it back to you.

"I can't keep holding this in any longer than I have. Max, I love you--."

"You can't. No. Y/n please don-."

"I love you. I love you and I need you to hear that now I can't go another two years with you not knowing. I've tried to hide it, I've tried to push it away, but it's no use – I can't escape these feelings for you. From the moment I met you, there was something about you that just...captured me. Your smile, your laugh, your presence. It all took my breath away. I've tried to ignore this feeling, to push it down and forget about it, but it's always there, lurking in the back of my mind. I can't deny these feelings for you any longer."

Y/n's heart sinks into your stomach as the silence hangs heavily in the air after your confession. Max looks at you, and in the depth of his eyes, you see your fears confirmed. There is no glimmer of affection, no hint of reciprocated feelings. Just a cold, unspoken rejection.

You can sense that your words have not had the desired effect, and realization sets in: he does not feel the same.

Max breaks the silence, his voice soft and quiet, "I'm sorry. I don't feel the same way. I'm so sorry."

Feeling vulnerable and exposed at the moment she gives him a soft smile to conceal her tears, "t's okay. It was silly of me to think you would ever love me anyways. I just needed to say it before it consumed me more. I can move on now. I'm just going to do some work on my laptop back here." It was like a switch turned on inside you and you became cold.

Not letting the awkwardness of a now two hour flight ahead of you, you decided to bury yourself in work. Max was unaware of what you typed away on your computer was a letter of resignation something you sent right after separating ways at the airport.

You denied having a proper goodbye because you knew in the end you would have stayed. You love Max but you loved yourself enough to leave instead of hoping one day he would feel the same. Instead of trying everything you could do to get him to love you; you leave hoping you won't have to beg for your love to be reciprocated.

— CARLOS SAINZ JR. ⁵⁵

lovers to enemies wolff!reader

“Did you know?” Carlos questions you, entering the apartment slamming the door. His eyes filled with anger and a hint of sadness.

You smiled at him from the couch, “Hello to you too, grumpy. I don't know what you're talking about.” You say going back to your book.

“Y/n don't play dumb with me. I just got out of a meeting with the team, Lewis is taking my seat next year. You had to have known from your father. Why didn’t you tell me?” Carlos glares at you standing in front of you forcing to take your eyes off your book.

You sit him down next to you and continue, “Can you just try to remember that I’m his manager? We both signed nda's with Ferrari we couldn't tell anyone not even his family, Carlos please I really wanted to tell you but my job would be on the line i would have been fired and possibly sued if the news got out.” You grab his hands, begging him to look at you.

i couldn't tell you

“You…you’ve known all this time? And didn’t tell me?” His face flashes with hurt and you feel so much guilt being the reason he is feeling this way. You knew it was messed up not telling him but this was your job you had to be professional when it came to things like contracts. You hadn’t even told your Dad about it until Lewis was ready to confirm it to him,

“Lewis has been in talks with them for months but he and his agent handling it for that time because he knew how conflicting it would be for me knowing I would probably tell you. He didn’t tell me until a month ago when we had to go through his contract and what not. Baby, please I wanted to tell you but I couldn’t. But I promise all this will fix itself we have a plan!” You explain to him, the last sentence filled with hope and surprise for him but he’s too angry to see through that.

“Promise? You promises seem to have meant nothing as of now. You promised me a lot of things and have kept them but this one? Betraying me? You promised we would be truthful in our relationship turns out only I have been. I can't forgive this. I can’t forgive you.”

His next words hit you like a ton of bricks, “I’m done. Our relationship is done and I need you out of here by tonight. I’ll be back later tonight hopefully you’ll be gone by the time I am back.” He stands up grabbing his keys and you tug his hand back begging him to stay.

“Please please Carlos, I’m begging you you just listen to me. All this will make sense you just need to trust me, please? I love you and you love me—.”

“No. I don’t think I do anymore. Someone who loves me would have never done this to me. Have a great life.” He pushes your hand away and walks out not glancing back as you yell for him begging him to come back.

It took you a few hours to gather all your things taking a few breaks in between to stop yourself from crying but there was no use in that, if anyone saw your puffy read eyes they’d know immediately.

As you zip up your final suitcase you hear the door open and expecting to see Carlos coming into your bedroom you’re met with a blonde woman wrapped around him.

You clear your throat as they almost kiss in front of you and Carlos quickly turns to you not expecting you to still be here and his heart drops to his stomach, “What are you still doing here?” You scoff wiping your tears away, that’s all he had to say?

“Just finishing up. Charles said he will grab the rest of my bags tomorrow since I’m staying with him and Alexandra for now.” You tell him and grab your purse before taking the picture frame that was filled with collages of you and Carlos, taking it with you to the living room as Carlos follows after you.

You throw the picture frame into the trash can, “Why did you do that?” Carlos asks you.

You shrug pulling an envelope out of your purse, “Our relationship is done like you said. The decent thing you could have done is fucked someone at least 24 hours after we break up not three hours later. When you realize what you've lost you will fucking regret it all, Carlos. Have a good life.” You mimic his previous choose of words in your last sentence.

Shoving the envelope to his chest he watches you in confusion as to what it pertains, “Congrats.” You tell him walking out the door and out of his life not giving him a chance to ask anything.

It’s as if his heart felt you getting further and further away with every step his heart began to feel heavy. As he opens the envelope his heart stops seeing the words written in bold; CARLOS SAINZ JR. 2025 MERCEDES DRIVER CONTRACT & AGREEMENTS.

— CHARLES LECLERC ¹⁶

friends to lovers to strangers mexican!reader

FRIENDS.

Meeting Charles in 2019 at the Mexico City Grand Prix was one of your favorite moments you’ll ever have. Closing your world tour in your home country he and a few of the other drivers along with their girlfriends had gone to your closing night. You were a fan of the sport and more specifically a fan of the Ferrari driver.

Your team let you know he was out there which made you much more nervous but either way you killed it out there and made lots of eye contact with him. They go backstage per your request and you get along easily with everyone but it was Charles you connected with most.

Form then on you guys became an inseparable duo that the world shipped so much but you both always denied the dating rumors. Your friendship with Charles was purely platonic.

You both experienced each others best and worst moments personally but also career wise. Maybe that was one of the first things that made you both realize the platonic love you had might be a little more.

LOVERS.

You both had been in bed watching a movie one night when Charles finally made a move with a simple sweet kiss that turned to more later that night.

You were attached to each other even more now despite having busy schedules. You made it work and planned out your schedules to spend the most time you can together. It was perfect for the next three years and despite the small arguments you would have every now and then you guys always made up.

Charles was devoted to you. He would be exhausted from a race weekend but would get home excited to help you create new music. You’d be singing or on the guitar while he played the piano sharing ideas on what melody to use. He understood you so well. He knew every single thing about you even the smallest of details that you didn’t notice yourself.

You knew all his habits. The ones he had before and after racing. He’d go into a little mental bubble hours before a race trying his best to push himself to do his greatest. You knew he loved massages after a race so you’d always be waiting in his room to give him that. He adored the little notes you’d leave him in various spots where he could find them on different occasions while you are off touring.

Until one day, the loving touches and words of affirmation turned into bitter arguments and no loving touches at all.

“It’s over isn’t it?” You smiled at Charles as he holds onto you, he had been visiting for a few days during summer break but it was time to get back to work. You spent the days arguing a routine that you’ve both been getting used to now.

Questioning why he spent only a few days with you and spent most of the break with friends. He threw the argument back to why had you scheduled your tour dates around his break.

It had been the moment of realization for the two of you that you loved each other but you were no longer putting each other first. You didn’t act like lovers. You didn’t act like best friends. You acted more like strangers.

“I’m so sorry.” Charles apologizes, tears filling his eyes that match yours. You shake your head wiping his tears away and he mimics you, “I’m sorry. We both love each other but we stopped trying. We stopped taking care of each other…of our love.” You lean against his hands cupping your face.

This would be the last time you’d be in each others arms and you wanted to cherish it forever.

“I love you. I’ll always love you.” Charles chants, closing his eyes he says it repeatedly almost a if he were hoping to wake up from this nightmare.

“Te amo, Charles. Siempre.” Your lips meets his one last time savoring the moment for as long as you can until he is called over for his departing flight.

He walks away hoping maybe one day you could meet again and it would be a different story. Maybe your love story didn’t end here.

STRANGERS.

A year had passed and you’d been taking a much deserved break from singing. Enjoying life in Mexico exploring new spots and meeting new people. You made new friends but never forgot about the ones you made in the past.

The Mexico Grand Prix once again coming up this weekend and you had been invited by Red Bull Racing. An offer you didn’t decline wanting to support your fellow Mexican driver and friend Checo Perez but also to catch up with Max who you’d grown close to the last year.

Everyone in the paddock talked about your arrival and what was to be expected if you bumped into your former ex. You could care less what the media asked of you as you walked alongside Max and Kelly talking about your next album. As you walk your heart stops when you see Charles walking towards you with Carlos next to him eyeing the situation Kelly and Max doing the same with you.

But as you approach each other you simply stare straight ahead spying no attention to him and his teammate who give a quick wave to the couple next to you and continue walking past you.

No one else seemed to noticed your hand reaching for Charles as you walked by him, his hand reaching for yours as well. It felt like a force of habit. Maybe that’s why they reached for each other

But in the end they walked away as strangers.

Strangers with memories of each other.

— LANDO NORRIS ⁴

grumpy x sunshine pr!manager!reader

You weren’t sure why Lando had grown such a strong dislike from you since the moment you met. You were hired as his new PR manager for the 2022 season and you were the youngest member of the communications team but they didn’t underestimate you.

You proved yourself being Daniel Ricciardo’s PR manager for the 2022 season but after he left you were assigned to be Lando’s PR manager after his last one left the team.

Being in charge of Lando was…a mission.

It could have been easy if he didn’t treat you so terribly. He treated you as if you were a robot; pure work and no worry that his hurtful words affected you.

Despite the hurt he made you feel every day you spent together you still arrived to every race weekend with a smile. You played the part of the perfect PR manager despite the constant belittling of received from the McLaren driver.

But sooner or later that light would dim.

“She’s just aggravating. Always coming in with a smile and giving me advice on what I should do or say when I’m with the media.” Lando rants to Oscar as they sit in his drivers room waiting for interviews to begin.

“I mean…that’s technically her job.” Oscar defends you, he had grown close to you and your bubbly personality always lighting up a room. He wasn’t sure why Lando was so angry towards you.

Lando was fine with everyone else but you. He was a charming guy with a smile on his face but plenty did notice the scowl on his face that would cover his usual smile when he was around you.

He was cruel to you but for some fucked up reason you found yourself developing a crush on him. You weren’t sure why you liked him why every thought you had was about him. He was invading your mind and heart, even if he hated you.

You noticed the small things he enjoyed, like distressing with a good playlist after a race. He enjoyed finding new cameras to add to his collection. He wasn’t an avid drinker but did enjoy a vodka cran ever so often. He wouldn’t admit it but you could tell he was get homesick sometimes and wish his family were with him at every race.

So you made it your mission to FaceTime his family every weekend before and during a race. Whether he made it to the podium or not you’d hand your phone over to him so he can talk to his family. He had always assumed it was his family who asked you to do this gesture every race week but oh boy was he wrong.

You walk into the McLaren hospitality ready for the weekend with a plate of homemade cookies in your hand. You made sure to hand a cookie to everyone you said hello to until you arrived to the garage and saw Lando with his race engineer and Andrea beside them.

You approach them with a smile ready to offer them some cookies, “Hey guys, I made—.”

“Y/n can’t you see we’re busy right now? This is an actual job and we put time into it unlike yours you just tell me I need to smile and be fake, I got it. Let us be now.” Lando’s word spit out like venom intended to hurt you in every shape possible. His mind is telling him how fucked up that was but he was so stressed about his car that he didn’t realize it until it was too late and you had tears in your eyes.

“Right. Sorry.” You smile tearfully walking away quickly not having the chance to hear the two men next to Lando scolding him for treating you with such disrespect.

“Get that attitude fixed of yours against the girl, Lando. I’m not gonna deal with it any longer if you keep it up. She’s a great girl and has proven what a great job she does for this team and for you especially.”

Andrea’s words echo through his mind the entire race weekend and despite his cruel words towards you he noticed you still managed to put a smile on your face.

It was time to head out after scoring second place at the Chinese Grand Prix. Lando was looking around for you confused why you hadn’t been at the press conference and you had sent an intern instead.

He gets to his room hoping maybe you were in there and he was ready to apologize but found an empty room instead. A plate of cookies on his table and papers next to it, he approaches the table and looks at the small note on the plate of wrapped cookies, “asked your mom for her recipe since you said you missed her baking cookies for you. hope i do them justice <3”.

He felt guilt consume him realizing that your earlier gesture was made for him specifically and he had blown you off. His eyes look at the papers next to the plate and he sits on his chair in disbelief reading your letter of resignation papers. You quit on the spot and had already been long gone since the race began.

Good luck on the rest of your season, you’ll be a winner soon I’ll always believe in you.

He read the text over and over again that you had sent prior to leaving but he not seen it since he was racing. He spent the next week going back to the text and your note, you showed him so much kindness and all he ever was show you the opposite.

Arriving in Miami he didn’t realize how crucial your role was in guiding him with the media. The new PR manager wasn’t terrible but they weren’t like you. You still have him the liberty to be himself as he had the right to but this manager was useless.

The most unexpected part of this weekend was him finally winning his first ever Grand Prix in his career of being in Formula One. His heart beating with all the adrenaline running in his veins as he reaches his team celebrating with them.

But as he hugged everyone around him he looked around waiting for the one person he wanted to see and celebrate with; you.

It was all too late. He realized his feelings for you until you were gone and now here was begging to see you smiling face in the crowd.

Getting a small moment to himself he opened his phone and saw a text from you;

“Congrats. I knew this year would be yours. Keep on winning, future world champion.”

He didn’t deserve you not when his cruelty pushed you away and still somehow showed him the love he now wanted to give you.

[xazse]

hiii pookie I LOVED your hybrid post like it got me foaming from the mouth ngl 🫶 you're so talented!!

If you're into it, can we get cowhybrid! reader and Farmer!Gojo specifically please and thank you? I need to see the reader all needy and desperate and Gojo being the only one who can truly give her release and and what she truly needs (feel free to remix or add anyone/anything that you please)

If you're not into it, please ignore this ask instead of refusing because I get embarrassed hihi🎀🫶 anyways mwah mwah love u take care pookie

ANOTHER TRY?

Notes: THANK YOU FOR THE COMPLIMENTS IM GLAD YOU ENJOYED MY WORK!!! and to the second ask I’m very happy you requested that bull!hybrid work lLOVEDDD WORKING ON IT!! You guys are so creative I need to eat ur brain!!! THIS IS FOR ALL THE OTHER PEOPLE WHO HAVE BEEN ASKING FOR A PT2 I SEE YOU GUYS!!! (IF UR READING THIS TO MY OTHER INBOX OFC YOU CAN BE 🪬 ANON!!)

Pairings: CowHybrid!Reader x Farmer!Gojo

Warnings: Lactation + big!boobedReader + implied chubby!reader + nipplesucking + grinding + mean!Satoru + pussy!slapping + teasing.

Gojo has spoiled you for far too long it makes his blood boil and temples wrinkle when you continue to go see Toji and Suguru, it becomes a habit for you to come back in the early mornings after having a night of “fun.”

Confronting said men proved to be so fucking useless, they just laughed in his face when he said he’d kick both of them to the curb should they continue to corrupt you.

“You need us Satoru, why are you allowed to have your nightly routines but she cant? It was gonna happen eventually.” Tojis face was decorated with a fat sneer, all those times he tried to make sure you stayed as far as possible were all for naught, it’s hilarious seeing him seething behind a cool facade.

“Never knew what Toji seen in the woman but now I completely understand his point.” Suguru yelled from where he was transporting some wood.

Talking to them proved to be useless, as a little payback he made them clean the shed from top to bottom.

Trudging back to the main house in his thick boots Satoru comes to face you relaxing on the couch without a damn care in the world.

Why is he trying to get them to be on his level when he should be punishing you, you’re the one who didn’t listen, you’re the one sneaking out every night. He doesn’t know why he feels this hold on you, you’re such a beautiful girl that he can’t help but keep you in this small bubble.

When your eyes land on him you don’t say any kind of greeting, simply ignoring his presence for the movie on the huge ass tv he bought for you and eating the expensive food he bought for you.

You look extremely good right now, your fat boobs not swollen, but your pretty lips are. Satoru won’t say it but his pants tighten at the thought of what they do to you.

He needs you right now, he’ll make it up to you as much as he can.

He approaches you calmly and collected, sitting down at the edge of the couch where your legs are propped up, you still don’t acknowledge him. His trained hands start circling on your soft supple skin, you surprisingly don’t push him away. You give Satoru an inch he’ll take a mile.

He starts groping your thighs, the pudgy things hold within the creases of his hand. He pushes your thighs apart and gets a good look at your panties: you always choose to walk around the house like this.

They’re extra tight the way they emphasize your fat pussy, the groan that slips from his lips aren’t-something he tries to hold back, he needs you to know how much he wants you, especially wants you all to himself.

The rise and fall of your chest makes you look so cute, why are you so shy all of a sudden? You’re averting your eyes as well.

Satoru starts teasing your clothed folds, dragging his thick finger up and down, he pushes extra hard on your clit eliciting a small moan from you. He continues this for a little, he needs you wet to take him properly.

He peels off your soddened panties and positions himself above you, finally face to face with you. Your boobs are the first thing he attacks, pulling on your shirt and letting them spill out, the little droplets of milk call to him. He’s grabbing one and putting it into his mouth: he loves your taste so sweet like honey as it cascades down his throat so smoothly.

“Nghm… Toru..” finally you’ve decided to grace him with your sultry voice.

He bites down a little on your nipple making you jump away. He reels you right back in and sucks even harsher, there’s barely any milk left but he’s going to make sure he gets his full.

“Toru.” You call his name so panicked and yet you’re grinding against his fully hard cock. He’s so desperate in the moment that he unbuckles his belt and lets his cock bob free.

His fat tip prods agaisnt your folds, messing with your sticky wetness, he smears it on his tip even grinding down on your clit, but he doesn’t put it in, you don’t deserve that.

He teases you, pretending he’s going to give you what you want just to take it all away.

“Please…” a harsh and loud smack is delivered straight to your clit, you yelp and buckle your legs closed.

“Shirt, take your shirt off.” He commands, of course you’re gonna listen, Satoru has never taken that tone with you.

Your boobs now freely spill for him to gaze at. He spreads your legs back open.

“I’m gonna give you ten slaps, close your legs for even one I’m restarting. Understood?” You nod and your ears move along with it. He likes this look on your face: confusion, arousal and a little bit of fear.

On the first slap you make the mistake of shutting your legs closed: completely an accident but he’s having none of it, he hits your little clit again and again.

“Ahn..” you’re still so fucking wet by the sixth slap, creating a nasty mess that drips to your ass. Gojo’s cock is still throbbing, he jerks himself off, smearing his pre all over.

By the tenth slap you’re gone, completely dazed and only able to whine outloud, he decides that you’ve had enough with the tears that sit on your eye line. He pushes your legs back and lines his weeping tip. The feeling of sliding into your sopping wet cunt is better than any pussy he’s ever had.

His strokes against you are fast even though he should be letting you adjust, the sounds of skin against skin meeting each other is downright lewd.

He tells you to rub your nipples, it adds so much more stimulation that you can’t find it in you to hate it.

His cock drags agaisnt your walls over and over, till you can’t feel anything but the sensitivity of your nipples and the twitching of his fat cock.

He fucks you like that all night, even when you’re meant to meet Toji and Suguru, you can’t stop creaming around farmer Gojos length and nor do you want to.

[writingquestionsanswered]

Hi! Could you talk more about "character development exercises", please?:]

Character Development Exercises

Character development exercises are writing exercises you can do to help you explore and develop your characters. This isn't a required part of writing or character development, but many writers find it helpful. Here are some that I like to do when I'm struggling to get to know a character:

Character Interview - imagine that you’ve pulled your character out of a story into the room and now have the opportunity to interview them. What questions would you ask them? What do you want to know about them that you don’t already know? What do you think the reader would want to know? What might be pertinent to the story that you haven’t thought about yet?

TV Crew follow around - Imagine you’ve dropped an invisible TV crew into your story’s world to follow your character around through an average day (even if it's anachronistic). Follow them from the moment they wake up until the moment they go to bed that night. What are they like when they wake up? What is their morning routine? What do they eat for breakfast? How do they get ready? What do they do throughout the day? Who do they interact with? What else do they eat and drink? What do they do for fun or relaxation? How to they make money or meet their basic needs? What is their bedtime routine like?

Letters or Journal Entries - Look at your character's back story, off-screen events, etc. and find something for your character to write about in a journal entry or a letter to another character. What would they say about this event? How does it make them feel? What do they think about it?

Use Your Character in a Writing Prompt - Look at some writing prompts and do one using your character as the main character. You can keep it within your story's world or plop them into a whole different world. Whatever works for you and your story. This is about getting to know this character in a different context than the events of your story provides.

Create a Character Mood Board/Aesthetic - Mood boards go a long way in mentally fleshing out a character for me. Being able to have a visual representation of their style, their vibe, things that are important to them, etc. really turns them into real people in my mind.

Create a Playlist for Your Character - I think playlists can also be a really great way to mentally flesh out a character in your mind. Sometimes, just having a particular song or a playlist of songs that makes you think of them gives them some dimension they wouldn't otherwise have.

Happy writing!

•••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••

I’ve been writing seriously for over 30 years and love to share what I’ve learned. Have a writing question? My inbox is always open!

♦ Questions that violate my ask policies will be deleted! ♦ Please see my master list of top posts before asking ♦ Learn more about WQA here

[joeyalohadream]

Hi me again.

I saw your post about how you received a negative anon message and was hoping you didn’t mean me? I sent you an ask about how much I loved your clegan childhood best friends idea (like literally can’t stop thinking about it) and just suggested that you could give the idea to another great writer in the fandom. I think it’s just as cool to be the idea maker sometimes and I wasnt insulting you.

I really do love your writing but you do take a long time to post new stuff and that particular idea is just everything to me so I don’t want it to be in limbo.

like you posted a bit of an angsty story the other day and got people excited and now you haven’t mentioned it again. Just don’t want that to happen to the childhood story cause it’s such a good idea.

sorry for rambling I just had to come back and say sorry if I’m the anon that made you feel bad. Wasn’t my intention..

Sorry everyone that reads this but I'm taking some of Swifty's backbone for a minute and answering a negative anon. Hiding my response below the cut so you can scroll past without seeing my drama if you'd like...

---

Of course it was your message that I was referring to.

In this fandom, full of the most wonderfully kind people I've ever interacted with, your message was the only negative one I've ever received. The fact that you could send that message, and now this one and somehow not understand that you're being incredibly hurtful is beyond me.

I wasn't going to respond to this message at all, just like I didn't respond to the first one you sent (just flat out deleted that one), but someone posted about my 'childhood friends au' today and brought it all back.

I checked out library books for research for that story and wrote the most detailed outline of any story I've ever thought up. And after your message, I returned the books and scrapped the story because you made me feel like garbage.

You flat out told me to give my idea to a specific writer in the Mota fandom that would 'turn it into a masterpiece'. You and I can agree on the fact that the writer you mentioned is one of the most talented fanfic writers around. They are. But to be so blatantly rude to me about my own writing and to call it 'advice'? Come on. You have to know you're being an asshole.

I'm a kind person. I'm also sensitive and hate confrontation and it even makes my stomach hurt to respond to this message because I don't like being unkind to ANYONE. I work two jobs. I work 60 hours a week most weeks. The fact that I find time to write anything is something I'm proud of and you calling me 'inconsistent' is just absolutely unempathetic.

Since you keep choosing to remain anonymous, this is the only way I can know I reach you to tell you this:

If you follow me, unfollow me. Don't interact with my posts. Don't read my stories. And stay the hell out of my inbox.

[robbiefischer]

this is incredibly dumb but i'm still exhausted from hosting thanksgiving like... dear body can you please get it tf together? it's been almost a week.

[imagoddamnonionmason]

Can I say one thing?

Why do people have to comment on other people’s way of conducting themselves in a fandom? If there’s an aspect of a fandom that’s you’d rather not see/interact with, then appropriately blacklist, block or do whatever so you don’t see that content.

But DO NOT go to other people’s blogs, comment on their works or their art, or do anything that might ruin their day, undermine their confidence and hard work, or overall make them feel bad.

Yes. This is about oc x canon. Fuck, it’s even about self inserts.

If that’s how someone wishes to spend their time in a fandom because it brings them joy, LET THEM DO IT.

It does not hurt you.

It does not attack you.

You can do something really responsible and NOT INTERACT.

Aka. DON’T LIKE? DON’T READ/LOOK.

It really is that simple of a concept and I have never been more baffled that this is what fandoms have become like.

[the-broken-pen]

A sapphic detective who gets too close to the truth of a case and gets confronted by her girlfriend for being too obsessed?

“You need to stop.”

The detective didn’t jerk up at the sound of her voice—just quietly stirred, rustling papers as she shifted upright to meet her eyes.

“I didn’t hear you come in,” the detective said slowly, eyes scanning over her. She watched her gaze catch on the water dripping from the ends of her hair, the mascara smudging itself down her cheeks.

“It’s date night,” she said, and even to her own ears her voice sounded tired. Dead. Rotting roses and dirty dishes in the sink.

The detective blinked once, then shifted through her papers until she found a scribbled in calendar. It was stuck on the wrong month.

“I forgot,” the detective murmured. It wasn’t an apology, and neither of them were pretending that it was. She could tell, even now, with her girlfriend pathetic and dripping water onto the hardwood floor in front of her, that the detective wanted nothing more than to go back to her evidence.

“Yeah,” she croaked. “Funny how it’s never the case you forget.”

The detective jerked, slightly, like she hadn’t expected the barbs in her girlfriend’s voice.

In the hallway, there was a drooping bouquet of flowers she hadn’t been able to bear bringing into the apartment.

“You know how important this is,” the detective implored, and it made her want to break things. Burn the papers, shatter the fancy glasses in the cabinet, spill wine across the carpets.

What about me, she wanted to scream. Am I not important to you anymore?

Instead, she said again, “You need to stop.”

“Stop?”

“The case. You need to stop.”

“I can’t just stop,” the detective laughed slightly, as if she thought it would convey how inconceivable the idea of stopping was.

“Yes, you can. Give it to someone else. There’s a whole precinct just waiting for you to put this file into their hands.”

At the thought of it, the thought of giving up this case, the hunt, the chase, pain flashed across the detective’s face.

“You don’t understand.”

“I do,” she replied. She had to shift her gaze to the dead plant on the corner of her partner’s desk, dirt dry and leaves brittle. “How could I not?”

“So then how could you ask me to do that? To give it all up? Why now?”

She had so many answers to that. So many moments that cut into her hands like a mosaic of memories. The bed empty beside her through the entire night. Cancelled reservations, one seat alone at the dinner table, laughs that died in her ribs. Friends, well meaning, who asked where the detective was, and the painful smiles she forced through the explanations. Work, and work, and work. Crime scene photos on the coffee table. The loneliness that seemed to care about her more than her girlfriend did.

There were so many times when she almost said something. Almost said enough. But she hadn’t, and now they were here, as she dripped a puddle onto the floor, and the detective looked at her like she had never seen her before.

When she tried to say that, any of that, it caught in her throat.

The detective took her silence for an inability to answer. A lack of evidence. Like she was throwing this tantrum for no reason, a little kid in the toy aisle of the store.

The detective sighed, rubbing a hand over her forehead. The other was already fanning through the papers once more. Her voice turned into something that begged to be understood.

“I’m so close—“

“To losing me.” She swallowed, painfully. “You’re losing me.”

“That’s not fair.”

“This isn’t fair,” her voice broke as she gestured between the two of them. “What you’re doing to me isn’t fair.”

“I’m not doing anything—“

“Exactly.” It was louder than she meant it to be. They both flinched.

“I’ll have it solved in a week, I promise.” She wasn’t sure who the detective was promising to.

“No.”

The detective blinked.

“No?”

“You heard me the first time.”

“I heard you, but I’m not sure what you’re saying ‘no’ to.”

If she had the energy to be slightly meaner, she would have told her to figure it out. Told her that she was a detective, this should be easy for her.

“I’m not giving you a week.” She took a deep breath. “And you’re not going to solve it.”

The detective’s looked at her like she didn’t recognize the person on the other side of the desk.

Finally, she understood what it felt like to face her girlfriend from the other side of an interrogation table.

Her girlfriend’s face was cold, and closed off. Her jaw was grinding into itself. She was staring at her like she couldn’t decide whether or not to consider her a suspect. As if the only reason she could fathom her girlfriend saying something like that was if she was actively sabotaging her.

She was cold, and her coat was wet, and this place no longer felt like home.

“You won’t solve this case.”

She was pretty sure there wasn’t anything crueler she could have said.

“You don’t know anything.” It was dripping with venom, and fear, and frustration. The fear the detective really wouldn’t solve it. The frustration that it still wasn’t solved.

“Do you really think you’re that special?” By now, it was too far gone for her to stop. There was no pretty way out of this. “You aren’t. This isn’t a TV show. You aren’t the main character who swoops in where no one else has before. It’s been decades of the same bullshit—taunting and evidence trails, and nobody has solved it. Don’t you think if it was solvable, it would have been by now?”

“There’s new evidence, and I’m not them—“

“What part of ‘you aren’t special’ don’t you understand,” she hissed, and the detective shifted away from her. “You aren’t the miracle detective who solves this. They’re going to keep on killing, and driving the people who try and find them crazy, and you’re letting them do it to you.”

“I’m not letting them do anything.”

“But you are,” she countered. “You have been for months. They’re messing with you. They’re everything to you, and you’re a game to them, and I’m nothing on the sidelines.”

“Babe, that’s not true,” The detective tried, voice softening. As if she had just realized something between them was wrong. That her girlfriend was hurting—had been, for a while.

She swallowed the tears rising in her throat.

“Do I need to become a crime scene for you to finally care about me again?” She slammed her hand down on the papers. Pretended the wince on the detectives face was concern for her, and not the papers she crumpled. “Will you look at me, love me again, if I’m a bloody photograph in this folder?”

“I do love you.”

“When someone loves someone else, they don’t leave them alone in the rain, waiting to be picked up. They don’t cancel to go dig through old archives on their loved one’s birthday. They don’t leave them in the middle of the night and let the blankets beside them get cold. People who love someone don’t live their life without a concern for the person they’re putting below everything else.”

“You’re making this really hard.”

“Good,” she snapped. “Because you’ve been making it hard to love you for months, and I’m glad you finally know how it feels.”

The detective paused, at that. Swallowed, eyes flitting around the room as if she would find the perfect thing to say in the remnants of the life they had built together.

“I love you,” The detective managed. Somehow, it was the worst thing she could have said.

“Good. Prove it.” She thought maybe dying would have hurt less than this.

“Prove it?”

“Prove it. Me, or the case.”

The detective froze.

“You don’t mean that,” she said, and it sounded like a plea. Don’t make me choose.

“Look at me and try and tell me I’m joking.” When the detective said nothing, she pushed further. “Go on. Do it. Choose.”

“I can’t do that—“ the detective choked. “This isn’t fair, you know that. I’m so close.”

Somehow, she had expected it to hurt less.

“Don’t make me choose,” the detective, her girlfriend, the love of her life finally said, voice breaking.

She had thought it would feel like dying.

It felt like nothing.

“You just did,” she said. The tears refused to be held, this time. The pain ran rampant through every word.

She knew her girlfriend could hear it.

“I love you,” the detective whispered. A final, desperate prayer for her to stay. But she was no god, and her girlfriend was no believer. And it would never be enough.

She let the door slam on the way out.

The detective never did solve that case.

[mymp3]

I had a lot of the same issues with reload as I see you’re having, and I do think most of it is from the new team’s inexperience. They’re trying to recreate a game that made very purposeful decisions in its mechanics and cutscenes without understanding why those decisions were made, which really undermines the experience.

If the team had more experience under their belt, or had full creative decision on an entirely new game, I feel like they could make a really good game! Reload is not that though.

I completely agree anon. It's a shame too, because it's not an awful game, just a different one. I wish they hadn't tried to recreate FES as a test project on a shoestring budget when it was literally the benchmark for our modern Persona games. It changed so much, it's iconic, a cult classic.

I really wish they wouldn't have lied about not planning EpiAi beforehand so they could cover the fact that the game doesn't look all too good. I wish they hadn't charged $200 for an "Aigis Edition" and not include the dlc. I wish they hadn't sanitized and scrubbed the game about death and grieving of all things that were slightly upsetting. That's what ended up happening though, and as you said, they're trying to recreate a game that was very purposeful in its creation.

Reload was a cheap quick test that they knew would work because it has a wonderful story and dedicated fans. As long as they make it a fun popcorn game, they don't have to put in those purposeful additions or think about it much at all.

[ruinakete]

cannoli - how does your muse express love? how do they act when in love that differs from how they act around others normally?

PASTRY LOVE HEADCANONS ・ not accepting!

hrm hrm hrm ... under the assumption that love, at least for the first question, extends to its platonic and familial forms, then the simple answer would be the phrase from her inspiration tag, "love is pain. pain is punishment". the third part would simply repeat, "and punishment is love".

although I've discussed her view on romantic love in small headcanons, I do not think it would stray too far from her ideals surrounding familial and platonic love. after all, are all forms of love not customary for obligation? is there not something to be given and laid in your partner's hands no matter the bond?

while I highly disagree with the notion that Zephia had any actual love, whether romantic or any, for Sombron, as she debunks this thought when speaking to Griss in Chapter 23, the way she behaves towards him is what she would expect from her partner; obedient, eager to please, and attentive to all she says. since he was the one to find her, centuries ago, she is the one who owes him all she is. servitude is the only expression of love that she believes is genuine.

anyone can say they love you. anyone can perform grand feats of public love. anyone can open their coin pouch and buy a gift in your name. but only a few can, without hesitation, throw themselves at your feet to make you smile.

the only difference between romantic, familial, and platonic love is the degree of affection; and how much you would sacrifice and lose in their name. "love is pain. pain is punishment. and punishment is love." can you really love someone if you are not willing to cut out their heart at the happenstance of betrayal? what of infidelity? failure? pain and punishment will always have a place in Zephia's heart, and, as such, will be equally taught to those she loves.

if you do not commit to the part, then you will be punished. if you do not reciprocate, then you will be hurt. to be loved, and be able to love, is the consent to withstand the inevitable pain that follows any relationship. and because Zephia will only love someone she sees as worthy, first, then her approach calls for their servitude, not the other way around.

love is pain, but that pain is not a two-way street until you tilt the scales of the hierarchy and step out of line.

[cerealmonster15]

I have to ask WHY on earth did they turn Flannery into a goldfish??? What did he do to them to make them want to Literally Curse Him??

man. thats a good question. let's see if i have an answer JFKLDSKFLJDS

i'll be real a lot of it was me kinda winging it improv style - i should probs clarify [im not sure how clear i am on artfight lol] that moooost of my non twst characters are like, from a roleplay thing my friend and i do in google docs together kfdsjfl so thats where flannerys from. and then sometimes, plotlines and characters stem from an idea on a whim - like originally i had an idea for flannery to be a lost prince that was turned into a fish by like, enemy hitmen or sometihing.

and tbh that makes more sense than family betrayal LOL but i thiiiiiiiiiink i swapped it to son of a politician and also an influencer [cries lol] because it fit the 'modern au' better. modern fantasy. whatever. also we do have a separate au googledoc universe that IS royalty themed so maybe one day he will be a missing prince there teehee

ok anyway sorry i havent answered your actual question i got distracted lol. so aside from half of it being me coming up with shit on the fly and being kind of bad at storytelling klsjfkdshf the IN UNIVERSE ANSWER is like, flannery kinda just doesnt have a good relationship with his family - his parents suck and flannerys not a "useful asset" and is also the product of infidelity. so it's like, he's not going to be a powerful politician or business guy, he's not good on camera, and also theres this unspoken secret of him being someone else's son <- i think my idea here was like, the father is Aware his wife was having an affair and that flannery isnt his kid but neither of them have Spoken Of It because blah blah keeping up appearances a divorce would be a scandal whatever. you know how it is with traditional family values 😒

and i think i have also just watched a lot of youtube videos covering family vlogger scandals/ also just regular vlogger scandals, and sometimes that shits just wild LOL so i was like ok. politician dad doesnt like or care about this kid, vlogger mom sees his disappearance as months worth of content to milk lol. so they hired someone to Get Rid Of Him - i cant remember if they... planned the fish part. maybe. i guess so? the plan tho was just have him turned into a fish that would probably get eaten and act like he got kidnapped or ran away and then announce hes dead later.

flannery's got an older brother that shows up at his school and is like, a clone of their mom, in that hes like "omg theres this GUY HERE who is PRETENDING to be my DEAD BROTHER i need to live stream this." and then something something their relation was proved and he pivoted immediately to "oh wowwww my poor sweet brother i cant BELIEVE our parents tried to cover you up like this wow i missed u so much let's be besties [lie]"

so anyway. there kind of isnt that a good reason besides drama + theyre in a magical setting and i thought it was fun LOL. flannery's one of my much newer characters so i havent had a lot of time to fully flesh out his character yet. he's a lil one note right now and i need to figure him out a bit more to make him,,,, actually interesting,,, but. 🫡

[pepprs]

dont worry abt responding to my messages!! they can be little trinkets for u to keep forever if u wanna :)))

dear anon… how could i not respond to THESE!!!!!!!!!! 😭💗💗💗💗💗💗💗 you are the sweetest kindest most WONDERFUL soul. it is an honor to receive these beautiful letters and i hope you know how much i cherish each and every one. not just the words but the adventures you take me on and write up for the two of us!!! and the beauty and magic you help me to see in the world around me and the peace and love and love and love you conjure for me in moments when i cant find it or feel it so easy!!!! like idk i know i have no idea who you are outside of being dear anon and i only answer asks once in a blue moon but it truly means the world to me. TRULY.

your writing feels like all the best things, all the things i love most. like leaf piles in the fall and the pikmin bloom soundtrack (btw if you dont play that already i HIGHLY recommend it to you specifically, i think u would really like it and tbh you sending me these letters has the same vibe as my pikmin bringing me postcards from their adventures :"~DDDD!!! if you ever do join it please lmk i would LOVE to be friends and send you postcards and do adventures together!!!!) and frosting on cupcakes and twinkly dust motes in the sunlight and cumulus clouds and dogwood flowers and the way things made of glass refract rainbows and SUNLIGHT SUNLIGHT SUNLIGHT. and even that isnt cutting it. how magical it all is. like i wish i wasnt so exhausted so i could express it better but it truly is so... idk. NOSTALGIC! COZY! HOME!!!!!

so... in order to try to articulate it (and also show my thanks / return the favor / etc.), i am sending this letter along with a care package knitted with word and song and magic and light. enclosed please find:

wind chimes that sing like the sun hitting the lake (also i REALLY want to get a butterfly hair clip!!! i cant wear hair clips or anything else fancy in my hair bc of my mask headbands but id love to have one in case im ever able to wear it in the future 🥹)

a heart-shaped pebble from brighton, to add to your collection (btw i LOVE the part about how you lost them a long time ago but you love them so you remember what they look like. WAUGH. gut punch GUT PUNCH IN THE BEST WAY!!!!)

a mug for hot chocolate, so we can share some together when it gets cold again -- decorated with hand-painted stars in all colors!

a tiny needle to knit your sundust satchels -- like the kind youd find in pixie hollow or the tale of desperaux or something (also both things that have dear anon vibes to me and are also DEEPLY nostalgic for me!)

a recipe for starfait, with illustrations!! (also i LOVE that idea for a replacement for "tesscore"!! but i may end up using that for my personal tag on my undertale / deltarune blog instead bc its so perfect (and also im HONORED that u associate that with me 😭😭😭😭))

a crown and wand for you to wear to match the fairy queen mouse while you write the same kind of magic and comfort she brings!

a packet of magical flower seeds that sprout the most whimsical sweet-smelling flowers, with petals that are soft to the touch!

a hand-woven scarf in your favorite color threaded with shiny silver strands, like comets streaming through the sky (also i am SO late to say this but UNO REVERSE CARD re: your new years wish to me which is genuinely making me lumpthroated and teary eyed reading it again in AUGUST. you are the sweetest EVER. and also ive never played journey before but ive been interested in it for years!!! i'll have to check it out and/or watch a playthrough!)

a hummingbird sculpture on a long stick for you to plant in your garden among the flowers, to sing to them and to you! (also RE: your question about your vocal range -- it just means that you can cover a little over two octaves (the number after the letter is the octave it's in, and each octave is a span of c-d-e-f-g-a-b-c -- so your range starts at about halfway through the third octave and goes to halfway through the fifth!) i think your range is about the same as mine iirc so we can hum along with the hummingbird and all three follow each other's notes :"~D <3)

a golden acorn on a thread for you to wear as a necklace when we go to the bird tea party! (by the way, have you ever read the book ""until the last acorn "when the last acorn is found?" it's a BEAUTIFUL book and it made me cry reading it! i think you and the acorn people would get along very, very well!!)

a lantern made of jelly moonlight and silver foil stars (see: ilomilo chapter 4 :"~D) for you to carry on your walks through the dim nights (you can hang the stars in the sky, and they'll brighten the world and light at your touch!)

a copy of one of my favorite books of all time, "the ten thousand doors of january," which is so much about wedging cracks open into other worlds, and something i think you might like very much / resonate with too!!

a big, big hug.

dear anon: THANK YOU. for all these words and for being you. i dont know how i got so lucky to have you sending me these little trinkets but i will most CERTAINLY keep them forever. i hope you experience all the peace and love and love and love to infinity. may you always know and shine with the light you bring and the light you are.

[writingquestionsanswered]

Hello

I recently started writing and seem to be struggling with describing the scene around my characters for example i write they are at the museum but i have no idea what to talk about to sort of help with the reader imagination this is the sort of thing i love when reading a book but as a writer i can't seem to include details without sounding boring i can say the walls are white the floor is yellow but they just seem like sentences sprinkled in

So my question is how can i write a detailed realistic scene through my characters senses that a reader can imagine not just read it

Trouble Describing Setting of Scene

One thing that really helps me is to first look up inspiration pictures or videos of the setting where the scene is taking place. So, if I was writing a scene in a museum, I would look up pictures or videos of a museum similar to the one in my story. Then I can imagine the actual room my characters are in during the scene, which makes it much easier to describe.

Also, this is a place where "show vs tell" comes into play, because if you say, "Ted and Mary walked into the museum. It had white walls and yellow floors..." that's of course going to sound clunky and boring. So what you want to do is "show" the details and weave them into the story.

Mary followed Ted into the first gallery, which featured bright impressionist paintings hung midway up white brick walls. They admired several paintings together before going their separate ways. Mary wasn't sure how much time had passed when she found Ted sitting on a bench, his gaze focused on the yellow tile floor.

See how that works? I didn't just say "the walls were white and the floor was yellow." I worked the details into the narrative flow, "showing" by making the details part of what's being seen by the characters rather than a direct statement.

Here are some links for more help:

Weaving Details into the Story How to Make Your Description More Vivid Adding Description to Your Writing Guide: Showing vs Telling

•••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••

I’ve been writing seriously for over 30 years and love to share what I’ve learned. Have a writing question? My inbox is always open!

♦ Questions that violate my ask policies will be deleted! ♦ Please see my master list of top posts before asking ♦ Learn more about WQA here

[alisonwritesimagines]

Count On Mom ~Batfamily Imagine~

Summary: The kids try to get Bruce to get away from the computer. Luckily, there is always one person who can take his mind out of anything including Batman duties. You.

Author’s Note: Haven't posted much in a while and I kept seeing a lot of Batfamily stuff at the last convention I went to so here we go!

BatFamily Masterlist

Reader’s Pronouns: She/Her

Warnings: boob flashing, hint to smut

Side Note: This is a secondary blog. If you comment a question down below, I will not answer since this is not the main blog. Please send the question to my inbox if you want a response back!

Do not repost this anywhere!

Three of the batkids stared at their adoptive father as he had been stuck in front of the screen in the Batcave. None of the moved as they watched Bruce in some kind of trance.

“How long since he moved?” Dick asked Cassandra and Jason.

“A day,” Cassandra monotonous answered.

“I think he blinked a minute ago, does that count?” Jason asked.

“It’s official. Alfred called it. He said he’ll bake cookies if we can get Bruce to stop working,” Duke said as he walked into the batcave.

"Step aside," Jason said as he cracked his knuckles. "This will be over in no time."

As the kids began to try to get Bruce to move away, no effort was made to moving Bruce.

"I got an idea," Dick said as he took out his phone.

You felt your phone ring, making you put the groceries down onto the kitchen island so you could answer your phone. You had just gone to the store to grab some ingredients to make dinner for tomorrow's dinner.

“Hello?”

“Hey mom! Are you and Damien almost done with grocery shopping yet?”

“We just got home. Why?”

“We’re trying to pry Bruce off of the computer in the Batcave and Alfred said he’d make us cookies if we get him away from the screen.”

“I’m on my way,” you say with a chuckle at the end.

"Already began to bake the cookies. I know you'll be able to get him away," Alfred told you.

"Of course I can. That's my superpower in this family," you joked.

When you got to the Batcave, you saw your husband tiredly staring at the screen in front of him. The dark bags under his eyes from the lack of sleep made you upset but you knew there was one thing you could do that would always get his attention.

"Aw my poor husband," you say.

"You got this mom?" Jason asked you.

“Step aside kids and close your eyes,” you tell them as you walked over to your husband.

“What are you going to do mom?” Dick as as he covered his eyes. The rest of the kids quickly covered their eyes to avoid to see what you were going to do.

You climbed onto Bruce’s lap before lifting both your shirt and bra in front of him. Bruce quickly snapped out of his daze before looking up at you with a smile.

“Tempting me my love?”

“Maybe,” you smile as you pulled your shirt and bra down.

“Let me have my cookies and you can have me,” you whispered into his ears as you stood up.

“Okay kids. Enjoy Alfred’s cookies,” you say as you headed out.

The moment the kids uncovered their eyes, they watched in shock as Bruce already began to make his way towards you.

“Leave it to mom for getting Bruce to do anything other than his Batman duties,” Jason said.

"I wonder how she does it," Duke says out loud.

"Because dad's got it bad for mom," Dick tells him.

By the time Bruce got to you, you were eating your chocolate chip cookies that Alfred had made with Damien. You winked at your husband as you kissed Damien’s head.

“Alfred, why don’t you and the kids go out for a bit? It’s lovely outside,” you tell him.

“Of course,” Alfred said before walking over to get the rest of the kids. You began to head upstairs to your room, knowing that you had stirred something in Bruce.

“You coming Bruce?” You called out. You smirked as you heard Bruce’s fastened footsteps.

You let out a laugh as you felt him pick you up. You held onto him as he rushed over to the bedroom.

“I owe you some alone time don’t I?” Bruce asked you with a smile.

“Yes you do. Now, while everyone is out of the house, why don’t you make it up to me?” You asked him.

“I plan to," Bruce said before kissing you passionately.

[violentdelightsandviolentends]

Pity Party.

Synopsis - Carmy just wants to see you treated the way he thinks you deserve. He decides to take matters into his own hands.

Pairing - Carmen Berzatto x Female Roommate Reader

Word Count - 3k

Warnings - smut. cursing. alcohol mention. carmys filthy mouth.

Age Rating - 18+

Author's Note - hello hello hello!! i am back!! i had a wonderful vacation soaking up the sun, and i am feeling refreshed and ready to go. i have had so many ideas over the past few weeks, so i'm excited to get some of them written asap!! this was a fic that came to me randomly, as i was thinking about roommate!carmen and how much of a menace he'd be if you ever talked about other guys. this was written as a part of my carmen roommates collection. it doesn't follow on from Finders, Keepers or Sweet Dreams, but it does exist in the same universe - so you can decide if this takes place before or after!! as always, feel free to send me any ideas or thoughts or burning desires you have. so much love <3

as always, reblogs, comments and feedback (even anonymous feedback) are immensely appreciated!! your reblogs are the only way to circulate my fics, which keeps me going <3

Series Masterlist. Masterlist. Inbox.

"You're back early."

Carmy had swung the door open, expecting to come home to an empty apartment. Instead, he's met with the sight of you, sitting on the couch, undoing the straps of your shoes.

"Fuckin' disaster," you mutter, loud enough for him to hear.

He breathes out a chuckle at the stormy look on your face. Carmy thinks you're cutest when you're angry. He aches to smooth the crease between your brows with his thumb.

"That bad?" he asks, taking a seat next you and kicking off his sneakers.

"You wouldn't even believe."

He rises and makes his way to the kitchen, filling the tea kettle and placing it on the stove top. Grabbing two mugs, he casts a glance over his shoulder at you, frowning at your body language. You look defeated.

Carmy steeps two cups of tea, placing one of them carefully into your waiting hands. He resumes his seat on the sofa, pressing his thigh against yours and turning to face you.

"You wanna talk about it?"

You think for a moment before replying.

"You're gonna laugh at me."

His face instantly crumples, confusion written all over it.

"I'll never laugh at you. I'll laugh with you, sure. But never at you."

He nudges your shoulder with his, urging you to go on.

"Okay, fine. The actual date was pretty good. He took me to that Italian place downtown-"

"Dolce Vita? Did you get the truffle pasta I told you about?" Carmy interrupts you before you can continue.

"Yes, oh my God. It was incredible. Do you think you can recreate it sometime?"

"Fuck yeah. They're pretty secretive with their recipes, but I think I can figure it out. You can help me if you want - I'm gonna need a sous chef."

He pulls a reluctant laugh from you, the sound echoing off the ceramic of your mugs. You both know that being the sous chef involves you sitting on the counter drinking wine while Carmy does all the work.

"Of course. I'll always be your sous chef."

"I'll hold you to that."

You smile at him gently, a little taken aback by the sincerity in his voice.

"Anyway. The dinner went great. He seemed super interested in me, asked me questions, told me about his job, his hobbies, his dog. He was hot, and good to talk to. I thought I'd hit the jackpot."

"And then?"

"And then we went back to his apartment. And it all went to shit."

He chuckles, blue eyes glinting in the moonlight.

"Tell me more."

"You really want to hear about all of this?"

It's not like you and Carmy aren't close. You absolutely are. It's just that there's always been this unspoken connection between the two of you. A bubbling, fiery attraction that you both shut down repeatedly, screwing the lid on tight whenever it rears its head. So, you tend to avoid talking to Carmy about dating. You're scared you'll accidentally blurt out the truth - you compare every single date to him.

"Of course I do."

His answer is so genuine it makes you ache. You continue, hesitantly.

"Well... things got a little... heavy. He wasn't a bad kisser, I guess... he just wasn't... a good one? He kept biting my lip super hard and it kinda hurt. Then he pulled my clothes off like a high schooler, and he's on top of me, and I'm waiting for him to sort of... do... anything? And then he's finished. Like, completely done. And then he has the nerve to ask me if I finished."

Carmy's mouth has fallen open, shock etched across his face. After a long, heavy pause, he speaks.

"What the fuck?"

You look at him for moment, before bursting into contagious laughter. He joins you, both of you with your heads thrown back, giggles reverberating around the lowlit room.

"I mean, seriously," he pants, still laughing. "What the fuck?"

"I didn't even answer him. I just put my clothes on, grabbed my bag and left without saying a word."

Every time you try to stifle your laughter, a giggle escapes. The situation wasn't funny at the time, but looking back, it's hilarious.

All of a sudden, you both go silent. You're deep in thought, reflecting on the seemingly never ending stream of bad dates that you've endured. Carmy is watching you intently, ocean blue eyes glued to your face.

"Fuck," you breathe. "This is kinda pathetic."

Carmy inhales deeply, and turns his body so it's facing yours on the couch.

"The way I see it," he begins, "you have two options."

You quirk a brow in confusion and stay quiet, waiting for him to explain.

"You can sit here feeling sorry for yourself, or, you can let me fuck you the way you deserve."

Your mouth falls open in shock at the exact same moment your brain seems to shut down. You can't think. You can't process his words. All you can focus on is the way he's staring at you. You suddenly feel hot under his gaze, the hairs on the back of your neck standing up. A shiver runs down your spine, and you have to remind yourself to breathe.

"Wh-... what?" you choke out.

"You heard me, honey. You can wallow in your little pity party, or you can let me show you what it's like to be with someone who can actually make you come. Your choice."

His voice has dropped an octave lower than usual, the tone warm and honeyed. He's still staring at you, blue gaze unrelenting.

"Is this gonna fuck everything up between us?" you whisper hesitantly.

Carmy reaches out and places a gentle hand on your cheek, thumb stroking careful circles into your skin.

"I don't think anything can fuck up what we have," he murmurs. "You're the only thing in my life that makes sense."

His confession seems to sober you up, the honesty in his words snapping you back to your senses.

"Okay."

He almost does a double take at the sureness in your voice.

"Yeah?"

"Yeah. Put your money where your mouth is, Carmen."

"There she is," he chuckles. "You scared me when you went quiet for a second there."

"Well, if what you say is true, you're not gonna be able to shut me up for the night."

He laughs darkly, and slides closer to you slightly.

"Oh, honey. You're gonna wish you hadn't said that."

He tucks a strand of hair behind your ear, tracing the journey of your neck with his fingertips. He rests his hand lightly at the base of your throat, the heavy weight of it making you pant.

"If there's any point where you don't like something, or you want me to slow down, just say so. Okay?"

You nod your head, entranced by the sudden dominance he's displaying. You've never seen this side of him before. You can't believe he's been hiding it this whole time.

"Words, pretty. Need to hear you say it."

"Yes. I understand. I'll tell you, I promise."

He doesn't say anything in reply, just smirks. He lets you sit in the silence for a moment too long, the anticipation slowly killing you.

"Please, Carmen," you breathe. "Please."

"Fuck," he groans, shuffling closer to you. "You sound so pretty when you beg."

Carmy leans in and kisses your cheek gently, testing the waters. He presses a kiss to your other cheek, and pulls back to watch for your reaction. When he's happy, he tilts forward and leaves a careful kiss on your chin, then your forehead, then both of your closed eyes, before kissing you on the side of your mouth. His closeness makes you whine, desperate for him to give you what you want.

Finally, he connects his lips to yours, starting off slow and tender. When you tangle your fingers in the hair at the nape of his neck and try to pull him even closer, his resolve snaps. His tongue sweeps into your mouth, exploring eagerly. You clamber over him and climb into his lap, straddling his hips and pressing yourself into his body.

Carmy can't decide where to put his hands. He's grabbing at your waist, running his fingers up your back, pulling you into him by your ass. You're both groaning into each others mouths, enraptured by the other person and the all consuming way they kiss.

"Can I take this off?" he asks lowly, pulling at the hem of your dress.

Instead of answering, you pull it over your head, throwing it onto the floor in front of you.

"Fuck," he murmurs. "Most beautiful girl I've ever seen."

His hands are roaming all of your exposed skin, as if he can't get enough. He's terrified he won't ever get to see you like this again, so he's not going to waste a second.

You grind your hips down into his, eliciting a groan from the both of you. His hands tighten their grip on your waist, as he leans up to press open mouthed kisses to your jaw. Your fingers fly to the hem of his t shirt, pulling it off swiftly. You manage to shove his jeans down and off, before attempting to pull off his underwear. Carmy stops you in your tracks.

"Nuh uh," he tuts. "This is about you. Not me."

He pulls you off his lap gently and shuffles so his back is resting against the couch cushions. He spreads his legs wide, and gestures for you to sit between them. When you don't move, he looks at you carefully.

"Give me a color, pretty girl."

You take a deep breath, and smile at him softly.

"Green, Carmen. Promise."

You manoeuvre sideways, so you can place yourself with your back to his chest. He wraps his arms around you for a moment and holds you tightly, as if he's scared you'll disappear any second. You relax into his embrace, all the tension leaving your body. You have nothing to worry about. It's just you and Carmen, in the place you call home.

You drop your head back into Carmy's shoulder, and allow yourself to get lost in the feeling of his hands on your skin. He's begun tracing patterns down your arms, your sides, your stomach, until he reaches your underwear. He plays with the band, dipping his finger underneath in a feather light touch. Goose bumps rise across your body and you shiver, practically vibrating with need.

"Carmen," you whisper. "Don't tease."

"But that's half the fun," he murmurs into your ear, and you can hear the smile in his voice.

You can picture it perfectly, too. The way his eyes crinkle, the way his mouth curves, the way he bites his lip to stifle it. The image in your mind makes you melt into him further. You want to be as close to him as you physically can be. You'd completely disappear into him if you could.

He brings you back to reality by cupping you over your underwear, groaning when he feels the saturated material.

"Oh, pretty girl. Is this all for me? Fuck."

Suddenly, his game of teasing has lost all its fun. Carmy twists his fingers into your underwear and pulls them off in one swift movement, throwing them in the general direction of your dress on the floor. He places a hand on each of your thighs and spreads them apart, hooking them over his legs.

Carmy starts off slow, careful. He caresses over your skin, gentle and almost apprehensive. When he gets to your core, he swipes a finger through, testing the waters. When you buck your hips into his hand, he knows you're both on the same page.

"Just relax, okay? Gonna make you feel good."

His deep, smooth, whiskey like voice is doing nothing to help the heat bubbling in your stomach. You only whine in response, wiggling your hips to urge him to keep going.

Carmy throws one arm around your stomach, keeping you plastered to his body. You can feel him hot and hard against your back, and you so desperately want to feel him that your mouth is watering. You grind back into him, and he reads your mind.

"Not yet," he whispers. "This is about you, remember? Need to show you what you've been missing."

With that, he circles your clit with two fingers, slowly but surely. He revels in the noises you elicit. They're making him dizzy, disorientated. He never thought he'd be the one to pull a sound like that from you. He's quite convinced he's dreaming.

"Let me hear you. Don't hold back on me, okay?"

You nod your head frantically, willing to give him whatever he asks if you get what you want.

Carmy slips a finger into you slowly, moaning under his breath at your warmth. When he thinks you're ready, he adds a second finger, and sets a steady rhythm, trying to figure out what you like.

After he's set his pace, he starts to curl his fingers on the up stroke, grinning to himself when he finds the spot.

"Yeah? Right there? That's it, isn't it?"

You're nodding and shaking and pawing at his forearms, trying to tether yourself to reality in any way you can. You think you might be floating, on cloud 9, in some sort of euphoric trance. You can't believe no one's ever made you feel like this before. You're convinced no one ever will again.

Carmy quickens his pace and basks in the glory of your moans. He thinks this might be the most beautiful you've ever looked, spread out completely for him. Every inch of your skin is touching his, and it makes his heart skip a beat for a second.

He presses a kiss into your hair and keeps his mouth there, murmuring honeyed praises into your ear.

"Doin' so good for me."

"You got it, honey, that's it."

"Atta girl. Keep going. Almost there."

"You look so fuckin' pretty like this. Fuck. Gonna be thinking about this forever."

"I'll ruin you, baby. Nothing's ever gonna compare to this, to what we have."

All you can do is moan in response, his filthy words pushing you closer and closer to the edge. You're almost there, but something is stopping you. You whine in frustration, tears welling in your eyes. Carmy feels the tension suddenly grasp your muscles, and leans down to mutter to you softly.

"What is it, sweet girl? What do you need? Just tell me. Anything, and I'll give it to you."

You're not sure how much you trust your voice right now, so you decide to show him instead. You take the hand that he's using to hold you to him and move it up your body until it's resting against your throat. You tighten your fingers around his, and moan in response to the pressure.

"Oh, baby," he coos. "Filthy fuckin' girl. Here I thought you were so innocent, and this whole time you wanted to be choked like a whore?"

The way he degrades you so lovingly makes you mewl. You'd never ever trust anyone else to speak to you this way in such an intimate moment - but with Carmen, there's no hesitation. You know he's just telling you what you need to hear in the heat of the moment. And you love him for it.

"Fuck, Carmen," you manage to choke out. "Keep going. Don't stop, please."

"I'll do anything you want if you keep saying my name like that," he whispers.

"Carmen," you moan in response. "Carmy Carmy Carmy Carmy Carmy."

You're chanting his name like a prayer. He's rutting into your back, hips grinding and circling in time with his fingers that are maintaining their steady rhythm. His fingers tighten around your throat as he crooks his digits just right, and the result is a devastating moan from you that Carmy wishes to have on repeat for the rest of his life.

"So close," you whisper hoarsely. "Harder."

Carmy uses his thumb to circle your clit with one hand, other hand pulling you by your neck back into him tightly. He grinds his hips dirtily into you, and the feeling of him so silky and warm against you is what sends you over the edge. The corners of your vision go white as you arch into him, head thrown backwards into his chest. The sounds you're making are so melodic, so borderline angelic that Carmy almost cries. Heaven, he thinks. This is salvation.

Carmy finishes with you, climaxing onto the soft skin of your back. You both relax simultaneously, chests heaving and panting. He removes his fingers gently and wraps both arms around you, pulling you into him tightly despite the mess. He reaches to brush the hair out of your face, and the gesture is so tender it makes your lip quiver.

"Thank you," you whisper after what feels like hours of comfortable silence.

"Sorry I called you a whore," he murmurs back.

You let out a surprised laugh, vibrating with amusement in his arms.

"I know you didn't mean it."

"I mean I did give you the best orgasm of your life, so... call it even?"

"You're forgiven," you chuckle. "Completely forgiven."

You trace gentle patterns over his forearms with your fingertips, following the black ink of his tattoos. He sighs in contentment and places a kiss into your hair, relaxing further into the couch.

You sit together like that for a while, neither of you too concerned with the time. It's not often you see Carmy so relaxed, so serene. You're enjoying it for as long as you can.

"We should clean up," he says quietly, eventually. "Sorry about the mess."

"It's okay. Worth it," you tease, pinching his thigh. He pinches your side in retaliation, which makes you jump.

"Come on, trouble."

He stands from the couch, never letting go of the grip he has on you. You have no choice but to stand with him, yelping as he half carries you through the apartment towards the shower.

The sounds of both of your laughter bounce off of the abandoned mugs of tea still sat on the coffee table, melodic and joyous. The moonlight seeps through the windows, illuminating the beginning of something special in the living room of your shared apartment.

[fum1ku]

LOVE TROPES - HQ BOYS

ft. osamu miya, daichi sawamura, kei tsukishima, keishin ukai, atsumu miya

should i be working on the highly requested pt. 2 to my recent works that’s currently sitting in my drafts? yes. should i also probably be working on the few requests i’ve got in my inbox? also yes. am i still over here writing whatever this is instead of doing those things? absolutely. at least i’m writing something!

OSAMU: friends to lovers.

you had been friends with the miya twins since high school. you had always butt heads with atsumu; bickering back and forth about anything and everything. but it was different with osamu. it felt like you both understood each other, in a way. plus the mutual dislike you both had for atsumu definitely helped. and now, nearly 8 years later, your friendship was still going strong.

well past 8pm, you stood over the front counter at onigiri miya with samu cleaning behind the counter for closing, and atsumu sitting at a stool next to you.

“i don’t know what his problem is! we go out for drinks one night, wind up at his place, and then the next day he can’t even be bothered to send me a single fucking text. seriously. i’m done!” you were going on about your.. most recent boyfriend.

“why don’tcha just dump him then?” atsumu offered, his mouth full of the onigiri osamu had made for him.

“atsumu, you’re disgusting! and i can’t because we aren’t even a thing! which is good—i don’t want us to be.”

osamu laughed at you two from behind the counter.

“okay well then what’s the problem! i don’t understand you women,” atsumu exclaimed, licking off the last bits of onigiri form his fingertips and shoving his plate behind the counter. “i’ve got practice tomorrow. so i’m gone. some of us actually have real problems that aren’t centered around one night stands with guys!”

“oh right, atsumu, like your sex life is any better,” you muttered. the door slammed shut behind him as the bell above the door exhibierst through the building.

you sighed, sinking further into your chair.

“here,” osamu slid a plate towards you. “might make ‘ya feel better. plus i need feedback to see if it’s worth addin’ to the menu.”

you smiled. “thanks, osamu. and yeah, i’ll give good feedback, promise!”

osamu smiled to himself as he wiped down the back counter. yeah, sure, after 8 years of pining he was no closer to asking you out. but, no matter what, he’d always be here to make you food whenever another boy made you cry.

DAICHI: love at first sight.

it had been a long practice and daichi had decided to treat everyone to a snack down at sakanoshita. daichi stood with suga and asahi waiting for the 1st and 2nd years to finish grabbing their fill. tanaka and noya had seen daichi paying as an opportunity to grab whatever they wanted.

“c’mon you guys!” suga yelled from across the store. “we don’t have all day!”

it has been a long day of classes for you, so it wasn’t even an option in your mind whether you should stop at the convenience store or not. only now you had found yourself in your own little debate.

“milk tea.. or coffee?” you mumbled to yourself. you were bent down over the drinks section taking your sweet time.

daichi turned around to see you and knew he was gone right then and there.

suga scoffed at the two 2nd years taking their time, only to turn back and find daichi’s gaze focused on you.

“hey, daichi, maybe we should—” he started, but stopped as soon as he noticed daichi staring. he whispered to asahi and they both began berating their poor captain.

“c’mon, dude! why don’t you just go talk to them? we obviously have the time!” suga nudged at his arm.

daichi denied anything. “hey, i don’t even now what you’re talking about, suga! we’re here for snack for the team, just go focus on that.”

“hey, don’t we go to school with them? y/n l/n. class 2, i think,” asahi piped up. he couldn’t remember where exactly he knew you from, though.

daichi was sure if he had gone to school with you, he’d remember.

“they’re in photography club! that’s how i know them! they asked me to join after i dropped out of volleyball,” asahi recalled, loud enough to grab your attention.

you looked up to find the set of 3rd years staring in your direction. your drink in hand, you made your way up to them.

“azumane, right? nice to see you again!” you beamed.

“y-yeah, right! good to see you too, l/n,” he smiled, nervously.

“are you guys in line?” you questioned.

“no—no we’re not! sorry about that!” daichi apologized, moving to the side to allow you to get to the register.

you placed your drink on the counter, making small talk with the guy at the front register.

“c’mon, daichi! if you don’t ask them before they leave you might not get to again!” suga whispered.

“suga, let it go. it’s too strange—they don’t even know me.”

suga shoved daichi forward just as you turned around to make your way towards the door.

“oh! hi!” you mused.

“s-sorry. hi.. again.”

“sawamura, right? you’re the captains of the volleyball team!” you smiled.

“yeah, i am. and you’re l/n, right? asahi was telling me about you. you’re in photography.

“i am, actually! and please, just call me y/n!”

“then just call me daichi!”

first name basis after 10 minutes? way to go daichi!

“actually..” you started. “i was wondering if it’d be possible for me to take some action shots of the volleyball team? i was going to use them for an upcoming project of mine. of course if not, that’s okay too! you probably need to talk it over with the team.”

“yeah—absolutely! i’ll have to talk it over with everyone, but i don’t see it being a problem at all,” he said, nervously rubbing the back of his neck. “what class are you in? i can talk to you some time next week to figure out what day would work best.”

“here,” you said, turning around to the man behind the counter. “excuse me, do you have a pen i could borrow?”

the man tossed you a pen, not giving a second look to you from behind his magazine. you pulled out daichi’s arm and started scribbling down numbers.

your.. phone number?

“now you can call me, that’ll be easier!” you smiled. “anyways, i gotta run. see you later, daichi. tell azumane i said bye too!”

he was speechless. did he really manage to get your number without even trying?

suga ran up behind him. “dude! how? you hardly said anything to them!”

“wow, daichi’s got skills with the ladies!” tanaka mused, noya trailing behind them. their arms were stacked full with all kinds of snacks.

he was definitely not paying for all of those.

KEI: academic rivals to lovers.

you worked at the library at the university you attended. tsukishima had seen you around campus a few times. yamaguchi would go as far as to describe you as tsukishima’s “campus crush”—which tsukki of course denied. he hardly even knew you.

but, this semester is when things finally got interesting. you had wound up taking the course tsukishima was the TA for.

you were currently bent down behind a bookshelf in the campus library, organizing the books that needed to be put away. you noticed a hand grab a book off your cart.

you stood up. “anything you need help finding?”

“no,” the man stated, blankly.

you examined the book in his hand. “wait. are you in psych 301? haven’t seen you in there before.”

“kei tsukishima. i’m the assistant in that class this semester.”

“oh! i’m y/n l/n. are you reading that book for fun then, or?”

“i know. i graded your last essay. something about the human consciousness or whatever,” he stated, pushing his glasses to the bridge of his nose.

your face went hot. “oh? so you were the one that gave me a B- on that. that was the best paper i’ve written all semester!”

“yeah, only because you can’t write any better ones. and maybe actually read the syllabus before you join the class,” he deadpanned.

“okay, mr. know-it-all. and for what it’s worth, i did in fact read the syllabus.”

“well if you actually paid attention, then you’d know this book was meant to be read alongside the other materials.”

wait. what?

before you could say another word, he placed the book back down in the cart. “my email is on the syllabus if you’d actually care to read it. good luck actually passing the class.”

you were so going to find that syllabus. and you were definitely doing to pass that class.

KEISHIN: second chance.

stepping foot into sakanoshita after years felt like a dream. but seeing keishin, your high school boyfriend, sitting there behind the counter, was what really sent you back.

“keishin?”

ukai actually took the time to look up form his magazine, and he was glad he did. “y/n?”

“keishin!” you smiled. “i didn’t realize you family still owned the place!”

he stood up form his seat behind the counter. “yeah! work here part-time, coach volleyball the other half.

“you coach volleyball? does the old ukai not coach anyone then?”

“nah, old man retired last year. still coaches a few younger kids on the side. but, hey, how have you been? it’s been years since i last saw you in miyagi. 4? 5, maybe?”

“yeah,” you sighed. “it’s definitely been awhile. but life has been great in tokyo. my internship finally ended and so i’m back here for the next month or two!”

“really? you got to let me take you out sometime—drinks, to celebrate.”

you felt the slight rush of heat to your cheeks. “r-right! of course!”

“hey, if you wanted, we close in less than an hour. you could wait here till then, catch up, then let me take you out for drinks.”

“alright,” you smiled, taking a seat behind the counter next to ukai. “tell me about your team then. where do you coach? karasuno?”

you felt like you were 16 all over again. just him and you.

ATSUMU: opposites attract.

you were the promotional manager for the msby black jackals. everyone on the team loved you—yes, even sakusa. though he wouldn’t admit it. but, atsumu being the sly guy he is, took every opportunity to flirt with you. of course, keeping things professional, you shut him down every chance you got. plus, it would never work. ever. you knew that.

he was childish, you were mature—top of your office only a few months in. he was selfish half the time, and he’d always describe you as one of the most thoughtful people he’s ever met. he was confident and bold. you were quiet and reserved, at least time him. so when you find yourself alone with him at the gym one night late after practice, going through your binder of advertising ideas, you didn’t know what to make of it. the way you could feel he eyes focused on you and only you drove you insane.

you finally took a break form your rant about new promotional ideas for the team, leaving a heavy silence between the two of you.

“y/n?” he finally said, breaking for silence.

“yeah, atsumu?” you respond, not looking up form your binder.

“you should let me take ‘ya out. i mean it.”

you quietly gasped to yourself.

sure, atsumu had made pass after pass at you every day for the last few months since you started working with the team. but, this time, he sounded so.. genuine.

what’s even worse is you couldn’t help yourself from the words the escape your lips in the last moment.

“okay.”

© fum1ku 2024.

⁂ taglist: @chloiyoomi @eashn + let me know if you want to be added! 💌

[macfrog]

sweet child o' mine | pt. iv

to @mrsmando - without whom this insane story would never have happened in the first place. i love you i love you i love you thank you all so much for coming on this journey with me - it has been a blast. i hope you like where we turn out! love you guys always n forever x

pairing: neighbor!joel x fem!reader

summary: you're a mom. it's time to get your shit together.

warnings: bon jovi mention straight out the gate, labor/delivery [i have never given birth. those of you who have are nothing short of remarkable. please forgive if some of this is a little inaccurate or vague], use of pain medication during birth, description of pain and post-birth recovery, super emotional reader, unprotected piv, oral, alcohol consumption. DISCLAIMER: this series covers some issues which i know may be sensitive and possibly triggering to some. warnings will always be as thorough as possible, but if there’s ever anything you feel i’ve missed, please let me know. feel free to drop by my inbox anytime.

word count: 12k

pt. i / series masterlist | main masterlist | playlist | follow @macfroglets w notifs on to be the first to hear when i post 🩵

It’s September twenty-third.

Well, by now, it’s probably the twenty-fourth. You’ve been a little distracted, rolling between the sheets with your next-door neighbor for the last couple hours.

The wedding’s still going strong downstairs. The same Bon Jovi song has played three times over. Tommy has called Joel to ask where he is so much that Joel’s phone is now switched off and shoved to the bottom of his bag.

You’re slouched on the toilet in a sliver of moonlight. A fistful of tissue, panties loose around your ankles. Rolling your forehead side to side along the cool tile, heartbeat hammering between your temples.

Joel Miller – Joel fucking Miller – is in your bed. Naked, sweating, cock probably still half-hard.

This morning, the very idea of the man was an eyeroll. Stood in your mirror, promising yourself that this time tomorrow, it’ll all be over with.

This time in a month, it’ll be a foggy memory.

This time in a year, it –

His voice is muffled through the bathroom door. “Did you fall in, or somethin’?”

You snort. The milky moon blurs across your vision when you pull yourself upright. You swipe between your legs and stand, flushing the toilet.

“I needed a fucking breather,” you tease, tiptoeing back across the room.

Joel’s stretched out; a worked arm draped along the headboard. Sun-kissed to the middle of his bicep, paler across his shoulder. One leg bare on the mattress, the other under the sheets. They only just cover his modesty – dark hair trailing beneath light silk just in time.

He’s so big. It’s like you never really noticed until now. He takes up half the bed, laying like this. And sure, you’re halfway to fucked, but – has he always been so handsome?

You flop down beside him with a sigh, curling up in the burrow of sheets at his side. Your eyes trail up his body – the sheen of sweat up his side, the dark, damp hair under his arm. All the parts of him you’ve never seen before, will never see again.

You gulp. Quit fucking staring.

He doesn’t notice, anyway. He’s rubbing circles into his temples, grumbling. “How many goddamn times are they gonna play It’s My Life?”

“…for Tommy and Gina…” you nudge him, “…who never backed down…”

Joel chuckles, pulling his hand down his beard. “Twenty bucks says he’s changing that to Maria.”

“Oh, for sure. I ain’t going back down to listen to it, though.”

He hums in agreement, reaching over for his beer. His Adam’s apple bobs as he drinks.

“You owe me, by the way. This is my room, remember? My fucking minibar.”

He pauses, the bottle against his bottom lip. His eyes linger south of your chin before he answers, “I’m paying for the damn room.”

“Then I want a drink from yours. Make it even.”

He clicks his teeth and drinks again. “It’s one beer. Call it an early birthday gift.”

You frown. “When the hell’s your birthday?”

“Tuesday.”

“Bullshit.”

“Serious. The twenty-sixth.”

You push yourself up onto your elbows; chest bare and on display. And it’s a strange feeling, how little you care. Twelve hours ago, you didn’t know how close to sit next to him at the ceremony. How many times you could accidentally bump knees or brush elbows and it not be weird.

But in the last two hours, he’s made you come more times than you can count. More times than anyone you’ve ever been with before – that’s for sure. And you’ve repaid the favor: the proof is still dribbling out of you. Still dripping between your legs, all pearlescent and warm. You’re soaked, swollen, still sore from the size of him.

It’s a fucking strange feeling, that you don’t mind at all.

“How old are you turning?” you ask.

Joel swallows. He settles the beer on his sternum, thumbing the corner of the label. Sucks in a deep breath and says, “Forty-eight.”

“Jesus,” you mutter, eyes wide.

He turns slowly, glaring at you. “Hilarious,” he drawls, bumping the bottle against your tummy.

You hiss at the sudden chill. Wiping cold droplets from your skin, you swipe it from his grasp.

Joel pushes himself from the bed with a quiet groan and pads across the room. His cock sways with each step, an arrowhead of thick hair at its base.

He doesn’t seem to mind, either.

You tip your chin back, taking a hefty swig.

The pulsing bass is heavier, guitar squeal sharper, when he cracks open the window. Cool air sweeps past the scent of sex and settles softly on your skin.

The mattress dips again as Joel settles back into bed. He pulls the sheet over himself, silk falling over the stubborn shape against his thigh.

“Well,” you pass him the bottle, “happy birthday, old man. Here’s to forty-eight.”

“Here’s to forty-eight,” Joel echoes, staring off into space, “and whatever the hell it has in store.”

1:29. 1:29. 1:30.

It’s blurring across your vision. The pain and the panic and the blinking of your fucking alarm clock.

Your stomach is still tensed in the aftermath of the contraction; an ache like the slow sway of the ocean, a wave rolling off into the distance. You’re hunched over the edge of the bed – knee bouncing, palms kneading your round belly.

“We’re okay,” you whisper, blowing into the still night. “We’re fine. Maybe it isn’t labor, right? Maybe it’s just those…Braxton…shit…Hicks.”

The cicadas laugh as your uterus swings again.

Another kick of pain; a bolt that winds you, piercing from your stomach down between your legs. So slow it feels fucking personal.

Your back curls, nails digging into the mattress. You grit your teeth until it passes, then push yourself to your feet, reaching for your phone.

You think of Joel: the flecks of gold in his eyes, the rough surface of his palms. The fresh, woodsy scent woven into every thread on his shirt, seeping from every pore on his skin.

The way he’d pull you under his arm and walk you to his truck. Play more Eagles or whatever shit he has to take your mind off the pain – tell you he knows, he knows as you whimper in agony. The way he’d hold your thigh the entire ride, loosening it only to weave his fingers through yours.

He’s in Houston, though. He’s something like three hours away. There’s nothing he could do, even if you did call – even if he did pick up. Even if he got in his truck right this second.

Shit. Shit fuck shit. How are you in labor right now, on this fucking night? All your teasing, all your taunting the universe. You really think that’s gonna happen? You think your kid’s that much of an asshole?

Yeah. They’re half you.

You’re on your own. It’s nothing new; you’ve been on your own for most of your life. You drove yourself to college, worked your ass off, and sold your graduation guest tickets to your roommate. You found a job by yourself, moved back to Austin and turned it into home by yourself.

You haven’t needed anyone or anything, since you were eighteen.

But – oh, Jesus, fuck it. This was a two-man job from the start. Some things you figure you can let slide – and having a kid seems like a pretty decent excuse.

Fuck it.

You move, hunched and hobbling, to the bathroom door. Slumped against the wooden frame, you cup a hand between your legs.

Sure enough, your underwear is soaked. The fluid trickles down the seam of your thigh, warm and thin. It glistens in the moonlight when you lift your fingers.

“Shit,” you whisper. “Goddamn it, Duck.”

Body tingling and almost numb with pain, you scroll through your contacts to J. You stumble into the bathroom, wet fingers slipping around the sink. A weight begins to pull low between your hips.

Two rings and the tone cuts, his voice instantly spilling a cool comfort down your spine.

There’s no hello, no double checking that you haven’t accidentally dialed him in your sleep. Only that trademark drawl, that flat tone you’d swear sounded bored, if it weren’t for the haste with which Joel asks, “You okay?” the second he answers.

As if he were awake anyway, just waiting for your call.

“Yeah,” you choke, rubbing the nape of your neck. “I just called at one in the morning to…to say hi.”

He sighs, the crackle of breath echoed by the tinkle of wind chimes. The creak of wood as he settles into a chair on Vanessa’s parents’ porch. “Alright, smartass. What is it?”

“I’m…I’m in labor.”

“Mhm. That sure is funny, baby. Good one.”

You groan. “No, Joel, I swear – I swear, I just went into labor.”

He pauses. The chimes titter in the background. “You’re…You ain’t kidding me?”

The sharp peak of pain swipes the air clean from your lungs. The phone hits the sink with a clatter, drowning out your cry.

This kid is beating the ever-loving shit out of you. You’d be embarrassed if you had the energy to think about it.

“Baby?” Joel yells, loud enough that the sound loops around the bowl. His voice lifts to an octave you didn’t know it could reach. “Talk to me. Please, talk to me.”

Your fingers clamp around the phone. “I’m f-fine. It’s fine. I just gotta…gotta change my fuckin’ sheets, Joel, my waters broke while I was sleeping –”

“Oh, Christ,” he growls. The door squeals as he storms back into Vanessa’s family home. “The sh…Change the goddamn sheets? You gotta get to a hospital, darlin’!”

You laugh, head tipping back. “It’s fine,” you tell him. “Feels like the kid’s trying to kill me, but I can – shit, I can take ‘em.”

There’s the jangle of keys, the ruffle of a shirt being thrown over his head. “Yeah?” Joel says.“You can take childbirth, all on your own? Do me a favor and call a damn ambulance, baby.”

“An ambulance,” you repeat, laughing again.

“Yes, an ambulance. Call 9-1-1 right now. You want me to call ‘em? Let me go grab the landline –”

“Joel, do not call an ambulance –”

And if you thought you’d heard him at breaking point before – plucking your underwear from his lawn, dragging you around Home Depot, paling in your room with a pregnancy test in his hands – you know you have, now.

“You gotta get to a goddamn hospital now, baby!”

His voice trembles at its end, quivers like the pluck of a guitar string. A high-pitched echo, a nervous vibration.

Joel’s panicking.

It’s the second thing in less than five minutes that you never knew he could do.

“I can’t afford a f-fucking ambulance, Joel,” you yelp, sitting back on the edge of the bathtub.

“I will pay for it,” he pleads, “I’ll pay. Just – you gotta call them. You gotta…” He sighs again, breath wavering. “You’re in labor, and you’re alone. If anything happened to you, I –”

A hushed voice interrupts him. Follows him through the house, knotting her nightgown around her waist and twisting her dark tresses into a ponytail.

“She’s in labor,” Joel tells her. “I can’t stay. I’m going back for her.”

The porch door slams shut before Vanessa can reply, and Joel’s back outside again. Gravel crunching beneath his boots, crickets screaming in the background. “Still with me?” he asks.

“Still here,” you breathe, tracing your nails along your leg. “Duckie says hi, I guess.”

He hums. “Hi, Duckie. You little shit.”

You rock back and forth, eyes closed. Breathing between contractions, your head low between your shoulders. “How long will you be?”

The truck door creaks open. “I’m leaving right now. I’ll be…Fuck, I’ll be a couple hours, at least. I’m on my way, alright?”

Tears drip onto your bare thighs, the salt spilling into your mouth. “Joel,” you shake your head, “I don’t think I can do this.”

“Yes, you can,” he says. “Are you kidding? Got us this far ‘n now you want to bail? That ain’t you, baby. Come on, now.”

“I wanna bail,” you insist. You slump to the floor, head lolling over the rim of the bathtub. Weeping like a little kid. “I’m scared, Joel. I’m so scared.”

“I know you are. Lord knows I’m scared, too – scared as hell. But –” the engine roars to life, “– I can’t wait to finally meet this kid. Our kid. Can’t wait to hold ‘em. Can’t wait to see you become a mom, and me become a dad.”

“Mom and Dad,” you whisper, sniffling.

“Mom and Dad, right? Yeah. You can do this. I know you can.”

The bathroom blurs behind your tears. You close your eyes, replacing the pale night with warmer dawn. Replacing it with images of tiny hands and feet; missing front teeth and a love-worn teddy tucked safely into bed.

Joel’s voice is softer, kinder. Calmer, now that he’s closing the hundred and fifty miles between the two of you.

“Just – don’t let the kid give you any shit, alright?”

The fear boils into determination. Something more irritating than it is terrifying. You inhale, blowing a heavy, shuddered breath to the ceiling. “Whatever, Miller.”

“Attagirl,” he says. “That’s the spirit. Now, call a damn ambulance.”

With a scoff, you push yourself to your feet, waddling towards the foot of your bed. You sway back and forth, holding your bump and listening to the hum of Joel’s truck.

And then you hear it.

Three sharp raps, from downstairs.

You wander to the hallway, squinting in the dark. “Joel?”

“Hm?”

“Are you…?”

The sound grows louder the nearer you draw. Quick knuckles against your front door.

“Am I what, darlin’?”

You lower yourself down the stairs, fist tight around the rail.

It’s August again. Sun’s encore blazing through your kitchen windows, bleeding golden through your living room. Everything shining, everything new and untouched.

Knock knock knock.

Light satin, duck egg blue; string lights and a diamond-encrusted necklace. The bones of your wardrobe propped against your porch. A rattling toolbox hanging from his fist, a positive pregnancy test in yours.

The knocking halts when you flick the porch light on. She calls your name once, old voice quivering.

Your phone is still glued to your ear as you pull the door open. “Al…?”

She squints at you and lifts a hand to shield from the light. She’s still in her pajamas – green dressing gown loose and lifting in the breeze.

Her eyes drop to the tee draped over your bump, the silver stream of fluid down the inside of your thigh. As she opens her mouth to speak, your hand slams into the doorpost.

“Oh, fuck,” you groan, and Alice Brown steps straight over the threshold.

“Are you in labor? Oh, sweetie. Sit down, sit.”

She backs you towards the stairs. One bony, trembling hand around yours – squeezing as tight as you are. She rubs up and down your spine, shushing until the pain subsides.

You blink up at her glowing figure, haloed by the porch light outside. “How did you…?”

She hushes you with a finger in the air. “I’m up most nights. I heard you from the window. Have you called 9-1-1?”

You shake your head, beginning to cry again.

Alice just nods, dismissing your bullshit. “Where’s your overnight bag, sweetheart?”

You toss a thumb over your shoulder. “It’s up in the nursery. I can go grab it –”

She holds you still with a hand on your shoulder. “Stay.” Another curt nod, then, “Get your shoes, get yourself over to my car. Do you need pants? You need pants. My car, right now.”

“Alice, you really don’t have to –”

“Get in the car,” she insists, climbing past you. “I’m right behind you!”

You watch her figure dissolve into the dim upstairs, and lift the phone back to your ear. “Did you…hear all that?”

“Alice Brown,” Joel replies, and you can hear the smirk in his voice. “What’d I tell ya? That woman doesn’t miss a goddamn thing in this neighborhood.”

“Three centimeters,” the obstetrician says, covering your legs with the sheet. “Still a little ways to go.”

The suite is hushed and still. Walls an unoffending shade of oatmeal; decorated only with oak paneling and a framed painting of some lilies.

A nurse tilts the shades, averting the twinkling city lights in the distance. She turns and smiles – the same fucking smile everyone’s been giving you since you set foot in the place. Head tilted, brows arched.

Sympathy that you want to chew up and spit back out at their feet.

You force yourself to smile in return, and she floats back out to the bustling reception.

“Will he make it?” Alice asks. She’s still in her pajamas; the floral print goes well with the interior of the room. “The father, I mean. Joel.”

The obstetrician peels the gloves from her hands. She shrugs as she drops them into a wastebin. “I don’t see why not,” she says. “Things are moving a little quickly, but I don’t see you having your baby in the next couple hours.”

“You don’t know this kid like I do,” you groan, shifting in the bed.

She lifts the cardiotocograph reading, scanning the jagged lines. “You’re doing great,” she says. “I’ll be back in a little while. Just holler if you need anything.” She strolls off, letting the door sweep shut behind her.

Alice adjusts your pillow and squeezes your shoulder. She holds out a cup of water, guiding the straw to your lips. “He’ll be here,” she whispers.

You take a sip and settle back. “I don’t think I’m that lucky. I told him I hoped he’d get a flat on the ride there. This feels like karma.”

“Well, if it’s anyone’s karma –” she wiggles her fingers, “– it’s his. Going to Houston was ridiculous in the first place. Hell, you two not being together is ridiculous.”

You scoff, shaking your head. “Just because we’re having a kid doesn’t mean we should be together. You shouldn’t be with someone for the sake of a baby who won’t even know any different.”

“Right, right,” Alice agrees, turning away. “You should only be with someone if you love them.”

“Exactly. And me and Joel – we’re not in love.”

She murmurs to herself. She lowers into a chair by the window, crossing her arms. “I’m seventy-three,” she says. “I’m not a damn fool.”

Something twists awkwardly between your hips. You wince, clutching your bump.

Duckie’s heartbeat pulses through the room. Muffled little bubbles of noise, popping one after the other. Strong and steady as hell – a determined little thing, the doctor said.

Don’t I fucking know it, you thought.

You reach for the silicone mask and cup it over your mouth. The gas is cold and funny when you inhale, feeling it shoot straight for the back of your skull. It does little more than dull the spiking pain, but still – you tip your head back, eyes rolling closed.

You let yourself fade from the suite – its yellow lamplight and hushed chatter outside – to somewhere warmer. Somewhere brighter.

Birdsong high overhead, and the whispering leaves on the oak trees in your yard. The sweet breeze on your skin, soothing the sting of the sun. Prickling wood on your fingertips, the gentle strum of a guitar somewhere beyond the fence.

Peering between the slats, catching glimpses of him like watching a film reel. His head nodding, his foot tapping. The concentration tight on his face; the perfect pick and pluck of his fingers on each string.

Half-hoping that he’ll spot you, scold you for spying and storm back into his house. That he might bring it up later – And another thing, while he whips his newspaper from your grasp, ignoring your cackling.

Half-hoping that he won’t. That he’ll sit there at his back door, bottle of beer at his feet, playing to his audience of sparrows.

And you’ll stand here, wishing you could ask the name of each song he hums.

The contraction splits your daydream in two.

In two hours, you dilate almost three centimeters.

You pace back and forth across the suite, pausing only when your womb clenches like a fist. The contractions are lasting longer, swinging lower, and punching harder. They’re giving you less recovery time; less of a chance to get back on your feet.

It’s a fucking nightmare.

Joel’s still not here. Last you heard, he’d just hit Travis County. Twenty minutes, baby, I promise. That was half an hour ago.

It might be for the better that he hasn’t gotten here. You’ve warned Alice three times already that you might just beat the shit out of him, whenever he walks through that door.

And you know what, sweetheart? She chuckled. I bet you could beat the shit out of him, sore as you are.

“Fuck,” you cry out, collapsing onto the bed. You stretch out forward, head hanging between your shoulders, and gulp back more of the laughing gas. The ache barrels from your stomach to your hips, peaking in the very center.

Alice rubs circles into the small of your back. It’s not helping, but you let her do it anyways. Gives her something to tell the neighbors that isn’t damaging to your reputation.

“That’s it,” she coos. “A little longer, just a little…”

The door clicks open just as the tense band begins to loosen.

Your head is spinning. The mask slips from your fingers.

Alice’s hand pauses. “…a little longer…” she repeats, voice drifting. Her weight leaves your back, replaced by something heavier, stronger.

Safer.

Someone grounding, someone smelling of pine and sweet spice.

He sits on the bed at your back and curves around your body. Lips to your shoulder like the sun in your backyard. His beard scratches against your hot skin.

You blink your eyes open.

Joel’s watch face winks back at you. His hands are over yours – bigger, wider. His fists swallow yours whole. They turn, slipping beneath your palms, and your fingers lace together.

“Joel…” you breathe, face turning in to his neck.

“Hi, sweet girl,” he says, wiping sweat from your brow.

You fall limp against his chest. “Holy shit.”

He looks exhausted. Gray, almost translucent. Looks like he’s just driven a couple hundred miles, half asleep and wholly panicked.

But – he’s here. He made it.

The sight of him, the feel of him holding you upright, melts away any anger or resolve to fight back. For now, at least. Picking an argument can wait until there isn’t a human splitting you in two.

He’s here. You’re not doing this alone.

“Holy shit,” Joel repeats. “You okay?”

“How did you get here so –?”

“Ninety-five the entire way.”

You frown. “Only ninety-five?”

“Trunk’s a hunk a’ shit,” he admits. “Couldn’t break a hundred.”

Alice scoffs, somewhere across the room.

He cradles you, his lips to your forehead. “Where we at?” he asks, staring at the paper churning from the cardiotocograph.

“Five, almost s–shit – six centimeters.” You clamp down on his hands, your uterus winding again.

Joel holds the mask back to your lips and you suck another chemical breath in. “Six? Jesus,” he gapes at Alice, “ain’t that…ain’t that real fast? For – for your first?”

Your fingers are weak and shaky, resting on his knuckles. “Your kid has a sick sense of humor,” you mutter into the silicone.

“That ain’t from me,” he says. “That’s all you, maestro.”

You turn closer into his shirt with a groan. He’s solid as a rock, swaying you through it. He’s here.

Alice swipes her coat from a hook by the door. She shakes her head, pulling it over her shoulders. “Ninety-five, Joel? Sweet Lord.”

He rolls his eyes. His hand curves around your bump. “Had a little bit of an emergency, Alice,” he says, watching your face twist with pain.

“And what if you’d had an accident?”

“I didn’t, Alice.”

“You could’ve, goin’ that damn fast. You’re lucky you’re even here.”

Joel finally looks up. “It’s four in the mornin’,” he protests, like a teenager. “Lucky if I passed five cars.”

You give him a weak smile, lowering the mask. You won’t win, you mouth.

He presses his lips to your head. “’s too much fun,” he murmurs, and you snort.

“Oh!” Alice throws a hand up. “I’m glad you find it funny!” She buttons her coat and glares back at both of you, hands on her hips.

She’s a busybody – has been since before you even moved in. She showed up on your doorstep on your first night with a casserole in hand, and made sure to get a good look at your living room before she shuffled back to her own place.

Always watching, always listening.

You never thought you’d see the day when you’d actually be thankful for her snoopiness.

“Thank you, Alice,” you say, head tilting. “For getting me here, for holding my hand…Thank you.”

Her expression thaws, eyes gleaming. With a sniff, she composes herself – and then points to Joel. “You call me as soon as that baby arrives. I won’t sleep, Joel, until you call.”

“I’ll call,” he assures.

She looks back at you. Balls her crepe paper fists, gives them a hearty shake. “Good luck, Mom,” she says, and with one last glance, slips out of the room.

Joel turns back to you, an eyebrow raised. “Take it she was out tendin’ to her tulips again?”

“Yeah,” you snicker, “one in the morning, those fuckers had to be watered.”

He chuckles. “You feelin’ okay?”

“Better now,” you tell him.

“I’m so sorry, darlin’,” he says, shaking his head. “I should’ve been here. A goddamn idiot, headin’ off like that. So damn stupid.”

“Shh, you’re here now.” You wipe the tears from the corners of his eyes. “I just needed you to be here.”

He nods. “I’m here, whatever you need. Tell me what I can do.”

You take a deep breath. “I need…”

Joel straightens – bracing, ready to jump at your first request.

“…I need a fucking break, Joel. I’m so tired, and this fucking kid –”

“Alright,” he sighs, shifting from behind you. “You and your goddamn jokes.”

You smirk, looking over your shoulder. “You missed me.”

“Hm,” he fixes the neckline of your gown, “I missed you. I really did.”

Born at 07:43. It’s a girl.

It’s like being broken open. Like splitting at the seams; your old self falling from you like shards of fruit. Separating, rolling apart; making way for someone older, wiser. Someone with all of the answers in the palm of her hand.

Mom.

You finally get it. She turns to you, finally glances over her shoulder. And she’s no stranger – no one you haven’t known your entire life. I know you, you whisper, nail trailing her smile lines and the pimples along her jaw.

I see you every time I look in the mirror.

Duckie is pulled from your body with a scream like bloody murder – a scream which matches the whimper you let out in shock, if not in volume.

The kid can scream. Jesus Christ, she can scream. It pierces the dull room; deafens you for a couple seconds the first time you hear it.

You’ve never heard a sound so fucking beautiful.

She wails as they lift her from your body. All curled-up, wriggling in the midwife’s arms. She wails as they slot her beneath your chin, as they wipe the blood and amniotic fluid from her.

She wails until the moment her skin meets yours, and as though it’s all you’ve ever known, you begin shushing her cries. Your arms close around her body, rocking her until she settles.

Her tiny hand grabs for something, for someone, for –

You.

Her mom.

“Joel,” you gasp, watching her tiny, pruned fingers clasp tight around just one of yours. “She’s…she’s so small…”

He sniffs in reply, lifting his hand from your shoulder to wipe his face.

You turn to look up at him.

He looks as broken open as you feel. Eyes bloodshot and soaking, tears streaming into his thick beard. A sob in his throat which chokes and silences him, until he catches your eye and he can’t help but laugh with elation.

“Look at her,” he weeps, all torn up by the little girl in your arms. He presses his lips to your forehead in a crash of a kiss: wet, soaking wet on your skin.

You beam up at him when he pulls away. “We did it,�� you whisper.

Joel shakes his head. He runs a thumb across the damp print left on your head. “You did it, honey,” he mutters. “I was nothin’ but a spectator.”

“You almost missed the game,” you quip, and he laughs again.

Your body throbs; nearly numb with pain, heavy with fatigue and emotion. But as long as she’s here, this tiny tornado of a girl, you don’t feel a thing.

Clenching and then unclenching her fist around your finger – so delicate compared to the punches she was throwing at your ribs just six hours ago. She’s worth every fucking second of it.

You finally fucking get it.

She fits so perfectly in the crook of your arm. It feels as though your body was made just to hold her – the very shape of you, designed especially for the very shape of her.

You wonder whether it was the same for your mom. Whether you came along and made her feel whole, for the first time in her life.

Duckie’s eyes open – all glossy and brand new, blinking up at the both of you like she needed no introduction. She already knows you, from the inside out. Her dad’s graying beard, the threads of silver around his temples. Her mom’s tear-stained cheeks, eyes red and bleary with sleeplessness and pure love.

You’re Mom, you’re Dad.

It’s all she’s ever known.

The pillow sighs as you lean back into it. The doctor begins repairing the damage done between your legs; threading and knitting your body back together.

You’re caught between a state of bliss and shock. Your brain is doing much the same work to itself as the woman between your knees is. Patching over all the bloody parts: the screams which tore your skin, the pain which cracked your teeth.

None of it holds a candle to the weight of her in your arms. No matter how tired you are, you can’t take your eyes off her. Her puffy cheeks, the little creases between her brows. No matter how sore, you never want to let go of her.

Joel runs a finger down Duckie’s cheek. “Ain’t she the most beautiful thing in the world?”

“I love her,” you say, bubbling again. “I love her more than anything.”

An hour old, and she’s already a daddy’s girl.

Joel ambles back and forth at the foot of your bed in the recovery suite, bouncing Duck in his arms. He’s never looked so relaxed, so natural at something. He’s never seemed so content, so peaceful.

Everything he’s ever made with his hands – structures and framework and your goddamn closet – and yet this, this tiny accident, this baby girl you were so sure you’d dreamt up right up until an hour ago –

This is the thing he’s proudest of.

Morning lifts through the windows, all soft and vanilla. It floats around him, sunlight spilling across his skin and breathing life and color into him.

Sunlight – or his daughter. They’re the same thing, anyway.

You pull apart a slice of toast, watching. Just watching. Sweet strawberry jam on your tongue, the flavor of everything sharper, fresher. The colors brighter, more vivid.

The world makes more sense like this, you think. Painted in shades of honey and ochre; a room in a corner of the world where time slows to a halt. A soft lullaby from his lips, and the little coos from hers.

The ache of love and labor lingers deep inside you, and nothing has ever made more sense.

You suck the sticky sweet from your fingertips.

Joel looks up, toying with Duckie’s hand. “You want her back?” he asks, a dumb grin on his face.

You shake your head. “I like watching you.”

He scrunches his nose, nuzzling it against his daughter’s, and whispers, “I wasn’t gonna give you back, anyways.” He sways in the early light, staring down at her. “Jesus,” he mutters, swiping at his eyes again, “I didn’t…I didn’t know I could love somethin’ this much.”

“Me, either.”

He drifts over, lowering himself slowly onto the edge of the bed. He extends his elbow, still cradling the baby, and helps you pull yourself upright.

You hiss, a not-so-subtle sting between your legs.

“You, uh…you think of a name yet?” Joel asks.

“Not yet,” you reply, hooked onto his shoulder. Duck blows a bubble and you wipe it with your knuckle. “I thought we were sticking with Duckie?”

His cheeks swell. The sun kisses the edges of his beard. “I thought of one,” he says softly. “Maybe. It’s your call.”

You yawn into his shirt, the warmth of him calm and soothing. “Alright, Miller. Hit me.”

He looks down at the baby nestled in his safe hands. The smallest thing either of you have ever seen.

The name must roll around his head a few times, the way he tilts to-and-fro – looking at her from one angle, then the next. Deciding, when he pulls back, that she suits it from every direction. Like it was her name long before he or even you knew it.

You watch his lips shape the name before you hear it.

Sarah.

And for what feels like forever, you just stare at him. The syllables lingering in the air like glistening specks of dust in a sunbeam. Your eyes follow them down to your daughter, now sleeping peacefully with two hands around one of her dad’s thumbs.

“Sarah,” you repeat, remembering whose name it was, whose name it is – whose name it has always been. “Sarah Miller.”

Joel’s shoulders lift. “What do you think? She look worthy of bein’ a Sarah?”

The rustle of tissue paper. Blue and green and purple tearing between your fingers. The funny fuzz of pom poms as your hands rummaged through the bag. Her hand swimming towards you, an orange foam fish riding the waves between her fingers. Bubbly sounds erupting from her lips.

Your girlish giggle. Her silly grin. Hopscotch along the sidewalk; stopping to look for cars before she’d walk you across the street. How much do I love you, baby girl?

More than the whole world, Mama.

“I love it,” you breathe, tears running to the corners of your mouth. “Sarah fucking Miller.”

“Sarah fuckin’ Miller,” Joel echoes; two wet lines the same as yours, curving down his cheeks. He shifts her into the crook of his arm.

You’re impossibly close. Your chin rests on his shoulder, foreheads brushing when you lean in to each other. His breath is hot on your lips, closer and closer and closer until –

He tastes like salt, rich with emotion. Salt, and then sweet when your tongue meets his. He lifts his free hand to cup your cheek, and your fingers link around his wrist.

And you know you shouldn’t be doing it – know this isn’t your man to be kissing. But in this room, where no one else can see – where it’s just you, him, and all the best parts of yourselves shaped into someone better – he feels like yours.

Just for a moment.

Joel takes the first week of Sarah’s life off work.

He spends a good twenty minutes on the phone to the contractor, talking more about the kid than he does the job. Her eyelashes, her fingernails, the way her legs scrunch anytime he lifts her up.

He’s besotted with the entire thing. And he tells everybody so.

He moves in with you both, stays in your guestroom. It’s a week of no sleep, no peace, and a total of three showers between you. Wearing the same clothes covered in spit-up and drool until one of you has the time or energy to do laundry.

It’s hard. It’s the hardest thing you’ve ever done. By your count, you’ve already cried three times to Joel – terrified you’re getting it all wrong.

But you’re doing it. Jesus God, you’re doing it.

You order takeout most nights. You can’t stand long enough to cook just yet, and you don’t trust Joel not to burn your fucking kitchen down – despite his protests. And it feels like, after everything your body’s given you, it deserves a greasy pizza and some chicken wings.

You rot on the couch together, watching shitty TV and arguing over reruns of Jeopardy! – until Sarah wakes and the whole thing begins again.

Joel loses the game of rock, paper, scissors tonight.

“Shh, baby girl. ‘s alright now, I gotcha,” he lulls, tucking her back in to her bassinet.

She fusses and stretches out; arms over her head, legs curled up. Her onesie is still a little too big – the socked feet all baggy, the sleeves rolled up her wrists.

He lingers for a moment as she drifts off, a hand stroking her tummy. Watching, always watching her. The rise and fall of her stomach, the puffs of breath from her nostrils, her lips still suckling away in her sleep.

“I swear I have a baby photo that looks just like her,” you say. “Same nose and everything.”

Joel clicks his teeth. “Got her looks from her mom. Lucky thing.”

“Low-hanging fruit,” you snort.

He drifts back over, sinking into the couch at your side. “Doin’ okay?” he asks, and you nod.

Every muscle in your body still feels like a ton weight. Your stomach is still swollen; there are still stitches between your legs. There are moments you can’t tell if you’re crying because of hormones, exhaustion, or joy.

Every time, it’s a combination of all three.

Life before feels so long ago – and it hasn’t even been a fortnight. But then you held her for the first time, and now – your arm misses the weight of her when she’s not in it. Your house feels eerily quiet when she’s not laughing, or whimpering, or screaming the fucking roof down.

You can feel your daughter growing up already, and she’s only ten days old.

On the mantelpiece, safe in a stippled gold frame, your mom beams down over her. The photo at least twenty years old, the memory even older. Laughing, the way she always was; nothing quite so funny as a joke frozen in time.

Joel prods you with his elbow. “She’d be proud of you, you know. Your mom.”

“Oh,” you scoff, “no, she’d be like, Holy shit. This kid totally kicked your ass.”

He chuckles. “Sure she did,” he shrugs, “she’s your kid.”

The TV babbles to itself across the room. In its glow, Joel meets your eye. A tiny, pearly fleck swimming in deep honey.

It’s familiar – each shade of bronze in his eyes, each thread of silver through his hair. Like you’ve mapped each and every line on his skin, collecting them like the sleepless hours between you.

Everything about him feels so normal. Burnt toast in the morning, a spoon clinking around a mug of coffee. The rustle of the newspaper, the sizzle of eggs in the pan, the baby snoring on your chest.

Everything – and yet nothing you’ve ever known.

“I miss her,” you whisper. “I miss my mom.”

His hand finds yours instantly. “I know, baby. I know you do.”

You slouch down, leaning on his shoulder, and close your eyes. Joel presses his lips to the crown of your head, his thumb looping around your knuckles.

Sarah gurgles in her sleep. She sighs – a satisfied little sound. Nothing has ever made more sense.

His voice rumbles against your skull. “Who sent the lilies?”

Your eyes flutter open. “Hm?”

Joel flicks his finger towards the window, towards a sprawl of speckled, cream flowers. “The lilies? They weren’t there this morning.”

“Oh…” You turn to look up at him, cringing.

He sees the flicker of her behind your eyes. Her lustrous curtain of hair, her perfect almond nails.

“Really?” Joel asks, mirroring your expression.

You nod, trying not to laugh. “From her and Kate. You were upstairs with Sarah when she came by. I offered to call you down, but – she just wanted to drop ‘em and go.”

“What did she…? Did she say anything?”

Your head shakes. “She just…she said congratulations, said she hoped we were okay. Then she got in her car and she left. I kinda figured things weren’t sunshine and roses, anyway. You haven’t fuckin’ seen her since Houston.”

He snorts, fingers massaging his eyes. “I was goin’ to tell you,” he mumbles into his palms, “I just…Honey, I don’t even know what day of the week it is right now. I’m sorry.”

“You don’t have to tell me anything,” you mutter.

“Yes, I do,” he insists. His eyes flit over to Sarah, then back to you. “We haven’t really talked it through yet, me ‘n her. I called her a few days ago, we agreed it’s time. It – it’s past time. I shoulda called it months ago.”

“I guess,” you sigh. “Are you okay?”

Joel’s brow furrows. “’course I am. I got the most beautiful baby girl in the world,” and then, rolling his eyes, “you’re here.”

“Oh, fuck you,” you clip, batting his arm. “Vanessa could do way better, anyways.”

“I don’t doubt it.”

You squeeze his fingers, softly adding, “I’m sorry it didn’t work out, Joel.”

He stares down at your clasped hands. He looks tired, worn out. You figure it’s not just from the newborn. But he takes a deep breath, something the color of relief dawning on his skin, and looks you dead in the eye.

“I’m not.”

­“Hey, Duckie – can you say, Happy birthday, Daddy?”

A vinyl wobbles on the turntable – some acoustic record from when Joel was a teenager. There’s wrapping paper still crumpled beneath the coffee table; four plates with more crumbs than cake left, dotted around the room.

Tommy leans in, a lopsided party hat on his head, and tickles Sarah’s chin.

She blinks at him, unamused, then scrunches her little nose and turns back into your chest.

He sighs, straightening. “She don’t like her uncle Tommy all that much,” he grumbles, sulking back over to the couch. Maria puts a consoling arm around his shoulder.

You rest your lips on Sarah’s head, breathing in her sweet scent. Swaying back and forth, you tease, “She don’t like anyone all that much, not unless they’re her daddy.”

Joel’s head lifts and he smiles, eyes glistening. He watches you and Sarah dance; laughs when you twirl her around and she tips her head back, flashing a gummy grin.

“She’ll come around to ya,” he tells Tommy, wandering over to your side. “We all learned to, eventually.”

Tommy scoffs. “Very funny, old man. Jesus.”

Joel stoops down to let Sarah run her small hands through his beard. He catches her fingertips between his lips and pretends to nibble on them.

She giggles, squirming in your arms. Her fingers find the sweeps of hair on his forehead and, taking a fistful, she tugs.

“Christ,” Joel hisses, pulling back.

“That was on you this time,” you chuckle, pointing a finger. “You know she does that, and you still fall for it.”

Maria glances down at her watch. “Is that the time?” she asks, turning to Tommy. “We should really turn in.”

“Oh – right, right.” Tommy tips the last of his beer into his mouth. “We’re takin’ Mom to brunch tomorrow. Better get some goddamn rest.”

Joel hums, still massaging his hairline. “Hey,” he whispers, elbowing you. “Maybe I should take her over. She’s getting sleepy – ain’t you, little Duck?”

“Oh, yeah.”

Tommy stands and holds a hand out. “Why don’t you let Maria and I take her? We’ll tuck her in, keep an eye on her. We weren’t half bad the other day, while y’all were at work. And if she’s stayin’ at Joel’s tonight anyway…”

You glance to Joel, who shrugs. Something shaped like Sure.

“As long as you don’t mind,” you reply, bouncing the baby slowly. “Let me go grab her things.”

Joel’s hand slips across the small of your back as you pass, making for the stairs. He lingers at the bottom, watching until you turn into the nursery with Sarah in the crook of your arm.

You set her down in her crib and gather some of her favorites: a yellow blanket, a duck comforter, a rattle shaped like an elephant. She watches contentedly as you shuffle back and forth, staring when you lean over the wooden rail.

“You know how much I love you?” you whisper, curling a finger inside her fist. She squeezes, and you say, “More than the whole world.”

She grabs at the chain dangling from your neck, the letter S catching the light. Instead, she lifts your finger to her mouth. Her nails scratch light as a feather across your skin. Her gums are tiny and soft around your knuckle.

Everything about her is tiny and soft. Her sweeping eyelashes, her plushy cheeks. Her round tummy, and the squeals she lets free as you dot kisses and blow raspberries all over it. No matter how much she’s grown in three months, she’s still so tiny.

She’ll always be the smallest, sweetest thing you’ve ever known. And she’s all yours.

“Jesus, kid,” you sniff, swiping at your tears. You slip your hands around her back and prop her on your hip. “Alright, let’s go. Quit making your mom cry.”

The bag over your shoulder, you carry her out of the room and into the dark hallway. It’s quiet downstairs; nothing but the crackle of the record player, the distant chink of dishes in the kitchen.

That – and hushed voices in the living room.

“Joel,” Tommy says, over and over again. He’s trying to cut in between his brother’s rambling. Joel – listen to me. Just listen, for one second –”

You linger on the bottom step, trying to split Joel’s voice from Tommy’s. Trying to pluck the words out, over Maria’s humming from the next room.

“…and it ain’t that simple, Tommy it’s –”

“What ain’t simple about it? You have a –” Tommy says it through his teeth, “– you have a kid together, Joel. You really think she’s gonna –”

Sarah grabs the charm around your neck and shakes suddenly, rattling the chain.

You close your hand around hers, losing your balance. “Shhhhit, Duckie, you –”

Joel’s eyes snap to your figure as you step down. He clears his throat, leaning away from Tommy. “Hey – hey, darlin’.”

“Hey,” you reply. Bright. Chipper. Unclenching your fist to let your daughter shake your necklace some more.

She squeals with delight when she spots Joel across the room.

“She ready to go?” he asks, slinging a quick – telling – look at Tommy.

You look between the brothers, browns quirking. They look as guilty as each other: scratching their beards, staring at the furniture instead of you. “Uhuh,” you reply, tongue against your teeth. “Everything…everything okay?”

Tommy slaps his thighs as he stands. “Everything’s great, sweetheart. Sure as shit. Joel – you, uh…you got a key on ya?”

“Oh, yep.” Joel reaches into his pocket. He unhooks a silver key from the chain and drops it into his brother’s open palm.

Tommy calls for Maria. He sidesteps around you, face flushed and smiling.

She floats through from the kitchen, drying her palms on her jeans. “Where’s my baby duck?” she sings, reaching for Sarah.

You pass her over and she melts into her aunt’s arms, curling up into a little pink lump on her chest. “She just had a feed, like, twenty minutes ago, so – she should go down pretty well. And there are more bottles in Joel’s fridge, if you need ‘em.”

Maria nods, wrapping Sarah’s blanket around her. She lifts the bag strap from your shoulder and hands it to Tommy. “I’ll text you as soon as she’s down. Come on, Duckie, let’s get you to bed.”

Tommy leans over and squeezes your arm, winking as he follows his wife. He calls goodnight to Joel, lifting a pointed finger over his head, and closes the door behind them.

Things could not have gone smoother.

It’s suspicious as shit.

You turn when you hear Joel shifting.

“C’mon,” he utters, a pile of plates in one hand. “I ain’t leavin’ you with this mess.” He heads through to the kitchen, broad figure swaying.

The plates spill into the sink, water trickling over them. Joel hums to himself as he gets to work with a sponge in hand.

You linger in the living room.

Things have been good lately – peaceful. You’re in as much of a routine as Sarah will allow: a steady pattern of dropping her off and picking her back up, patchwork family dinners, daytrips whenever both of you can make them.

Your body is healing, pulling itself back together. You don’t have to think about being Mom anymore – she walks in stride with you. The world is painted a new shade of normal – one where you can do anything with a baby on your hip, one where love becomes your first language.

One where you swallow back the ache in your heart, for better or for worse. The only piece of you still fractured. The only wound left open.

Joel’s birthday cards lie flat on the coffee table. You pluck them up one by one – his parents’, Tommy and Maria’s, yours – and Sarah’s.

A messy splotch of a handprint, bright yellow paint smeared across half the fucking card (she hasn’t quite mastered self-control yet). A googly eye plastered to the bird’s chest; orange crayon for the beak and legs.

Sure, you took charge for most of the project – but when he opened it and saw his daughter’s little masterpiece, you caught him swiping his knuckle at the corner of his eye. He snuggled into her, perched on his lap, and whispered, Thank you, little Duckie.

You prop them along your mantelpiece, dotted around your mom’s photo. When you step back, looking from son to brother to…a good friend, you could almost pretend.

Almost pretend that they belong here, on this mantelpiece. There is no yours and his. Just one of everything; nothing doubled nor halved.

Almost pretend that he won’t collect them as he leaves, break into another teary laugh at the sight of the duck painting, and then kiss your cheek goodnight. Promise to have your daughter back in time to go swimming tomorrow morning.

Almost.

“Hey,” Joel calls, “did you, uh – did you hear Tommy talkin’ about Jackson?”

You slip into the kitchen, side by side with him at the sink. “Uh, yeah,” you reply, lifting a towel. “Moose, pine trees. Yep.”

“It sounds beautiful. You think we should take a trip up there sometime? Could be Sarah’s first vacation.”

“You mean the three of us?”

He shrugs, scrubbing a bowl in the water. “Sure. I don’t think Duckie would let one of us stay behind, do you? She’d scream the damn airport down,” he chuckles, looking back to the twinkling bubbles.

You hum. “Maybe.”

“You don’t feel like it?”

“No, I do. I just – I don’t know. Maybe someday.”

“Okay,” Joel says, nodding. “Put a pin in it.”

He passes you a dripping plate and you drag the towel over it, circling the pattern until the suds are wiped clean. And another, and another.

It feels awkward. It feels stiff. There’s something hanging between you, heavy on both your shoulders. A weight you haven’t felt around Joel in over a year.

You turn to him as he stacks the last plate on the draining board. “Is that what you were talking to Tommy about?”

Joel pauses. “You heard that, huh?”

“Only the part about having a kid. It’s none of my business, I know, I just –”

“Actually,” he clears his throat, “it’s plenty your business.”

He leans back against the counter and crosses his arms. A deep breath, cheeks puffing as he exhales. His grip on the dish towel whitens his knuckles.

He’s…nervous. The same shade of gray he wore the night you went into labor.

He takes another unsteady breath.

“Joel?” you ask, head tilting. “Whatever it is, you can say it. I got whiskey, if that’ll make it easier. Probably tastes like shit, but…”

His expression cracks. His eyes twinkle, and he smiles. Only a little, but enough. Enough to let the words slip through.

“You know, that night at Tommy’s wedding was one of the best nights of my life.”

Your heartbeat thuds a bassline in your ears; the rush of your blood the squealing guitar. Skin tacky, moans caught between teeth. Laughter and lust tangling together in the air.

“Yeah?” you ask.

Joel nods. “Yeah. Lying there – talking, laughing, messin’ around. I don’t think I’ve ever laughed that hard in all my life. I could’ve stayed in that room with you forever.”

Your eyes start to sting. You look away.

“I thought I would regret it. I thought I should regret it. And I never did. But then,” he takes a deep breath, “the next day, I look out front, and my newspaper’s sittin’ on my lawn. And for two weeks straight, I kept checking – and there it was. I thought, Sure as shit, she regrets the whole thing. I thought you never wanted to see me again.”

You shake your head. “I wanted to see you again. I missed – I missed you. Missed pissin’ you off.”

He laughs. “I missed you pissin’ me off. Missed that annoying as hell thud on my porch.”

“I didn’t know if you wanted me to – you know,” you admit, and Joel nods.

“We got pretty good at avoidin’ each other,” he grumbles. “And then – with Vanessa, I thought I’d be doin’ you a favor. Letting you off light.”

“You…you took her number to do me a favor?”

“Naw,” Joel says. “I took her number ‘cause her brother in-law has a lumber company, and I had a closet to build. I was drunk, I was an idiot, and I brought it up to her at the wedding. By the time I thought it through, you ‘n I weren’t speakin’.”

You stare at him, jaw slack. “Are you fucking kidding me?”

He shakes his head. He edges closer to you. Voice low, he says, “I shouldn’t’ve gone out on that first date with her. I shouldn’t’ve done any of it. I should’ve talked to you about what I was feeling.”

“Well, maybe we both should’ve,” you mutter, wringing your hands. “I wasn’t exactly the best at it, either.”

His head tips, considering. “Can I tell you now?”

You glance over to him. “Tell me what, Miller?”

“Tell you…tell you that I love you,” he whispers.

It steals the breath from your lungs. One clean swipe.

He nods to himself, then – certain of it – and says it again. “I do, darlin’. I love you.”

Your heart begins to hammer. Tears spill over onto your cheeks, dripping from your jaw.

“And, look –” Joel takes your wrists, “– I got no right to say any of that, I know. I put you through a hell of a lot, these last few months – and that kills me. But if you’ll let me, I swear to you – I’ll make it up to you. I’ll take care of you for the rest of my life.”

You look up. His cheeks are dappled, too – glistening with tears. “Joel…” you weep.

He cups your jaw. “Listen to me. What we’ve had, the last three months – I want it all the time. I want you, and I want Duck. I want the three of us under one roof. I want to sleep in the same bed as you.”

You breathe a shuddered laugh. Your hands fall over his wrists. Keep talking, you mouth, bottom lip trembling.

“I want to get married, or not,” Joel says. “I want to show up to Tommy and Maria’s anniversary party late, ‘cause Duck couldn’t pick which shoes she wanted to wear. I want to have more kids, take ‘em on vacation.”

“Wyoming?” you sniff.

“Wyoming,” he repeats. “I want…I want all of it, baby. You ‘n me. I want you ‘n me, more than anything in the world. And if I’m too late, then you can tell me. Tell me, and I swear on my life I will never mention it again.”

Your hands curve over his. His strong knuckles, worked and weathered and worn by his years. Down to his wrists – the tatty strap on his ages-old watch, the dark hair peppered along his arms.

“I love you so much, baby. So much that it drives me insane. You drive me…fuckin’ insane.”

“Oh, fuck you,” you whisper, balling your fists against his chest.

Joel laughs, nose brushing against yours. “Yeah,” he sniffs, “I figured you’d say som’ like that.”

“I love you, too,” you mumble, linking your arms around his neck. “Shit, I love you.”

“Ain’t that a thing?” he says, and his lips are on yours.

It’s been a year. A year since the first time you felt him – lips soft as velvet, sweet with alcohol and something stronger. His tongue and yours, his teeth and yours. Every part of you clashing with every part of him.

And goddamn, you’ve missed it.

Joel follows you upstairs, pinning you to the wall by your bedroom door. White heat flooding through your veins, he kneels before you and pulls you onto his tongue.

He’s hungry.

He laps at you as though you’ll be gone in the morning. As though he won’t wake up tangled in you, breathing in your scent, lips on your skin.

Dusk seeps in at the edges of your vision; daylight draining from the sky. It’s dark, too dark to see him clearly, but you feel him fucking everywhere.

His beard grazes the inside of your thigh. He kisses where he scratches your skin. He holds your hips steady, tongue dipping in and out.

“You know how fuckin’ sweet you taste?” he growls, slipping inside again.

He looks so good between your legs. Like he was made for it – made for you. All yours, in ways you never really understood until now.

He brings you to the edge with his tongue flat against your clit. Holding your hips firm against his mouth, groaning with you as you fall.

You come with a broken moan. Hips stutter to a halt, legs fall wide open. The warmth in your belly spills over and rushes to every corner of your body.

Joel moans, tongue still lapping as your cunt pulses all over him. “Good fuckin’ girl,” he slurs, watching you come undone.

He stands, a chaste kiss to your lips, and then parts them with his tongue. “Taste good?” he mumbles, kissing you gently.

Yeah, you think, moaning against him, it tastes fucking good.

He spreads you out on your mattress and kisses what feels like every square inch of your body. You giggle at the feeling of his lips behind your ear; moan when they close around your nipple.

Your back arches; little lightning bolts as he pulls the buds to a peak. Your fingers knot through his hair; hissing at the meeting of pain and pleasure between Joel’s lips.

“I love you,” you whisper, when he settles between your legs. You don’t know that you’ve felt something so true in all your life.

He smiles. Your fingers trace the lines at his eyes.

“Come here,” he says, and pulls your hips to meet his.

You curve a hand around his neck, glancing down at your open legs. “Looks a little different to the last time you saw her.”

Joel shakes his head, licking his lips. “Beautiful, baby. She looks so goddamn beautiful.”

Each movement is careful, deliberate. He notches his tip at your hole and pauses until you’re looking at him again.

And then he pushes in.

He slips an arm under your head; the other holding your thigh on his waist. He kisses you as you stretch around him. He still tastes like salt and slick.

You gasp, teeth gritting around a hiss. “Fuck,” you whimper, turning in to his chest.

“Easy, easy,” Joel coos, voice rumbling against your temple. “Catch your breath. Doin’ so good.”

“It’s not sore,” you tell him, nodding for him to move again. “It’s…it’s just…different.”

“Tighter,” he groans, eyes on your cunt as it draws his cock in.

You agree, “Tighter.”

He catches you in another kiss, his tongue slipping between your lips. “Feel so good, sweet girl. Breathe. ‘m right here.”

It’s never felt like this before. This gentle, this tender.

You have never felt like this before. Broken open, stitched back together. Your heart split into two – whole again each time his body meets yours.

Joel catches your moans on his tongue. He steadies his pace; rocking into you over and over. Laughing against your lips; your fingers intertwined with his.

“Feel good?” he pants.

Your head rolls back. “Mhm.”

“Take it, baby. Such a tight little thing.”

“Joel,” you cry, “I’m close.”

His teeth nip at your neck. “Shit,” his hips jump, “attagirl. Just like that.” He thrusts into you harder, bleeding the color from your vision.

You pull his lips to yours, foreheads tacky. Joel’s eyes gloss over.

I love you, he breathes.

And the world whitens.

He pulls you against his chest when you come back around. Shifts up the headboard, skin all sticky and warm. He kisses your temples, kisses your shoulders, kisses your knuckles.

You melt into his grasp, turning to look up at him. You run your fingers over his lips, through his damp hair. Just staring. Drinking him all in.

“You were right next door, the entire time,” you whisper.

He runs a thumb across your cheek. “Yep.”

“Do you think we wasted too much time?”

Joel’s lip turns. “Nah,” he says. “We found our way.”

“Needed a little help, though.”

He scoffs, tongue between his teeth. “I’m sure she’ll hold it against us forever.”

You think of that evening in August. The last bow of the sun before your world changed forever. Of deals struck and promises made. Of satin on your fingertips – newspaper ink and duck egg silk.

You think of that photograph on your mantelpiece. Bright eyes watching every second of it. A smile on her face the entire time.

You laugh to yourself. Joel looks down and kisses your swollen cheek.

“We should go,” he taps your thigh, “got a little duck who’ll be wonderin’ where her mama and daddy are.”

The church tower rings out twice as the truck purrs between graves.

Joel pulls up under the shade of a sycamore, tires rolling to a halt. Sarah kicks her feet, her heels thudding against her car seat.

“Mama,” she presses a sticky finger to the back window, “flowers.”

“Yeah, baby,” you call over your shoulder, hugging your own graveside gift a little tighter in your arms. “Lots of ‘em, huh?”

“Yeah,” your daughter quietly considers, then kicks her seat again.

Joel waits patiently for you to give him the go ahead. He slips a hand around your knee, looking ahead at the rows of headstones. So patient, so gentle.

Your chest swells, a deep breath filling your lungs, and you nod. “Alright.”

“Sure?” he asks. “Take as long as you want, darlin’.”

But if you wait any longer, you’ll never leave. The paper wrap crinkles in your arms. “You take Duck,” you reply, “I’ll take…”

Joel lifts your hand, placing a soft kiss between your knuckles. “You got it. We’ll walk on.”

He leaves you in the truck to collect yourself. He unbuckles Sarah and sets her loose, following her across the grass with his hands in his pockets.

Her light-up sneakers flash as she sprints; head tossed back, toothless smile pointed to the sun. She turns back to her dad, her little hand fitting perfectly into his.

Made for each other.

You hook your fingers around the handle and leave the truck.

Their grave is a short walk down a grassy slope, sheltered by another towering tree. Its leaves flutter down around you as you near the stone; stray petals which catch in the breeze and lead the way.

You kneel down, the grass dry and prickly through your jeans. “Hi, Mom,” you whisper, sweeping some dust from the base of the grave. “Hi, Dad.”

Your grandma picked this spot. She’s long gone – laid to rest elsewhere with a grandfather you never met – so you try to visit as often as you can. Freshen the flowers, brighten up the stone.

It fucking sucks, but someone’s gotta do it.

You peel the brown paper from the bouquet, exposing the soft colors Sarah picked back in the florist. They fit perfectly on the stone, right beneath the words Devoted parents.

Tears prick at the corners of your eyes, a feeling that wraps itself around your throat and steals any other words – until a flash of pink catches your attention.

“Duckie,” Joel calls, following her between graves. “Hey. This is a cem…Hey, Duck, listen – this is a cemetery, we gotta be – Sarah!”

You stifle a laugh, watching him jog after the hoodie tied around her waist. He swipes for her hand and she dodges him, ducking between graves faster than his mid-fifties joints can turn him.

There’s no one else here – it’s only you. And it’s a quiet enough place as it is, so – you let her laugh. Let him chase her, and let her sneakers light the place in pink. What else is there to do?

“Sorry it’s been a little while,” you tell your parents, eyes still on your man.

He’s kneeling now, Sarah on his thigh, in front of a tall, cross-shaped stone. They’re pointing at the words on the stone, her inquisitive eyes studying each one.

“I know I said I’d come visit for Dad’s birthday, but I guess things got busy – what with the move and all. We’re still living out of boxes. But the girls’ rooms are almost done – we just gotta paint ‘em.”

You look back down to the stone. Your mom’s name carved deep into spotted marble, your dad’s underneath. One awful date to tie them both together.

Dad probably heard Duck’s first squeal and turned away; gone back to whatever boring activity he might get up to in the afterlife. But your mom, you know for certain, is sat with her chin on the heel of her palm. Watching her mini-me trace the shapes of words, squirming when Joel presses his lips to her temple and whispers hints to her.

She’s probably smiling, making some comment about how big Sarah’s getting. How smart she is, how funny. How she must keep you and Joel on your toes – and goddamn, she’s right.

“Joel’s been working on the kitchen,” you continue. “I left my phone in the truck, but you should see it, Mom. He got these marble countertops, these little brushed-gold handles. He wrote our names on the wall before he tiled it, so whoever remodels after we’re gone will find that. The four of us.”

“M-meh-mem-orr-mem-or-ree?” Sarah tilts her head.

Joel nods. “Memory, yeah. Good job, Duck.”

“Duckie’s good,” you tell your mom. “She’s top of her class in – well, everything. Really wiping the floor with all the other first-graders. She’d have been your favorite – I know that much. And you’d have been hers.

“She’s gonna be some kind of lawyer, we think. Social justice and all that. She likes to be a woman of the people. Always talkin’ back to Joel – she hardly cuts him any slack, these days,” you laugh.

“He’s good, too – Joel. Working hard, as usual. Tommy and Maria visited last week – they brought Buckley, and now Duck won’t stop goin’ on about us getting a dog.”

You chance a glance over the stone, making sure the pair are out of earshot when you add, “Don’t tell her, but we called the pound last night. We’re heading there tomorrow while she’s at school to pick one out for her birthday. Joel’s giddier than I think Sarah’s gonna be.”

Joel’s carrying Duck now, wandering down a wobbly row of graves.

She halts him by pointing to one. “N-eh-v-eh-never…fff-or-g-for–”

He stares at her, a grin breaking across his lips. “Sound it out, that’s it. ‘s a big word, baby girl. You got it.”

The world seems to blur around them. The birds sing, a light melody from overhead. The green trees sway across the blue of the sky; the straight soar of cars on the highway. It all fades into the background, behind the two of them – wandering from shade into brilliant sun.

Your family. Your man, your blood – and everything in between. The little girl who brought it all together in the end – leading her dad by hand over knolls and broken stone, chasing butterflies, and asking what eh-teh-err-nal means.

“Means forever,” Joel says, kneeling beside her. “’s how long I’m gonna love you for.”

“And Nel?”

“And Nel.”

“And Mama?”

“And Mama.”

Sarah runs her hands through his beard, swaying side to side. “But me the most,” she concludes, nodding.

Joel hms, biting back a laugh. He lifts his chin, asks the little girl whether or not he’s going gray.

She has the same ridiculous laugh you do. The same snort you used to find so embarrassing, until you heard it come from her.

Just watching them stokes the already burning fire in your ribcage – the warmth flooding around your heart. He’s so good at it – being a dad.

Was he ever anything else, before he was a father? You can’t remember a time you didn’t wake up next to him, wrapped up in his arms, or with one of his kids burrowed between your bodies. It all feels so long ago, now.

He wanted to do everything. He’d lie with you between his legs, holding your half-sleeping form upright while you fed her. He’d race home after work specially to bathe her. He picked up any and every single duck-themed thing that he came across.

And what were you? Mom felt like such a fucking longshot. So out of your reach that you couldn’t understand the meaning of the word.

But there are days when she says it – Sarah, looking up at you with Joel’s twinkling eyes and a smirk which matches yours – and it’s like you’ve been waiting your whole life to hear it. Like you’ve been waiting your whole life for her.

Well. Her, and her little sister.

“And, uh – another thing,” you say, reaching for the plastic handle of a car seat. “I brought somebody for you to meet.”

A clumsy fist shoots up to shake a speckled dinosaur toy – the brown spheres of its eyes catching the sunlight. She squeals with delight when you unbuckle her, kicks her legs the same way her sister always did.

“She’s a little nervous, ain’t you, Nel?” you whisper, laughing at her gummy smile and tiny, socked feet. “She spit up on herself on the way here, but – I think you’re gonna love her.”

You perch the baby on your thigh, same as Joel did with Sarah, and she wraps her fingers around one of yours. You wiggle it – waving to your mom’s name, to the petals gently fluttering in the breeze.

“Mom,” you sniff, “this is Ellie.”