#harassed is a strong word. he made comments. it just sounds more dramatic

[2-braincells]

dear diary today my principals dad harassed me abt my skirt length and some random 12 yr old boys cat called me. men of all ages are strange.

[dlwritings]

Creepy Dan | Tom Holland

masterlist found here

pairing - Tom x reader word count - 1,477 warnings - language, coworker is creepy A/N - for the anon who requested x | I hate that I had personal experiences to draw from for this story. Women! Deserve! Better!

summary - You have a coworker who harasses you at work, but you’ve never told Tom about him. When he sees the treatment you receive first hand, he’s not okay with it.

You deserved better than the job you were at. That much you knew. Sure, everyone needed to pay their dues and work some kind of customer service job, but not one like this. Not at a restaurant where the bartenders drank on the job and the chefs ate off the plates they were about to serve. You hated everything about the job, but it paid, and you were desperate. A lot of your coworkers caused problems for you, but there was one who was the worst of the worst.

You called him Creepy Dan.

Creepy Dan was a grown man who had a tendency to strike up perverted conversations with you. There was the time you were taking a break on the steps to the basement of the restaurant and he came and sat beside you to tell you about the erotic novel he was writing. Or the time he commented on the leggings you wore -that you promptly never wore again. Or one of the numerous times he put his hand on the small of your back as he walked by you. Or or or. The stories went on.

And it wasn’t fair. You shouldn’t have that many stories. In a perfect world, you wouldn’t even have one story. But this was not a perfect world.

You had complained to the boss a few times before, but it never got you anywhere. Creepy Dan had been working there for years -you only a few months. Plus, who would believe a young girl over an adult man? You were the girl who cried wolf, right? When you talked to your boss, you tried not to sound too dramatic. So, instead of saying, “He tells me about his erotic novels,” you said, “He tells me things about his life that I’m not comfortable with.” To that, your boss said, “That’s just Dan! He’s just making conversation.” When you said, “I’m not comfortable with the way he touches me,” he came back with, “Has he harmed you physically or sexually?” Well, you couldn’t exactly say yes, so your boss didn’t exactly see a problem.

Creepy Dan was a chef -one of the ones who drank just as much as the bartenders and always sent a plate out with a few less fries than should be there. Most nights, you didn’t have much interaction with him. He usually stayed back in the kitchen, and you could hide out at the hostess station or make rounds on the restaurant floor.

But not today. Today, Creepy Dan decided to leave the kitchen cave. You weren’t sure if he was genuinely chatting with customers to get reviews on his food or just wanted to stay as close to you as appeared socially acceptable. He constantly made his way over to whatever table you were at and put his arm around you, resting that hand on your back (that you had grown uncomfortably familiar with), and sometimes even letting his fingers squeeze your hip.

You hated it.

On the upside, Tom came by. Tom was your boyfriend, and he, Harrison, Harry, and Tuwaine would visit you from time to time. While he knew you didn’t like your job, he didn’t know why. You didn’t like to talk about it, mostly because you were embarrassed. Instead, you just complained to him about rotten customers and subpar pay.

The days he came by were usually busy, but today it wasn’t. You got to go over to where he and the boys were sitting and chat with them for a while. Everything was good -you were all laughing about something Tuwaine said- until Creepy Dan walked over, his hand finding that familiar spot on your back. “I hope you’re not laughing at the food over here,” he said with a smile.

Tom noticed you immediately tense up, and his eyebrows furrowed.

“These are some of my friends,” you said to Creepy Dan. You were painfully aware of his hand still on your body, and you wanted to move out of his touch, but you knew that would just cause him to make some comment about it. Still, when his fingers started moving across your back, you couldn’t help but flinch. Creepy Dan frowned, and you knew you hit a nerve.

Tom didn’t like this. Not in a possessive no-one-can-touch-my-girl way, but in a this-man-is-creeping-(Y/N)-out-and-that’s-not-okay way. “Friends?” he laughed. “I think we’re a bit more than that babe.” He stood up from his seat and reached a hand out to Creepy Dan. “I’m Tom. Her boyfriend.”

Sure, Creepy Dan had at least 15 years on Tom, but that didn’t intimidate your boyfriend. Creepy Dan shook his hand, then chuckled and put his arm over your shoulders.

“Here I thought you had the hots for me,” he said, stroking your cheek with the back of his hand.

“Uh, mate,” Tom said, his voice level, “why don’t you take your hands off my girlfriend, yeah?”

“(Y/N) can speak for herself,” he said, then looked down at you. “Can’t you?” You swallowed nervously, your mind reeling with what happened the last time you spoke for yourself to the boss. You got nothing, pissed Creepy Dan off, and essentially egged him on into harassing you even more.

You made eye contact with Tom, and your boyfriend’s eyes narrowed. He gently took your hand and pulled you away from Creepy Dan, then stood in front of you a tad protectively. Creepy Dan’s jaw clenched, and he rolled his eyes. “Whatever,” he said. “Her loss.” He started to walk away, but not before mumbling, “Stupid bitch can’t do anything right anyway.”

You saw the anger in Tom’s eyes, but you held his arm before he could do anything rash. Did you want to see Tom punch this grown man in the face? Of course you did. But you also didn’t want Tom to fight it out for you. That’d get you fired, and it’d feel like Creepy Dan still won.

Still, you couldn’t hold back the tears that came as soon as Creepy Dan was gone. Tom pulled you in for a hug, and you squeezed your eyes shut so you wouldn’t have to look at the other boys. “Why didn’t you tell me that’s why you didn’t like it here?” he asked, wiping the tears from your cheeks.

You shrugged. “‘S stupid.”

“It’s not,” he said with a shake of his head. “That man should be fired.”

“I know,” you whispered. “And I’ve tried. I’ve gone to my boss, but he just won’t listen.”

“Maybe he needs some customer complaints,” Harrison piped up. “Because I’d be happy to go to your boss and tell him that his chef ruined my meal by harassing my waitress.”

You smiled as the other boys agreed, and Tom’s hand found his way to the small of your back, comforting the spot that seemed to burn every time Creepy Dan touched it. “Thank you boys,” you said. Tom kissed your cheek, and you turned with your head held high to keep working.

Because that’s what you would do: keep working, and keep speaking up. It was hard, and it was uncomfortable, but it was important. And you knew you weren’t alone -that you had support. Because your friends weren’t the only customers who saw the interaction with Creepy Dan.

One of your tables left a note with their tip: We’re talking to your manager about the chef. That was so wrong. Stay strong girl!

It brightened up your evening and definitely made your shift go by faster. Even though the rest of the boys left, Tom stayed around so he could drive you home. The ride home was silent, save for the sound of the radio humming in the background. When you got inside, Tom swiftly gave you a kiss on the cheek. “How about I run us a bath, mm?” he asked.

“Really?” you said. Tom didn’t exactly love taking baths together. Sure, he loved the intimacy and being close to you and relaxing, but he didn’t like getting pruney, and if it didn’t lead to sex, he got bored with it.

“Yeah,” he said softly, tucking some hair behind your ear. “I thought we could relax a bit. Drink some wine. Just-” He smiled. “Just be together.”

You gave him a small smile. “We don’t have to,” you said. “I know you don’t always like taking baths together.”

“Darling,” he said, “‘M gonna take care of you tonight, okay?” You felt tears come to your eyes and nodded.

“Thank you, Tommy,” you said. He nodded and placed a kiss to your lips.

Yes, work was stressful and less than pleasant, but you didn’t have to take it home with you. Tonight, you’d let Tom take care of you. Creepy Dan was at work, but Tom was here. And he always would be.

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

add yourself to my TAGLIST

strike-through means Tumblr won’t let me tag you

ALL: @bangtan-serendipity​ | @planetdemon | @the-singing-clown406​ | @tomshufflepuff​ | @bluelalal​ | @grandloser​ | @jackiehollanderr​ | @mindset-jupiter​ | @bisexual-sk8r | @feel-like-gold​ | @runaway-apple​ | @miraclesoflove​ | @marvelismylifffe | @wonderbyers​ | @coraz0ndcristal​ | @lizmarvel​ | @delicately-important-trash | @superhoorny4daddy​

TOM: @hannihannelora | @lbuck121​ | @quaksonhehe​ | @onepackfrombroke | @geminiparkers | @ladykxxx08​ | @gkarisa839​ | @destinedbooklover | @tinyyoungblood​ | @itstasken | @rxves | @theamuz​ | @camimndess​ | @ethereal-beauty-p | @thenoddingbunny-blog​ | @tothemoonandbackx3000​ | @call-me-baby-gir1​ | @iwannabekilledtwice​ | @keithseabrook27​ | @lowkey-holland​ | @hiiii-i​ | @parkers-gal​

[neighborhood-houseplant]

Katsuki Bakugo x Reader

_______

Pairing: Katsuki Bakugo x Reader

Pronouns: Female Pronouns (She/Her)

_______

Katsuki was a confident boy. Most people would agree he was too confident. And throughout his time in middle school, people would always tell him how amazing his quirk was. He had fought many people outside of school grounds and all of them ended in less than two minutes.

This confidence carried with him into UA. He again aced quirk tests and fought people in the sports festival, he had won those matches until he fought (Y/n). The girl was strong and had amazing reflexes as well as fighting techniques and he wondered how he hadn't noticed her before.

She had been one of his classmates since the beginning of the school year. (Y/n) was so quiet and shy, that he often forgot she was even there until a teacher would call on her to answer a question, or if a classmate asked her to help with some form of school work.

This completely contrasted with how she acted on the battlefield. Weirdly enough, she was a childhood friend of Momo's. They were equivalent to unstoppable together, both with their cooperation and skillsets.

During the sports festival, he had been paired to fight her. He had an arrogant smirk on his face as he took his place on the platform. This was however wiped off his face when the girl kept dodging his blasts.

He was getting frustrated as the match went on, she kept on hitting him and the crowd was going crazy after his fight with Uraraka. Especially when she got a clean hit in his gut, roundhouse kicking him right after. He grabbed her shirt, accidentally burning off some of it off, exposing her toned stomach.

He then let out a huge blast, throwing her out of bounds, but was shocked when she threw something at him blasting him out off the arena as well. However, he won as she had been out of bounds, mere milliseconds before him.

At the end of the fight, they both walked up to the stands together as other students took place for their matches. She congratulated him on his win, commenting how cool it was how he controlled his blasts so well. This had made him slightly happy, though he did not tell her this.

Once the two had reached the stands, he had noticed how Mineta was gawking at her and she was shifting uncomfortably. He ended up giving her his shirt, with his black tank top underneath. He felt a sense of pride when he noticed how it was too big for her, hanging off her slightly. He however didn't get to focus on this long as Kirishima remarked how it was, "So manly!"

He soon after began talking to her more, trying to get her to take part in group activities that she would have normally avoided like the plague. Even going as far as to allow her to call him by his first name. The two ultimately became best friends. The two were inseparable, one was always with the other.

This brought us to today. Classes had ended for the day as students were packing their bags and picking up their homework from Aizawa's desk. Bakugou stood next to (Y/n)'s desk as she was packing her bag, holding two copies of the homework. He handed one to her as she finally fastened her backpack.

"You done or what?" He asked, feeling slightly impatient, and wanting to leave the stuffy classroom. "Yeah, let's go." (Y/n) spoke, throwing her backpack over her shoulder as they said their goodbyes, leaving the building.

As they reached the gates, the two continued down the road together. "Katsuki, don't you live that way?" asked the girl, pure confusion and a slight hint of anxiousness lacing her tone that Katsuki, unfortunately, picked up on.

"Yeah, and? I just happened to be going this way dumbass." He clicked his tongue at her. She sighed and let the comfortable silence envelop them. Suddenly, her phone dinged, notifying her that she had a message. Her eyes quickly scanned over the text. "Mom wants me to pick up some things for dinner tonight. Well, I have to go Katsuki, See you tomorrow."

"Hold on a minute, I'm coming with you." He rolled his eyes at her. "Goodness knows you'll do something to screw something up." The two soon reached the grocery store as (Y/n) picked up a basket going along the aisles. She placed Pasta, tomatoes, onions, vegetable oil, rice eggs, and a carton of milk in the cart before heading up to the register, Katsuki at her heels.

After paying for the items, the cashier handed her a bag containing the items, as she thanked him and left the store with Katsuki. "Oi, dumbass, give me one of the bags." She nodded and handed him one of the bags, thanking him, placing her bag on the ground, and storing one of the bags using her quirk as he handed her the second as she did the same to it. Finally, she resituated the bag on her back as they resumed the walk.

The closer they got to the said house, Katsuki noticed how (Y/n) became more fidgety. "What's wrong?" He asked with an oddly calm voice. "It's nothing, I-" she got cut off as a group of three boys, probably their age walked towards her. She let out an irritated sigh, before glancing in his direction.

"What do you want, Haru?" She seemed uninterested. "Oh, nothing. Just wondering who your little friend is. I'm surprised you even have any!" He let out a crazed cackle, his friends following soon after. Katsuki opened his mouth, already getting irritated with this guy. He would've said something he probably would've regretted it (Y/n) hadn't spoked first.

"Who he is isn't your business, now if you'll excuse me, I have somewhere to be, unlike you harassing highschoolers." Then turning on her heel and continuing down the path. It would've been left at that, if the boy Haru, hadn't followed them, intent on making (Y/n) lose her temper.

"Oh come now, I just wanted to greet an old friend, (Y/n)." He spoke in an irritating tone of voice. "Don't call me by my first name, and we aren't friends." She once again rolled her eyes. "You're not wrong, (Y/n), as if I'd want to be friends with a weak quirked idiot like you." He spoke again, soon coming to regret his words.

Just like that, Katsuki's patience was gone. He whipped around to glare at the boys, his eyes hard and angry. "Scram, before I blast you to hell!" He held his hand up, small explosions emitting from his palms. This however didn't seem to discourage Haru.

"Or what? What are your fireworks going to do?" The most taunting grin plastered across his disgusting face. Just like that, he realized just how badly he screwed up. Bakugo lunged at him, much bigger and stronger explosions coming from his palms.

He would've beat up the kid Haru right there and then if (Y/n) hadn't grabbed his arm, "Ignore him, Katsuki. He's not worth your time or effort." This luckily calmed down Katsuki effectively, as he lowered his outstretched hand.

Haru was on the ground, a terrified look on his face. His so-called 'friends' had left him behind as soon as Katsuki moved towards them. "You damn extra, if you ever try anything with (Y/n), I'll end you." Katsuki glared at Haru, as the boy ran off.

As they resumed their walk to (Y/n)'s house, Katsuki spoke up. "Why didn't you tell me you were getting bullied?" He sounded almost hurt that she'd kept this from him. "I just didn't see the point, I mean, if I couldn't handle a few bullies, how would I become a hero?" (Y/n) said, her eyes downcast.

"Everyone needs help once in a while, just tell me next time. If they mess with you, they're messing with me, alright?" Slight gentleness in his tone. The girl nodded at him. "Okay." They soon reached their destination.

"Katsuki, why don't you come inside? I'm sure my parents would love to have you over for dinner." She glanced at him, awaiting a response. The boy carelessly nodded, making it seem like he didn't care, but he was happy she even wanted him to enter her home. He removed his shoes, placing them next to (Y/n)'s.

"I'm home!" She called into the house. Her mother picked her head out of the kitchen. "Hi dear, you brought a friend over? That's nice." Bakugo's eyes trailed to (Y/n), who was blushing in embarrassment. She hurriedly changed the subject. "I brought the groceries." She spoke removing the bags from the little void, placing the bags on the counter.

"Thank you, your father should be home shortly, You and your friend can go upstairs, I'll call you down for dinner later." Taking the bags from the girl, and sending the two out of the kitchen.

Leading Katsuki to her room, (Y/n) placed her backpack near her desk, as Katsuki did the same. She sat on her bed, motioning for Katsuki to do the same as he threw himself on the bed, letting out a dramatic sigh., as they both started giggling.

The two began doing their homework, occasionally asking one another their opinion on their answer. After what felt like ages, really only being an hour, (Y/n)'s mother called them downstairs for dinner. "Hey you two, come down for dinner." Katsuki watched in slight amusement as (Y/n) hurriedly stood up.

As the four sat on the dinner table, (Father's name) spoke up. "So, who's your little friend?" He eyed Bakugo suspiciously. "His name is Katsuki Bakugo." (Y/n) spoke up. "Well I must say, he's quite a catch." (Mother's name) said in a playful tone, causing both Katsuki and (Y/n) to blush heavily.

It then started to rain. "Katsuki looks like you'll have to stay over for the night." (Y/n) said. "Look like it." He spoke, pulling out his phone to text his mother. After he put it away, (Y/n) stood up, collecting the empty plates with her mother.

The two were in the kitchen, washing dishes as Katsuki and (Father's name) were bonding over their love of working out. When (Y/n) came back, she gestured to Katsuki to come with her to go to bed. The two excused themselves and left.

(Y/n) placed a futon on her floor. "You take the bed and I'll sleep on the floor." Eventually, the two fell asleep, well (Y/n) did anyway. Katsuki was tossing and turning, smiling fondly to himself at how welcoming (Y/n)'s parents were. His mind went back to when they were eating, how flustered he'd gotten about (Mother's name)'s offhand comment. Then it hit him.

"(Y/n) you dumbass, you made me fall for you." He whispered to himself, falling asleep.

[gojifan97]

Dads For Deku-Family Bonding

“Alright Izuku, are you ready to come out?” said Gentle, knocking on Izuku’s door. La Brava was standing a little behind Gentle, staring expectedly at the door.

“Y-yeah! I’m ready!”

“Excellent, then show us what the newest member of our show will look like!” said Gentle, dramatically flourishing his arms. After all a showman must always be practicing, he never knew when the camera would turn on.

“Behold…” Izuku said. The door slammed open and Izuku leapt out, “KILLER RABBIT!” He landed on the floor and struck what seemed intended to be an intimidating pose. Seemed to being the operative term.

This wasn’t helped by his costume. It looked like a giant bunny costume. It consisted of a black jumpsuit, with elbow and knee pads, a dark green waistcoat with gray geometric highlights (how did he even get that?), a utility belt partially hidden by the coat, white gardener’s gloves, his red sneakers (throwing off the color scheme), a dark mouthpiece with a fanged grin painted on the front, and a cowl that covered his head topped by massive bunny ears. All in all, he looked ridiculous.

Gentle struggled to hold in his laughter. Beside him, he saw La Brava doing the same. He began to frantically fake-cough to get it out of his system.

“Gentle are you alright?” Izuku asked running up to him. The failed attempt at being intimidating now replaced with his regular sweet and harmless demeanor.

“Yes, yes. Just had something in my throat,” Gentle said. An idea began to form.

“Oh good. You were just coughing so hard, and it sounded so weird…”

“Hey, Izuku,” said La Brava, shuffling awkwardly, “About your name…”

“Huh? Is it bad?” Izuku said, his eyes looking like a sad puppy under his mask. La Brava stumbled slightly, so Gentle took this opportunity to jump in.

“Not at all! However I think you should drop the “Killer” part from your name. It creates a negative image for our viewers!” he said. La Brava sent him a confused look.

“Oh ok, that makes sense,” said Izuku. “Then I shall be Rabbit! And while they may have once underestimated me, seen me as something weak and helpless, the evils of this world will soon learn I am a threat to all those who harm the innocents!”

“Oh, so that’s why you went with that motif. That makes sense,” La Brava said. But when Izuku looked away she still eyed his costume skeptically.

“Now, I believe we have other things to do now. The sun is down, it is time.”

“Wait now? Tonight?! I thought I was just trying on my costume today!”

“Not to worry Izuku, you said you’ve been training in that on your own right?” said Gentle.

“…Yeah…”

“You have me and La Brava to handle the lion’s share of the work and protect you if needed right?”

“Yeah.”

“And you need to start eventually right?”

“Yeah! Ok. I’m ready to have my first outing tonight!”

“That’s the spirit!” said Gentle, who began walking to grab his disguise.

“Come on! La Brava said to Izuku as she went for her own. “You’ll do great!”

The three ran across the rooftops. Whenever they came to the edge of one, Gentle would take the lead and use his quirk to make the edge of the roof a trampoline for them. They stopped on the edge of a roof overlooking a street in a more run-down neighborhood. Gentle looked and listened for any sign of wrongdoing. He heard the sound of crying. He looked and saw a little girl sobbing in front of a tree, her cat near the top loudly meowing, stuck.

“Follow me!” He said, leaping down. After a few light bounces he and La Brava were securely on the ground. Izuku stood on the edge, staring down.

“Come on Izuku! You can do it!” said Gentle.

“We made it! Gentle made the ground soft!” said La Brava.

Izuku snapped to look at them as if he’d forgotten about them.

“Trust me,” Gentle said, “You’ll be fi-“

Izuku raised his hand in a “wait” gesture, then began scrambling down the building, using any handholds available and even dropping himself once or twice, using the parkour skills he’d shown Gentle so happily last week. Gentle felt proud. Until Izuku slipped and fell onto an awning. He rolled down and Gentle softened the ground just before Izuku landed into a roll. That did not terrify Gentle at all. Only slightly concern him.

“S-sorry, I guess I have to work on that a little more…” Izuku said. “I wanted to try getting down myself so if you’re ever not there I’ll be able to do it on my own…”

Gentle smiled, “Excellent forward thinking. And don’t be afraid to try again. As long as I’m here I’ll be ready to help catch you.”

“I am too! Even if I’m not strong. I will even use my quirk to help you if needed.” La Brava said. Love of surrogate little brothers was still love after all.

Izuku began tearing up, “Thank-OH MY GOSH THE CIVILIAN!” He leapt to his feet and began racing to the little girl with the cat in the tree. La Brava got out the camera.

Gentle tried to introduce himself, but he didn’t even make it past “I AM” before Izuku was kneeling next to the girl.

“Hi there, I’m Rabbit. Do you need some help?” said Izuku.

The girl stopped crying, turned to Izuku, and pointed, “My kitty Cupcake is in that tree and can’t get down. Are you a hero? Can you help him down? Be careful, he scratches.”

“Don’t worry, I’ll get him right down!” said Izuku. He quickly climbed the tree until he made it to the wailing cat. He carefully lifted the cat into his shoulders and climbed down. “There you go!” he said, “The cat wasn’t any trouble after all.”

“Oh good! I guess he was too scared by being up in the tree!” said the girl. Izuku smiled, until her words seemed to sink in. The rest of them picked up on it too, just as the cat began growling.

After Izuku escaped that ferocious little cretin, the girl gave him a hug, calling him her hero, thanked the rest of them. She picked up her pet monster and walked inside. The three of them ran off to their next adventure.

“I didn’t get any footage of you Gentle, but I got plenty of Izuku. It makes for a great debut!”

“Excellent work La Brava!”

“I’ve got a question though,” she glanced at Izuku, who was running ahead and upwind of them, then she continued in a tone too low for him to hear, “Why’d you let him keep that ridiculous name and costume anyway? It doesn’t even match our theme!”

“Well La Brava, that’s because I realized Izuku has a different appeal. His attempts at intimidation are so horrendous to regular people that they will endear them to him. That, his soft demeanor, and how obviously bad he is at looking “cool” will make them all love him causing our videos to, what were your words, ‘go viral for sheer dorky adorable?’”

“I guess. He will have cuteness appeal with a lot of viewers, especially younger ones” she said, “but why not tell him?”

Gentle smirked. “Because he’d never believe me. So, I’ll let his unexpected popularity be a pleasant surprise.”

They soon came across a group of muggers harassing a trio of teenagers.

“Greetings! I am the GENTLE VIGILANTE, here to make my vigilante debut!” said Gentle.

“I am his faithful butler and partner in ending your ungentlemanly behavior, La Brava!”

“And I am here to protect the innocent, underestimate me at your own risk, for I am Rabbit!”

The last one caused the criminals to break into a fit of laughter. It lasted until Rabbit punched one in the face.

After a brief fight the muggers were all subdued. Izuku seemed to be gleeful about defeating two of them quirkless, Gentle was happy to have tried out Izuku’s suggestion of carrying and rubberfying a rapier (quite good for slapping those hooligans), while La Brava struggled working the camera.

“It won’t turn on!” she said, pushing the button for the fifth time.

“That leader guy said that his quirk disables all communication and recording devices that get too close and keeps them that way for twelve hours,” said one of the teens.

“W-what?” she said, looking like she’d just been told Christmas was cancelled.  

“Yeah, sorry. My phone got the same. Hope I don’t lose anything already on there.”

“But that means…” she groaned, “never mind. You guys ok?”

“Yeah! Did they hurt you? Or take anything? You know, before we showed up?” said Izuku.

“Aside from some incredibly crass comments? No.” said one of the teenagers.

“Ungentlemanly filth,” said Gentle, “No matter. You all run along, find help, and call the police. Tell them where to find these ruffians. In the meantime my associates and I will be off.” He, La Brava, and Izuku bounced away.

“That was, a fine experience. Worthy of some fine tea,” said Gentle.

“Yeah, even though we won’t have any footage aside from maybe Izuku helping the girl. Still, it was nice to do all that,” La Brava said.

“I got to be a hero. I got to save people,” Izuku said, taking off his hood and mouthpiece, “I know I’ve said it before but, thank you for taking me in Gentle. You’ve given me so much I never thought I could have.” His eyes glistened with tears.

“You’ve repaid it in full with all you’ve given us Rabbit, from your smarts and strategies, to your moral compass that lead us to becoming the vigilantes we are today. It is an honor to have you with us,” said Gentle.

“He’s right you know. You’ve helped us as much as we’ve helped you,” said La Brava.

They shared a group hug. They eventually broke off and La Brava said “With the camera shot, what are we gonna-“

They heard another scream. Izuku was already running toward it. As they neared the alley they heard it from, La Brava said to Gentle, “About your plan. With Izuku?”

“Yes?”

Izuku got into the alley just ahead of them and shouted, “Stop dirtbags! I am the terror that hops in the night! RABBIT!”

She smirked, “It’s totally gonna work.”

[jjkpls]

Love (G)

> genre : fluff

> pairing : kim namjoon x reader

> total words : 1.6k

> warnings/content : established relationship, tooth-rotting fluff (like really, namzoon makes me real shoft), writer!namjoon

“Mom, listen. I think I love him.” She's cooing in the phone, loud and ear-piercing squeals hurting your eardrum, you have to pull the phone away from your face to preserve it. Namjoon is watching you through his thick-framed spectacles. His pretty eyes are staring with an obvious alarm. They're twitching nervously, widening further at each blink. He's gawking for a minute before he starts pouting, cute lips puckered and jaw set in discontent. It makes you grin, giggle even, as he frowns deeper, genuinely upset, with a sweet flush on his honey cheeks. He’s patient though, waiting quietly for you to ramble a bit more to satisfy your mother's curiosity, wait for you to finish listening to the couple advices she has for you even though none really falls in a receptive ear and finally hang up. When you do, he’s been waiting for so long he doesn’t know how to break out of his silence. It’s your feet, snug under his warm thigh, sneaking further under that unravel his stiff tongue.

“You're so mean! What was that?” He exclaims right away. His voice is all low and rough, his alluring voice almost intimidating. He sounds like he used to to you when you first met him and you were a tiny little shy thing, just wanting to be noticed by the tall handsome monster of charisma. It was before you discovered he was just a giant nerd, lanky and clumsy and anything but daunting. 

Tucking a strand of hair behind your ear, eyes searching the sky for an answer, you casually ask, “What do you mean?”

“I- You- can't just say it like that!” He can tell you're feigning innocence when you know damn well what you just did and it tickles his patience even more. “I was supposed to-” Here goes the sexy brain flushed down the toilet by your malicious amusement. You’re not mean. It’s just that he’s too funny to mess with. Anyway, he can’t be mad at you for saying you love him, can he? “I wanted to say it first. I've been- I've been working on a poem for you, you brat.” He’s done fighting, knowing his previous weapons of choice won’t work. You wanted to mess with him and he showed like a pure idiot that you hit just right. It’s pointless to fight back therefore he decides to whine. He doesn’t believe himself cute enough to have this technic effective but after months of being with you, he’s learned that you don’t know him the same way he knows himself. He’s proven it again as his whiny complain, although he cringes hearing himself, reaches you and so effectively brings all your guards down. You���re rising from your end of the sofa, making your way to him so you can install yourself on your favourite seat: his lap. He’s so comfortable under you, with his big meaty thighs and his broad chest that’s always supporting you so kindly. He’s still sulking when you appear in front of him, though his hands are already reaching to set on your ass. He likes to pretend it’s just a safety issue: he doesn’t want you to fall over and knock your head open on the corner of the coffee table. But you know your man better than that.

You lean in to work your magic on his mouth, smooching him generously before his jealous cheeks try to catch your attention by winking their lovely dimple at you and you give them the same treatment. 

“I have to meet your mom before marrying you, right?” He asks so calmly, you’d think he’s just wondering aloud. The words shock your heart for a second. It’s more excitement and happiness rather than surprise. He’s said that a million times before. He’s never properly asked. He would just throw it out. During sex or when you’d cook for him or massage his taut neck when he’d spend twelve hours on end writing, he’d say “You’re really good at this. I should marry you, shouldn’t I?”. You’d be a mess of embarrassed giggles or snarky comments to bite him back for teasing you but that’d be about it. The thing is, he’s never looked at you like that while saying it. Or maybe he did but you’ve never noticed. This time anyway, you see so much adoration, you wonder if he’s not about to sneak a little black velvet box from under the cushion. There’s no box coming out so you brush away your stupid greedy and hasty self to joke around with him. 

“You're not even going to ask me?” Because as any of the other times, it doesn’t look any close to a proposition.

“You lost the right to choose when you stole the first 'I love you' from me.” It makes you laugh in the crook of his neck. He sounds so petty, it’s the cutest. He is not that bitter though, as you chuckle, replaying the funny way he stressed the ‘stole’ in your head, he kisses the side of your face, his hand gently smoothing your hair out. He’s so sweet. Your boyfriend is the sweetest person you’ve ever met, and he’s yours for some reason. You straighten up to see his face, his eyes are searching for yours, saying ‘hi’ so lovely so when they do find them. He’s also the most handsome. Gosh. 

“So I'll be wearing your name?” He nods, you press a peck on his smiling lips. “And then, we'll have little babies?” Your grin extends from one end to the other. You just think back to that time he babysat his nephew for a day. He was so excited, rambling on the phone about all the things he'd planned on doing with him that day, all the places he wanted to take him to. You can't recall the full list of all the projects, mixed between artsy places clearly age-inappropriate for the three-year-old and fun places for kids you just couldn't imagine his giant gangly figure to stand amongst the short crowd. What you can picture perfectly though, as if it happened just yesterday, is his pale face. The teary eyes, flushed nose and trembling lip. He looked half-dead, about to cry from how overwhelming and harassing the day had been. Children are a blessing. Made of love and fun, but they require a lot of work. He didn't know that or had chosen to ignore it to let the enthusiasm take over. He was far from ready to have kids of his own, you knew that much. But you want to have some with him eventually and fantasizing about it feels wonderful. “With your dimples?” You question with undisguised euphoria, asking and smiling with your palms pressed together, as if he was Santa Claus and you were begging him to please, please, please, grant you the present you wanted oh-so-bad.

“What if they don't get my dimples?” He challenges with a side grin. 

“Well,” You start with a dramatic rise of your eyes to the ceiling. What an upsetting thought. “I'll have to love them anyway but I might cry a little.” It makes him laugh so you just keep it at that. Knowing he knows damn well that whatever your children take from him will be a gift. He knows because he thinks the same about you.

“I love you.” You say again because the way you said it earlier was way too entertaining but this man deserves to hear it softly too. “Do you really wanna marry me?” He kisses you softly. His plump bottom lip lingers against your own as if it just wouldn’t leave. He gives in, kissing you deeper for an instant. Short but strong enough to leave a deep impression on you, rendering your eyelids so heavy, opening them up is turned into a challenge. He always does that. Always takes your breath away. Always steal an additional piece from your heart. It's fine with you for he makes sure to replace each pieces he steals with one of his own. 

“I'll never feel lonely again with you by my side.” It’s so genuine. So thoughtful. Carefully thought about. Namjoon even if he’s a man of art and beauty is also a very intellectual, logical being. You know he sees love as this beautiful, magical because fairly-unexplainable thing. But he also admits that love takes thoughtful dedication, time and effort. It’s a decision, it can’t just be something undergone, it'd be too easy. Too easy to feel and too easy to lose. When he’s looking at you with those eyes, his warm hands tender on your skin, feeling his frenetic heartbeat under your palm, you know he’s chosen you. You might cry, you realise. How lame would that be? He would love that, the hopeless romantic asshole. 

“Was this in the poem?” You ask, turning your head to the side to avoid his stare as you sniff discreetly. Namjoon gasps out loud. 

“Ok, it's on!” He exclaims before his giant hands are grabbing you by the waist to throw your back on the sofa. There’s an alarm in your head going off to remind you that this clumsy ass man has almost killed you multiple times just by having sex with you, therefore you know for a fact you don’t want to play wrestling with him because it’s too early to die, you’re not even wearing his name yet! But he’s a giggly mess as he starts tickling your sides, watching you, with pure teary adoration, squirm and cry for mercy and you gather that it’s fine. Dying by his side with his lovely laughter tickling your ears would be such a heavenly way to die.

a/n : another happy birthday to our precious namjoonie <3. i hope you guys enjoyed, lately i’ve found myself writing so much smut, i wonder if i’ve not become inept for fluff lol let me know! kisses!

[dekatsu]

60+90, BakuDeku for the fic mash up

Some Poorly Timed Confession + Unexpected Virgin coming right up! This was a lot of fun writing lol (ao3 link)

~

“I’m going to die a virgin,” Mineta bemoans as he throws himself down onto the ice, dramatically rolling onto his side and and then back again. “Just when I was getting somewhere with that nice barista, too!”

Katsuki stares at him in disgust, kicking out against Mineta’s leg to walk towards the wall of their little snow cave. They were lucky that they could take shelter behind a large rock just as the avalanche hit.  

“You are pathetic,” Jirou comments from behind him, voicing Katsuki’s thoughts.

Ignoring the whines coming from Mineta, Katsuki reaches out to pat the snow, lightly. “Depending on the amount of snow, we might get flooded, if we try to break free.”

“So, we are trapped until help comes from outside?” Ojiro asks, his tail tapping against the ground lightly.

Hearing those words, Mineta starts to thrash around again. “Just blow us out of here! I can’t die like this! Get me out, I have a date tomorrow!”

Katsuki holds his hand up, making small explosions. “If you don’t shut the hell up, I’ll blow your ass up,” Katsuki threatens, to which Mineta immediately falls silent. Good, one problem dealt with.

“No phone connection. We are snowed in. I could try and hear if anyone is close by, but snow isn’t the best conductor for sound, and it numbs my senses.” Jirou shrugs and pockets her phone again. “What were the last updates on Midoriya’s team?”

“The comms cut out when the avalanche hit. But they should have gotten away in time with Uraraka’s quirk.”

Of course their rescue would in Deku’s hands. Katsuki grunts as he sits down on the ground. When Mineta holds his hand up, Katsuki glares but nods anyway. 

“So, blow us out,” the clown says.

“I can’t.”

“Why?”

“Because this little bubble might collapse in on itself, if he forces his way out,” Ojiro explains, to which Katsuki grunts.

“Then I’m really going to die a virgin.”

“Please shut up, now,” Jirou commands. “God, please let them find us before we freeze enough to huddle together,” she adds.

There is a moment of silence before Mineta says, “It’s really cold, you know. Maybe we should-“

The echoes of no vibrate through the little cave they are in before Mineta can even finish his sentence. At the outright rejection, he throws himself on the ground again and glares. “Just because you all got laid already. Have some sympathy.”

“I would have, if it were anyone but you dying a virgin. You deserve it.” The glare Jirou sends Mineta is lethal. “Scum.”

“Just because I tried sneaking a look once!”

“Every week for three years!”

“If I couldn’t touch, I just wanted to look.”

Before Jirou can reply, Katsuki holds his hand up. “One more word and I’m filing a complaint against you for harassment.”

“I’m not harassing you!”

“You are.”

“Am not.”

Katsuki doesn’t dignify that with a reply so Mineta glares at them all sullenly in reply.

It’s Ojiro who speaks up next, surprising them all. “Now that we might freeze to death… maybe I should have accepted the chance to go to Europe. There is this friend I met, over the net…you know.”

“Was it a girl?” Mineta asks.

This time it’s Ojiro who scoops up some snow from the ground and throws it right at Mineta’s head. “Freezing should be your last worry right now, Mineta.” Then he scoops out some more snow, slowly rolling it into a ball in his hands.

“Here we are, dying and you all are still shitty to me.”

“That should make you think about the reason.”

“She’s is right.”

“She’s also dating Kaminari. I saw them kissing last Friday,” Mineta reveals, spite in every word. “Who said she wouldn’t ever date the idiot when we graduated?”

“You perv fucking spied on us!”

“If you don’t want to get spied on, don’t kiss in hallways!”

“You disgust me.”

“If you open your mouth, I’ll stuff my hand into it,” Katsuki says before Mineta can reply.

Mineta makes a show of closing his mouth, zipping it shut, locking it and slowly throwing the key at him. Katsuki pretends to snap it out of the air. “If you as much as open your mouth before I throw the key back at you, I’ll shovel a way out of this damn hole using your body.”

Mineta gives him the finger, which earns a small laugh from Ojiro.

“Thanks,” Jirou says. Then, twirling her earlobe around her finger, she whispers. “Also, we aren’t dating. We are engaged.”

To which Mineta’s jaw drops so Katsuki holds his fist up and he immediately shuts it, alternating between glaring and looking bemused.

“Congratulations,” Ojiro says, scratching his head. “That’s some great news. He’s been crushing on you since U.A.”

“Thanks,” she replies, nodding. There is a flush up high up her cheeks.

Mineta throws his hands out towards Jirou and makes a show of pointing at her.

“Drop it.”

He continues.

“Mineta.”

He holds one finger up.

“Fine. One fucking second,” Katsuki says.

So, Mineta takes a deep breath before using his second. “How does she throw insults at me one second and gets all shy and blushy in the next?” he demands. Then he zips his mouth up again.

Jirou’s glare isn’t as strong this time, when she gives him an answer. “Your lack of respect towards anything female will only earn you insults from said females. It’s cause and reaction.”

When Mineta holds his hand up again, Katsuki shakes his head. “Sit tight.”

And then the silence stretches. Katsuki thinks about ways out that won’t bury them, but nothing comes to mind. It’s when he stands up to stretch his leg out that he notices the attention on him. “What?” Katsuki asks. “What you looking for?”

Ojiro looks away, hand on his neck, Jirou just shrugs and Mineta gives him a look. Katsuki glares at him. “You’re really keen to fight, huh?”

Mineta shrugs and glares at the snow.

“It’s just,” Ojiro starts, throws the snowball in his hands on the ground and shrugs. “We all confessed something, so we just assumed…”

“Assumed that I would join your little round of honesty?”

Ojiro shrugs again and says nothing.

Katsuki looks at all three of them, who look back, and sighs. “I have no fucking idea what you want to hear. Make something up in your heads.”

“Come on, Bakugou. There must be something you can tell us. Something small,” Jirou inquires.

Katsuki shrugs. “Like what?”

“Who all did you f-“

Ojiro’s tail stops Mineta from finishing his sentence as it clamps tightly around his mouth. “Do you have a death wish?” he hisses.

“Let him talk,” Katsuki says, grin on his face. “I want to hear his question.”

Ojiro reluctantly lets him go. Jirou carefully backs away just as Mineta opens his mouth to sign his death wish.

But then there is a sudden shift in the air as a hand pokes out behind Mineta and Deku’s face follows shortly after.

“Midoriya,” Ojiro says, sighing in relief. “Your timing is perfect.”

“Thank god we found you guys. Mei did say her heat scanner is reliable. Still, I couldn’t help but worry.”

“No dying a virgin,” Mineta shouts as he rushes down the tunnel Deku has apparently shoveled.

Deku stares after him and then looks at them but Ojiro just shakes his head. “Just know you saved his life.”

“Yeah,” Jirou agrees. “Thanks for the rescue.”

“We made a tunnel to get to you guys, from a safe distance. Just get to the opening and Uraraka will carry you to the top, where first aid is waiting.”

“Nice,” she says and walks past them. Ojiro and Katsuki follow suit and Deku falls in line behind them.

“So, why were you going to kill Mineta?” Deku asks when they finally catch up to Mineta.

Uraraka taps him to make him float up. Katsuki watches him float for a moment and then shrugs. “He was about to ask who all I fucked.” Then, lifting his hand to his mouth, he shouts, “the answer to that is no one, Midget. I’m a virgin until Sunday.”

Izuku chokes on his spit, Uraraka loses her concentration and Mineta falls. It’s only thanks to Ojiro’s quirk reflexes that Mineta doesn’t crash into the snow.

“The hell?” Mineta screeches.

Next to Katsuki, Jirou asks, “why ‘till Sunday?”

Katsuki points at Deku.

Deku stares in shock, points at himself and asks, “me?”

Uraraka finally loses it and breaks out into loud snorts of laughter.

Katsuki asks, “don’t want to?”

So, Izuku flushes, scratches his cheek and says, “it’s not that I don’t want to. It’s just that we haven’t even dated, and I mean, I have liked you for like forever but like, is this really ok? I mean Sunday is just four days away. But I guess we could go on a date beforehand an-“

“Stop muttering up a storm and just say yes or no, Nerd.”

“Yes,” Deku says immediately. “I mean, yeah. Definitely.”

“Good,” Katsuki says and then leans in. There is a moment in which Deku’s eyes go incredibly wide before he squeezes them shut.

“What’s taking you so long, Midoriya? Uraraka?” Hatsume asks from the top.

“Deku and Bakugou are a thing now,” Uraraka calls back.

“Nice. Now move. It’s freezing up here!”

So Katsuki pulls away, watches as Uraraka helps his team up one by one. Then, when it’s only Deku and him, he says, “it doesn’t have to be Sunday.”

“Yeah,” Deku whispers.

“I don’t care.”

“Me neither.”

Uraraka turns to them. “So, who’s next?”

Katsuki steps forward, let’s Uraraka tap his shoulder and uses his quirk just a little, to steer himself into the right direction.

“A date. Let’s go on one. Sunday, I mean.”

“Okay,” Katsuki calls back.

“Okay,” Deku says, smile in his voice.

“You two are making me sick,” Uraraka comments.

Katsuki just flips her off.

[hpdabbles]

Into the Snake Pit  2

Remus glances up the moment the common room door opens but it’s not  Severus  so he ignores the group of seven-year purebloods that walk in. They have their noses raised in the air, acting too important and Remus hates them for it, but the werewolf still blushes when Malfoy winks at him.

He hates how easy it is for him to be flustered and Lucius Malfoy enjoys this piece of information greatly. It’s hard to guess if he’s serious, everyone knows the seventh year enjoys harmless flirtations just to watch people squirm.

Recently, Remus is his latest target and he can hear the Malfoy heir laugh from across the room obvious enjoying his effect on the fifth year. It’s not fair.

Remus knows that people only flirt with him on dares, or punishments for losing something and apparently now for just amusement. It shouldn’t hurt but it does. It reminds him how undesirable he is, how beneath them he registers in the eyes of those around him.  

He stands up suddently uncomfortable in the room. He marches by the seventh years, eyes forward, chin raised and emotions effectively cut out of his face. He is aware of the jeers, and sneers but he refuses to let them win.

Think murder and walk. Remus chants in his head planting his steps in a confident matter. One that dares anyone to cross his path. It’s very effective in getting people to leave him alone.  Think murder and walk. 

It feels like ages but he’s out of the common room, allowing himself one breath of relief. He was aware that Malfoy had run his eyes up and down his body but hadn’t done much more so he let it slide.

He checks his pocket watch - the one his father gave him not too long ago. Usually, it was supposed to on his seventeen birthday but with the illness, his dad’s gotten the family wasn’t sure if he is around for Remus’ coming of age.- and winces.

Severus isn’t usually this late. Not unless something has delayed him and he can only think of one group that goes out of their way to make life hell for the half-bloods..well, go the extra mile anyway. 

Remus starts to speed walking, twisting his head and taking sniffs of the air. He sometimes wishes he had a map of the school, something to let him know where everyone was but he has to settle for tracking his best friend on smell alone.

He has to hastily dodge other students and the always watching eyes of the school portraits. It’s not curfew yet but it’s nearing the time making Remus more nervous as time goes by.

He doesn’t bother asking fellow students if they have seen his friend, those that wear any color other then green won’t bother even listening and those that do wear green would waste time mocking him instead of helping.

It’s nearly an hour later - forty-five minutes to be exact- that he finally picks up Severus’ sent. It’s surrounded by the smell of the Marauders and he quickens his steps until he’s full-on running.

Remus doesn’t know what they have done, but he knows it’s something horrible if they manage to get Severus alone. Goodness, why did he let him alone? Yes, it’s been a few weeks since they tried anything, giving the werewolf a false sense of security that they finally, finally, have gotten bored of harassing his friend so he hadn’t been there to escort Severus.

Now the other half-blood was paying for his carelessness. 

He spots them then.

 Surrounding Severus in the clock tower courtyard their backs to Remus with Black making some kind of comments that has Sev shaking his head and sneering.

His best friend has been backed into one of the walls but he doesn’t lower his gaze off of them, looking ready to fight them off even though he knows he’ll lose. 

Black says something again, hands moving around him a dramatic flair, almost frantic like he’s begging for something but the Slythrian doesn’t want anything to do with them and he sneers more intently obviously refusing whatever they want. 

Potter seems to be at his wit's end, as he tugs on his own hair then step forward to say something that has Sev jerk back, terror in his black eyes.

Pettigrew's shoulders shake in a obvious laugh before he waves his wand in the air, not exactly a threat but a very clear reminder that it could be. 

They must feel so big, cornering someone and doing so when they think no one will find them. They must feel like so fucking untouchable, on their high horses and their endless amusement at hurting others.

Severus jerks again, the terror in his eyes taking a larger form. The wolf in Remus roars with protective rage. He sprints at full force towards the group his want in his hand and shoots his sting hex before they can turn around.

It hits Black right in the rear, stinging enough to have the teen shrieks in pain as he jumps away but enough it’ll leave any marks. Can't have bias-headmaster turn the blame onto him no can he? 

 The other Marauders all turn wide eye not used to Remus resulting to violence but the full moon is too close now so he’s working on only wolf’s instincts. 

“Rem!” Sev yells amaze as if he wasn’t expecting anyone to come for him. It makes him so much angrier. The werewolf makes sure to plant himself in between him and the Gryffindors wanting to keep his friend behind him where he is safe.

“Ow ow ow. Dang Lupin, I like it when you get rough with me but not that-”  Black starts rubbing his bum until Potter slams an elbow into his ribs at the same time Pettigrew stomps on his foot. “I mean- Lupin, how are you? I’m very interested in what you have to say!”

Potter jabs him again with his elbow and Black hastily adds. “Respectfully! I’m very interested in what you have to say respectfully!” 

Pettigrew slaps a hand onto his forehead with a shake of his head and Potter sighs long-suffering. Black just looks nervous. 

“What?” He can’t help but ask. Even Sev, who always never been able to pick a bickering fight with him doesn’t know what to say to whatever just came out of the Gryffindors’ mouth.

All the fight somewhat drains out of him, suddenly confused by such odd behavior. What? Was this a new angle? Was Black trying to get him to lower his guard?  

Black looks frozen with fear for only a split second before he takes a deep breath visibly gather his courage. “I meant that you must have an incredible mind since every part of you is incredible and that you're more than just a pretty face and I think it must be tiring not have enough people realize just how amazing you are!”  

Oh.  He’s making fun of him. Of course. Black just like Malfoy. He just trying to show the world how utterly desperate and pathetic Remus is by making flirtations and watching him get flustered. It’s a trick. A joke. 

Remus’ face clouds with rage and Black actually looks started before he honest to Marlin pulls out note cards from his robes. His silver eyes run over the words, reading at a rapid pace as Potter groans.  “No Sirius, not that notes. I told you not to bring those.”

Black ignores him.  “In hopes to show you how sincere I am, I made a list of all the non-physical things about that I think are amazing. One, you always turn in your work on time. That means your reliable and dependent. Two, you never sound disrespectful even though I know I irritate you. Three, you have a big heart always helping Reggie and-”

“Sirus for all that is good and magical shut up”   Regulus says appearing out of nowhere that even Remus jumps. He gives his brother a cool unimpressed look before he grabs the Slythrains arms.  “I told you to make amends not make yourself make a fool. We’re leaving. Come find us when you figure it out.”

Quick a snake the youngest Black snatches the notecards out of his brother's hands.  “I’m taking these back. I told you to study them not read them out loud. Idiot.”

He leads them away from the  Marauders. Remus is surprised by the strong grip he keeps on his arm, but can’t help and look back at the Gryffindors. Potter and Pettigrew awkwardly pat Black’s back as the most attractive of the three bury his face into his hands. 

Once they are out of sight, Reggie releases them. But not before he realizes he’s all but holding Sev’s hand and blushes darkly. 

 “Sorry about that.” He nods his head towards the courtyard and the wolf inside Remus, now that he knows his little pack is safe, settles enough to wonder what the youngest Black had to do with all this. 

“Regulus. You set them to this?” Sev sounds hurt if he was prone to show too many emotions but the other Slythrians catch the tone easily in his voice. The third-year winces looking suddenly very shamed.  His friend presses on. “Why? Why would you do that?”

Remus looks between them feeling like he shouldn’t be watching this. He always suspected  Severus liked the younger man more then he let on, even if he wasn’t aware of the boy’s crush on him, but this may just damage any chance Regulus ever had with him. 

The younger boy shifts tension coiling his shoulders taut and swallows thickly. “Sirius approach me. It’s been so long since he’s...since he last tired and I heard him out. We’ve been reconnecting lately and I...I missed my big brother.”

He looks up pleadingly at them, begging them to understand, and Remus once again wonders why this poor kid is a Slytherin. The snakes eat people like him alive, too much emotion. 

“He’s trying again.”  Regulus continues when they say nothing. “I’ve...He promises to help me. Escape. From you know what.”

At once the half-bloods stiffen. Yes they know, a war is going on and the Slytherins are all expected to be on one side, a side that would have people like them killed, people like Remus’ mother dead. 

They have a better chance of not taking the mark but someone like Regulus? Someone who had nowhere to run when his family pushed for him to join? Sirius Black has all but ran away from his family to the safety the Potters offer, he’s going to be okay, unlike his younger brother. 

 “Fine” Sev says, unhappy but willing to understand.  “Fine.”

Regulus smiles a relived love-struck little thing and suddenly Remus can’t take it anymore. His wolf forces past his mouth filter and he blurts  “You two should kiss. Mark each other as mates.”

Remus isn’t sure who is more horrified at that moment. He turns on his heels walking away before he has to face the situation.

This,  he decides,  Is all Black’s fault. All of this. 

He so busy mentally cursing the other fifth year he completely ignores Malfoy when he arrives into the common room. He just walks up to his bed, crawling under the covers and wants the day to end. 

[neoblogcrying]

Day 7: FutureMyths(a)- Modern AU

No one believed it at first, but Shen Yuan and Liu Qingge managed to form a friendship with each other. At first, the two children weren’t on good terms with each other, but they soon saw past their previous differences and got along.

Liu Qingge came to respect the ‘book nerd’ Shen Yuan, and Shen Yuan came to tolerate Liu Qingge’s sword waving ways. It hurt getting hit by a plastic sword, but he now understood that Liu Qingge didn’t intend to hurt him.

He was just a kid.

Kids will be kids.

They are cute.

Still, what hurts… HURTS! That’s the reason why they fought to begin with. Liu Qingge didn’t know how strong he really was, and he hurt Shen Yuan, which is why he got angry at Liu Qingge. Liu Qingge was indignant, blaming Shen Yuan for being ‘so weak’ even though he was older.

They hated each other from that point onwards. They would never fail to glare at each other and throw insults at each other at any chance they got. Though Shen Yuan and Liu Qingge were like mortal enemies with each other, they were both united under the ‘Liu Mingyan is the cutest thing and she must be protected’ banner.

Much to the bane of her brother’s existence, she surprisingly got along well with Shen Yuan. Can she be blamed? She was trying to make a flower crown in vain, and he came around to help her with it! They made the best flower crown together, and ever since, she was attached to him.

No matter how Liu Qingge tried to pry his sister away from Shen Yuan, it would never work. In fact, she’d get angry at him for trying to pray them apart. Let her play when Shen-ge! Go hit people with your plastic sword like you always do!

Shen Yuan started carrying children’s books with him for just in case he’d come across the Liu siblings. That way, he could read books to Liu Mingyan.

Any time Shen Yuan was around, Liu Mingyan would follow him like a duckling, asking to make flower crowns together, or to read her a book.

One day, when Liu Qingge was being harassed by some older kids, Shen Qingqiu came to his rescue. (That being said, he got tossed around as well, but he tried, and that’s what counts!) Seeing that Shen Qingqiu stubbornly stayed with him, refusing to leave him behind, it made Liu Qingge respect his bravery.

He may be a ‘book nerd,’ but he had guts!

Liu Qingge kept telling him to run away because this wasn’t his battle to fight. He wasn’t involved, so the bigger kids should leave the intruder (aka Shen Yuan) alone.

There was something about a young kid trying to be brave and act tough that warmed Shen Yuan’s heart.

That’s how the two put their pasts aside to form a friendship together.

If he thought that Liu Mingyan was sticky… Liu Qingge had her beat. Instead of following behind him like his sister did. He would always grab Shen Yuan’s sleeve, or the back of his shirt. He had the older brother clinging onto his shirt and the younger sister trailing behind them.

It was like watching a mother duck with her ducklings.

In more recent times, you could find the children playing in the park together as their parents would talk nearby.

“Me? I like reading… so maybe I’ll be an author? No, maybe a book critic when I grow up?” An editor sounded good too. He would get to read all sorts of books in that field, and that sounded attractive as a career. “What about you, Qingge?”

The children were currently discussing what they wanted to do in the future.

“I wanna be a super hero!”

“Really? Like a fire fighter or the police?”

Three children were laying on the grass, staring up at the sky. Shen Yuan lay in the middle with Liu Qingge and Liu Mingyan clinging onto either arm.

“No, a super hero! I’ll grow strong and protect people like Shen-ge, who are weak.” 

Ouch. Shen Yuan’s eye twitched in annoyance. He may be a kid who loved to read, but that doesn’t mean he’s weak! He’s weaker than others, but he’s not weak. He can open jars on his own, thank you very much.

“What about you, Mingyan?” He chose to ignore that comment and changed the subject.

“I want to be Shen-ge’s bride!” The little girl cuddled Shen Yuan’s arm, giggling quietly. She was the epitome of cuteness. Shen Yuan’s heart melted over how cute she was, but a certain brother had a different reaction to his sister’s words.

His sister was trying to get ahead of him! “You can’t do that! Shen-ge has to be my damsel in distress.”

“What damsel!? Don’t give me that kind of role.” Shen Yuan lightly knocked the top of Liu Qingge’s head in annoyance. First, Liu Qingge called him weak, and now he was delegating him to the ‘Damsel in distress’ role?

Liu Mingyan laughed at her brother for being scolded, feeling like this was a personal victory for her. After all, Shen-ge didn’t yell at her for her dream.

In truth, he thought that she would grow out of that phase soon enough. She’ll find someone else to fall in love with.

“Isn’t the Damsel the most important person to the hero? For me, that’s Shen-ge. You can’t marry Mingyan! You’re mine!” Liu Qingge announced this loudly as if this were common sense known across the land.

Both Shen Yuan and Liu Mingyan stared at the sword-wielding youth with a look of disbelief.

“Being married is better than being a Damchel in dress!”

“Damsel in distress, Mingyan.” Shen Yuan corrected her. The siblings were so cute when they weren’t fighting each other.

He made the mistake of thinking that the fight was over when Liu Qingge didn’t have anything to say in response. He must have conceded to his sister. No, he was busy thinking about the validity of his sister’s words.

If being married was better than being a Damsel in Distress… then he had to marry Shen-ge if he wanted to be with him forever.

Yeah, he wanted to be with Shen-ge forever! “You can’t marry Shen-ge if I marry him first.”

Dramatic gasp!

“Nuh uh! I’ll marry Shen-ge first!”

There they go again, fighting over things they’ll forget about in a couple of years. Shen Yuan ignored them, letting them bicker among themselves.

Closing his eyes, he waited for the siblings to tire of their fight. Instead, he felt a pair of lips on his cheek, from the side Liu Qingge was laying.

GASP

“I’m telling on you! Ge stole my future husband!” Liu Mingyan sprang up to her feet and she ran to where the parents were talking to tell them about her brother’s evil deeds.

Kissing someone on the cheek, so scandalous!

Of course, that didn’t mean that they were married by any means, but it was hard to explain that to the young and impressionable Liu Mingyan.

“Hmph. I win.”

“Don’t make your sister cry like that. Go and apologize.”

“If Shen-ge promises to marry me, I’ll listen.”

What a brat.

“Fine fine, I promise. Now go.” It’s not like he’ll remember this in the future anyways, so a little white lie promise is no problem… right?

[another-gay-fanfic-blog]

In The Closet

Midnight is the best hour of the day. I slip on my invisibility cloak and wander the silent castle and grounds when I can manage to stay up. It's not allowed, but as long as I'm under the cloak I can stay out of trouble. It's my fourth year at Hogwarts, and I've just recently been named as the second Hogwarts champion. Ron isn't talking to me, otherwise I might bring him along with me at night. 

It seems as if Ron's not the only one who hates me for being the second champion either. I didn't sign up for the stupid tournament, honestly even if I had been allowed to enter I wouldn't have. I'm sick of the spotlight and the attention of being Harry Potter. At first when I learned I was famous it was exciting and fun, but very quickly it made my life hellish. The first task hasn't even started and already I get no time alone. 

Late night walks are the only peace I ever get now. It's nice to be able to walk around Hogwarts and be ignored. In the day I get lots of under the breath comments and angry glances. Malfoy has been an even bigger pain in the ass than ever, the mocking and taunting he starts has reached a new high. I wish Malfoy had been chosen as champion instead, maybe the dragons in the first task would eat him and I'd never have to watch another dramatic reenactment of my every mistake. 

I slip on the cloak and down into the common room, no one is awake, just the way I like it. I slip out the portrait whole and even though she can't see me the fat lady curses at me for waking her. I walk silently through the halls, even invisible if I'm not careful filch might get wind someone's out of bed and ruin this last bit of solitude for me. The castle is most beautiful at night, because I can explore and appreciate it. Even the portraits and paintings are asleep at this time. 

I'm turning a corridor when I hear someone, a familiar voice, but without the loud arrogant mocking in which I've always heard it I don't recognize who is speaking till I see him. The moment I see that slick white blonde hair I can feel the anger and frustration rise in me. Draco Malfoy, out to ruin the one good thing I have these days. I can't think straight, I don't go for my wand, just slip the cloak off and throw it behind the nearest statue. 

Before he has time to make a sound, I've lunged forward and thrown a punch. Draco dodges on reflex, shock in his grey eyes at the sight of me. His stupid pale face looks like it's missing some well deserved bruises, and all the frustration and anger bottled up inside me drives my actions. Draco is so stunned that he drops his wand and has to fight back with his hands. I land a solid punch to his left eye, and then he catches my stomach with a sharp blow. 

The air rushes out of my chest, but the anger only rises. I'm not thinking, and I slam my whole body towards his, trying to tackle him to the ground. It works, but we both go flying backwards into a closet left open. In our scuffle we manage to close the door, and are both plunged into darkness. After a few more minutes of fighting, we both tire out and separate. I collapse to the ground, and I can hear draco out of breath nearby. 

"What the hell Potter?!" Says Malfoy, more surprise in his tone than anger. 

"Really? You're surprised that I'd hit you after everything you've done? You deserve a good punch just for what you've been doing to me this week." I snort and roll my eyes, he can't see it, but I hope he can at least hear the eye roll in my tone of voice. 

"No, I'm always happy to hit you Potter. I'm just surprised you're out at night, now that you're Triwizard champion do you fancy yourself immune to all rules?" I could picture the sneer on his face with every word and it made me want to hit him again. "Or maybe you're hoping that filch will take you out himself so you don't have to face the shame of failing at the first task?" 

"Do you ever spend all your free time trying to think of new ways to prove you're obsessed with me?" I snap back, "You have a new way to torment me every hour," the last sentence is more bitter and quiet than anything. The anger has worn off and now I'm just feeling tired. 

"Whatever Potter, enjoy the closet." I hear Malfoy standing up and wait for the faint light of the hall when he got the door open, but it didn't come. I could hear him doing something, but the door stayed shut. "The doors locked." He said after a minute. 

"So?" I ask, we both know the spell to unlock doors all too well. 

"So I dropped my wand when you attacked me! Will you just come let us out?" He asked, sounding a bit embarrassed. I'd forgotten about that, and stood up reaching for my wand. Panic began to rise as I realized I too must have dropped my wand, because I didn't have it with me anymore. 

"My wands gone too," I say as I triple check my pockets and feel the ground to see if it might have just dropped in here. No such luck. 

"Wait, what?" Draco sounds just as freaked out as I am. "Are you saying we're stuck in here?" He asks. 

"We could yell for help," the idea coming to me suddenly. Someone is bound to hear after a while and come let us out. 

Draco snorts, "Yeah I'm sure filch will be thrilled to help us out." He says with thick sarcasm. My heart sinks as I realize he's right, the only one possibly awake and out at this time would be filch and his nasty cat. If he were to find us we'd be in astronomical trouble. I don't reply, just sit trying to wrap my head around the fact that I'm going to be stuck in this small dark closet with Draco Malfoy for hours. 

I hear Draco sit down near me and sigh deeply. He must be resigning himself to the terrible reality of our situation too. Of all the people to get stuck with, it had to be him. I actually had a bit of a crush on him back in the first year, but I've never told anyone. Between his constant harassment and Ron's obvious hatred of him I figured that was never going to pan out. He's just gotten crueler and crueler each year, so it wasn't hard to get over him. 

"Firewhiskey?" Draco asks after we've been sitting in silence for awhile.

"What?" I ask, not sure I've heard him right. 

"We were going to have a party in the Slytherin dorms tonight, but it didn't work out. I was going to hide the firewhiskey I'd gotten father to send when you attacked me, as long as we're trapped in here together, I figured I'd offer to share." He explains. 

"Oh, um okay." I say taken aback. "Thanks." 

He just pushes a bottle into my hands. "I have two, you can drink this one." He says and begins ratting around on the other side of the closet. I'm not really able to focus on whatever he's doing because this stuff is really strong and apparently Malfoy expects us both to drink a whole bottle each. I've never drank that much in my life, but I'm not about to be shown up by the prick. 

Suddenly a light flickers on, and I turn to see Malfoy with a lantern. We both look around the space around us, there's some bins of cleaning stuff and a few extra lanterns on a dusty shelf. I pull a bin up to sit on and a larger one to use as a makeshift table. Malfoy pulls up his own bin and sets his firewhiskey on the table I'd made by my bottle. 

"Doesn't look like anyone's used this for a long time," he says while running one long pale finger through over thick dust on the lantern. He brushes most of the dust off and the small room gets a bit brighter. He sets the lantern down and turns back to me. "Look, I know we hate each other and have this whole feud thing going on, but seeing as we're stuck till who knows when, let's have some fun." 

This whole night is getting stranger and stranger, but I'd also rather get along for the couple hours we're trapped in here. I nod in agreement, still just a bit too shocked to form coherent sentences. He opens his bottle and raises one thin carefully shaped eyebrow at me, waiting for me to follow suit. Nervous, but not willing to back down I do the same. He raises his bottle up and I copy silently. "Cheers," he says and takes a large swig.

Firewhiskey burns more than any alcohol I've ever tasted, I can tell how strong it is. I make a face after I set the bottle down and Malfoy laughs. "That was my reaction the first time I tried it too," says Malfoy. "Do you need to tap out Potter?" He teases, but it sounds a bit friendlier than his usual jabs. I narrow my eyes and take another, larger, swig from the bottle. 

"I can handle myself just fine Malfoy, I'm not a light weight either!" I say, it's a complete lie, but I would never be able to live with myself if I let Malfoy beat me in anything. His expression changes and he takes the implied challenge. We take about five shots each before I really am starting to feel it. I know it's a bad idea to have any more, but I'm still feeling competitive. Malfoy I guess could tell and decided to have mercy on me. 

"Alright Potter, let's take a break. This is your first time with firewhiskey after all." He says. I would normally object just because I'm proud, but I'm getting too drunk to be prideful. 

"Okay sounds good Draco," I realize my mistake and quickly correct myself. "Erm, Malfoy I mean." I say awkwardly.

"No, it's okay. How about first names just for tonight, we can go back to feud names after we get out." He laughs and looking at him, I'm starting to think that maybe he's feeling the firewhiskey too. 

"Okay, Draco then." I say, testing the name on my tongue. "Can I tell you something?" I ask, maybe it's because I'm drunk, but I find myself wanting to open up about the tournament. 

"Sure Harry." He replies, and my name sounds so strange coming from his mouth without malice. 

"I didn't sign up for the tournament. The first task is dragons- and I'm terrified. I think whoever put my name in might have been trying to kill me." I say, letting out all the worry I'd been trying so hard not to show in front of Hermione or any of the other Gryffindors.

"Father told me about that, honestly the whole tournament is insane. I don't really think you put your name in Harry, I saw your face when it was called. I just have to make fun of you cause you hate me or whatever" He said while looking down at his bottle. 

Harry watched him and felt a rush of emotion, someone actually believed him from the beginning and it was Malfoy? Then he processed the last words Draco said.

"Draco I only hate you, because you're so awful to me, if you weren't such a dick we might even be friends" I say slowly. How could he not know? He looked up in shock and finally our eyes met, he looked pissed.

"I am going to kill Pansy!" He says loudly and takes another big swig of the firewhiskey. I have no idea what he means, but he's ranting at this point. "Oh so I need to insult him to get his attention, huh? I've spent the last four years trying to get him to like me, and every time I've doubted myself it's the same advice!" He takes another drink and then begins to imitate his friend. 

"Oh Draco, he obviously hates you, you can't tell him! You have to play it cool, tease him more. Get his attention by insulting him and mocking him, maybe then he'll pay attention to you and start to like you!" He seems to have forgotten me entirely, and in his anger is reaching for the bottle again. He's had too much and without thinking I reach out to stop him. Our hands meet on the bottle and I blush. 

Draco is staring at me and I start to blush too. Maybe it's just the firewhiskey, or maybe it's just the light, I'm not really sure what he's mad at Pansy for, but I'm remembering how cute I've always found him. 

"Harry, can I tell you something?" He asks while looking into my eyes. I just nod, this light is casting shadows that highlight his cheekbones. I'm feeling less and less over him by the minute. "Harry, I've had a huge crush on you ever since we first met. After the first time you rejected me, on the train first year, I went back to my cabin and Pansy gave me advice on how to get your attention."

My jaw drops as I finally realize what he's saying. I don't know what to say, he just confessed his feelings for me. I lean in and kiss him, the feeling of his lips on mine makes my brain short out. I push the table out from between us and tangle my fingers in his hair. He pulls me closer and we fall to the ground. All I can think about is how right it feels. Soon I feel his cold hands on my chest as he pulls my shirt off.

We end up falling asleep curled up together in the closet that night, I'm not sure what we're going to do tomorrow when someone can finally get us out and finds us here. All I know is that we're going to figure it out together. I stroke Draco's hair as he sleeps in my arms, and I know that no matter what happens, I'm not blaming this on the firewhiskey. I never got over Draco either, and I'm glad I didn't. 

[wannawrite]

Best Of Both Worlds

who?: Wanna One’s Park Woojin

genre: 🌸

type: scenario

word count: 4.3K

TW: coarse language

blog navigator. 

who said love and evil don’t mix? 

love-hate! AU

I have so much to say about this AU

⁃ admin l 

disclaimer: pictures used do not belong to me and credit goes to their original owners everything that is written here is purely fictional DO NOT READ IF TRIGGERING

~

“Excuse me? What the hell did you just say? I dare you to repeat that shit again!” Your steely glare bore into the sarcastic hazel orbs of Park Woojin’s.

Aka the most annoying person, you had ever encountered.

Woojin sighed and casually repeated his sentence. “I really like your, yes, your best friend, Clara and yes, you should help us get together.”

The words took your brain too much time to process, too much time functioning around Park Woojin.

“Wow,” you drawled. “I lost brain cells trying to comprehend your words so bye, time for me to leave.”

The most, you managed to amble two steps away from him before e caught your elbow.

“Let me go you idiot! Or I’m going to yell to this whole neighbourhood that you bullied me!” You threatened, beyond angered.

Reluctantly, Woojin released his grip on your arm.

“Why should I even help you? Clara has a heart of a puppy! She can’t even harm a damn fly! Why her?” you groaned, picturing a harmful image of Park Woojin and Clara together.

He was the embodiment of the devil while she was the angel who was in charge of the choir in heaven. As a couple, it would be awful.

Disgusting.

Woojin beamed happily. “Because you love your best friend and you want her to be happy,” he explained like he was stating the obvious.

Giving him a once over - just in case he changed in 0.5 seconds, you decided that he was definitely not cut out to be boyfriend material, let alone Clara’s sort of boyfriend material.

You snorted. “She’ll be miserable with you! What kind of guy pours his milk into a bowl before the cereal. Uncultured! Strike one!”

Woojin frowned, teeth gritted. “That was one! time when we were 8 years old!”

Then, as if a light bulb flickered on inside his rather dull head, he smirked. “Don’t you remember when we were 8? And you had this massive crush on Lee Daehwi?”

A hot red seared your cheeks at the mention of that day. The day Park Woojin embarrassed you in front of all your neighbours at the monthly barbecue. Back then, he was the only one who knew you had a crush on Daehwi.

How? Woojin stole your diary in kindergarten, deciphered your illegible handwriting during nap time and discovered your secret crush.

What a gentleman.

“You better shut your mouth before I rip out your vocal cords, sew them back then slowly snip the seams one by one!” You growled threateningly. At least, you hoped to seem more collected than you actually were.

The imagery is really starting to take its toll on me.

“Do you always have to be so graphic?” Woojin rolled his eyes. “All I’m asking is for you to put in a good word for me. What have I done to you?”

Done to me?

A perfectly cut nail jabbed its way into Woojin’s chest accusingly. “You? What have you done to me?”

“I mean, you invaded my privacy when we were kids. Told the whole neighbourhood and the Lee family that I had a crush on their son! Then everyone spent two years thinking I was a slut because you claimed I kissed two people in an hour!”

Woojin took one look at your finger on his chest and flicked it away. “Talk about harassment now.”

You wanted to scream in his face and perhaps tie him upside down to a tree.

Woojin was such a jerk! Helpful next-door neighbour my ass!

You stormed ahead of him, eager to arrive home. Just breathing the same air made your head spin. Slamming the door in his face seemed perfect.

“That was when we were kids! I’ve apologised!” He yelled from behind you before stretching his long legs and catching up with you.

“Sure.”

A sigh left Woojin’s lips as he dramatically pinched the bridge of his nose in mock despair. “Fine. I have a proposition anyway.”

“I’m not interested,” you shot back, boredom filling your tone.

“It involves Lee Daehwi,” he hummed casually.

Those three words. Someone’s name. Those were enough to make you freeze, and cause your heart to pound.

You cleared your throat and tried to appear nonchalant in front of Woojin, hoping he would not notice.

“Okay,” you groaned reluctantly. “I’m listening now.”

If only your complete infatuation allowed you to tune out to whatever Woojin would propose.

Hell, who would make a deal with the devil?

“How fickle of you. I’m wondering if Daehwi even deserves someone like you,” Woojin commented, a teasing smirk on his lips.

Annoyed, you kicked an innocent stray pebble on the sidewalk, wishing it was Woojin’s face.

“Get on with the deal or I’m backing out.”

The boy put his hands up in mock surrender, faking shock. “Woah, okay.”

Surprisingly, he obeyed.

“I’ll set you up with Daehwi, if you help me get into Clara’s good books.”

“You make it sound like-“

“You don’t even have to help me until your ship is sailing,” he cut in hurriedly. “Who else would you go to? I’m Daehwi’s best friend and your next door neighbour, so perfect !”

It sounded like the most perfect proposal in the world. But Woojin wasn’t from this world. Far from it. Down under.

However, because of my stupid adoration for Lee Daehwi, I’m going to give Woojin a chance.

And Clara sleep paralysis.

But how bad could it be? It’ll be a win-win situation at the end.

Hopefully.

Clara’s a strong woman, she can handle herself. Like this, I can also regulate Woojin’s behaviour around her, maybe even sabotage it.

Thoughts like those filled your mind as you weighed out the pros and cons.

You chuckled quietly to yourself and offered Woojin an outstretched hand.

“I believe you’ve got yourself a deal.”

~

It was way past visiting hours at your house, after dinner and the time when the whole family was doing their own thing.

For example, you were holed up in your room, watching the latest drama on your laptop and grinning like an idiot.

That was when your father knocked on your door and announced that someone was here to see you.

Eyes narrowed in suspicion, you padded out to the living room to meet your uninvited guest.

“You!”

Your jaw fell open in disbelief and shock, a finger instinctively pointed accusingly at the person sitting on your sofa.

“What are you doing here?” you hissed, clearly frustrated, mildly annoyed Woojin had to see you in your lazing around outfit.

“Well, hello to you too. I feel so welcome here,” Woojin replied sarcastically.

While you were in your comfiest t-shirt and shorts, Woojin was clearly dressed up for a night out. That fact alone made you worried.

Plopping yourself into space next to him, you asked once more, “What are you doing here?”.

Woojin grinned like the Cheshire cat, wide and proud. “Someone I know is throwing a party tonight and...Daehwi will be there. Facts only.”

“And if you’re lying?”

In all honesty, you wouldn’t put it past him for lying.

He scoffed. “Why would I be? Our pact starts today. The faster I get you and Daehwi together, the faster I can get Clara.”

Woojin stretched out a hand, eyes almost challenging you to grab it. “So, party or no?”

Taking his hand, you shook it. “Give me a while, I need to change and tell my parents. Drinks or whatever are in the fridge.”

Daehwi. Daehwi. Daehwi. He’ll be there.

~

“Impossible,” you muttered under your breath, scanning the crowd frantically for any sign of Woojin or Daehwi.

Half an hour after losing Woojin, he was still nowhere to be found. Sure, he had instructed you to wait in the kitchen while he fetched Daehwi but he was taking way too long.

Plus, the kitchen began filling up with hungry drunkards and you figured it was time to scram.

Even though this party could be considered ‘small’, you weren’t exactly familiar with any of the faces. 

Who even threw this party? Their snack selection sucked.

“Y/N!”

Finally!

Pushing through the crowd, you reached the other side of the house, from where Woojin was calling.

“Damnit! Don’t you know how to pick up a phone?” He flashed his phone screen in your face, the device was calling yours.

“Sorry. But you, you took way too much time to fetch him,” you fired back. “And, I called you twice as well!”

Luckily, Daehwi noticed your presence and decided to break the ice.

“Hey y/n, good to see you. Woojin never mentioned you would be here tonight,” he said with a smile.

“Hi!” You glared in Woojin’s direction to ask for help. “Uh, I love giving surprises so, here I am!”

You swore he facepalmed.

“Uh, I love parties and all!” You added much to Woojin’s horror.

To your relief, Daehwi only chuckled in amusement.

“Oh my god! Guys, it’s MY song! This is MY jam and...it’s time to dance! Come along,” Woojin shouted, dragging you and Daehwi to dance without waiting for replies.

“Oh, I didn’t know you listened to Taylor Swift,” Daehwi murmured. Woojin paid no mind to his accurate comment.

Woojin didn’t. As his next-door neighbour, all you had heard for the past few nights were pop and rap songs with the occasional ballad thrown in.

“Guess he’s trying out something new,” you added, trying to seem casual and composed.

In reality, your heart was going to leap out of your chest.

Quite a graphic scene.

Suddenly, Woojin announced that he needed a drink, or saw someone he knew, whichever excuse came first. He left you and Daehwi in the centre of the dance floor with a wink.

Shit! That prick knows I can’t dance!

Act composed. Breathe in, breathe out. Breathe in, breathe out.

“I love this song,” you said, attempting to groove but ended up stepping on someone’s toes.

“Um, looks like you and Woojin have similar tastes, haha! Y’all must spend a lot of time together,” Daehwi responded, somewhat unsure of how to react.

Crap!

“Oh, nah.” You quickly tried to brush off the assumption. “We’re just neighbours. You know that. You’re my neighbour too. Wait, why am I telling you this. You already know this. I-“

Ahh, the rambling.

Inhaling deeply, you calmed down and gathered your words properly.

“Sorry for my rambling. I think the party has me a little woozy,” you explained sheepishly.

People began to jostled you around, so you ended up finding your spot on the sidelines. Daehwi trailed after you.

He shook his head in, disagreeing. “Don’t be.”

Then, his thick brows furrowed with concern, eyes searching for any signs of distress. “Are you okay? Do you want me to call Woojin? You should be heading home if you’re feeling unwell.”

This is why he’s so perfect. He is THE sweetest man on this planet and no one can change my opinion.

“No!” The yell was a little too loud, causing a couple of odd looks to be thrown your way. You hastily made up a believable excuse, trying to smile flirtatiously, “Uh, I just got here. Besides, we just met!”

“I’ll be taking that away from you.”

In one swift motion, Woojin had swooped your cup of ‘whatever it was from the kitchen bar’ and throwing it into the trash.

You blinked twice at him, almost unable to believe what had just happened. “Woojin! Wha-“

Daehwi looked relieved to find Woojin. “Thank god you’re here! Uh, I...oh! Youngmin hyung!”

He looked to you, then to Woojin and back to you. “If you don’t mind...”

Woojin nodded in ‘Youngmin’s’ direction, grabbing a hold of your elbow. “Go ahead.”

Your mutter was incomprehensible.

“I guess, I’ll see you guys around! Nice meeting you here! Drive safely!” Daehwi bid the two of you goodbye with a wave. He disappeared pretty quickly into the crowd.

“Do you want to stay?” Woojin gestured to the most happening place of the party. Sighing, you rubbed your temples and shook your head, kicking the trash bin on the way out.

When you were seated in Woojin’s car and definitely out of earshot, did you begin to spill the short encounter to your friend.

“He asked me if I was okay!”

“He does that all the time.” Was his muted reply. “...But good job, I saw you guys talking.”

Woojin took a left down the lane.

A scoff left your lips. “Of course, until you interrupted us and threw my drink in the trash.”

He remained nonchalant with his answer. “Okay. Whatever that was had reached your brain and you were acting like a malfunctioning Ken doll. I saved your ass from embarrassing yourself in front of Daehwi.”

Reclining into the plush leather seat, you nodded playfully. “Whatever helps you sleep at night.”

With another turn, Woojin cleared his throat. “So, about our deal...”

“Yeah, yeah, Clara and all.”

Honestly, no bones in your body were excited to introduce Woojin to Clara. Even though she had witnessed your ‘banter’ with him, she never knew who he was. Plus, she was the nicest type of friend who thought of everyone in the best possible light.

Most people.

Woojin? Definitely.

Settling on her contact, your finger hovered directly above the illuminated blue button.

Text or call?

“How about next Saturday, a double date, bbq place next to the library?” You suggested.

“Double date?” Woojin questioned, brow quirked.

“Yeah, you, me, Daehwi, Clara. She loves barbecue by the way. I’ll say you suggested the idea,” you said, throwing in ideas as they came.

A smile broke out on Woojin’s face, so wide it made your heart flutter. You reached over and pinched one of his cheeks.

“You’re blushing,” you sang with delight.

“Yeah, why wouldn’t I be?” Woojin admitted without hesitation. “Barbecue?”

“Text sent!” You confirmed happily, nearly tossing your phone to the back seat.

“Let’s get it.”

~

You: hey Clara, caught a fever, not coming to school so help me tell everyone, okay?

Clara: omg :((( i hope you get better soon and I’ll drop by later. Get some rest now💖

Right after you received her reply, you sent a heart back and threw your phone across your room.

The fever had really gotten you all worked up. It was incredibly annoying that your immune system picked and chose the times to malfunction.

Such as a fever two days before you were scheduled for a double date!

Wonderful.

The thought of cancelling the date mad you blush hotly with anger and frustration. Maybe you cried once or twice thinking about how the ‘breaking the news’ scenario would play out.

All you could do was to wait for the fever to subside then sweet talk your way into your parent’s approval. They would feel uneasy.

You hissed, retracting a hand away from your forehead that burned like hot coals.

Well, nothing could materialise unless the fever broke.

Sulkily, you slipped under the blankets again and hoped for rest to come.

Somehow, you wondered if Woojin had noticed your absence from school, or whether he noticed you hadn’t left your house that morning.

The fever must have severe impacts on your prefrontal cortex. Who would think of him? Why do I want him to notice? Do I want him to care?

At least, you managed to quietly slip into a serene dream.

~

“Rise and shine, brat .” A voice rang, echoing off the walls of your brain.

“Get up! You need to wake up! Your forehead’s burning, you have to take your pills!”

Mum? But,,,mum doesn’t swear and she’s meant to be at work. Clara? Clara never swears! Besides, she has tuition today. Neither of them have deep voices...Dad is at work too...

Woojin?

Wait, it could be Daehwi?

Trying to guess the person from voice alone was a seemingly easy task for a person whose brain wasn’t being eaten up by a fire.

Strange, it placed Woojin on the list too.

“What,” you whispered, unamused.

Claps sounded through the atmosphere, and a sarcastic voice followed suit. “Fantastic! Sleeping beauty has awoken! Though, I must say you look much more like the beast when asleep.”

At that comment, your eyes flew open and you leapt up to confront the intruder.

“Park Woojin! What are you doing here?”

Isn’t this the second time in two weeks that he has adventured into my house? First my living room and now my bedroom?

“Woojin! Now, I have to disinfect my whole house because of your germs!”

With a gentle push on your shoulder, you fell back onto your bed. “Relax,” Woojin said. “I come in peace.”

He gestured to his mysterious metal tureen, a teddy bear and a balloon. “The notes are from your friends. Clara got you the balloon and, I bought you the bear.”

Weirdly enough, you felt paper wings of tiny butterflies flap in your stomach and heart begin to thud.

“Oh,” you muttered wordlessly, accepting his teddy bear.

Woojin then proceeded to offer you the container of chicken broth stew, saying how he spent hours broiling it. He also managed to brag about his excellent chef skills.

After which, he presented a folder of all the work you had missed, with a sticky note of instructions. It was neatly organised and even had colourful sticky tabs.

“Clara collected the work and asked me to deliver it,” he clarified.

Clara’s handwriting was a whole lot neater and more cursive than his boxy letters.

Still, you played along, not wanting to put him in a spot.

“Why are you doing all this for me? You really didn’t have to.”

A part of you was reluctant to hear the truth because Park Woojin came up with the most ridiculous reasons ever. But the other half wanted to know if this meant something, at least platonically.

For a minute, Woojin distracted himself by looking anywhere but in your direction.

“You idiot,” he finally snickered. “I still need my favourite wingman for Saturday. Can’t have you bailing on me.”

You sort of knew he was joking and truthfully, it made a whole lot of sense. Yet, why did it somehow hurt?

Sensing the shift in your mood, Woojin grew anxious. He gave your shoulder a pat. “Hey, all that aside. I came here as your next door neighbour and your friend. You can call me anytime.”

Reassuring.

His words were so reassuring.

Friends.

We were friends now.

Maybe you were sick and ignoring his usual stupid, goofy side and tapping into the soppy, emotional perspective but you appreciated this unseen side of your new friend.

“Thank you for caring,” you expressed with gratitude.

He gave a charming boyish nod before enveloping you in a bone-crushing hug.

Woojin looks like the kind of guy to give good hugs

~

A glance at the clock told you that you were five minutes late to the barbecue place.

The main reason: the cool, calm, playful Park Woojin was having a total breakdown in his bedroom

First, it was about the colour of his shirt. Then, how he did his hair and how many earrings he should wear.

The past hour or so was spent on you trying to encourage and reassure him.

“Cheer up! You always look amazing in everything and you’ll look even better when you show off your cooking skills! I know you can make a mean fried rice!”

“But, what if-“

“No buts! You can do this! You’re Park Woojin! And, you have me! The best wingman in the world!”

Your energetic pep talk seemed to have calmed his nerves for the time being.

Meanwhile, you received text updates of food Daehwi and Clara had ordered.

It seemed like the two of them hit it off well in the short time they had been sitting at the same table. Their casual banter got on your nerves more than it should have.

Yet, your mind was more preoccupied thinking about Woojin.

He had barely uttered a word to Clara.

Deciding that enough was enough, you kicked him in the shin under the table.

“Ouch!” He exclaimed. “What the hell?”

“That’s...not...how you grill meat, Woojin! Let me teach you how. I think food is an essential part of a conversation starter, don’t ruin it,” you warned through gritted teeth.

“Hey! It's not like you do any better in cooking,” Woojin shot back, clearly not getting the message.

Clara smiled sweetly and awed. “These two argue like a married couple! How cute!”

You picked up the scissors and gave a little ‘snip-snip’. “I’ll chop off my ring finger before he ever proposes!”

Clara motioned for you to calm down before whining about your dramatic ways.

“I think they’re funny,” Woojin suddenly defended. “I-I mean...it’s fun to challenge someone.”

Daehwi and Clara exchanged not-so-subtle looks.

Oh no.

They think that this ‘double date’ is for them to wingman us! Plus, they do look like they enjoy each other’s company.

Woojin would be so crushed! I need to warn him.

“Woojin,” you coughed. “I think I left my...wallet in the car. Could you come with me to get it?”

Wordlessly and with shaky hands, he passed you the car keys. You swore you saw him suck in a deep breath when your fingers brushed.

You felt sparks too, you were just better at concealing them, for the sake of Clara and Daehwi.

Woojin couldn’t stay here alone. What if they get the wrong idea and interrogate him until he is forced to reveal our pact? That’ll end his chances with Clara forever!

This pact was so stupid!

But it did give me some of the best moments of my life. Woojin bringing soup over, going to parties together...

“Uh, I forgot where we parked the car.”

Groaning, Woojin got up from his seat, back to his usual self. “Seriously? I suppose it comes with age. Your skin looks a lot more wrinkly than before.”

Yes, he was back to his usual self.

“You’re insufferable! I can’t believe it,” you grumbled, quickly steering both of you out of the shop.

Out of sight, you filled him in on how the current, dire situation. But that didn’t faze him one bit.

“Hello? Woojin! You have to talk to Clara okay? Giving her a yoghurt smoothie every day isn’t going to suffice!”

You continued to talk once the car came into sight.

“Besides, you were so nervous about meeting her! Chill, calm down. Now’s the perfect time to use all your charm on her!”

“I like you.”

You stopped dead in your tracks, jaw dropping open as you locked eyes with Woojin. Surely, he’s kidding.

Right?

It has to be his confession for Clara. That’s what he’s so nervous about! He just needed to rehearse with me.

A half-hearted laugh let your lips. “Woojin, don’t play with my feelings.  At least give me a warning before you practice your confession on me.”

He glanced away then looked straight into your eyes.

“Hey, Clara,” he began confidently.

You offered a thumbs up for encouragement.

“Don’t get me wrong, I think you’re an amazing person but, it isn’t working out between us-“

A frowned etched into your face and you reminded that it was love confession, not a breakup scene.

“I like your friend, y/n. So, please help me tell them to stop being so dense!”

I. Like. You.

What the hell.

“You don’t have to tell me anything now, or ever. I just wanted you to know,” he said. “Come on, let’s go back before they finish lunch.”

“Why do you like me?” you blurted out. “I mean, we hated each other from day one, remember?”

He shrugged, his cute shrug. “You are a lot different from the version that I ‘hated’. I think getting to know and understand you made me realise how much I enjoyed being together.”

“As for Clara, I was infatuated, we talked about it on one of our many yogurt smoothie encounters. She...likes someone else anyway, but I’m not hurt or anything.”

Even though your face burned and your head hung low, every single bone in your body was bursting with joy.

“I don’t know what to say,” you finally admitted.

Truthfully, your whole Daehwi crush had died down the more time you spent with Woojin. Daehwi was a good friend and Woojin? Well, you had to work that out.

“Can I get back to you on it? We live next door, we can talk any time,” you suggested shyly.

Woojin burst out laughing. “Woah. You gon’ break my heart just like that? Bold. I like it.”

Ahhh, my favourite side of Park Woojin is back.

Snickering, you fought back. “Can’t wait till I set your hair on fire and you’ll feel what it’s like to be...roasted.”

“Oops, forgot you feel that all the time whenever I’m around.”

Woojin rolled his eyes and smirked, a mischievous glint in his eyes. “Funny, but you’re the one always getting clowned. Remember that time I threw slime into your hair, you never realised and your crush had to point it out to you? History can repeat itself today.”

Damn, now I’m going to lie awake tonight thinking about that incident.

“You better take that back before give you all the burnt meat today!” you declared. “God, I can’t stand you!”

Chortling, Woojin wrapped an arm around your shoulder, pulling you closer. “Watch out for cars. Your blind ass is going to get run over one day.”

He leaned down to whisper in your ear, leaving a shiver running down your spine.

“You know you love me.”

Two fingers gently pinched his cheek in response.

“Please. I love barbecued meat more than you. Don’t get ahead of yourself.”

But secretly, once he was looking away, you grinned, stretching from ear to ear and your heart never felt warmer.

[nicolewrites]

The Ecruteak Incident

You guys can thank @thecoordinatorsquad for this one.  Sequel/Prequel to ‘enter stage left’

Words: 3,658 FFN | AO3

When May arrives in Ecruteak City, the sun is still high in the sky. It’s a nice change from many of the later arrivals she’s been having since travelling on her own. Without Ash’s drive to reach the next city and the next gym as fast as possible, May has found herself distracted by training, relaxing and wildlife between towns and she often arrives just as night is falling.

It’s just after noon as she sets foot on the cobblestone streets that are a tribute to the older days. She notes, with interest, that many of the buildings are constructed in older, more traditional styles and with more muted colour palettes. The guidebook that she carries on hand tells her that it is out of respect for the Bell Tower that stands just to the north of the city.

Her first impression of the city is quaint: it’s smaller and less bustling than many of the other cities she’s visited in Johto so far, but it is definitely more pedestrian friendly. There are definitely still a fair share of coordinators and contest fans mulling about with the contest being two days away. The cobblestone streets are obviously not meant for cars, and the small market kiosks lining the streets further encourage walking over driving.

To the north, May observes the old Bell Tower rising on the horizon and she makes a mental note to visit it. Following her map towards the Pokémon Centre, she walks past the city’s gym. The building is like the rest of the city, painted in muted colours, but there are cheers from within and May smiles. Sometimes she misses watching Gym Battles. Ash certainly had a flair for making them interesting. Max was leaving in September, so maybe she should make some time to watch a few of his battles.

There are large maple trees on several street corners with their big green leaves open to the sky. It reminds her of Petalburg and the tree that’s on the corner near the gym. This part of the city, May knows, will be exceptionally beautiful in the fall when the leaves change colour and start to fall. She hopes she’ll have the opportunity to return for it, but her carefully planned schedule–Drew’s idea, not hers–says that this contest in Ecruteak is the only one for the season. The city wasn’t much for pageantry–much more about tradition.

She spots the crowd about a block from the PokéCentre and her heart sinks in her chest. It’s a group of, mostly, young teenage girls, some older and some younger than herself. None of the girls in particular are familiar, but the hunches of their backs and the high pitched giggles are all too familiar.

Fangirls.

Of course there are fangirls here. There is a contest in two days and there are some higher-profile coordinators entering. Plus, this is one of the larger cities in the region so the increased population of fans also makes sense. May walks hesitantly towards the Centre, just hoping not to get mauled by excited girls.

To her surprise, they don’t seem to pay her any attention as she approaches. They are much more interested in whoever is inside the Pokémon Centre as displayed by the way they keep glancing in the windows and giggling. Unfortunately, their crowd extends to block the front entrance which means May will have to wade right through them.

She takes a deep breath to steel her nerves and pushes through the first few, excusing herself politely. “Excuse me, just need to pass by,” she murmurs, trying to move unseen.

She gets almost to the door when one fan turns and stares her directly in the face. “Hey!” the girl exclaims, “What right do you have moving us from our view?”

May sighs. “Sorry, I was just trying to get into the Pokémon Centre. I need to register for the contest.”

“Register?” another girl pipes up, sounding scandalized. “You can’t compete! You can’t be given the opportunity to win.”

May frowns. “Well, that’s not how coordinating works. The best coordinator in the contest will win the ribbon.”

The first girl put her hands on her hips and gives May a condescending once-over. “Well that’s obviously not going to be you, so maybe you should just run along.”

May’s anger bubbles up. No one gets to talk to her like that, except maybe Drew, but he’s always teasing when he does. Before she can burst with frustration, one of the other girls stumbles away from the window, squealing dramatically.

The doors to the Pokémon Centre slide open and all the girls fall completely silent, staring in awe at the person who emerges from inside. May just exhales in relief. Out of all the people, he’s probably not a bad one to save her from this situation, even if he’ll never let her live it down again.

Drew looks puzzled by the situation, but he walks out towards May anyways. The girls part like the sea for him and he stands next to his rival, glancing at the girl who had been giving May spite.

“Maple, you made it before dark for once. I guess I can call off that search party,” he jokes. His tone is easygoing and relaxed. He seems to be completely ignoring the fans and is instead focused on May.

Smugness curls in her belly as May smiles at him. “Haha, Drew. I know you didn’t beat me here by much. You were coming from Blackthorn, weren’t you? I was only in Violet City, my journey was much shorter.”

He shrugs. “I still beat you here, and I’m all registered for the contest. You should do the same. We don’t want a repeat of the Len Town Contest do we?”

May frowned. She didn’t need reminding of her first blunder of the season. She had forgotten how busy the first contest of the season was and had arrived too late to register, leaving Drew with only Solidad as an obstacle for the ribbon. He had won and he still wouldn’t let her live it down, even as they planned an appropriate route through the region, determining at which contests they would butt heads.

“I’m getting there,” she says after a brief pause.

He laughs and just gestures back to the door. “Come on then.”

May steps towards Drew, and freedom from the swarm of fangirls, when one pipes up. “But, Mr. Drew! How can you encourage competition?”

Drew frowns at the girls. “I’ve asked you all already to leave me alone, I don’t want to get Officer Jenny involved. May is my rival, and my friend and none of you bear that distinction, so you should all scram before I report you for harassment.”

It takes a minute, but the gravity of his words sinks in and the girls start to leave, but not without glancing back at him as they go. Drew sighs and rubs his temples.

“Let’s get out of here, please,” he says, annoyance still heavy in his voice.

May laughs. “Oh but Drew, you have to tell me more,” she teases. He levels a hard look at her and May laughs again. “I’m only kidding. I find them incredibly annoying as well, don’t worry.”

They walk into the Pokémon Centre as Drew complains about how they’ve been following him around since he arrived in town. May giggles. She has her own set of fans, but none of them are ever as bad as the cult of fangirls that follow her rival around.

May does end up registering for the contest in time, and the morning of, she heads down to the lobby to get breakfast before heading over to the hall. Drew is sitting at one of the tables in the cafeteria with an empty plate and a steaming, half-full cup of coffee in front of him. He’s flipping through a newspaper and only looks half-awake.

May’s heart tightens as she watches him. It’s strangely domestic and almost cute. She blushes and shakes off the feeling, heading to gather her own plate of breakfast. After taking a generous helping–she’s hungry, there’s no excuse–she heads back towards where he was sitting. May places her plate down and slides in across from him.

He glances up only briefly to acknowledge her presence. “May,” he greets casually, before returning his attention to the article he’s reading.

She takes a couple bites of her food before curiosity wins out. “What are you reading about?”

He puts the paper down and slides it towards her. She notes the headline: ‘Excitement Continues Around Conclusion of Wallace Cup in Sinnoh’. May smiles. She skims the article briefly. It talks about the contest, the venue, and her and Dawn’s battle in the final. Curiously, she notes the fact that Johto and Hoenn were both bidding for the next Wallace Cup.

“It seems the coordinating world was pretty impressed by your new style out there. Even if you did manage to lose to a rookie,” Drew comments, stealing his newspaper back.

May rolls her eyes. “Dawn was good. And besides, her mom was a Top Coordinator before either of our times so she’s grown up around it. I almost won the Violet City Contest after I got back anyway. My slump is over, we both know that.”

Drew shrugs. “We’ll see today, I guess.”

May sticks her tongue out at her rival, who shares a rare smile at her childish action, and tucks back into her food. The whole situation is friendly and calm even though in a couple of hours they could be going head to head for what would be both of their fourth ribbons. Despite May’s apparent slump, Drew was equal to her in ribbons, though May conceded that he had entered far fewer contests and was spending more time on individual training.

Still, getting a foot up on him would be a welcome change since he always seemed to be one step ahead of her.

As the appeal scores are revealed, May takes one of Drew’s telling characteristics and spins it back on him. She smirks at him. She’s in first, and he’s close behind her, only 0.3 points back, in second place. They’re both comfortably through to the battle round, but May’s ahead this time.

It feels good, especially since May knows that Drew’s appeals and combinations are generally his strongest points, whereas hers lay more in powerful battling, something she had picked up from Ash. Still, Drew was notoriously good at spinning people’s power back on themselves to earn massive points, and he was also incredibly strong.

The bracket is revealed and to May’s surprise, she and Drew are not opposite each other. In fact, if they both win their first battles, they’ll be facing off in the semi-finals. She casts him a surprised glance and he shrugs in return. May laughs. She’s still going to beat him–that’s her plan.

As they take the stage for the battles, cheers spring up around them, but Drew’s cheering section is loud and very female. Drew smirks and flicks his hair. The crowd screams in appreciation and May smothers a snort. At least his fangirls will get to enjoy his showboating for a little while.

The announcers call for them to choose their Pokémon, and May watches as Drew calls out Flygon. The Dragon Type is one of his strongest, and May knows there is no going easy here with him. Still, she has an advantage in this case.

“Glaceon! Take the stage!” She spins elegantly and tosses the capsule containing the Fresh Snow Pokémon outwards.

Drew visibly blanches at the sight of her new team member. Though he’d been encouraging of May when she had gone to Sinnoh, she knows that now he’s realizing that Glaceon places her at a significant type advantage over many of his Pokémon, especially Flygon. May lifts her chin confidently.

The timer starts, and Drew wins first move.

As far as contest battles go, besides her stint in the Wallace Cup, her battle against Drew has been the fiercest she’s fought in Johto. He always has tricky combinations ready to counter, even if she pushes forwards with strength. Still, this time, she had been better. Glaceon has squeaked her through to the finals and May is elated.

There are despondent cries from the crowd: Drew’s devastated fangirls and May glances at her rival again. He returns Flygon and nods to her, conceding defeat respectfully. She was better today, and they both know it.

In the end, May makes a blunder, choosing Beautifly in the finals to match up against a Quilava. With both a speed and type disadvantage, she puts up a fight, but in the end, a Johtoan coordinator named Crystal eventually wins the Ecruteak Ribbon. She’s not overly disappointed.

She can use the battle with Crystal to create new defensive combinations, especially against moves like Aerial Ace and Swift that never miss. Plus, she reminds herself, she beat Drew. That’s always a plus.

May calls back Beautifly and heads backstage. The locker room has cleared out, as expected and May gathers her stuff. It will be a few more minutes before people start leaving as Crystal will still need to be presented with her ribbon. May doesn’t see a reason to stick around. She’s kind of hungry again and is interested in trying out some of the street food she’d seen over the last couple days. A treat sounds nice, for both her and her Pokémon.

She slings her bag up onto her shoulder and exits the room, heading for the main entrance. She only gets a little ways before she notices that Drew is striding towards her with purpose. She blinks at him, but he looks frustrated.

“Drew?” she questions, but he ignores her, basically grabbing her around the waist and spinning her around.

They walk at a brisk speed past the locker room, back towards the stage. Drew doesn’t say anything, but relief breaks into his face as he spots a janitor’s closet off to the side. He yanks open the door and herds May inside without breaking stride. The door shuts behind him and May gives her rival an incredulous look.

“What are you doing?” she demands.

“Shh,” he hushes her urgently.

The closet is dark, but not overly small so they each have personal space. May still has no idea what has gotten into Drew, but she tries to study him in the dim light. He looks frustrated, but she doesn’t think it’s from the contest. This annoyance stems from other causes.

Many of her silent questions are quickly answered as she hears footsteps pound through the hallway. She raises an eyebrow at Drew and he just lets out a long sigh.

“I know he went this way. And if we can’t find him, then we can surely give a piece of our mind to that girl who beat him,” a snarky voice exclaims.

May blinks. It’s the voice of the girl from outside the PokéCentre a couple days ago. Drew had been escaping from his fangirls and he’d managed to save her some hassle too by hiding her as well since it seems they blamed him for his loss in the contest.

“What’s the point?” another girl complains. “He lost. He’s probably not sticking around. There’s no point in us being here if he isn’t.”

A few other girls agree, and to May’s delight and Drew’s relief, the girls relent in their search. To be safe, they give it almost a minute of silence outside the closet before they emerge and scan the hallways, ensuring their safety.

When they know they’re not going to be hassled, May bursts out laughing. “Wow, they’re even worse about your losses than you are.”

Drew runs a hand through his hair. “It’s annoying. Don’t laugh at me, if this was you, you’d be the same.”

May shrugs. “It’s not me though, so I get to laugh. I did beat you today,” she reminds.

Drew rolls his eyes. “You still lost.”

May sticks out her tongue. “I beat you though, so it’s fine.”

Drew starts to walk towards the entrance to the contest hall, pausing briefly to let May catch up to him. They walk side-by-side towards the entrance. They’re almost to open air when Drew hesitates.

“There’s a festival tonight, for several reasons, mostly Johto culture stuff, but I was wondering if you wanted to come with me?” he asks carefully. “There will be lots of food, if you were wondering.”

May smiles brightly. “Sounds like fun! I’ll meet you in the lobby at seven?” she asks.

Drew nods. “Seven.”

“Did we lose them?” May asks, gasping for breath. She tugs at the hemline of her dress and scans the crowd around them.

Drew scowls bitterly. “For now, anyway,” he mutters.

May sighs. Everything had been going great. The festival was brightly lit compared the usual muted nature of Ecruteak City. There were sparklers and fireworks and dancers in the streets. Lanterns were hung from storefronts and homes and music twinkled through the whole town. The usual market stalls were bustling with life and energy and true to recommendation, the food had been incredibly excellent.

They had been in the middle of enjoying a demonstration by the Kimono Girls, something that was surely inspiring combinations for both of them, when the disruption had started. A couple people had begun whispering around them, assessing them as competitors from the contest that had happened earlier.

Both Hoenn Coordinators had tried to ignore it, but it quickly escalated as Drew’s fangirls began to appear. Drew had grabbed May by the hand and pulled her away, down an alley as they ran to try to escape the crowd. They had used the bustle of the festival to hide their escape, but still, it wouldn’t be long until they were found again.

“We really can’t catch a break with these girls, can we?” May grumbles.

Drew laughs and she glances at him. Under the moonlight and the light of the lanterns, his hair and eyes are almost glowing. Plus, she catches the shadows of dimples in his cheeks from his natural smile and May’s stomach twists. He looks gorgeous and she’s paralyzed by her realization.

He’s wearing dressy clothes–just as she is wearing a nice dress–for the occasion and he looks very sharp. She inhales quickly and tears her eyes from her rival. She can’t find him attractive. They are rivals. Sure, they’re mostly friends too, but he’s her rival first. Competition over attraction, she tries to will herself to believe.

“I am both really sorry, and really not, because that was honestly kind of fun,” Drew admits. He smooths out his already perfect hair. “Well, I’d imagine that we have a couple minutes before they figure out where we’ve gone, so let’s keep exploring, shall we?”

He offers her his arm and before she can talk herself out of it, she’s smiling and sliding her elbow into his.

They stroll out onto a main street again and May is quickly distracted by a cute vendor’s stall with several adorable accessories for sale. She drags Drew over and spends a little while chatting with the owner and browsing the wares. She steals a glance back at Drew, and he’s already watching her and she blushes.

“I saw green hair go this way!” someone yells.

Both coordinators flinch. May glances around, but she can’t pinpoint where the fan was, so she looks at Drew desperately. He looks a little pained and May lets out a short huff of air. She grabs a hat from the table of wares in front of them, apologises to the store owner and drags Drew towards another nearby gap between buildings.

She shoves the hat on his head to hide his hair and spins his back to the street so they are facing each other, and are much to close for May’s sanity. She feels heat rush to her cheeks as she makes eye contact with a startled Drew. There are more cries from the street of people that have seen Drew, and May is desperate.

She places a hand on either side of Drew’s face and pulls it down towards her. He’s startled, but he doesn’t resist as she brings him into a chaste kiss. For a brief moment, there is nothing, just their lips awkwardly pressed together as they pray no one recognizes them. But then there is a gentle pressure against her mouth and May almost jumps.

She kissed Drew, but now he’s actually kissing her.

She manages to kick her brain awake enough to kiss him back for a few seconds before he breaks away, breathing deeply. His green eyes are illuminated by the lantern over her head and the hat looks stupid on him, but he’s incredibly beautiful and he’s looking at her with a mix of surprise and pleasure on his face.

May blinks, breaking their staring contest and they both note that the fangirls have moved on and they’re alone. She slowly peels her hands from Drew, feeling heat swarm into her face. He’s a little flushed himself, but May drops her eyes to the ground quickly.

He coughs awkwardly and she lets her eyes drift up warily. He’s smiling, despite his best efforts, and he steps back from her a little. “Let’s just agree to,” he trails off carefully.

May laughs and it comes out rattled and nervous. “Never talk about this again?”

He laughs too. “Sounds good.”

May catches Drew’s eyes drifting to her lips one last time before he steps further away from her. A vibrant firework explodes over Drew’s head and May giggles one last time.

It’s a fitting night, she thinks to herself. But, they’re never going to talk about this ever–EVER–again.

[agingerwithaseoul]

I want to talk about feeling distanced from a part of yourself, or rather separating a toxic part of yourself and convincing yourself it’s not really you.

I don’t want to seem like I’m trying to play the victim here at all. I was faced with a challenge and i failed it. I was weak where i very easily could have been strong. I was put into a very uncomfortable work situation where I was the most depressed i have ever been in my life. I had to sit in the kitchen at work because i would just be crying uncontrollably at the office. It was everything from minor sexual assault to not having a bed for 3 months. I was being emotionally abused for 3 months straight by the person who basically controlled my job, my housing, and the opinions of everyone around me.  This then continued for many months after that.

Because of my depression, the new people I was working with treated me in all different ways.  Some were over the top supportive and asking me how i was doing every day tears or no tears, and some were the opposite.

By the end of the summer I had lost 20lbs and was trying to figure out how to see a therapist with no american medical insurance. I had to ask my abuser if the company would cover my therapy and his response was ‘you need to make more friends.’ I never got treatment. 

I came back to Korea with my depression for 6 more months, with the treatment by the new coworkers getting even worse, which in turn made me treat them poorly too. That’s when the toxicity of my personality became clear. Luckily I had my best friend and my boyfriend with me in Korea so I wasnt facing it alone, but my depression was turning into something much more dangerous. This was the first time in my life I had met people that unapologetically made me feel horrible and openly ignored or belittled me and my defense mechanism was to try to do the exact same back which, doesn’t work. During this time I also had an infection that almost cost me my kidney, they’re both permanently scarred. I didn’t go to the hospital early on because I didn’t want to miss work and give my abuser an excuse to scold me. Later I needed surgery.

The coworkers were taken out of my life without much closure, but the anger in my heart was still there. It was like a bad break up where I check up on their instagrams not knowing what I’m looking for. Do I want them to be unhappy? Do I want them to be happy? I dont know and its unhealthy.

My depression significantly lifted nearly simultaneously with me not having to deal to those people and after I started YouTube I was so happy! My best friend had just moved away so I was suddenly missing a huge piece of my life. YouTube was something that was motivating me to leave my house and the comment section was where I had most of my human interaction. 

Looking back on it now, I was much lonelier than I would ever admit to myself. As for my boyfriend, youtube was like my own little world so we never talked about it and it felt very private and very mine. He is always a shining light for me, but only recently did i let him into this part of my life.

Though I thought my depression had left me alone, something happened that proved I was wrong.

I had done something that was misunderstood, and it was the first feeling of being attacked that I’ve had since the time I was depressed. This misunderstanding caused someone to do something so small and so petty that it shouldnt have bothered me, and writing it here seems so stupid, but it really hurt me.  My best friend had left, i had started this new fun creative adventure and every time i logged in i would be met with a small gesture of hate. To them it probably felt like nothing, and looking back on it I should definitely have been able to handle it, but at the time it felt like i had made these special paintings and every day i’d find someone poured a bucket of red paint over each and every one of them. It really sounds so dramatic but I was (or maybe still am) emotionally weak from basically 2 years of emotional abuse and it got deep under my skin.

Everything about this situation was so petty that I didnt want to talk to anyone about it, so I buried it. Then I gave up. It was like someone kept picking on my scab i was trying to ignore and i took the bait. I got angry and acted out, but it was worse because i had the internet and i could be anonymous. And my actions hurt people. I hurt people. And i can never undo what i did or excuse why i did it.

The scariest thing about this was, i was able to completely separate the me that was mean in this one space online, from who i was “in real life.” That person i was being was the opposite of the morals and standards i hold myself to “in real life” even though so much of what i consider my “real life” is online. This is where im going to get confusing because to be honest im still confused.

There was a part of me that felt satisfaction seeing people agree with some mean thing I wrote online at the same time i’d feel totally ashamed and guilty and i couldnt sleep because of what i did.

I know i seem really positive and happy and like a supportive friend and i am, but there was a small part of me that wasn’t or still isnt, i guess,  because i know even though im suppressing it, its still there. What was most unhealthy is that i was so sure it was just an internet persona that i didnt consider it to be a part of myself. The person you see on youtube or tumblr or instagram is honestly who i am, its not a fake personality i put on, thats genuinely how i am if you were to meet me on the street. But i refused to accept that that isnt completely me. There’s that 1% of me that is a person i loathe, that im ashamed of, that i wanted to stop being, but part of it felt like such a release to play that role.

I was so ashamed of myself that i couldnt tell anyone. Even my friends that i really trust, it was such a private thing that it almost felt like it was part of another world. Not the reality i lived in. again, confusing but thats just how i felt and honestly still feel a little bit. I didnt want to tell people about it because i didnt want them to think that was who i am, but really it was just i didnt want to admit that that was who i am.

Then one day, it really hit me how badly i had behaved. I felt ashamed and i knew i needed help.

Luckily i have a friend who is understanding. I had lied to her face many times when it came to this dark side of mine. I knew she needed to know and i trusted she would have the best advice and wouldnt sugar coat things for me. And luckily i was right. She listened, and she held me accountable. Now that i finally let someone in and that someone was able to tell me point blank ‘what you’re doing is wrong and unhealthy’ i felt the ability to come forward to the person I hurt. Whether or not they believe me or accept my apology is out of my hands, but now that I know I told the truth, I can begin to move forward. 

Now I’m working on figuring out what it was that made me act like that. Why was my reaction to such minor harassment so cowardly? What is it that affected me so strongly? How i behaved makes me feel actually nauseous and I know I will never do that again. I hurt people because i could and thats unacceptable.

With online behavior nowadays especially here on tumblr or youtube, its so easy to be someone you arent.  But as you act out that persona long enough you have to accept that its not some persona, its you. Its me. I took those thoughts and words from my own mind and put them out there by my own choice. That rude person is a part of me and i need to deal with it. I think having a great support system around you is important and i lost that now that i have such infrequent contact with my friends.

So if you’re reading all the way through, perhaps its because you’ve felt something like this to? Maybe not taking advantage of online anonymity but maybe you have a small part of your personality that you’re not proud of, that you separate from your true self.  I hope you can accept that that is also you and that we all need to work on that if we ever want to grow.

I’m sorry if this is coming out of seemingly nowhere because this is so not my personality, but it is. Its something i am going to deal with and i hope that this inspires anyone else to reflect on some part of themselves they’re ashamed of or distanced from. To accept it as part of you and to grow from it. You cant fix something if you pretend it isnt really there.

Im sorry this was vague and i will feel uncomfortable talking about this with anyone that isnt someone that knows the situation so im not going to answer any comments about this but please see this is as my first step in acknowledging and moving forward. Thank you for listening if you’re still here.

[rfassholes]

Hey Gray! I love your blog :D I was wondering if you could do this request: RFA+Minor trio reacting to MC's and their own child being bullied in front of them (like maybe the bullies didn't see them RIGHT THERE) for being chubby but the daughter/son is like really chill and hits them with a 'I'm used to it it's ok' thank you :DD I'll request more now!! Good luck with your blog and excuse my english lolol

Hey now, you’re an all star I’m so sorry nobody is allowed to apologize for their English on this blog. You’re really good with it, so don’t worry at all! English is a bitch to learn, and if anyone judges you I will f i g h t. Also, no matter how many other blogs I’ve seen in the past, I still don’t know who makes up the minor trio. I’ve seen it mentioned a lot, and I always assumed it’s Jaehee, V, and Saeran. If it’s someone else, I’ll gladly write for them, too! (Dialogue of fat-shaming in Jaehee’s. Just a heads up!)

Yoosung:

He had to pick up your kid from school one day because he got off from work early

Yoosung drove there just a little too early when he saw your child getting harassed by three other kids

oh no

nonononono

Instead of just driving up, he parked that damn car and walked up

Just far enough so they thought he was a highschooler  even if hes older hes still small you can fight me on this

Once he was in earshot, his only thought was how dare they

The things they were saying were downright disgusting to him

Yoosung walked right up and tapped one of them on the shoulder

“Hey there buddy boy, I’m going to ask, no, tell you to kindly leave and never speak to my child again”

Your kid just kinda bip bopped along with him after he turned to leave after the kids had given half-hearted apologies

“Hey, Dad?” “What? Do you want ice cream? We can go. If you want to talk, we can do that, too” “I just wanted to say that you didn’t need to do that. What they said is pretty normal for me”

oh hell no

Yoosung just nodded slightly “But it doesn’t have to be” “It’s just like that, but can we still get ice cream?” “Yep! Just don’t tell, MC!” “Will you promise not to tell them about my school either? I don’t want them worried, since you seem to be”

So they went out to a small shop that wasn’t too far away from your home and talked about animals

Then once they got home, you could see him looking concerned at your child when the put their bag from school up

He went to his office and typed out an email

Turns out, he got the three kids suspended

PTA Dad Yoosung won’t stand for that shit

Didn’t tell MC because he promised

Zen:

You can’t tell me he’s not a PTA dad either

Sure, practice sometimes doesn’t allow him to go to every meeting

But you know he’s ready to fight Nancy at the bake sale because what were those brownies, Jesus, Nancy

aNYWAYS, you both had to go to one of those lame ass schools fairs

you couldn’t say no to your kid because those puppy eyes reminded you of Zen’s

You were waiting in line for food while Zen was buying tickets for things and you let your child go off with their friends

Then the yelling started dAMMIT, ZEN

“How dare you talk to my child like that?” “Well, um, sir-” “No, I’m not hearing it from you, young man” “I want to say-” “Not you either, young lady!”

Zen walked back with your kid in tow and he was fuming

“MC! Can we leave? There’s much better food at the restaurant we passed” “Only if you tell me what happened, because it looks like our daughter is perfectly fine” “No, she is nOT. They were making fun of her weight! How dare they insult our princess” “Zen, You sound like a script right now, calm down”

Your child just mumbled, “Well, that’s what happened during school anyways”

Turning around so quickly that you got bitch-slapped by his hair, he looked at your kid

He was n o t having this shit

“Who cares if you’ve got squish? There’s just more to love! Those kids are douchebags” “Zen-” “As long as you’re comfortable with you, there’s no issue. If you feel bad because of that snotbag, I will find out who his mom is and raise hell” “Zen-” “That one girl looked like her mom runs a drug cartel. I should know, too, because her mom is probably Bethany” “Hyun!”

He turned back towards you flashing a slightly awkward smile

“MC, that boy was a beast”

“Not this again” Well, damn, if your kid is sick of it, he probably should be, too

You ended up leaving after your kid was done with his shit wanted to leave

He may or may not have raised a little hell on the board

Gave a two minute monologue on bullying at the monthly meeting

Jaehee: (Good end and after end spoilers)

Your son liked to hang around the café after school was done with a few friends

He came in one day with several people, a few being ones you recognized

You were taking orders and Jaehee was wiping down tables along with picking up dishes

cue dramatic plate falling when she overheard their conversation

“Maybe your clothes wouldn’t be so big if your  parents didn’t bake so much for you” “He’s right. All those pastries can’t be that great. Especially with how little you do in PE” “Maybe stop eating all of your lun-”

“Excuse me, but who are you, ma’am?” “Just a friend of this kid” “Get out of this café” “Who are you? Where’s the manager?”

“Mom, it’s fi-” “I’m Mrs. Kang, the owner of this establishment, and the disgusting comments you are making are towards my son. Leave”

The girl turned bright red and moved to gather her things

Jaehee’s badass arm stopped her from properly getting up

“I thought it was heavily implied that you were to apologize”

She was downright glaring at this kid

You paused when nobody else was at the counter and turned your attention to what was going down

This look wasn’t even reserved for customers who threw orders at her

Once the girl left after having to repeat her apology several times, all the others followed, trying not to maintain eye contact with Jaehee

She slid in the booth across from your son and had a lengthy discussion about what was wrong for people to say

Jaehee had had enough in her life getting treated awfully, so your kid wasn’t allowed to have any of that

That night, you had to talk her out of fighting that kid

“Jaehee, that’s assault” “MC, it’s justice”

Seven:

He was dicking around with the security system at your kid’s school

It’s not stalking if its not obsessive

The system’s visual aspect may not be strong, but the audio was pretty okay

Seven just wanted to hear what your child was doing after the bell had rung (I had to look up if it was rung or rang just now)

As soon as he heard what a person was saying that was most definitely not your child, he was ready to f i g h t

Your kid came back from school that day and went to greet him

He may or may not have turned around in an office chair dramactically

“So who’s Jun Ho? He sounds like a real biiiii-I mean, jerkwad” “How do you know who he is? He’s in one of my classes.” “Some teacher emailed me saying he was being rude to you. Making remarks on your appearance or something” “Oh, yeah, he does that a lot. It stopped bugging me awhile ago”

Red Alert: How About No?

“He shouldn’t be saying things like that in the first place. Why do you even talk to him?” “Jun Ho gives me food” “As much as I love food, you should never be degraded to get it” “But it’s soda, and I can’t take that to school” “You won’t get in trouble if no one finds out. That’s besides the point. Can you please drop that douuu-um, that trashcan? You don’t deserve to be told anything that’s negative about yourself that isn’t constructive”

Your kid just tried to assure him that It’s Fine, Dad but it most definitely Was Not

So then he went into every social media account he could find of Jun Ho’s and left some lovely messages and photos for the kid to find later

Jumin:

you know this motherfucker sent your kid to a private school

He didn’t realize that not every person would be magically nice to eachother

Just let him believe

Jumin was content with that for awhile until The Incident

Your son was walking back into your home as he was video chatting people at a party

For some reason, their conversation dropped off to what sports people were playing and some dumbass in the background made a rude remark to your kid

Jumin walked over and took the phone from your son’s hand and got the attention of the teenagers

holy shit, that was the dude that their parents made those important business deals with

that suit is probably worth more than all my organs

damn, he looks like he’s about ready to fail all of us in a class

“Please refrain from ever contacting this phone ever again. Your words are unappreciated by myself”

Your son was desperately trying to mute him repeating that it was all okay

Jumin was still drilling these kids

“Furthermore, it is not any of your business to inquire about an individual’s health whatsoever. I will have you make good note that everything in this household is meticulously organized, so no, you’re not ‘concerned for his health’ or any other excuse that is as incompetent as yourselves. Have a good evening”

Sassy Jumin snapping that hang up button

Then he held out the phone to your son that took it nervously

“You’re never to speak to them again” “Dad, I-” “No, it is absolutely not fine. You will not be told that just because you’re not of the bare minimum weight, that you are any less of a human being. You are to be respected. If you are to speak to any of your classmates, please inform them that all business deals with their families will end soon.”

He most definitely called all of their parents that evening to tell them of these changes

Blocked every number he could

Also made sure that any future advertisements that were made by any department were to be inclusive of plus-size models

V:

There was a new museum and he was invited to attend it’s opening with his family

No way this Cotton Candy Man could say no when your daughter got excited at the mention of an artist she loved that was to have an exhibit showcased

Everyone had gotten dressed up for the occasion, including V in a snazzy I’m so sorry that I use that word suit, yourself in comfortable formal wear, and your daughter wearing a tighter blouse with a skirt

What she wore didn’t bug you or Jihyun, whatever made her the most loving to herself was fine by you

The three of you had walked in and were walking around to greet other guests and enjoy hors d'oeuvres

Your daughter walked off to admire the paintings until who you recognized as one of her fellow students walked up to her

There was no use in eavesdropping so you continued to walk as V walked into the room of the pieces

He honestly didn’t notice them until he could hear your child’s voice

Then he noticed what the other party was saying

Calm Dad walked over to them and apologized for his interruption in the conversation to tell off the student for what they were saying about your daughter’s outfit

“Hey, Dad, Mi Na wasn’t bothering me” “Then she was bothering me. Mi Na, please refrain from speaking negatively about my daughter’s appearance in the future. I assure you that whatever clothing she wishes to wear will not effect you”

You looked over to see the “Bitch, you ain't shit” smile on his face and got interested to see what was going on

He explained to you the situation then spoke to your daughter again with a short lecture on Why She Was Perfect and Why People Suck

Got the girl kicked out from the museum afterwards

To make it up, even though “It was fINE, DAD,” V was able to get artwork from the artist your daughter was so excited to see

Saeran:

this one’s going to do with an ice cream parlor I’m sorry

He agreed to go on a family outing as long as the crowds weren’t too big

Hey, if you made it this far, don’t mess it up

To his favorite ice cream parlor first!

None of you cared if it was eleven am

It was always time for ice cream

While you three were waiting in line, your child noticed that the person scooping was the dickbag of an upperclassman that had been harassing them for a couple of weeks

Saeran noticed how they acted and offered to get a table with them so that it would fit into conversation easily

They nodded and went with them so that he could ask what happened

Your kid told him that the boy at the counter was giving him shit for his weight and that “It’s perfectly fine”

Then Saeran was p i s s e d

He assured them that they were perfectly fine as long as they liked themselves

Saeran then offered for them to go back in the line where you were ordering your food

Your child was slightly anxious as to what he’d do to the worker

He glared at that upperclassman so strongly that you thought he had killed Saeran’s joy in life

Considering how much Saeran loved his new family, he pretty much did, so the kid deserved to be scared for half a minute

He then smiled at you when you handed a cone to him and you sat down with the three of you eating happily

Saeran noticed the glances he was getting but didn’t mind them

He glared at the kid again for good measure when he held open the door

I’m sorry that this took me so long! Also, no offense if your name is Nancy or Bethany. They’re just my go to PTA Mom names. I’m going to try to get at least two requests up each day. I hope that this was to your satisfaction, but I’ll happily fix anything if you see fit. Much love to you all!

[tortuga-aak]

How the symbiotic relationship between Trump and Fox News has fundamentally changed American politics

Gabriel Sherman reported on Fox News' former head Roger Ailes and his sexual misconduct.

Sherman believes Fox News has changed after Ailes and that current head Rupert Murdoch hates Donald Trump.

Gabriel Sherman says Fox News has an aging demographic and is clinging to Trump because its keeping their viewership strong.

  On this week’s episode of my podcast, I Have to Ask, I spoke with Gabriel Sherman, a special correspondent for Vanity Fair. In a recent piece for the magazine, Sherman reported that people in the White House were concerned about President Trump’s mental health and wondered whether he was in a state of decline. He is also the author of The Loudest Voice in the Room, a biography of Roger Ailes. Sherman’s reporting on Ailes’ conduct helped lead to his downfall at Fox News for sexual misconduct.

Below is an edited transcript of the show. In it, we discuss whether Trump’s behavior is really getting worse, how Fox News has changed since Ailes’ departure, and why Rupert Murdoch secretly “loathes” the president.

You can find links to every episode here; the entire audio interview is below. Please subscribe to I Have to Ask wherever you get your podcasts.

Isaac Chotiner: We know each other a little bit, and I think the reason is because about five years ago we were probably the only two people in our extended social circle spending hours every day watching Fox News. You were watching Fox because you wrote a very informative book about Roger Ailes, and I was watching Fox because I’m a sad, pathetic person who wanted to make myself more depressed. And then we started text messaging and talking about Fox. What got you so obsessed with Ailes and writing about Fox News?

Gabriel Sherman: I’ve covered media and politics for the better part of my journalism career, and I had written a series of pieces for New York magazine about cable news. Reporting in that world, I realized that Roger Ailes, through the founding of Fox News, had just fundamentally rewired the way politics was practiced in America.

I looked and talked to my book agent and realized that there had not been a real rigorously reported and authoritative biography of Ailes. So I thought it was a great subject for my first book, and I naïvely didn’t really understand that the reason there had not been a book about Ailes is that he is—or was, now that he’s passed away—one of the most vindictive and paranoid people that have probably ever lived.

He did everything he could to thwart and attack and demean reporters who wrote about him, and I found myself for about three years in his crosshairs. He hired private investigators to dig into my past and commissioned right-wing websites to smear my reputation in not-so-veiled anti-Semitic ways.

But I think [my book explained] how Fox News worked from the inside and revealed it to be a real cult of personality that functioned as a megaphone for Ailes’ paranoid and really eccentric and bizarre worldview filled with Islamophobia, racism, and really extreme political viewpoints that a lot of people perhaps thought were just cynical ways to market a news network to an audience, but were in fact real expressions of his extremism.

Jim Cooper/AP

Do you feel that you had some sort of insight into Trump early on because of this?

Without question. We should remember that Ailes gave Trump a weekly call-in segment on Fox & Friends, which is the id, the ideological core of Fox News. It’s where the talking points that Ailes wanted to inject into the bloodstream originated. Once a week, Trump would call in for unfettered, freewheeling discussion to put out his worldviews, and that’s where Trump really pushed a lot of the birther and racism ideas and the anti-immigration positions that became the bedrock of his candidacy.

You were saying that Ailes was not taken seriously as someone who actually had this frightening worldview, and I think aspects of Trump are made for TV. But I also think that one thing we’ve learned in the past two-plus years is that many of these views that he expresses are probably more honestly held by him than people assumed when he rode the escalator in Trump Tower in June 2015.

Without question. We all need to remind ourselves that Donald Trump has been a race-baiter pretty much for most of his adult life. In fact, going back to his early years, his father famously was tried by the Justice Department for housing discrimination in their middle-class housing developments in Brooklyn and Queens. Donald Trump in the 1980s took out a full-page ad after the notorious Central Park jogger case.

What is your sense of how Fox News has changed since Ailes left the network?

In some ways, it’s changed a lot. The culture of fear that he presided over with the PR department functioning like an internal security service—spying on employees, leaking damaging info to media about it, wayward employees—that’s mostly gone by the wayside.

The lockstep talking points that emanated out of his second-floor office have also subsided. The network does not function as a pure expression of one person’s worldview. What I see now is more of a business. And Rupert Murdoch, who privately loathes Donald Trump—I think it’s a little bit of a false narrative that’s been out there in the press that Murdoch and Trump have forged this bromance. I think this is purely a business decision.

You think actually “loathes”? That’s a strong word.

I know from my reporting that people who have been in private settings with Murdoch say that he makes dismissive comments of Trump and tells him to stop tweeting, which is something that Trump will be doing till his last dying breath. Yeah, this is not a close, personal relationship. This is, from my reporting, a business relationship, and Murdoch was smart enough to know that the audience Ailes had assembled are die-hard Trump voters, so it doesn’t make sense really to shift the network ideologically.

You say that Murdoch may loathe Trump, and it’s clear that his sons do not like Trump and do not like the ideas Trump is putting into the country.

We should point out that James Murdoch’s wife just recently tweeted comments about sexual assault and harassment being wrong on both sides, which people took to be a veiled swipe perhaps not only at Donald Trump but at Roger Ailes.

Kevin Hagen/Getty

OK, but while I get that, and I get why the Murdochs are not going to turn Fox News into a left-wing or centrist network because it’s incredibly important part of the business, it does seem that they could do something about things like Fox & Friends, which is full of conspiracy theories and fake news and seems to influence Trump in a negative way. We often see him tweeting ridiculous things that he clearly has seen minutes before on Fox & Friends. I’m surprised that there’s been no effort by the Murdochs if this is how they feel to at least clean up some of the crazier stuff on Fox.

No, I agree. I don’t think you would perhaps dramatically lose their viewership if they dialed back the conspiracy theories by even 25 percent, but I think Rupert Murdoch’s philosophy since he replaced Ailes after Ailes was fired in July of 2016 has been to do no harm. Murdoch has, with a light touch, removed the internal fear and paranoia that presided over the network, but externally the programming on air has largely remained intact. I don’t think there is a necessarily compelling reason for that other than they know that Fox News is the profit center of 21st century, and they don’t want to mess with it.

You have these surreal moments where the Wall Street Journal editorial page—which Murdoch owns and which I think a lot of people see as being close to Murdoch’s actual views—will write something about Trump is doing this well, but he needs to stop tweeting crazy things, and then that morning, he will have tweeted something crazy that he saw on Fox.

It’s a hydra-headed beast. We should also mention Sean Hannity. I know you talked about Fox & Friends, but Hannity, who Trump just gave an hour sit-down interview with, is perhaps the most influential outside adviser to the Trump administration. I was talking to a very prominent Fox person recently who was telling me how often Hannity talks to Trump. Trump calls him almost every night after Hannity’s prime-time show just to give him feedback and bat around ideas and gripe about all the people who are sliding him. Between Fox & Friendsstarting the day and Hannity ending the day, the network is really book-ended by the most pro-Trump media. It’s something much closer to the way Putin’s media and Russia state-run media functions than it would be historically an American media institution.

One of the points of your book is that Ailes was a brilliant showman and made great hires, including people like Bill O’Reilly, who people may find distasteful but are incredible television personalities and talents. Now you see people like Tucker Carlson, who has failed at basically every TV show he’s ever had until now and who I do not think is a particularly skilled broadcaster. You see their 9 p.m. hour, which has been a mess, and they can’t quite figure out what to do with it, and they’re still getting great ratings. Ailes obviously was a television genius, but it also seems like we’re at this point with the right-wing audience in America—not to sound condescending—where you can put anything on the air and you will get extremely good ratings. It almost reminds me of the fact that the Republican president can do anything he wants and still have a 35 percent approval rating.

There is something to that. Ailes used to joke around the office that the Fox News audience was aged 55 to dead. And there is a kernel of truth to that joke. But the Fox News audience is really an actuarial game at this point. They get older ever year. I believe some of the statistics I saw were like 68-something years old for the [average] age of the Fox News viewers.

These are people whose habits are set, and they come home or they sit at home—a lot of these people are shut-ins—and they click on Fox in the morning and they just keep it on all day. It doesn’t really matter the content of the programming, except it has to remain reliably conservative and somewhat conspiratorial.

At this point the audience is baked in, and it’s a very stable audience. But we should point out that it’s not a growing audience. The ratings still dominate the cable race, but it’s a very static, set number. This is not a growth industry, and we’ve seen in fact, in online media, the growth and explosion of sites like Breitbart, which have tapped into this new generation of the younger, Gamergate kind of guys. That is the more dynamic part of the ring-wing movement.

To turn to Trump: Do you really sense that he’s declining in noticeable ways, and is this a widespread fear in the White House?

One thing that I reported this week in my Vanity Fair piece is that one of the reasons Trump has cocooned himself inside the Fox News bubble—granting basically his only live television interviews to Sean Hannity, Fox & Friends, and Mike Huckabee—is that, if you talk to Trump advisers, they’ll tell you he has lost a step.

Recently, he was supposed to appear on the season premiere of 60 Minutes, and Trump declined to do the interview, but it was discussed, and Trump advisers breathed the sigh of relief that that interview didn’t happen. The idea of Trump being in an adversarial live TV interview where the audience and viewers could see him flailing and rambling I think was cringe-worthy to his inner circle.

Richard Drew/AP

When I hear usually secondhand from people who worked for Trump or talk to reporters who talked to these people, there seems to be almost nobody in the White House who has anything other than contempt for Trump—no one who really seems to believe in him, and everyone seems to treat him like a child. Is that a fair accounting, according to your reporting?

I think that’s generally fair. There are a few exceptions—some of the campaign loyalists, like Dan Scavino and Hope Hicks, and some of the longtime Trump confidants who he’s brought into the West Wing.

I think the best way to put it is that these men and women say, This man was democratically elected. This is the system. We had the Electoral College for better or worse. The American people wound up with this president, so they are doing their best to serve the country even if they see on a daily basis things that are completely illogical.

So when they express dismay over Trump’s mental state or his managerial abilities or lack thereof, do people talk about him like he’s like an uncle who says embarrassing things? Are people actually scared of where the country is headed? Did they not care because they’re nihilists? I think it’s all of the above. I can’t speak, obviously, to the calculations that I’m sure anyone in the West Wing is making about why they’re there and why they’re working in this administration.

I had a very senior Trump adviser tell me this week that Trump’s lost a step. This adviser said that Trump reminded him of his grandmother when she started to lose it a little bit in her later years. This is the man that people who work with him see. People are there for their own ambition. People are there for the safety of the country—Gen. John Kelly and James Mattis and people who genuinely want to protect the national security of the United States. I think this will be a storyline that will continue to play out.

NOW WATCH: Scientists think they've finally solved the mystery of the 'alien megastructure' star

from Feedburner http://ift.tt/2yTqY5Q