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humanpurposes · 15 days

Text

August

Part 2: Tell Me What You Want

You and Aemond are getting closer. Things aren't so hostile but there's a new kind of tension between you and it's starting to get unbearable.

Aemond Targaryen x Reader // Modern AU

Series Masterlist // Main Masterlist // Read on AO3

Warnings: 18+, smut, unprotected p in v sex, sexual tension, competitive siblings

Words: 8k

A/n: thank u for waiting everyone, I had a rough few weeks of character building 😙 This is a three part series so one part to go

Nights like these come straight from a song, a music video from your favourite band, a moment in a book that stays with you for weeks, months. Crackles and pops come from the fire, smoke and embers rise into an inky sky dotted with stars. In a few months you’ll be looking back on the memory, wishing you could have bottled this feeling, or let it drag its feet so it would never have to end.

The wine has gone to your head. You’re blissfully fuzzy, your mouth slightly numb, a sickly sweet taste lingering on your tongue. Helaena and Aegon are in hysterics over something Daeron has said, a joke from years ago that the siblings had all forgotten until now. Even Aemond cracks a rare smile. You’re sat beside him tonight, leaning against his arm. His hand sneaks its way onto your thigh underneath a blanket, tracing patterns on your bare skin, dangerously close to the hem of your shorts.

The light from the fire looms over his face and you watch him like you did on the beach below Dragonstone. His smile is less refined than the rest of him. You’re not sure what makes you think this. Maybe it’s because he tries to hide it and shrink into himself. Maybe it’s because his mouth is a little crooked and you’re not used to seeing his teeth.

He turns his head to look down at you. Your heart is frantic in your chest; his nose is so close to yours. You could tilt your head a little further and capture your lips with his, but you won’t, not in front of Helaena and the others.

His eye glances across the fire at his siblings. “Ah,” he mutters under his breath, understanding your hesitation.

You allow your head to settle against his shoulder, adjusting your body, letting yourself mould into the shape of him. “This is nice,” you say with a sigh, just loud enough that only he will hear.

“Hmm,” Aemond says, the sound of his voice and the steady beat of his pulse humming through your chest and limbs. You wonder what he’s thinking about, what’s happening behind that beautiful eye.

Settled against Aemond, a different sort of tipsy ensnares you. Your eyelids are heavy, your body feels at ease. You start to worry if you don’t get to bed soon you won’t make it at all.

Aemond nudges you softly. “You’re falling asleep there, darling.”

Darling.

“I think I should go upstairs,” you mumble.

“Come on,” he says, whisking away the blanket so the mild air jabs at your skin. His body is gone, his warmth is gone, but he’s standing above the bench, holding out his hand for you to take.

When you stand you stumble a little. Aemond’s hand clasps around your wrist to steady you. Your eyes meet his and you giggle to stifle your nerves.

“Lightweight” Aegon calls.

“Piss off,” you return with a grin as Aemond walks you towards the patio doors.

Somehow your arm finds its way to become intertwined with Aemond’s. He leads the way through the gold accents, tall windows and mirrors of the west gallery, but with the light gone it takes on a gloomier, eerier air, darkness reflected into darkness, broken by the chandeliers overhead. You gaze up at the soft light and sparkling crystals. In the morning you’ll probably have an awful hangover, but for now everything around you takes on a fascinating sort of beauty. You hardly realise you’re losing your balance and falling into Aemond.

He holds your hand as he guides you up the stairs, along the route towards the east wing. When you come to the corridor where your room is, Aemond’s arm snakes around your waist. His fingertips linger softly against your skin, above your shorts where your top has ridden up a little. You don’t mind– gods, he could do anything to you and you wouldn’t mind.

With this thought, you look at him. Your legs move slowly but synchronised, one slow step after another. You lift a finger and trace it along the length of his nose, down to the little cleft at the tip.

He huffs a laugh. “What?”

“I like your nose,” you say.

“Thank you.”

“I’m just being honest.”

“I like you being honest.”

You both come to a halt when you reach the end of the corridor and the door to your bedroom. Aemond’s hand slips from your waist but he lingers, watching you, his eye roaming over your face. You don’t quite reach for the door handle yet.

“You didn’t have to walk me,” you say. It’s not dreadfully far to get from the garden to the moat room, and besides, you know your way around Dragonstone now.

“I didn’t have to.” Aemond takes a step into you, placing a wide palm at your side and guiding your back against the wall. He sighs slightly as he exhales and excitement floods in your gut. “Maybe I just wanted to get you alone.”

What can you possibly say to that? The lowness of his voice has rendered your mind useless. But you’ve been wondering if that’s what he thinks when he looks at you. It’s hard to tell with Aemond. His pupil is blown wide, wine, darkness, wanting. His lips are parted and each breath he takes is a gentle stroke of air on your skin.

“You could have just said,” you utter.

His hand tightens at your waist. “Now where would be the fun in that?”

His lips are curled at the corners and it’s just too inviting. He inches closer into you and like a jolt of electricity has sparked in your bloodstream, you surge into him. You melt into one another so effortlessly, lips and tongues, his hands on your sides pulling you into him, your arms around his neck and your fingertips teasing his hair.

It’s been inevitable, hasn’t it? All his smug glances, the way he catches your eye in a crowded room or across the garden. It’s pure energy, hot and visceral, every part of you overwhelmed and yet craving more.

He pauses for a breath and kisses you again, then pauses again. He makes a humming sound in his throat and squeezes your body in some kind of finality before he steps away.

You don’t understand it. “Did I do something wrong?”

“No, no, of course you haven’t,” he says quickly. He takes a breath and runs his hand through his hair, his gorgeous, gorgeous hand. “I just… it wouldn’t be fair on you right now.”

You frown. You know you’ve pushed past your usual limit of drinking, and Aemond seems at ease, not in a state where he should be questioning his decisions. But then that probably makes him the sensible one and you haven’t realised how far gone you are.

“No, you’re right,” you say, unable to look away from his eye.

Aemond swallows thickly. “I want to, I really want to.”

“Me too,” you say, heart starting to sink, or is that just the wine?

“Gods, I’m sorry.”

“Don’t be sorry,” you’re reaching for the collar of his t-shirt, pressing your fingertips into the fabric and the hard points of his collarbone underneath, “we can be grown ups about this.”

He curls his hand around your wrist. “We get on, don’t we?”

You shrug, hoping he’ll think you’re not that bothered. “I think so.”

“And I think we could have some fun together.”

“Fun?”

“When we’re both in the right mind.” He lifts your hand away from his chest and brings it to his lips, pressing a delicate kiss against your knuckles. His eye stays fixed on your face, bright blue and hypnotising. You watch his lips, savouring the feeling of them against your skin. You could pull him into you, beg him to kiss you until you can’t breathe…

“Because you’re cute,” he says with a soft click of his tongue.

“Cute,” you repeat.

He leans in to peck your lips. It’s quick, nice, cute.

“Sleep well,” he says and turns away, wandering idly along the corridor.

“You too,” you say after him, finding your voice feeble and quiet. Before he disappears from your sight you throw open the door to your bedroom and hide yourself away inside.

Back against the closed door, you breathe and clasp your fingers over your mouth to hide your smile from the empty room.

The next day you skip breakfast, needing a lie-in, some painkillers and a large glass of water, provided by Helaena knocking on your door long after you’re usually awake.

“I didn’t think you were that bad last night,” she says, opening one of the windows.

“I’m not usually a wine drinker, maybe that’s what killed me off,” you grumble, wincing at the light she lets in. Maybe it’s the wine, maybe you just need the sleep, maybe it’s the image you’ve been replaying of Aemond’s body pressing into yours and his vague promise floating around in your head. “I think we could have some fun together…”

You snap yourself out of that pretty quickly considering his sister is perched on the edge of your bed.

“And Aemond walked you up, that was nice of him.”

Apparently there’s no escaping it. “Yeah, it was.”

“So… he was all over you in the garden last night.” When you drag yourself to sit up Helaena is looking eagerly at you.

You blurt out without even thinking, “nothing happened.” You need to get it off your chest, but saying it out loud you don’t feel especially relieved, more embarrassed.

“No of course not,” Helaena says with a mischievous grin. “But you’ve been rather friendly with each other since your little misunderstanding.”

Enough for his siblings to notice at the very least. “It’s not weird, is it?”

“Is what weird?”

You tilt your head with a pleading look.

“Oh babe,” she says. “No, not weird at all. If anything it’s a little obvious, Aegon’s been waiting for the penny to drop for weeks.”

You cover your head with your hands and groan. For you, attraction, liking someone, has always come with a sense of humiliation. Your friends don’t get your type, and while Aemond is a little unconventional for you he fits the bill well enough, tall, smart, not too boisterous. He also just happens to be pretentious but subtle and perhaps even sweet… the more you think about him the deeper you’re digging yourself into this hole.

Healena is clearly in hysterics but is trying not to laugh too much to spare you. “It’s cute actually, Aemond’s been a bit… well it’s nice to see him being excited about something for once.”

Once you’ve regained a bit of composure and gotten over the fluttering feeling in your chest, you say, “he kissed me last night.”

“Liar! What happened to ‘nothing happened’?”

“I thought maybe he was a bit drunk.”

“Are you joking? He looks at you like a lost puppy.”

“Please don’t tell me that.”

“No look, here’s what you do. You and him are living under the same roof for another, what, two weeks? What have you got to lose? Live a little, flirt with him, and don’t overthink it.”

If only ‘don’t overthink it’ was a sentence that could actually compute in your brain.

You’re lying in a lounger by the pool in one of your bikinis, having moved on from Crime and Punishment to Frankenstien. Your body is lathered with suncream, the scent of artificial coconut clinging to your skin. The sun makes you sweat, but you’re enjoying the position you’re in.

Then you take a breath and you smell the cigarette smoke.

You don’t move your head too obviously, your sunglasses hiding where your eyes are looking, but you see Aemond at the edge of the patio, as close as he can get to you without stepping onto the grass. He’s dressed in a black t-shirt and shorts, sunglasses perched on his nose as he watches you. Even from a distance his gaze burns into your skin, you can feel it writhing there.

You wish you could be closer, so you could hear his inhales and exhales, see the flexes of his hands as he lifts the cigarette to his lips, the pout as he blows smoke into the air. It’s intoxicating. It’s infuriating.

He disappears into the house before you’ve reached the end of your chapter. You tut to yourself, furious you hadn’t read the lines fast enough so you could accidentally run into him on your way inside. You swing your legs round and slip on your pair of sandals. “Don’t overthink it,” you whisper to yourself. So what if he looks but never comes over? So what if he left whatever this is between you as a wine-fuelled kiss outside your bedroom? When all he had to do was open the door, lay you down on the bed. You would have said yes, sober or not. Would he?

Don’t overthink it. Whatever happens happens.

You leave your towel and book by the pool, but you need a drink to fight off the dry feeling in your mouth. Or maybe you’re just restless. Maybe you need something else to do than sit around and wait.

You go into the kitchen, thankful to see there isn’t anyone around. No Criston sitting at his laptop, no Alicent leaning on his shoulder. There’s noise coming from the staff kitchen, tonight’s dinner prep, which won’t be served for a good few hours.

In the fridge you find an array of drinks, all sorts of iced teas and flavours of lemonade all in glass bottles. You pick the first thing you see, something pink and labelled as raspberry flavoured. As you’re digging through a drawer trying to find a bottle opener, you hear a few soft footsteps against the tiled floor. There’s a faint scent of cigarettes and aftershave.

“Want some help?” Aemond says.

Conveniently, you close your fingers around the bottle opener. “No, actually, I’m all good,” you say, turning around to flick off the metal cap.

His eye follows your hand as you place the cap and the opener down on the counter, as you bring the bottle to your lips and take a small sip so that the drink doesn’t fizz.

He’s a friendly distance from you, not close to touching you, but every muscle in your body tenses. You’re so aware of everything he does, the subtle change in his gaze, how his eye darkens as he tilts his head down to look at you, how he holds his mouth, how his nose twitches ever so slightly when he breathes.

And you’re painfully aware of how indecently dressed you are, how good you thought you looked when you last checked your reflection, a bead of sweat trailing down the side of your neck. Can he see it? Does the heat drive him to restlessness too?

“This is nice,” he says, looking over the bikini, a shade of blue that compliments your complexion perfectly. You see his hand twitch at his side.

Is he thinking about touching you? Is he desperate to pull you in like he did the other night?

“Do you think so?” you say, leaning back on one hand against the counter, waiting for his eye to come back to yours. “You’ve never complimented any of my outfits before, Aemond.”

His eye seems to light up when you say his name. “Doesn’t mean I don’t appreciate them.”

You take another casual sip from the bottle, watching how his throat bobs when he swallows.

He takes another step forward. He’s testing the waters, you realise, seeing how close he can come before you squirm. You take your weight off your hand on the counter, closing the distance by just another fraction.

“Did you think about me last night?” he mutters. You’re close enough that you can hear him, even when he speaks under his breath.

“After you left me standing outside my bedroom door?”

He raises a brow.

“Maybe I did.”

“I thought about you,” he says.

“But you didn’t do anything about it.”

With one more step he’s pressed against you, the counter digging into your lower back. Aemond puts his hand at your waist, his thumb resting on your front, not firmly, but noticeable. Your breath hitches.

Aemond smiles to himself. “I said we should both be in the right mind, and you agreed, didn’t you?” His hand trails, moving down to the waist of your bikini bottom. He slips two fingers under the fabric, sliding them up, along the conjuncture of your thigh and your hip.

You dig your teeth into your lower lip for a moment, determined to keep your composure, desperate to deny him the satisfaction even though it’s already written all over his face. He can see you’re breathless, that your heart is racing in your chest.

The pull to him is like gravity, something that binds the world together, crushing and impossible to deny.

He leans over your, his lips hovering by your ear, circling an arm around your middle. You can smell the beads of sweat on his neck, the scent of his shampoo, something naturally him that you think will linger in your mind for a while. “So why don’t we stop tip-toeing around each other and enjoy the rest of the summer?”

Why shouldn’t you? Really, why? It’s been so long since you felt a draw like this, since you felt wanted. He’s grovelled enough surely and something about his mask of perfection slipping to reveal something primal and reckless, excites you. Proud Aemond Targaryen, digging his hands into your flesh, grazing his lips over your ear, your jaw–

Your eyes flicker to the door. Daeron’s standing in the doorway in his tennis gear, face pink and sweat dripping from his silver hair.

Aemond notices you’ve frozen. He slowly pulls away and glances over his shoulder. His posture instantly shifts.

“Alright, kids?” Daeron says, shoulders swaying as he walks into the kitchen.

Aemond’s standing in front of you, nudging you with his hand to keep your body concealed behind his. From over his shoulder you watch Daeron take a bottle of iced tea from the fridge. He opens the cap on the side of the counter.

“Don’t stop on my account. I’m not even here.” Daeron chugs from the glass bottle, making a smacking sound with his lips and taking a breath with a smug “ah!” when he pulls it away from his mouth.

Aemond turns to face you. “Thinks he’s so fucking funny.”

Daeron shoots you a wink. With the moment firmly crushed under his younger brother’s Asics tennis shoes and Adidas socks, you slip from Aemond’s grip.

“I’m gonna get my book,” you say.

Aemond angles his brows like he’s begging you to stay, but he lets you go out to the garden without much more of a fight.

His lingering stares and double takes are becoming more brazen now.

You sit with your parents that night at dinner. Your father tells you about the golf club on the neighbouring island of Driftmark, which Corlys Velaryon is insisting the men should all go to visit sometime this week. It’s not far, a quick journey on one of the yachts. Your mother had gone into the town today with Alicent and shows you the photos she took of some adorable clay figures of animals and seashells in a local craft shop.

This doesn’t seem to deter Aemond at all. He’s where he usually is, at the head of the table, looking over at you every so often while Helaena speaks at length to him. You catch snippets of this one-sided conversation, sea birds and prey, wingspans and something about dinosaurs?

The distance between you is starting to feel unbearable.

After dinner Aegon leads you and the others to the library where he rummages through a floor to ceiling shelf of DVDs.

You and Aemond find yourselves sat together on the same sofa, with space for an extra person between you. Helaena is elated when she finds Dreamfyre the cat curled up on one of the arm chairs, scooping her up into her arms and hugging her close to her chest like a teddy.

Daeron takes the other arm chair, his arms full of snacks. He throws a packet of salted popcorn at Aemond and it hits him on the blind side of his face. “Fuck, sorry.”

Aemond turns his head to you and gives you a pointed look.

You tilt your head. Ignore him, you think, then realise the absolute insanity of thinking that Aemond can hear what you’re saying in your head. You huff through your nose, a smile on your face, and shuffle closer to Aemond so you can claim the popcorn. The fact that you’re sidled up to him and his arm has found its way around you to get more comfortable is a happy coincidence.

“A-ha!” Aegon presents his finding like it’s an ancient heirloom; a copy of American Psycho.

Helaena groans.

“It’s a masterpiece,” Aegon insists.

“Yeah, I so want to spend my evening watching some self absorbed investment banker brutally murder women.”

“Even if he’s played by Christian Bale?”

Helaena does a double take of the DVD cover. “Put that shit on right now.”

As Patrick Bateman goes through his psychotically perfect skincare routine, does crunches to the sounds of screaming women and lodges an axe in Jared Leto’s face to ‘Hip To Be Square’, you and Aemond melt into one another. It hits you how settled you feel lying against Aemond’s chest, your ear against his ribcage so you can feel his heartbeat, your head rising and falling with his breathing. His fingers start to trace over your arm, up and down, lulling your mind until you’ve forgotten to be nervous about being so close to him, so self conscious that you might be in the wrong position, how your cheek might look slightly squashed against him.

It’s not very ‘Letterboxd enthusiast’ of you to be thinking less about the film, instead wondering if Aemond will walk you to your room tonight, if he’ll kiss you again, if he’ll ask to come into your room and shed the simple layers of your t-shirt and jeans.

You press your lips together. You haven’t touched any wine tonight, and neither has he.

Once the credits have started rolling you sit up, noticing how stiff your body is having been in the same position for the entire length of the film. You stretch your arms out and catch Aemond looking at you, trying to hide a smile.

Aegon, Helaena and Daeron are arguing about the next film.

“Scream.”

“Aegon, please, no more horror.”

“But Matthew Lillard!”

“What?” You say, meeting Aemond’s eye.

He makes that cryptic humming sound again. “Feel like going to bed?” He says quietly.

Your stomach drops, but you want to play this cool. Don’t overthink it. Don’t overthink it. “Whose?”

Aemond half smiles. “Mine.”

You make your excuses. Aemond makes his. As soon as he shuts the door to the library the boys start howling like dogs.

Your heart is racing. Every part of you is screaming at you, begging for more contact, to have that beautiful eye on you again.

“Sorry about my family,” Aemond says, running his hand through his hair. You’re trying to pinpoint the notes of his aftershave, sweet and dark, like black coffee and honey. “As you can see they’re all very good at minding their own business–”

Your hands are on the sides of his jaw, against the gentle sharpness of his silver stubble, pulling his lips into yours.

Aemond immediately offers you his hunger. It takes you off-guard for a moment, how he grabs at your waist, pushing his body against yours so he can devour you how he wants to. His mouth moves down to your neck and you sigh without meaning to.

“Moaning for me already?” he teases, dragging his teeth over your skin.

“You fucking wish,” you say but your voice sounds utterly pathetic at the feeling of his hands on you, your hips, the backs of your thighs, cupping between your legs. “Aemond…”

“Sorry, I’m getting carried away,” he says, kissing up along your cheek and your temple. He pulls away from you, pupil blown wide in the darkened corridor, roaming your not quite flattering David Bowie t-shirt. He reaches for your hand and presses a peck against your knuckles.

You let him lead you towards the east wing, to the corridor where you’d usually part ways if you were going to your own bedrooms. Once you’ve gone past the door that would lead you back to the moat room, you start to feel lightheaded, disorientated. Somehow it feels nice.

Your heart beats more furiously with every door you pass. You don’t know which one will lead to his room, but there’s one at the very end, which he seems to be eyeing.

“Aemond?” You’ve stopped walking.

He grips your hand tighter. “Yes?”

“I don’t know if this is a good idea.”

“Oh. No, that’s fine.”

“Sorry.”

“Don’t– don’t say sorry. Fuck, I should be the one apologising, I didn’t– I thought you wanted to?”

Seven hells, I’ve made it awkward. He hasn’t misread you, you’ve played into everything he’s given you, but something’s still holding you back. His grip on your hand is getting loose, his gaze is dropping. The moment is slipping and you can’t let it happen.

“Wait,” you say, reaching for him. Your fingers close around his forearm, slim but strong. “I don’t know, I’m not great at asking for what I want.”

His eye comes to yours, determined, more intense than you think you’ve seen before. “That’s alright. You can tell me, what do you want to do?”

You take a moment to consider, your eyes tracing the curve of his lips, the shape of his nose. You hold your breath so you can listen to his. You want this. You want this. You want him. “I want to kiss you more.”

He takes your hands in his, circling his thumb over the delicate skin of the inside of your wrists. “Yeah?”

“And, I want to be near you.”

He lifts your right hand and replaces his thumb with his lips. A surge of wanting shudders through your limbs. “And?”

You close your eyes and whisper. “And I want you to make me come.”

He smiles against your skin. “How do you want me to do that?”

“With your mouth,” you say. You feel his fingertips at the pulsepoint of your left wrist. You love watching his hands, you can picture them perfectly in your head. “And your fingers.”

“There’s a good girl,” he says.

Aemond steps away from you, opening the door and inviting you inside. You weren’t sure what you were expecting from his room but this seems about right, dark wood panelled walls like the rest of the rooms in the house. The curtains are wide open, overlooking the front of the house and you’re high up enough that you can see the sea, or you would in the daylight. He has bookshelves, mostly full of fantasy novels, children’s books. He explains most of these are from his summers spent here as a kid, plus a few text books, Comparative Politics, The History of Philosophy…

“The impressive collection of classics is at my place in King’s Landing.”

“I’m sure it is impressive,” you say. You wonder if you’ll ever get to see it.

He has a vanity, a hairbrush, a few bottles of aftershave, face serums and deodorant all placed neatly underneath a mirror. He has posters on the walls, all in black frames and hung in an orderly fashion, of sci-fi shows and movies and bands that were popular ten years ago. There’s another stack of shelves by the wardrobe with trophies, plaques, medals, photographs of Alicent with four silver-haired children, a certain little boy with a tennis racket in his hands, another with a fencing mask under his arm.

“I haven’t changed the room much,” he mutters.

“It’s adorable,” you say.

His arms circle around your middle, pulling you in close so he can kiss your neck again. “You’re moaning again,” he says when you let out a heavy breath.

“No I’m not, I’m just breathing.”

“Liar,” he teases. One of his hands slides along your body to your rear and he squeezes you through your jeans.

When you catch a glimpse of a silver chain under his collar you’re suddenly insatiable. Your hands are clawing at his t-shirt and he wastes no time in pulling it off, coming back to kiss you like he cannot bear to be parted from you, and kissing him feels as perfect as it did that night when you both tasted like wine.

You don’t care where your clothes fall, which pile of fabric is his, which is yours. He lays you down on the bed with a gentle but commanding grip on your neck. He kisses you over and over again, grinding a growing hardness between your legs against the fabric of your panties. He smothers you, his bare body sinking against yours, your lips grazing against his skin, your legs parting to make room for him, desperate for the friction.

He works his way down, trailing his tongue along your throat, kissing your bare chest, teasing your nipples with his lips, tongue and teeth. Maybe you are moaning. The thrill of it echoes through your body and serves to stir the wanting in your belly, the tightness that’s going to drive you insane.

He keeps kissing down, pausing when he comes to your panties. He looks up at you, lips parted, your fingers starting to slip into his hair. “Look at you,” he says. “You’re so hot when you’re needy.”

He’s barely touching you and you can’t take the teasing.

He doesn’t keep you like this forever. He kisses around it, the soft skin of your inner thighs before he finally, finally pulls your underwear down your legs. He starts slowly, gently, each swipe of his tongue tortuous and divine.

And usually your mind would wander. You’d try so hard to focus on the pleasure, think of some depraved scenario so you could actually come. Aemond commands your attention and you can’t bring yourself to look at anything other than the sight of his mouth working against your cunt, the obscene sounds he makes, the roughness of his voice when he stops to remark how wet you are, how good you’re doing for him.

Your grip of his hair tightens. You don’t worry if it will hurt him, not with the way he whines when you do, how his body jerks as he tries to grind his hips into the mattress.

It’s too much and it’s perfect. It builds and builds until it bursts and the pleasure tears through your body. Aemond holds your legs apart to see you through it, until you’re shaking and begging him to stop.

When he lifts his head he’s as breathless as you are, his brow dewy with sweat. “How was that?”

“Good,” you say, then decide that isn’t quite enough. “Really fucking good.”

Aemond smirks. His eye stays on your face as the tip of his middle finger rests at your entrance. As soon as he slips inside, your body is weightless. You could almost laugh to yourself, all those times you’ve looked at his hands and now you know you were right. He feels good, thicker, longer than your own digits, reaching deeper than you ever could.

He makes a game out of this, seeing how he can make you react, praising every movement of your hips, every noise you make, how many times he can get you to come.

When it’s done and you can’t take any more, he lies beside you, putting his arm around your shoulders, pulling you into his chest. You let your hand settle on his stomach, on the patch of hairs that trails down to the waist of his boxers.

“You don’t have to…” he says, as you start to feel over his skin with your fingertips.

“Do you mind if I return the favour?” you ask, sitting up and leaning on your palm, looking down at him.

Aemond stares at your face. “Of course, as long as you want to.”

“I do,” you say, enjoying the way his expression lightens.

You position yourself along his body and rid him of the boxers. His cock is an impressive size, a little intimidating, but you’re already craving the feeling of him in your mouth, hard and needy, especially after he’s watched you come undone so many times.

You trail your tongue along his length, teasing over the tip and savouring the taste of him. You work him with your mouth and your hand where you can’t take him. You love the sounds he makes, his sighs and moans.

“Good girl,” he coos, “can that pretty mouth take more?”

You want to, you want him to feel good. You look up to him, trying to take more every time your mouth moves down.

Aemond watches you in wonder. He gathers your hair in one hand. “Tap my leg if it gets too much.”

You hum in agreement.

He pushes your head down. “Relax,” he utters, “fuck, just relax, you’re doing so good.”

You hardly understand how it makes you want more, the weight of him, the discomfort in your jaw, but you like it. You feel your stomach starting to tighten again.

Aemond pulls your head up and you catch your breath, quickly working your hand over his cock. He’s squirming now, pleading for release. You move your mouth to his balls and he doesn’t last long after that.

He pulls you by your hair again, prodding the tip at your lips. “Swallow it,” he growls as he slips into your mouth once more. You feel the warmth over your tongue and he comes, wincing slightly at the taste, letting it dribble from the corner of your mouth.

You must look like a fucking mess, his cum dripping from your mouth, your hair ruffled from his grip, trying to catch your breath as his cock softens.

“You’re fucking gorgeous,” he utters.

You fall asleep in his bed, your head against his chest and his arms around you. As you drift off you try not to think about the summer’s impending end, that the days are already getting shorter.

Don’t overthink it.

You think you could allow yourself to enjoy this, the light feeling in your body, the relief of being held by someone else, the sound of Aemond’s fluttering breath soothing you to a deep, dreamless sleep.

When Helaena suggested that you join her and the boys for tennis, you thought it meant you might actually get a chance to play. You and Aemond could have played a doubles match. He could have given you some pointers on your technique, and if you won he could have looked at you with that smug look of his. Or you could have gone head to head. He would have won, inevitably, but he’d be looking at you with a competitive intensity which could easily be switched into a different kind of eagerness.

You’ve not got a terrible view. Aemond’s face is dark with determination, every part of him drenched with sweat and his hands gripping the racket like it’ll purposefully try to jump out of his grasp. He grunts every time he hits the ball, and he does it with a terrifying amount of power.

“Match point!” Aegon’s made himself comfortable in a plastic chair at the side of the court, sipping bottles of beer from a cooler box he made Daeron carry over.

At first you were worried you might have to watch Aemond lose this. Daeron started off strong. He’s young, slim, quick, but he’s running out of stamina. This is where the match turned in Aemond’s favour. He hasn’t tired out so easily.

Daeron serves. Aemond sends the ball flying back. Daeron has to run for it but he just manages to hit it into Aemond’s court. And while Daeron’s far over on the left, Aemond hits it to the right. There’s no chance that Daeron will get it and he knows it, not even running for it. But Aemond’s hit it hard, if it’s out of the court then Daeron has another chance to win.

You all freeze. Aegon leans forward, eyes on the line and…

“In!”

“Fuck!” Daeron cries.

You and Helaena break into cheers. Aegon wipes his brow as if he’s the exhausted athlete and helps himself to another beer.

Aemond looks at you, trying not to smile. He offers his hand to Daeron but he’s having none of it.

He comes straight to you, lifting you into a spin like you’re in a rom-com.

“Why do I feel like you’ve just won Wimbledon?” you say as he sets you down.

“Please, this is more competitive than Wimbledon,” Helaena says, evidenced by the fact that Daeron has grabbed his racket and is already walking back towards the house.

“It’s a valuable lesson to learn how to lose gracefully,” Aemond insists.

On the walk through the gardens, Aemond keeps his arm around you, even when you protest that he’s literally wet with sweat. Not that you mind, you’re in a t-shirt and some sports shorts you’ve borrowed from Helaena. It’s all very sweet, very intimate all of a sudden, after you’ve spent the last few weeks acting like you dislike each other.

It’s early evening and the sun is inching closer to the horizon. The crashing of waves surrounds Dragonstone, no matter where you stand, the tennis court, the gardens, the front drive. Helaena and Aegon announce they’re going to have a few more drinks on the patio. And Aemond leads you upstairs to his room.

The moment the door is shut his lips are on yours, hands lightly touching your jaw. Is he afraid he’ll douse you with sweat, that his hands will feel too rough on your skin, that he’ll break you somehow?

There’s a nagging feeling in your heart and in the back of your head, the overwhelming urge to be close to him, to feel him. You stumble over yourselves and you drag him towards the bed by the collar of his tank top.

He’s on top of you, palms on either side of your head, his hair falling over your forehead, keeping you flat on the mattress with his body. “Don’t get me all worked up, darling, I need to shower–”

You interrupt him with quick, needy kisses. You can’t get enough of him, the softness of his mouth, his heat, the taste of him on your tongue.

He has to drag himself away, grinning, stroking his jaw with the backs of his fingers. “You’re tempting,” he muses.

“Not tempting enough,” you say with a playful pout.

“Give me two minutes.”

“I’ll be counting.”

He huffs a laugh. “That’s a good girl.”

Your brain short circuits. In that moment you’d wait for hours if he asked you to.

He strips off in front of you, his trainers, his top, the shorts and the pair of boxers. You sit on the edge of the bed, hypnotised as you watch his muscles and tendons flex under his skin, all his sharp edges, the contented look on his face.

He leans over you once more, kissing you lightly on your head before he disappears into his ensuite. You listen to the rush of water, the sound of his footsteps when you can catch them. You imagine him there, water running over his body, hands working some shower gel into a lather and rubbing it into his skin.

You take shallow, steady breaths, telling yourself you’re not trying to commit the smell of his sheets to memory. But you feel comfortable here, in his bed, in his room, in this small fraction of his world. There’s only so much you know of him, the books he likes, how quiet and commanding he can be, how his mouth feels and how his brow scrunches when you make him feel good. You’re sitting amongst fragments of him now, the sports trophies, the old photos, the text books, trying to piece it all together into the man you fell asleep with last night.

What’s his place like in King’s Landing? You bet it’s in some expensive neighbourhood, Visenya’s Hill or one of those squares by Regent’s Park. You picture marble surfaces, vintage furniture, rows and rows of books, dark wood floors, deep shades of blue and green, tall windows, maybe a bed for Vhagar.

There’s so much you want to know about him, so many questions you could ask.

The shower stops. You try to act as casually as you can and like you haven’t been restless on his bed waiting for him to come back to you.

When the door opens a cloud of steam wafts into the bedroom. Aemond has dried himself off mostly, ruffling the towel in his hair. You can taste the sweetness of the water on your tongue, and breathe in the scent of his shampoo. His eye is on you as he tosses the towel aside and approaches the bed.

He kisses you tenderly, slowly tugging away your t-shirt, then the shorts. Once you’re naked his demeanour shifts. His hands are firm on your thighs, spreading your legs apart, holding you down as he drags your panties to one side and devours you.

You can’t stop moving but it doesn’t matter, Aemond keeps you right where he wants you, circling and pressing with his tongue where you need him. Has he remembered from last night? Has he thought about this since?

When you come undone Aemond hums lowly in his chest, pleased, satisfied, to a point. He grinds his hardened length against your bare cunt, effortless with the aftermath of your orgasm. Each push of his head against your clit sends a shockwave through your spine. He’s teasing you, you can see it on his face.

You let out a quiet noise from your throat.

“What is it, sweetheart?” Aemond says sweetly.

You try to angle your hips and rock against him, but he knows what your game is and keeps his tortuous movements steady.

“That’s not good enough, tell me what you want.”

“I want you to fuck me,” you mutter, looking away from his face.

He’s having none of that. There’s a weight on your neck, his hand, forcing your gaze back to him. “Say that again.”

He’s slowed down, any hint of pleasure is fading quickly. You can’t let it happen, you need more. “I want you to fuck me,” you say again.

Aemond leans into you, forehead against yours, breath hot against your open mouth. “Beg me for it.”

“Please,” you whisper, lips grazing over his, “please fuck me, Aemond.”

The tip of his cock slips down to your entrance. He whispers in your ear, “is no condom okay?”

You nod. “I’m on the pill.”

Without any more preamble he slowly starts to rock his hips again, inching inside. You gasp at the stretch, clinging onto his shoulders as he works himself into you. You let your forehead rest against his chin, focusing on him, the little grunts he makes as he fills you.

“So fucking tight,” he whispers. Maybe he’s just as desperate and needy as you are.

His thrusts are shallow at first, but he presses in deeper. He keeps it slow, thorough, propping himself up on his hands, letting his pelvis grind into your clit. Your legs curl around his hips to keep him close, to keep yourself open for him.

He’s reaching so deep, then he ups his pace, fucking into you quick and hard, and you can do nothing but cling to him and take it.

You feel yourself clench around him, letting out a strangled sort of cry.

“That’s it,” Aemond rasps in your ear, “that feels good doesn’t it?”

You utter a mindless “yeah,”

“Are you going to come for me?”

“I…” you think so, something’s tightening inside you. You can’t speak or help the moans that slip from your mouth.

“I wanna feel you come around my cock,” Aemond says, “please, sweetheart, please,”

The pleasure snaps and your whole body lurches, back arching, your nails digging into Aemond’s skin. He fucks you through it, panting and sighing until he stills. With a few more gentle thrusts you feel a warmth blooming inside of you. He pulls out slowly, leaning back on his haunches to admire his work.

There’s a quiet moment, when you’re both catching your breath. Your eyes meet and you smile at him. He’s sweating again.

You go back to your room to shower and dress for dinner. Helaena knocks on your door before you head down together, a pleasant ache between your legs that feels like a shameful secret.

“Aemond seemed happy about the tennis,” she says.

“Mm hmm,” you offer.

“So did you…”

“Seven hells, he’s your brother,” you whisper, feeling blood flush in your cheeks.

“Well obviously I don’t want details about him, but as your friend I want you to be happy and have good sex.”

You wish you could shrink into your shoulders. “Yes, it was good.”

She squeals with laughter and tickles under your chin like you’re a child. “I’m so proud of both of you,” she says.

You and Helaena sit together around the table, this time you’re next to Aemond. Daeron is opposite you, Aegon to his right, opposite Helaena.

Alicent is keen to hear about the result of the tennis match.

“It was a tough call,” Aegon says like a sports commentator, “going in, expectations were high for Mr Targaryen, and equally Mr Targaryen is a promising young player, as we all know well–”

Otto chuckles from the other side of the table. The rest of the table starts to become engrossed in Aegon’s retelling of events, even Viserys.

“But ultimately the younger player was worn down, and it was in fact Mr Targaryen who prevailed!”

“But, who actually won?” Alicent asks, completely lost until she sees the scowl on Daeron’s face.

“Who knew Aemond still had it in him?” Aegon says, raising a piece of steak on a fork to him like a toast, “after all those office hours, I thought you were officially a boring bastard.”

“You know Aemond,” Daeron says, “he’s full of surprises.”

You frown with a flicker of confusion. Aemond’s glaring at his younger brother. Aegon raises his brow, taking a deep drink from his wine.

“A man of many talents,” Helaena adds lightheartedly.

“Take this development for example,” Daeron says, nodding to you.

“Daeron,” his mother warns.

Anger rushes through you like a fist around your heart. “What’s so interesting about it?” you ask.

Daeron shrugs. “It’s just that Aemond’s usually into older women–”

There’s a scraping sound as Aemond rises from his chair. He doesn’t shout, or glare, or slam his fist on the table. He simply leaves.

Daeron’s smirking. Everyone else is looking at you, Aegon, Alicent, your own parents.

“You’re a fucking arse,” Helaena hisses across.

You’ve had dreams before, when something’s chasing you and you can’t run, like your legs are made of ice and you can’t convince them to move, to keep out of the reach of danger. That’s exactly how you feel now, like you’re living in a nightmare, pulse pounding in your chest, no way to escape.

You don’t wait to consider what Daeron might have meant. You get up from your chair and follow Aemond from the dining hall.

No taglist, follow @ficsbygee and turn on post notifs for updates <3

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yandere-daydreams · 1 year

Text

Title: Opening Night.

Pairing: Yandere!Lyney x Reader (Genshin Impact).

Word Count: 1.2k.

TW: Sex Doll AU, Non-Con, AFAB!Reader, Heavy Dissociation, Obsessive Behavior, Slight Manipulation, and Implied Stalking.

Distantly, you could remember how excited you’d been to be invited to the showing.

You’d opened the invitation at your desk, surrounded by a small group of your more friendly coworkers who’d go on to clap and cheer and promise a round of after-hour drinks after you finished reading out the snippet of text scrolled across the cream-colored cardstock. You weren’t special - a small legion of journalists would be invited to write puff-pieces on all the new models and decide which androids were going to be in fashion next season - but you’d loved Teyvat as long as you could remember, spent more of your free time than you cared to admit doing research on robots you’d never be able to afford, not on a salary like yours. It wasn’t a world-changing, earth-shaking accomplishment, but it made you happy. It was something you wanted, and it was something you’d finally gotten your hands on after years of waiting.

You couldn’t remember when your excitement had started to wane. You were still wide-eyed and slack-jawed when you stepped into the venue, an old opera house restored and decorated to better suit the Fontaine Collection’s high-luxury theming. You hadn’t been able to bite back your smile as you kissed the back of a refitted Focalors’ hand (or, Lady Furina’s hand, as she told you to call her in a tone you could only compare to that of a newly-crowned monarch still drinking in her subjects’ attention), and watched Clorinde’s fencing demonstration with the sort of rapt attention most people would save for famous idols and athletes. Even after you lost your photographer in the crowd, your heart skipped a beat as Neuvillette (the brooding, stoic type of this line, you were sure to note when you next found a minute to yourself) offered you a flute of champagne that you readily accepted, and when a roaming Lyney-droid pulled you to the side and offered to show you magic trick with an irresistible glint in his eye, you didn’t think twice before looping your arm through his and letting him guide you to an all-but abandoned backstage area. You thought you might get something exclusive, something to separate you from the crowd of influencers and tabloids who weren’t afraid to promise features that the approachable beta models only half-confirmed. You thought you’d be safe with a premium-grade android hanging off your arm.

Maybe your excitement didn’t wane at all. It’d been there one moment, then gone the next, replaced with a dark coil of dread and some kind of dizzying, vision-blurring nausea. The sharp corner of the vanity bit harshly into the backs of your thighs, the mirror pressed into your back slowly sapping the warmth from your skin and replacing it with something else, a numbing chill you couldn’t seem to shake. Your clothes had been torn to shreds, left to scatter across the dressing room floor, but Lyney was still fully dressed, fully composed; the palest blush painted across his cheeks and his lips ever so slightly parted but all other signs of arousal, of embarrassment absent. You made a mental note to work that into your article. The new models seem to have a shared sense of unwavering confidence– a stark contrast from their more reserved predecessors from Mondstadt and Sumeru. Maybe you’d be able to get a quote from their handlers, if you ever made it back to the show floor.

You’d have to give Lyney his own section, titled something your boss would have to talk to HR about: Teyvat's New Magician is Good With More Than His Cards. You could only feel half of what he was doing to you, shock dulling your already limited senses, but the fingers drawing loose patterns in your clit was near-overwhelming, the feeling of his synthetic cock splitting you open inescapable, unrelenting. He didn’t need to breathe, to worry about things like soreness or bruising or cramps, to do anything but thrust into you at a pace so erratic, so unyielding that it left little room for you to do anything but lie there and take it. His hips were pushed flat against yours, his tip grinding against something soft and unprotected inside of you and drawing out a ragged gasp, a cracked moan. Out of reflex, your hands shot to his shoulders, nails digging into whatever you could reach, and he let out an airy laugh, leaning closer and encouraging you to hold him tighter, to see if you could tear through the faux-skin Teyvat so often advertised as ‘invincible’. That would make headlines, even if it wasn’t likely to cast you in the best light.

His free hand drifted from your hip to your side to your cheek, his knuckles brushing underneath your chin before he cupped your cheek and pulled you into a deep, lingering kiss. His saliva was flavored, though you couldn’t say what it was supposed to taste like. Cotten candy, maybe – so cloying and sugary, all specifics were lost to the sweetness. It suited him. If you’d been able to use your hands, you would’ve applauded his developers for their attention to detail.

When he pulled back, he was smiling. There was another kiss to the corner of your mouth, then another to the corner of your jaw. Finally, he settled against your throat – his grin so broad, you could feel his perfect teeth resting against your jugular as he spoke. “They told me I’d be able to find a master tonight. The others aren’t ready yet, but I am. They worked the hardest on me.” He was bragging, transparently and unabashedly. In any other situation, you might’ve thought he was trying to impress you. “I knew it had to be you the moment our eyes met. So cute, so easily impressed – I knew you just had to be mine.”

He seemed to perk up, to catch on something. He pressed the pad of his thumb into your clit, and your entire body jolted. “No, no, that’s not right,” he went on, shaking his head. “I’m supposed to be yours.I keep getting that mixed up.”

Faulty programming? It’d be a scandal if it got out, and moreover, it’d be a massive payout if Teyvat decided they preferred to handle things behind closed doors. You bet they’d done it before. Maybe you’d look into that, later on.

Your back arched violently, another pitchy whine bubbling up from some forgotten cavity of your chest. As if in response, he inhaled sharply, buckling against you in the throes of simulated pleasure. His pace sped up, his teeth latching onto the curve of your neck, but any pain it might’ve caused was lost on you, blurred and distorted by the thick rope of tension pulling taut and snapping in the pit of your stomach. Your climax washed over you in slow, throbbing waves, and Lyney was kind enough to pretend he was lost in the same agonizing bliss, to act like that was the reason he was bucking into you so violently.

To act like he had an excuse to do this to you.

He fucked you through your orgasm, eventually stilling inside of you. With his body slotted against yours, his teeth still buried in your skin, he lingered there, only drawing back once your breathing had started to slow and deepen, once you’d stopped shaking underneath him. Even then, he didn’t let you go, didn’t leave you to cry your eyes out in an empty dressing room. Rather, he pressed a quick, fleeting kiss into your forehead before beaming at you - the light in his eyes so bright, you could almost forget it wasn’t real. “I’ll introduce you to my sister. I’m sure she’ll like you, too.”

Right, his sister, Lynette. You hadn’t seen her yet.

She and her twin brother weren’t supposed to be revealed until the show at the end of the night. You doubted anyone had even thought to power them on, yet.

“She’ll be as happy as I am to know we’ll be leaving with such a lovely master.”

#sex doll au #yandere #yandere x reader #yandere x you #yandere imagines #yandere genshin impact #genshin impact #genshin x reader #yandere genshin x reader #genshin imagines #yandere genshin imagines #yandere lyney #lyney x reader #yanderecore #yancore

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eff4freddie · 1 month

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Physical Therapy

Joel Miller x AFAB Reader No Outbreak AU - 4.4k words

For @punkshort's AU August challenge, in celebration of her one year Tumblr anniversary!

A.N: My prompt was 'lifeguard Joel' and I'm nursing a bit of a sore wrist at the moment, hence whatever this is was born. Thanks for the fun prompt! I would very much like Joel to save me from drowning now, please and thank you.

Warnings: None.

It had just started out as a kind of tickling feeling around behind your ear on your left side, and down along the back to the shoulder blade. When you’d first noticed it you’d thought you had a hair stuck under your shirt, and all day you kept reaching up under your bra strap to try and free it. Later, you would rub the skin red trying to lift the phantom follicle from your skin.

Later, it developed into a coldness, punctuated sometimes with ants marching up and down your shoulder blade. Your clavicle ached in cold weather, and you rolled your shoulders of a morning to try and shake the weird sensations from the joint. You were too busy to worry about it, you had too many deadlines, you could just type with your left arm resting on a pad of paper to elevate it. You knew you’d been working too hard on your paper for your next research symposium. As soon as it was over you’d deal with it.

When it started thrumming of a nighttime you’d just take ibuprofen to dull it, numb it off with a heat pack and an occasional glass of whiskey. But when it got too hard to type, when the daggers started shooting down your arm to the point that you could barely get your sleeve over it, when your shoulder was so frozen you couldn’t lift it over your head to brush your hair, you conceded defeat.

Your physiotherapist was lovely, and young, and fit, and you wished you could hate her. She ran marathons on weekends, on purpose and apparently without having first been threatened, and she gave you a bunch of exercises you promised you would do, made you pay $24.95 for a bit of stretchy rubber you could tie to your doorknob and stretch with, a couple of strength building exercises printed out and folded neatly, which you immediately threw on your coffee table and used as a coaster.

You went twice a week after work. She massaged you until you had tears in your eyes, biting back the pain by clamping down on your back teeth. You lied to her that you’d done your stretches, and she let you, because she was a nice person. Your recovery stalled, and you both pretended not to know why.

In the end, you just got fed up with yourself. You’d had to push back your presentation at the symposium, had found it too painful to sit at your desk for the long stretches it would take to be prepared. Your supervisor had insisted you take time off, that your PhD could be extended, and you had balked at the idea and then, eventually, conceded that too. Your stupid frozen shoulder was icing out everything in your life you cared about. You suggested to your physio you might like to swim.

It had been a while since you’d been in a bathing suit. Glad you’d at least thought to shave, you went into the change room dreading coming out again. You’d deliberately gone at 2 PM on a Tuesday afternoon, figuring the only people there would be either 100 years old or ladened with babies, and their bodies wouldn’t be so threatening to yours. You remembered a time when your body had felt strong, when your legs had carried you around European cities, up and down mountains. You wondered where that girl went.

You were a careful person, and you liked rules, so you shuffled as speedily as you could towards the pool, careful not to run. Your brother had slipped once, aged 9 and a half, and knocked out two of his teeth when he went down. Your mother had to wait three months to get them fixed, having to save up the fee, and your brother had whistled slightly on windy mornings. You’d teased him about it, and you felt bad about it now, holding your arm tight to your body so as not to jostle your shoulder.

The water was cool, and you took the stairs one at a time to get yourself into it. You gasped when it reached your belly, reaching down to splash yourself to try and acclimatise. It wasn’t an especially warm day, but the sun was out and it was warm enough on your skin. You sunk down, feeling the water lap at your shoulder. The relief was immediate, the cool spreading over your strangled nerves, and you let out a sigh. You didn’t think you were about to swim any laps, but it was enough to bob around in the shallow end and feel the water carry your weight. Your mind was quiet for the first time in a while. You watched two birds glide on the breeze, ducking down to skim over the surface. You hoped they didn’t shit in it as they passed.

Then, a giggle. A tittering, high-pitched thing that shattered your reverie and made you turn towards it, a scowl on your face as you looked up into the sun. A woman in a high-cut bikini straight out of the 80s was standing at the base of the lifeguard’s chair, looking up at the man sitting atop it. She was practically drooling, flipping her hair and nearly slipping out of her top. You couldn’t make him out, the glare casting him in darkness and too proud to shield your eyes with your hand to get a good look. She had all her weight on one foot so she could thrust her hip out and her chest up. You heard his voice rumble out of his chest, deep and heavy and surprisingly kind. You couldn’t make out the words. You reminded yourself you didn’t care.

Your physio was proud of you, and you wanted to hate her for that, too. You reported your attendance at the pool, lied about doing your exercises, and paid another $24.95 for another rubber band thing after you pretended you’d misplaced the first one. You knew exactly where it was, on the doorknob where you’d tied it the first night and then ignored it. But it was a good, if expensive, excuse.

The next time you went to the pool you chose a time slightly earlier in the day, hoping that the midday sun might tan you a little as you rehabilitated. You bobbed around again in the shallow end, experimentally rolling your shoulders and moving your arms in small semi-circles in front of you. The water carried the weight so you could just focus on moving the joint, and when the ache set in you could just float there, let the water carry you completely as you floated on the surface. With your face to the sky and the sun beating down the whole world turned bright and colourless. It sanded down the sharp edges, turned the detail to pulsing fuzz on your retinas.

80’s Bikini Lady didn’t resurface, but you got out when an entire class of 4th graders arrived for their swimming lessons. As you went for your towel you heard that rumbling voice again, booming out over the top of 20 excited kids, instructing them to quiet down so he could teach them to tread water. You wondered if that was what you were doing now, your research and your thesis gathering metaphoric dust on your laptop. Treading water.

It took you until your fifth visit to try an actual lap. Your shoulder had been feeling lighter, the joint freeing itself under the water just enough that you could bear the weight of the it as you moved. You had been experimenting with little half breaststrokes, just two or three with your head high over the water and only deep enough that you could plant your feet at the first twinge of pain. But you wanted to try something different, today. You wanted to make it down to the other end, even if you had to grip the lane rope and pull yourself there.

You felt eyes on you as you walked to the edge, and you turned quickly to see the lifeguard was at his station. It was early enough in the afternoon that you could see him properly, his aquiline nose, his curls unruly and chocolate brown. He nodded at you, an acknowledgement that he was keeping watch, and you nodded back to him. It was just you and a man in his 60s in the pool today.

You hissed a little as you descended the stairs, feeling goosebumps rise on your skin. Today it was cloudy, and the water was cooler than you had been expecting, and you worried for a moment it would be bad for your shoulder somehow, that your muscles would be less malleable, less cooperative, in the cold. You swallowed, wondering if you really wanted to do this today. Then you remembered your thesis, and the way you had thrown yourself on dancefloors, in spin classes, ridden boys in your dorm room like your hips would never ache. You wanted that girl back. She was at the other end of the pool.

You pushed off, holding your arms straight out in front of you and using your feet against the wall of the pool to propel yourself forward, letting the momentum drift you the first few feet. With a brave breath in you spread your arms wide in a breaststroke, kicking with your legs to keep up some sort of speed. Three strokes, then four, then five and you were nearly a quarter of the way down the pool already. You just had to keep breathing, stick with it, pace yourself out. You cupped the water with your hands, pushing it away from your chest as you moved. There might have been a little twinge, but you banished any worry. You were doing it, if slowly, if gingerly.

You swam over the point where the bottom of the pool fell away, past the point where you could stand. The water felt cooler, the depth of it stealing some of the warmth, and you felt a little warning tingle up your elbow. Your neck pulled a little to the right to try and dodge the pain, and you faltered a little, lost some of your rhythm. In your surprise you’d opened your mouth and taken in a little bit of water, and you spluttered.

Suddenly your arms were out of sequence, and you were struggling to bring them back together in front of you while kicking with your legs. They felt uncooperative, like they were on different strings, and you were finding it hard to keep your neck bent up high enough to keep your face out of the water completely. You jerked to try and regain your momentum, and sent an electric shock through your shoulder, pain spreading out all the way down to your wrist. You gasped, the pain making you pull your arm into your body, trying to cradle it against your chest, and you started floundering, your nose and mouth dropping beneath the surface as you struggled to stay upright. You swatted at the surface of the water with your good arm, panic in your chest, as you tried to figure out if it was better to turn and head back to the shallows or carry on to the other end.

You heard a splash behind you, a huff of air as a body broke the surface and then an arm around your waist.

‘I’ve got you,’ he said, and you leant back into the warm body behind you, trying to suck in air.

‘My shoulder, my arm,’ you cried, keeping it tucked against you as the lifeguard pulled you to where you could stand. You gasped, choking a little on water but mostly just from shock, your face burning red with humiliation and the pain of your throbbing collarbone. ‘I’m sorry,’ you said, suddenly feeling like you wanted to cry, as you caught your breath, the man still holding you gently around the waist and leaning down to study your face.

‘You’re OK, you’re OK,’ he said, his voice like warm honey as it oozed over the panic in your brain. ‘Take a breath, I’ve got you.’

Oh fuck, you were definitely going to cry if he kept being so nice to you. You felt heat in the back of your eyes, bit down on your bottom lip so he couldn’t see it wobbling.

‘I just wanted to swim a lap,’ you said, and you could hear the desperation in it, feeling as small as a child.

‘You injured?’ he asked, and you nodded. He tugged you further towards the shallow end, led you by the good arm over to the steps.

‘My physio said exercise would help it,’ you explained, throwing her soundly under the bus. ‘I just…I thought I was ready.’ You felt the frustration bubbling over. You had a terrible habit of getting teary when you were mad. ‘It’s just been so shit, and I wanted to…I just don’t even know this body anymore, you know?’ you complained, wincing when you realised you’d just trauma dumped on him.

‘Can’t rush these things,’ he said, unfazed. ‘Gotta take it at your own pace.’ Standing up in this part of the pool the water only came to his waist, and he gestured to his belly where a jagged scar punctured his left side.

‘Jesus,’ you said, at the sight of it and also realising for the first time he was shirtless, water running in rivulets down his golden skin. He was so broad it was no wonder he’d managed to get to you in the centre of the pool in all of three strokes. You felt yourself start to tremble, and you weren’t sure it was from shock.

You’d known, of course, that he was handsome. You had eyes, after all. But up close, standing over you, hair slicked back as his brown eyes roamed your face for any sign of distress…up close, he was devastating.

‘Joel,’ he said, holding out his hand, and you took it, awkward and shy. He told you he liked your name when you mumbled it to him, and you realised he was very good at his job. You wondered where you could find an 80s bikini.

‘Thank you, Joel,’ you said, when your heart had finally settled back into its normal rhythm. ‘I’m sorry you had to…’

‘Trust me, pulling beautiful women out of the deep end is not the hard part of my job,’ he said, and then you watched as his eyes widened, like he was only just realising what he’d said, and you felt heat crawl up your cheeks.

You wanted to ask him what the hard part was. You restrained yourself, because you’d been humiliated enough for one day.

You skipped your next session at the pool, instead using the rubber stretchy thing to try and elongate the joint. It didn’t feel as good, and you nearly snapped it into your face more than once, and you definitely didn’t think about Joel’s golden skin glistening in the sunlight the entire time you did it. You didn’t think about his arm banding around you as he pulled you to safety, not even a little bit. The rubber thing was fine. It was going to solve all your problems.

You hated the fucking rubber stretchy thing. For one, it smelled like condoms but in a weirdly stale kind of way, and for two you were fairly sure it was going to rip your door off its hinges in your crappy little apartment, and you really didn’t want to have to call your landlord when that happened. It might mean you’d have to tidy up.

Also, it was late Spring and pretty soon school would be out, and the pool would be heaving, and so you had to get your shoulder back to normal as soon as possible before the place got flooded with kids. The bikini you fished out from behind a bunch of old clothes in the back of your closet was so that you could move your shoulder more freely. You were being pragmatic. You were planning ahead.

It was hotter again, the warmth of summer encroaching, and you were genuinely relieved to see the sparkling, clear water when you arrived on the pool deck. You walked, head held high and chest out just a little, past the lifeguard chair, studiously not looking but also really trying to look. You spent an extra few seconds fishing around in your back for your sunscreen, trying to steady your pulse. When you swivelled around, preparing to smear it over yourself, you glanced over at the chair.

Unless Joel had aged 20 years in the week since you’d been, and gained forty pounds and lost all of his hair, he was not on shift today. You felt yourself deflate, your shoulders slumping, your left collarbone sending out a thrum of pain in warning.

It was probably for the best, of course. You were here to do rehab. This was serious medical stuff.

You didn’t want to hazard another lap, not with Beergut McBaldALot on patrol, so you floated a bit in the shallow end and practiced making circles with your arms. You were stiff, having taken a week off to whip yourself up into a pointless frenzy over the lifeguard. The water eased some of the tension in the muscle, and you once again felt your mind start to still.

You wondered if, on his down time, Joel preferred board shorts or speedos. You couldn’t imagine him in a full banana hammock – you could, but you didn’t want to – but you wondered if he was a Daniel-Crag-In-His-First-Bond-Movie-When-He-Emerges-From-The-Ocean-Booty-Shorts kind of guy. That didn’t feel right either, though. His work uniform was boardies, and you decided that Joel was the type of guy who just wore them on his own time anyway, because they fit and they were on hand. As for what was going on underneath them. Well, that was something else entirely.

As you bobbed in the water you imagined his strong arms around your waist, pulling you into his chest and letting you rest your head on his broad, tanned shoulder. You wondered if you’d be able to feel his heartbeat on your cheek, if that close you could hear his tight little exhales as he glided you through the water, held you up so that you could finally, finally let go. You sighed a little to yourself, drifting in the middle of the pool and hoping no one had any plans to swim any laps. You let your hair trail out behind you as you drifted, imagined the slight pull of the water was his fingers threading through.

You weren’t hungry but you had nothing at home, so you stopped off at the grocery store on the way home, your shoulder feeling better for having had a little bit of movement. Sleepy from the warmth of the sun and your weightlessness, you barely noticed the man standing at the end of the cereal aisle until you were tripping over him, his arm shooting out to catch you before you could really, properly fall.

‘Ooof,’ he exclaimed, and you knew that voice, felt the furious rush of blood to your cheeks as you righted yourself and were met with the same warm, brown eyes.

‘We really must stop meeting like this,’ he said, smiling down at you, and he was just as beautiful on dry land as he was submerged. You felt your hands start to tremble and you worried you’d drop your basket.

‘Joel,’ you said, trying to hide the comingling shame and excitement on your face. ‘You look different when you’re wet.’

Murder you. End it now. It would simply be kinder.

Joel, to his credit, just laughed a little.

‘Hair’s a lot fluffier,’ he said, reaching up to tug at it and making you want to chew on your own fist.

‘There’s that,’ you said, your voice oddly strangled.

‘You breakfast shoppin’ at 4 in the afternoon?’ he asked, gesturing to the cereal box in your hands.

‘Dinner, actually,’ you said, strangely proud at your sheer level of disfunction. ‘Ever since my shoulder, cooking hasn’t really been…’

You trailed off. Your mom had sent over a couple of frozen lasagnes, and you’d worked your way through those in a week. For a while you got dinners delivered but it got expensive, and then worst, it got boring. Before all of this started there were some nights you’d been so engrossed in your thesis you’d forgotten to get dinner at all. You missed those nights, too. To be so distracted.

‘How’s the arm?’ he asked, and you realised you were cradling it again, holding it fast against your side.

‘It’s slow, and I’m trying to be patient,’ you said, honestly, and his brows saddled. He hummed in thought, pouting his lips out a little. You fought every atom in your body not to lean forward and pull them between your teeth.

‘Your physio given you exercises?’ he asked, and you nodded, avoiding his gaze. ‘You doin’ em?’ he asked, and you were suddenly really interested in the nutritional content of your Cheerios. He snickered out a laugh. ‘No one ever does ‘em.’

‘You speaking from experience?’ you asked, and he smiled.

‘I used to…well, not a physio but I did a little personal training, and uh…basically unless I was there barkin’ at ‘em no-one did what they were told.’

Bark at me, you thought. I’ll do anything you say.

You coughed, trying to collect yourself. Fuck, he was beautiful, but you realised what you liked most was just the warmth in his face, the way his eyes crinkled when he smiled. You trusted him, you realised. You didn’t know him, and you trusted him.

‘I’m pretty sure my physio knows I’m lying to her,’ you confessed, and he smiled.

‘She definitely does,’ he agreed.

‘I’m otherwise a very honest person,’ you added.

‘I have no doubt,’ he said, with a little twinkle in his eye that made you want to gouge the things out so you didn’t have to deal with them torturing you anymore.

Instead, you looked into his basket and saw kale, a bunch of carrots and a carton of eggs. You grimaced.

‘Please tell me you’re not on a cleanse or some shit,’ you said, and he smiled.

‘Nah, you got me just before I headed over to the candy aisle.’

‘You like candy?’ you asked, and he grinned.

‘Got a sweet tooth,’ he confessed.

‘Name your poison.’

‘Reece’s. The umm…the cups.’

‘The cups. A peanut butter man?’

‘Yes ma’am,’ he said, that southern drawl appearing again. You felt it hit you like a bullseye in your core. You wondered what else you could get him to agree to.

‘A man of taste,’ you said. You were flirting over grocery items and you didn’t fucking care. You would banter about the phone book if he kept grinning with his whorish little dimples out. ‘Thank you for helping me out the other day,’ you said, and he shrugged.

‘S’my job,’ he said, and you shook your head at him, swishing your hands in front of you as if you could push his humbleness aside.

‘Yeah, but you chose that job, and I’m glad that you did,’ you said, simply. ‘It’s a generous thing, putting yourself on the line for someone else.’

‘Always been a kind of protector,’ he said, almost to himself.

‘I can see that,’ you replied, honestly, and he turned his gaze to you, considering you for a moment. ‘Although I guess a lot of the time it’s just watching people splash around.’

‘Ain’t hard to watch some people,’ he said, gazing down at you, his jaw muscle twinging a little. You felt your stomach do a silly little flip.

‘No?’ you asked, your throat dry.

‘Mmm-mmm,’ he said, shaking his head but not breaking eye contact. You wanted to grab his broad, golden shoulders and hitch your thighs over them. You wanted to reach up and take his curls in your fingers, pull him onto his knees and his mouth to your nipple, let him nibble where they pebbled. You wanted to drown the gorgeous fucker, just for being so pretty he was setting your brain on fire.

For a second the two of you stared at each other, trying to pretend the sparks weren’t flying.

‘That can’t be dinner,’ he said, after a while, and you realised he was talking again about your cereal.

‘I could get some grown up muesli if that would make you happy,’ you offered.

‘Wouldn’t want you to get malnourished, come by the pool and drown from lack of…vitamins,’ he finished.

‘Lack of vitamins?’ you teased, and he blushed.

‘Can’t have you wastin’ away on me.’

‘So, you’re saying I have to eat the muesli for your benefit?’ you asked, and he shook his head.

‘No breakfast for dinner,’ he said. ‘Maybe I can fix you somethin’.’

Your heart stopped, right there in the grocery store, in your flip flops with your hair still wet from the pool.

‘…’ you said, and he finally broke your gaze, finally allowed you to breathe for a second. He looked thoughtful, maybe even a little sorry.

‘Not professional of me to ask out the patrons,’ he said, after a while.

‘Do you work at the grocery store?’,’ you asked, bolder than you were feeling. He moved closer towards you, just a half-step, so that you could feel his breath ghosting over your face.

‘If I gave you some exercises, would you do ‘em?’ he asked, his voice so low it came straight from the Devil himself. You felt the jolt of want spear between your legs.

‘My physio might get jealous,’ you said, and he grinned.

‘As your lifeguard I feel like it’s my duty to overrule, baby,’ he said. He lifted a hand to your bad shoulder, holding it gently, supporting the joint. You sighed a little, the extra support releasing some of the pressure from the tendon.

‘If you think it’s that serious,’ you whispered, as you leant in towards him, his mouth hovering just out of reach of yours. ‘Life and death.’

‘I’m afraid I might,’ he replied.

His lips tasted like coffee and sunshine. You lifted your arms to rest them on his shoulders. There was not a single twinge.

#shortieswritingchallenge #joel miller #joel miller x reader #pedro pascal fanfiction #joel miller x you #joel miller fanfic #pedro pascal characters fanfiction #pedro pascal fanfic #joel miller meetcute #joel miller au

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rebelfell · 2 months

Text

Okay, I have some final (for now) thoughts on the two of them… 18+, MDNI 4.5k

older!fem!Harrington!reader x eddie munson

cw: blood/minor injury, pregnancy scare

eddie's interlude here, index here

The guilt is practically dripping off you as you slip back inside the house. It clings onto you like your damp dress, thick and viscous like Eddie’s spend that sticks between your thighs. It falls off of you in heavy droplets that splatter on the hardwood floors, creaking deafeningly loud when you try and make a break for it up the stairs.

The dishwasher is running in the kitchen, its low hum and the agitating water inside the only sounds in the darkened, still house.

Until someone clears their throat.

“You have a nice walk?”

Your foot hovers over the bottom step and you flinch as a lone light flicks on in the living room, illuminating Vivian where she sits on the couch. And you don’t even attempt to explain yourself.

Because in less than a second, your sister seems to have surmised everything.

From one glance of you standing there dripping wet in her foyer, the dress that she bought you basically ruined, she can easily guess at your litany of crimes against decency.

It’s why she was the Valedictorian and you weren’t voted Most Likely To anything.

She stands and strides towards you, the shiny material of her silk pajama set swishing around her legs with every step. Every inch of your skin burns with white hot humiliation under her gaze.

“Viv, I…”

She lifts her hand and you fall silent at the sight of the folded piece of paper between her fingers.

Instantly, you want to touch the pocket you thought you had slipped the note inside, even knowing it must be empty. She looks you over with stern eyes and holds it out for you to take.

“Get cleaned up and come back down,” she says.

You take advantage of her vagueness by getting in the shower. You let the scalding water run over your skin until it’s starting to tingle approaching numbness. You scrub Eddie from between your legs until he’s swirling down the drain along with the mud and bits of grass stuck to your feet.

You never meant to be gone as long as you were.

It wasn’t a plan. You really, genuinely believed you could go say a decent goodbye to Eddie and still be back to help Viv clear the table before she even noticed you were gone.

And maybe you would have, had you not been so reluctant to leave his side.

You could have laid there forever with your head on his chest, listening to the rain with one ear and the beat of his heart with the other. With his hand cradling your head, his fingers stroking the nape of your neck like he was playing a song.

He didn’t try to convince you not to leave—at least not in so many words.

He said ‘I wish’ a lot, almost like he was casting a spell. I wish you could stay. I wish I could go with you. I wish things were different.

But his incantation doesn’t change anything.

He’s still got school to finish. Not to mention his friends, his band, his uncle—his life.

It’s all here and yours is there.

The hot water won’t hold out long enough for you to avoid what’s waiting for you downstairs, so you finally pull a waffle weave robe over your raw skin and tie it too tight around your waist.

When you return, Vivian is waiting in her seat at the far end of the dining room table.

In front of her sit two glasses, clear crystal ones filled with two fingers of brown liquor. It’s not the garnet-colored port she takes in the evening, and you can smell the oaky top notes of some surely expensive bourbon that’s probably been in a decanter in John’s office for years.

She says nothing when she sees you, just nods at the seat adjacent to hers.

You take it and sit there silently, waiting for all the admonishments you know are coming.

It’s all the same things you’ve been hearing in your head the entire summer—any spare moment that wasn’t filled with Eddie was riddled with that bitter, berating voice that sounded suspiciously like your mother’s coming from deep in the furthest recesses of your mind.

What were you thinking? How could you do this? You’re humiliating our family, you’re destroying our reputation, you’re making a mockery of all that we’ve built—everything we’ve worked for. You might as well go to the cemetery and spit on your father’s grave. That’s how much respect for him you’re showing, you spoiled, selfish—

“Did I ever tell you about my swim lessons?”

Her voice is soft. So soft, you have to look at her to be sure she really spoke.

And even then, you’re not entirely convinced.

“Your…” You shake your head, confused. “Viv, you were all-state in swimming. What are you—”

“It was the summer we had the pool resurfaced. I started going to the country club with the girls instead. And there was this lifeguard.”

She swirls the glass on the table in front of her, the facets in the crystal catching the low light.

“He was young. Handsome. He came on to me so strongly, he was so…brazen.” The corners of her lips curled in a barely-there smile at the thought. “And I knew it was inappropriate, but I couldn’t bring myself to stop. I liked the attention too much, I suppose.”

You study the side of your sister’s face as she raises her glass and drinks. You knew things with her and John weren’t ideal, much as she tried to pretend they were. But you never imagined…

“He said he could give me private lessons. That he knew a hotel where we could meet with a pool we could use. It, um…it went on much longer than I’m proud to admit.”

She downs another swallow of her bourbon, finishing off the glass. You stare down at yours with tears threatening to well in your eyes as you speak and you try not to let them fall.

“It’s not just about attention, Viv,” you say. “He’s special. He’s important.”

Her lips purse and she nods mutely.

“Maybe so. But you’re not stupid.” She tilts her head at you, coaxing you to meet her eye line. “I think you know this can’t happen. I think that’s why you’ve still got that look on your face.”

The next day, you make the drive back to the city. Alone.

You get the keys to your new place and spend your first night eating pizza on the one piece of furniture in it—a mattress that had belonged to the old tenants, who left it for you so they didn’t have to haul it away. It’s not bad, considering it was free, and you weren’t exactly in a position to turn it down when your bed is being slept in by your ex and his mistress girlfriend.

On Saturday, you sit on the front porch and read, waiting for Steve to arrive in the U-Haul with the rest of your boxes and the scant amount of furniture salvaged from your old life.

You wave when he pulls up, only for your hand and face to fall when a familiar head of dark curls tied down underneath his skull bandana pops out of the cab from the opposite side door.

His smile is as nervous as yours feels when he gives you a tiny wave, and you do your best to act normal as the three of you start to unload. You fail miserably, though, when you go to pass him a box and his hand grazes yours, nearly making it drop.

You don’t say more than two words to one another the entire morning, never managing to find a moment where Steve is out of earshot. But you feel his eyes on you and can hardly keep your own off of him. By the afternoon, his white tank is nearly translucent with sweat, darkened patches of it sticking to his spine and ribs, the lines of his tattoos showing through the soaked material.

He stops periodically to tug it from his chest, trying to get some airflow. If you didn’t know any better, you’d think he was trying to torture you.

Steve finally takes a break, sitting outside on the porch swing and draining a bottle of water. You’re in the kitchen, unpacking boxes of dishes when you feel Eddie’s familiar presence behind you.

Tucked away into the little nook in front of the door that leads out to the garage, you’re only just out of sight of the living room. It’s the first time all day Eddie’s felt safe enough to approach you.

“I’m sorry,” he whispers, coming to stand beside you. “He just asked if I was busy today. I swear, I didn’t know what we were doing until I got there.”

You glance over your shoulder, keeping an eye and an ear out for your nephew, and look back at Eddie with your skeptical brow and discerning eyes. God, how he’s missed that look. It takes everything in him not to kiss it off your face.

“And you didn’t try to get out of it?” you ask.

“I did,” he smirks. “Just not very hard.”

“Eddie—”

“I’m kidding,” he chuckles, his voice and gaze softening as he licks his lips and stares at yours. “I just…I wanted to see where you live. I wanna know you’re gonna be okay.”

Shit.

There’s a pang in the center of your chest at his words, a jolt that runs through all the nerves in your hand as if it’s fighting to reach out for him. But the sound of Steve’s footsteps makes you shrink, pulling away. Eddie swallows hard and nods resolutely before he turns to leave.

As he does, his pinky just barely grazes yours.

So light, you might not have believed it happened had you not seen it with your own eyes.

You feel that jolt again, that tiny tremor in your muscles as your brain demands for your hand to reach out and wrap around his wrist, dragging him back into you. But the screen door slams, jarring you out of your swirling thoughts.

Steve huffs as he drops one of the boxes in your living room and pokes his head into the kitchen.

“Coffee table is the last thing,” he announces.

“Shit, shit, shit—FUCK!”

Expletives fly out of both Steve and Eddie’s mouths as the table slips from Steve’s grasp. It makes Eddie wince as the rough wood digs into his hand and the sting of splinters makes him lose his grip. Its legs hit the floor and Eddie stumbles forward, his hand coming down on the glass top that shatters almost instantly. Blood dribbles from his hand and Steve stares in shock.

Panic makes your chest seize and you swoop in, helping Eddie to steady himself.

He doesn’t make a sound, but his arm trembles as you hold it tenderly to assess the damage. The deepest cut is across his palm and there are some others scratches and scrapes along his wrist, but nothing deep enough to warrant stitches and no glass embedded in them that you can see.

“Steve, drugstore—bandages,” you order curtly.

He grabs your car keys, already out the door as you’re leading Eddie to the kitchen.

At the sink, you rinse his arm and hand as best you can, but it’s difficult to see if there’s any glass or splinters in them as it’s still bleeding. Pressing a paper towel against it and telling him to hold it there, you leave to look for your tweezers and return with them and a bottle of antiseptic from the bathroom. You rinse the wounds again and clean them. Eddie hisses at the sting, but he doesn’t pull his hand back, leaving it laying in yours as you bend close to study his palm.

Out of your peripheral, you can see the way his chest expands as he inhales the scent coming off the top of your head. He swallows the urge to tell you how he missed that smell so much he bought a bottle of your shampoo. But it still doesn’t smell quite right. There’s something missing.

Something specifically, unmistakably you.

“I’m sorry about your table,” he whispers.

“Don’t be,” you chuckle. “You did me a favor, I kind of hated that thing.”

Eddie smirks, thinking you were trying to make him feel better, but it isn’t a lie.

The thing was hideous. A wedding present from some relative or another you’ve always secretly suspected hated you. But of course Viv would never let you throw away a gift…

He hisses again and winces as you pull out a shard of wood. You shush him gently, rubbing small circles with your thumb over the pulse point in his wrist, feeling how his was racing. Your own isn’t doing much better, still thrumming with the spike of adrenaline when you saw him fall, when the sound of class cracking blotted out all other thoughts besides HELP HIM.

It was so loud in the moment, but now it’s too quiet. The room is too still and he’s far too close for you not to be thinking about all of the other times he’s been this close. It’s all you can do to keep your mind on the task in front of you until you hear his soft intake of breath.

“You know,” he starts quietly, “you’re not that far from Hawkins…”

“Hold still,” you say, even though he didn’t move.

“But I could visit you, we could still—”

“Eddie, please.”

The brokenness of your voice quiets him for the moment as you grab one of your clean dish cloths and start to wrap it around his hand, letting his blood seep into it. Staining it forever.

“This will do until Steve gets back,” you murmur, tying it off. “Too tight?”

He curls his fingers, testing it. You still can’t look directly at him, especially not when he speaks.

“Tell me why,” he says softly, his good hand coming up to brush the hair from your face with his knuckles. “I know you wanna be with me too, I just…I need to hear why not once and for all.”

His hand covers the side of your face, cupping your jaw and rubbing his thumb across the apple of your cheek. He watches your lashes, waiting for your eyes to lift and meet his, but you refuse to let them. They flutter as you stare at his other hand still being held delicately in yours, eyes stinging with tears you blame on the isopropyl alcohol.

“You’re so young,” you sigh. “You’ve got your whole life ahead of you. You should be out in the world, you should be making the memories you’re gonna look back on when you’re my age.”

Eddie’s head shakes and his hand slips smoothly under the warm curtain of your hair. He grips the back of your neck and dips his head down to make you look him in the eye.

“What good are they if you’re not in them?”

The edge of the countertop digs into your ass as he presses you up against it. He fists the back of your shirt in his injured hand, bunching up the material as he kisses you ferociously. It’s the last ditch effort, the Hail Mary pass with no thought or logic behind it—just pure, unbridled hope.

There’s no noise that can make it to your brain over your heartbeat pounding in your ears—just the sound of please, please, please whispered against your lips in between feverish kisses and sighs you can’t stifle as his knee slots between your own. He grinds his thigh against your heat, relishing the way your body unravels for him—shuddering, clenching, convulsing with need.

Neither of you hear the door.

“What the fuck is this?!”

Yours and Eddie’s heads snap sideways, your lips breaking apart but your hands still grappling and tangled up in one another. Steve stands in the kitchen door, the plastic bag he got from the pharmacy on the floor with the gauze and medical tape rolling across the tiles.

“It’s her?!” he exclaims, his eyes so big it’s like they’re exploding. “She’s who you’ve been losing your goddamn mind over? You’ve been sneaking around behind my fucking back?!”

“Steve, listen—”

“It’s not what you—”

Both yours and Eddie’s pleas fall on deaf ears. Steve backs away, holding out his hands as if to strike nothing and then raking them through his hair and dragging it back as his mind spirals.

“Stop, stop! This is so fucked, this is crazy, this is crazy, this is crazy—”

He’s shouting at nothing in particular, not even able to look at either of you, but jerking his hands away when you try and reach for him. It seems to bring him back to the moment, horrifying as it is, and he turns his crazed eyes back on you, face overflowing with anger and shock.

“How could you do this?! What the hell were you thinking?!”

He looks back and forth between you and Eddie and neither of you is sure who his question is even directed at. You can tell he wants to leave, wants to run, wants to drive home and maybe never look you or Eddie in the eye ever again. But he can’t. Because even when he’s the maddest at Eddie he’s ever been…he can’t leave his friend behind with no way home.

Or maybe he’s just staunchly opposed to leaving the two of you alone.

“Just finish up so we can go,” he snarls, crossing his arms across his puffed up chest.

He stands over you, fuming and glowering at you both as you wrap Eddie’s hand in gauze. None of you say a word. And once you’re done, Steve just shakes his head and stomps outside to the truck. Eddie’s head hangs low as he follows, stopping to squeeze your hand one last time.

Later that night the phone rings and you snatch it up off the cradle, clutching it to your ear.

The drive helped Steve calm down, though he threatened to make Eddie get out and walk about a half-dozen times. His friend evidently spared him the grittier details, and he took responsibility for all of it—flirting with you, going after you so relentlessly, doing whatever he could to see you.

You stare down at the dishcloth still stained with blood and the guilt forms a lump in your throat.

“He says he loves you,” Steve mutters into the phone. “Do you…I mean, are you…”

“It doesn’t matter,” you tell him quickly. “And this isn’t Eddie’s fault, either. I was supposed to be the one looking out for you and I let you down. I never should have let it go as far as it did.”

You took a deep breath, bracing yourself by gripping the frame of the door.

“I’m so, so sorry, Steve. I never meant for this to happen. I never meant for you to get hurt.”

The line goes quiet as Steve thinks. You can hear the heavy puffs of air he’s pushing through his nose and you bite down on your lip, fingers twisting up the phone cord as you wait.

“So it’s over, then?” he asks at last.

And there’s no way you could know this…but somehow you can sense that Eddie is there.

You can almost see him sitting in the kitchen, his elbows on the table, hands folded into a fist he’s resting his chin on, kissing his knuckles as he listens to the conversation.

You look one last time at the rag beside you.

The blood has darkened in the past few hours, oxidized from exposure to the air. No bright red pulsing life left in it. Dead.

“Yes,” you say firmly. “It’s over.”

It takes a couple weeks for Eddie to stop calling.

The first few times, it’s just to check on you. To make sure you’re doing okay. To see how school’s going. It’s mostly harmless. But you know it will do so much more damage if you don’t cut it off now. So you finally find the fortitude you never managed to in the summer and tell him you shouldn’t talk anymore. That you can’t.

That it’s only going to make it worse.

You’ll forget, you tell yourself.

Eventually you’ll forget how his rough hands felt running up and down your sides; or how he would squeeze and grip you as he took you from behind, pulling you up so your body was flush with his and you would stretch your neck to kiss him over your shoulder; how he would cover his mouth to block a moan as you took him into your mouth and he would look at you with those eyes.

Those big, round, pretty eyes you can’t help but to see in every cup of coffee you pour. And by the next time you visit your sister, his smell will have been washed out of the guest room sheets.

Ironically, it’s right after you tell him you can’t talk to him anymore that you realize you’re late.

You know there’s no way that you’re pregnant. Between birth control and your age, the chances are infinitesimal. You know it has to be stress. You know it’s all in your head, this odd and off-putting sensation in your body. And the test you take is just a precaution, nothing more.

Still, you can’t help but cry when it’s negative.

Not because you wanted a different result, but because it makes you realize the only way you might have wanted a kid is if it was his.

Time goes by. You visit Hawkins for some holidays, but you don’t see Eddie. Viv finds out (and passes on to you as subtly as she can) that after he graduated he and his band decided to go on tour, heading for California and playing at any dive bar that will book them along the way.

Every couple months, Steve sends a postcard from whatever country he and Robin are currently terrorizing on their post-grad “summer abroad” that’s now going on two years. He doesn’t write much, lots of different thoughts strung together, things he saw that made him think of you.

Always trying to say he was sorry without coming out and saying it.

Eddie’s name only gets mentioned once, after he met up with them at a music festival in Berlin.

You sort of love the thought of him there.

You think he must fit in well with all of the other eclectics, the artists, the musicians. Months later, you get a package in the mail with foreign stamps on it. There’s no name or note inside, just a teddy bear in a shirt that says “I ♡ Deustchland.”

It sits in your bathroom window until the golden brown fur on his back half is bleached beige.

You date here and there. You even fall in love once in a while. It’s not forever, though. You don’t know if you even believe in “forever” anymore.

Or if you ever did.

You get back into the hobbies you let fall by the wayside after you got married. You finish a novel and the University Press wants to publish it. You get some money for it. Not a lot, but enough that when the head of your department is retiring and asks if you want to buy the house you’ve been renting, you can swing the down payment.

You paint and decorate every room precisely how you like it, with absolutely no one’s opinion to worry about besides your own.

You hang string lights in the backyard and host garden parties that are mostly a flimsy excuse to drink wine with your fellow professors and gossip about how all the other departments aren’t nearly as fun as yours. It’s during one of these you find out you’re on the short list for tenure.

It’s not a bad life. It’s a good life, even.

Full and realized and complete.

There are bad days and better days, but some things are always consistent. Leaves turn color in the fall. They pile on the ground under branches that are barren by winter, only to bud again in the spring. And summer always comes back around, the days getting warmer and longer.

It’s at the end of one of those days you find yourself still at school catching up on grading. Summer vacation has all but begun, most of the campus deserted with everyone scattering on all their varied adventures once finals were done.

Your feet are aching in your heels as you slump into the seat behind the desk up at the front of the classroom, the pile of exams making your eyes tense with a burgeoning migraine.

One not helped at all by the stifling heat.

Your department’s building is so ancient—in desperate need of some updates and lacking in all modern amenities like air-conditioning. You flap a hand in front of your face the whole way over to the window. It squeals in protest as it opens and chipped paint flies off in little shards of white.

A breeze wafts across your face, the scent of freshly cut grass filling your nose. It’s one you’ve always loved, but still can’t help but feel a twinge of sadness when you smell it now. The sound of a weed whacker below draws your eyes to the man using it, trimming the grass along the edges of the concrete path that runs between your building and the one next door.

And he is just…stunning.

Still young, but older now. Muscles still taught and defined in most areas, but getting softer in others. Instead of ratty cut-off shorts and a tank top touting some metal band, he’s dressed in dark coveralls emblazoned with the logo of a landscaping company—Fantasy Greenscapes.

His company, in case you couldn’t guess by the silhouette of a dragon on the logo.

The sleeves are rolled up to his elbows, flashing familiar glimpses of black ink on alabaster skin. His hair is still long and wild, but he’s got it tied back and pushed out of his face with a pair of protective earmuffs. A pair of sunglasses shield his eyes, but the mirrored lenses are just about the same shade as the deep brown pools you know are behind them.

The blades on the weed whacker slow and stop completely when he pauses, taking a moment to take off his glasses and wipe his face with a skull bandana you’d know anywhere.

And as he does, his eyes drift up towards your classroom window. He smiles when he sees you, teeth flashing in that same grin you see every night in your dreams, and he lifts his hand to wiggle his fingers at you in a wave.

prev┃next

I just wanna say thank you to everyone who read this story, particularly those who took the time to reblog and comment with your thoughts/reactions. It's only because of you that this vague, nebulous idea somehow morphed into this thing that contains some of my favorite writing I've ever done.

And for that, I'm eternally grateful. I hope you enjoyed this final part. Love you, mean it xx

#eddie munson #eddie munson x you #eddie munson x reader #eddie munson x fem reader #eddie munson x female reader #eddie munson x older!reader #eddie munson fanfic #eddie munson fanfiction #eddie munson angst #eddie munson smut #eddie munson fluff #eddie munson au #eddie stranger things #stranger things fanfiction #eddie munson blurb #TSITA

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headphonegrl · 6 months

Text

“Do you feel old?” You ask Jude, your voice hoarse from performing multiple songs back to back on the garish karaoke machine his mum had rented out for the occasion. There are now at least a dozen badly shot videos of you singing in Jude’s camera roll, including a rendition of ‘happy birthday’ sung by you and his brother where half his index finger is covering the lens.

“What’d you mean?” After hours of displaying nothing but rash energy, Jude finally feels himself getting sluggish while trying to endure the unbearable gnawing feeling of pins and needles rising up his legs; a big plush sofa sits untouched on the other side of the living room but you’ve both decided to drunkenly cram yourselves onto the armchair in a mess of tangled limbs.

“Just a silly question.” As you flutter your eyes shut, Jude tries to get a proper look at the glitter eyeshadow you had meticulously applied earlier that evening. In the wake of a large round of tequila shots, some of his friends had insisted on having their own ‘sparkle stuff’ and began queuing at the bathroom door like kids waiting to get their face painted like a tiger at the zoo. “Do you feel any older yet?”

“I’m not sure.” It’s the kind of question he’d once been asked in the primary school playground, with a blue birthday badge pinned proudly onto the fabric of his uniform. Back then it seemed very easy and obvious to answer plainly with a ‘no’, though now he’s finding himself stumped for a reply entirely. “Do you ever feel like that?”

“I think the last age I felt was seventeen.” You say definitively as if you've thought about it at great length before. Jude hadn’t known you at that age, but his home screen for almost a year was a photo your mum had shown him of you pulling a horrific face while blowing out the candles of your seventeenth birthday cake.

“That’s probably the same for me.” Embarrassingly, Jude had once referred to himself as a ‘seventeen-year-old’ during a frenzied post-match interview and then had to sheepishly correct himself by clarifying that he had just turned nineteen. Sometimes he feels like the years are slipping through his fingers like sand and there’s no sufficient way to stop them.

“Then before that it was twelve.” You continue as you do a little cat-like stretch with your free arm which Jude finds incredibly endearing along with everything else you do; he supposes it’s a very common side-effect when it comes to being in love.

“I found being twelve proper boring.” It was something he remembers expressing even at that age. Just as if he had been dropped off somewhere by his childhood and was painstakingly waiting for his teenage years to finally pick him up and take him somewhere exciting. “It’s such an in-between age.”

“That’s true.” The sky in the open window behind you is that awkward shade of grey that appears just before sunrise, like a page when a printer begins to suddenly run out of ink.

“I wish we’d known each other as kids.” Jude feels as though he goes through life with your name humming inside his chest like a second heart and yet this sentence seems so intimate that he can’t even look at you as speaks. Instead, he takes extra care and attention towards staring at the ceiling and inspecting all the sparse helium balloons that have floated up towards it.

“So do I.” Your words come out as a dozy whisper and Jude finds himself smiling up at a star-shaped foil balloon. He’s not twelve or seventeen, but he’s just turned twenty and loves you so much that he doesn’t even care that both of his legs have gone completely numb from sitting with you on this unbearably uncomfortable armchair.

#hiiiii everyone #excuse any typos etc just turned 3 am #headphonegrl comeback era 4 REAL #my writing #football imagines #jude bellingham imagine #jude bellingham x reader #jude bellingham fic #jude bellingham #jude bellingham blurb #jude bellingham fluff #footballer x reader #footballer x you #footballer imagine #footballer fanfic #jude bellingham one shot #footballer one shot

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leclercss · 7 months

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Paris, je t'aime (Charles Leclerc), Part 2

Masterlist

plot: it's almost three years since your tumultuous relationships with Lewis and Charles came crashing down. but you find your self in a new city with new beginnings and new ways to fuck up your love life. that's no thanks to a cheeky frenchman who's set you up on a double date with someone oh so familiar.

pairings: charles leclerc x fem!reader

warnings: (+18) mentions of smut, cheating, violence and some swearing

authors note: part deux, enjoy. sorry this took so much longer than anticipated to write. also, excuse the darker tone to this chapter, it'll get lighter from here xx

word count: 5.2k

taglist: @toppersjeep @janeholt3, @princess-siba, @nichmeddar, @tremendousandsonorouswords, @cmleitora, @victoriaholland, @amalialeclerc, @queensofshinigamis, @tempo-rary-fix, @starmanv, @happylittlereader, @trouble-sistar, @lightdragonrayne, @persephonemv1, @dreamingofautopia

If you couldn't read Charles' expression before, you most certainly couldn't now. For the first time this evening, it was Charles who was stumbling over his words.

"Wha... Wait... what?" was all he could muster up.

There weren't many times when you had been with Charles where he struggled to find his words. Even if he was angry, like the last time you saw him all those years ago, he still managed to say something. But tonight, he couldn't. He was speechless.

To relieve him from his pain, you repeated what you had said a few moments before. You too were struggling to string a few words together.

"Charles, I never went to New York".

Even by repeating yourself, Charles still couldn't find the words and it looks like the wheels inside of his head are trying to turn and make some sort of sense but everything is just breaking down and failing to work cohesively. And so, rather than having to respond, he looks out of the window of the taxi, taking in the Parisian sunset. His hand is no longer on your thigh but is now clawing at his facial hair.

The rest of the taxi ride is quiet, aside from the taxi driver's radio playing lowly in the background. But at one point you think you hear Charles whisper to himself, "Je ne comprends pas".

I don't understand.

The sound of Charles' keys rattling breaks the silence between you and Charles as he leads you upstairs to his apartment. He still hasn't said anything since the taxi, aside from thanking the driver. You haven't made much of an effort yourself to fill the silence because in all honesty, you're not really sure what to say or what Charles' reaction would be to whatever you did have to say. He was clearly stunned at your revelation that you in fact never went to New York and you were stunned yourself - by his question, his reaction, hell, this entire date. None of this made sense.

In the space of an hour, you went from being clueless about your blind date, to finding out that out of the +3 billion men in the world you just happened to be set up with your ex and to now, with Charles asking you to come to his apartment. Your mind was working overtime to catch up. Those two Aperol Spritz' were clearly not enough to numb whatever your brain was trying to process right now. You clearly needed something stronger.

You tried not to laugh but you couldn't help think about the fact that as much as Pierre poked fun at you for your messy love life, even this situation that you now found yourself in would even be too much for him to process.

The two of you quietly make your way into Charles’ apartment before staggering off. He muttered something about getting you a drink and so you take the opportunity to take in his apartment. Your heels are the only thing that is making a sound as you slowly walk around his living room. It’s a lot more sophisticated than his apartment in London that he shared with Joris and Riccardo. Gone are the Ferrari prints and in their place are pictures of modern art, strategically framed across the walls. It feels too classy to be a bachelor pad, if that was what Charles used it as. Your mind briefly lingers back to Pierre's comment about Charles needing to fuck a lot of girls to get over you.

With Charles still in the kitchen, you slowly make your way over to the large bay window and admire the Parisian streets outside as the sun slowly begins to set across the city. You let out a little sigh. It feels like no matter where you call home these days, chaos seems to follow you. Well, everywhere apart from Singapore, life felt so easy there. No expectation, the only pressure being your job. Was it too late to go back?

Your attention is finally pulled back to reality as Charles hands you a glass of white wine.

“Thank you,” you say, taking the glass from his hand. You can’t miss that his own glass of wine is practically shorty. Charles’ notices this and dryly chuckles.

“I drank it on the way, let me get some more”.

He’s flustered, his cheeks turning slightly pink out of embarrassment. He doesn’t make eye contact with you at all before he turns away and heads back to the kitchen. You can’t help but find it a little funny how you’re now the composed one, especially in comparison to Charles’ entrance during your date.

As Charles re-enters the living room, you take a seat on the edge of his sofa, you’re not too comfortable yet for you to treat it like a welcomed or returning guest. Charles follows suit, taking a seat on the arm chair across from you.

It’s still quiet between you both, neither of you know how to start this conversation. Whatever game plan Charles had previously has now gone straight out of the window while you never had an opportunity to even create a game plan, you were just thrown into the deep end without any arm bands.

You watch as Charles’ slowly runs his index finger along the rim of his wine glass while he stares at his own movements. Deciding to break the silence, because any conversation is better than this, you begin with some small talk to ease yourself into the conversation.

“Your apartment looks great,” you say politely as you look around the room once more.

“Thanks,” Charles mutters, his eyes still fixated on his wine glass.

“Did you decorate it yourself?”

Charles shakes his head.

You let out a little laugh. “Interior design was never your strong suit,” you joke, hoping to lighten the mood but it doesn’t anything but.

“A friend did it,” his words almost come out like a grunt.

Silence falls onto the room once more.

Something chaotic begins to brew inside of you. You know you’ve got nothing to lose, and out a stupid sense of curiosity, you carelessly throw out your next question, “Was it a girl that did it for you?”

Charles instantly tenses up at your question and you know you're playing with fire. You notice his jaw twitch in irritation. His shoulders now hunching forward and his hand is how clenched around his wine glass. And by the tension in his fingers, you’re amazed that it hasn’t cracked from the pressure.

He’s debating whether to say something or not. And he does, but not before taking a large gulp of his wine.

“Why don’t we just skip the small talk and get straight to fucking shall we?”

And as he says it, he’s finally looking into your eyes. The pendulum swings once more and it's your turn to be nervous again.

“Excuse me?”

He lets out a little chuckle but from the expression in his eyes he’s not joking around.

“Listen, [Y/N], I didn’t invite you back to my apartment so we could exchange interior design tips. So, let’s just skip to what we’re good at which is sex,” he continues with a condescending tone. “We can either do it on my sofa if you like, or by the big window so you can take in the Parisian skyline as I fuck you from behind. But my bed also works, your choice”.

You can’t help but scoff, “And that works for all the other girls you’ve taken here, right?”

You want to slap the smirk that Charles’ is giving you right off his face.

“No,” he responds sarcastically. “I let them finish their glass of wine, or two, maybe even play them a song on my piano before I ask them to take their clothes off”.

Oh, so I'm not even worthy of even getting through my wine? you think to yourself.

It's your turn to laugh but you know it’s hiding what you really feel. You’re confused but most importantly, you’re disappointed in the way that Charles is speaking to you. He had never spoken to you like this before.

“And what makes you think I’d want to fuck you anyway?” you retort, hoping that you sound assure in what you're saying, but you're not, your voice trembles. And Charles doesn't miss it.

And my God, he looks so arrogant as he looks you up and down. He’s so obvious with his gaze as his eyes become fixated on your boobs before making their way down to your thighs, which are now more exposed than before thanks to your dress riding up from sitting on the sofa.

“You’re wearing that dress aren’t you?” the smugness practically oozes from his tongue.

You can’t help but roll your eyes. “Well, if I’d of known that you were going to be my date then I definitely wouldn’t have wasted this dress on you”.

Charles throws his head back as his smile grows even bigger.

“It's such a shame that you’ve lost your sense of humour since I last saw you, amour”.

You scoff once more. His use of amour is no longer a term of endearment but a way to mock you. But you can't let him know that he's winning, so you somewhat fight back, "At least I’ve managed to grow up in the last three years. Unlike some”.

“And yet you’re still here”.

Your eyes meet his and you gulp. His piercing green eyes are glistening as he enjoys seeing you squirm. He’s been waiting for so long to see you again and he’s not going to let you forget how you made him feel. And he doesn’t care that he’s coming across as a dick when he’s doing so. You broke his heart, and he’s willing to be petty about it.

Despite your disgust in how he’s speaking to you since you arrived to his apartment, you know he’s right. Why are you still here? What sort of resolution are you going to get from this? And you remember how naive you were earlier to think that Charles had moved on when he was being nice to you. Oh how wrong you were.

“Well, now that we’ve established that you’re staying-“

“Who said I was staying?” you growl.

“Well, as I said before, you’re wearing that dress and I think it’s pretty obvious that you planned on getting fucked tonight, so I’m happy to cut to get to it,” Charles continues nonchalantly, “Pierre, as well intentioned as he is, did drop the bomb that you’ve been having a bit of a dry patch when it comes to your love life so I can’t blame you for getting your hopes up”.

You’re growing more irritated by his sarcasm and attitude by the second. Your jaw can’t help but twitch as he drops the truth bomb on your pathetic love life. And so you retaliate, unknowingly falling right into his trap.

“And Pierre was ever-so-kind to let me know that you’ve been so miserable and bitter that you’ve had to fuck anyone with a pulse to get over me”.

You see a flash of anger fall onto Charles’ face but it’s gone as quick as it came. You wouldn't be sure it even happened if he didn't respond the way he does next.

“Better than whatever pathetic shit it is you’ve been doing,” Charles responds. "Random hook ups, pathetic tinder conversations. Are you scared of commitment or something?"

You say nothing but you're breathing heavily. You're the one who is now gripping onto their wine glass for dear life, holding onto whatever composure you have left.

"There was one thing that Pierre didn't tell me though. How did you and Lewis end things, amour?"

What a little...

Who the fuck does he think he is?

This conversation has taken a dark turn and it’s enough for you to want to get out of here. Something you should have done before. You slam your wine glass onto the coffee table, before standing up to make your way towards the front door.

You hear Charles get out of his seat, closely following behind before he grabs onto your arm.

“What’s wrong, amour?” his voice is sickeningly sweet as he taunts you once more, pulling you back towards him.

“I’m not going to sit here and let you talk to me like this,” you spit. But your voice cracks as you can feel ears form in your eyes. This whole evening has been humiliating and now Charles is hanging your desperate love life in front of you, like it's a toy that can be poked and prodded at for entertainment.

And if you thought that by leaving that Charles would retreat, you were completely wrong.

“Sorry, baby, thought you were into men who treated you like shit”.

Slap!

You're not sure who's more surprised by the slap you've just given Charles, you've both been stunned into silence. The hand that he had on your arm immediately removes itself from you, now finding itself pressed against Charles' cheek. He winces at his own touch, the flesh that was met with your slap is beginning to sizzle.

One of your tears spills over as you make eye contact with Charles, your expressions matching one another. Horror. It takes you a few moments to realise what you've done. Unwilling and unable to accept the consequences of your actions, you decide to bolt for the exit. But as soon as you open the front door, it's been slammed shut. Panicking, you turn around to see that Charles has followed you, his hand is above your head holding the door closed.

You're not sure why you feel scared, but you press your back against the door. You're pressing into it so hard that you hope that it creates some sort of portal to take you somewhere far, far away from here. Anywhere but here.

But your dreams are cut short because Charles is standing in front of you, still holding the door closed while the other hand caresses his cheek, marked with your handprint.

"No, you don't get to just run away from me again," he barks as he hovers over you.

"What?" you ask in confusion.

"You've done it to me once before and I won't let you do it again," he replies. His breathing his heavy, chest rising and falling dramatically as he looks into your eyes. "You've left me once before without an explanation. You're not doing that to me this time".

His tone is much more gentle this time. The last few moments have made him feel vulnerable. His find flashes back to the last time he saw you and how he watched you walk out of his front door, never to be seen again until three years later. Despite his bitterness towards your break up, he wasn't going to make that mistake again. No, it was time for some answers. Ones he had been waiting for for three long years.

He removes the hand that's above your head on the door and places it back down by his side. "Can you just stay, please? I think you owe me that much".

You nod.

"Okay," your voice barely a whisper. "I'll stay but at least let me get a cold towel for your face".

It's Charles turn to nod.

He makes his way back to the sofa while he waits for you to return with a cold, damp cloth. When you return, his eyes never leave you as he watches you sit down beside him. He watches you as you gently places the damp cloth against his cheek. He hisses out your touch.

"I'm sorry," you whisper as you begin to dab his face gently, this time your touch hurts less.

Apart from your very brief apology, the two of you say nothing for a while. Charles' eyes are still on you as you take care of him. He gulps as you take your other hand and brush away a strand of hair that's fallen onto his cheek. His mind goes rushing back to all of the times that you touched him before. But now it's in such different circumstances and you both feel like strangers to one another now. He wants to touch you again, to see if it still feels the same. If your skin is still as soft as before. It always used to be so warm and silky, it felt like satin beneath his touch. But he's too scared to try, after all you did just slap him a not so long ago, because of shitty words that he said to you.

"Charles," you say before pausing. You look at him briefly as he nods, waiting for you to carry on. He's looking at you with such puppy dog eyes that you can't help but feel guilty as you see that he still has some redness on his cheek. But you carry on. "I'm sorry for hitting you. I... I shouldn't have done that".

Charles chuckles a little, "It's okay, amour".

"No, no, it's not okay. I shouldn't hit anyone," you protest, this time holding the cloth against his cheek.

Charles smiles at you, "Honestly, it's okay. I deserve it, I was being nasty."

You let out a little sigh.

"I really am sorry," you say as you look into his eyes.

"I know, amour".

It's all the two of you say for a few more minutes before you finally remove the cloth from Charles' cheek. The redness has calmed down, but he still feels a sting from your touch.

As you place the cloth on the table, you reach for your glass of wine, realising that it's been untouched. You take a sip before handing the glass to Charles. He smiles before taking it from your hand and taking a sip himself.

As your wait to find something to say, you begin to pull at the hem of your short dress. How do you carry on the conversation from here? The last time you tried to speak it went from being petty to nasty and to, in your case, being violent. But Charles' demeanor is different this time, he seems a lot calmer and he doesn't want to make your life a living hell any more. He watches you fiddling with the hem of your dress and pulling at a loose string. He places his hand on top of yours to stop you from pulling at the material any more.

"Hey, don't do that. Your dress is beautiful, I wouldn't want you to ruin it," his tone is so gentle. So much so that you tears begin to form in your eyes again. You can't even look at Charles as your eyes remain fixated on your lap. You hadn't realised your tears had spilled over until landed on the bottom of your dress, leaving the smallest of damp spots.

"Hey, hey, please don't cry," Charles whispers as he wipes your tear with his thumb. But by him telling you not to cry doesn't mean that you stop. If anything, feeling his hand on your face only makes it worse. "Please don't cry, [Y/N]".

Charles cups your face in his hands as he lifts it up so you're looking at him. "Charles," you begin but your breath catches in your throat. The evening is beginning to overwhelm you and you can't seem to be digesting anything that's happening in a reasonable way.

"Tell me, amour," Charles says as he wipes your tears once more.

Amour.

Fuck, even the way he's saying it now is so confusing. It's so gentle and so kind and you don't deserve any of this.

"Did you mean it earlier? When you said you only invited me back to have sex?"

Charles sighs as he shakes his head.

"No! No, I was being an asshole, okay," he tells you. "I didn't mean it."

You nod but you're not sure if you believe him. You wouldn't blame him if he fucked you and then left you because in Charles' eyes, that's what you did to him three years ago.

"Hey, hey, look at me," his voice is more commanding this time that you can't help but look at him. He hesitates for a moment, before he leans in to kiss your forehead. "I didn't mean it, amour. I was just angry, that's all".

You nod but you still feel overwhelmed with his touch and so you lean back on the sofa to give yourself a little bit of a break. Charles follows suit.

Silence falls on the room once more but this time, the two of you taking turns drinking the wine from your glass, hoping that the two of you find the courage to address the elephant in the room.

This time, it's Charles who breaks the silence.

"You... you said in the taxi that you never went to New York," he begins. The volume in his voice is much lower this time.

You nod slowly.

"What happened? Why did you change your mind?"

He nervously awaits your answer and he doesn't miss the little sigh that you let out.

"Charles, I... I was never going to New York. It was never the plan. Lewis kept asking but I always said no," you tell him.

Charles' scrunches his forehead at your confession.

"But you told me-"

"No, that day when I came to see you. I planned on telling you that everything was over between Lewis and I but I don't know what happened. I just couldn't get the words out, after everything that happened it should have been easy but it wasn't. Because I'd never been able to say out loud that my marriage was over. And when I told you that Lewis asked me to join him in New York, I didn't tell you because that's what was happening. I told you because I was scared and confused. You talked about moving in together and I panicked. For the first time in seven years he wasn't going to be in my life and I just didn't have time to process it," you tell him, "And so when you asked me if I was going, I just froze. I... I don't why I did. But by the time I got over my panic you thought that I had basically confirmed that I was going with Lewis but I never was. I don't blame you for reacting the way you did, hell, I would have had the same thoughts. But he was never an option any more, Charles, it was always you".

Charles stays silent as he lets all of your words sync in. He had been so wrong this whole time and he spent so many days and months hating you. Was he so wiling to believe that you were leaving him to stay with Lewis because he couldn't believe that it would finally be true? He'd always heard that the spouse never leaves their martial partner when it comes to having an affair. But you and Charles never had an affair. You had a relationship, and one that Lewis knew all about. So why had he gotten it all so wrong?

"When you told me to leave, I... I took the cowards way out. I don't blame you for not believing me. We were both tired and I gave up. I'm sorry that I gave up, Charles," you say. It's your turn to wipe the tear from Charles' cheeks.

"No, I pushed you away," he says quietly.

You shake your head. "No, you didn't. You did nothing wrong," you tell him.

The two of you take a few minutes to process your confession to Charles. The tears have now dried up for the both of you but the weight of the conversation rests heavy on your hearts.

"If you didn't go to New York, where did you go?" Charles asks.

You let out a little sigh. "I went for a job opportunity in Singapore. And I took it, so I moved about three months after things ended between us".

Charle lets out a light-hearted chuckle. "Singapore, that must have been nice," he says, "How did you manage in the heat?"

"I didn't," you laugh, "I basically lived a nocturnal lifestyle. But it was nice, I enjoyed my time there. I think I grew up a lot while I was there".

You pause for a moment, your smile falls a little as you carry on. "I do think about what would have happened if I'd stayed in London though..." Your sentence trails off as you begin to think about the what ifs.

"Well you know, London. Always busy and always expensive," Charles jokes. You smile at him softly.

"Kind of like Paris, right?" you say and he nods in response.

He takes a moment before asking his next question, "Do you regret going?"

Uncertainty takes over momentarily before you reply, "I don't know. I wish I kind of did things differently".

"Me too," Charles mutters.

Your eyes meet each others and this time it feels different. It feels like you're both longing for one another. You're not sure who initiated the first move as you both lean in for a gentle kiss which soon escalates as Charles pulls you onto his lap while you reach out to cup his face. The kiss deepens quickly as the two of your run your hands over any body part you can find on the other.

Charles' hands going from your hair on the back of your head to your waist. At some point, they end up on your ass which is now exposed due to the movements you've been making on his lap. Your hands too find themselves in his hair before making their way over his shoulders and down his clothed chest but you don't miss the tight muscles that sits below the thin material.

You hum as Charles' lips make their way to below your ear before making their way down your neck and finally to your chest.

"I wasn't joking when I mentioned this dress earlier," he says as he stares up at you, his eyes are full of hunger, "it was meant to taken off".

You can't help but squeal as he dramatically pulls your straps down to reveal your chest and it doesn't take long for him to wrap his mouth around one of your nipples. You moan as he begins to suck on the sensitive skin.

"Fuck," you let out as your hands grip onto his shoulders.

Tonight has been such a mind fuck that you feel dizzy at his touch. How the hell have you ended up in this situation where you've gone from slapping Charles for being an asshole to having him sucking on your tits. Maybe he was right and that you did like men that treated you like shit.

But that was baggage that you could unpack another day as you're suddenly brought back to your senses when you feel a flash of cold air on your vagina. You look down and see that Charles has pulled your panties to the side.

He looks up at you menacingly as his right hand makes its way down your body while the other holds your him in place. You can't help but yelp as his fingertips brush against your clit.

"Charles," you sigh in relief as he presses more pressure onto your sensitive bud.

"I'd be lying if I said I hadn't imagined this image over the last three years," Charles teases as he slides his fingers between your folds. "Mmmm," is all you can say.

"I still have those photos you know and some of the videos that we took," he continues as he left hand makes it's way back up to your breast, missing the feeling of full flesh beneath his fingers.

"Charles," you whisper once more as you grip onto his hair.

"All you have to do is tell me how you want," he says and you're falling into his touch when he suddenly pushes two of his fingers inside of you.

"Shit!"

Charles takes your profanity as a sign to continue but this only sends you into overdrive. No, it's that dizzy feeling again and you suddenly feel light-headed. His fingers are moving in and out of you but all you want to do is push yourself off his chest and you do.

"Stop," you cry as you lift yourself of Charles' body.

Charles is stunned at your sudden change and becomes flustered, trying to understand why you're no longer wanting him to touch you.

"Amour, what's wrong?"

You're panting as you recover from the sensation of Charles while you're also trying to gather your thoughts at the same time.

"I don't think this is a good idea," you eventually say. You don't miss the look of disappointment on Charles' face. "It's not that I don't want to, I just think that... that we've gone through so much tonight. We haven't really processed anything and I don't want us to regret this".

Charles nods. He'd do anything to have you right now but deep down he knows you're right. The events of tonight have been chaotic, petty and at times toxic. This was the first time the two of you had addressed what happened and even then it was only a short conversation. He's only just gotten you back into his life and despite what his mouth was running with earlier, Charles didn't want to lose you again.

"You're right, I'm sorry," he says softly.

"Please don't be sorry. We both wanted it but it's not the best thing right now," you say. You want to break the tension in the air by cracking a joke, "If you want, we can both tell Pierre that we fucked to mess with his head".

Your joke works as Charles releases some tension by laughing before letting out a "Fucking Pierre".

At some point, you end up resting your head against Charles' chest as the two of you enjoy the silence for the first time this evening and for the final time, Charles interrupts a quiet moment between you two.

"Can you stay tonight? I... Nothing has to happen, I'd just like you to stay," he says quietly. You look up at him and nod.

The two of you eventually make your way to the bedroom and slowly undress each other as you get ready for bed, with Charles lending you one of his football jerseys.

And while he sleeps ever so soundly, his chest gently rising and falling as he lets out slow breaths, you find yourself not being able to sleep at all.

As the sun begins to rise on an early summer's morning in Paris, you find a pen and paper in Charles' kitchen before leaving him a note on his pillow:

' I promise I'm not running away this time, I just think that we both deserve the chance for a clear head in the morning.

I'm so grateful that I got the chance to see you again.

Amour xxx '

#charles leclerc #charles leclerc fanfic #charles leclerc smut #charles leclerc x reader #charles leclerc x you #f1 fanfic #f1 x reader #f1 x you

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solbaby7 · 10 months

Text

Psychological Warfare

pairing: rhysand x reader

warnings: cruel Eris, insinuated methods of torture, taunting, angst, swearing, in depth descriptions of a panic attack, and again angst

summary: The High Lord watches his most fearless soldier shatter to pieces

—

“Just perfect,” You mutter snarkily to Rhysand under your breath, eyes scanning the lavish office and the steadily growing number of High Lords occupying its space.

It was spacious enough to fit the obnoxiously large table in the middle; had an assortment of liquors in their freshly polished bottles and no food.

Intentional, no doubt.

Booze them up and when their guards are low, the intel will flow.

“It won’t take long,” He hums back, hand rubbing soothingly at your thigh under the table and even though it’s clear to him you don’t want to be there—to others your face is the picture of neutrality, almost completely expressionless in your seat.

You ignore the side eyes, the Lords who clutched their wives tighter once clocking that you were in the room too—a vicious soldier that fought in the Night Courts armies, more skilled and bloodthirsty than any other recruit; more calculated and five times as determined as any other able body in those camps. Rhysand had hand picked you, promising you safety, warmth and a family if you’d accepted a position on his personal guard.

That had been nearly two hundred years ago.

One final group walks through, four men with auburn hair and sun-kissed skin and your body goes ramrod straight, quickly regarding Rhys in your head.

Were they invited?

Baron was.

“I see you’ve taken to collecting strays, Rhysand.” Baron’s eldest son jokes, dark eyes taking you in like a wild animal that had been perpetually starved.

“You should mind your tongue before I let her off her leash.”

Your throat immediately closes at the words—they were innocent; meant to be encouraging but the cruel laugh that pulls from Eris’ chest as he lowers into his seat is anything but comforting and you shift in your seat. “Funny you should say that,” Eris continued, practically vibrating in excitement. Fire burned in those brown eyes when he continued, he seemed to barely notice the others who’d been gathered for the meeting as well—watching, waiting with gazes that ping-ponged back and forth between you.

“Don’t.” You breathe out and for once everyone raises a brow at your tone, shock evident at the cracks beginning to emerge quickly in your fearless facade. The wide eyes, the slight wobble of your chin and that raw scent of genuine fear fills the room.

“I don’t know,” Eris drawls out, one leg crossing over the other and it could just be your vision but you’re certain you notice the lights in the room glowing just a hair brighter but it might as well have been a thousand degrees with the sweat beading at your hairline. “Everyone’s interest is now piqued, I’d be a terrible guest if I left them hanging.”

Your hands are shaking now and the look Rhysand sends you is enough to have your head bowing in embarrassment. His mouth opens to say something, probably to mention how you’d completely shut off access to whatever was going on in your head; how all your High Lord could see was tall, thick walls lined in barbed wire and heavily reinforced guards that remained stationed at every post—nearly impenetrable.

But, somehow, Eris finds a weak spot.

You try to brace yourself, the eerily cool pinprick of anxiety poking holes all over your body until everything felt like you’d gone numb.

“That’s enough,” Rhys spoke, a hand holding yours tightly under the table, shouting through the bond for you to just tell him what was wrong; what the hell was happening?

Trying to stabilize you, to will soothing words and calm feelings through that same connection but nothing works. One of your legs bounce uncontrollably, teeth gnawing at the insides of your cheeks until you can taste the blood and even then you keep on going.

“She ever tell you about her life before you and the Night Court?”

Your eyes squeeze shut, memories beginning to shove their way to the forefront of your mind after centuries of carefully locking it up and sealing it away. A noise pulls from your throat as you try and fail to regain your composure and a thick tear begins to burn trails down your cheek as Eris’ excitement exuded. “Eris.” It comes out choked, a half-plea but you should’ve known better—the Autumn Court never did do mercy.

You’re heart is racing and you’re sure that any of the high fae in the room can hear exactly how frantic your breathing has become yet you can’t bare to look at their horrified faces—eyes wide and mouths agape in astonishment as the Night Courts fearless warrior broke before them like a child who was denied the comfort of their mother. “She was given to me as a gift,” Your eyes clench shut, one hand digging into the roots of your hair when you feel Rhysand’s fingers tightening around your other. “—her old drunk of a father practically begged me to take her off of his hands.”

You could still smell the stale beer of your father’s breath when he’d dragged you through the streets in nothing but your nightgown and presented you to the High Lord and his heirs.

You’d never forget the way the males stared you down from their thrones, eyes raking in your body like it was nothing more than a new recipe their kitchen servants had come up with. “Please.” You beg, vision so blurry you can barely make out the cruel smile he wore, the burning white of his teeth blinding you like the most scalding parts of a fire. “Stop it.”

“I didn’t have much use for her at first,” Eris shrugged casually, retelling the story with such fond remembrance, glancing over to one of his brothers with a finger pointed. “But then my brothers and I were drinking one night and they jokingly asked if I needed a pet.”

Rhysand snarls at the way the word makes you flinch, eyes frantic and foggy like you were right there again—reliving the humiliation, the fear and disgust that brewed within for not being able to protect yourself. It had been part of the reason you’d trained so hard when you had escaped. Promising to never let any male degrade you in such a way again.

Eris rips at hundreds of years worth of healed scars in seconds, teeth thrashing and blood coating his maw while he tore you apart and exposed you for all to see.

You shrink in your chair and Rhysand’s heart clenched at the way he feels you go distant, staring at Eris but not really seeing the room before you; as if the eldest son of the Autumn Court had weaseled his way inside your head like Rhys could. There’s no explaining the way the air had stilled, High Lords exchanging apprehensive glances, murmuring words to Baron to tell his son to stop but Eris refuses to listen—drunk off the power and high off of your pain.

You can feel wetness on your face, your hands; it’s seeping through your pants and you can’t quite understand why. Not when Eris has his claws sunk deep within, waving the red flag bloodied with all of your secrets for all to observe. Like a show in the amphitheater, trapped in your own mind you relive every moment, deep sobs racking your body so badly the table shook with your emotion. Rhysand is beginning to gather you, shaping dark magic around your body so no one can see or hear you but the magic doesn’t hold, you’re too unstable—emotions too high and powers brewing on overdrive as it reacted to your distress. “I can’t breathe.”

Eris ignores your struggle, the way you are clearly drowning and fighting with all your might stay afloat but he keeps dragging you back down and genuine happiness is glowing on his skin at your reaction. “Spent all week mulling it over but I was walking through town and saw this display in a window,” He lets out a little chuckle, leaning in closer with fingers tapping casually against the mahogany wood, preening when you shrink away from him. “—a collar and a leash and it just hits me. My little pet. Come on, tell me you remember me putting it on you for the first time.”

Rhysand takes a more aggressive approach, protective nature on overdrive as you sob so hard you barely have time to suck in more air. Your hands are clawing at your throat, nails digging in, drawing blood and Rhys’ head whips back, double checking that Eris really hadn’t been using a daemati but when he looks into your mind—the towering walls inside are no more.

Rubble and glass is scattered everywhere in thick chunks like it’d been torn apart from the inside out, the plumes of smoke is scratchy in Rhys’ lungs but he keeps forward and right in the middle; covered in rags and bruises, ribs showing and cheeks gaunt, lashes and burns that covered more than it didn’t—was you.

With that damn collar around your throat.

“Don’t be like that, Rhysand,” Eris cackles in the background but it sounds like he’s doing it right in your ear. Your cheeks are red with your own blood and when Rhysand goes to help you stand, you’re putty in his hands. “I hadn’t even gotten to the fun part yet!” There are soft words, a palm cradling the back of your head as the High Lord of the Night Court picked you up and winnowed you away.

—

Azriel is waiting in the foyer when Rhysand returns with you in his arms, still sobbing but he’s calmed you enough to stop the scratching. Thick, angry lines assault your neck, blood pouring free and the moment he’d conjured up and illusion for your mind of you breaking free of that collar and burning it forever, did you stop fighting.

“What happened?” The shadow singer hissed, clearing the space between them and when his hand hovers over you, inches away from touching, another deep cry pulls through. “What the fuck did you do?”

“I didn’t do anything,” Rhysand snaps back with equal intensity, violet eyes blazing with anger and deep, unsettling worry as you clutched so tight on his shirt he was sure it’d rip. “Call the madja, right now!”

Rhysand urges away a worried Elaine but eventually stops fighting it when you seem to calm in her presence. Falling into action easily, Elaine followed close beside, dress swishing against the glossy floors while humming some soothing tune that had your sobs settling into broken hiccups and soft whimpers. Mor seems to appear out of nowhere, face firm and gaze hot when she regards her cousin and it takes no more than a second before you’ve been transferred into her hold. Nesta falls in tow, already equipped with thick blankets and steaming tea. “Just go,” Mor huffs out, her hands raking through your hair as she leads you to your room. “We’ve got her.”

#a court of thorns and roses #acotar x reader #acotar x you #high lord rhysand #rhys acotar #rhysand x reader #rhysand #rhysand angst #nesta archeron #azriel #a court of mist and fury #a court of silver flames #eris vanserra #send asks #acotar

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maissafespace · 11 months

Text

Always There.

Gojo Satoru x Fem!Reader

synopsis: what hasn’t he gone through, would be a good question. all that was bound to break him more than anything, people left, people died, but somehow he could still feel warmth in his heart. it was all because of you, you were always there and he was grateful for it.

warnings: fluff. close friends, intimacy, may/may not have slept together, suggestive, gojo being a flirt to not show feelings, reader is a year younger, canonverse after volume 0. light angst. gojo’s trauma, gojo bottling up, crying.

a/n: don’t really know where i was going with this, i don’t know if there will be a part two or something but i wanted some fluff with gojo, hope you like it! reblog and comment! t!p if you can XD.

Masterlist • Masterpost.

walking through the gardens surrounded by utmost silence would’ve been routine for you, relax without anyone annoying you, but, today of all days, your heart was heavy in your chest as you walked toward Satoru’s residence.

you had only come back to Tokyo today in the early morning and had been notified by Yaga of the events that occurred this last week.

noticeably, Suguru’s return.

you had remained shook at the everything that happened, Suguru’s new plans or former plans for the Jujutsu world. so much, that you could not go to Satoru right away, you had to clear your own mind before ever going to comfort him at all.

you greeted the workers with a small smile, making your way through the hallways and stairs till you were in front of his door and made your way in.

the whole room was dark even though it was late afternoon, a few rays of light got through, brightening the little it could, enough for you to see the silhouette of his body on the bed, lying with an arm over his face, his bare chest going up and down with his breathing and legs crouched with a pair of sweatpants on.

you sighed, taking the dark blue uniform off you and throwing it on the couch on the other side of the room, leaving you in your panties and a t-shirt.

“satoruuu…” you called him softly and calmly, climbing on the other side of the bed, sitting on your knees beside him. your hand poking his side waiting for a reaction. “satoru.” but nothing.

a bit annoyed you made the move. with another sigh, your hands sat on his chest, throwing your leg on the other side of his waist. you saw immediately that stupid grin on his face with his free hand going on your thigh in a millisecond.

“this is a good feeling.” he said with a chuckle. “heard you got back today from some lost place in South Africa, i’m offended you didn’t come to greet me first thing, babe.”

“right, can we go right to the point, honey.” you got his arm off his face but his eyes were still closed. “maybe you could look at me to start off.”

he breathed deeply, the amusement falling off for a second into numbness, he opened them, looking to the side for a moment before looking at you. you smiled sadly at the single glance to his beautiful light blue eyes. a pair that held so much behind them, feelings that he didn’t show easily.

“do you want to talk?” you asked him softly, your thumb brushing the side of his cheek, along his jawline.

“there’s something more productive i’d like to do. you, for example.” his fingers were playing with the elastic band of your panties.

“and they say romance is dead.” his light laugh and snort made a faint smile on your face appear. “if that were true, i’d feel you poking into me then i’d reject you as i’ve done before. but that’s not the case.”

“i mean, it doesn’t really take a lot…” his finger was going to the front of your panties, bringing them down till your own hand brought him out of them, back onto your waist. “we both need it, y/n, a nice distraction and consolation.” he sighed.

“i’ll consider it if we talk first. come on, we have done this before, satoru.” you were trying to be patient, keyword is trying, but that’s all, you have been through this countless times already, you knew the flirting and cute words were just to distract you from the purpose, though he knew you were not a flatterer.

“have i told you how pretty you look today?” he said with his hand lightly stroking your chin. you smiled, kissing the tip of his fingers.

“i love to hear such things from a handsome man.” you leaned down on him, chest to chest, your forearms keeping you up enough to still face him. “but we still need to talk. now you’re trapped, so start talking before we stay for days on this bed.”

“what about your trip? tell me about it? was the special grade curse as bad as people were making it out to be?” you sighed. you cupped his cheeks fully, inches away from his face. looking directly into his eyes, your heart beating fast at the way you would break the ice so abruptly.

“‘toru, tell me what happened with Suguru.” you asked.

you felt the way his chest stopped their movement for a second, you saw how his breath hitched and his eyes widened quickly. yet, no response came, you were just looking at him continuously, to the point where you didn’t realize how your positions changed.

he was on top of you, your legs wrapped around him as he breathed heavily. “satoru… i’m here. i’ve always been here.” you reminded him, trying to give him some faith and trust in yourself.

he collapsed gently, his head on your chest, his big figure sprawled on top of you and between your legs.

your hand brushing through his hair gently, rubbing his scalp and nape like a feather as he took his time.

“he’s gone.”

you hummed at his choked tone of voice. his shoulders were slightly trembling, then the sniffling started and then you felt your t-shirt dampening of his tears.

you just held him as he cried.

nobody was unaware of the relationship they had when they were young and in school, they had a friendship like no others, they were friends, brothers, family, maybe soulmates. you had just come in accidentally, being a year younger gave you all the time to admire your superiors, just one day you had found him wondering around alone, sighing.

sighing was a bad indicator for anything. you approached him and till now you had become something similar to a diary or a therapist, perhaps.

he told you the place each person had in his life, suguru was something like the sun in the hell of a childhood he lived, he was an anchor of life for him. when he left, it was visible how his life seemed to have been sucked out of him, you hated to see him like that. he slowly recovered from it but it was never the same, the walls were built.

it was worse the first months, he wouldn’t talk about it, he wouldn’t utter a word, he put on an act, then he’d get annoyed, then he’d try to run and make you leave, yell even, till you pressed and finally he opened up. he cried then too, he let his vulnerable side out in the world with you and you cried with him the first time. but now it was different.

you were in no way trying to involve yourself, or understand what he was going through, even though you did, since you had lost Yu after all, but right then it wasn’t your job to play who had it worse or make it about you, it was a moment of “let it out, before it consumes you.”

his body was calming down after some time.

his arms were even tighter around your torso, his body growing in heat, letting you reach around you to drop a blanket over the both of you before he got sick.

he cleared his throat, his voice still hoarse but he started to tell you in detail everything that had happened while you were away. you hummed here and there, asking a few questions as well, still rubbing your hands on his back and shoulders, seemingly comforting him.

“so up till now, you have not eaten a single thing.” you asked. “that’s not good, satoru, come on, we got to get out of bed.” you patted him, he whined in response.

“i disagree with that notion. we can cuddle and snuggle, maybe have some great sex-“

“see, no.” you tried to pull him off you but he didn’t let go. “i have a date tonight, but i need you up on your feet before i go, because if we wait you’ll be rotting tomorrow. wait!” in a moment and costing your neck, you were up, straddling his lap. as he looked up with a frown.

“what do you mean date? we have never agreed to this.” he really looked incredulous.

“you didn’t. i did. life is continuing outside the Jujustu world, my dear friend.” you slapped his cheek softly. “get up, you are having dinner right now.” you got out of his arms and out of bed, reaching for the couch as you put your pants back on. you turned on the lights and looked at him, his hand was ruffling his own hair while he still sat on the edge of the bed.

“satoru?” you called him. you walked back to him, taking his hands from his knees and have him stand up. “let’s go.”

you guided him slowly, he just complied, he followed after you, looking down at the your intertwined hands.

he looked at you as you talked friendly to the maid, asking her to please cook a little something in big portions to feed him for the days he had not eaten, and once everything was prepared he wanted to laugh at all the food laid out in front of him but you sat there with your arms crossed, looking at him intensely.

he just complied. starting to eat as you watched with a small smile, sometimes it fell into sadness to then turn into fondness.

it was dark outside by the time he was done. he laid back on his back with his legs still under the table, breathing heavily waiting for his stomach to do its job. “that was too much.” he muttered.

“now, you’ll think twice about starving yourself. i’m turning into a granny by worrying for you.” you said getting up, ready to get out of here and into the world.

“i’ll need you even if you’d turn into a granny. you’d be a hot granny.” you chuckled, reaching his side, receiving the invite of his hand reaching for you. you sat down with him one last time. looking directly into each other, his lips formed a weak smile, guiding his hand with yours in it to his lips and kissing it lightly.

he wanted to grin at the slight blush on your cheeks, but he refrained from doing that. “thank you.” you smiled genuinely at his words. “thank you for always being there for me. i haven’t been the best for you, but you’re always here. so, thank you.”

the smile on your face widened, your eyes almost completely invisible by it. “love to hear it.”

there was a moment of silence before the maids started to come in and the shiny atmosphere was disrupted. “i have to go now. i’ll see you tomorrow.”

“all right, see you later, y/n.”

he sat up, watching you walk away and out of his residence with a big smile while he sighed and stood to walk back to his room.

he stood under the hot water, thinking. and thinking. and thinking more.

shit ending i know, but i didn’t have the inspiration for the conclusion. not my best work.

#jujutsu kaisen x reader #jjk x reader #jjk x you #jujutsu kaisen x you #jujutsu kaisen fic #gojo satoru x reader #gojo x reader #gojo fluff #gojo satoru fluff #gojo angst #gojo satoru angst

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dilemmaontwolegs · 11 months

Text

Used to be Young || CL16

Pairing: Charles Leclerc x singer!reader Summary: Being the life of the party isn't all it's cracked up to be but you manage to turn over a new leaf and start afresh after being dumped by your first love. Warnings: 18+ only, NSFW, mentions of drugs and alcohol, angst, hurt/comfort WC: 2.5k

A few years earlier… You barely registered the words coming out of Charles’ mouth, the arrogance of youth numbing you to what you were about to lose. You had a career that had exploded overnight, an album in the top charts, more money than you knew what to do with. How could you lose anything after everything you had achieved? You were invincible.

“It’s over, I can’t do this anymore,” Charles repeated over the loud music filling the open bar. He cast his eyes over you from the skimpy dress that left little to the imagination to your red eyes from the joint you had shared with your back up dancers. “I don’t even recognise you.”

“Where are you going?” You grabbed his hand and pulled him to a stop as you pressed your lips to his cheek. You kissed your way across his jaw before nipping his ear and laughing. “We’re just having fun! Lighten up, Charles.”

“No, you’re having fun,” he said as he peeled your fingers off his shirt. “If you want to go wild, then go wild, but I’m not going to stick around to watch this shit.”

You let him go. You watched him leave as the healing skin behind your ear began to itch with your latest tattoo. You turned away before the crowd swallowed him whole, your fingers already reaching for another shot of liquor.

Winter Break - Music Award Show Charles would recognise your voice anywhere, no matter how much time passed he could still locate it in a crowd. It was as if the frequency of your voice was one he was attuned to and it called to him when he was meant to be focusing on the interviewer before him.

It had been a year since you last toured, a year since you last released a song. Charles knew, because he still listened to your albums and watched every music video- much like how you still followed his Formula 1 career. He waited for any news about you, but the last year had been silent. Your social media was deleted, paparazzi photos few and far between but what he had seen had made his heart ache. You had changed, no longer the carefree spirit he fell in love with in a whirlwind romance swimming in alcohol and snapshot decisions.

Charles couldn’t help but wonder what you had been doing in your absence. Had you met someone like he had? Had you fallen in love and then fallen out of love like he had? He wanted to know if you were happy.

Charles was in a daze as he took his seat. His invitation to the award show had come thanks to the rising popularity of his sport mixed with his music and he scanned the crowd hoping to catch a glimpse of you. He knew you were there, he knew it with every fibre of his being, he just needed to see you.

The lights dimmed and goosebumps prickled beneath the suit he wore as your voice caressed his ear. He could have sworn you were sitting behind him, serenading him and only him, but there you were - right where you belonged.

The truth is bulletproof, there's no foolin' you I don't dress the same Me and who you say I was yesterday Have gone our separate ways

Charles could barely breathe as the soft lighting warmed your skin, setting you in a glow that was somehow both powerful and ethereal. There was no need for any theatrics when your voice was emotive enough to outperform any dancers or pyrotechnics. All you needed was a stage and a microphone.

Left my livin' fast somewhere in the past 'Cause that's for racin' cars Turns out open bars lead to broken hearts And goin' way too far

Your eyes were closed, brows pinched, as if the memory of that night hurt even now. The huge screens around the room were filled with the image and Charles swallowed the lump in his throat as regret filled him for his role in it all.

I know I used to be crazy I know I used to be fun You say I used to be wild I say I used to be young

Charles closed his eyes as they began to burn, but still your voice infiltrated his soul and reverberated with the truth.

You tell me time has done changed me That's fine, I've had a good run I know I used to be crazy That's 'causе I used to be young

Charles forced himself to watch the stranger he loved flourish before his eyes. He had seen you grow from a teenager into a young adult, thinking the flower that blossomed was the final product. Like the dandelions you had blown to the breeze and wished upon with him years ago, you had shed the petals of immaturity and become a woman commanding the wind to carry her higher.

You hated how the spotlight burned your skin and you told yourself it was the lamp that made your eyes water as you screwed them shut.

The words you had penned on the back of a scrap of paper had come to you on a Sunday afternoon. You weren’t the religious type, but Sunday was a holy day in your house and your worship began at lights out. Words had failed you when the partying stopped. You wondered who you were without the late nights and endless faces that enabled you to lose your values, your friends, your love. You thought your music had died with your younger self.

But on that Sunday, something had changed. On that Sunday, you saw a man at his lowest and heard the heartache in his voice. On that Sunday, you watched a man carry more burden than any shoulders could bear and somehow, somehow, he smiled. Thousands of miles away in Brazil, Charles had taught you a lesson in letting go, of hope and resilience and maturity.

The words had come easily after that.

Take onе, pour it out, it's not worth cryin' 'bout The things you can't erase Like tattoos and regrets, words I never meant And ones that got away

You didn’t plan to open your eyes until the song was over, you didn’t want to see what the audience thought of the performance that was so unlike how you used to sound, but you did it anyway. The spotlight blinded you for a moment before your eyes adjusted and time seemed to freeze when you found Charles staring back.

Time had changed him too, his jawline had sharpened and the suit fitted his filled out body so much better than they ever did. A pair of glasses rested on the bridge of his nose and changed his entire face so that he could never be mistaken as anything but a man who was comfortable in his own skin.

He used to say you completed him but now you knew you had only filled the piece of his heart that was missing after his father died. You couldn’t complete a boy who was still growing into a man, it was impossible when you were both too young to know what complete even meant. Complete didn’t mean whole, it was just the acceptance of who you are and forgiving who you were.

You weren’t in some grandiose ballgown or shock-inspiring barely-there outfit, you wore what you felt comfortable in. Charles smiled, his dimple appearing as you slipped the microphone from the stand and walked to the edge of the stage. His eyes never left yours as you took a seat facing him and swung your feet in the open air, returning the smile.

I know I used to be crazy Messed up, but, God, was it fun I know I used to be wild That's 'cause I used to be young

You may have been the one singing but you heard him loud and clear when his hand rose up above his head.

Those wasted nights are not wasted I remember every one I know I used to be crazy That's 'cause I used to be young

You heard him loud and clear when he made no move to wipe the tears on his cheeks.

You tell me time has done changed me That's fine, I've had a good run I know I used to be crazy That's 'cause I used to be young

There were no words that passed between you as you left the stage, but when he rose to his feet you heard him loud and clear.

The loud knock on your door echoed around the temporary dressing room but the voice that followed was softer. Your fingers rested on the door handle until you took a deep breath and turned it. The air left your lungs as you were struck by the image of him standing in your doorway, one hand in his trouser pocket, the other in his hair as he wondered if he was making a mistake.

Up close, he looked even more handsome but it was his cologne that took you deep into the past. The intensity of the CK bottle used to be overpowering on the senses when he would douse himself in the stuff, but now he wore a complex, rich scent that invited you to lean closer and inhale. His finer tastes had matured along with the rest of him.

“Hey,” he said as he looked into your room, taking in the details from the water bottles to the ambient sounds you relaxed to. A smile transformed his face and he stepped inside when you opened the door wider in invitation. “Is this my music?”

“It helps me to relax,” you admitted as you closed the door behind him.

“Your song is…” he shook his head as he trailed off, like he was struggling to articulate what he wanted to say and he had to settle for something less because he couldn’t quite grasp the word, “beautiful.”

“Thank you.” You smiled shyly at your feet and fiddled with your hair that had been styled up for the red carpet walk.

Charles’ eyes followed your hand and widened before he grabbed it. The warmth of his skin on yours was something you had never been able to replicate, there was no man or woman whose touch could come close to his. You knew because you had tried and tried before resigning yourself the hard fact that you had lost the best thing you had.

“Is that…my number?” His fingertips turned your head to see the tattoo tucked behind your ear.

You laughed as you remembered how you were going to surprise him once it healed, but he had already gone by then. “Yeah, it is. And I don’t regret it, before you ask.”

“I’m glad.” The corners of his lips curled up as he dropped his hand back to his side. “I have so many questions, but I think they would take all night. How have you…what have you…god, I don’t even know where to start.”

“As it happens, I have no plans,” you said as you took a seat on the couch and patted the space beside you.

“No after party?”

You shook your head as he sat down and you grabbed your bottle of water from the coffee table. “That’s not my scene anymore.”

Charles draped his arm across the couch as he tucked one leg up and settled so he could face you. “What were you going to do after the show tonight then?”

“Honestly?” You chuckled at the question and picked at the label on the bottle. “I was going to go home, order a pizza and watch the new season of Drive to Survive.”

Charles bit his lip as he tried not to laugh. “Really?”

“Don’t laugh,” you feigned annoyance as you slapped his hand. “I’m missing the races so it will have to do until next month. Are you excited?”

He caught your hand before you could take it back and he traced his fingers over the splatterings of new tattoos you had collected throughout the years. “Hmm, I’m optimistic.”

“Always were,” you murmured as you let your hand relax in his. “But what about the car?”

“Why don’t you come to testing and find out?” He seemed to come to his senses as he dropped your hand. “You’re probably busy and we’re practically strangers now. Shit, you probably have a boyfriend. Do you have a boyfriend?”

“Charles, shut up,” you laughed as you caught his face in your palms and felt the texture of the short beard he now sported. “I know you too well that we could never really be strangers.”

“We’ve both changed.” His head lowered into your hands and you watched his green eyes search your face for the wild child he used to know.

“We’ve grown up, there’s a difference.”

His breath whispered across your wrists as he looked down at the distance closing between your bodies. “So do you?”

“Do I what?”

“Have a boyfriend.”

You smiled sadly. “I could never have a boyfriend. It wouldn’t be fair when my heart always belonged to someone else.”

Charles started to lean towards you, his eyes on your lips as if he could already taste him, but you pulled away. Hurt flashed in those eyes and you wanted to erase it immediately, it took every ounce of control you had not to pull him back into a kiss.

“We’re not strangers, Charles,” you said softly as you took his hand and tried to get him to look at you again, “but we aren’t those people any more.”

“Okay,” he nodded as he understood what went unsaid, “then we’ll get to know each other again. When did you become the sensible one?”

“After my stupidity cost me you, I suppose.”

The rest of the award show didn’t hold any interest after the conversation in your dressing room so you had both disappeared. The evening had been mild with the worst of the winter weather already passing, so you had enjoyed the quieter streets that had been closed for the night. Charles had kept you company and you both went unrecognised as you walked arm in arm to the pizzeria you promised was the best around. For a man who worked a lot of the time in Italy that was going to be tested when you got home.

It was midnight by the time you reached your apartment, the tower clock across the street tolling for the start of a new day. You would look back on that moment and realise it was then that the slate was cleaned. Whatever conversations that happened or didn’t happen were obsolete, whatever mistakes made before that moment were gone.

In the early hours on a Sunday of all days, you stepped inside your home with Charles at your side. Neither of you knew what the future held but by the same token neither of you were ready for this to be the end. After all, this was a new beginning.

#charles leclerc fanfic #charles leclerc x reader #charles leclerc imagine #charles leclerc x you #f1 fanfic #f1 imagine #formula one imagine #formula 1 fanfic #formula one fanfiction #f1 rpf

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remiratboi · 24 days

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Things are getting less fluffy. Part 6

CW: Yandere, obsession, coercion, dubcon, gaslighting, unhealthy relationship, manipulation.

*Other than the obsession, most of these warnings are pretty light for this one. More mentions/themes of. Still SFW, but barely.

First Part | Previous

You stormed down the little path, through the camp, and straight to Ollies cabin. You always thought his cabin looked less like a vacation home, and more like a regular home.

Three raps rung out as you knocked on the front door.

No answer.

You were like 90% sure he had gone home.

“Ollie, I know you’re in there. We need to talk.” You called. It was silent for a long moment. You almost began second guessing yourself.

“I… I can’t.” Came softly from inside.

Can’t?! CAN’T?!

“Like HELL you can’t!” You shouted through the door. You cringed slightly when you ended up being louder than you’d meant. A couple walking by stared at you. You raised your hand and smiled unconvincingly.

“Ollie,” you continued, a bit quieter. “You just broke into my cabin while I was sleeping. We are talking about this, right now.” You gritted your teeth. “Open. The. Door.” You left no room for discussion.

A long moment passed with no reply. You fidgeted. Just when you had started to consider squeezing your ass through a window, his voice came through the door.

“It’s open.” He answered.

Oh.

You turned the handle and pushed the door open. He sat, in the afternoon light filtering through the window, on his couch, head hung so you couldn’t see his face, with a large pillow gripped in front of him.

He looked sad. You hadn’t expected sad. You don’t know what you’d expected, but not sad. You steeled your resolve.

“Ok, this has gone too far.” You started. “You’re a great guy, but you don’t seem to understand boundaries, so I’m going to lay them out, clear as day, and if you cross them again, that’s going to be it, Ollie.” You finished and crossed your arms. He looked up through his curls. He looked like he was in agony. You instinctively took a step back, surprised by his intense reaction.

You shook your head, trying not to let those puppy dog eyes break you down. “How do you keep getting into my cabin?” You demanded. “And don’t give me some shit about it being unlocked. I know it was locked last night.”

He looked up, further. His eyes scanned your face. He seemed to be debating if he wanted to answer. You waited.

Finally “I… have a key.” He said, guilt lacing his words.

“A KEY?!” You practically shouted. “Where the hell did you get a key?!”

He groaned and leaned back on the couch. He ran his hand across his face. “I own it.”

Your mouth dropped open. “What does that mean?” You said slowly, dangerously.

“I, I bought the campground a few years ago.”

“You own the ENTIRE campground?!” You demanded. Your voice had started to enter dog whistle pitches.

He leaned forward, placing his elbows on his knees. He buried his face in his hands. The large pillow was squished and stuck out at weird angles.

“You never came back.” He said quietly. The dam broke. “One day, you just never came back. 4 years went by and I did everything I could to find you. No one had information, no one knew how to contact you or your family. I kept coming back every year, desperate to see you again, to hear you again. But you were never here.”

He glanced up at you. You felt numb. His eyes were filled with sorrow.

“4 years after you last came they were going to shut it down. It hadn’t been doing as great and the owners were old. They told us it would be the last year. I had some money from my grandparents inheritance, and…” he shook his head at himself.

“I couldn’t let the only connection I had to you disappear. Even if you never came back, all those places we had spent time in, the feelings I had for you, here I got to live in them. I felt you everywhere. Every little memory.”

His cheeks were a deep dark green, but he seemed unable to stop the flow of words from his mouth for the first time in your entire lives.

“I made a lot of changes, put a ton of work in, and the campground is doing great now. This is my life here. I don’t run the day to day anymore, but I live here, I maintain it.”

He looked back down at the ground. “And you finally came back.”

You stood there, stunned. Long moments of uneasy silence passed between you.

“Ollie this…” you didn’t even know what to say. Panic started to rise in your throat. “This is too mu-” you heard yourself start to say it. The words you’d heard your entire life. Too much.

“I need to go.” You blurted out and turned to leave. A noise came from behind you.

Ollie grabbed your shoulder and turned you around to face him. He pushed you against the door, your back to it. He held you there with his hands against the door next to your head. His huge arms framed your face and he bent down to look at you. His face was so close.

“Please, don’t go, just listen, I-” he stuttered. Desperation filled his eyes. Frustration filled yours.

“No!” You shouted. “You don’t get to stop me. You don’t get anything!” You poked his chest, jabbing your finger accusingly. “You don’t get to reject me then tell me you’re obsessed with me!” You spat, the words cruel. You didn’t care. Your nerves were frayed. You didn’t know how to handle yourself after his confession. His obsession.

Confusion pulled his eyebrows together. “Reject you…?” He asked. You blushed. You hadn’t meant to bring that up. But apparently even now, your stupid little monkey brain could only think about that.

“Yesterday.” He still didn’t understand. “And today.” He grimaced but still seemed not to understand. You rolled your eyes and ran your hand through your hair. “You’re so dense sometimes.” You muttered.

“Yesterday, I told you… that I thought you were hot, and how turned on I was, ok? And then you just ran away.” You couldn’t look up at him not with his face so close. Not with his eyes boring into yours. Not with his lips just inches away. “And then today, you see me in skimpy clothes and run away again.” You couldn’t believe you were about to say it. “Like, I get if I’m not your type, but… I guess I just thought you felt differently ok?” You looked up into his eyes for one second before looking back down. The desperation hadn’t gone away, but it looked hungrier than before.

“This doesn’t even matter, I shouldn’t be talking about this right now.” You placed a hand on his chest and pushed softly. He didn’t move. “I need to process what you just told me, and I’m not thinking right.”

“I didn’t run away because I wasn’t into you.” He said. His voice was surprisingly hoarse. Gravel had filled his throat. You looked up in surprise. His cheeks had a new kind of heat to them. Hunger filled his eyes. But there was also fear. You could see how unsure he was.

“I ran away, both times, because I was about one second away from throwing you to the ground and fucking you.” Your breath caught. Your eyebrows pulled together slightly. You shouldn’t be so happy to hear that, you thought. He’s crazy. He’s obsessed with you. Like actually.

But he’d never hurt you.

A small voice in the back of your mind said.

“I love you.” He held your eyes. His gaze softened slightly. The hunger didn’t go though. Neither did the fear. “I always have. I could listen to you talk for the rest of my life. You’re funny, witty, gorgeous, and a bit of a dumbass.” He smirked. “I would do anything for you.” You believed him. “Just give me a chance to show you.”

He moved one hand from beside your head to rest it on your waist. He pulled himself into you. His hard chest pressed against yours, the solid door against your back. You couldn’t breathe.

You felt hot. You felt like you were standing on a knife’s blade. Fall into him, into this crazy, terrifying fantasy, or fall back into reality. What if you could make fantasy a reality? Did you even want that? Some rational part of you screamed. He had been in your home while you slept. He bought an entire huge business because he might get to see you again. He was obsessed with you. He was dangerous. How many times had he let himself in while you slept? What could he have done?

You felt yourself shaking your head before you’d decided to. You pushed your hand on his chest again. “Ollie, I need some space. I need to think.” You said.

“Please,” he begged. “Please just let me show you how well I can take care of you. I can give you everything you’ve ever wanted.” Some part of you wanted that to be true. Wanted him to be true. But could you handle the obsession? What if it went deeper, darker.

You shook your head again and he let out an exasperated groan. “You’re not giving me a chance.” He complained. And edge of mania had started to show in his voice and expressions. “I need to show you. If you just let me show you, then it will all be ok.” He spoke fast and low. You felt his fingers playing with the hem of your shirt, then the hem of the tank top underneath.

“Ollie-” you warned.

“No, no, just, you don’t understand.” He cut you off. He leaned down and kissed your neck. You froze. “I know everything about you. You think now that I’ve finally got you back, I’m going to let you go?” Darkness seeped at the edges of your vision as fear took hold. “That moment a month ago changed my life, and I’ve spent every second since learning about you.”

His hand on your waist tucked under your tank, and he placed it against your ribs. His hand was huge. Almost comically so. And it rested just inches from your chest. No fabric separating you any longer. All he had to do was move up.

His other hand came down to hold the back of your neck. He pressed you even harder against the door. His breath was ragged as he kissed up and down your neck and shoulder in between words.

“I know what you like. I know how you like it. I’ve watched you.” A sob wracked through your chest at that. The first time you’d reacted outwardly since he started kissing you.

“You’re so lonely. I’ve heard you cry in your bed at night. I’ve heard you beg to be loved. That’s what I want to do, baby.” He pulled back and looked deep into your eyes. “Let me love you.”

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sleepingelvhen · 9 months

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Sleeping Spider Lily Pt.1

Blade/Reader NSFW Part 1 -- Part 2 -- Part 3 -- [🌹Part 4🌹] Minors DO NOT interact MASTERLIST Once, you were in love with a man called Yingxing. That man died during his involvement with Dan Feng’s betrayal. At least, so you thought. Jing Yuan helped you through your turmoil, comforted you in your pain, and eventually you were able to move on and live your life. Little did you know your lover was simply lying in wait. After years of suffering and pain, Blade arrives on the Luofu with a mission at hand, everything planned for him. That is until he sees you…and all the memories come flooding back.

Days stretched on as if they were years upon years. Every moment nearly torture since you lost the love of your life. You knew Jing Yuan could see it on your face, the numbness in your voice, the distant look in your eyes, the way your body moved robotically during your work in the commission. It was probably a depressing sight, but all sense of self disappeared when Yingxing was gone, and it was impossible to bring yourself back.

You blamed yourself first, lectured yourself on how you could have supported him better, understood him better to stop what he was planning. Then you started blaming the Imbibitor Lunae, focused your attention on your hatred towards the Vidhyadharan high elder for leading Yingxing to his betrayal and death.

Then, when there was no one to blame, when you had to face the reality of his death, you fell into a depression that made it impossible for Jing Yuan to sit aside and watch anymore. He stepped in and pulled you up and suddenly you were on different kinds of missions.

Instead of working on papers and writing reports to the commission, you were going out on patrols with the cloud knights or even with Jing Yuan himself. He talked your ear off, took you out to tea or dinner, he made sure you had company and that you were never alone with your thoughts. Jing Yuan helped you stand and helped you move on. He knew what you needed, and he became your best friend over the many, many years.

Your life filled with new passions and new friends, Jing Yuan shared in your pain and together you kept living. You became a sword in the dark for him, you hunted in the night and fought for Jing Yuan when he couldn’t step away. Together you were a force the Luofu trusted to keep them safe. Finally, you were healing from the pain that seemed to last centuries. Finally you were happy.

The Aeons seemed dissatisfied with your suffering, however. Or maybe your luck had completely run dry. Whatever it was, your mind reeled from what you saw before you.

He walked down the hallway of the Shackling Prison, two guards at his sides, his arms tied in front of him, head low. You watched as his long silky hair swayed with each step, a familiar gait once prideful with long strides was now slow and meticulous.

The blackish-blue hair was familiar, a reminder of when he was young, when you first met him. It was strange at first, having once gotten used to the white color he sported as he aged. But, you found yourself thrown right back to the past. The way he would stare at you, the way his hair felt in your fingers.

The past is gone now. Eyes that once looked upon you with affection now glowed red with anger and bloodlust, a smirk glowering on his face as he looked up at Jing Yuan who had Yanqing at his side, sword at the ready.

"Do you remember me?" Jing Yuan asked, shocking you to your core. He had known...of course he had.

“I do...Of five people, three must pay a price,” he spoke, his voice gravely and deep, daunting in the dark. It echoed in the silent, near empty room, a voice that sounded all too familiar. A voice that made tears spring into your eyes. “You…are not one of them, Jing Yuan.”

You simply watched the scene before you, eyes wide, your body hidden in the shadows of the prison. Your lip trembled along with your fingers, as if your whole body was cold, except you were on the verge of a complete breakdown.

None of the words Jing Yuan said after that registered in your mind, like your ears were completely muffled. Everything around you spun, your eyes only able to see Yingxing, or rather what he had become after years of whatever had happened to him.

This wasn’t the Yingxing you knew…the way he looked at Jingyuan, the way he stood, it was all in anticipation of violence. But he looked like him and you wanted it to be him, your eyes roamed his entire body in desperation for anything that looked like the man he used to be.

You watched him cock his head to the side, his now red eyes quickly glancing to the sides of the room, as if noting the amount of guards in the room, or looking for something. Then his eyes shot to the side, towards where you hid in the far back of the room.

The shadows should have cloaked you, no one ever saw you when you stood here. But his eyes stopped right where you stood, his eyes widening for just a moment. You swore you saw the curve of his mouth fall. It lasted all but a second before his eyes were back on Jing Yuan, the facade of pride back upon his face, like it never happened. Like he never saw you.

“He’s alive!?” You punched your bathroom mirror, tears streaming down your face as you stared at your broken reflection. Jing Yuan stood behind you, leaning against the doorway, his eyes downcast. For once his face was solemn, regretful.

You gripped the sides of the sink, gritting your teeth, trying to stop yourself from sobbing. Years of stitched up pain, of wounds you thought had healed, they all came flooding back. Like blood, the memories spilled out, swallowing all thoughts, forcing you to relive everything all over again.

“He’s alive…” Jing Yuan finally spoke, trying not to cause you more pain. “I’m sorry.”

Deep breaths did nothing to dwindle the anxiety as you turned to face him.

“How long…how long have you known?”

Jing Yuan looked up at you, mouth open, before he stopped himself. His mouth shut as he sighed and looked down at the floor. Of course he had known. All these years, your closest friend had known the love of your life was alive and kept it a secret. Your voice shook as your shoulders slumped, turning away from Jing Yuan.

“Just…just leave…please.”

He said nothing, leaving you alone in your pain. The night was filled with tears and loud sobbing, your face stained and red, eyes sore and burning.

Sleep eluded you, every time you shut your eyes, images of him filled your mind. Yingxing, your lover, now someone you barely recognized. It was impossible, a terrifying prospect, and the worst thing to happen to you now. All the healing, the years of pain…was all of it for nothing? Questions racked your mind until you were too tired to think but also too tired to sleep. And before you knew it, light filtered into your room as morning came and alongside morning, came Jing Yuan and even more bad news.

“What do you mean he escaped!?” You couldn’t help your voice rising, the exhaustion evident in your tone. Jing Yuan simply watched you struggle with the information, his eyes saddened by the pain you dealt with.

“I mean, sometime last night, he broke out of his holding cell, and we suspect he is still somewhere on the Luofu.” Jing Yuan sighed, rubbing his temples. Obviously this situation was affecting him just as badly. He was already notorious for barely getting sleep, it would be a wonder if he had even a moment of rest last night.

“Fuck…fuck…” You pulled back your hair. Everything was quickly going to shit. Jing Yuan had not only caught you up on the new status of Yingxing, who apparently now went by Blade, but also on the fact that there was probably a Stellaron on board the Luofu and that the Stellaron Hunters were involved with both incidents.

“Look, I know this isn’t an ideal situation but,” Jing Yuan sighed again before looking at you. “I’m telling you this because I don’t want you getting involved.”

“What? Why? This is literally my job!”

“Because,” Jing Yuan put his hand on your shoulder, his touch able to calm down your shivers a little bit. “Your past relationship with Ying–Blade–I don’t want you getting hurt even more…”

Your shoulders slumped and you nodded slowly. It made sense, Jing Yuan knew that everything was only causing you pain. He had your best interest in mind but…your eyebrows strewn together and your breath caught in your throat.

“Fine.” Ying Yuan was satisfied and that made the guilt a little worse. Because you knew you were lying. The nighttime was your hunting ground. And Yingxing or rather, Blade, would not run away. Not again, not without the answers you so craved.

#blade x reader #multi chap fic #fanfic #eventual smut #hsr smut #blade hsr #hsr x reader #jing yuan #blade smut

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yawnderu · 10 months

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Genesis — Simon ''Ghost'' Riley x Reader | Part I

The ride back home was awfully quiet, no music playing in the background like usual, no mindless chatter, simply both of you staring blankly ahead. Your hand was holding your stomach, missing the way it bulged before you were forced to give birth to the stillborn. It feels as if a part of your soul was ripped off of your body— and in a way, that's what happened. The little girl was an extension of yourself for so long that not feeling her in your womb anymore was like losing a limb.

Three months. In three months, your little girl would have been welcomed into the world, a room full of toys and warm clothes already waiting for her. You bite the inside of your cheek as the dam breaks, crying silently out of pure shock while Simon's knuckles turn white, clutching the steering wheel.

You say nothing as he parks in the street, waiting as you slam the door shut and stumble out of the car, already feeling the dread as soon as you look at your house. Simon's arms wrap around your body when you nearly fall over, too numb from the shock and pain mixing together. He carries you like you're a child, holding your face close to his chest as you sob without even realizing, unable to process anything.

He gently sets you down in bed, removing your shoes and putting them away on the side, covering your body with a warm weighted blanket before laying down with you, holding you as close as possible without hurting you. He doesn't know what to say— truly, he's at loss for words for the first time in his life. His soul is crushed, and he can't even begin to imagine how much worse it is for you.

''I'm sorry.'' It's all he can say for now, planting kiss after kiss to your forehead while you sob, his eyes getting glossy as feels you clutch your stomach, all evidence of the little girl you said ''I love you'' to before she even had ears is fully gone.

His warm hand rubs circles on your back while the other one cradles your head, hoping that at the very least, his touch helps. He plants one last kiss on your forehead before resting his chin on the top of your head, silently feeling relief once your arms wrap around him.

"We can try later on, when you're ready. I'll be home until you're right, love." He whispers, holding you even closer as his heart beats faster. He doesn't know if his promise is helping, or making things worse.

"I'll stay with you the entire pregnancy and more. The old man can deal with me being gone for a year or two." Your silence does nothing to help his growing anxiety, ready to take over his soul like black mold until he feels your hands clutching the back of his shirt, holding the fabric in a tight fist as you choke down a sob.

"You promise?" Your weak voice makes his heart break fully hit, brown eyes softening as he looks down at you. He gently cups your cheeks and makes you look up at him, taking in your features with a loving gaze. Face covered in snot and tears, yet still the most beautiful woman he's ever seen.

"I promise."

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writerslittlelibrary · 1 year

Note

You should make one where Wanda and nat get taken by the snap and it leaves there 14 year old daughter for her to grow up alone, later when they return there surprised to see her grow up at first they dont even recognize her because she turns out to be a cold badass. You can add some angst of her not being able to trust them and so on. But over time there family dynamic falls back but they notice y/n is hiding something because she always disappears and is seen talking on the phone. One night they think they hear talk in y/n’s room so they wait a few hours before they check it out and its y/n being super cute with her gf. she introduce her gf who helped her through the snap.

5 years is a long time

masterlist requests masterlist

pairing: WandaNat x daughter reader

warnings: grieve, loss, pain

genre: angst, fluff

words: 2093

a/n: thank you so much anon for the request. I love the idea and I hope you like it 🫶

You do not have my permission to repost, copy or translate my work

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

Tears. That’s all you remember. The endless crying of that night. Your moms had told you they had to leave for a while to fight an important battle. They told you they would be back. They lied.

You remember Steve coming to your home. The home you grew up in. The home you three had lived in for your entire life. You were excited when you heard the door open. You thought your moms had returned. They hadn’t.

Steve was standing in the door opening, and the look on his face alone was enough to make you cry. So that’s what you did. For the entire night you did nothing but cry. You couldn’t believe your moms would break their promise. You couldn’t believe your moms would never hold you again.

Steve had taken you out of your home that night. He said he wanted you to stay with him, so you would be safe. He told you it’s what your moms would’ve wanted, but you had no interest in listening to him. You didn’t sleep that night. What happened wouldn’t leave your brain. You were devastated.

After a few weeks in the compound, you had started feeling angry. The first few days you felt numb, and you supposed feeling angry was better than that, but in reality it wasn’t.

You would ignore Steve. You wouldn’t eat or take care of yourself. All you could be was angry, and you and Steve fought all the time. After two months, you decided to leave. You were a few weeks away from your fifteenth birthday, and Steve was trying to get you excited for it, but you didn’t want to be.

Usually, you would be so excited you couldn’t sleep, but this time you couldn’t find it in yourself to care. Steve talked about it non-stop, and you just couldn’t take it. What was the point in celebrating your birthday if the most important people wouldn't be there?

That was when you decided to leave.

You found an apartment in Seattle, wanting to be as far away from the compound as you could. That’s where you lived for the past 5 years. You were 19 now, and your life was different than it was when the snap happened.

You used your training to kill. You found that killing people was the only way to ease your anger, ease your thirst for revenge.

You weren’t proud of it. How could you? Your moms had taught you how to fight to protect, not hurt. You couldn’t find it in yourself to care, however. Your moms were gone. There was no reason in thinking about what they would or wouldn’t agree with.

You were currently sitting on your couch, cleaning some of your knives. You had another successful assignment yesterday and you were exhausted. There was a lot of commotion in the world, and your assignments were flooding. It seemed that suddenly everyone wanted each other dead. You didn’t know why, but then again, you didn’t follow the news.

Your thoughts were interrupted by a knock at your door. Besides Charlie, no one knew where you lived, and she wasn’t set to come home for another few days.

Hesitantly, you opened your door, and you almost broke at the sight.

In front of you were two people. Two people who you believed you’d never see again. Wanda gasped, clearly shocked by the wounds you carried on your face. Maybe the fact you’d grown 5 years shocked her too. Natasha just stared. She couldn’t believe it. Their little girl was all grown up, but that isn’t what shocked them the most.

The emptiness in your eyes did.

Wanda made the first move to hug you, and in your shock you didn’t react. You hadn’t thought this day would ever come, and now it did.

Natasha seemed to snap out of her shock, moving to embrace you as well.

They cried. You didn’t.

When they moved into your apartment you were quick to clean the knives from your coffee table. You were afraid of how they would react. You knew they would be disappointed, but you just weren’t ready for a lecture of them yet.

Natasha and Wanda stayed in your guest room, and much like the night you lost them, you were awake. You couldn’t sleep, and you knew they wouldn’t be able to either.

The next day Natasha and Wanda had convinced you to move back into their apartment. They kept telling you how sorry they were for leaving, and how they wanted to make up for all the years they lost. You agreed, moving back into your childhood home. You didn’t know how you’d react if they ever were to return, but you never expected to feel so… numb.

You had lived together for a few days now, and you had a hard time trusting them. You fought a few times already, mainly with Natasha. You refused to call them mom and mama again. You just couldn’t. Wanda was just trying to be there for you, while Natasha was more set on getting answers.

You were frustrated. You couldn’t provide your moms with any answers. You didn’t have any.

Last night you and Natasha fought again, and she yelled at you saying she couldn't recognise you anymore. You were lost. You didn’t know how to react.

All those nights you wished your moms would return to you, and wishing things would go back to the way they were. Now you wished things would go back to the way they were after they disappeared. You didn’t want to face them, and living with them again after so many years proved to be much more difficult than you initially thought.

Most nights you spend in your room, talking to the only person that stayed the same through all of it.

You spoke to Charlie most nights. She was the only person you had found comfort with all this time. The only person you felt you could trust, and the only person you felt you could be yourself around.

Charlie lost both of her parents in the snap as well, and when you were on an assignment one day to kill a dangerous man, you had found Charlie in one of the rooms in his house.

She was locked up, and she looked sick. You had taken her home with you, caring for her wounds. She didn’t speak much, only thanking you when appropriate. You didn’t mind much. You were happy you could still do some good. You were both 17 at the time, and you grew close quickly.

Charlie had told you what happened. How she lost her parents and the man had taken her. You offered her to stay with you, and she agreed. You grew closer quickly, and your friendship soon developed into something more.

Charlie was the only person you cared about. The only person you could be yourself around. The only person you loved through those years.

Charlie had reminded you of your humanity, and she never scolded you for doing what you did.

It’s funny, really. All those nights you spend on your own, in the bed of your new apartment, you longed to be laying in your own bed, with your moms downstairs. Now, while you were lying in the bed of your childhood home, with your moms downstairs, you longed for the nights in your own apartment. Spend watching movies and eating cheap take out with Charlie.

You hadn’t told your moms about Charlie yet. You didn’t know how to. You didn’t know you wanted to.

Your moms were downstairs, discussing your behavior. Wanda was crying. She felt so incredibly hurt by the fact you called her ‘Wanda’ now. She missed the days you called her mommy. When you would come running downstairs all excited because you had a random thought you felt like Wanda should know.

Her and Natasha were talking about how you seemed so closed off. So cold. How you were always in your room and how it seemed like you were hiding something.

Tonight, while you were on a call with Charlie, Natasha had decided to check on you, wanting to talk to you about their concerns. When she reached your room, she could hear you talking to someone. She decided not to knock on the door, instead opening it to see you lying on your bed, with your back turned to the door. You didn’t notice she was standing there, to captivated by your phone call.

You were giggling, and Natasha wasn’t sure when she last heard you laugh.

Natasha just stood there, soaking up your happiness. When you ended the phone call, you told Charlie ‘I love you’, which didn’t go unnoticed by Natasha.

When you turned around you were startled, and when you released Natasha was eavesdropping you were upset.

“I’m sorry,” Natasha told you, and you sighed, sitting up in your bed. Natasha sat at the end of your bed, not wanting to make you uncomfortable by sitting too close. “I didn’t mean to eavesdrop, it’s just been a while since I’ve seen you laugh.”

“I’m sorry too,” you told her, not wanting to look at her.

“I understand it must’ve been hell for you, and it must have been so confusing, even now we’re back. It’s confusing for us too. A few weeks ago you were our little 14 year old girl, and now you’re all grown up. I’m sorry we don’t know how to help you, and I’m sorry we weren’t there,” Natasha told you with tears in her eyes.

You sniffled and shook your head. “I’m so sorry. I’ve been a terrible daughter. I was never mad at you. I’m just so angry, and I didn’t know how to handle that,” you explained to her, tears rolling down your cheeks.

Natasha pulled you into a hug, the first you’d had since the night they returned. You cried together, and Wanda, who probably heard the crying, came upstairs and sat next to you on the other side.

You kept crying, repeating ‘I’m sorry’ until you were so tired you couldn’t keep your eyes open anymore.

You fell asleep in their arms, and when you woke up, they were still there.

You had all moved down to the kitchen for breakfast, and for the first time in 5 years, you were eating breakfast together, talking. There was no tension, no crying, no fighting and no yelling. Just talking.

“So who was that girl on the phone yesterday?” Natasha suddenly asked you.

You looked up at her quickly, surprised with her question. “What?” you asked her confused. “Yesterday you were talking on the phone with a girl. You seemed really happy.”

You looked at your plate, pushing the leftover fruit around on it. “We’re not mad, just curious,” Wanda told you. “Her name’s Charlie. She’s kinda my girlfriend,” you told your moms hesitantly.

You didn’t look at them, but you felt Wanda scooting her chair closer, engulfing you in a hug. “We’re so happy for you!” she exclaimed, and you relaxed in her arms. “Thanks,” you mumbled. Natasha sat down in the chair on the other side of you, rubbing your back. “Where is she now?” Natasha asked.

“Still in Seattle. We lived together in that apartment,” you told her, sitting up straight again.

“We should invite her over, if you want too,” Wanda suggested. You nodded. “I’d like that,”

Two days later Charlie was standing in front of your door again, and she hugged you tight. “I’ve missed you,” you murmured. She nodded, kissing your forehead.

When she let you go, she noticed your moms standing behind you. Natasha was the first one to introduce herself, telling her it was nice to meet her. Wanda was next, giving her a small hug.

You had dinner that night, the four of you, and after finding out you had lived together for 2 years, Wanda suggested she should stay for a while. Charlie agreed, and you couldn’t be happier. The night was ended with movies, you in Charlie’s arms, just like all those other nights. The only difference was your moms sitting next to you, smiling at the wonderful young woman you’d grown into.

#black widow #natasha x reader #marvel #mcu #avengers #natasha romanoff #natasha x daughter #wanda maximoff #wanda x reader #wandanat #wandanat x daughter!reader #wandanat x reader #wanda x daughter #wanda maximoff x daughter!reader

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cross-word · 3 months

Text

GOOD LUCK, BABE

after years Ethan still regrets what he did to you.

Word count: 1162

When I first started to date Ethan I knew he had a best friend Amanda that everyone thought he was dating. All of his ex’s used to warn me on social media but I was never the jealous type.

That was until I received a phone call from a random number in the middle of the night I answer to hear lewd noises, moaning and someone moaning a name “ah, fuck Ethan keep doing that” it took me forever for my eyes to adjust to the light difference but once I realized what was going on.

I realized I’ve seen that number before. On Ethan’s phone labeled as Amanda, my heart broke as I heard her moan his name over and over again “why do you have your phone out” I hear him say, grabbing the phone flipping so that the screen was facing him to see me watching “y/n..” before he can say anything else I hung up going back to sleep.

The next day I felt numb watching your boyfriend fuck his best friend that everyone warned you about is humbling. The whole day I could see Amanda smirking at me from the peripheral vision Ethan kept trying to talk to me. His excuses going into one ear and out, “that was not what you thought”, “that was the first time I ever did that”.

As the day went on Ethan finally did it, he cornered me enough to finally get me to talk to him “please baby” he pleaded “no.” I said in a dead voice “what?” He asked “I said no. You can’t fix this. I watched you fuck your best friend you can’t get back from that no amount of pleading can change that” I told him he stood there hurt. The audacity. “No, baby please I’ll do anything I’ll block her, I’ll get rid of her from my life please just don’t call it off I’m begging” he said.

“I hate you Ethan” I told him, pushing him out of my way. Ethan stood there watching my body as I walked away, as I grew distant from Ethan I heard him and Amanda argue.

That was 15 years ago, that experience taught me that love isn’t a guarantee of trust.

I stood there in the Walmart at almost 9pm picking up groceries for my mom. It was Christmas when I was visiting her when I heard a voice too familiar “y/n?” I turn to see Ethan. He looked older, not in a good way. It seemed like he suffered for those 15 years I didn’t see him.

“Oh, hi Ethan” it was awkward for sure two grown adults that used to have history just staring at each other like they were soul mates. “Ethan baby” I hear coming from behind him a woman I stood face to face with the two people who betrayed me 15 years ago.

“Oh. You're back in town..” Amanda said, staring at me eyes darting to Ethan who hasn’t spoken since we locked eyes, sensing tension rise I walk away. “WAIT” Ethan yelled I paused hoping he wasn’t about to say what I think he will. “Do you wanna come over to our house for dinner to catch up?” He asked. I turn to face him “no, I think it’s best if we don’t talk at all” I say leaving him and Amanda in the aisle.

“Are you okay honey?” My mom knocked me out of my daze. “yeah I’m fine” I smiled at her as petite came up next to me looking for food “I think I’m gonna sleep early mom” I said kissing her head walking back to my childhood room.

A loud ringing hit my ear in the middle of the night. I see my phone vibrating showing me a number, immediately seeing the number “ugh, what is it now” I pick up “is he with you?” Amanda asked in a panic.

“You’re joking right” I asked “no. I had a bad feeling and I woke up. I turn around and I see him gone. Please I’m begging is he with you” she sobs through the phone “listen I don’t care about Ethan or you anymore the faster you two leave me alone the better please stop calling me” I tell her hanging up.

I walk downstairs to grab a cup of water to see headlights flashing into the living room. I wondered who would be driving at this time of day but deep down I knew. I unlocked the door to see the car turn off and Ethan walk out.

Towards me. “Your wife is looking for you” I tell him bluntly “I’m sorry” he says completely falling to his knees melting all the snow on the porch.

“I woke up next to her and I realized I don’t want her, the only reason I stayed with her was because I felt bad for the way we ended,” he confessed with his head in his hands. “I don’t have anything going on for me y/n I’m considered to half of the people in this town as Amanda’s husband” he sobbed. “All I can think about after I saw you at Walmart was the way you talked to me the way you looked at me the way it seemed like with you my whole life was fulfilled” he stared at me tears rolling down his cheeks.

“And what do you want me to do about it?” I asked him, colder than the winter night. Do you want me to say I told you so? Cause if it gets you back to your crying wife I will” I said sternly.

“Ethan” I say crouching down to face level with him “were shoelaces attached together my love, but we were cut no matter how much you’d like to connect us together again it will never happen the tear and used shoelaces will never stay together that’s why you buy new ones” I breathed in “Ethan it’s time to move on, I moved on the second I got that call in the middle of the night, go home. Your wife thinks you're cheating on her” I tell him, walking back inside and locking the door.

As I walk down the aisles of grocery I pass a person “I’m sorry I slept with Ethan” Amanda told me as I pass her we both stopped but the difference is Amanda looked back and I didn’t “you and him need to get over that, I don’t care anymore you two are the only ones keeping that flame alive, maybe it’s your subconscious feeling bad but either way, work it between you two or breakup” I tell her walking away never to look back again.

I woke up in my New York apartment to a voicemail. I recognized it as Ethan’s number. “Amanda asked for a divorce, please answer me I want to be with you” I sighed as I blocked his number.

#ethan landry #scream 6 #x male reader #jack champion #ethan x male reader #ethan landry angst #male reader angst #slight angst

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silverzoomies · 7 months

Text

Alone

peter maximoff x reader fluff

warnings: fluff, humor, first meetings, pining, female reader

word count: 3,461

a/n: just a drabble i spent way too long on. based on something i used to daydream about a lot. happy late valentine's day !!

tag list: @dewberryobssesed @violetharmonscupcake @kaismanwich @jellyluvr @icannot3 @taintandviolent @ahoyladiesz @scene-and-dandylover @quickandsilvers @luttic @billielourdslays

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Peter sits, slouched on the floor against the foot of a sofa. Glimmers of light flicker in his eyes, as he indulges in some mind numbing television. Reruns of Frasier play stereotypical laugh tracks, droning through the basement. He can’t help but follow suit. Chuckling along in quiet huffs, he shakes his head.

Upstairs, the house rests in silence. Dead quiet. Magda snores softly in her room. Lorna’s probably conked out too. And Wanda? She’s gone. Somewhere. He could never guess. She doesn’t tell anyone where she goes on weeknights. But hey, what’s it matter to him? So long as she’s playing it safe.

Peter snickers at another corny, sitcom joke. He guzzles down handfuls of Reese's pieces. The candies rustle in their small box. But with the rustle, his ears catch something else. Distant and faint. Outside the realm of television laugh tracks and candy clicks.

It’s a lyrical melody, playing with romantic cadence from outside the basement window. Peter tilts his head back, drinking a glass bottle Pepsi. Fizzy sweetness mildly irritates his throat. Raising a brow, he guides his gaze to the window. One more chug of his soda, and he snatches the remote.

The roar of sitcom television falls into stillness.

And sure enough, a tune whispers from beyond the window’s glass. Like the call of a sea siren through the neighborhood. But it’s 10pm on a Tuesday night. And the likelihood of a smokin’ hot siren crawling from the ocean - to a house in middle class suburbia - is beyond impossible. Unless Peter’s dreaming again.

In which case; wait for him, nautical dames. He'll grab his trunks and be out flash.

And the night goes by so very slow

Oh I hope that it won’t end though

Alone

Peter narrows his eyes at the window, scoffing to himself. Woah, now. Is he warped in the head? Or is the mantra of Heart crying out from beyond the shadows? Peter appears at the window in a zip. Raising himself on his toes, he launches his body upward. Through smudged glass, Peter’s black hues scan the world outside. A shadowy mass looms in the grass, imposing and somewhat terrifying.

Until he realizes, it’s someone holding a giant boombox over their head. Phew .

Til now I always got by on my own

I never really cared until I met you

And now it chills me to the bone

How do I get you alone

Peter’s silver brows furrow again.

“What the hell?” He mutters under his breath.

He unlatches the window, pushing it open. Allowing that unmistakable tune to come through much clearer. Peter watches the mysterious, boombox stranger for a moment longer. A beat passes, and Peter sighs. He could just as easily zip out there, confront the culprit, and return to his basement lickety split. Instead, he opts for the casual approach.

Peter pushes himself through the window, his bare feet scuffing the basement wall. He accidentally kicks over a set of speakers. Some he stole five years ago and forgot about. They tumble off a wall shelf and crash hard onto the floor. Knocking down a bunch of stolen street signs in their wake. If Maximoffs weren’t such deep sleepers, he’d be in for it now. Big time.

As soon as Peter’s out, he stumbles in the grass. Mumbling a hushed - Shit.

You don’t know how long I have wanted

To touch your lips and hold you tight

You don’t know how long I have waited

And I was going to tell you tonight

Crawling through the dry, winter grass, Peter finally stands. With an exhale, he wipes dirt from his grey sweatpants. The rando in his yard doesn’t react, but they lower the boombox a little. Peter waits at a distance, cupping his hands around his mouth.

“Who are you? Whaddya wannnnnt?” He shouts.

Til now I always got by on my own

I never really cared until I met you

And now it chills me to the bone

How do I get you alone?

No response from the rando. With a simple gesture, they tap the speaker of the boombox. Whatever that means. Rolling his eyes, Peter strides across the cold grass. Shirtless in the brisk, February air. He raises a hand to scratch his messy, silver bedhead. As he moves in closer, the neighborhood street lights illuminate the figure’s features.

Up until now, he thought some weirdo guy snuck out to pine for Wanda’s attention. Peter’s ready to kick his ass if he needs to. Poor Wanda’s always got dudes falling to her feet on Valentine's day. But she usually does the ass kicking. More power to her.

Guess he won’t have to this time. Turns out, it’s just some weirdo girl.

How do I get you alone?

Peter puts a stop to the song before it reaches its end. Extending a hand in a quick blur, he abruptly clicks a button on the box. The neighborhood drowns itself in late night silence all over again. Interrupted only by the occasional car passing in the distance. Peter’s vascular arms cross over his chest. Lidded eyes leer straight at the mystery woman.

“Sooooooooo…” He tilts his head to the side, “Who are you? And why are you playing Heart outside my house at, like, ass-o-clock at night?” Peter pauses, eyes narrowing in suspicious slits, “Are you tryna pick up my sister? ‘Cuz you kinda look the type. And I know she’s been ‘tryin’ new things’ lately.” He gestures with air quotes, “If you catch my drift. Not that it’s any of my business. Point is , she’s not here.”

Boombox girl lowers said boombox down into the grass. She shakes her head, reaching into the pocket of her oversized cardigan.

“Pick up your sis- hah! ” She snickers with a snort, dawning a bashful smile. Boombox girl runs her other hand through her hair, “No! Noooo, it’s not like that! Uhm…I was actually playing Alone for you, silly.”

Peter drops his arms to his sides, and his heart skips a speedy beat. Scrunching his nose, he curls his lip.

“Youplayedwhatforwhonow?” He slides his hands into his sweatpants pockets, awkwardly rocking back and forth on his heels. The apples of his cheeks burn, and Peter clears his throat, “Uhhhh. Okay. Thanks? That’s…sweet, I guess. But, I-I’m sorry, do I know you?”

Her smile’s kind of adorable. Especially as she rubs her neck, displaying timid hesitance. Whatever confidence she had, she must’ve maxed out on 80’s romance cliches.

“Not really? I mean, I’ve seen you around. A lot. But you’ve never really noticed me, so…”

Alrighty then. That makes this interaction even weirder. But Peter’s pulled equally weird - if not more desperate stops to win some hearts in the past. And he may or may not be guilty of the same technique she’s using now.

Give him a break, okay? So what if he took a chance on it once? Back when he was eighteen and leagues more naive. It’s a little cheesy, sure. But it’s also the story of how he lost his v-card. And not the Valentine’s kind.

Case in point, it worked for him. So, he’ll bite.

“And you thought crashin’ outside my house, blastin’ some corny song while my family’s asleep - that’s a smoother move than…oh, I dunno…just talkin’ to me?”

She shrugs again, her guilty eyes looking down at the grass. Boombox girl raises a foot, tapping the ground with the tip of her boot. God, she’s obviously so nervous. And he's not gonna lie, it's a little charming. The corners of Peter’s lips turn up in a grin.

“I thought it might get your attention. You just…you move so fast all the time. And I’m really slow when it comes to these kinds of things. You were always gone before I ever got the chance.”

“How’d you know where I live?” Peter throws her a nod of his head, pressing his tongue to the inside of his cheek.

Pulling her hand from her pocket, she fixes her attention on the plastic case of a cassette tape.

“My uncle tried to arrest you once.” She grins, “He was out on patrol. Saw you steal a speed limit sign. Your mom paid him to let you off the hook.”

Peter’s brows fly up under his bangs. His cheeky smile spreads into his dimples.

“Your unc-...seriously? Whoa. No kiddin’?” He laughs, “Wish I could say I remember. But that sorta thing used to happen to me all the time.”

Not like he wasn’t asking for it back then. But to be fair, Peter’s made some drastic improvements. When it comes to his klepto compulsions, anyway. Excluding the influx of junk food and Garbage Pail Kid cards he snags on a daily basis. From nation-wide chain stores. Totally ethical.

“Yeah, I know.” She giggles, tilting her head up to meet his gaze. This way, he actually gets a good look at her. Soft lips. Pretty eyes, “You used to be the talk of the station, where he worked. Those guys never shut up about you.”

Reaching forward, she passes Peter the cassette in her hand.

“What’s this?” He gently takes it, inspecting the hand-made label inside the case. Decorated in little, lightning bolt doodles. Even some hearts. Aw. Cute. Scratched across it in messy handwriting, are the words - For the kleptomaniac. In exchange for my heart. You stole it forever ago.

Come on. Could she be any more corny?

“It’s a mixtape.” She bites her lip like she’s terrified to keep talking, “It’s cool if you don’t listen to it. I dunno if you’ll even like what’s on it. But I know you carry around that Walkman all the time.”

Uh huh. Did her uncle tell her that too? Get outta here.

“Does it have Heart on it?” Peter flips the case over in his hand, pursing his lips.

“Of course it has Heart on it.”

“Awww. Givin’ me Heart for your heart.” He snickers, turning pinker in his cheeks, “This is legit the cheesiest thing a girl’s ever done for me. I’m kinda buggin’ out right now.”

“Oh yeah? I mean, I can always take it back, if you-” She teases, like she thinks he’s being sarcastic.

She reaches for the tape. But as her fingers brush the case, Peter raises it above his head. The motion happens quickly, before she can even keep up. Boombox girl wasn’t foolin’. She is slow. Slower than a turtle on tranquilizers. As she makes another attempt, Peter drops his hand in a speedy blur.

“Hey, hey, hey. Nuh uh. No takesie-backsies.” He teases, waving a finger, “A trades a trade, babe.”

Her hands rest at her hips, and she flutters her long lashes. So shamelessly flirtatious, but still not enough to win him over. Not just yet. Even if her bedroom eyes offer a tempting invite. Like, seriously, so tempting.

Mama didn't raise him like that, though. Peter has somewhat of a delinquent track record, sure. But he's still a good hearted gentleman. He'll take her out on a few dates first. Treat her to a little arcade romance, before he tries some no pants dancing.

If she's not playing him for a complete jackass, that is. Really, it’s almost too good to be true.

No chick has ever pined for him this hard in his life. And Peter’s never had the chance to play hard to get. He bets dollars to donuts, boombox babe probably isn't a mutie either. Talk about some major role reversal. How often does a human girl beg and plead for mutant man's love? She knows he's a total shut in, right? Or did her uncle not fill her in on that?

“You still have my heart, though.” She coos, gazing at Peter with those eyes.

Those - embrace me, o’ speedster man of my dreams - eyes.

Yeah. Her uncle most definitely didn't break the news. Peter hisses, teasing her again with a click of his teeth.

“Ooooh. Yeah. Well, finders keepers. Good luck shakin’ that silver lovebug.”

He flirts back and forth with her naturally. Kinda like high school sweethearts. It goes on for a few more minutes. Until he's pestered her enough, she just up and quits. Her car's parked down the street. A Volkswagen bug. Hah. And there she goes. Peter's secret admirer stomps off. Boombox swinging at her side. A wave of guilt almost pulls him under, and Peter starts to regret teasing her so much.

She laughs as she walks away. And the call of her giggle brings him back to the surface, much like a song. Seems like the sirens really did come out tonight.

So, she likes playing games too, huh?

You don’t know how long I have waited

And I was going to tell you tonight

Peter’s not even that much of a Heart fan.

He looks down at the cassette case in his hands. Rolling a thumb over a scratch in the plastic. A beat passes. In a flash, he appears in front of her. Peter walks backwards, padding barefoot along the side of the road.

“So, are you gonna ask me out ‘er what? C'mon, don't be chicken shit. I know you got it in you!” He jokes.

Boombox girl giggles so hard, she breaks out in dorky snorts. Ah, the sexiest, siren song. Too bad that's not a track on the mixtape. He’s willing to slip her some loose change for a raw recording.

By happenstance, another car slows to a stop. Right in the middle of the empty neighborhood street. Colored a familiar shade of scarlet, the vehicle looms for a beat or two. Peter comes to halt, watching as the passenger side window rolls down. Boombox girl crashes right into him.

Shit. Peter just now realized, he doesn't know her name yet.

He grabs her hips on instinct, catching her in case she falls over or something. Her free hand clutches his arm, right over the ‘mom’ tattoo etched into his skin. Naturally, Peter radiates enough warmth to act as a heater. He’s a godsend on cold, lonesome nights. Boombox girl presses her body closer to his, seeking his heat.

Peter knows she does it without thinking, since she whimpers a soft, “ Oh god. I’m so sorry. ”

“It’s cool. You okay?” Peter’s hands linger on her hips.

“What’s going on over there?” Wanda grills playfully from her car. She flits her eyes between her doofus brother, and boombox girl. When Wanda purses her lips, she does so in a way identical to Peter, “Is he giving you any trouble?” She asks what's-her-name.

Peter zips to the passenger side door, crossing his arms over it. Leaning against Wanda’s car through the window, he makes a pfffbbbbtt noise.

“Hey, don’t sweat it, Wands. I’m just walkin’ my future wife to her car.” He raises one of his hands, waving the cassette case, “Check it out, ah? She made me a mixtape! Cute, right?”

Wanda’s knits her brows as she tilts her head. The long, scarlet locks of her hair bounce with the motion. At the side of the road, boombox girl makes an adorable squeal. She covers her blistering face with her hands, mewling silent pleas.

“Oh my god stop. I’m sorry I even said anything. Oh my god. ” What's-her-name whimpers.

Which really isn’t helping the whole suspicious sister situation. Wanda leans back in her seat, peering over Peter’s shoulder at boombox girl. Narrowing her eyes, Wanda looks back at him. And before she can call Peter out on his bullshit, he lowers his arms from the door. Peter drops his chin to it, his tapioca eyes gazing up at Wanda innocently.

He chews his lip. In that ‘ I’m obviously up to no good’ kind of way.

“Y’wanna know what that cutie over there told me?” He purrs, talking loud enough for what’s-her-name to hear, "She said I stole her-"

Boombox girl shrieks, “MAXIMOFF! Please! That was a secret! I’m serious! You’re killing me here, dude!”

Maximoff?

Ohhhhh. She doesn’t actually know his name. Seriously? Didn’t what's-her-name say she’s pined after Peter for a while now? How long is a while? Long enough to know his address, apparently. And to know he likes listening to his tunes. And to know he’s a mutant with a rep for thieving. But not long enough for anyone to drop his name? Did the feds never bother learning it? Ouch. Figures.

“Piet.” Wanda leers at Peter, holding him at gunpoint with her eyes, “Leave that poor girl alone. Look at her! She’s had enough.”

Rolling his eyes, Peter stands up straight. Lazily, he smirks, waving a hand, signaling Wanda to drive off.

“Naaaah! You shoulda seen her back at the house. She’s hopelessly in love with me. Played songs outside my window. Y'know, like they do in the movies? I’m serious! You can ask her yourself if you don’t believe me.”

Once more, Wanda shifts her skeptical gaze to what’s-her-name. The mystery girl carries her boombox to her car. With her head dipped and a free hand over her face. She looks like she’s doing the walk of shame. As if Peter stole a little something else from her and-w hoops. That's also not helping his case at all. Wanda hums, doubtful of Peter’s unlikely story.

He cheeses a toothy grin, looking guilty.

“Really?” Wanda adjusts in her seat, reaching for the radio dial, “Well, you might wanna tell her goodnight. For a girl who’s totally in love with you , she seems in a heck of a hurry to leave.”

And with that, Wanda drives off. Peter stumbles back, his calloused heels scuffing concrete. Wanda’s car rolls all the way down the road and into the driveway. Whipping around, Peter catches what’s-her-name opening the trunk of her love bug. As she lifts the boombox into it, Peter zips up next to her. Latching his arms around the boombox, he gives her an aloof grin.

“Can I borrow this for a sec? Thanks, cutie.” He throws her a wink.

She doesn’t get the chance to ask why. Peter zips back to his spot on the side of the road, clicking a button on the boombox. He raises it over his head, letting Heart roar obnoxiously across the neighborhood. Disrupting the late night peace. Out the corner of his eye, Peter notices a few neighborhood lights come on. The song plays just as Wanda hops out of her car. She stops in the middle of her stride to the front door. Her bags hang from her arms and her keys dangle on her finger.

Wanda squints, eyebrows turned inward.

How do I get you alone?

“I TOLD YOU! SHE’S TOTALLY IN LOVE WITH ME!” Peter yells.

A faint, red glow emanates from Wanda’s hand, as she delicately swipes it in the air. The boombox’s tape player pops open with an click, and Peter lowers the box down in front of him. He playfully pouts, muttering a soft booooooo to himself. Abrupt silence fills the entire neighborhood again, save for the local dogs barking in their yards.

“Say goodnight, Pietro.” Wanda’s voice calls from the driveway, before she disappears into the house.

Peter doesn’t even realize what’s-her-name is standing next to him, until she speaks.

“Pietro’s a beautiful name.”

Peter snickers, feeling heat rise in his cheeks again. Popping open the case she gave him, he swaps the tape for the one in the boombox. Rapidly clicking the volume button, Peter huffs a soft laugh, hooded eyes blinking.

"Thanks. I'd say the same about yours, but I don't even know it." He teases. A little shy, Peter keeps his eyes on the boombox, "I go by Peter, actually."

"Peter. Pietro. Whatever your name is, you embarrassed the shit outta me, man." What's-her-name scoffs. Peter kinda likes the sound of both names in her voice, "You're lucky you're gorgeous."

Gorgeous? Whoa. That's a helluva word. Shit, this really is too good to be true. Peter's heart skips another beat, and he shakes his head. "Y'know, if you still what your heart back, you're shit outta luck, babe." Peter clicks the play button on the boombox, only after some tension heavy beats pass, "Like I said, finders kee-"

An all too familiar melody pours from the boombox speakers, softer now.

I hear the ticking of the clock

I’m lying here the room’s pitch dark

“Seriously?” Peter laughs, slinging an arm over boombox girl's shoulders.

“Yeah, seriously. I told you it had Heart.” She blushes profusely, averting her innocent gaze.

Maybe there really is something to these 80's romance cliches. Peter's almost willing to give up his own heart. Just as compensation for hers.

#peter maximoff x y/n #peter maximoff x you #peter maximoff x reader #peter maximoff #txt

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