#highly specific recommendation request

[welcometogrouchland]

"u okay?" Yeah I'm good I just need a piece of media that, regardless of genre, has a sense hope and/or whimsy at it's core to explode my heart

[thoughtsforsoob]

txt!being called pretty boy by their s/o

a/n: I’ve actually been to the hello kitty store mentioned in Kai’s part :) I went to Tokyo recently and stayed in Asakusa (where that store is located). If you’re ever gonna go to Japan and love hello kitty, I highly recommend that specific store bc…if you didn’t know, there are hello kitty stores ALLLLLL OVER Japan. Not even kidding. I think I spend over $400 just on hello kitty merch, snacks, etc… I may have a little obsession :) anyways, enjoy and requests are always open

[beelmons]

Luxury Poker Nights pt. 2

Pairing: Hotch, Reid, Morgan x fem!reader Rating: Explicit, smut (18+, minors do not interact with this story) Word count: 5,806 cw: unprotected sex (do not recommend), sex-servant kink, voyeurism, multiple partners, non-vegan food options, slight degradation, free use kink Summary: It's Aaron's turn to host the poker night, and he figured it would be a great move to invite the entertainment they all fervently enjoyed last time: you. A/N: This was so highly requested I hope it lives up to expectations. Prompted by an original blurb found here Tag list: @illumi3 @ash-recs @canyonmooncreations @howabouticallyou @unlikelyqueenninja @kay-moranguinho and my always honorary mentions: @ihavemanyhusbands @cassiemartzz

Meeting Aaron Hotchner was nothing short of an absolute pleasure. Gentle, kind, considerate, funny when he finally got rid of the stoic boss facade, everything you would love in a partner whether casual or serious. All these reasons played a role in deciding to partake on a very specific contract: to serve as his servant, sexually speaking. 

"Hey," Aaron greeted you before leaning in to press a friendly kiss to your cheek. 

"Hey, Mr. Hotchner." you replied. 

His head tilted and eyebrows raised with playful offense "I've told you, if you don't want to call me Aaron, at least go with Hotch." 

Every so often he would call you in, mostly to a very beautiful house owned by a man you knew as Rossi, and you'd come for the sole purpose to act out your role. To serve and please them. 

This time, however, he was hosting in his own apartment. It was the classic bachelor pad, the adult version, barely decorated but tidy and resourceful. You had been in there only once, but you had memorized the area pretty well. He also looked especially handsome, navy blue polo shirt and denim black pants with casual sneakers, you could notice his toned biceps in that outfit. 

"What are my instructions for today?" you asked as you got in, taking a look around to remember the layout. 

"The usual. Although, I might ask you to take charge of the kitchen for a little bit. Bring snacks, beverages, nothing too complicated. Oh, and…” he began to say, reaching for a bag that was laying by the entrance “this.” 

From it, he pulled out what seemed like a traditional maid apron. You could tell he had it tailored for your body, and that the lace around it seemed to be fine, not the cheap ones costume stores had. You reached for it and pulled it from the strings you were supposed to tie, you hovered it over your body to catch a preview of what it would look like, the man had a good eye, it sure made you feel hot. 

“Of course, if it makes you uncomfortable, we can ditch it.” he tried to reassure you, seeing how you kept admiring the piece. 

“It’s alright, Mr. Hotchner. But a maid outfit? I thought you preferred me in the bare.” you teased. 

“Don’t worry, we still get plenty of access to the parts of you we love the most, being that the apron is the only garment of the costume you will actually wear.” his hands slipped in his pockets, his face lighting up with a smug smile “You can change in the bathroom, the guys should be here soon.” 

You made your way to the mentioned room to obey your first order of the night. Aaron waited patiently in the kitchen, putting together a couple more things so that the serving part of your job would be easier. Nonetheless, a knock on the door distracted him from his duty. He hurried to open, immediately being greeted by Morgan and Reid. 

“Hey, where’s Dave?” he asked, noticing a missing member. 

“He said he’s got something to do but he’ll catch us—” Morgan’s eyes fixed on something behind Hotch, and his train of thought completely disappeared “—later.” 

The boss turned around when he noticed Spencer’s perplexed eyes, similar to Morgan’s, and he smiled to himself as he turned around to watch you already in your ‘uniform’, to call it some way. The apron was comfortably secured around your waist, the length of it barely covering your front to the middle of your thighs, your back absolutely exposed, being that the fabric of the apron was only on the forepart, your upper body out in the open, with your nipples already perked from the cold air conditioning hitting them. And to them, you were the most beautiful of monuments. 

“What’s your safe word?” Aaron asked, his eyes immediately scanning your body.

“Cacao.” you said confidently, your head nodding in reassurance. 

Aaron looked back at Spencer and Morgan, making sure they caught what you had said. They both shook their heads in agreement, and so he locked the door behind them “Let’s begin poker night, then.” he ordered. 

“I’ll get some drinks for you guys.” you said, and you were about to move to the kitchen when Hotch’s voice stopped you. 

“I believe I haven’t given you permission to speak.” he emitted in a commanding voice. 

You understood his words for what they were: a warning. He had been clear enough, when you were there to work, you had to be diligent. Always keep yourself busy, available, and quiet, those were the rules you had signed up for. Your hands folded on your lap and you bowed your head slightly in response. 

Once they were out of your sight, you headed to the kitchen. You gathered a couple of snacks that Mr. Hotchner had prepared; some peanuts, pretzels, and cut up fruit, added with three open beers. He had let a tray out for you as well, possibly with the intention of making everything easier. By the time you got to the table and began to spread the food and beverages around they had already dealt the cards. 

You settled the empty tray on the side on a random surface, and Mr. Hotchner spread one arm in your direction indicating you that he wanted you to join his side; you did as he desired and his arm wrapped around your waist, pulling you to sit on his leg. As if ritualistic, the hand that was closer to his body was grabbed and brought to his lips, a gentle kiss landed on the back of it, and then he guided it to his member, that at some point he had already exposed. It was an instinct, you already knew what to do. Your hand began to slowly massage the barely hard shaft, and you could hear him exhale particularly hard at the sensation. 

“Rules will change for tonight. You can’t bet ‘All in’ unless you have at least fifteen chips, and you can’t bet two rounds in a row.” Aaron began to say. 

“Isn’t 15 a bit expensive?” Spencer’s eyes narrowed with doubt. 

“Not at all, given that an ‘all in’ winner also gets 10 minutes to command our servant as they please.” his hand dragged upwards, purposely taking his time to brush your skin with his fingertips, nipple included, until they landed on your chin, tilting your face to have you look in the direction of the other two men “And you could agree, she’s worth the risk.” 

Your breath hitched in your throat at the way they hungrily stared at you, but they didn’t say anything further, both Morgan and Reid simply went back to looking at their cards. 

The game began and you hadn’t been given permission to move, you had to remain on Mr. Hotchner’s leg, caressing his member. He seemed unbothered by your steady movement, but you could feel him throb every so often, and it would fill you with cocky pride. That was another rule: you weren’t allowed to go rogue, they came when they wanted to, not when you caused them to. If you acted too smart and tried to make them climax before they wanted to, you were sidelined, given the silent treatment. That was more punishment than doing anything else to you, because chances were you were going to enjoy whatever else. 

You would steal a glance at random times to notice his tip swollen and reddened, even when he tried to keep composure, and continued to play his hands normally, you had learned the little twitches his dick made whenever he was getting close. His head turned to place a chaste kiss to your shoulder blade, giving you permission to keep going. Your hand trailed down to give his balls a gentle squeeze, which caused a loud groan to come out of his throat, and after a couple more fast strokes he began to spill his seed. 

Mr. Hotchner had been clear that he did not like messes; his entire member was coated in his semen, and some had spilled over his pants as well. You reached for one of the pockets the apron had sown on to find a handkerchief that you recognized as his, in seconds, you were on your knees, you wiped clean the fabric of his pants, his shaft, on the other hand, didn’t require the cloth, you grabbed at the base and licked a strip up, repeating the same movement until he was clean, and hard yet again. 

“All in.” Morgan’s voice snapped everyone’s attention, and since you hadn’t been given indication to do otherwise, your mouth kept working Aaron’s dick.

“Already? You’ve only won one round.” Spencer asked, his math not quite adding up. 

“I’ve got enough.” he clarified. 

“You got exactly 15, though, if you lose this, you don’t get any more.” Hotch looked in his direction.

Morgan’s head tilted slightly to the side, catching sight of your still bobbing head. He smiled as a response to his boss’s explanation, pushing the chips forward to the center of the table. 

“She’s worth the risk.” he said, a wink sent to Spencer. You couldn’t help but blush at his words, even if you weren’t able to stop your current activity unless indicated. 

The other two men exchanged looks, if they didn’t raise, they would still lose, perhaps that was part of Morgan’s scheme, but they weren’t about to just give you up by default. They pushed the corresponding chips to the pool in the center, and Reid was the first one to open his cards. Full house, nines over jacks. Hotch was in a slump, two pairs, queens and kings. 

“Full house.” Morgan said before he opened his cards, and Spencer’s attention was specially perked “Aces over sevens.” he finally said. 

Spencer let out a soft curse under his breath as Morgan laughed in pride, he was certainly rejoicing on having made that play. You received a light tap on your shoulder that indicated you it was time to move masters, and so you stood up and directed to stand next to Derek. 

“Actually, sweetheart, I will need you in the kitchen for a bit.” he said, his hand nonetheless landing on the skin of your rear, gently squeezing it “Peanuts and pretzels are a bit hard on my stomach, do you think you could make me a quick sandwich?” he asked ever so chivalrously.  

“Anything in particular you would like?” you asked, taking his question as permission to speak. 

“Some ham and bacon would be excellent, thank you.” with a soft slap of your ass he sent you your merry way. 

Kitchen duty was on the original arrangement, although you didn’t quite picture yourself making sandwiches, Derek’s smile was so charming you would learn gourmet cuisine just to please him. 

You gathered the required stuff, bread, some mayonnaise, and the ham and bacon. Being that you were topless, using a pan was out of the question, so you used the tray on the small electric oven that was next to the stove to cook the pork strips. You were too entranced by the silly way in which the meat shrunk to notice that Derek had walked into the kitchen, only becoming aware of his presence when he leaned next to you against the counter. 

“You make a great maid.” he pointed out, and you bolted up a little from the surprise. His hand instinctively reached for your waist, trying to keep you from falling back “Easy, you might hurt yourself.” 

Even when he made sure your feet were steady, he didn’t remove his hand from where it was, in fact, he simply took a couple of steps closer. 

“I enjoy servicing.” you said, eyes traveling south. You could see his cock already hanging out from his zipper, and you tried to reach for it in an attempt to caress it. His free hand, however, stopped you. 

“I can see that. You also take initiative, that’s impressive.” he began, his hand bringing yours up to press a kiss to it in a similar way Hotch used to do, but instead of allowing it to stroke his member, he directed it to the kitchen utensils you had laid out “But I believe for things to be done right they have to be done with the utmost concentration, so why don’t we focus on that sandwich, huh?” 

You pouted a little and he let out a light chuckle at your disappointment. You went back to the task at hand, getting a dull butter knife to begin spreading the mayonnaise around the slice. You felt the warmth of his touch leave your waist, and you were about to complain yet again until you felt one of his fingers sneak between your legs and trail up your slit. 

You shuddered and your legs instinctively closed. He tsk’ed his tongue in disapproval, and you understood to return them to their original position. Derek wasted no time, the two fingers in the middle of his hand slipping into your cunt. He was fixated on your face, absorbing every expression as you melted due to his digits, your hands gripping on the surface, leaving the sandwich unattended. 

“I haven’t told you to stop working, have I?” he whispered commandingly. 

His fingers began to curl upwards inside of you as they continued to move inside and out, getting coated with your juices. You tried your best to keep yourself still, your hand shakily reaching for the rest of the ingredients. He didn’t stop his movements even when you dropped the knife on the counter from the way he hit the back of your cunt.

“Careful.” he warned at the clinking sound, you peeked over your shoulder while you grabbed the utensil and out of the corner of your eye you could notice his hand moving over his now hardened cock “Come on, beautiful, keep going.” 

You shook your head a little in an attempt to clear it, even when his relentless fingers weren’t giving you the opportunity. You finally managed to pay attention and began to assemble the deli meats. You barely noticed when he moved behind you until you felt his tip rub against your entrance. 

His hands ran over your front as he pushed inside of you, slowly, and they landed on your breasts. A pleasure mewl slipped past your mouth, but you cut it short. 

“Come on, now, I’m not Hotch.” he complained while he gave you the chance to adjust to his member “You don’t gotta have my permission to talk, let that voice out.” 

His hips snapped rather roughly against yours, a loud slapping sound echoing around the kitchen; it caused a loud moan from you, one that you were sure could be heard from the other room. “That’s a good girl.” he praised. 

His initial rhythm wasn’t slow, after all he was in a hurry. It made assembling the sandwich all much more difficult, you struggled to open the door of the electric oven, almost getting burned thanks to the way his cock so deeply pushed inside you, all while your throat was unable to keep quiet, intermittent noises unsteady from his thrusts. 

One of his hands slipped down and in between your legs, the tip of his middle finger rubbed at your clit with a gentle speed, almost unmatching to his hips. You sensed him look over your shoulder to check up on the status of his food, and your hand trembled as you set the bacon down to finish it up. He laughed with pleasure, and his fingers dipped on the skin around your hips. 

“Can you take it, baby?” you could feel his thick member erratically twitching inside of you as he asked, and you nodded your head fervently “Of course you can.” he reassured. 

He snapped a couple more times, rough enough to make you lose your balance and press up against the counter, before you heard him grunt and felt your cunt being filled with his spill. The sensation of his cock pushing your walls sent you over the edge, and you began to drip with your release, a loud moan accompanying the blissful sensation. He pulled out with ease, not waiting for you to come out of your high, and stepped away to grab the meal you had prepared. 

“Thank you, beautiful, looks delicious.” he winked at you with his signature charming smile before he began walking out of the kitchen “Oh, and pretty boy said he wanted some iced tea, be a doll and bring it after you’re done cleaning up, thanks.” 

Without further word, he vanished from your sight. You had to take a second to catch your breath, desperate for a bit more friction. You considered touching yourself, but if Mr. Hotchner were to catch you, you wouldn’t be able to come again all night, he would make sure of it. 

You could feel Derek’s cum beginning to drip, but the cleanliness of the kitchen was a priority. You abided by the task that you had been handed, after a couple of minutes of cleaning up, since you hadn’t made a big mess, you prepared the beverage for Dr. Reid and headed back to the area. You settled the glass of iced tea next to the man that had requested it. 

“All in.” as soon as you stood next to him, you heard the youngest of the group exclaim, he then muttered a casual ‘thank you’ at the gesture of having his drink brought over. 

Hotch and Morgan exchanged playful glances. They knew he was rushing, his decision possibly prompted by the fact that your breasts were so close to his face; they noticed the bobbing of his adam’s apple, and Aaron had paid attention to how he palmed his bulge while he heard you get taken in the kitchen. Logic just flew out of the window when you were around, and his coworkers adored seeing that side of him. 

“You got me.” Morgan said as he folded his cards, and Reid cockily took a sip off his drink.  

“I’ll play.” Hotch mentioned before adding his chips to the pool. 

“Two pairs. Kings and Queens.” Spencer opened his hand. 

On his part, Hotch could simply scoff while he threw his cards on the table. “Jacks and Queens.” he said with pretend defeat. 

The blond man boasted with his expression in pure pride. He didn’t use to be the kind to order you around, unlike the other two who had gotten very comfortable, and preferred you took the initiative during game sessions. 

This time, nonetheless, he looked quite eager to take control. Once he noticed you looking at him expectantly, waiting patiently for your command. He narrowed his eyes, ever inexperienced, trying to come up with something, or rather trying to find the right way to ask. 

“Could you…” he stopped to try and analyze his next words “Could you bend over?” he motioned towards the table. 

It took your entire strength to not laugh, you weren’t making fun of him, he was just ridiculously adorable, and it made hard contrast with the whole situation in the first place and his actual sexual interests. You obeyed, not wanting to make him self-conscious, moving Derek’s plate out of the way elegantly before resting your entire body face-down against the piece of furniture. 

You let out a quiet whimper from the contrast in temperature; your ass was left up and exposed in his direction. He finally stood up, and you looked back to peek at what he was up to, his hips had lined up with yours, his member was still clothed, but that didn’t stop him from grabbing at your asscheeks and pressing his bulge against your dripping cunt. 

“Why don’t we change the game?” his eyes were glued on your skin wrinkling up with every push, but he kept talking to his coworkers “How about blackjack? Hotch can play house” he proposed. 

“Reid, it’s literally illegal for you to play blackjack in two states.” Hotch pointed out. 

“That’s true. You have an unfair advantage.” Morgan added. 

“Card counting can only be done with extreme concentration and observation of the cards being dealt.” his eyes didn’t leave your body, his palm gently massaging your skin as he kept rubbing himself on you “And I happen to be too busy to pay enough attention.” 

“Alright, but blackjack is a fast game. The player needs to win at least three rounds to claim their prize. Draws don’t count towards the winning number.” Aaron clarified.

The rest of the players nodded in agreement. Mr. Hotchner was the dealer, since he was playing the role of ‘the house’, and he began assigning the first round of cards. Before he got to Reid, though, he noticed there was no space on the table, your body occupying most of it, and so he resolved he would just put it over your naked back. 

You gulped in surprise and your body seemed to get hotter, you surely weren’t expected to be used this way; your nipples brushed against the surface of the table, and Reid noticed how you pushed back against him slightly. 

The doctor pulled away, satisfied for the time being with the friction that he had gotten, and realized there were a couple of white-ish stains. 

“Come on, Morgan!” he exclaimed once he noticed it was semen “Can’t you clean up after yourself?” 

Derek could only break into a laugh, and you noticed a small smirk on Aaron’s face as well. 

“Sorry, kid.” he simply said, waiting for Hotch to open his second card. 

Reid made an unamused expression and crouched down to observe the situation. You still had some drip down your thigh, and your slit still had some traces of Morgan’s release. 

“I’ll help you out, but I need you to do something for me.” he said, palming at your ass to let you know he was talking to you; you hummed, replying that you were listening intently “I won’t be able to use my mouth, so if I suck, it means hit, if I insert, it means stay” 

You furrowed your brows with confusion, but he didn’t give you much time to understand. You felt his tongue trail up your inner thigh, taking the liquid that had spilled over it with it, and shortly the muscle pressed against your slit, taking a lap at your entire sex.

Your hands gripped at the side edges of the square table, on your right side Derek Morgan was looking intently at his cards, on your left Aaron Hotchner was paying close attention to the youngest’s movements. He snapped back to the game once your pleased noises started flowing, his hand darting out to land on top of yours and rub at the back of it slightly. Aaron dealt the second round of cards and Reid’s landed on your back once again. 

“14.” the older man said. 

A little distracted by the way his tongue teased your labia, you didn’t pay attention to the words the dealer had said until you felt Spencer’s lips wrap around your clit and intensely suck the air in. The sensation, which was foreign, made your legs go weak; the man pressed his face against your rear to keep you up, and it only made the interaction so much hotter. 

“Hit me!” you exclaimed in between moans. 

“8. Adds to 22.” Hotch said calmly. 

Reid grumbled against your cunt, his tongue going back to your entrance instead, superficially licking, taking his time to taste everything around it. 

Morgan was busted as well, which meant the house took the round. Spencer kept a steady and slow pace; you felt the cards being removed from your back and, almost immediately, a new one was added. 

“20.” Hotch said again. 

The youngster’s hands had been placed against the outer sides of your thighs in the meantime, however once he heard the number they traveled up. He pulled away and you slightly whined at the lack of contact, his thumbs spread the outer part of your pussy open and his tongue immediately slipped inside your entrance. 

“Stay.” you struggled to let out, only coming out as a shaky breath. 

Hotch opened a couple more cards, Derek was busted again, so there was a chance for Reid’s win. 

“21 for the house, house wins.” Aaron exclaimed. 

Your head defeatedly laid against the wooden table, the man buried in your rear could feel your walls clenching and your hips slightly moving to grind against yours. Your shaky breaths didn’t only alert him that your second orgasm of the night was coming, the other two men could also tell. 

“Reid, your time with her is almost up.” Aaron pointed out after taking a look at his watch. 

Spencer pulled away once again, to your discomfort, and narrowed his eyes pretending to think.

“I’ll tell you what, win this round and I’ll let you orgasm.” Reid proposed to you. 

You trembled a little with anticipation, feeling your orgasm edging on. Instead of allowing his tongue back on you, he simply pressed open-mouthed kisses to your labia, making sure he wouldn’t touch any sensitive areas. 

Aaron dealt another round of cards over your back, not even paying attention to your begging face. 

“16.” he notified you since your eyes were tightly shut with irritation from being so close yet unable to release. 

“Hit me.” you commanded, still feeling Reid’s wet lips kissing your sides. 

“3. Adds to 19.” He clarified as he threw another card against your back. 

“Hit me.” you said once again.

Aaron and Spencer exchanged looks, it was a very risky move, statistically heavily improbable.

Hotch opened the new card against your back, and he let out a pleased chuckle. “2. Adds to twenty one.” 

Reid laughed with incredulity, but he was a man of his word. His lips clasped your sensitive nub once again, and he sucked the air in as his tongue moved rapidly from side to side. A high-pitched moan at his movements, and you couldn’t help but to release your juices over his face. You could hear an erotic slurping sound from the back, he was abiding by his promise of keeping you clean. 

“Well played!” he beamed at you and cleared the cards from your back “That was a very unlikely pull, I’m surprised you made it.” 

“Certainly.” Hotch reassured as he dealt the next round of cards.

Reid had sat back down on his chair, and as the pieces of carton landed on you, you decided to stay put on the table. Spencer’s eyes would travel from his cards to your ass from time to time, almost as if he was pondering his next move after he won. 

However, he wouldn’t be as lucky, and neither would Derek, since the next round was won by the house, which meant Hotch was back in control. You were about to stand back up and his hand laid on your bare back, stopping your movement,

“Actually, honey, why don’t you remain there for a little bit more?” he commanded and you obediently remained “Reid, move.” he said standing up.

The younger furrowed his brows with unintentional defiance “But this is my seat…” he quietly complained. 

“You can have your seat back once I’m done with her.” Hotch said, his tone was as imposing, but you could tell he was a little more gentle. You didn’t know the exact nature of their relationship, but you had figured Spencer was a soft spot for him. 

He finally obeyed and stood up and away from the chair, leaving enough space for Hotch to stand behind you. You could immediately feel the tip of his member prodding at your entrance, after what Reid had done to you, you certainly didn’t need any more preparation. You were overstimulated as it was, but his cock was always welcome, and he could tell by the way you were clenching around nothing simply by having him so close. 

He smirked to himself at the feeling and immediately allowed himself inside of you. You grunted with pleasure as you felt him enter, your fingers, tired from gripping on the sides of the table, beginning to curl around in the air. 

“Here, you can grab onto this.” the ever so chivalrous Derek Morgan reached out to intertwine his fingers with yours, giving you a soft area for you to squeeze trying to not lose control. 

Mr. Hotchner wasn’t going to pretend being gentle, his thrusts picking up speed as soon as you had gotten used to his size. He moved his shirt slightly aside, enjoying every second of watching himself disappear between your contracting walls. He let out a soft groan in pleasure, and you could tell he was beginning to lose himself in you. His hand gripped at your buttock, squeezing roughly to help him move your hips back and forth. 

The other two participants didn’t seem to move a finger, they could only stare, with pleased expressions on their face, at the way tears began to prickle on the corner of your eyes. Reid reached to land a hand on top of your head soothingly, and his kindness was always appreciated. 

Your obnoxious sounds were a delight to the three of them, therefore they dreaded the tune of a ringing phone interrupting the melody they adored. Hotch reached for the gadget within his pocket, furrowing his brows at the caller ID. 

“Yeah, JJ?” he said and made a ‘shushing’ sign to Spencer and Derek. 

Reid gently moved his hand from your head to your mouth, initially he was simply going to cover it with his palm, but an impulsive thought beat him to it: his index and middle finger slipped inside your mouth and pressed against your tongue. 

“Suck.” he ordered in a whisper “It will help you keep quiet.” 

You obeyed the doctor’s order, however, focusing on coating his digits in your saliva; your sounds were kept muffled in your throat, but they escaped your lips from time to time, since Aaron was not giving you a second of rest. 

“Can’t it wait? I see. It’s fine, Reid and Morgan are with me, call Dave, we’ll meet you there in 15.” Hotch continued instructing. He was doing his best to appear unbothered, and he was purposely hitting deeper each time, almost making it a challenge for you to keep your sounds down. 

“A case?” Morgan inquired as soon as his superior got off the phone. 

“And urgent.” he put the device away once again and leaned slightly over you. His fingers glued themselves to your clit, circling it slowly, he was trying to, most likely, rush your orgasm. The pleasure it brought to you was a little painful, being that it had been the part of your body that had received the most attention during the night. You whined at the sensation, and Reid had to slide his fingers further back to keep you from screaming. 

“You know, Hotch, there’s a question that I’ve been meaning to ask for a while.” Spencer suddenly emitted, and Aaron looked curiously in his direction, prompting him to inquire “Are you really paying her?” 

The question caused Hotch to chuckle slightly “No, it’s more like an arrangement.” he confessed, still focused on pounding your cunt. 

“Then what does she get out of it?” his eyes narrowed as he observed you, fucked out of your mind, swallow your cheeks around his fingers. 

“She gets to come,” he clarified “as many times as she can take.” 

As he spoke, his hand raised to land a loud, yet not utterly strong, slap on your ass; he did that sometimes when he allowed you to release. His hips snapped one final time, pressing all the way in to spill his cum inside of you. Your third orgasm of the night was divine, your teeth slightly gritting against Reid’s skin. 

You laid there, absolutely exhausted, for a couple of minutes as they gathered their things and fixed up their clothes. Once you had recovered your energy enough to stand up, you felt your knees betraying you almost immediately. Morgan bolted from his nearby spot to offer his body as support, his arm surrounding your middle. 

“You alright?” he asked with concern and you nodded. 

“Here.” Spencer came closer with a wet wipe that he handed to you. 

“I’m sorry we can’t see you off, but this is urgent.” Hotch came out of a random room with a briefcase on his hand and his pristine suit already on “Rest as much as you want and help yourself to anything in the kitchen, just make sure to lock the door when you leave.” 

Without saying any further he leaned closer to you and pressed a gentle kiss to your lips. He muttered a ‘let’s go’ directed to his subordinates and almost dashed outside the apartment. Morgan simply took a quick peck at the side of your head and told you to ‘take care’. Spencer stood there awkwardly for a second; you could see in his eyes that he was trying to do something, anything, but he couldn’t find the right gesture. Unable to take it much longer, you curled your hand into a fist and offered it in his direction. He bumped it with a fist of his own, and both of you laughed with a bit of embarrassment.

“Listen,” you said before he could move away, slightly entranced by his hazel eyes “the arrangement I have with Mr. Hotchner…” you diverted your gaze, suddenly slightly embarrassed “...it’s not exclusive.” you finally said. 

Spencer’s eyes opened and eyebrows raised in surprise, were you insinuating what he thought you were? His mouth opened and closed in search for an answer, but he struggled to make sense of anything, too scared to diffuse the interest you had shown in him. 

“You don’t have to agree right now,” you reached behind you, to the side table that had the landline phone on it, to grab a pad and a pen and immediately wrote down your number “if you want to explore a contract of your own, give me a call.” you said with a smile handing the paper over to him. 

“I will!” he said with almost too much excitement. 

“Reid!” Morgan yelled from the corridor. 

Spencer let out a quick curse and wrinkled his face with frustration “I’ll call you.” he said before he left in a rush. 

You giggled a little with teenage-like excitement, a feeling that you hadn’t experienced since you first started your dynamic with Mr. Hotchner. New guy, new conditions, new games. Perhaps poker is not the only way to have fun. 

[fan-goddess]

First Week Of School

Request: By @slytherincursebreaker for me to make a written version of this artwork that I highly recommend you go look at before reading! They never cease to amaze me with their work!

Summary: Penelope it seems has been using words she doesn’t fully understand…

Authors Note: As you can see I had too much fun writing about domestic Michael. But do I care? Nope!

Taglist: @humanpurposes, @watercolorskyy, @omgbrcat @blue-serendipity @arcielee @slytherincursebreaker @tumblin-theworldaway

Warnings: Pregnancy, hormones, smutty talk, discussions of a sexual nature (if I miss any let me know!)

Michael Gavey never thought he would ever have kids, let alone a wife, or even a girlfriend at that. Yet that all changed when in his first class of his first year at Oxford, he met you. Granted, he’d been an absolute idiotic prat, as he himself had put it. Yet somehow you kept on coming back to hang out with him with a smile on your face.

Even when Oliver Quick abandoned him in the pub at the drop of a hat just so he could get five minutes of stupid Cattons time and attention like some kind of desperate puppy, you managed to sneak away from your much more popular friends and catch up with him while he was headed back to his accommodation. And when he asked why, you’d said it was all to ask if he was okay and wanted someone to talk to.

In all honesty It was probably the first moment is sort of clocked in Michael’s head that he liked you as more than a friend.

He somehow managed to keep hanging out with you rest of the school year. Even plucking up the courage from not even he knows where to ask you for your phone number so he could talk to you during the holidays when he’d be forced to go back to his parents house.

When the next school year came around in September though, it was with great pride when he practically peacocked his way back to campus with you on his arms and his virginity long gone behind him.

And by the end of Oxford, he had a ring in his pocket just waiting to be placed on your finger, which soon was done by the end of that year.

Years went by since Oxford though, and yours and his lives changed for the better as the two of you moved in together in a nice quaint flat and eventually did manage to get married. It hadn’t been a very big event as the both of you only invited just a handful of guests, and yet it was easily the happiest days of yours and his lives.

It had been an especially emotional time when somehow both of you managed to start ugly crying at each other’s speeches.

Yet you easily managed to outcry yourself when two weeks after coming back from your honeymoon in America, or more specifically after a spontaneous trip to the airplane cubicle, you found yourself sitting on the toilet while Michael was away at work with a pregnancy test in hand, and four more sitting on the edge of the bath saying the same thing.

Pregnant.

You’d tried to surprise Michael that same day after finding out by surprising him when he came back from work, but it didn’t help as the so called ‘baby brain’ managed to somehow hit early, and somehow at the near exact time when Michael was walking through the front door about to greet you, you were frantically trying to put out the fire that had miraculously started on the now charcoal bun you’d placed in the about an hour ago in the oven.

“What on earth is going on?!” You hear Michael shout, his voice confused as he watches from the doorway you frantically try to throw the charcoal lump into the sink.

“It wasn’t my fault!” You say practically on the verge of tears as you try to blink through the sudden onslaught of tears.

“Hey hey hey none of that!” Michael says, dropping his leather satchel as he moves closer to you so he can take you in his arms and kiss the top of your head, while rubbing a comfortingly warm hand on your back. “What’s the issue love?”

“I-I-“ You begin, somehow crying even harder at Michael’s warm embrace. “I wanted to surprise you! But I ruined it!”

“We all forget things sometimes love, doesn’t make you any less smart! Now, what is it you wanted to surprise me with?”

“I…” You pause, stepping away slightly so you could grab his hand previously on your back and place it on your belly. “I’m pregnant Michael.”

You could swear you could see the exact moment his mind went numb, and you honestly don’t think you’ve seen a better state of his. Other than when he’s been fucked out of his mind of course.

“Are you serious?” He eventually says, knocking himself out of his little trance to look you dead in your eyes.

“Yeah darling,” You smile, beginning to tear up again when you see your husbands face slowly turn into his own delighted grin. “We’re having a baby!”

“We’re having a baby!” Michael repeats, his voice breaking as his own tears start falling. Scratch what you thought earlier about outcrying yourself in the bathroom earlier today, within five seconds Michaels already managed to outdo you again.

Over the next few months Michael was attentive as he could be with work and all that, and yet you honestly couldn’t have asked for anything better. Even when the baby was being born in the delivery room, Michael was standing next to you with his hand in yours, and very much ugly crying.

“Michael, you aren’t the one giving birth!” You groan, glaring up at him while you continue to groan in pain. Still, your ever sarcastic husband gave his very much expected sarcastic response while you continued to crush his hand in your own.

Though by the next day, you were holding his and yours daughter in your arms. A girl you both agreed to name Penelope.

The years went by quickly with Penelope in yours and Michaels lives, and it was with great sadness when you realised you wouldn’t get your little one to welcome you both home with a smile on her face, as Penelope’s starting date for primary school came soon approaching.

“Can’t she just start next year?” Michael asks, getting into bed with you and kissing the side of your head before grabbing the physics book on his side table.

“If she starts next year, she’ll be older than all the kids there. You don’t want people to think she got held back do you?” You smile, using your husband’s own doubts about her against him as you pretend to focus on your own book.

It takes everything in you not to burst out laughing at Michael’s little grumble he does out of the corner of your eye. You can’t see it, but you know for sure he’s got a little scrunched up glare on his face like he always does when he’s annoyed at something.

The next few days pass and Michael doesn’t bring up the idea of Penelope starting next year again. Though whether that’s fuelled by Michael’s fear of a held back daughter of something else you don’t know, as the first day of school soon approaches.

On the day however, everything starts smoothly as you make Penelope a healthy breakfast to get her through the day and make her a sufficient lunch box filled with food you’re pretty sure has the food she currently claims to like in.

Yet when you, Penelope and Michael get to the front gate of the school, that’s when the waterworks start. And it weren’t even started by Penelope nor yourself. In actuality it was Michael who began sniffling when your daughter walked into class for the first time all on her own, with her bright pink my little pony backpack strapped tight to her back paired with a bright smile on her face.

“Oh honey…” You sigh, putting your arms around him and tucking his head in the curve of your neck. It didn’t matter if his glasses were digging into your skin, or if his tears were leaving uncomfortable wet patches on your shirt. All that did matter was making sure Michael was feeling comforted and loved at that moment while other parents and children awkwardly stood around you.

“She’s not our little girl anymore…” He murmurs, his lips tickling your skin while his breath begins to slowly even out.

“She’ll always be our little girl Michael,” You say, kissing the top of his head before he moves away from you, his face a lovely shade of pink with embarrassment. “Whether she’s beginning primary school or finishing her A-levels, she will always be our little girl. Do you understand me?”

“Course I do you twit!” Michael says, rolling his eyes at not only you but at the mother he heard behind you gasp in shock at his little nickname, even when he most certainly knows he could’ve said a whole lot worse. Especially when he remembers the uni days and the whole range of vocabulary he used back then.

Still he ignores her as he grabs your hand to drag you back to the car so the two of you can go back home and get ready for work. And later that day when 3pm comes around, both you and Michael stand eagerly by the after school pick up point, with you watching with such fond eyes when you see Michael open his arms wide to give Penelope a big hug as she runs up to him, her own arms open as wide as they can go.

“Did you have a nice day sweetie?” You say, smiling as your daughter finally moves to look at you and give you your own small hug. Yet not as big of a one she gave Michael of course, as hell make sure to mention later on.

“Yeah mama!” She says, grinning loud and radiating pure joy as you and Michael lead her to the car with one of her hands in yours and the other in Michael’s. “I made lots new friends today!”

“Any boys?” Michael offhandedly asks, not really expecting an answer, but he certainly reacts like he was looking for one when your daughter actually answers with an enthusiastic yes and a handful of boy names. Totally oblivious to Michael’s genuinely horrified expression that makes you want to take out your phone and take a picture of it to make it your Home Screen picture.

“Well it’s a good thing you’ve made all these friends! Hasn’t it Michael?” You ask with a pointed stare and a harsh pinch to his leg after you’ve strapped in Penelope and got into the car together.

“Yeah yeah lots of friends I’m very proud of you sweetheart…” Michael says with gritted teeth, looking at you with his own glare telling you exactly what he thought of these new friends of your daughter. The topic of which he brought up again later that night, after eating dinner together, brushing teeth and getting into bed.

“I told you we should’ve let her wait another year…” Michael grumbles, glaring at the page of his book that he’d been on for the last ten minutes.

“And what would that simply achieve?” You ask him, turning the page of your own book. “It’s not like you’d be able to convince her cooties are real and to stay away from boys love, as the teachers would just intervene.”

“I could certainly try…” He simply says back, finally turning the page. You don’t engage with Michael anymore as you sigh while switching off your lamp and getting yourself comfortable between the sheets. Though before you shut your eyes you have to pull Michael down slightly to give him a deep loving kiss.

“Night love.” You say, shutting your eyes and acting oblivious to the flustered mess that is your husband sitting beside you. Yet when you hear his own shaky goodnight back you can’t help yourself from giggling slightly, before allowing sleep to take you.

The rest of the week though goes well, with a significantly less amount of tears from everyone while you drop Penelope off and pick her up from school. And by Friday, all three of you have managed to get yourselves in a good little routine.

“Now Michael, remember that I’ve got that meeting at work at 3 so I can’t pick up Penelope with you today!” You calmly say, focused on packing your daughter’s lunch box which according to her needs to have a cheesestring and a babybel so she can share with her friend Alex.

It’s adorable, so you allowed it almost instantly. Yet somehow it made it even better when you heard Michael two minutes after trying to interrogate your four year old daughter on whether Alex was a boy or a girl.

“Fine fine…” He groans, moving away with a roll of his eyes to kiss your forehead in a loving gesture. “And don’t worry love I’ll be fine on my own! Just as long as stupid Alex ain’t there…”

“Oh behave Michael!” You sternly say, your eyebrows furrowing in annoyance at his insistent worrying. “And besides. If you do this and behave, I’ll do that thing you like tonight with you. How about that?”

“Really?!” Michael asks, a mixture of surprise and arousal on his face. “Outfit and all?”

“Outfit and all.” You repeat, a sultry smile on your face as you kiss the corner of his mouth next to his lips and move away to grab the finished lunch box and place it in her backpack. “Penelope it’s time to go! Put your big girl shoes on please!”

“Yes mummy!” You can hear her say upstairs as she comes bolting down the stairs with an adorable smile on her face. The sound of which you assume knocks Michael from his little trance, as as soon as she comes down and starts putting her shoes on that’s when Michael comes from the direction of the kitchen with his own adorably bashful look on his face.

The rest of the day for Michael though goes great. As that morning with you he drops Penelope of at school, afterwards dropping you at your own work.

“I’ll see you later love.” He says, kissing you on the lips before you move to get out of the car.

“Oh I most certainly will baby.” You smirk back, making his stomach twist and turn in anticipation for later.

“Such a tease…” He murmurs, before starting the car and driving off to work. There weren’t many classes for the day, as by the time came for him to start driving to Penelopes school to get ready to pick her up, he’d already eaten lunch and popped into the bakery by his work to get her a little gingerbread man for an afterschool treat.

It was all going so well as he waited by the pick up area with the treat sitting in his coat pocket. That is however, before Penelope’s form teacher who he remembers meeting when originally toured around the school, came up to him and asked for a quick chat about something that happened today.

“What happened?! Did something happen to her?!” He frantically asked as soon as he walks inside the teachers empty classroom and sat in a chair opposite her desk.

“Oh no nothings happened to Penelope at all!” The teacher reassures, a comfortable smile on her face. “I do however want to discuss with you about some particular language that she used earlier today during break time on the playground.”

“Oh really?” Michael asks, curiousity on his face when he thinks about the words he and yourself try to use when around her. Though when the teacher begins to speak, pure and utter mortification is only what remains.

“From what I heard of the playground monitor on duty, Penelope was talking to one of her male classmates when she used what she herself called NFI. She explained the situation and the words involved in NFI quite graphically I must say…”

“Oh god I’m so sorry about this!” Michael groans, his head in his hands in an attempt to hide his bright red face of embarrassment.

“Oh please don’t be! I can understand that kids at this age are like sponges as they repeat whatever they hear their parents say and not know the meaning of the words at all. Myself and the teacher who’d been on duty have spoken to her about certain language and repeating what mummy and daddy have said, but I thought best to tell you as she’ll probably listen more to a parent than myself.”

“I will definitely have a discussion with her, and so will her mother too when she gets back from work.” Michael says, standing up and thanking the teacher for her time as he begins to leave the classroom. “Thank you for letting me know.”

When Michael exits the classroom Penelope is already sitting down on a chair opposite, staring at him with a smile on her face.

“Hi daddy!” She says, getting down from the chair to run up at him and give him a hug on his legs when he doesn’t reach down quick enough. “Where’s mummy?”

“Mummy’s at work sweetie, she said so this morning that she’ll see you later and is so sorry for not being here.” Michael says, now kneeling down to get to her eye level.

“It’s okay daddy! I forgive mummy!”

“Well I’m sure mummy is very grateful for that!” Michael says, pausing as he begins to help her put on her coat and continues on with what he was about to say. “Penelope your teacher told me you made a boy cry using NFI.”

“But he started it daddy! He’s a cu-“

“Loser!” Michael quickly interrupts, sternly staring at his daughter. “You can call him loser not that word... At least punch him I'll allow it since he's a loser...” He mumbles those last words, not expecting Penelope to hear him and actually listen.

Though that’s future Michaels problem when in two weeks he’s called into the headteachers office to talk about not encouraging violence…

The gingerbread man that is still in Michael’s pocket gets put in a cupboard soon as he and Penelope gets home while she’s busily distracted trying to put Bluey on the tv by herself. On a normal day he’d not allow it as a form of punishment, but even he can’t deny the enjoyment of those little Australian dogs…

There’s a reason why he sometimes calls Penelope his little muffin after all.

When you get back from work and give him a quick kiss, of course only after saying hi to Penelope who continues to sit watching tv, he can’t stop the words from spilling from his mouth.

“Penelope’s teacher talked to me after school. Apparently she’s been using NFI at break time and made a boy cry…” He says, watching about a hundred emotions go through your face. Though the one he least expects for you to settle on is amusement, as you begin laughing hard.

“She really is your daughter I suppose!” You laugh, practically crying as you wipe your eyes with the back of your hands. “Never thought she’d be showing this early!”

“Oh… bugger off!” Michael groans in mock frustration.

“Careful Mikey you know how impressionable she is!” You continue to laugh, practically red at how frustrated your husband now looks standing in front of you. Again, that little scrunched up expression evident on his face.

“There are so many words I want to call you right now…” He moans, stepping towards you with a dark look in his eyes that you can’t help but feel attracted to.

“Oh really?” You begin, smiling as you wipe the final onslaught of tears from your eyes. “Maybe you can tell me tonight? When we do that thing?”

“Oh is that still on the table?” Michael says, his mood a compete turn around as his face looks surprised and yet also thrilled. “I’d have thought-“

“Oh please baby. You really thought that since you were acting like a spoilt boy you wouldn’t be getting a reward? Well then I suppose it’s a good thing what will be happening tonight is not a reward for you then my love. But in fact a punishment. There will be no outfit anymore, no more of that thing you like for a long time. Do you understand that?”

“Yes ma’am…” Michael murmurs, his eyes dark and hooded as he bends his head down about to kiss you. That is however, before Penelope comes running round the corner with panic on her face.

“Mummy mummy mummy! Please don’t punish daddy! It was my fault!” Your daughter begs with genuine horror in her voice. “Pleeeeeeeease don’t punish him!”

“Oh no it’s okay baby!” You say, kneeling down to take her in your arms. “I’m not gonna actually punish daddy you don’t need to worry about him.”

“Do you promise?” She asks, looking at you with such an adorable pout on her face you honestly can’t think of anything cuter at that moment, even with the reasoning for it lingering in the back of your mind.

“I promise.” You say, bringing her in for a big hug while she burrows her head into your body and wraps her own smaller arms around you as tight as she can.

And as Penelope’s distracted, you make sure to wink at your still flustered husband and mouth three simple words at him that makes him somehow flush an even deeper shade of red.

Definitely a punishment.

[pomefioredove]

hi hi there! I'm not sure if I'm doing this correctly, but can I request vil comforting the reader through a breakup? (totally not self indulgent comfort) I love your writing so much and you write vil so well. Thank you!

anon this isn't related to any exes but I have a bunch of highly specific reaction images in my gallery to use when I describe a person (usually a man) I personally think vil schoenheit would hate

summary: vil has always hated your ex type of post: short fic characters: vil additional info: implied romantic, reader is gender neutral, reader is not specified to be yuu, hurt/comfort

There are very few things Vil Schoenheit is ever wrong about.

Even when he wants to be.

There are a million and one ways he could have said I told you so.

He might have even given himself a little pat on the back if the timing was better, but this was about you, not him and his excellent judge of character.

He never liked that person.

Thus, when you had turned up at his door not too long ago, looking like a kicked puppy, that was his very first guess.

And now, he dabs at the corners of your eyes with a silk handkerchief, trying to salvage the lovely makeup look he'd recommended earlier while you talk.

Another cascade of tears fall down your cheeks as you describe the nature of the emergency. He winces.

"Oh, dear. Please tell me you dumped them,"

You shake your head.

One part of Vil is aghast. The other is offended. Not only on your behalf, but at the simple fact that anyone could break up with someone he held in such high regard.

Are they ignorant? Stupid?

How could anyone be so foolish as to let you get away...?

"It's for the better," Vil says, tilting your chin up to prevent any more tears from falling down your pretty cheeks.

You sniffle. "I know you never liked them, but..."

"This isn't about that," he says it plainly, even though it's half a lie. "This is about the fact that you had ever entertained such a character. They're not worth a second of your time, do you hear me?"

You're quiet for a moment, not sure how to respond to his sudden attempt at boosting your confidence.

"It's just complicated,"

"Relationships tend to be. Hold still for me, dear," he picks a stray eyelash off your cheek.

Vil doesn't believe in things like wishing on eyelashes, but even as he blows it off the tip of his finger, he's thinking of you.

"You will survive," he turns back to you, smiling slightly. "Even with your terrible taste in partners."

"If you had it your way, you'd interview every person I liked,"

He rolls his eyes. "Tsk. You say that like it's a bad thing,"

Even now, you can't help a small, weak laugh. There was something rather impressive about the way he could lift your spirits without even trying.

The same thought seems to occur to him, and he smiles, delicately wiping away another tear with the tip of his finger.

"I just don't think I'll meet anyone up to the Vil standard,"

"Good thing you don't have to," he smiles, almost teasingly. "I'm right here, after all."

Another eyelash is wiped away along with the tear, though this time, as he blows it away, he makes a wish.

[from-the-clouds]

bad liars (savior complex ii) - joel miller x f!reader

part one | masterlist | song inspo |

Baby, you're a vampire You want blood and I promised...

summary: It's been a month since Joel has last seen you, fully healed since your last interaction. But you haven't spoken...at all. Your radio silence becomes cause for concern when he hears about an outbreak of Infected at the hospital where you work. There's enough explanation in this part that you could read it on it's own, probably, but I'd highly recommend reading part one first to get the full experience. pairing: joel miller x f!reader words: 7.9k warnings: SMUT - 18+ ONLY, minors DNI. (porn w/ plot, unprotected sex, oral, rough sex, dirty talk, praise kink, age gap. dom/sub dynamics.) Heavy angst, multiple POVs, implied drug abuse, alcohol use, canon-typical suffering! Blood mention. Both reader/Joel are insanely emotionally unavailable, and love to lie to themselves and each other! (please dm for specifics if you have any questions). a/n: Ya'll loved savior complex and I'm so happy! Literally don't think I've had a fic get that many notes before, i had so many requests for a part two and because it felt like i left things open-ended enough, this came to me pretty easily! It might be the horniest thing I've ever written and also very angsty (what's new?)....but I think you'll like the ending <3 Special to @ay0nha for letting me yell at you about my writing and to @zbeez-outlet for the wonderful idea.

Joel exhales and runs his fingers through his salt-and-pepper hair – the tips of which were frozen together from standing outside for so long. It had gotten cold out. Very cold. Boston always did this time of year, and because of it, people stayed in, and crime in the QZ dropped, making it a safer place - though that wasn’t saying much. 

Of course, the cold didn’t stop him from dealing. It did make his job a hell of a lot more difficult, since FEDRA was bored, out looking for trouble, and didn’t have more pressing matters to attend to. Although today, he must’ve been in luck, because the only sign of FEDRA had been helicopters and tanks that were clearly on a mission, driving to the opposite side of the QZ. Good, he had thought. A distraction. 

Joel leans back against the brick wall of the alleyway, pulling the hood of his jacket up over his ears, stares at the ice in the cracks of the pavement. When he hears the crunch of gravel underfoot, he straightens.

The man approaching looks nervously over his shoulder, hands shoved deep in the pockets of his flimsy sweatshirt. Dave, a customer of his for some time. 

“You’re late,” Joel doesn’t bother with a proper greeting.

“I know, I know, I got held up on my way here,” Dave answers, immediately beginning his excuse. “They cleared out the hospital because of an outbreak, that whole area was locked down so I had to take the long way.”

“Outbreak?” Joel tilts his head.

“Infected. I guess a bunch of hospital staff got bit. FEDRA had to go in and put them all down.” 

Joel feels a distant pang of concern somewhere in the back of his head. “How many?”

Dave shrugs, scratching the back of his neck. “I don’t know, man, that’s all I know. It’s not like they’ll ever tell anyone what actually happened.”

Joel can’t help but think of you. He knows a couple people who work at the hospital, most of them through smuggling, but you’re the only one who he’s really able to bring to mind at the moment.

“So, can we, uh…”

Joel pulls the plastic baggie out from his pockets, fishing out the pills. On his end, Dave produces a wad of credits, his shoulders sagging in relief once they’ve made the trade and the drugs are in his hand. He takes one immediately, shoves the rest in his pocket. “Thanks man, I’ll see you next week?”

Leaning back against the wall, he nods, and watches his customer disappear down the alleyway. 

The second Dave is out of sight, Joel’s chest tightens, and he takes a deep breath. There’s no reason why news of Infected at the hospital should concern him. If FEDRA had been called in – they would’ve gunned down anything that moved until it was under control. He knew, better than anyone, that they would do unspeakable things in the name of keeping order. Innocent people probably died, but the dead can’t get infected.

It had been about a month since Joel had last seen you, after he’d gotten beaten within an inch of his life and ended up on your doorstep, and you were the only person that could help. It hadn’t gone at all how he expected it would – at the end of the day, he had been surprised by your tenderness. 

Still, despite that you’d let him take you on the edge of your bed, legs wrapped around him, bouncing on his cock, he wouldn’t really say that it changed anything about your relationship. He had actually been kind of afraid that it would, that your attitude towards him would shift to something more amicable.

But you hadn’t spoken to him in a month. Joel had told you he owed you one after you stitched him up, and had anticipated that you’d take him up on his offer pretty quickly. There were so many things he could do for you to make your situation better. Maybe you’d need credits…. Medicine…. Food…. Booze… Pills, something, but you haven’t reached out. You could just be biding your time until you really need the favor.

Still, the radio silence takes him aback. He should be relieved that you aren’t talking to him. But nothing? Even if it’s not about a favor…he wants some kind of confirmation that you’d both made a mistake. After all that, did you really expect nothing from him?

It dawns on him there’s now a chance you’ll never speak to him again, because you’re one of the ones that FEDRA killed. Or worse….you had gotten bit. 

Joel passes by the hospital, taking the long way home. Everything is locked down, taped off. There’s a crowd around the place – family members, he assumes, pleading with FEDRA agents for information and getting nothing in return.

“Go home. I’m sure they’ll turn up,” he hears one of them say to a weeping woman. It’s useless to ask for an honest answer, for one of them to actually care. 

Joel could go home. He could crush a couple pills, snort them, and quell the burn with a couple drinks. He could fall into restless sleep and wake up the next day as he always did, go about his business as usual. Survive. One day at a time. 

Would he ever get confirmation that you’re alive? Because at this rate, he’s not sure he’ll ever know either way. 

The feeling is going to linger. He hates it. Were you gone? If you are, he can handle knowing. Its somehow worse not to. 

He tries to justify it to himself. You’re one of his solid connections to the hospital, you’d traded with him for medical supplies before. This is business, really, if he thinks about it that way. If you’re dead, he and Tess need to find someone else to work with. 

Joel decides to take a detour on the way back to his place.

It’s past curfew when he arrives at your apartment, the sun has long since dipped below the horizon and with that comes an even harsher cold. Boston winters, he thinks to himself. If he is capable of missing anything, he’d say he missed Texas. Before all this, the last place he’d be caught dead was on the East Coast. 

Joel raps on your front door. He forgets how shitty your building is, that you sleep here alone every night, listening to your neighbors arguing through the thin walls, shady characters slinking out of shadows in the dimly-lit hallway,

A few seconds pass. When he hears nothing behind your door, he knocks again, a little louder. 

More time passes. He knocks again, louder. Maybe you didn’t hear him. 

Nothing. He does it again. Could you be asleep? His jaw clenches.

Still nothing, and Joel knocks even louder. Maybe you’re not even here, and you work nights, and he’s just missed you as you head out for another shift. But he knows that’s unlikely. Since he’s known you, you’ve never worked nights. So where the fuck were you?

Joel’s pounds on your door, yells your name into its chipping paint. He listens for something, anything, on the other side, and there’s nothing, absolutely nothing, but he keeps going The side of his fist starts to hurt, but he can’t stop himself. He doesn’t even realize what he’s doing until he hears one of your neighbors yelling from the end of the hallway. 

‘Shut the fuck up!’

Joel doesn’t hear exactly where the voice comes from, but it’s enough to snap him out of it. He halts his movements, his forehead falling against hollow wood, and in the silence, hears his heart pounding in his ears. 

“Fuck!” he kicks the wall just outside the frame of your door so hard the drywall gives, leaving a hole behind. “Fuck.”

He stares at the result of his outburst for an undetermined amount of time. You were all alone. To his knowledge, you had no immediate family to inform. Who would be around to remember you? He’d never really know for sure what had happened. 

“Joel?”

He looks up, his hands still clenched tightly into fists. When he sees that it’s you, standing at the end of the hallway, they loosen. 

You look horrible - haggard, tired, your hair tangled and matted. As you move closer to him, he doesn’t miss the way your shoulders are hunched underneath the weight of your backpack. But once you’re standing in front of him, you straighten, lift your chin. 

“What is this?” you ask. “What are you doing here?”

There’s no animosity in your tone, he thinks. You might be trying to put some in there, but you don’t have the energy to do so, so it just comes out sounding very flat.

Joel realizes, suddenly, that he doesn’t have a reason. A real reason that wouldn’t….give him away. He puts his hands on his hips, thinks desperately. You do nothing to help.

When he settles in silence, offers you nothing, you just sigh and shake your head. Your teeth are chattering, lips cracked from the cold, and you seem desperate to get into shelter, twisting your key into your lock and opening the front door. Once you step inside, you flick on the lights. He follows you, closes the door behind you both, and locks it.

“Oh, yeah, come on in, I guess,” you say over your shoulder. 

Joel crosses his arms, standing in your kitchen. 

“What, am I in trouble or something?” you ask. “Because if I am, you’re gonna have to wait until I’ve showered.”

“It can wait,” Joel says, and sits at one of your kitchen chairs. 

You shrug off of your backpack and leave it on a chair, then unbutton your coat, tossing it on top. Joel swallows hard when he sees the damage it’s been hiding. Your scrubs are dirty, tattered in some places, one of the sleeves hanging, partially ripped off. And they’re covered in dried blood. It’s smeared on your arms, on the back of your neck. Not yours, he hopes. 

What the fuck happened to you? You don’t turn to see his reaction, don’t look over your shoulder to see if he’s going to ask about it. It’s almost like he’s not even there, and you clearly wish he isn’t. 

He realizes then, that he has the confirmation he’s looking for. You made it out alive. He doesn’t actually need anything else from you. And you’ve given him a perfect out. He can leave while you’re in the shower. 

But he doesn’t. Not when he hears the shower start, or the screech of the curtain across the metal rod, the sound of water hitting the basin. He stays there, motionless, until you duck out of the bathroom with your arms wrapped around yourself, wearing a sweatshirt and sweatpants, hair damp and teeth chattering. 

You pad with bare feet onto the tiled area of the kitchen, brushing past him. 

“What the fuck happened to you?” he asks. 

You finally look at him, like you’re surprised he spoke up, or even asked the question. A choked, bitter laugh leaves you, and you shift your attention away from him, reaching into your cabinet for a bottle of bourbon. “Pass.”

You pour yourself a whiskey, and Joel watches you throw it back in one go, your nose scrunching up, your hand clasping into a fist as you take the shot. The taste doesn’t stop you from pouring another drink and gulping that one down, too, without as much of a reaction as the first. It’s only when you start pouring the third that he intervenes, standing and crossing the room to cover the glass with his hand before you can grab it. 

“Slow down,” he says.

“I know you’re not telling me what to do in my own home.” Your mouth opens as you look up at him, incredulous. 

Joel looks past you, shakes his head. He supposes your right, but it doesn’t make it any easier to watch the self-destructive behavior, which is funny considering how often he engages in it himself. He gives in, removes his hand from your glass. “At least…pour me one. You shouldn’t drink alone.”

Your expression softens slightly, and he’s able to see all the pain you’re hiding, just for a flash, before you turn to retrieve a second glass from your cabinet. 

Once you hand him the whiskey, he sits in the middle of the tiny loveseat you’ve got in your front room, expecting you to sit in the armchair across from it. Instead, you approach with your own drink, nudge his knee with your own, and Joel slides over to make room so you can fall onto the couch beside him. Much closer than he’d expected. 

It’s surprisingly good bourbon, and he wonders how many times you’d wasted it by downing it like you just had, instead of taking your time, savoring. He waits for you to get settled before he speaks again.

“What happened to you?” he tries once more, a little softer this time. 

There’s some contemplation on your end, you look at him for a moment, then at your glass, then back up at him again. He can almost see you trying to figure out how much you’re going to share, but he wants to know everything.

“There was an accident at the hospital,” you answer, finally. 

Joel slings his arm over the back of the couch, angles his body towards where you’re curled up, legs tucked underneath you. I’m listening.

Your voice stays even, blase. “A guard at the border broke protocol…and someone who was infected was brought in. By the time we realized, it was too late….”

“Were you hurt?” 

“Almost.” you say. “I mean, yes, actually, I’m a little scratched up, but…it’s not as bad as it could’ve been.”

Your teeth start chattering again. Joel wonders if it’s because of the cold, or your nerves. Figures it’s probably both.

“My coworker turned and I uhm….I had to…” you say into your glass, your free hand flexing like it’s trying to shake off some unpleasant muscle memory. “I had no choice.”

“I understand,” For whatever reason, he spares you from telling the story. To him, taking down Infected was nothing. But to you…“What else?” he presses.

You shrug, avoiding his eyes, one of your arms coming to grip at your opposite shoulder. “I can’t really remember. A bunch of people died. FEDRA came in and just started gunning everything down….” you shook your head, and straightened up.

“I heard about that,” Joel offers.

“Wait…you knew about this?”

“Yeah.”

“So then why are you here, asking m-” the rest of your sentence drops off, your lips parted slightly. The look on your face shifts, slowly. Your eyes narrow. Remorse turns into something more neutral, then into curiosity. “Oh my god….you were worried about me.”

“No.”

“Yes, you fucking were,” your lips curl slightly, it’s not quite a smile, but it’s something close to amusement. 

“No,” Joel defends himself. “I wanted to hear what happened from someone–”

“No you didn’t,” you interject, but he raises his voice to finish his thought.

“–who actually works there, not FEDRA’s propaganda.”

“No you did not. You’re checking up on me. You came over here after curfew to see if I was–”

“Enough,” Joel growls with enough conviction that it shuts you up, and he’s grateful, but its not enough to wipe the self-satisfied look on your face, because it doesn’t.

“What are we, like, friends now?”

He doesn’t answer, and slugs back the rest of his whiskey.

“Or would that be too much for you?” You don’t wait long for him to give you an answer, probably because you know he won’t respond. “I mean, if we’re both being honest–” He definitely wasn’t being honest. “–Today was really fucked up.”

You’re leaning forward now, some of the space between you is gone. And though you’re trying to give the impression that you’re unphased by everything, your hand is clenched tightly around your glass, and you avoid his eyes. It’s painful to watch you resist the urge to trust him. Not that he’s ever given you a good enough reason to – he knows he doesn’t deserve it, but he wants it anyways.

“It’s funny…” you say after a while. “I remember thinking that I didn’t want to die. At least… not like that. I’ve never felt that before…That’s something, isn’t it?” you ask him. 

Joel looks at you, and is surprised at the vulnerability in your expression, sees you looking for some kind of validation from him. “....It is.” 

You finish off your drink, and put the empty glass on the coffee table, shift closer to him.

“It looks like you healed up okay,” you say, after a spell. “How’s your shoulder?”

“A little sore, nothing I can’t handle.”

“Did you take those antibiotics?”

“Yes.”

“Good. And I can’t even tell you had a black eye.”

“I’m fine,” Joel asserts. 

Another shiver wracks your body, and he can tell this one is actually from the chill – your apartment is cold as fuck, it even is starting to bother him. 

“Don’t you have a heater?”

“Kinda,” you glance over at the radiator in the corner. “Sometimes it works.”

“What do you do when it’s colder than this?” It was only November, things would only get worse. 

You shrug. “I don’t know….just be colder, I guess.”

Joel imagines you curled up in your bed alone, wrapped in a thin comforter, shaking in front of him like you are now. He winces. 

“How long are you going to stay?” you ask, changing the subject.

“I should probably go now.”

You nod, scoot closer. “But maybe…” you trail off, contemplating. 

Joel sits up straighter, prompting you when you don’t speak again. “Maybe what?”

“Maybe you could stick around for a little while longer.” There’s a warm hand, yours, that lands on his thigh, and he recoils like you’ve touched him with a fire iron. He rises to his feet. 

“Hey,” you stand along with him, step in front of him to block the pathway to the door. He could easily get past you, obviously, but it’s not as simple as that. 

Of course he’s fucking thought about what happened the last time he was here – his arms around your waist, his mouth on your neck, your chest, your hands on his shoulders, whining his name. A freak accident, a glitch in the matrix, a statistically improbable thing. 

“What?” he asks as you step forward, the fingers on your free hand sliding into the belt loops of his pants. He feels blood rush to his cheeks, to other places. And you’re still fucking shivering. You look so fucking miserable, he wants to yell at you to put on a coat, to wrap yourself in a blanket, in his arms. 

“Joel,” you say his name softly, tilting your head up, leaning close. And then your hand is on the side of his face, and he realizes you’re fucking pleading with him. He knows what you want, but he has a feeling this isn’t just about sex. You’re looking for comfort, as if he’s capable of giving it. 

“We made a mistake…once,” he tells you. “We’re not going to make it again.”

He says it to hurt you, but it doesn’t work. It’s like you knew it was coming all along. “I knew what I was doing,” you answer, earnest. “Didn’t you?”

Yes. You glance down at his hands, which are squeezed into fists so tightly, his knuckles are white. If he’s not rigid, he’s not sure how he’ll be able to resist. He wants you. God, he wants you. He never thought he’d be able to have you again. 

“I could help you loosen up.”

Joel’s walking on the edge of a one-thousand foot cliff and hoping his foot slips. He wants to surrender. The only thing he thinks might save him is to say the meanest thing he can. Maybe you’d get turned off.

“Listen to yourself,” he says, finding the strength to meet your eyes. “You want me so bad, you sound pathetic.”

“Asshole,” you step closer, your mouth twitches, your lips are inches apart. “Do you think I care what you think about me?”

Joel realizes his plan has backfired. But he really only has himself to blame, he should’ve known better. With you, he’s never in as much control as he wants to be, and deep down, he likes it. 

“Go lie down on the bed.”

It’s the only thing that seems to shock you. “What?” 

“I won’t ask you again,” Joel steps backwards, crosses his arms. “Go lie down.” 

──────

If you told yourself a couple months ago that one day you’d find yourself pinned down by Joel Miller, you’d think it’d be because he was about to kill you. Maybe because you cheated him out of something, maybe because you did something else to piss him off – it didn’t really matter. Regardless of how fucked up it was, that idea would seem more dignified than what was happening now. 

Your back is being pressed deeper into the lumpy old mattress, and he’s on you. His mouth is warm, hot, wet, and dragging down your neck, nipping, sucking, licking. Your hands are itching to reach out, to skate down his torso, trace along his jawline, tug at his hair, but you can’t because he’s got them pinned above you with only one of his own. Anytime you try to fight him, his grip only grows stronger. 

It was shameful, really, but you had asked for this – begged for it, basically. There were a number of reasons why – one of which was to blow off some steam after a near death experience, the other because you’d fucked him before and it had been good, much to your dismay. There was also a third reason that you weren’t interested in acknowledging now. 

After the night Joel had gotten jumped, and you’d taken care of him, everything has changed. It’s a cliche, but true. You’d known what you were doing when it happened, and had no regrets. But it was probably not supposed to happen again, and you tried to keep it that way, more for his sake than anyone else’s. But….he was the one who showed up tonight after he’d heard what had happened. It wasn’t nothing.

Joel pulls away from you so abruptly that you gasp, shivering in the wake of his impossible warmth. 

“Sit up,” he instructs, and you turn to find him at the end of the bed, arms crossed. 

You obey, mostly just for the view. You hope to admire him, fresh from kissing you – flush skin, wet lips, tousled hair. Only he’s frustratingly stoic, unsullied – like he hadn’t been touching you at all. 

“Look at me,” he says, and you do. 

“This doesn’t mean anything.”

“It’s nothing,” you agree. 

“I won’t be gentle.”

“I don’t want you to be gentle.”

“Good,” you watch his shoulders loosen, just a little, and he takes one step backwards, his eyes tracing down your body and then back up. “Strip for me….” 

You aren’t dressed sexy at all, you remember, a sweatshirt and sweatpants. If you had thought this through a little more, you might’ve tried to make it nicer for him. “....Okay.”

“Start with your shirt,” he says, and you grab at the hem, but he snaps at you. “Ah-ah….slower.”

You swallow, nod, and carefully lift the fabric, dragging it up over your stomach, over the swell of your breasts, revealing your tight, thin white tank top. 

“That’s it, nice and slow.” 

Joel’s voice is soft but stern, a low rasp that makes your cunt clench around nothing, and he’s not even touching you. The sweatshirt is pulled over your head, falling somewhere on the crumpled bedspread. 

Languidly, you lean back, shifting your weight to get off the mattress, and Joel palms himself through his jeans. You can see where he’s straining against the denim, and you find it hard to tear your gaze away as you go to pull off your sweatpants. Joel stops you again. 

“Turn around.”

You do, and you’re sure he has a nice view of your ass as you slide them over your hips, bending over to let the fleece pool around your ankles. Slowly, you rise back up, looking at him over your shoulder for approval. 

“Good girl,” he murmurs. Your stomach flips. A month ago, you would’ve done anything to get him to stay away from you, and now, you’re terrified to disappoint him. 

That’s the problem. You’d spent most of the day fighting for your life — literally. But even after standing behind a barricade of heavily-armed FEDRA soldiers outside the hospital, you didn’t feel as safe as you did when you saw Joel at your door. You need him. For now, at least.

“Now the shirt,” he tilts his head towards the mattress, nodding encouragingly.

You get back on the bed, sitting back on your heels, and begin to pull the tank top up. It’s your last layer up top, you’re not wearing a bra, and you’re feeling a little vulnerable with him just watching you, fully clothed and composed, your gaze falling down to look at the threadbare linens. 

“Eyes up,” he instructs. “Look at me.”

Taking in a shaky inhale, you do. It’s not easy. Everything about him looks dark, animalistic. A coiled ball of energy, waiting to pounce.

But, even when you’re bare before him, he doesn’t. 

“Lie back, close your eyes.”

Of course, you don’t refuse, settling your head against the pillows. 

There’s a sound of a belt – his belt, unbuckling, the snap of a button, the dip of the bed where he kneels when he comes to hover over you. Two hands land on top of your thighs, pressing the backs against his denim-clad knees, thumbs pushing your legs further apart. 

And then…nothing. He’s still. He’s still for so long, that you actually think that something’s wrong. When you open your eyes, you’re met with a view of the underside of his jaw. You can just make out the pinched expression he’s wearing as he looks down upon you. Disdain, maybe…but it’s not meant for you, it’s for someone else….him.

“Joel,” you murmur. Instinctually, you reach for his hand.

The second it makes contact, he smacks your hand away so hard your whole body jolts. “I told you to close your eyes.”

“Sorry,” you mumble quickly, closing them again. 

You are well aware that he’s actively working through shit, probably doing some kind of mental gymnastics to rationalize why it’s okay to fuck you again, which, when you really think about it is kind of….pathetic. It’s the only thing that makes you feel any sort of power in a situation where you’ll surrender everything else. It’s a fair exchange. 

Maybe, on a different day, you would want it softer. You’d like to think he’s capable of that, even though he seems determined he isn’t. Luckily, you don’t want it softer. After today, you want to be so far gone you can’t think. 

Joel answers by leaning down and catching you in a bruising kiss. Finally. You press yourself against him cause you’re freezing and he’s so warm, and you frantically begin to unbutton the flannel he’s wearing, making it about halfway down before he pins your hands above you again.

“Slow down.”

You whine, a little frustrated because all you want to do is touch him. The fingers on his free hand hook around the elastic of your underwear, and he starts to drag them over the curve of your ass. 

He’s got to be joking with how deliberately he’s moving, anticipation only building underneath his featherlight touches.

When he’s got your panties around your ankles, you slide your legs together so he can pull them off entirely, keeping them closed as his weight shifts, and your thighs are pulled back apart.

“You’re already so wet for me,” he doesn’t need to feel you to see it clear as day, with you spread open in front of him. “So fucking desperate.”

He’s all-but glaring at you, like you’ve done something wrong, and for a minute, your eyes flick away, just for a second of relief from the tension.

“What, are you embarrassed?” he asks. 

“N-no,” you stammer, though it was supposed to sound confident. 

Thankfully, he doesn’t press you, his head dipping down to press his lips to your knee, then an inch higher, then an inch higher, then higher – keeping his eyes locked on yours the whole time, an arm winding around your thigh.

“I wanted to do this last time.” A confession. 

“Yeah?” you sigh, trembling. It’s maybe the nicest thing he’s said to you, but you can’t even acknowledge it, because you’re buzzing.

He turns his face, his beard scraping along sensitive skin. “Mhm,” his deep rasp vibrates directly to your cunt, and when his head dips down, you close your eyes – it might just be better to focus on only one sensation at a time, you’re not sure you can handle seeing what he’s about to do.

Joel’s mouth is on you the second you do, and you gasp. He licks up the seam of your lips, mouth latching around your clit, swirling with his tongue, and back down – firm, determined, practiced. You try to buck up, but he has an arm locked around your hips. 

He removes himself from you just enough to utter two words. “Stay still.”

You want to protest, but you realize that he’s let go of your hands, and it gives you the opportunity to thread your fingers into his hair, while you dig your heels into the broad expanse of his back, and he groans, tongue curling into you. 

“I’ve thought about this,” you gasp, answering his earlier admission.

“When?”

“At night. More than once.”

“Fuck,” Joel growls, and you wheeze when he works one finger into you, forcing you to take it along with his next words. “You know how fuckin’ bad that is? Dreamin’ about a man nearly twice your age?”

“I d-don’t care, I want you anyway. Y-you can do whatever you want to me,” It’s too early to be past the point of speaking coherently, it really is, but you’re already there. 

“F-fuck,” Joel repeats himself, and pushes another finger inside you next to the first, the stretch almost uncomfortable, but quickly fading to pleasure. “I’m going to.”

You’re not the going to tell him, though, that he’s the first man whose ever gone down on you, because you’re a little fucking scared for some reason. It’s intimate, very intimate, more than you expected. 

The truth is, you weren’t actually very experienced at all. You could count on one hand the number of partners you’d had, and still not use all of your fingers. While some of them were good enough, they all paled in comparison to Joel. There had never been anyone like Joel. 

His fingers curl as his tongue swirls around your clit and you cry out, inhale sharply. Minute by minute, you’re getting wetter and wetter – can hear yourself with each twist of his fingers inside you, bearing down on him. 

“You taste so fuckin’ good,” he grunts, and your eyes flutter open just for a second, just to see his forehead, dark eyes staring back at you, and his hips dipping, rutting against the mattress. God he’s getting himself off to this. As hot as it is, the thought of not getting to feel him inside you causes a rush of anger. 

“F-feels so good,” you’re right there, already, and it’s pitiful.

“I know, baby, I know,” he says. “You’re already so close, aren’t you?”

Instead of answering, you just nod, gasping. Joel works you right up to the precipice, hands tightening in his hair, hips lifting off the bed – and then he slows a little –  just enough – to pull you back off the edge, and you let out a humiliating sob.

“Shhh!” he hisses with his mouth still on you, resuming the steady pace he had going. A little sigh of relief when you feel your release approaching again. He just lost his rhythm for a moment, it was nothing.

Again, he’s got you right there, you’re so close, hips jerking, breathing in short, sharp pants, something molten working its way up your spine. “Joel, that’s it, please I-”

He falters again – just enough. And it’s gone again.

You realize, with dismay, that he knows exactly what he’s doing. He hadn’t lost his rhythm. He’s doing this on purpose. 

If someone asked – not that anyone would – you wouldn’t be able to recall how long he keeps you in that state, being dragged and dangled, but denied the privilege of falling. It’s torture. 

And at first, you try to be patient. You figure he’ll grow tired, desperate, and eventually want to move on. But apparently, he doesn’t want to move on. He’s content to keep you this way for as long as he sees fit, and you can’t handle it any longer. It’s starting to hurt.

“Please, Joel, let me-” you gasp.

“Let you what?” he pulls back from you, frustratingly too soon, once again.

“Let me come, please, I’ll do anything, I’ll be good, please, please-”

“Just a little longer,” he dismisses you.

All you can do is pant and writhe, completely at his mercy. He keeps going like that, and you’ve stopped trying to filter yourself, the sounds he makes as he laves at you are obscene, you can see yourself glistening on his chin, and can feel the sheets damp beneath you. At this point, he’s enjoying this more than you are.

“Joel,” you plead with him again. “It’s too much, I c-can’t. Just, please I really need-”

“You wanna come for me, baby?” he asks. You nod ferociously. 

“Yes, please, please,” 

“You’re so fucking sweet when you beg, you know that? ” he murmurs. “Wish you were like this all the time.”

“Fuck off,” you manage, feeling heat rise to your cheeks. You should do this to me more often. 

Joel chuckles, and it vibrates just right, his fingers curling again and you moan, hands tightening in his hair. He’s focused now, you can tell because the constant stream of filth he’s been whispering has finally stopped. He’s persistent.

You’re unable to stay quiet, continuing to whimper just like that and please don’t stop over and over. And then all at once, every muscle in your body grows tense and you cry out, cunt pulsing around him so tightly that his fingers slow. “There you go, pretty girl, that’s it.” 

You whisper his name as he continues to fuck his fingers into you, riding you through your orgasm and licking up the mess you’ve made. 

At some point in the aftermath, Joel withdraws from you, and you hear the sting of his zipper. It takes a moment, but you’re able to see him through heavily lidded eyes, kneeling in front of you with his shirt unbuttoned all the way, pants around his ankles, jerking himself slowly in his hand. God he’s fucking huge, how had you forgotten about that? He’s a vision, beard still wet with you, looking down, watching your chest rise and fall. In that moment you realize two things. One, even though you’ve already come, you somehow want him even more than you had before, and two, you’ve never wanted to suck a dick so bad in your life. 

So you sit up, crawl towards him, and reach out with one hand to take him in your palm. He lets you, sighing, closing down his eyes. First, you have to kiss him, so you rise to your knees, and he pulls you into his arms, one of them winding around your waist, the other coming to rest at the small of your back. “You take such good care of me,” you whisper. 

He grimaces at the words like they’re an insult. You expect him to retaliate, to tell you that you shouldn’t say that sort of thing, but he never does. So you kiss him, gently, bringing your free hand to the side of his face. Once again, he lets you, and you taste yourself when his tongue presses into you mouth. You run your thumb over the head of his cock, and he hums against your touch, almost contentedly.

You’re doing whatever you want to him, and you’re shocked he hasn’t put a stop to it. It could be satisfying enough, you think, just to keep kissing him like this. Still, you sink back towards the bed to test things further. You’re about to wrap your mouth around him, but he pulls you off by your hair, so quickly, so hard that you yelp.

“No.” he says firmly. “Lie back.”

“But I just wanted to-”  

“No.” 

You consider trying to reason with him, but decide it won’t be worth whatever he’d do if you continue to argue.

Joel braces himself with one hand above your shoulder, the other wrapped around his cock, slowly teasing you by rubbing himself up and down a few times, before he gives in, finally pushing into you.

“Oh, fuck,” you gasp at the stretch, reaching out grasp at his bicep, arching your back. He’d prepped you, and it was still too much. 

“You can take it,” he says, pressing deeper into you. His hips are all the way flush with yours, he’s to the hilt, and he still snaps them even further, once, holding you there, so deep, you feel like you’re choking on him. “See? There you go.”

It seems like you can’t quite catch your breath, and you squirm underneath him for some kind of friction, some kind of relief from how intense it all is. You can feel him throbbing inside you, feel how badly his own body is begging him to move, but he doesn’t. 

“Joel,” you cradle the back of his head, look him in the eyes. “Move, please.”

He doesn’t answer, he just brings his hand to grip your jaw, his thumb and forefinger pressing into the soft flesh of your cheeks. 

“Please?” you murmur again, and his thumb slips into your mouth, silencing you. You suck on it obediently, and after you do, he finally gives you what you want.

──────

Joel told you he wouldn’t be gentle, and he isn’t. 

He hadn’t been able to do this last time. Taste you, spread you open, fuck you properly. His hips snap against yours – ferociously, unrelenting, over and over. You’ve been going at it for awhile now, and he actually wants you to break. He wants you to tell him to slow down, to be a little more tender, not press into you so deep, so hard, so that if he listens, it wouldn’t mean he’s breaking his own promise. He’s got to be rough with you, because he’s afraid of what could happen if he’s not.

But you don’t break. You fucking take it, take him, each time, again and again, your nails digging into arms, your legs locked around his hips. Each time he delves into you, you’re getting wetter and wetter, and yet, you’re still so fucking tight. He doesn’t understand it. It’s been a long fucking time since he’s been with a woman like you – and you might be the best he’s ever had. 

You’re not even making any noise – you’re just panting, gasping in Joel’s ear as you cling to him, and that’s all. He can’t even look you in the eyes. If he does, he knows you’ll see everything that’s wrong with him, and still beg for him to give you more. 

Two hands land on either side of his face, turning his head so you can kiss him. Despite how he’s treating you, you keep trying to connect, to ground yourself. For as much as he wants to refuse, it feels too cruel to deny you. He lets you lock your lips with his own, feels your cunt clutch him even tighter. It’s impossible for you to kiss for more than a few seconds at a time without it getting broken up by a whimper here and there. You’re getting close again, he’s started to get better at recognizing it.

“You’re fucking so perfect on me, baby, you feel that?” he asks, and you nod, breathless. “Taking me so well, such a good fucking girl-”

A gasp from you cuts him off, your eyes squeezing shut as you are taken over by your climax. Joel groans and does everything he can not to come when you start pulsing around him, holding him closer, since there’s nothing else to do. It’s way too intimate…because it’s missionary, and he should’ve known better than to start off like this. 

Pulling out of you is the hardest thing he’s had to do in a while, and he ignores your noises of protest now that he’s left you empty. Then, he flips you onto your stomach. He takes a moment to admire the curve of your ass, how it dips into your waist….to him, your body is perfect, and you’re young, your skin still supple and smooth. There are still places he hasn’t gotten his mouth on, and it’s a shame, he thinks, but tonight his patience is wearing thin. Joel pulls you back until you’re on your knees, and slides back inside. There’s a little resistance, you whimper, but it’s easier than the first time. He wraps an arm around your waist, the other across your chest, and starts to jerk his hips upwards, into you. 

“Oh fuck, Joel,” you sigh in relief.

“I know, I know.”

You drop your head back until it falls against his shoulder, winding your arm back so you can pull at his hair, which kind of fucking hurts, but he likes it. 

Ultimately, you’re pretty easy to please, and it’s not long before he feels the telltale flutter of your walls as you drip down over him, soaking his lap. 

“You’re making a fucking mess, baby. You gonna come for me again?”

All you can do is plead with him. “I can’t, Joel. I can’t do it again, please just-”

“Yes, you can,” he interjects. “I know you can, baby, don’t worry…I’ll help you.”

“O-okay.’ 

He slows the roll of his hips just a little, focuses on deeper, longer strokes, and lets the hand that’s currently squeezing one of your tits fall to where your bodies are joined, finding your clit immediately.

You whine, arching back against him, the swell of your ass packed against his lower stomach. He sees a single tear leaking from the corner of your eye and feels a little guilty for what he’s doing to you. Only a little, though. 

Without any warning, for the third time, you’re coming around him – easier than the last time, like always – and he uses the feeling of you throbbing around him to chase his own release, his hand clapping over your mouth to muffle your moans as he becomes increasingly frantic. 

He turns his head, rakes his teeth along your exposed neck, and sinks them into your pulse point with a groan. Your breath is hot against him when you whimper in response. 

“Just a little more, honey.” He’s so close. You bob your head, though you’ve nearly gone limp in his arms.

Like last time, Joel knows it’s a bad idea, but he’s not going to pull out. The thought of deliberately coming inside you is actually what sends him over the edge, and he’s cursing and moaning your name. You whine at the feeling of him pulsing inside of you, arching back for more, even though he can tell you’re exhausted. 

It’s fucking freezing in your apartment, and yet, his skin is damp with sweat when he finally regains some awareness of his surroundings. He’s panting, you’re sniffling, a weak smile on your face as you catch your breath. Before he can stop himself, he presses his lips to your cheek. 

Joel tilts you both forward – very tentatively, keeping an arm wrapped around your waist. At some point, your hand settled over top of his, and you threaded your fingers between his own, holding his hand across your stomach. You keep it there, even after you’ve settled onto the bed.  

It takes a few minutes before either of you move, but it’s you who gives in first, wriggling out from where he’s got you trapped partially underneath him. 

You retreat to the bathroom, like you did last time. Somewhere during your coupling the linens have slid down the bed, and Joel settles back against the pillows, throwing an arm behind his head.  Now that he’s stopped sweating, he’s just cold, and he reaches to pull the bedspread over him. He should leave, he thinks, before you come out and ask him to. Beat you to the punch. Maybe while you’re still in the bathroom. 

A few minutes later, and you return from the bathroom, dressed again in sweats. He hears you pour yourself a glass of water, gulping it down. You flick off the lamp on your bedside table, and fall into bed next to him, lying rigidly on your back. He should reach out, pull you against him, let you settle in his arms. Instead, Joel rolls over on his side. 

It’s terrible how beautiful you are, he thinks, watching you stare up at the ceiling, hugging yourself. So beautiful, and fucking smart. You’re strong, too, but not as strong as he wishes you were. Of course, no one could ever be that strong.

He whispers your name. You turn your head, pupils still blown wide with lingering lust.

“You need to learn to defend yourself, to shoot a gun, to fight,” he says. “After today.”

“What?” you roll to face him. 

“You said you didn’t want to die,” Joel continues. “So you need to learn. ‘Case something like that happens again.”

“Oh yeah? Lemme guess, you’re gonna teach me?” your voice is a little hoarse after what he’d done to you, and you smirk at him.

“Yes.” It sobers you up, that he’s not fucking with you, or giving you a hard time. “I owe you, remember?” 

“You do.” 

“So…. I’ll teach you.” 

“....Okay.” 

“Alright.”

Joel rolls over to his opposite side, and you’re left staring at his back. Arms wrapped around 

himself in a tight hug, he waits for you to tell him to go.

You never do. 

Instead, he feels the heat of your body as you curl up against him, slotting one of your legs between his own. Your hand grazes up his ribs, over his bicep – a gentle, quick massage – before you tuck your arm underneath his own, your palm flat against his heart. 

“What are you doing?” he asks, frozen at how tender the embrace is. It’s a foreign feeling, he can’t remember the last time someone touched him like this. 

The tip of your nose hits the nape of his neck, and he can feel your shuddery exhale.

“I’m cold,” you say, like it’s obvious, lips brushing featherlight against his skin. “And if you’re staying, you might as well make yourself useful.”

He can’t roll over and wrap his arms around you. He can’t kiss your forehead or play with your hair or murmur into your ear. He can’t offer you anything in return. Joel decides, though, if he’s going to accept comfort from anyone, it’s going to be from you.

──────

taglist (basically if you asked for a pt 2 on the last part i tagged you): @bbyanarchist @dlwrish @imaginewrites24 @captain-yellow-96 @daisyintheskyewithdiamonds @sludgec0r33 @c0wb0ym3nace

[toxicanonymity]

that's the spot

2.3k | masseur!joel x f!reader | masterlist

This was a request from @megangovier20. ty @dark-scape for the title. Also highly recommend @swiftispunk's amazing masseuse!reader fic: say it with your hands.

warnings: I8+ non-outbreak, Joel jacks off, unsafe PiV, reader pressures joel, wants a rough touch, can sit on Joel

Your friend referred you to Joel for your back, and after having his hands on you that first time, you needed more.  He was gentle and professional.  Too gentle. Too professional. You yearned for a rougher touch and he couldn’t stop calling you “ma’am” at first, even when you asked him not to.  The room was tranquil and minimalist.  There was a shelf for your clothes, a hook for your keys, a chair, and a massage table.  It was dimly lit and he wore a linen tunic with matching drawstring pants.  He gave you privacy while you stripped down to just a towel. 

Initially, you were startled by how handsome he was – the perfect hook of his nose, his tortured brow, and sad eyes. The mesmerizing pattern of his facial hair.  But you were at ease once he spoke in a low, calming voice as he kneaded your back.   “You’re too young ‘n healthy to be walkin’ around with back pain” was the first thing he said with you face down on his table.  The depth and masculine softness of his voice mesmerized you, and from then on, you tried to keep him talking as much as you could.  It was hard, though –  he wasn’t much of a talker.  

Joel’s hands on your back did as much for you as any other man’s hands between your legs.   It had been a long time since a man touched you at all.  But as far as you could remember, no one’s hands compared to his, not even close.  Strong and massive, gliding across your smooth skin, firmly pressing into your muscles, they turned you on unlike anything you’d felt before.

Every time you left his office, you were in desperate need of release.  You squeezed your thighs together as soon as you got in your car, and once in the privacy of your bedroom, you thought about nothing but his hands all over you as you brought yourself to climax.  It never took long after an appointment with Joel. 

-

One day, you asked Joel if he could be a little rougher with you.  

“Rougher?” he asked skeptically. 

“Don’t be afraid to hurt me,” you told him.  

He was hesitant and explained he’s trained in specific massage techniques, “and rougher ain’t one of’em.”  He offered to try the massage gun on you instead.  The thought of a tool instead of his hands didn’t do it for you, so you told him maybe another time.  

The next time, you slipped him some extra cash and asked him to work you over as hard as he was willing to.  He searched your eyes and must have seen the desperation, because he wouldn’t take the folded bills,  but he finally agreed. 

At first, it was only slightly rougher than usual.  

“Good, that’s great,” you kept telling him.  “Perfect.”  Your praise gave him the confidence to continue.  “More,” you kept telling him.  “Harder.”  

When he finished that day, there was something in the air between you, like each of you knew this was going to become more than massage therapy.  Seeing it in your eyes appeared to be the confirmation he needed. He again refused the extra cash.  

In the following weeks, when you said “harder” or “please, rougher,” he obliged, often grunting with the effort.  He used his elbows at times.  

“Damn, you like it real rough, don’t ya?”  he muttered at one point.   It was a far cry from his professionalism at the first appointment, and it turned you on that you were breaking down his walls.  He was good at hiding his arousal, but you could hear it in his voice.  

At the end of the appointments, he always composed himself back into the perfect professional.  He scanned your body and wet his lips, but there was no sign he’d make a move.  He had the self-control you lacked. 

-

One week, you asked him to get on top of you.

“If that’s what ya need, sugar. . . I’m here to give ya what ya need.” Those words sent a rush of blood to your loins.  

At your urging, Joel got on the massage table and straddled your ass.  He used his fists and knuckles and his body weight.  You sighed and moaned as he pushed the sweetest pops and cracks out of your skeleton. His grunts and heavy breaths made a symphony with your own sounds.  

You ached and throbbed between the legs.  After a particularly sensual sigh left your mouth, you felt his crotch twitch before lifting off your ass. He wasn’t going to let you feel him get hard, but the knowledge of it made you swell with need. 

“Lower,” you said. He scooted back, moving down your body, and kneaded your back lower and lower until his hands were almost at your ass. 

“Lower,” you pleaded. “Lose the towel.” He took the towel off you, and his big hands slowly crept onto your ass cheeks. 

“Yes,” you said. “Feels so good. . .”  

He took two handfuls of your ass and inhaled loudly.  

"Ohhh,” you sighed.  You were close to coming. 

“Feels that good, huh?” he said in a low, horny murmur.  

He flattened his hands and slid them from your ass, down the curve of your lower back, up to your shoulder blades and said “You’re somethin’ else, you know that?” 

The contrast of his light touch and the desire in his voice did it for you.  You clenched your thighs together and sighed as you reached your release.  You dug your pubic bone into the table with your pulsations and he took his hands off you in astonishment. 

“Fuuuck,” he sighed and brought his hands down gently on your back.  “Was that what I think it was?”

“You have a way with those hands, Joel.”  

“God damn,” he said.  

-

“Will you lie down on me?” you asked. 

“I, uh, I’m really enjoyin’ all this. . .but I think I better not right now.” 

“You dunno how good you make me feel,” you gushed.  “You dunno much I need this."

He was quiet.  “Nice of you to say that. . . tryin’ to be professional, but god damn, you make it hard.”  

“And that's exactly how I want you,” you purred.  “Come on.  Lie down on me for just a minute.  Let me feel you for just a minute, and I swear to God I’ll leave.” 

After a few seconds he agreed, “Only have a minute ‘til I gotta go anyway.”  

Your hands were under your head with your elbows out to the side.  He walked on his knees back up the table, pants dragging against your sides.  Then he slid his large, veiny hands under your arms, sending a rush through you.  He put his forearms down on the table.  Then he got in a plank and you felt the linen of his tunic hang against your needy skin. 

He dipped his hips and lightly grazed your ass with the hardness in his pants.  He murmured into your hair, “Guess this is what you want?”

“Mmmm, yeah. . .” you replied.

Then he laid onto you, lowering his pelvis first.  You moaned and he sighed as his hard bulge pushed against your inner thighs. 

"Gimme all your weight."

He slowly lowered more of his weight.  

“God damn, sugar. . . you got me breakin’ all kinda rules.” He swelled harder against you, making your whole body weak with desire, and you savored the weight of his body on yours.  Your insides buzzed from head to toe.  His hips just barely thrust into yours, making you wetter.  

“Mmm,” you sighed.

He stayed there for a minute, just barely rutting into you, then sighed loudly as he climbed down from the table.  “Sorry, sugar.  That’s it for today.”  His massive palm lightly stroked your upper back.  “I’ll let you get dressed.” 

You turned over onto your side, facing him before he could turn around to leave.  You followed his eyes to your naked breasts before he could avert them.  He swallowed and clasped his hands in front of his crotch, trying to regain his composure. 

“Joel….” you said and lightly stroked his inner elbow.  His eyes met yours again and he bit his lip.  “Thank you.” 

He winked. “See ya next time, sugar.” 

-

You looked at the clock and realized you might make him late for his next appointment.  You quickly dressed in a daze, your whole body tingling with the afterglow as you put on your jeans and t-shirt.  It wasn’t until you were in the parking lot that you realized you left your keys on the hook in his massage room.  When you came back in, the receptionist was closing the appointment book.  

“Excuse me, I don’t want to interrupt Joel’s next appointment, but I left my keys in there. . ..”

“Oh, you were his last appointment for the day.  I think he’s probably gone.”

“Oh. . .” 

“Go ahead, it should be unlocked.” 

-

As you approached the door and put your hand on it, you heard him sighing over the squish of skin.  Your breath hitched.  So that was why he had to go.  Fair enough.  You took a deep breath, turned the handle, and opened the door.  

In the dimly lit room, Joel was seated in the chair with his legs spread wide.  His strong, veiny hand was wrapped around his hard cock. He froze when you opened the door, pausing mid-stroke. You nearly scared him to death.  He opened his mouth, but words didn’t come out.  There was a look in your eyes that paralyzed him.  He watched with bated breath as you closed the door behind you.  You took your keys off the wall and suddenly he looked more embarrassed, like of course, that’s why you’re back.  

He started to tuck himself away, but you shook your head, don’t.  You stepped out of your shoes, and as soon as you pocketed your keys, you unbuttoned your pants.   You took  your underwear down with them and his eyes fell to your nakedness.  He looked at you with his chest heaving, mouth watering, and rubbed his lips together as you crossed the room.  He was holding his dick back against himself and cupping his balls with his other hand. 

When you got to him, you put your hands on his shoulders, and slowly mounted him.  You stayed hovering over his lap, then you took off your shirt and bra.  One more step and you would be directly over his cock.  “God damn, you’re hot,” he said to your tits, then took a deep breath.  

“Heard you’re off the clock now,” you replied in a low, sexy voice.  

“Guess I am,” he murmured, glancing up at your face.  

You looked down at his stiff member, weeping with precum, and you wet your lips.  He held it at attention for you and gently cupped your ass with his other hand.  He gave it a light squeeze with his palm, prompting you to take that last step forward.  His face looked about as needy as you were for his body on yours earlier.  His cock looked delicious and its angry pink head was begging to be inside you.  His girth was impressive, and it had been a long time for you, but you knew you could take him because you had never, ever been so ready.  Your body yearned to be filled by his.  

You lowered yourself onto him, and when his cock’s swollen head met your dripping entrance, you sighed as your body took him in.  You sank right down, letting his girth spread you apart.  You gasped when your bodies were flush and sighed as your body finished rearranging itself around him.

“Fuuck,” he breathed.  He looked down at where your bodies met, then looked back up at you, astonished.  

You gently rocked there, enjoying the fullness of him all the way inside you. His pubic bone, cushioned by neatly trimmed hair, rubbed against your clit and your pleasure built rapidly.  

You began to lift and lower yourself on his rock-hard shaft and he grunted as his hips moved in rhythm with yours.  Each time you claimed his full length, the tension inside you swelled.  He looked back and forth between your eyes and mouth, then you kissed him.  He eagerly accepted your mouth, and when your tongue parted his lips, he sucked with an, "Mmm."  Your lips broke away only to whimper as you rode him, building quickly toward your orgasm.  Your breath was hot against his cheek, and his against yours as you rode his thick cock.  His head fell back with a moan.

“Easy. sugar. I’m not lastin’ long like this.” His voice amplified everything you were feeling.  The next time you took his full shaft inside you,  you stayed down and rocked your hips again. 

“Fuck, you feel too good,” he panted and a look of pain spread across his face. He held both your ass cheeks. His lips puckered with an exhale, his climax looming ever closer.  You came down hard on him one last time and groaned as your tension released into something otherworldly.  You clenched around him and a powerful flex of his strong arms abruptly lifted you by the ass, prying you off his cock.  

He came as soon as his cock sprang out of you.  Still in the throws of your own climax, you pulsed and moaned and and sat on his thighs watching the last of his cum dribble onto his uniform.  

“Sorry,” he panted, catching his breath.  He was self-conscious about the timing, even though you came.  

“Shouldn’t have started without me,” you teased him. You sat there for a minute in silence and rested your head on his shoulder.  He rubbed your back. 

You asked him, “What were you thinking about?”

“Hmm?” he asked. 

“When I walked in on you.  What were you thinking about?”

He looked at the massage table.  “How ‘bout I show you next time?” 

-

As always, thank you SO much for your engagement! I love y'all so much. 🖤 I notice and appreciate every comment and reblog even if I don't respond out of self consciousness to flood my comments.

PSA, PLEASE CHECK YOUR CONTENT SETTINGS. Many of my posts have been flagged very quickly recently even if they weren't explicit (like lincoln 1) so if you don't want to miss anything, you might want to follow me and check my profile regularly (filter to "latest fics" from my header) or get on the joel tag list.

[sundrop-writes]

Emergency Contact

Jason Todd x Gender Neutral Reader

You choke on your words, but you swallow them faster.

Just want you to be my Emergency Contact.

Summary:

After Jason miraculously comes home from his brush with Deathstroke, you’re both feeling it in very different ways. You have an unexpected physical wound from the battle, and he has many (very expected) emotional wounds. You help each other heal. Even if it’s very stubborn on both your parts.

Jason Todd x GN!Powered!Reader. Enemies/FWB to Lovers. Angst and Hurt/Comfort. (Slight Smut). Set during Season 2, Episode 5.

Word Count: 10,400

DC Titans Masterlist | AO3 Link

THIS IS A RE-POST. This is a fic from my old blog (a blog that was shadowbanned, forcing me to move). This fic is not stolen, it is completely mine, and I am just re-posting it to help people find my new blog, and to make my masterlist complete when I post new fics for this fandom.

Detailed warnings and author’s notes below the cut.

...

Warnings: general emotional angst, Jason has a self deprecating inner dialogue, (kind of) enemies to lovers - more like annoyances to fuck buddies to lovers, friends with benefits to lovers, the reader and Jason have a bantering/argumentative nature to their relationship, the reader is meant to be 100% gender neutral (the reader is never referred to in the third person, so there is no need to use they/them pronouns, but the reader is not called she/her or he/him), Jason calls the reader ‘babe’ (imo, a completely gender neutral term and he would call anybody that), mentions of alcohol (Jason drinking a beer), the reader character has ice powers (not entirely relevant to the plot but I couldn’t help myself lmao).

sexual themes throughout, mentions of sexting (no detailed descriptions), mentions of sexting in public, mentions of the reader character sending nudes to Jason (no detailed descriptions of the photos), one scene with detailed smut (but it is not the primary focus of the fic), the reader’s genitals are not described in any specific way, some dirty talk, Jason is more dominant and the reader is more submissive, penetrative sex, Jason is annoying even during sex, Jason has a pain kink (even when he’s a dom, he’s a painslut, I don’t make the rules), scratching/marking (Jason receiving), slight humiliation kink.

mentions of canon level violence, mentions of kidnapping (in alignment with canon), mentions of Jason being beaten by Deathstroke, mentions of Jason’s near-death experience (being dropped off the building), gun violence, the reader is injured - has a bullet wound/bullet fragment in their stomach, mentions of blood, descriptions of first-aid, mentions of puss from an infected wound (theoretically, not something that happens in the fic). That should be everything.

A/N: The title for the fic comes from a song by Pierce the Veil of the same name. It’s a newer song, and it’s one that I absolutely went to when looking for a title for this fic. The concept of becoming someone’s emergency contact is about upgrading the relationship from casual to much more serious, and just the whole song, and specific lyrics in it suit this fic so well. I highly recommend listening to it paired with this fic.

This was based on a request from my old blog, but obvi I don’t have that ask anymore - the request was about Jason getting shot and having his wound attended to by the reader, but I changed it to the reader getting shot cause I thought that was more interesting and less common. If the person who made that request sees this and finds my new blog, I hope you enjoy it! And in general, I hope everyone who reads this enjoys it.

This is another re-post from my old blog, and I do have a sequel for it in my drafts, which I am not actively working on. And before I post the sequel, I do plan on tweaking this and revamping it a little, but I figured I would repost this for now just to have the masterlist complete on this blog.

...

If asked, you would be hard pressed to explain your relationship with Jason Todd. 

The best way you could describe it would probably be - friends with benefits? 

But most of the time, the two of you weren’t even friends. You weren’t the type to hang out casually, or spend time alone together if it didn’t involve ripping each other’s clothes off. 

If you ever exchanged secrets or those precious bits of your most raw selves, it was by mistake. It was through sarcasm, or coming off the tired lips of someone who had just been exhausted by a few orgasms. The two of you knew each other well, quite literally inside and out. But you always made a deep, concerted effort to hold each other at arm’s length. And maybe that’s part of what all the snark and harsh words were for. 

It wasn’t all arguing. You were friendly. You could be civil, at the very least. 

Right from the moment you had first met Jason, you had found him to be so damn annoying, a shitstain on the earth - yet, someone you couldn’t stay away from. The line between flirtatious banter and a truly grinding argument was always so thin with the two of you. 

… 

You hadn’t expected that your life would be truly changed when you walked into that safehouse in Chicago that day. You truly thought nothing of him when his eyes landed on you - in those moments, a completely anonymous stranger, raking his eyes over you like you were a piece of meat. It was a gaze that immediately made you feel naked, something that made you want to smack him. You told yourself it was because he was being a pervert, not because of the heat that curled in your gut at feeling so intensely desired by him. 

He had been sitting on the couch sipping a beer like he owned the place, his thighs spread wide in a way you immediately decided was arrogant and annoying rather than hot - showing off his muscle tone as if it was trying to break through his jeans. Definitely annoying. Definitely the stance of a fuckboy trying to look bigger and badder than he was. He definitely was not attractive. 

When Dick led you, Rachel, Gar, and Kory further into the condo that seemed far too conspicuous to be a safehouse, the stranger you would later come to know as Jason quickly spoke up. 

“Who are your friends?” He asked. 

As he rose from the couch, his eyes lingered on you. Though his words seemed more out of curiosity, you couldn’t help but feel that bite of something more salacious lingering in his voice. 

It caused you to scoff and roll your eyes. 

“Not important.” Dick declared, his voice snippy. He was clearly annoyed with this new guy, and you could tell that your perceptions of him were definitely not ill-informed. 

“Who’s he?” Kory asked, going for the obvious question. 

“Not important.” Dick parroted out the words again, sounding much shorter with his patience. 

“Anybody want a brew?” Jason asked, motioning with the beer bottle in his hand. 

“Brew?” You twisted your eyebrows with disgust, staring him down as you commented on his odd choice of slang. 

He didn’t get to reply, as you were trampled over by Gar’s enthusiastic voice in your ear. 

“I do!” He said, raising his hand with excitement. 

“No, you don’t.” You quickly told him, reaching out to grab his hand and put it back down. “It’s disgusting.” 

You had a grand suspicion that Gar had never drank beer before, and he had no idea what he was truly asking for. Rather, he was simply taking advantage of trying new things because Dick and Kory were incredibly slack parental figures and he was away from home for the first time. 

“No, no one wants a brew.” Dick sighed, shaking his head. He threw Jason a small glare and you resisted the urge to laugh. 

“That can’t be Adamson.” Kory said, motioning toward Jason. 

This left you confused. But you didn’t question it. 

“He’s not Adamson. Adamson’s in the bathroom. Unconscious.” Dick explained. 

“Hi, I’m Rachel.” Rachel told Jason, offering him a sweet smile - being her usual sweet self. 

“Jason.” He introduced himself, in that moment, finally giving you a name to that obnoxious face. 

“I’m Gar!” Gar said with a grin, to which Jason nodded. 

Jason caught you glaring at him, and looked you up and down again, as if trying to willfully tear off your clothes with his eyes. It made your skin itch with heat and you would forever deny that it was a feeling you liked. 

“What can I call you, babe?” He asked, his voice entirely slimy, the kind of tone he would have used to recite cheesy lines to Tinder dates, you were entirely sure of. 

Before you could come up with some clever reply, Dick sighed in frustration and started balking again. 

“Okay, who we all are doesn’t matter right now.” He pressed, his neck so entirely tense that veins began to pop from the skin. “Can we just chill out, relax, sit on the couch and watch TV or something?” 

It seemed that he wouldn’t get his wish. 

Gar quickly charged around the table, finding something else to get strung up about. 

“Yo, when did you get another one?” He asked, putting his hands on both of the expensive cases on the long dining table - a copy identical to the one you knew to be containing Dick’s Robin outfit. 

It made you curious, and the answer that followed certainly surprised you. 

“That one’s mine.” Jason said, his chest literally puffing out with pride as he stated the fact. 

“No way.” You scoffed. 

“Yes way.” He quickly argued back, the whole exchange sounding entirely juvenile.

“This one’s yours? Wait, you’re Robin too?” Gar quickly put the pieces together. 

“I thought you were Robin?” Rachel commented, tilting her head toward Dick with curiosity. 

“I am.” Dick said firmly. 

“He was.” Jason corrected, a cocky smirk forming across his lips. 

“Batman really lowered the height requirement, huh.” You said. 

The words flew from your mouth before you could stop them, seeing as it was likely the only thing you could nitpick about Jason’s appearance. Between his stunning sharp jaw, his piercing blue eyes, his oddly appealing wild hair, his muscle tone being somehow visible beneath his baggy clothing - all of it made you equally frustrated and annoyed with him, and your baser urges couldn’t resist the low-hanging fruit. 

You felt victory and a slight pang of guilt when Jason deflated because of your comment, shrinking back into himself at your words. 

He didn’t have anything to say in return, he simply sipped his beer. 

“Wait, how many Robins are there?” Gar said, beginning to excitedly ramble at the thought. “Are there a lot? Cause I would love to-” 

“Okay, quiet.” Kory cut him off, clearly becoming annoyed with all of this dancing around the point as much as Dick was. “Sit.” 

Her words were firm, and you couldn’t help but to listen. You found yourself collapsing to sit on the couch while Rachel and Gar took seats at the dining table. Jason continued to linger in the middle of the room, staring at Kory and Dick as their frustration filled the air. 

“Bathroom.” Kory told Dick, and then they left to deal with whoever - or whatever - Adamson was. 

Jason sighed and took a seat beside you. When his eyes fell on you, you set your jaw and glared at him. You didn’t give away a single ounce of the heat you were feeling as his eyes locked with yours. 

“Even if I am the shorter Robin, I can assure you that everything else about me is… very long.” He lowered his voice and whispered those last words, crowding into your personal space as he did so. 

It sent shivers down your spine, his silken voice making the words sound too tempting. Even if you twisted your face and said ‘gross!’ causing him to dissolve into laughter, you didn’t make an effort to move away from him or put any space between your two bodies on the very large couch. You told yourself it was because you were tired from a very long day of travel, not because you were enjoying the smell of his strangely expensive cologne from this close by. 

His grin was still entirely smug, and you couldn’t stand it. 

When he raised the beer bottle up to his mouth again, you reached over and put a hand on his forearm, forcefully dragging his arm down as you made a snide comment. 

“That shit is disgusting, why the hell do you drink it?” You asked. 

You found your face drifting toward his again and if asked, you would say it was a form of intimidation - not that you were being drawn in by an unconscious attraction to him. 

“Because I can.” He replied, just as snide as he slipped your grip and sipped on the drink. 

You mocked his words in an entirely childish voice, and then you raised a single finger up to it and skimmed along the neck of the bottle. It took only a single moment of concentration with your skilled powers to freeze the beer inside solid. He thought he felt an extra chill coming off his hand, but convinced himself that he imagined it. But when he kept it tilted and nothing came out to meet his lips, he shook it and then stuck an inquiring eye inside the bottle. 

When he saw that it was completely frozen, he looked over and saw you grinning, and little did you know - that was the moment he became completely taken with you. You were one of the most annoying people he had ever met, and he found himself so intensely attracted to you. 

Even if it was getting under your skin by arguing with you or fucking your brains out, he knew in that moment - he had to get inside you and drive you insane the same way that he knew you would for him. 

… 

When Dick left to go check on his old circus friend Clay, Jason winked at you and said ‘don’t miss me too much’. You made a show of putting a finger near your mouth and audibly gagging. 

Later that night, when Jason didn’t return, you hated the curl of disappointment that panged in your stomach. You wanted to hit yourself for staring at the door, waiting for the second Robin to come in behind Dick. 

You hated yourself even more for replying to Jason’s texts. 

Apparently he had taken your phone out of your jacket pocket when you went to the bathroom (not to see Adamson - a different bathroom, to pee). And he had put himself in your contacts as ‘Hot Guy’. He had also sent himself a text from your phone that read ‘omg Jason you’re so hot, will you fuck me?’. And then replied to it from his own phone with a picture of his cock. 

Unfortunately, the only thing you could mock about the picture was poor lighting. 

When you told him as much, he quickly remedied that with several more pictures - ones with better lighting. He sent a video with very distinct audio. You would deny that you rushed to put your headphones in to listen to it while you sat on the train with Kory and Gar. You would deny that it drove a hard, hot pain between your thighs. 

You dug through a folder and sent some pictures of your own. You told yourself it was to prove to him that you were too good for him - to show off something he could never actually have. To tease him. 

You would deny that you loved the compliments he gave you, that you ate up the affection like a plant lovingly soaking up the sun. 

When you were sexting him, you had no clue that you were ever going to see him again. It was almost mindless, something for a dopamine hit to distract yourself from all the chaos going on around you. You weren’t doing it because you actually liked Jason. You didn’t have any real attractions toward him, or any real plans to carry out all of the bold things you said in those messages. 

You had no clue that you’d end up living together. 

When you did find out that Dick would be taking Jason into the newly reopened Titans Tower along with you, Gar, and Rachel, you didn’t make a big deal of it in your mind. When Jason made flirtatious remarks toward you in person, you brushed him off. You put up a wall. 

You told yourself that he was nothing more than a cocky, shallow guy who would use you for sex and then throw you away - something you could never actually build a proper relationship with. And if you were supposed to live together, be some kind of team like Dick expected you to be, then you couldn’t be messy. You couldn’t get emotional. 

You had no clue that on one of those first nights living together, your self assured discipline not to give into your lust for him would break like a wafer cookie, and you would be in his bed faster than a sea turtle running into ocean. 

… 

“Fuck, babe, you feel so good on my cock.” Jason grunted, his face buried in your neck as he thrusted deep inside of you. The loud squelch of artificial wetness coming from between your thighs as he worked his hips, working you open with a needy, demanding pace. “Bet you love this cock, huh? Tell me how fuckin’ much you love it.” 

“Shut up.” 

The words came from your throat as a weak whimper, much less powerful than you had intended. 

You didn’t want to give him any more power than he already held over you - he had you weak and willing on his cock, something you would have never admitted could be true until it was happening in these moments. 

Though you would never admit it aloud, you loved the way he handled you. Having you pinned against the bed with his fingers digging into the flesh of your hips, having you breathless and moaning as he fucked into you with fast, obviously skilled strokes. Your nails cut into the flesh of his back, and he let out a low rumble from his gut as the sharp sting sent a wave of pleasure through him. 

You hated the twinge of lustful embarrassment that curled in your gut when he chuckled at your words. 

“Oh, you want me to shut up?” He asked, slightly breathless from the act himself, moving one hand beside your head to raise himself up slightly to look in your eyes. 

He was sweaty, disheveled, his hair a mess, his muscles taught with the effort as he continued to pound into you. You hated that you had imagined him much like this before, and that this outlived all of your fantasies. 

“Yes.” You fired back. “Just shut up and fuck me.” 

He bit his lip - something you didn’t know was him trying to hold back his orgasm, so utterly turned on by your bratty defiance, the twinge of a whimper in your voice as you said those words. 

“You weren’t tellin’ me to shut up when I was texting you.” 

He said, all hot breath fanning across your chin, his hips spearing forward in sharp, hard hits that made your skin smack loudly together. It made you work hard to suppress moans deep in your chest in a way that was painful, like venom inside your lungs. You wouldn’t give him the satisfaction of your sounds, of knowing just how good he was fucking you - even if he could see it written all over your pleasure twisted face. 

“You only begged for more when I was tellin’ you how I was gonna lay you on my bed. Take you apart… make you scream my name.” 

He reached his other hand from your hip to the point where you were joined. He began touching that tender place, making sharp, vicious strokes that were almost vengeful. Tears easily gathered in your eyes and he let out another chuckle when you choked on a deep, pleasurable wail. 

“Tell me, how many times did you touch yourself reading what I wrote?” 

He asked, leaning down to whisper the words right in your ear. 

“How many times did you cum thinking about me?” 

“I didn’t.” You choked out, digging your nails deeper into the skin of his back, causing him to grunt as the pain mixed with the pleasure flowing through him. 

“Sure, babe.” He smirked down at you, turning that look into something absolutely pavlovian that would forever make you feel his cock deep inside of you when you saw it, rather than feeling annoyed. 

Maybe from that point on, it was a bit of both. 

In an effort to shut him up, you reached up and claimed his lips. It was supposed to be a kiss, but it was mostly teeth. When you bit down on his bottom lip, snarling, he tasted blood and the way he moaned at the pain was absolutely unmistakable. It was something you remembered and used against him many times after that. 

… 

You wouldn’t allow yourself any room for self hatred when it came to that break in your self control. When it became an ongoing thing, you spun it as positive in your mind. 

It was just sexual release. You and Jason both needed it. It paired well with intense training and the heavy studying that Dick made you do. It lowered your stress levels a lot, and it helped you get through the day. 

The more time you spent around Jason, the more you got to know him, and the more you came to realize that he was nowhere near shallow. You easily saw that he was caring, deep, complex, troubled. The more time passed, you found yourself falling for him and the more you deeply denied it. Because it was just sex. 

Things were good between the two of you, and you knew that if you added anything else to the mix - any complicated, mushy feelings - you would fuck it up. 

You were especially reminded of this - how important it was not to fuck things up - just a day or so before every other force aside from you railed Titans Tower and began royally fucking things up. 

… 

It was a morning just like any other at Titans Tower. It was delightfully quiet - even though Dick demanded that everyone get up at ungodly early hours to begin training, you had somehow managed to wake up before everyone else and you were enjoying the peace it brought you. 

When you got up to see that Jason was already in the kitchen, standing at the counter as he munched on a bowl of cereal, you wanted to scorn the idea that your peace would be interrupted. But instead, you found yourself willfully suppressing a smile. 

You yawned and walked over to the counter, grabbing a bowl from one of the cupboards, thinking that cereal was just the right idea on his part. A deep frown cut through your face when you poured out the rest of the cereal box he had left on the counter, and a very measly amount fell into your bowl. 

“What kind of asshole only leaves three fucking cornflakes in the bottom of the box?” You scoffed, causing him to chuckle. 

“Learn to count, babe.” He told you, speaking with his mouth half-full. “That’s more than three.” 

You rolled your eyes. You were likely exaggerating - but still, it seemed rude to you to leave such a small portion, barely a handful, in the bottom of the box. 

“Or did I make you cum so hard last night that I knocked the common sense out of your head?” He added on, throwing you that signature smirk that made heat bloom between your thighs. 

You let out a sarcastic snort, giving him a purposefully disgusted grimace as you lifted the bowl up and dumped the remaining cereal into his portion instead. 

“You might as well take these.” You told him. “And don’t flatter yourself, you’re not that good.” 

You moved behind them, distracting yourself from the conversation by making a cup of coffee. 

“Oh really?” He perked up, rising to his full height, pure mischief in his voice. “It didn’t sound like it last night.” 

Much to your horror, he then began imitating your moans. 

“‘Oh, Jason! Oh, fuck me! More!’” 

It was a cartoonish, pornographic imitation, something he likely wouldn’t have done if the others were anywhere within earshot. Oddly enough, even though your relationship was casual, you still kept it guarded and private, as though it were some precious secret that needed to be kept from the others. 

“‘Jason, please, your dick is the best! Oh, make me cum!’” 

But that was the farthest thing from your mind as embarrassment curled in your stomach, the reaction he likely wanted to draw out of you. You hated that you didn’t truly know if it was accurate or not, because sometimes - yes, he did fuck your brains out and make you completely mindless on his cock. 

But you would never admit that he was right. 

“Shut up.” You sighed, causing him to dissolve into laughter, feeling as though he had won. 

But you wouldn’t simply leave it at that. 

Instead, as you pushed the button on the machine and your coffee began to drip, you turned around and gently placed your fingers on the side of his cereal bowl. You froze all the milk inside of it solid, making it into one large frozen chunk with the spoon stuck inside when he wasn’t looking - distracted, staring at your face, looking for any trace of the reaction that he had drawn out of you. 

You just glared, and he smirked once more. 

When he picked up the spoon again and went to take another bite, the entire bowl came with it. He sighed in defeat when he realized what you had done. 

“You know, it’s so damn annoying when you do that.” He sighed. 

“I know.” You grinned at him. 

He couldn’t help the butterflies that fluttered in his stomach at this. He resisted the urge to grab you by the sides of your head and steal the grin of your mouth with his own. He told you that it was out of annoyance, and not affection. He told himself those lines were most definitely not blurred when it came to you. 

… 

Confessing your feelings to Jason would not have been your choice. 

Given the choice, you would have let your feelings quietly live and die inside of you. You would have just kept Jason as a friend. You would have even dropped the amazing sex if it meant staying on good terms with him. 

But the stakes rose pretty quickly, and things were taken out of your hands. The choice was stolen from you and Jason entirely against your will. 

When you found out he was missing, supposedly kidnapped by Doctor Light on the heels of some misguided plan - something inside of you shattered. Up until that moment, if you thought it was just a stupid crush, or an infatuation inside of you that would easily fade with time - you quickly found out that you were wrong. 

You went through the stages of grief like a rocket. 

Denial. Staring at the door, waiting for him to walk inside at any moment. Just like you had back at the safehouse.

Anger. Being so pissed at Dick at the other older Titans that you could barely breathe. How had they let this happen to him? How could they make him feel so inadequate that he felt the need to go out on his own, half-cocked, clearly doing something in the name of looking for their approval? 

Bargaining. You would have traded places with him. You would have been the one, alone and scared and stranded if it meant that he got to be at home safe. You would have gone with him to carry out the stupid plan if he had only asked. Why hadn’t he asked you? 

Depression. You wept in your room, hands clasped over your face, letting out chest-shaking sobs as you thought of the possibility of him never returning home again. You realized the possibility of him dying was very real and it made your lungs burn. 

And then finally - Acceptance. You finally accepted that your feelings for him were something bigger, and if it meant that you were the only person in the Tower who truly cared about him (probably aside from Gar) - the only person who didn’t just see him as a pawn to be used against Deathstroke - then you had to do something about it. 

So you laid out your love for Jason. You put it all on the line for him. You accidentally confessed to him, showed your feelings in a gesture so quiet it screamed. 

You knew that for someone who stepped up to become Robin, someone who scorned cops for pummeling down on the innocent when they were supposed to be protectors - stepping up to try and save his life meant a love bigger than anything else you could have done. 

And he was terrified of it. There was a big justice in your love for him. And to him, there was an even bigger justice in giving you an out to escape it - to escape loving him.  

… 

Hectic. 

That was easily how you would describe the last few days at Titans Tower. 

Between the unexpected arrival of Rose - Dick taking on another stray because, like Rachel said, he couldn’t resist a bird with a broken wing. Finding out that she was related to one of the deadliest men on earth that the Titans apparently had previous history with. And then Jason going off on his own without telling you, some botched hostage trade, and the group picking up yet another stray - a strange boy who had saved Jason’s life. It was all a blur of hectic chaos that had you snapping your neck to keep up. 

Sleep was scarce and you couldn’t remember the last time you’d had a proper meal. 

But you weren’t truly worried about any of that. 

Dust had been kicked up around your life, and you couldn’t wait for it to settle before you made your next important decision. 

Even though the wounds were still tender, you knew that things were safe for now, and your number one concern was Jason. 

The minute he had gotten in the door, even though he was slightly hobbled and clearly sore from whatever Deathstroke had done to him, he rushed out of your sight. He was clearly eager to get away from everyone like a wounded animal sulking away to lick his wounds in peace. And when you had chased him, ignoring a nagging pain in your own side from the fight, he had slammed his bedroom door in your face, entirely uncaring of the fact that you called out his name, concerned for him. 

The rest of the group was distracted with Conner - not knowing what he had been shot with or how to fix it. You hated it, but in the eyes of the group, yet again, Jason and any of his problems fell to the back burner. 

After you had taken a short shower and changed your clothes, you found yourself here. Standing in front of Jason’s closed bedroom door, hoping not to face another cold rejection. 

You wondered if he would be sleeping, wondered if you should interrupt his peace. But you knew that sleep was unlikely after everything that had happened. 

So you took the leap. 

You raised a fist, once again pushing down that stinging pain coming from the right side of your stomach. You reasoned that it was probably nothing more than a bruise forming there. And you knocked on the door. 

A few moments later, the door was jerked open, and Jason glared at you. 

His eyes were dull and tired, and there was a large bruise forming on the side of his mouth. Probably one of many others that you couldn’t see, from the way he had been walking earlier. He likely hadn’t been sleeping, but you had disturbed him. 

“What the hell do you want?” He grumbled out, his voice dull, lacking any true fight. 

“I wanted to check on you.” You told him, entirely honest. “I know it might seem stupid, but I wanna see how you’re doing.” 

Jason scoffed and rolled his eyes. 

He wanted to agree that - yes, it was stupid. It should have been obvious how he was doing after being kidnapped, beaten, and dropped off a building. But he was an idiot who had gotten himself thrown headfirst into that mess, thinking he could handle it. And he didn’t need to go crying to you about how badly he had fucked up. He had made a poor choice and he deserved all of the consequences. It was a simple fact of life. 

“I’m doing just fine, thanks.” Jason said, entirely snide and sarcastic. “Look, I don’t need your help, okay? So fuck off.” 

It was a set of harsh, cutting words. But he thought getting distance from you would be best. This whole thing had woken him up from the sweet little fantasy the two of you had been participating in. He was a natural born fuck-up. And sure, he could have you for a while, play around a bit - but he could never truly make you happy. Eventually, he would fuck you up too. He was a harsh poison and it would be better if he got out of your life before you felt the full effects. 

He moved to shove the door closed and upon instinct, you reached up and fought him on it. Unconsciously, you winced as a sharp pain came from the injury in your stomach, reaching for it with your free hand as you held the door open with the other. It should have been no big deal. With your meta abilities, you usually healed quicker. You weren’t even used to feeling it when you got hurt. You were probably just feeling it worse because you were tired. 

You tried to ignore the pain. But in a moment, Jason’s eyes went wide with worry as his gaze darted from your face, knit with pain, to where your hand was nursing the injury. Any sense of smarmy discontent dropped from his features, immediately being replaced with a softness and worry for you. 

“You’re hurt.” He said quietly. 

He let the door fall open again, reaching for your hand to inspect the injury himself. 

“I’m fine.” You played the card this time, exchanging his lie for your own. 

It was an odd play. He had lied about not being so torn up inside, emotionally devastated as he was, and now you were lying about not being physically injured from the fight. The two of you made an odd, but perfectly matched pair. 

Jason barreled right past your words, and you were easily pliant to his touch as he removed your hand from the injury. You certainly were not expecting for him to find anything incriminating under your hand. But he glared at you when he found bright red spread across your palm, a glossy wetness leaking through your shirt. 

“You’re bleeding.” He grunted at you. 

Clearly, he was disappointed in the fact that you had neglected to bring this injury to the group’s attention. Pissed off at the fact that you weren’t in the medbay with Conner receiving some treatment right now. 

Maybe you could blame it on the chaos. Maybe you could blame it on the fact that with everyone so emotionally distraught, you didn’t want to be just another problem for everyone to fuss over. 

“Whoops.” You breathed out sarcastically. “I didn’t even notice.” 

That last part was honest. In all the adrenaline, all your worrying over whether or not Jason was going to live as you watched him dangle so high off the ground - you truly hadn’t paid any mind to the injury. 

“You didn’t-?” Jason huffed out in anger, but didn’t bother finishing the sentence. 

Perhaps he partially understood himself, knowing how the adrenaline from a fight could stamp out pain. Or perhaps he knew how truly stubborn you were and he didn’t want to waste his energy arguing with you. 

“You need this treated.” He added on. 

No matter how fucked in the head he was, he never wanted to see you hurt. That was something he would definitely waste his energy on - wearing down your stubbornness until you let him or someone else in the house take care of the injury properly. 

“Conner is worse off than I am.” You shrugged. “He needs the attention more.” 

“Then let me help you.” He said, an impatient nagging rising up in his throat. “Bruce gave me some first aid training. One thing that means I’m not totally useless.” 

The words made your chest ache for him, a pain that easily competed with the bleeding wound. 

“Jason-” 

You wanted to argue with him. You wanted to tell him he had infinite worth to you. 

But of course, he cut you off. 

“Just go sit on the bed.” He told you, quiet, but a firm command that you couldn’t ignore. 

He gently pushed past you, on a quest for some supplies to patch you up with. You then found yourself drifting into his room almost mindlessly, your hand clutching the wound again upon instinct. It was a place that you felt oddly at home. The nights you had spent in that bed since coming to Titans Tower, your head delightfully empty as he had fucked you hard and fast - they were by far your favourites. 

You would say it was because of the sex, and not just because you got to be wrapped up in Jason’s arms. Maybe everything had changed. Maybe your answers were different now. Maybe you were raw and tender and Jason wasn’t prepared to chase you in that devotion. 

But that was just the thing. With you and Jason, there was never any sense of devotion. You and Jason were always hard and fast. Teasing each other, verging on the edge of vengeful. It was a flame that burned intensely hot - but it was never anything soft. It was never anything that prompted you to knock on his door so late, wanting to check on his well being. It was nothing that prompted you to make chase to put your life on the line for him. 

Even just knowing that he had the intent to attend to your injury, called himself useful because of it - the thought cradled you like a warm blanket. It had you balancing on the edge of a dam holding back a barrage of feelings that you had been quelling down since the moment you had first put your lips on his.

“I told you to sit.” Jason’s voice came from behind you. 

He had raided the infirmary and now had a handful of supplies - luckily without anyone seeing him or questioning why. When you turned to him, he was closing the bedroom door behind him, sealing you both in with this newfound soft intensity, the tired lull of two people unwilling to hold back that softness anymore. It was entirely dangerous, and entirely life-saving at the same time; and neither of you realized it. 

“Since when do you get to boss me around?” You told him, your voice low and lacking any true spirit or sarcasm. 

It was in the same vein as the banter the two of you usually threw around - bickering about who was a bigger asshole, who was more stubborn, who was better in bed. 

You expected some kind of sexual comment in return. You could almost hear it now - he was the boss of you because he made you melt on his cock, made you mindless and dumb with it. 

But, no dice. 

The longer you stared at him, catching bits of the fresh pain swimming through those gorgeous blue eyes, you wished so badly for the mischief and sarcasm and light to come back and bite you the way that it used to. 

It only made your stomach churn harder at the whole situation. Things had officially changed between you and Jason. You had yet to find out if it was for the better, or for the painstakingly worse. 

Jason sighed through his nose. 

“You can be such an asshole sometimes.” He told you. Coming from him, and given the nature of your relationship, you knew it was almost a compliment. “Will you just sit down and let me help you?” 

Even though you were utterly terrified of the swelling of emotions you felt, bound to come to a head - you did. 

You sat on the edge of the bed and he placed the supplies beside you. 

When he mumbled out a quiet ‘lay back’, and you did, his cool fingertips at the hem of your shirt pulling it upward felt strangely more intimate than any other time you had been in this same position. It wasn’t heady, you weren’t granted the distraction of his mouth on yours and his tongue shoved between your lips while a harsh throbbing nagged between your legs.

This was quiet, and calm, and gentle. 

When you caught his eye above you as he wiped away the blood with some clean gauze, you saw nothing but pity and worry and sparkling affection for you. You almost dared to call it something as epic and dangerous as love, buried deep in his eyes. He worked with the most delicate touch, almost as if he was afraid to break you, before he glanced down and inspected the wound. 

His brow furrowed with even more intense worry, guilt nipping at his insides when he got a good look at it. 

“I think I see a bullet in here.” He told you, and then he moved around the bed and grabbed his phone, turning on the flashlight to have a better light to inspect it. You felt intensely naked, intensely caught when he began shining the light on your stomach with a harshly inquisitive look across his face. “Definitely something shiny. You got shot and you didn’t fucking tell anyone?” 

It was only then that you realized when you had gotten the wound - the exact moment clicking into place in your mind. 

“It was only a ricochet.” You argued quietly. “It’s not that bad.” 

Jason scoffed and rolled his eyes, and began sorting out his supplies, preparing to pull out whatever was lodged inside of you. 

… 

Dick explicitly told you to stay put. 

They only wanted the more experienced Titans, the Varsity squad on the case when dealing with Deathstroke. He blamed young naive incompetence as the reason Jason had gotten captured in the first place. You blamed him and Bruce pushing Jason out, making him feel like he needed so desperately to prove himself. But it was something Dick wasn’t ready to hear - an argument you weren’t going to have with the very stubborn team leader. 

Instead, you went for the silent route. You trailed the rest of them out of Tower, and when Dick strayed away from the rest of the group, his head on a swivel as he glanced back and forth, seemingly wanting to assure that none of the others were following him - you followed your gut instincts and went after him. 

You hid in the shadows and the moment that Deathstroke hit the button and those panels scrolled up, revealing Jason stranded on that scaffolding - you couldn’t help yourself. 

“Jason!” 

You screamed out his name, you leapt forward. 

Dick didn’t have time to scold you, not before the gunfire started. 

Kory came out of nowhere - seemingly, she had the same idea as you. Putting her life on the line for an emotionally repressed man that she hadn’t admitted her feelings for. But she was there because she was in love with the other Robin. (Or rather, a man who claimed over and over again that he wasn’t Robin.) 

Things quickly became a blur - flashes of flame as Kory fought, battling with the muzzle flashes from Deathstroke’s guns, limbs flying as they fought each other. You didn’t see it, but Deathstroke raised and aimed at you as you rushed toward the window, blindly going after Jason. In response, Dick charged forward, redirecting the gun as he pulled the trigger. You heard the sharp ‘ping’ sound of metal on metal - what you couldn’t see was the bullet hitting one of the metal beams in the ceiling. But you certainly felt it when it sliced into your side. 

At the time, it was nothing compared to the fear you felt for Jason. 

His eyes were wide with terror, and you could only focus on getting him to safety. You had no idea that a large part of his panic came from seeing you in the building. He had hoped that Dick would keep you away from all of this. But there you were, standing a few feet away from a man with a gun who was shooting around wildly. Jason would have delighted in being dropped off the building to his death if he had to see you get fatally shot when he could do nothing but squirm on the other side of the glass. 

You put two hands on the glass, banging on it - of course, it was no use. It was inches thick, meant to keep people from going through it at this height. Working entirely on instinct, you put your palms flat across it and began forming ice crystals over it, hoping to make it rigid and breakable if it was frozen. 

Once there was enough ice, you quickly looked around and spotted a metal pipe there for the in-progress construction of the building, so you grabbed it and rushed to smash the glass with it. You felt victorious as it shattered, and Jason flinched away from the shards, putting you one step closer to freeing him. 

Though the moment the glass was cleared, leaving the wind whipping around you, his first words of greeting to you were not celebratory. 

“What the hell are you doing here?” He barked at you, clearly angry with you. 

You felt a dull ache in your chest at this. You thought he might be relieved, happy, pleased. At the time, you couldn’t interpret his harsh reaction as worry for you possibly getting hurt. 

Nonetheless, you ignored his harshness. You would save him, whether he wanted to be saved or not. You draped your body through the window, reaching out to him. You made an effort to keep most of your weight planted on the floor of the building, in case the scaffolding wasn’t stable enough to hold two people at once. 

“What do you think?” You replied, pure sarcasm dripping through your voice as you reached behind Jason and began fiddling with the rope around his wrists. 

The position put the two of you in intensely close proximity. Jason caught a whiff of your unique scent, the shower gel you used that mingled with your body’s natural oils; and he felt so painfully at home. For the first time that night, he held back tears. He couldn’t help but to lean his forehead on your shoulder, taking comfort in having you so near after being on edge and terrified for so many hours. You resisted the urge to run a hand through his hair, to cradle him and give him further comfort. You forced yourself to focus on the task at hand - getting him to safety. 

Behind you, at the very back of the room, Dick and Deathstroke wrestled with the remote for the explosives attached to the scaffolding. 

Just as you managed to get Jason’s wrists freed, Deathstroke hit the switch, and the bombs went off. 

… 

You winced loudly as Jason dabbed at the wound with disinfectant. 

“I would say sorry… but, you’ll thank me later when this isn’t swollen and leaking puss.” He told you, throwing you a small smirk. 

It was smug. It was the usual kind of humor that he gave you. 

It was comforting to know that every trace of the Jason you knew hadn’t been stolen by Deathstroke. 

You held your breath as he pressed down with the medicine-covered gauze again, drawing much less of a reaction out of you this time. 

“Great mental image, Jay.” You replied, your voice dull. It lacked any of the true bite you wanted to deliver in response to him. “I’m sure it’s such a turn-on thinking about my puss.” 

It was meant to be a joke. But even unconsciously, it was an acknowledgement of that dangerous line - the line between truly caring and just using someone for sex. The line between having someone in your life as a body to get off with, and being so… homely with them. 

You and Jason were towing that line dangerously. It was a thread that you were balancing on, and it would either break, or you would cross to the other side and be forever bonded to him. 

Jason shrugged. “Maybe I don’t have to be turned on by you all the time.” 

There was more stuck in his throat. Another dangerous acknowledgement of that line. 

‘Maybe I just have to care.’ 

Both of you lulled into silence because neither of you dared to say it. 

After a few moments, Jason put down the gauze and hesitated to reach for the tweezers. He knew that pulling the bullet out would be painful, but inevitable. It was a lot like the state of your relationship with him. Break it off, and find happiness elsewhere, or acknowledge this big thing swelling to fruition between the two of you. Have Jason fuck it up eventually. Painful, but inevitable. 

“You shouldn’t have to be hurt like this.” Jason said quietly. “You shouldn’t have gotten hurt for my sake.” 

There it was again - words with a dangerous double meaning. 

You looked up at him, pure pain knit across his face, and for a moment he looked from the tweezers to you and he could hardly stand holding your gaze. 

‘It’s worth it.’ You wanted to say. ‘For you, I’d bear any pain.’ 

The words lived and died behind your eyes, and your tongue decided on something else entirely. 

“It’s nothing.” You told him. 

You downplayed the pain, pretending that the injury was only a minor inconvenience for you. And in the grand scheme of life, it was. With time, it would heal. Losing Jason would be something you’d never heal from. 

Jason shook his head at this statement. 

He forced himself to reach for the tweezers then. He handed you his phone, a silent agreement that you would hold the light as steady as you could. He knew you well, too well, and he knew that you needed something else to focus on to push away the pain. He put his free hand on the plush of your stomach, pulling back slightly to hold the wound open while you held the light on it. 

When the sharp metal of the tweezers breached your wound, you wanted to swear. You wanted to call him an asshole as the pain shot through you. You wanted to scold him for leaving the Tower and being kidnapped in the first place. But you knew that even if it was playful or sarcastic, fueled by the bite of your pain, it was not what he needed to hear right now. So instead, you held your breath, and gripped his phone hard, keeping the light steady as you bared the sharp shocks of pain. 

After a moment of digging around that felt like an eternity, he pulled out the fragment and held it up to show you as you collapsed back against the bed, panting with tears stinging the edges of your eyes. 

“It’s not nothing.” He declared sharply. 

You couldn’t conjure a response. You knew he was right. And you didn’t want to be forced to admit it. 

Instead, you turned off the light from his phone and relaxed into the bed, closing your eyes as he walked around to the trashcan and threw out the bullet fragment. It fell into the bottom of the plastic wastebasket with a very small ‘ping’ - making you wonder how something so small could cause so much trouble. 

Jason quickly returned to you, dabbing more disinfectant into the wound in a way that made you groan and flex away from the touch. Once again, he did not apologize. 

There were a few moments of muddy silence with nothing but your slightly labored breathing, trying to contain your sounds of pain so as to not make him feel any further guilt about the whole incident. 

Your mind churned, and you couldn’t help the next words that came from your mouth. 

“I meant what I said.” You told him. 

At the sound of this, his hands immediately stilled. You felt his eyes on you, and you forced yourself to open your own and look up at him once again. He stared you down with intense examination. He looked for any ounce of falsity, any sign that you were lying, even posturing to make him feel better after everything that had happened. 

He didn’t find any. 

You thought he might acknowledge you, that he might say something back to return your mighty words. Instead, he simply reached for more gauze, and began putting a final bandage on your wound. 

… 

The explosion caused a sharp rattle through your ears. It shocked you and made you dizzy and put the whole world off-kilter. The only thing you could perceive past the mind-numbing hum in your brain was the feeling of Jason’s rough glove gripping tightly onto your wrist, so you gripped back as hard as you could. 

When you blinked open your eyes, you were half-hanging out of the open window, the edge of the floor cutting into your waist as you held onto Jason by nothing but his wrist. His whole body weight created a harsh burn, straining on the muscles in your shoulder as you watched him dangle hundreds of feet above the street. 

Panic flooded you. 

You scrambled to reach out with your other hand, and the moment you moved, your shirt slipped against the sleek, polished material of the floor and you began sliding out the window. You gasped and Jason stilled his panicked flailing immediately. 

“Don’t move!” He shouted. 

“Give me your other hand so I can pull you up!” You shouted back. 

Beyond the unpleasant hum of your eardrums rattling, you still heard chaos behind you. Gunshots, the grunts of fighting, Kory and Dick’s voices yelling. They were busy with Deathstroke, they couldn’t help you or Jason. 

Jason looked up at you with glassy eyes. 

He knew that with all his gear weighing him down, even with the training you had been doing, you wouldn’t be able to pull him up. Not by yourself. And if you weren’t careful, his body weight would just pull you out of the window and cause you to go tumbling down to your death along with him. 

When you saw that frown etch across his lips, that filthy look of dawning - you glared at him. 

“Give me your other hand!” You screamed, your voice raking across your throat like hot coals. A hot boiling rage at the fact that he seemed almost determined to die. 

There was one thing he was determined about. If he was going to die, he wasn’t going to take you down with him. 

His gloved wrist started to slip from your nervous, sweaty palm, and you tried hard to hold on tight. You formed large shards of ice, hoping you could create some kind of bond there by freezing your hand to his. But it would only be temporary with gravity trying to tear the two of you apart. 

“You have to drop me, Y/N.” He said, nothing but pure mourning on his lips. “I’m dead weight.” 

You both knew it was a horrendous double meaning. 

He thought he was a dead weight to your life. 

“No!” You immediately defied this thought, that feral rage ripping at your throat once again. “I’m gonna pull you up. I’m gonna pull you up!” 

You reached your other hand down and tightly wrapped both of your hands around his wrist, yanking upward. The harsh movement caused you to slide even further out the window. You were now dangling dangerously over San Francisco with only the thickness of your thighs giving you any real stability on the intensely high up floor. It made you dizzy, and the only thing you had to focus on were the wet wells of Jason’s eyes staring up at you. 

“It’s no use!” Jason said tearfully. 

You ignored him. 

You cast your chin over your shoulder, and began shouting. 

“Help me!” You screamed, trying desperately to get the attention of Dick or Kory. “Help me! Fuck!” 

“You have to let go.”

Jason’s words immediately shifted your focus back to him. 

But of course, you refused. 

“I’m not letting go of you!” You declared sharply. “Not that easily.” 

As he stared up at your tearful eyes, he knew that you meant it as more. 

Unfortunately, it was the one thing he was terrified of. 

He thought that you saw him as some shiny perfect thing, something good and worth having in your life. He thought that you were incapable of seeing the poison, the true fuck-up that he was. If you didn’t let go of him, sooner or later, just like everyone else in his life, you were going to get burned. 

So Jason did what he had to do. 

He began prying your fingers off his wrist, trying his best to keep you stable while he forced himself from your grip. 

“No!” You shrieked. “No, no, no-” 

You didn’t have much room to fight him about it without falling out of the window yourself. 

You made a move to readjust, to get a tighter grip on him - and it was the one deadly move that caused him to slip out of your touch completely. 

You were forced to watch on in chest clenching horror, blinking through heavy tears as he began hurtling toward the ground. 

… 

If not for Conner - a literal miracle - swooping in and saving Jason at the last second, then you would have spent the rest of your life regretting those moments, wondering what you could have done differently to save him. 

When Jason finished taping down the bandages, making sure the wound was clean and secure, he laid his palm flat on top of it. It was a kind of ‘kissing it better’ that instantly spread warmth curling through your gut. It was a touch so incredibly tender - especially compared to the heated, aggressive groping you were used to from him - that it caused a whimper from the back of your throat. 

You knew it was unlikely, but you hoped that he hadn’t heard it. 

“All done.” He said quietly. 

You instantly felt regret when he took his hand away and began tidying up the medical supplies. But you forced yourself to sit upright, now feeling only muscle soreness and a much duller pain coming from the area. You felt intensely thankful for his care as you pulled your shirt back down, righting your clothes back into place. 

“You’re free to go now.” Jason told you, his voice still low, as though a single decibel would shatter the delicate peace between the two of you. 

You felt your heart sink. 

In an instant, you understood what it was - he was concerned about your physical wellbeing, but he didn’t actually want to have you around. Just like his reaction to you showing up at the hostage exchange - he didn’t want your presence there. 

You heaved a sigh and got off the bed as Jason busied himself with gathering up the used gauze to throw it away. As you put your hand on the doorknob, you couldn’t quite bring yourself to leave. 

It was something else. 

It had to be something else. 

Jason hadn’t let himself drop off a building in some desperate ploy just to get away from you. He had been trying to save you. 

He was so utterly willing to give his life for yours. 

And now he was trying to back down from that. 

You turned and faced him, leaving the door closed. When he turned from ditching things in the wastebasket, he froze. He was entirely surprised that you were still there.

The two of you locked eyes, both staying still - like a predator and prey locked in a stalemate, wondering who would run first. 

In this situation, you weren’t sure who was the prey. 

You were both so vulnerable. 

Jason thought it would be selfish to get caught up in all of this, to finally admit those dangerous feelings he had for you. When he cared for things, he usually ended up breaking them. Of course, it was never on purpose - he was an idiot. Everything he touched, he fucked up. He had made that more than evident with his last braindead plan, the outing to prove that he was worthy of being Robin. Something that had gotten you shot, probably could have gotten you killed. 

If you stuck with him any longer, you probably would end up being killed. And he would never forgive himself for that. 

He would be better off ripping himself from your hold, as much as it hurt. Giving you a dose of that heartbreak now so that you could get over him and go after better things. 

As you stared at Jason, you could see all the pain boiling underneath his surface. You wondered what he was thinking, what the hell he was churning over in that intense brain of his - but you didn’t dare to ask. 

You knew that he needed to be held right now - in every sense of the word. You knew that he needed to be cared for the way he had cared for your wound, pushing past the pain in order to heal. You wondered if he would lay down and bear it or if he would continue to fight you. 

You were the one to bravely step forward. Though Jason was tempted to ask you to leave, that thing inside of him yearning to marinate in his isolation because he deserved it, he pushed it down. He let his hands naturally come to sit on the plush comfort of your waist as you put a gentle touch on both his shoulders, leaning into his body ever so slightly. 

You laid your forehead on his cheek, right next to that ugly bruise that had been left on him, and he let out a contented sigh as he felt your warmth envelope him. For the first time since his feet had touched the ground, he felt calm. He felt safe. 

You smoothed a hand across his shoulder, and raised your head, using your touch to gently tip his face toward yours. He quickly realized that your intention was to kiss him. And something ached in his heart - something painful and longing. He knew that it would not be needy and haste with the intention of pile-driving toward sex like your other kisses had been. He knew that it would be the metamorphosis of your relationship that he was not prepared to go through. 

He nuzzled along your forehead, gently stopping you. 

“Please don’t do this.” He murmured quietly into your skin. 

He knew that it would break him. 

He knew that this was the moment - like Gatsby reaching up toward the stars - this would be the moment that he was tied to you forever, damned by his love for you. Only, much different than Gatsby, he wasn’t destined for some grant fate if he didn’t have you. He was on a one way path to a messy death, and he was determined not to take you down with him. 

Tears pricked the edges of his eyes at the thought. 

You pulled back, just enough to properly look him in the eyes, and your own tears formed when you saw that pathetic puppy dog looking back at you. 

“Why not?” You demanded, much sharper than you intended. You knew he was fragile and you didn’t want to upset him any further than he already was. 

“You know why.” He replied, his voice barely scraping above a whisper as the emotion clutched at his throat. 

Jason wanted to hold onto you forever, but he was also a realistic person. He expected that any minute now, you would rip away from his arms and charge out the door, entirely angry with him, and this would finally be over. You would finally be safe from him - safe from any nasty fate his life could conjure up for you. 

You hated what he was asking of you - asking you not to care for him anymore. As if you could somehow switch it off. Impossible. 

“I meant what I said.” You repeated yourself, still entirely firm in this conviction. “I’m not gonna let you go that easily.” 

You leaned in, planting your lips on his in a light kiss. A pained sigh ripped through you when he didn’t make any moves to kiss you back. 

“Jason, please.” You whimpered out desperately. “If you get to bandage my bullet wound, then I get to do this.” 

Jason wanted to spell it all out for you, plain and dirty. He wanted to get angry, he wanted to scream. He wanted to rush along the inevitable. He wanted to tell you what a poison he was to the world, that he deserved to die and you deserved better things. But he had the utmost feeling that you wouldn’t listen. 

“Please, stop pushing me away.” You whispered against his lips. 

Instead, he listened to your plea. He let himself indulge in this selfish softness for once. 

He reached up and grabbed your jaw, pulling you into a firmer kiss, declaring every ounce of passion and terror that he was feeling in those moments. You answered it all right back - digging your fingers into the shoulders of his shirt, letting out a hot huff against his cheek as you leaned into his body. 

He would never be perfect - but he was yours.

...

PLEASE NOTE: I do have a sequel in mind for this, but I don't know when I am going to have it finished and posted. Please do not ask me to write more of this or ask me when the sequel will be coming. If you are going to comment, please comment about the body of work here that I have already written.

[herecirmsims]

Sunshine Protector

So here we are - my 100th posepack! That feels like a silly number to be honest, and like I should apologise for spamming with my nonsense over the last two years. I'm so grateful to everyone who's used my poses, and who've made requests; it's definitely helped me improve! Thank you!!

For this 100th pack, I decided to make some poses specifically for it rather than sharing requested poses/poses I've already made for my story. I adore the sunshine x protector trope so that's what I did here, except because I'm me and I'm annoying, in this pack it's the shorter Sim who's in the protector role. It matches the dynamic of my main couple and it's been hard to find poses that reflect that.

These were made with masc rigs and there may be clipping or floating depending on Sim and body type.

You will need: - Pose Player - Teleport Any Sim or MCCC

TOU: please don’t paywall or claim as your own. You may adjust for personal use to avoid clipping etc., but please don’t pass them off as your own work.

DOWNLOAD HERE (SFS)

You can easily browse more of my posepacks in my gallery.

Also! My Sims story's 2 year anniversary was a couple of months ago and I missed it for various reasons, so I thought I'd do a joint celebration since it's this story that got me into making poses in the first place. I made a bunch of gifts and hated them all except for this one - Fen's sock collection, since his socks are the real main character. I used prints from the freebie section of the CreativeFabrica site btw which I highly recommend!

Download Fen's sock collection here (SFS) The Maxis Match Feet link is here

Thank you @ts4-poses and @alwaysfreecc !

[thisismysecondrodeo]

obsessed with thinking about how ted would react to seeing y/n in more revealing clothes for the first time; short shorts, a crop top, a bikini, maybe some lingerie that y/n picked out just for him 😁😁

AN: Thank you for being patient this request has been bumping around in my inbox for a while and it's a good one!!

Swimsuit for reference (a black-owned brand I highly recommend so affordable! I own 3 of their swimsuits lol)

Rating: Mature

Tags: Secret Relationship, Established Relationship, Pre-smut, Vacation, When you're trying to get it on but your boss walks in, Reader in a swimsuit, Ted losing it just a little Fic Masterlist

-

You and Ted had been surprisingly successful at keeping your relationship under wraps at work. Of course HR knew; as soon as you got hired as Rebecca's personal assistant and Ted volunteered to give you a tour of the pitch, you knew he'd be a problem. You saw more of his broad shoulders in his white polo than you saw any of Nelson Road. And you were too busy looking at him to notice him looking at you. Back upstairs, you tried to surreptitiously ask for the policy on dating colleagues, but it was obvious who you were interested in, and it only took a few days for both of you to get your shit together and make a move.

It was a mutual decision to keep the relationship quiet: you were still getting your bearings at work and Ted had enough going on as it was. But it was certainly nice to pop in on him on quiet days with a coffee or to sit out on the pitch while you sent emails and pretend like you didn't see Ted trying to impress you with tricks the boys had taught him. A few of the boys had asked if you were seeing anyone and Keeley and Rebecca had tried to set you up a few times, and you were so thankful for the friendships you were forming but it was getting harder to come up with creative ways to shut them down. You and Ted hadn't spoken about how long you would keep things under wraps but you were in no big rush, especially when you still got to come home to your boyfriend in a Kansas City t-shirt and sweatpants cooking carbonara and offering you a glass of wine.

"So are you excited for the teambuilding extravaganza," you smiled at Ted as you hopped up on the counter beside him watching him beat together eggs and cheese.

"Sure am! I'm already packed. Looking forward to 5 beautiful days in Majorca. Just hope the boys don't get into too much trouble out there."

"M-Majorca?"

Ted looked at you over his shoulder confused at your reaction but then he smirked, "Well yeah? Why is something wrong with Majorca?"

"Nothing's wrong with Majorca," you laughed. "Rebecca just asked me to go with her to Majorca but she didn't mention anything about the team..."

Ted was plating up pasta as you chuckled over what you thought was a coincidence and you followed him to the table. "I may have been a little earworm in the bosses' ear, suggested the boys might stay out of the news if the boss was nearby."

"Ted!" You exclaimed when you realized he looked somewhat sheepish. "What you're saying is you tricked my boss into going on vacation so you could hang out on a beach with your girlfriend?"

Conveniently, Ted had too much pasta in his mouth to respond beyond a small shrug and you laughed. You were only teasingly mad, because you were already planning the outfits you'd pack and the sneaking around the two of you'd get into. "Well I guess I better get packing too," you said and watched as Ted beamed.

-

You'd scheduled Rebecca a couple hours of massages and facials and she'd invited you to join her but you declined. You weren't lying when you told her you weren't big on massages, but you certainly did have ulterior motives. You slipped on a swimsuit you'd bought specifically with Ted in mind: a colorful abstract two pieces, thin straps crisscrossing your midsection. He'd sent you a selfie from the hotel beach so you knew exactly where he'd be. He'd captioned it vacation face because he hadn't shaved and his salt and pepper scruff was in full effect. You couldn't deny it did something to you to see it in a picture, you knew you'd lose it to see it in person.

Stepping out on the beach, a few of the players called out hellos and you waved but kept moving, knowing you were still technically at work and just popping out to see Ted. You found him in a beach chair next to Beard, who was snoozing with his latest paperback tented over his face. Ted on the other hand was looking right at you, the arms of his orange-tinted sunglasses glinting in the sun, his lips slightly parted. You smiled, but crossing the sand with his gaze heavy on you brought on a sudden wave of lust. You wanted to know exactly what he was thinking and feeling. You wanted to climb into his lap in that chair and feel his stubble, secret relationship be damned.

He took his sunglasses off as you approached, tucking them into the pocket of the short sleeve linen shirt he was wearing. He looked downright delectable on vacation and you couldn't wait to say just that. Meanwhile, he was looking at you like a precious piece of art. His eyes roamed every inch of your exposed skin from top to bottom and back again and a blush crept up his cheeks that you knew wasn't just from the sun

"Hiya Coach," you flirted and Ted bit his bottom lip, his hand reaching for you on instinct before he realized where he was.

"Hi Y/N, you look...," he glanced over at Beard but seemed content that the man was sleeping, "fucking fantastic." Your jaw dropped at the profanity that he never used in public but put to use frequently in the bedroom. The look in Ted's eyes was as erotic as you've ever seen and you wanted his hands on you immediately.

"I was going to ask if this seat was taken," you gestured to the chair on the other side of him, "but you're looking a little...hot." You grinned, leaning just a bit closer under the guise of getting under the umbrella. "Why don't you come inside with me for a bit, Coach?"

Ted moved like you had just told him there was a fire and you couldn't help but laugh at the way he kicked through the sand. You caught up and led him to the suite you shared with Rebecca, figuring you still had a solid hour and a half before her pampering was over, and Ted was sharing with Beard who was asleep at the moment but could come knocking any minute. You pulled Ted into your private room and his hands were on you instantly as the two of you tumbled onto the plush hotel bed.

"Now where did you get this little number," Ted whispered gruffly in your ear as he trailed his fingers along the straps just below your belly button.

"That's what you want to ask when you could be asking me to take it off," you sighed and Ted smiled devilishly.

"I dunno," Ted said, pulling the fabric of the bottoms to the side and sliding his finger where you were already embarrassingly slick, "Maybe I'm thinking of keeping them on." Ted placed hot, open-mouthed kisses along your neck, his scruff sending little shockwaves to where his fingers were still exploring and you whimpered loudly.

And then you heard, "Y/N?"

The two of you had been so distracted you hadn't heard Rebecca come into the common area of the suite. You looked at Ted wide-eyed not sure if you should slide out from under him and answer or pretend you weren't there. Ted looked as tense as you felt, silently sliding your bottoms back in place. He looked around for somewhere to hide and sat up, in the process knocking a book off your nightstand with a sharp thud.

Undeterred and unaware, Rebecca knocked and then pushed the door open talking the whole time. "I ended up leaving the appointment early because I forgot I had a call with a member of the foundation about the gala, do you think you could order me—"

Rebecca finally looked up and noticed your... entanglement. You and Ted hadn't moved a muscle—you were on your back in a skimpy swimsuit and Ted was sitting next to you, one leg off the bed and shirt unbuttoned. There was absolutely no mistaking what Rebecca had just interrupted and you could see the little amused smile on her face.

"Oh, hello Coach Lasso." Ted gave her a small wave, tucking his shirt around himself like a robe. "Will you be joining us for lunch?"

You couldn't help it. You outright cackled at the ridiculousness of this moment. "I'm SO sorry, Rebecca, I'll—"

"No, no," she responded immediately, "I shouldn't have just barged in like that. I'll leave you two to—uh, well. I'll leave. But then I want all the details." Rebecca winked at you as she shut the door and you dissolved into giggles looking at Ted's mortified face.

"We're so lucky we have a cool boss," you whispered, sitting up to kiss Ted apologetically.

"You won't hear me disagreein', but boy was that embarrassing," Ted chuckled, "next time I'll just kick Beard out."

"Well, you might as well text him now because I'll be seeing you tonight."

[witchie-writings]

HEY HEY HEY HEY HEYYYYY

ok i wanna do sum short if request are closed please ignore :)

King Ghidorah x human! reader who can hear far away kinda like dolores from encanto? One-shot or HC what ever you prefer 🙃

“Tonight. He wants 5 babies.” -Dolores

More than happy to oblige, Anon! Not a lot of King Ghidorah HCs around, so I suppose I got to support what I can lol. Had to make it short because TUMBLR

Ah, King Ghidorah, my long lost love. The False King, Destroyer of Worlds, Monster Zero, the Death Song of Three Storms… ends up with a human mate. Quite unexpected, very unexpected. The mere thought of Ghidorah wooing a human to become his mate was just absurd to Monarch scientists: who was this person, why did they become Ghidorah’s mate, how did they become Ghidorah’s mate?! All these unanswered questions, and they definitely weren’t going to be able to grab answers from the walking hurricane himself, or more specifically, the heads.

With having a human as his mate, Ghidorah has to be careful, ungodly amounts of careful, but if they possess the unique ability to be able to hear noises from leagues away? Ichi is surprised the human hasn’t gone insane from all of the over stimulants, and is genuinely worried about their health because of this power. 

Ichi is the head that took the longest to warm up to, but he is the head that cares the most about the well-being of his mate. Whenever he could, Ichi would lean down, tenderly nudging his mate with concern practically brimming from his golden gates; his tongue would flick out, grazing over his mate, speaking through his actions as he cannot convey words. If Nii or San, specifically Nii, attempt to do any sort of skit in an attempt to irritate or get a reaction from their shared mate, Ichi would be the one to harshly bite into one of their horns, yanking them up and emitting warning growls from his throat as a vague threat should they continue to pester their S/O. 

God, Ichi would be borderline trying to make as little noise as possible (for a god damn Kaiju) for his S/O’s sake. I imagine with that sort of hearing, you could accidentally burst your eardrums, as to hear that far, you gotta learn to heighten your hearing to travel across that distance; one wrong step, and you could have a ruptured ear. Ichi would piece that together pretty quickly, and just… try to tell his other heads to shut it. Minimal blinking, minimal breathing, minimal everything in general. He just wants his S/O to be comfortable.

Then, there’s Nii. Oh, my sweet lovable Nii. Ever the aggressor and one to cause chaos, he’d be absolutely overbearing to where he’d be causing so much noise in an attempt to help his S/O. He’d blow up at Ichi or San for the smallest of things - they’re being too loud, so he’d attempt to bully them into shutting up, then start a fight with Ichi and that’s a whole clownfest in itself. Nii would be the head that took the second longest to warm up to his new S/O, as he isn’t as highly guarded as Ichi is, but it’s still quite the accomplishment to be able to reign Nii in because of his nature as a whole. 

God, his S/O has him wrapped around their tiny fingers. Would do absolutely anything for them… then get into fights over the heads about it. Through their shared mental connection, he recommends the idea of ear muffs and how they should grab some immediately, right now, and then try to tug the body to the nearest store. He’s trying, he really is, but he doesn’t really realize his actions cause more harm than good… it’s the thoughts that count, right?

San is the easiest to warm up to, due to his quite jolly nature and interest in humans as a whole. He’d find it quite curious about his mate’s hearing abilities, always wondering, what can they hear? Can they hear Godzilla snoring in the ocean? He has to know! So he does bug his S/O more often than not, he doesn’t mean to cause any harm! He’s just a curious noodle, a very curious one indeed.

Once Ichi and Nii explain the situation, he does feel quite guilty. After all, he’d feel as though he’s been contributing to the strain on his S/O, when he really didn’t mean to. He’d try his best to be more quiet, but he does slip up quite often. Please don’t blame him, he’s trying. 

[asaraviapt]

[EN] Video Game Writing Resources!

Hello! My name is Andrea--I have been writing for games since 2018, and even worked as a writer at Firaxis Games from 2022 until April of 2023. So, I knew a few things about narrative design--but what the fuck is it? Recently, I gave a talk about the fundamentals and history of the field of narrative design. In Spanish. So, let's talk about it in English--the "what," "why," "how," "when," and "who," of narrative design! What is narrative design? Narrative design is not just writing--it's a huge part of it, but designing a narrative system involves implementing narrative content into the build of the game. So there is a technical learning curve to it. Personally, I watched and obtained certifications in Unreal Engine 5 and Unity in order to be aware of the limitations of each engine. I used the free trial of LinkedIn Learning, but courses about this engine are available in these websites: - https://platzi.com/ - https://www.arkde.com/ - https://www.domestika.org/?query=unity - https://www.coursera.org/ Why do we need narrative design? In order to create an interactive story that the player feels a part of, narrative designers are mandatory. It's not a responsibility that can be placed on other designers (then we would be entering crunch territory) rather someone who specifically specializes in both creative writing and game design is needed to explain within the context of the game's story why the mechanics work in a certain way. Imagine if a Telltale game did not have dialogue, for example--what would we be left with? Or if The Last Of Us did not convey a narrative through its environments.

Narrative designers are needed so that all of the departments are in sync and understand the story that they are trying to tell. For example, if a game takes place in a haunted house that was abandoned, we need all hands on deck. The narrative designer can explain to the environment artists why there are so many holes in the living room--perhaps the last tenants of the house were a rowdy bunch. Or, they can tell the sound designers which planks of wood are the most rotten and need a loud sound effect to highlight how it has been abandoned. How do I become a narrative designer? There is no one way to become a narrative designer. Some people start in QA and transition into the field, I have also witnessed engineers and doctors wanting to get into narrative design. I do recommend having the following (at least): - A passion for storytelling. - Deep understanding of the mechanics of the game and the player experience. - Communication skills are incredibly important--can you describe your story in a concise way to your peers in a Confluence page?

Documentation skills are also a massive plus.

Very basic understanding of game engines and limitations. You don't have to be a computer science major, but know what your requests will entail. If you have an idea of a cutscene, can the engine handle it? Will the animators have enough time? Is it within scope?

If you can, attend game jams! They are an amazing way to network with amazing people and get a feel of what the game production pipeline is like.

Additionally, I highly recommend the following resources: First, the free resources! ~It's free real estate~

Look up Twinery tutorials. (https://twinery.org/) Not only is it free, but you can use it on your browser. More importantly, you will learn about branching narratives and can create your own games within a few minutes--the interface, though it requires a bit of coding, is incredibly easy to use and there are a lot of tutorials available online.

Download Ren'Py (https://www.renpy.org/) and watch tutorials. It's free, and there is a huge community of visual novel developers who may need help with narrative designers, writers, editors and even translators. An amazing resource that a colleague shared was this Discord with visual novel developers--if you have an idea, feel free to connect with artists and voice actors here! https://discord.gg/nW5yn4FE

Network, network, network! Follow narrative design and game writer groups on Discord, Facebook and even LinkedIn. -- An amazing convention that is online, free and accessible regarding narrative design is LudoNarraCon.

If you go to itch.io you will see a list of game jams that you can attend to for free! Some game jams that I have attended and had a positive experience are the following: - Woman Game Jam. I encourage folks from marginalized genders to attend this game jam, as we have a large pool of mentors willing to help in every single discipline at any time due to the global nature of it. It is a safe and inclusive space for women and nonbinary folx who want to get into the gaming industry! - Global Game Jam. Self explanatory, it has some in-person opportunities but you can also attend remotely. - Greenlight Jam. Do you have an idea that can not be done in only 48 hours? The Greenlight Jam is amazing, as it lasts four weeks--which allows narrative designers to develop complex narrative systems and even record voice lines for a more complex project. Side Note: Even though most game jams have a time limit, I do encourage narrative designers to develop and polish the prototypes and levels created during game jams to have portfolios and writing samples that stand out!

Work With Indies is a job site that publishes job opportunities--including ones in writing and narrative design. Additionally, their Discord has some networking events with writers so you can connect with them.

Other websites that not only publish jobs but include networking events are Hitmarker.net (this is their Discord), IndieGameAcademy (link to Discord),

Newsletters! A lot of experienced game writers have newsletters dedicated to the craft, to name a few that I highly recommend: -- Greg Buchanan's newsletter. Rounds up game writing news every Tuesday, and includes job opportunities. -- Bright Whitney's newsletter. A studio founder with amazing insights regarding game design and thoughtful narrative, Whitney's threads are extremely insightful. -- Susan O'Connor's blog on The Narrative Department. In addition to providing free knowledge regarding world building, narrative design, game writing and other specifics of the craft Susan interviews industry professionals and alumni who offer testimonials that have amazing advice. -- GDC talks about narrative design. Though I recommend the GDC vault as well in the next section, I highly recommend the GDC talks regarding not only narrative design but the development of your favorite titles!

Now, for resources that may not be free--but I highly recommend, as someone who used them first hand. - The Narrative Department. This post is not sponsored by them at all, however it is rare to find an instructor as kind and hard-working as Susan O'Connor who has been a narrative designer in historic AAA, AA and independent titles. Known for her contributions in Tomb Raider, Batman: The Enemy Within, and BioShock to name a few (imdb is: https://www.imdb.com/name/nm1897248/) her Game Writing Masterclass offers a certification in everything related to game writing. A few subjects she touches on are: -- Characters and how to make them compelling. -- Barks and ambience writing. -- Dialogue, backstories and scripts. -- How to work with other departments. And more! Additionally, you would obtain access to a huge alumni network full of game writing professionals working in independent, AA and AAA studios! Not to mention that all of the assignments completed in the class will look amazing in a portfolio as game writing samples. - GDC Vault. Though I have an opinion on the price tag of GDC tickets and the vault, I would definitely include it as it has resources from several studios, writers, narrative designers and more! When was narrative design formed? When can I become a narrative designer?

That's a wonderful question. Narrative design, as a term, was first used around the 90s but became more established between the 2000s and 2010s. So, although the field is relatively new, and there are not a lot educational resources available, consider yourself part of an innovative field that is exponentially growing! Recently, a game developer asked when was the best time to keep an eye out for job openings. And a harsh truth about the gaming industry is that it is extremely volatile--layoffs, downsizings and startups rise and fall. This is not meant to deter anyone from pursuing a career in narrative design, but rather I am including it for the sake of transparency. We cannot predict when a studio is going to layoff their employees, or when they cancel unannounced projects. Unlike most industries where we know for a fact that recruiters keep a sharp eye for candidates in Q1 and Q3, a piece of advice I received from a mentor of mine was to try to predict when projects are going to need more stories. There's the release of a game, and then there is the addition of additional narrative content--and for this, they will more than likely need associate/entry/junior level narrative designers, writers and quest designers. But--this is related to searching for a job as a narrative designer, and I can write a novel about that (and will edit this article to redirect folx into it.) So, keep an eye out for huge game announcements. Then, cater your resume to what the studio is looking for in a narrative designer. Now, to finish off this article: Who is a narrative designer? If you have a passion for storytelling and games, and have participated in game jams, congratulations you are a wonderful narrative designer! Make sure you always include that you are a narrative designer, and not an aspiring narrative designer--it makes you stand out amongst applicants. That's all I have for now--feel free to interact, comment and share! Let me know if I missed something and I will be sure to add it.

[telvess]

SFW and NSFW headcanons for hades please? :>

Record of Ragnarok: Hades SFW+NSFW headcanons 🔞

There you go 😘

SFW

Deep down, Hades is romantic. He likes to surprise you with something from time to time: a nice dinner, candles, a bath or all of a sudden request for a dance. He doesn’t do it too often, because it would destroy the element of surprise.

I’ve said this before, but Hades is the biggest sucker for a smile. He just finds you disarming whenever you give him one. Even better if he is the one who makes you smile. And so it is with giggles, the sound makes his heart beat faster.

Hades is sophisticated and quiet individual, but he would be so soft for you. He knows you are pretty capable of looking after yourself, yet still firmly believes it is his duty as your husband to take care of you. So whenever you’re in a conflict with someone, Hades doesn’t intervene, but still is pretty well-informed about details in case you will need him to have your back.

His favourite part of the day is the evening, when you both can finally relax after fulfilling your duties as king and queen of the Underworld. Hades would like to spend this time with you, not necessarily in an active way, it’s enough for him to just be in your presence when both of you are wrapped in your own entertainments.

Ask for his brothers and you may end up listening to endless stories from Hades’ childhood. He loves them dearly, but doesn’t have many opportunities to talk about them, that’s why your interest in this topic would make him very happy.

Hades would definitely share his love of chess with you and doesn’t mind teaching you how to play. However, don’t expect special treatment, he considers it as a lack of respect for the opponent, which is a no-no for him.

Same goes with wine, I’m convinced that Hades has his own winery and it’s his great hobby. He can teach you everything about it. He’s also very picky when it comes to choosing the right wine, he drinks only the best, so relying on his knowledge in this matter is recommended.

NSFW

Hades likes to chill with you lying on his chest and giving him soft kisses. He just closes his eyes and allows himself enjoy the moment. Making him feel your kisses all over his face is the best way to provoke a further activities.

Hades is highly respected figure in the universe and is seen by many as a fearsome god among the Greek pantheon, so he’s used to all this esteem, acknowledgement and high regard from others, but the praises from you in the bedroom are completely different kind of story. You probably wouldn’t make him blush, but definitely surprise him and make him smile sincerely.

Hades is a big fan of a blowjob. He wouldn’t ask you to go down on him, but if you decide to take the initiative yourself, he wouldn’t stop you. The moment you start caressing him, he is on your mercy. At first he may try to suppress moans, but that won’t last long.

Hades prefers to create variety in different positions rather than kinks. He wants you to be satisfied and the way he achieves that doesn’t matter.

On the more specific side, if you do a reverse cowgirl, Hades would hold your loose hairs. Not pull it - hold it - just so it doesn’t get in the way. He just wants to let you fully enjoy yourself, without any unpleasantness. Besides that he can just admire your beauty and rub your back.

If he is in charge, he prefers to kiss your lips in the middle of the act, when he thrusts into you. It gives him an extra level of connection and he adores hearing you moan into his lips.

[gentlebeardsbarngrill]

02/05/2024 Daily OFMD Recap

TLDR; Cast & Crew; Rhys Cameos; Samba BTS; Samba & Rhys Goofyness; Wee John Wednesday + surprise Leslie; UK Launch; Watch Party Reminders; What We Do In The Shadows; New Watch parties: Love Birds; Articles; Fundraisers; Schadenfreude; Trends; Morale/LoveNotes/MORE RHYS CAMEOS; Daily Darby/Tonight's Taika;

Jeez Louise fam today was a seriously jam packed day! Once again Im worried I'm gonna miss something because there was just so much so please feel free to let me know!

== Cast & Crew ==

The Crew section is a hefty one today, so buckle up buttercup it's gonna be a chaotic and heartwarming ride.

Okay so, yesterday we had that lovely message that was edited from our beloved captain. But then our dear friend @meowzawowaza_ over on twitter released yet another part of the video that specifically went over Rhys' frustrations with the cancellation. Now it's less positive, but as she says, it adds another layer that is helping rally the troops to keep fighting. Here's the thread with the videos. Apologies if you don't have twitter... I don't have a link outside of there at the moment. If I find one, I'll update it here.

THEN because she's awesome, our lovely @lucyrosebutler decided to share the cameo she had gotten previously. Which he ended with, "Yeah, you be you, keep rock'n, and yeah, you be you, and do it loudly."

Before continuing with the cast & crew...

== Kudosboard! ==

Wanna send our lovely captain, Rhys, some kudos and love after all he's given us, especially the last two days? You can do so over on kudoboard.com! Thank you @madzilla84 for making this happen! Get on over there and send our sunshine man some love!

Alright! On to more Cast & Crew.

= Samba =

Samba, our favorite BTS buddy posted a new BTS picture + was making sure to shout out the new S2 out on BBCIplayer today!

= Samba & Rhys =

Then because our entire cast and crew is a pile of goofballs, Rhys and Samba shared this little exchange on twitter:

= Wee John Wednesday Monday! =

And well, then there was Wee John Wednesdays Monday! Where we not only got to see the expected three cast members: Kristian Nairn, Vico Ortiz, and Madeleine Sami, but a SURPRISE guest, Leslie Jones who crashed the Instagram live party.

You can watch the whole thing on Kristian Nairn's IG Here. WHICH I highly recommend because it was an absolute blast and got so many of us pumped and ready for more. Some highlights that absolutely cannot describe the pure and wonderful chaos were:

Rocket Jousting

Leslie fucking every alien in space

Leslie wants to come to a convention

Horny pickle ball

Jenkins is on board for s3 if it happens

They see how hard we're working on SaveOFMD and they said "they deserve it" (s3) and "so do we!"

Mads just randomly runs into Taika on the beach

Gypsy made a chest binder for all Vico's outfits @edscuntyeyeshadow ty for the screenshots here on tumblr

Oh and David Fane popped in because he's a gem of a human being. Thanks @madzilla84 for catching that!

= Leslie Jones + Convention =

PSSSST: Wanna help get Leslie to a con? Go request her on the Galaxy Con Websites! Thanks @insane_foliage on twitter for the suggestions!

= Vico Ortiz =

Upcoming cast events! Sunday Feb 11, 4PM PST, Vico will be interviewing with the lovely Samantha Rei on Instagram Live

= Erroll Shand =

I just, can't get over how amazing Erroll's IG Stories are, and how much he interacts with the goofy fan memes. I love this guy.

== Uk Launch ==

So many people logged in for the UK Launch of S2!!! Thank you everyone! The data teams over at @saveofmdcrewmates are still crunching numbers to show how things went the first day, but we can definitely see #OurFlagBBC trending for a bit!

Also Pink News was tweeting about the launch, and Wee John Wednesday!

Great job everyone-- please keep it up if you have the spoons! Wanna watch OFMD again? You can help support the UK Launch by watching it on BBCIplayer! Once again, if you are outside the US you can get instructions on how to here on @reallygoodplants page, or from this article.

== Watch Party Reminders! ==

= What We Do In The Shadows Watch Party! =

Tuesday February 6th, 9PM GMT, 1 PM PST, 4PM EST

Watch Party Hashtags:

#VamPirates

#SaveOFMD

#AdoptOurCrew

== New Watch Parties! ==

FINALLYYYYY we have a Love Birds Watch Party! Feb 9th - 9 pm GMT, 4 pm EST, 1pm PST.

Watch Party Hashtags:

#AdoptOurLoveBirds

#AdoptOurCrew

#SaveOFMD

==Articles==

So many articles today with the UK launch, including the Guardian again!

What’s On TV This Week: 5th February – 11th February

TV Tonight: It's the Final Series of Curb Your Enthusiasm

Our Flags Means Death fans get TV licence just to watch pirate show

The Best Romantic TV Series to Get into the Valentine’s Day Spirit

8 TV Shows Were Canceled in January 2024, Including 4 From HBO

Why won’t there be a Our Flag Means Death season 3?

= Fundraiser Status =

eSIMs and Sanitary Products for Gaza by Our Flag Makes A Difference is currently at 27% of their goal. If you're looking for a good cause to donate to, these folks have been incredibly transparent about all funds.

@One of the crew, @mcstuffiesphd is selling Jeff stickers as well as other SaveOFMD merch and donating 50% to the Our Flag Makes A Difference group for the above fundraiser.

== SchadenFreude / Trends Time ==

Thank you @btweenhisteeth on twitter for capturing this metric! Looks like WB Discovery is still having a bit of trouble with their stocks. Wonder why that could be?

Other fun trends that popped up today: Thank you @merryfinches catching a shot of the pile of royalty below.

== Morale / Love Notes ==

So normally I just want to say all the things about how lovely you all are, but Rhys posted YET ANOTHER video on cameo tonight, and I feel like his voice is the sunshine we all need. The longer one up, is dedicated to LGBTQIA+ folks with some anecdotes from Rhys' childhood, and another specific to the crew for this show (it's about 3 mins 10 seconds long). Please take a few minutes to go watch them, you don't need a log in or anything for them. It's just worth it to hear our lovely captain say nice things.

== Daily Darby / Tonight's Taika ==

And to end the night, just some silly gifs that maybe sort of but don't quite go together for tonight. Goodnight lovelies, it was a LOOONG day today, please go get some rest. Love you.

[marauderswithpalestineproject]

Marauders With Palestine Project FAQ

Can volunteers open themselves up to more prompts if availability changes/can people change the number of prompts they’ve marked themselves available for at a later time?

Absolutely! It will all depend on how many prompts we get, though.

Will there be a social way to contact other participants in the project?

Yes, they’ll all be added to a discord server shortly.

Where can people send proof of donation?

We’ll post the link to a form where the contributors will be able to send proof of donation as well as their prompt(s).

What is the deadline for art/fics/edits?

They may be posted all throughout June, so the hard deadline is June 30, 2024.

Do I have to post the art/fic/edits on my account when completed? (particularly for nsfw)

Preferably, yes. NSFW art can also be posted to ao3.

Will we be able to contact the person that submitted the prompt we're given, if we have any questions?

Yes, that will be possible. (Applies to art, fics, and edits)

Is it ok if participants don’t use discord/are only available for contact via email?

That’s perfectly fine, we can contact the participants via email, tumblr, or twitter, though discord is preferred.

How long will prompts be?

No longer than 100 words.

Are there any word count expectations for fics?

None at all, but we encourage writers to make their fics longer than 1.5k words.

Should the fics be tagged any specific way on ao3 to make it clear they’re for the project?

The fics need to be tagged with MWPProject 2024 Fandom Initiative, and they’ll also be added to a collection. 

Will prompts be filtered/checked for inappropriate/hateful content before they are given out?

Yes, any and all prompts will be checked and approved by the mods.

Can volunteers reject a prompt assigned to them if they are not comfortable with it?

Yes, the volunteers can contact the mods if they wish to change their prompts. 

How long do volunteers have to complete their contributions?

Prompts will be assigned between April 23-30th, and posting begins June 1. They can, however, post their works all throughout the month of June. 

If a volunteer doesn’t have any public socials, do they have to post their art/fic/edits?

They may create an ao3 account, there’s plenty of time for them to request one.

Do artists need to attach their names to the art?

If they want to remain anonymous, they may post their work to ao3 and we’ll keep it anonymous within the collection.

Are simple prompt requests ok?

The prompts can’t be longer than 100 words, so simple prompt requests are ok.

Would I need to donate the equivalent of 5USD or am I okay donating 5 dollars in my currency? (non US based donations)

It has to be the equivalent of 5USD in whichever currency you use.

Can someone donate on the behalf of another person who is unable to do so? 

Yes, they only need to let us know about it. 

May I post anonymously to the collection?

Yes.

Do volunteers have to be a part of the discord server?

It’s not required but it is highly recommended.

Can you keep my email private/make sure it’s not shared outside of the mods?

Only the mods have access to the emails, you don’t need to worry about that.

Are there any preferences in terms of characterizations/appearances of characters?

No, but it is recommended to not be too specific so that the volunteers can work with their prompt as best as they can.

If donors have specific requests for how characters are drawn/written, will they be in contact with the volunteers assigned to their prompts? 

Yes, but at the end of the day, this isn’t commissioned fanwork, so the end result will be entirely up to the volunteer in question. Micromanaging will not be allowed.

If a volunteer is filling multiple prompts, can they decide how long each one is?

Yes they may.

Will prompts include tropes?

That is up to the donor, but being too specific with the prompt may make it hard for the assigned volunteer to fulfill it satisfactorily.

What will the prompts look like?

We will provide a form where the donors will be able to specify the pairing and their prompt. Please note: when listing pairings, use the Character Name x Character Name format (i.e. Remus x Sirius), versus ship names (i.e. Wolfstar), as some ship names aren’t well known, or vary across the fandom.

Does sketch mean actual sketch, or should there be a more polished final product?

Up to the artist, as styles and practices vary person to person. 

Can volunteers post their contributions on any social platforms?

Yes, they can.

Should writers characterize based on their own headcanons, or based off the wishes of the prompter?

The priority is fulfilling the prompt as it’s been given, but the volunteers can find a middle ground if they’re not entirely comfortable with something.

Where/who can I contact if later questions arise?

You can send an ask to the MWPP blog, or you can send an email to marauderswithpalestineproject@gmail.com. All mods tumblr urls are listed on the MWPP blog, and all mods will be available to answer questions in the discord server as well. 

How will we navigate if a volunteer is assigned a prompt they are uncomfortable with?

You may contact the mods and we’ll change it, bit please only do so if the prompt is genuinely something you cannot work with, as reassigning prompts may be troublesome for the mods.

Will I have to explicitly state in the final product that it was created for the project?

Yes.

Do I have to post the fic/art/edit, or can I just send it to the prompter?

It needs to be posted, but it may be posted anonymously via ao3.

Can I participate as an artist with a collage rather than a drawing?

We won’t be accepting collages, as that is technically not original work and it wouldn’t be fair for the prompter.

[tenpintsofsundrop]

Emergency Contact

Jason Todd x Gender Neutral Reader

Leave me something - or let me out. I'm starving. Push me, pull me. Waiting for the start of:

Things that I want, this happily ever after. You choke on your words, but you swallow them faster. Just want you to be my Emergency Contact.

Summary:

After Jason miraculously comes home from his brush with Deathstroke, you're both feeling it in very different ways. You have an unexpected physical wound from the battle, and he has many (very expected) emotional wounds. You help each other heal. Even if it's very stubborn on both your parts.

Jason Todd x GN!Powered!Reader. Enemies/FWB to Lovers. Angst and Hurt/Comfort. (Slight Smut). Set during Season 2, Episode 5.

Word Count: 10,400

Titans Masterlist | AO3 Link

If you want to be notified whenever I post a new fic, make sure to follow my library blog @sundropslibrary and turn on notifications there.

List of detailed warnings and author's notes below the cut.

Warnings: general emotional angst, Jason has a self deprecating inner dialogue, (kind of) enemies to lovers - more like annoyances to fuck buddies to lovers, friends with benefits to lovers, the reader and Jason have a bantering/argumentative nature to their relationship, the reader is meant to be 100% gender neutral (the reader is never referred to in the third person, so there is no need to use they/them pronouns, but the reader is not called she/her or he/him), Jason calls the reader ‘babe’ (imo, a completely gender neutral term and he would call anybody that), mentions of alcohol (Jason drinking a beer), the reader character has ice powers (not entirely relevant to the plot but I couldn’t help myself lmao).

sexual themes throughout, mentions of sexting (no detailed descriptions), mentions of sexting in public, mentions of the reader character sending nudes to Jason (no detailed descriptions of the photos), one scene with detailed smut (but it is not the primary focus of the fic), the reader’s genitals are not described in any specific way, some dirty talk, Jason is more dominant and the reader is more submissive, penetrative sex, Jason is annoying even during sex, Jason has a pain kink (even when he’s a dom, he’s a painslut, I don’t make the rules), scratching/marking (Jason receiving), slight humiliation kink.

mentions of canon level violence, mentions of kidnapping (in alignment with canon), mentions of Jason being beaten by Deathstroke, mentions of Jason’s near-death experience (being dropped off the building), gun violence, the reader is injured - has a bullet wound/bullet fragment in their stomach, mentions of blood, descriptions of first-aid, mentions of puss from an infected wound (theoretically, not something that happens in the fic). That should be everything.

A/N: The title for the fic comes from a song by Pierce the Veil of the same name. It's a newer song, and it's one that I absolutely went to when looking for a title for this fic. The concept of becoming someone's emergency contact is about upgrading the relationship from casual to much more serious, and just the whole song, and specific lyrics in it suit this fic so well. I highly recommend listening to it paired with this fic.

This was based on a request from my old blog, but obvi I don't have that ask anymore - the request was about Jason getting shot and having his wound attended to by the reader, but I changed it to the reader getting shot cause I thought that was more interesting and less common. If the person who made that request sees this and finds my new blog, I hope you enjoy it! And in general, I hope everyone who reads this enjoys it.

...

If asked, you would be hard pressed to explain your relationship with Jason Todd. 

The best way you could describe it would probably be - friends with benefits? 

But most of the time, the two of you weren’t even friends. You weren’t the type to hang out casually, or spend time alone together if it didn’t involve ripping each other’s clothes off. 

If you ever exchanged secrets or those precious bits of your most raw selves, it was by mistake. It was through sarcasm, or coming off the tired lips of someone who had just been exhausted by a few orgasms. The two of you knew each other well, quite literally inside and out. But you always made a deep, concerted effort to hold each other at arm’s length. And maybe that’s part of what all the snark and harsh words were for. 

It wasn’t all arguing. You were friendly. You could be civil, at the very least. 

Right from the moment you had first met Jason, you had found him to be so damn annoying, a shitstain on the earth - yet, someone you couldn’t stay away from. The line between flirtatious banter and a truly grinding argument was always so thin with the two of you. 

… 

You hadn’t expected that your life would be truly changed when you walked into that safehouse in Chicago that day. You truly thought nothing of him when his eyes landed on you - in those moments, a completely anonymous stranger, raking his eyes over you like you were a piece of meat. It was a gaze that immediately made you feel naked, something that made you want to smack him. You told yourself it was because he was being a pervert, not because of the heat that curled in your gut at feeling so intensely desired by him. 

He had been sitting on the couch sipping a beer like he owned the place, his thighs spread wide in a way you immediately decided was arrogant and annoying rather than hot - showing off his muscle tone as if it was trying to break through his jeans. Definitely annoying. Definitely the stance of a fuckboy trying to look bigger and badder than he was. He definitely was not attractive. 

When Dick led you, Rachel, Gar, and Kory further into the condo that seemed far too conspicuous to be a safehouse, the stranger you would later come to know as Jason quickly spoke up. 

“Who are your friends?” He asked. 

As he rose from the couch, his eyes lingered on you. Though his words seemed more out of curiosity, you couldn’t help but feel that bite of something more salacious lingering in his voice. 

It caused you to scoff and roll your eyes. 

“Not important.” Dick declared, his voice snippy. He was clearly annoyed with this new guy, and you could tell that your perceptions of him were definitely not ill-informed. 

“Who’s he?” Kory asked, going for the obvious question. 

“Not important.” Dick parroted out the words again, sounding much shorter with his patience. 

“Anybody want a brew?” Jason asked, motioning with the beer bottle in his hand. 

“Brew?” You twisted your eyebrows with disgust, staring him down as you commented on his odd choice of slang. 

He didn’t get to reply, as you were trampled over by Gar’s enthusiastic voice in your ear. 

“I do!” He said, raising his hand with excitement. 

“No, you don’t.” You quickly told him, reaching out to grab his hand and put it back down. “It’s disgusting.” 

You had a grand suspicion that Gar had never drank beer before, and he had no idea what he was truly asking for. Rather, he was simply taking advantage of trying new things because Dick and Kory were incredibly slack parental figures and he was away from home for the first time. 

“No, no one wants a brew.” Dick sighed, shaking his head. He threw Jason a small glare and you resisted the urge to laugh. 

“That can’t be Adamson.” Kory said, motioning toward Jason. 

This left you confused. But you didn’t question it. 

“He’s not Adamson. Adamson’s in the bathroom. Unconscious.” Dick explained. 

“Hi, I’m Rachel.” Rachel told Jason, offering him a sweet smile - being her usual sweet self. 

“Jason.” He introduced himself, in that moment, finally giving you a name to that obnoxious face. 

“I’m Gar!” Gar said with a grin, to which Jason nodded. 

Jason caught you glaring at him, and looked you up and down again, as if trying to willfully tear off your clothes with his eyes. It made your skin itch with heat and you would forever deny that it was a feeling you liked. 

“What can I call you, babe?” He asked, his voice entirely slimy, the kind of tone he would have used to recite cheesy lines to Tinder dates, you were entirely sure of. 

Before you could come up with some clever reply, Dick sighed in frustration and started balking again. 

“Okay, who we all are doesn’t matter right now.” He pressed, his neck so entirely tense that veins began to pop from the skin. “Can we just chill out, relax, sit on the couch and watch TV or something?” 

It seemed that he wouldn’t get his wish. 

Gar quickly charged around the table, finding something else to get strung up about. 

“Yo, when did you get another one?” He asked, putting his hands on both of the expensive cases on the long dining table - a copy identical to the one you knew to be containing Dick’s Robin outfit. 

It made you curious, and the answer that followed certainly surprised you. 

“That one’s mine.” Jason said, his chest literally puffing out with pride as he stated the fact. 

“No way.” You scoffed. 

“Yes way.” He quickly argued back, the whole exchange sounding entirely juvenile.

“This one’s yours? Wait, you’re Robin too?” Gar quickly put the pieces together. 

“I thought you were Robin?” Rachel commented, tilting her head toward Dick with curiosity. 

“I am.” Dick said firmly. 

“He was.” Jason corrected, a cocky smirk forming across his lips. 

“Batman really lowered the height requirement, huh.” You said. 

The words flew from your mouth before you could stop them, seeing as it was likely the only thing you could nitpick about Jason’s appearance. Between his stunning sharp jaw, his piercing blue eyes, his oddly appealing wild hair, his muscle tone being somehow visible beneath his baggy clothing - all of it made you equally frustrated and annoyed with him, and your baser urges couldn’t resist the low-hanging fruit. 

You felt victory and a slight pang of guilt when Jason deflated because of your comment, shrinking back into himself at your words. 

He didn’t have anything to say in return, he simply sipped his beer. 

“Wait, how many Robins are there?” Gar said, beginning to excitedly ramble at the thought. “Are there a lot? Cause I would love to-” 

“Okay, quiet.” Kory cut him off, clearly becoming annoyed with all of this dancing around the point as much as Dick was. “Sit.” 

Her words were firm, and you couldn’t help but to listen. You found yourself collapsing to sit on the couch while Rachel and Gar took seats at the dining table. Jason continued to linger in the middle of the room, staring at Kory and Dick as their frustration filled the air. 

“Bathroom.” Kory told Dick, and then they left to deal with whoever - or whatever - Adamson was. 

Jason sighed and took a seat beside you. When his eyes fell on you, you set your jaw and glared at him. You didn’t give away a single ounce of the heat you were feeling as his eyes locked with yours. 

“Even if I am the shorter Robin, I can assure you that everything else about me is… very long.” He lowered his voice and whispered those last words, crowding into your personal space as he did so. 

It sent shivers down your spine, his silken voice making the words sound too tempting. Even if you twisted your face and said ‘gross!’ causing him to dissolve into laughter, you didn’t make an effort to move away from him or put any space between your two bodies on the very large couch. You told yourself it was because you were tired from a very long day of travel, not because you were enjoying the smell of his strangely expensive cologne from this close by. 

His grin was still entirely smug, and you couldn’t stand it. 

When he raised the beer bottle up to his mouth again, you reached over and put a hand on his forearm, forcefully dragging his arm down as you made a snide comment. 

“That shit is disgusting, why the hell do you drink it?” You asked. 

You found your face drifting toward his again and if asked, you would say it was a form of intimidation - not that you were being drawn in by an unconscious attraction to him. 

“Because I can.” He replied, just as snide as he slipped your grip and sipped on the drink. 

You mocked his words in an entirely childish voice, and then you raised a single finger up to it and skimmed along the neck of the bottle. It took only a single moment of concentration with your skilled powers to freeze the beer inside solid. He thought he felt an extra chill coming off his hand, but convinced himself that he imagined it. But when he kept it tilted and nothing came out to meet his lips, he shook it and then stuck an inquiring eye inside the bottle. 

When he saw that it was completely frozen, he looked over and saw you grinning, and little did you know - that was the moment he became completely taken with you. You were one of the most annoying people he had ever met, and he found himself so intensely attracted to you. 

Even if it was getting under your skin by arguing with you or fucking your brains out, he knew in that moment - he had to get inside you and drive you insane the same way that he knew you would for him. 

… 

When Dick left to go check on his old circus friend Clay, Jason winked at you and said ‘don’t miss me too much’. You made a show of putting a finger near your mouth and audibly gagging. 

Later that night, when Jason didn’t return, you hated the curl of disappointment that panged in your stomach. You wanted to hit yourself for staring at the door, waiting for the second Robin to come in behind Dick. 

You hated yourself even more for replying to Jason’s texts. 

Apparently he had taken your phone out of your jacket pocket when you went to the bathroom (not to see Adamson - a different bathroom, to pee). And he had put himself in your contacts as ‘Hot Guy’. He had also sent himself a text from your phone that read ‘omg Jason you’re so hot, will you fuck me?’. And then replied to it from his own phone with a picture of his cock. 

Unfortunately, the only thing you could mock about the picture was poor lighting. 

When you told him as much, he quickly remedied that with several more pictures - ones with better lighting. He sent a video with very distinct audio. You would deny that you rushed to put your headphones in to listen to it while you sat on the train with Kory and Gar. You would deny that it drove a hard, hot pain between your thighs. 

You dug through a folder and sent some pictures of your own. You told yourself it was to prove to him that you were too good for him - to show off something he could never actually have. To tease him. 

You would deny that you loved the compliments he gave you, that you ate up the affection like a plant lovingly soaking up the sun. 

When you were sexting him, you had no clue that you were ever going to see him again. It was almost mindless, something for a dopamine hit to distract yourself from all the chaos going on around you. You weren’t doing it because you actually liked Jason. You didn’t have any real attractions toward him, or any real plans to carry out all of the bold things you said in those messages. 

You had no clue that you’d end up living together. 

When you did find out that Dick would be taking Jason into the newly reopened Titans Tower along with you, Gar, and Rachel, you didn’t make a big deal of it in your mind. When Jason made flirtatious remarks toward you in person, you brushed him off. You put up a wall. 

You told yourself that he was nothing more than a cocky, shallow guy who would use you for sex and then throw you away - something you could never actually build a proper relationship with. And if you were supposed to live together, be some kind of team like Dick expected you to be, then you couldn’t be messy. You couldn’t get emotional. 

You had no clue that on one of those first nights living together, your self assured discipline not to give into your lust for him would break like a wafer cookie, and you would be in his bed faster than a sea turtle running into ocean. 

… 

“Fuck, babe, you feel so good on my cock.” Jason grunted, his face buried in your neck as he thrusted deep inside of you. The loud squelch of artificial wetness coming from between your thighs as he worked his hips, working you open with a needy, demanding pace. “Bet you love this cock, huh? Tell me how fuckin’ much you love it.” 

“Shut up.” 

The words came from your throat as a weak whimper, much less powerful than you had intended. 

You didn’t want to give him any more power than he already held over you - he had you weak and willing on his cock, something you would have never admitted could be true until it was happening in these moments. 

Though you would never admit it aloud, you loved the way he handled you. Having you pinned against the bed with his fingers digging into the flesh of your hips, having you breathless and moaning as he fucked into you with fast, obviously skilled strokes. Your nails cut into the flesh of his back, and he let out a low rumble from his gut as the sharp sting sent a wave of pleasure through him. 

You hated the twinge of lustful embarrassment that curled in your gut when he chuckled at your words. 

“Oh, you want me to shut up?” He asked, slightly breathless from the act himself, moving one hand beside your head to raise himself up slightly to look in your eyes. 

He was sweaty, disheveled, his hair a mess, his muscles taught with the effort as he continued to pound into you. You hated that you had imagined him much like this before, and that this outlived all of your fantasies. 

“Yes.” You fired back. “Just shut up and fuck me.” 

He bit his lip - something you didn’t know was him trying to hold back his orgasm, so utterly turned on by your bratty defiance, the twinge of a whimper in your voice as you said those words. 

“You weren’t tellin’ me to shut up when I was texting you.” 

He said, all hot breath fanning across your chin, his hips spearing forward in sharp, hard hits that made your skin smack loudly together. It made you work hard to suppress moans deep in your chest in a way that was painful, like venom inside your lungs. You wouldn’t give him the satisfaction of your sounds, of knowing just how good he was fucking you - even if he could see it written all over your pleasure twisted face. 

“You only begged for more when I was tellin’ you how I was gonna lay you on my bed. Take you apart… make you scream my name.” 

He reached his other hand from your hip to the point where you were joined. He began touching that tender place, making sharp, vicious strokes that were almost vengeful. Tears easily gathered in your eyes and he let out another chuckle when you choked on a deep, pleasurable wail. 

“Tell me, how many times did you touch yourself reading what I wrote?” 

He asked, leaning down to whisper the words right in your ear. 

“How many times did you cum thinking about me?” 

“I didn’t.” You choked out, digging your nails deeper into the skin of his back, causing him to grunt as the pain mixed with the pleasure flowing through him. 

“Sure, babe.” He smirked down at you, turning that look into something absolutely pavlovian that would forever make you feel his cock deep inside of you when you saw it, rather than feeling annoyed. 

Maybe from that point on, it was a bit of both. 

In an effort to shut him up, you reached up and claimed his lips. It was supposed to be a kiss, but it was mostly teeth. When you bit down on his bottom lip, snarling, he tasted blood and the way he moaned at the pain was absolutely unmistakable. It was something you remembered and used against him many times after that. 

… 

You wouldn’t allow yourself any room for self hatred when it came to that break in your self control. When it became an ongoing thing, you spun it as positive in your mind. 

It was just sexual release. You and Jason both needed it. It paired well with intense training and the heavy studying that Dick made you do. It lowered your stress levels a lot, and it helped you get through the day. 

The more time you spent around Jason, the more you got to know him, and the more you came to realize that he was nowhere near shallow. You easily saw that he was caring, deep, complex, troubled. The more time passed, you found yourself falling for him and the more you deeply denied it. Because it was just sex. 

Things were good between the two of you, and you knew that if you added anything else to the mix - any complicated, mushy feelings - you would fuck it up. 

You were especially reminded of this - how important it was not to fuck things up - just a day or so before every other force aside from you railed Titans Tower and began royally fucking things up. 

… 

It was a morning just like any other at Titans Tower. It was delightfully quiet - even though Dick demanded that everyone get up at ungodly early hours to begin training, you had somehow managed to wake up before everyone else and you were enjoying the peace it brought you. 

When you got up to see that Jason was already in the kitchen, standing at the counter as he munched on a bowl of cereal, you wanted to scorn the idea that your peace would be interrupted. But instead, you found yourself willfully suppressing a smile. 

You yawned and walked over to the counter, grabbing a bowl from one of the cupboards, thinking that cereal was just the right idea on his part. A deep frown cut through your face when you poured out the rest of the cereal box he had left on the counter, and a very measly amount fell into your bowl. 

“What kind of asshole only leaves three fucking cornflakes in the bottom of the box?” You scoffed, causing him to chuckle. 

“Learn to count, babe.” He told you, speaking with his mouth half-full. “That’s more than three.” 

You rolled your eyes. You were likely exaggerating - but still, it seemed rude to you to leave such a small portion, barely a handful, in the bottom of the box. 

“Or did I make you cum so hard last night that I knocked the common sense out of your head?” He added on, throwing you that signature smirk that made heat bloom between your thighs. 

You let out a sarcastic snort, giving him a purposefully disgusted grimace as you lifted the bowl up and dumped the remaining cereal into his portion instead. 

“You might as well take these.” You told him. “And don’t flatter yourself, you’re not that good.” 

You moved behind them, distracting yourself from the conversation by making a cup of coffee. 

“Oh really?” He perked up, rising to his full height, pure mischief in his voice. “It didn’t sound like it last night.” 

Much to your horror, he then began imitating your moans. 

“‘Oh, Jason! Oh, fuck me! More!’” 

It was a cartoonish, pornographic imitation, something he likely wouldn’t have done if the others were anywhere within earshot. Oddly enough, even though your relationship was casual, you still kept it guarded and private, as though it were some precious secret that needed to be kept from the others. 

“‘Jason, please, your dick is the best! Oh, make me cum!’” 

But that was the farthest thing from your mind as embarrassment curled in your stomach, the reaction he likely wanted to draw out of you. You hated that you didn’t truly know if it was accurate or not, because sometimes - yes, he did fuck your brains out and make you completely mindless on his cock. 

But you would never admit that he was right. 

“Shut up.” You sighed, causing him to dissolve into laughter, feeling as though he had won. 

But you wouldn’t simply leave it at that. 

Instead, as you pushed the button on the machine and your coffee began to drip, you turned around and gently placed your fingers on the side of his cereal bowl. You froze all the milk inside of it solid, making it into one large frozen chunk with the spoon stuck inside when he wasn’t looking - distracted, staring at your face, looking for any trace of the reaction that he had drawn out of you. 

You just glared, and he smirked once more. 

When he picked up the spoon again and went to take another bite, the entire bowl came with it. He sighed in defeat when he realized what you had done. 

“You know, it’s so damn annoying when you do that.” He sighed. 

“I know.” You grinned at him. 

He couldn’t help the butterflies that fluttered in his stomach at this. He resisted the urge to grab you by the sides of your head and steal the grin of your mouth with his own. He told you that it was out of annoyance, and not affection. He told himself those lines were most definitely not blurred when it came to you. 

… 

Confessing your feelings to Jason would not have been your choice. 

Given the choice, you would have let your feelings quietly live and die inside of you. You would have just kept Jason as a friend. You would have even dropped the amazing sex if it meant staying on good terms with him. 

But the stakes rose pretty quickly, and things were taken out of your hands. The choice was stolen from you and Jason entirely against your will. 

When you found out he was missing, supposedly kidnapped by Doctor Light on the heels of some misguided plan - something inside of you shattered. Up until that moment, if you thought it was just a stupid crush, or an infatuation inside of you that would easily fade with time - you quickly found out that you were wrong. 

You went through the stages of grief like a rocket. 

Denial. Staring at the door, waiting for him to walk inside at any moment. Just like you had back at the safehouse.

Anger. Being so pissed at Dick at the other older Titans that you could barely breathe. How had they let this happen to him? How could they make him feel so inadequate that he felt the need to go out on his own, half-cocked, clearly doing something in the name of looking for their approval? 

Bargaining. You would have traded places with him. You would have been the one, alone and scared and stranded if it meant that he got to be at home safe. You would have gone with him to carry out the stupid plan if he had only asked. Why hadn’t he asked you? 

Depression. You wept in your room, hands clasped over your face, letting out chest-shaking sobs as you thought of the possibility of him never returning home again. You realized the possibility of him dying was very real and it made your lungs burn. 

And then finally - Acceptance. You finally accepted that your feelings for him were something bigger, and if it meant that you were the only person in the Tower who truly cared about him (probably aside from Gar) - the only person who didn’t just see him as a pawn to be used against Deathstroke - then you had to do something about it. 

So you laid out your love for Jason. You put it all on the line for him. You accidentally confessed to him, showed your feelings in a gesture so quiet it screamed. 

You knew that for someone who stepped up to become Robin, someone who scorned cops for pummeling down on the innocent when they were supposed to be protectors - stepping up to try and save his life meant a love bigger than anything else you could have done. 

And he was terrified of it. There was a big justice in your love for him. And to him, there was an even bigger justice in giving you an out to escape it - to escape loving him.  

… 

Hectic. 

That was easily how you would describe the last few days at Titans Tower. 

Between the unexpected arrival of Rose - Dick taking on another stray because, like Rachel said, he couldn’t resist a bird with a broken wing. Finding out that she was related to one of the deadliest men on earth that the Titans apparently had previous history with. And then Jason going off on his own without telling you, some botched hostage trade, and the group picking up yet another stray - a strange boy who had saved Jason’s life. It was all a blur of hectic chaos that had you snapping your neck to keep up. 

Sleep was scarce and you couldn’t remember the last time you’d had a proper meal. 

But you weren’t truly worried about any of that. 

Dust had been kicked up around your life, and you couldn’t wait for it to settle before you made your next important decision. 

Even though the wounds were still tender, you knew that things were safe for now, and your number one concern was Jason. 

The minute he had gotten in the door, even though he was slightly hobbled and clearly sore from whatever Deathstroke had done to him, he rushed out of your sight. He was clearly eager to get away from everyone like a wounded animal sulking away to lick his wounds in peace. And when you had chased him, ignoring a nagging pain in your own side from the fight, he had slammed his bedroom door in your face, entirely uncaring of the fact that you called out his name, concerned for him. 

The rest of the group was distracted with Conner - not knowing what he had been shot with or how to fix it. You hated it, but in the eyes of the group, yet again, Jason and any of his problems fell to the back burner. 

After you had taken a short shower and changed your clothes, you found yourself here. Standing in front of Jason’s closed bedroom door, hoping not to face another cold rejection. 

You wondered if he would be sleeping, wondered if you should interrupt his peace. But you knew that sleep was unlikely after everything that had happened. 

So you took the leap. 

You raised a fist, once again pushing down that stinging pain coming from the right side of your stomach. You reasoned that it was probably nothing more than a bruise forming there. And you knocked on the door. 

A few moments later, the door was jerked open, and Jason glared at you. 

His eyes were dull and tired, and there was a large bruise forming on the side of his mouth. Probably one of many others that you couldn’t see, from the way he had been walking earlier. He likely hadn’t been sleeping, but you had disturbed him. 

“What the hell do you want?” He grumbled out, his voice dull, lacking any true fight. 

“I wanted to check on you.” You told him, entirely honest. “I know it might seem stupid, but I wanna see how you’re doing.” 

Jason scoffed and rolled his eyes. 

He wanted to agree that - yes, it was stupid. It should have been obvious how he was doing after being kidnapped, beaten, and dropped off a building. But he was an idiot who had gotten himself thrown headfirst into that mess, thinking he could handle it. And he didn’t need to go crying to you about how badly he had fucked up. He had made a poor choice and he deserved all of the consequences. It was a simple fact of life. 

“I’m doing just fine, thanks.” Jason said, entirely snide and sarcastic. “Look, I don’t need your help, okay? So fuck off.” 

It was a set of harsh, cutting words. But he thought getting distance from you would be best. This whole thing had woken him up from the sweet little fantasy the two of you had been participating in. He was a natural born fuck-up. And sure, he could have you for a while, play around a bit - but he could never truly make you happy. Eventually, he would fuck you up too. He was a harsh poison and it would be better if he got out of your life before you felt the full effects. 

He moved to shove the door closed and upon instinct, you reached up and fought him on it. Unconsciously, you winced as a sharp pain came from the injury in your stomach, reaching for it with your free hand as you held the door open with the other. It should have been no big deal. With your meta abilities, you usually healed quicker. You weren’t even used to feeling it when you got hurt. You were probably just feeling it worse because you were tired. 

You tried to ignore the pain. But in a moment, Jason’s eyes went wide with worry as his gaze darted from your face, knit with pain, to where your hand was nursing the injury. Any sense of smarmy discontent dropped from his features, immediately being replaced with a softness and worry for you. 

“You’re hurt.” He said quietly. 

He let the door fall open again, reaching for your hand to inspect the injury himself. 

“I’m fine.” You played the card this time, exchanging his lie for your own. 

It was an odd play. He had lied about not being so torn up inside, emotionally devastated as he was, and now you were lying about not being physically injured from the fight. The two of you made an odd, but perfectly matched pair. 

Jason barreled right past your words, and you were easily pliant to his touch as he removed your hand from the injury. You certainly were not expecting for him to find anything incriminating under your hand. But he glared at you when he found bright red spread across your palm, a glossy wetness leaking through your shirt. 

“You’re bleeding.” He grunted at you. 

Clearly, he was disappointed in the fact that you had neglected to bring this injury to the group’s attention. Pissed off at the fact that you weren’t in the medbay with Conner receiving some treatment right now. 

Maybe you could blame it on the chaos. Maybe you could blame it on the fact that with everyone so emotionally distraught, you didn’t want to be just another problem for everyone to fuss over. 

“Whoops.” You breathed out sarcastically. “I didn’t even notice.” 

That last part was honest. In all the adrenaline, all your worrying over whether or not Jason was going to live as you watched him dangle so high off the ground - you truly hadn’t paid any mind to the injury. 

“You didn’t-?” Jason huffed out in anger, but didn’t bother finishing the sentence. 

Perhaps he partially understood himself, knowing how the adrenaline from a fight could stamp out pain. Or perhaps he knew how truly stubborn you were and he didn’t want to waste his energy arguing with you. 

“You need this treated.” He added on. 

No matter how fucked in the head he was, he never wanted to see you hurt. That was something he would definitely waste his energy on - wearing down your stubbornness until you let him or someone else in the house take care of the injury properly. 

“Conner is worse off than I am.” You shrugged. “He needs the attention more.” 

“Then let me help you.” He said, an impatient nagging rising up in his throat. “Bruce gave me some first aid training. One thing that means I’m not totally useless.” 

The words made your chest ache for him, a pain that easily competed with the bleeding wound. 

“Jason-” 

You wanted to argue with him. You wanted to tell him he had infinite worth to you. 

But of course, he cut you off. 

“Just go sit on the bed.” He told you, quiet, but a firm command that you couldn’t ignore. 

He gently pushed past you, on a quest for some supplies to patch you up with. You then found yourself drifting into his room almost mindlessly, your hand clutching the wound again upon instinct. It was a place that you felt oddly at home. The nights you had spent in that bed since coming to Titans Tower, your head delightfully empty as he had fucked you hard and fast - they were by far your favourites. 

You would say it was because of the sex, and not just because you got to be wrapped up in Jason’s arms. Maybe everything had changed. Maybe your answers were different now. Maybe you were raw and tender and Jason wasn’t prepared to chase you in that devotion. 

But that was just the thing. With you and Jason, there was never any sense of devotion. You and Jason were always hard and fast. Teasing each other, verging on the edge of vengeful. It was a flame that burned intensely hot - but it was never anything soft. It was never anything that prompted you to knock on his door so late, wanting to check on his well being. It was nothing that prompted you to make chase to put your life on the line for him. 

Even just knowing that he had the intent to attend to your injury, called himself useful because of it - the thought cradled you like a warm blanket. It had you balancing on the edge of a dam holding back a barrage of feelings that you had been quelling down since the moment you had first put your lips on his.

“I told you to sit.” Jason’s voice came from behind you. 

He had raided the infirmary and now had a handful of supplies - luckily without anyone seeing him or questioning why. When you turned to him, he was closing the bedroom door behind him, sealing you both in with this newfound soft intensity, the tired lull of two people unwilling to hold back that softness anymore. It was entirely dangerous, and entirely life-saving at the same time; and neither of you realized it. 

“Since when do you get to boss me around?” You told him, your voice low and lacking any true spirit or sarcasm. 

It was in the same vein as the banter the two of you usually threw around - bickering about who was a bigger asshole, who was more stubborn, who was better in bed. 

You expected some kind of sexual comment in return. You could almost hear it now - he was the boss of you because he made you melt on his cock, made you mindless and dumb with it. 

But, no dice. 

The longer you stared at him, catching bits of the fresh pain swimming through those gorgeous blue eyes, you wished so badly for the mischief and sarcasm and light to come back and bite you the way that it used to. 

It only made your stomach churn harder at the whole situation. Things had officially changed between you and Jason. You had yet to find out if it was for the better, or for the painstakingly worse. 

Jason sighed through his nose. 

“You can be such an asshole sometimes.” He told you. Coming from him, and given the nature of your relationship, you knew it was almost a compliment. “Will you just sit down and let me help you?” 

Even though you were utterly terrified of the swelling of emotions you felt, bound to come to a head - you did. 

You sat on the edge of the bed and he placed the supplies beside you. 

When he mumbled out a quiet ‘lay back’, and you did, his cool fingertips at the hem of your shirt pulling it upward felt strangely more intimate than any other time you had been in this same position. It wasn’t heady, you weren’t granted the distraction of his mouth on yours and his tongue shoved between your lips while a harsh throbbing nagged between your legs.

This was quiet, and calm, and gentle. 

When you caught his eye above you as he wiped away the blood with some clean gauze, you saw nothing but pity and worry and sparkling affection for you. You almost dared to call it something as epic and dangerous as love, buried deep in his eyes. He worked with the most delicate touch, almost as if he was afraid to break you, before he glanced down and inspected the wound. 

His brow furrowed with even more intense worry, guilt nipping at his insides when he got a good look at it. 

“I think I see a bullet in here.” He told you, and then he moved around the bed and grabbed his phone, turning on the flashlight to have a better light to inspect it. You felt intensely naked, intensely caught when he began shining the light on your stomach with a harshly inquisitive look across his face. “Definitely something shiny. You got shot and you didn’t fucking tell anyone?” 

It was only then that you realized when you had gotten the wound - the exact moment clicking into place in your mind. 

“It was only a ricochet.” You argued quietly. “It’s not that bad.” 

Jason scoffed and rolled his eyes, and began sorting out his supplies, preparing to pull out whatever was lodged inside of you. 

… 

Dick explicitly told you to stay put. 

They only wanted the more experienced Titans, the Varsity squad on the case when dealing with Deathstroke. He blamed young naive incompetence as the reason Jason had gotten captured in the first place. You blamed him and Bruce pushing Jason out, making him feel like he needed so desperately to prove himself. But it was something Dick wasn’t ready to hear - an argument you weren’t going to have with the very stubborn team leader. 

Instead, you went for the silent route. You trailed the rest of them out of Tower, and when Dick strayed away from the rest of the group, his head on a swivel as he glanced back and forth, seemingly wanting to assure that none of the others were following him - you followed your gut instincts and went after him. 

You hid in the shadows and the moment that Deathstroke hit the button and those panels scrolled up, revealing Jason stranded on that scaffolding - you couldn’t help yourself. 

“Jason!” 

You screamed out his name, you leapt forward. 

Dick didn’t have time to scold you, not before the gunfire started. 

Kory came out of nowhere - seemingly, she had the same idea as you. Putting her life on the line for an emotionally repressed man that she hadn’t admitted her feelings for. But she was there because she was in love with the other Robin. (Or rather, a man who claimed over and over again that he wasn’t Robin.) 

Things quickly became a blur - flashes of flame as Kory fought, battling with the muzzle flashes from Deathstroke’s guns, limbs flying as they fought each other. You didn’t see it, but Deathstroke raised and aimed at you as you rushed toward the window, blindly going after Jason. In response, Dick charged forward, redirecting the gun as he pulled the trigger. You heard the sharp ‘ping’ sound of metal on metal - what you couldn’t see was the bullet hitting one of the metal beams in the ceiling. But you certainly felt it when it sliced into your side. 

At the time, it was nothing compared to the fear you felt for Jason. 

His eyes were wide with terror, and you could only focus on getting him to safety. You had no idea that a large part of his panic came from seeing you in the building. He had hoped that Dick would keep you away from all of this. But there you were, standing a few feet away from a man with a gun who was shooting around wildly. Jason would have delighted in being dropped off the building to his death if he had to see you get fatally shot when he could do nothing but squirm on the other side of the glass. 

You put two hands on the glass, banging on it - of course, it was no use. It was inches thick, meant to keep people from going through it at this height. Working entirely on instinct, you put your palms flat across it and began forming ice crystals over it, hoping to make it rigid and breakable if it was frozen. 

Once there was enough ice, you quickly looked around and spotted a metal pipe there for the in-progress construction of the building, so you grabbed it and rushed to smash the glass with it. You felt victorious as it shattered, and Jason flinched away from the shards, putting you one step closer to freeing him. 

Though the moment the glass was cleared, leaving the wind whipping around you, his first words of greeting to you were not celebratory. 

“What the hell are you doing here?” He barked at you, clearly angry with you. 

You felt a dull ache in your chest at this. You thought he might be relieved, happy, pleased. At the time, you couldn’t interpret his harsh reaction as worry for you possibly getting hurt. 

Nonetheless, you ignored his harshness. You would save him, whether he wanted to be saved or not. You draped your body through the window, reaching out to him. You made an effort to keep most of your weight planted on the floor of the building, in case the scaffolding wasn’t stable enough to hold two people at once. 

“What do you think?” You replied, pure sarcasm dripping through your voice as you reached behind Jason and began fiddling with the rope around his wrists. 

The position put the two of you in intensely close proximity. Jason caught a whiff of your unique scent, the shower gel you used that mingled with your body’s natural oils; and he felt so painfully at home. For the first time that night, he held back tears. He couldn’t help but to lean his forehead on your shoulder, taking comfort in having you so near after being on edge and terrified for so many hours. You resisted the urge to run a hand through his hair, to cradle him and give him further comfort. You forced yourself to focus on the task at hand - getting him to safety. 

Behind you, at the very back of the room, Dick and Deathstroke wrestled with the remote for the explosives attached to the scaffolding. 

Just as you managed to get Jason’s wrists freed, Deathstroke hit the switch, and the bombs went off. 

… 

You winced loudly as Jason dabbed at the wound with disinfectant. 

“I would say sorry… but, you’ll thank me later when this isn’t swollen and leaking puss.” He told you, throwing you a small smirk. 

It was smug. It was the usual kind of humor that he gave you. 

It was comforting to know that every trace of the Jason you knew hadn’t been stolen by Deathstroke. 

You held your breath as he pressed down with the medicine-covered gauze again, drawing much less of a reaction out of you this time. 

“Great mental image, Jay.” You replied, your voice dull. It lacked any of the true bite you wanted to deliver in response to him. “I’m sure it’s such a turn-on thinking about my puss.” 

It was meant to be a joke. But even unconsciously, it was an acknowledgement of that dangerous line - the line between truly caring and just using someone for sex. The line between having someone in your life as a body to get off with, and being so… homely with them. 

You and Jason were towing that line dangerously. It was a thread that you were balancing on, and it would either break, or you would cross to the other side and be forever bonded to him. 

Jason shrugged. “Maybe I don’t have to be turned on by you all the time.” 

There was more stuck in his throat. Another dangerous acknowledgement of that line. 

‘Maybe I just have to care.’ 

Both of you lulled into silence because neither of you dared to say it. 

After a few moments, Jason put down the gauze and hesitated to reach for the tweezers. He knew that pulling the bullet out would be painful, but inevitable. It was a lot like the state of your relationship with him. Break it off, and find happiness elsewhere, or acknowledge this big thing swelling to fruition between the two of you. Have Jason fuck it up eventually. Painful, but inevitable. 

“You shouldn’t have to be hurt like this.” Jason said quietly. “You shouldn’t have gotten hurt for my sake.” 

There it was again - words with a dangerous double meaning. 

You looked up at him, pure pain knit across his face, and for a moment he looked from the tweezers to you and he could hardly stand holding your gaze. 

‘It’s worth it.’ You wanted to say. ‘For you, I’d bear any pain.’ 

The words lived and died behind your eyes, and your tongue decided on something else entirely. 

“It’s nothing.” You told him. 

You downplayed the pain, pretending that the injury was only a minor inconvenience for you. And in the grand scheme of life, it was. With time, it would heal. Losing Jason would be something you’d never heal from. 

Jason shook his head at this statement. 

He forced himself to reach for the tweezers then. He handed you his phone, a silent agreement that you would hold the light as steady as you could. He knew you well, too well, and he knew that you needed something else to focus on to push away the pain. He put his free hand on the plush of your stomach, pulling back slightly to hold the wound open while you held the light on it. 

When the sharp metal of the tweezers breached your wound, you wanted to swear. You wanted to call him an asshole as the pain shot through you. You wanted to scold him for leaving the Tower and being kidnapped in the first place. But you knew that even if it was playful or sarcastic, fueled by the bite of your pain, it was not what he needed to hear right now. So instead, you held your breath, and gripped his phone hard, keeping the light steady as you bared the sharp shocks of pain. 

After a moment of digging around that felt like an eternity, he pulled out the fragment and held it up to show you as you collapsed back against the bed, panting with tears stinging the edges of your eyes. 

“It’s not nothing.” He declared sharply. 

You couldn’t conjure a response. You knew he was right. And you didn’t want to be forced to admit it. 

Instead, you turned off the light from his phone and relaxed into the bed, closing your eyes as he walked around to the trashcan and threw out the bullet fragment. It fell into the bottom of the plastic wastebasket with a very small ‘ping’ - making you wonder how something so small could cause so much trouble. 

Jason quickly returned to you, dabbing more disinfectant into the wound in a way that made you groan and flex away from the touch. Once again, he did not apologize. 

There were a few moments of muddy silence with nothing but your slightly labored breathing, trying to contain your sounds of pain so as to not make him feel any further guilt about the whole incident. 

Your mind churned, and you couldn’t help the next words that came from your mouth. 

“I meant what I said.” You told him. 

At the sound of this, his hands immediately stilled. You felt his eyes on you, and you forced yourself to open your own and look up at him once again. He stared you down with intense examination. He looked for any ounce of falsity, any sign that you were lying, even posturing to make him feel better after everything that had happened. 

He didn’t find any. 

You thought he might acknowledge you, that he might say something back to return your mighty words. Instead, he simply reached for more gauze, and began putting a final bandage on your wound. 

… 

The explosion caused a sharp rattle through your ears. It shocked you and made you dizzy and put the whole world off-kilter. The only thing you could perceive past the mind-numbing hum in your brain was the feeling of Jason’s rough glove gripping tightly onto your wrist, so you gripped back as hard as you could. 

When you blinked open your eyes, you were half-hanging out of the open window, the edge of the floor cutting into your waist as you held onto Jason by nothing but his wrist. His whole body weight created a harsh burn, straining on the muscles in your shoulder as you watched him dangle hundreds of feet above the street. 

Panic flooded you. 

You scrambled to reach out with your other hand, and the moment you moved, your shirt slipped against the sleek, polished material of the floor and you began sliding out the window. You gasped and Jason stilled his panicked flailing immediately. 

“Don’t move!” He shouted. 

“Give me your other hand so I can pull you up!” You shouted back. 

Beyond the unpleasant hum of your eardrums rattling, you still heard chaos behind you. Gunshots, the grunts of fighting, Kory and Dick’s voices yelling. They were busy with Deathstroke, they couldn’t help you or Jason. 

Jason looked up at you with glassy eyes. 

He knew that with all his gear weighing him down, even with the training you had been doing, you wouldn’t be able to pull him up. Not by yourself. And if you weren’t careful, his body weight would just pull you out of the window and cause you to go tumbling down to your death along with him. 

When you saw that frown etch across his lips, that filthy look of dawning - you glared at him. 

“Give me your other hand!” You screamed, your voice raking across your throat like hot coals. A hot boiling rage at the fact that he seemed almost determined to die. 

There was one thing he was determined about. If he was going to die, he wasn’t going to take you down with him. 

His gloved wrist started to slip from your nervous, sweaty palm, and you tried hard to hold on tight. You formed large shards of ice, hoping you could create some kind of bond there by freezing your hand to his. But it would only be temporary with gravity trying to tear the two of you apart. 

“You have to drop me, Y/N.” He said, nothing but pure mourning on his lips. “I’m dead weight.” 

You both knew it was a horrendous double meaning. 

He thought he was a dead weight to your life. 

“No!” You immediately defied this thought, that feral rage ripping at your throat once again. “I’m gonna pull you up. I’m gonna pull you up!” 

You reached your other hand down and tightly wrapped both of your hands around his wrist, yanking upward. The harsh movement caused you to slide even further out the window. You were now dangling dangerously over San Francisco with only the thickness of your thighs giving you any real stability on the intensely high up floor. It made you dizzy, and the only thing you had to focus on were the wet wells of Jason’s eyes staring up at you. 

“It’s no use!” Jason said tearfully. 

You ignored him. 

You cast your chin over your shoulder, and began shouting. 

“Help me!” You screamed, trying desperately to get the attention of Dick or Kory. “Help me! Fuck!” 

“You have to let go.”

Jason’s words immediately shifted your focus back to him. 

But of course, you refused. 

“I’m not letting go of you!” You declared sharply. “Not that easily.” 

As he stared up at your tearful eyes, he knew that you meant it as more. 

Unfortunately, it was the one thing he was terrified of. 

He thought that you saw him as some shiny perfect thing, something good and worth having in your life. He thought that you were incapable of seeing the poison, the true fuck-up that he was. If you didn’t let go of him, sooner or later, just like everyone else in his life, you were going to get burned. 

So Jason did what he had to do. 

He began prying your fingers off his wrist, trying his best to keep you stable while he forced himself from your grip. 

“No!” You shrieked. “No, no, no-” 

You didn’t have much room to fight him about it without falling out of the window yourself. 

You made a move to readjust, to get a tighter grip on him - and it was the one deadly move that caused him to slip out of your touch completely. 

You were forced to watch on in chest clenching horror, blinking through heavy tears as he began hurtling toward the ground. 

… 

If not for Conner - a literal miracle - swooping in and saving Jason at the last second, then you would have spent the rest of your life regretting those moments, wondering what you could have done differently to save him. 

When Jason finished taping down the bandages, making sure the wound was clean and secure, he laid his palm flat on top of it. It was a kind of ‘kissing it better’ that instantly spread warmth curling through your gut. It was a touch so incredibly tender - especially compared to the heated, aggressive groping you were used to from him - that it caused a whimper from the back of your throat. 

You knew it was unlikely, but you hoped that he hadn’t heard it. 

“All done.” He said quietly. 

You instantly felt regret when he took his hand away and began tidying up the medical supplies. But you forced yourself to sit upright, now feeling only muscle soreness and a much duller pain coming from the area. You felt intensely thankful for his care as you pulled your shirt back down, righting your clothes back into place. 

“You’re free to go now.” Jason told you, his voice still low, as though a single decibel would shatter the delicate peace between the two of you. 

You felt your heart sink. 

In an instant, you understood what it was - he was concerned about your physical wellbeing, but he didn’t actually want to have you around. Just like his reaction to you showing up at the hostage exchange - he didn’t want your presence there. 

You heaved a sigh and got off the bed as Jason busied himself with gathering up the used gauze to throw it away. As you put your hand on the doorknob, you couldn’t quite bring yourself to leave. 

It was something else. 

It had to be something else. 

Jason hadn’t let himself drop off a building in some desperate ploy just to get away from you. He had been trying to save you. 

He was so utterly willing to give his life for yours. 

And now he was trying to back down from that. 

You turned and faced him, leaving the door closed. When he turned from ditching things in the wastebasket, he froze. He was entirely surprised that you were still there.

The two of you locked eyes, both staying still - like a predator and prey locked in a stalemate, wondering who would run first. 

In this situation, you weren’t sure who was the prey. 

You were both so vulnerable. 

Jason thought it would be selfish to get caught up in all of this, to finally admit those dangerous feelings he had for you. When he cared for things, he usually ended up breaking them. Of course, it was never on purpose - he was an idiot. Everything he touched, he fucked up. He had made that more than evident with his last braindead plan, the outing to prove that he was worthy of being Robin. Something that had gotten you shot, probably could have gotten you killed. 

If you stuck with him any longer, you probably would end up being killed. And he would never forgive himself for that. 

He would be better off ripping himself from your hold, as much as it hurt. Giving you a dose of that heartbreak now so that you could get over him and go after better things. 

As you stared at Jason, you could see all the pain boiling underneath his surface. You wondered what he was thinking, what the hell he was churning over in that intense brain of his - but you didn’t dare to ask. 

You knew that he needed to be held right now - in every sense of the word. You knew that he needed to be cared for the way he had cared for your wound, pushing past the pain in order to heal. You wondered if he would lay down and bear it or if he would continue to fight you. 

You were the one to bravely step forward. Though Jason was tempted to ask you to leave, that thing inside of him yearning to marinate in his isolation because he deserved it, he pushed it down. He let his hands naturally come to sit on the plush comfort of your waist as you put a gentle touch on both his shoulders, leaning into his body ever so slightly. 

You laid your forehead on his cheek, right next to that ugly bruise that had been left on him, and he let out a contented sigh as he felt your warmth envelope him. For the first time since his feet had touched the ground, he felt calm. He felt safe. 

You smoothed a hand across his shoulder, and raised your head, using your touch to gently tip his face toward yours. He quickly realized that your intention was to kiss him. And something ached in his heart - something painful and longing. He knew that it would not be needy and haste with the intention of pile-driving toward sex like your other kisses had been. He knew that it would be the metamorphosis of your relationship that he was not prepared to go through. 

He nuzzled along your forehead, gently stopping you. 

“Please don’t do this.” He murmured quietly into your skin. 

He knew that it would break him. 

He knew that this was the moment - like Gatsby reaching up toward the stars - this would be the moment that he was tied to you forever, damned by his love for you. Only, much different than Gatsby, he wasn’t destined for some grant fate if he didn’t have you. He was on a one way path to a messy death, and he was determined not to take you down with him. 

Tears pricked the edges of his eyes at the thought. 

You pulled back, just enough to properly look him in the eyes, and your own tears formed when you saw that pathetic puppy dog looking back at you. 

“Why not?” You demanded, much sharper than you intended. You knew he was fragile and you didn’t want to upset him any further than he already was. 

“You know why.” He replied, his voice barely scraping above a whisper as the emotion clutched at his throat. 

Jason wanted to hold onto you forever, but he was also a realistic person. He expected that any minute now, you would rip away from his arms and charge out the door, entirely angry with him, and this would finally be over. You would finally be safe from him - safe from any nasty fate his life could conjure up for you. 

You hated what he was asking of you - asking you not to care for him anymore. As if you could somehow switch it off. Impossible. 

“I meant what I said.” You repeated yourself, still entirely firm in this conviction. “I’m not gonna let you go that easily.” 

You leaned in, planting your lips on his in a light kiss. A pained sigh ripped through you when he didn’t make any moves to kiss you back. 

“Jason, please.” You whimpered out desperately. “If you get to bandage my bullet wound, then I get to do this.” 

Jason wanted to spell it all out for you, plain and dirty. He wanted to get angry, he wanted to scream. He wanted to rush along the inevitable. He wanted to tell you what a poison he was to the world, that he deserved to die and you deserved better things. But he had the utmost feeling that you wouldn’t listen. 

“Please, stop pushing me away.” You whispered against his lips. 

Instead, he listened to your plea. He let himself indulge in this selfish softness for once. 

He reached up and grabbed your jaw, pulling you into a firmer kiss, declaring every ounce of passion and terror that he was feeling in those moments. You answered it all right back - digging your fingers into the shoulders of his shirt, letting out a hot huff against his cheek as you leaned into his body. 

He would never be perfect - but he was yours.

...

Final note: yes, I used to be @/pinkchubbiebunnie. That is still my username on AO3, so if you saw this fic posted on there, it is my fic. Please do not accusing me of plagiarising fics if you see this, because this is my own fic. This is my new blog. Feel free to follow me if you’re interested in my fanfiction and thoughtful discussions of the media that I enjoy.