#how things will end so i just keep my thoughts to myself. and let you speak your mind. i dont mess around with your stuff | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

jordyn14 · 2 days

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can you please write jealousy joe??? I would love to see that 😁😁

Pairing: Joe x fem first person

Words: 2,020

Notes: I’m loving these requests, please keep sending them in! I hope you enjoy!! <3

Taglist: @wickedfun9

I reached forwards and grabbed the alcoholic drink I’ve been sipping on periodically while laughing and having a great time with some friends. Like every night after the Bengals first win of the season, Joe, my best friend and her husband, and me all go to our favorite bar in Cincinnati to celebrate the win, and today wasn’t any different.

The bengals first game of the season which was a home game was pretty much a shutout. Joe threw for over 400 yards and threw for 4 touchdowns, 3 of which were to ja’marr chase. It was everything we could’ve hoped for the first game of the season, so in celebration, we all came to this bar in the quieter part of Cincinnati.

We all sat at a small table in the back together while Joes hand rested on my thigh, squeezing and trailing his hand up and down it periodically, which sent shivers down my spine. As I sipped my drink, I got to the very end of it and then set it down on the table. “Alright, I’m going for another drink run. Anyone need anything else?” I asked the 3 other people at the table who were still laughing at something Joe said a few seconds ago.

From next to me, Joe patted my thigh. I looked over to him with a flustered smile on my face, the alcohol somewhat taking an effect. Damn, I was a lightweight. “I’m good, baby, but thank you.” Joe said and leaned over to me and placed a kiss on my cheek. My face flushed red and I looked over to my best friend, Serena, and her husband jonny. I let out a little giggle as Joe slid his hand up my skirt jokingly, knowing how it affected me. Once I contained myself, I cleared my throat and waited until they both said they could use another drink before I walked away.

As I walked away, I could feel Joe’s stare on me the entire time. Ever since we first met at LSU when he transferred, I was totally taken aback by him. The first thing that drew me in were his looks. Those locks that fell onto his forehead and those bright blue eyes. His body wasn’t bad either. What made me stay was his personality. Before I met Joe, I didn’t know a man could be so amazing, inside and out. I mean we’re talking about a nerdy, Lego and SpongeBob loving, funny, kind, thoughtful man. What more could a girl ask for?

When I got to the bar, I found a place to squeeze myself in and placed myself between two people. After a few seconds, the bartender walked over to me so I put in all of our drink orders and started to sing along to the music quietly, wanting the time to pass quicker. “Oh my gosh…is that really you?” A familiar voice asked from next to me. I raised an eyebrow and looked over to the man before my mouth practically dropped open. “Luke? What the hell are you doing here?” I asked in a shocked tone and instantly wrapped my arms around him. The both of us just laughed, shocked to see one another.

Back at LSU, Luke and I used to hang out pretty frequently. It was never anything more than two friends getting together, getting high, or getting drunk-even studying in some rare cases. Our little friend group consisted of me, Luke, anna who was Luke’s girlfriend, and Serena, my best friend. But, since Luke was 2 years older than me, by the time Joe came along Luke had graduated, which means I never got to introduce Joe to him and the friend group kind of broke up and became Serena, me, Joe, Ja’marr chase, and Justin Jefferson.

“Since Anna grew up here, we decided to move back. What are you doing here?” He asked me as we pulled away. “I followed my boyfriend here after college. When I get my drinks you’ll have to come meet him, he transferred right after you left.” I told him. After hesitating for a few seconds, he nodded and flashed me a smile. “Yeah, I definitely will have to meet him. So how have you been? How’s your writing going?” He asked me. “I’m good, writings been good too. I actually published my second book a few weeks ago. What about you? How has your business major been going?” I asked him with laugh, knowing back in college he had no idea what to do with it. “I actually didn’t do anything with it. I’m a police officer how. I love that I found out what I was passionate about after I spent thousands of dollars on college.” He laughed. I laughed and grabbed the drinks the bartender set down in front of me as was about to invite Luke over to our table so Joe could meet him.

All of a sudden, I felt a hand slide around my waist and looked to the side to see Joe practically hovering over me and Luke, who was shorter than me. I couldn’t help but notice the angry expression on Joe’s face and how he was clenching his jaw. I was about to open my mouth to introduce them but Joe spoke right over me. “Hey, I’m Joe, Her boyfriend. And you are?” Joe said abruptly, giving Luke a fake smile in the process. I looked up to Joe with a glare on my face at his rudeness and was about to say something yet again when Luke talked first. “Hey, Luke. It’s good to meet you, man.” Luke said and held out his hand for Joe to shake it.

Joe just glared down at his hand and then looked right back up at his face, not shaking his hand. “Excuse us, Luke. It was great seeing you again.” I said. I flashed Luke a smile before grabbing onto Joe’s arm and tried to pull him with me, but he wouldn’t budge. Why did he have to be so strong? I could feel his arm muscles as I gripped onto his bicep before I said, “Joe?” In a somewhat pissed off tone. I saw Joe look Luke up and down before grabbing two drinks in his hand while I grabbed the other one and started walking with me.

I scoffed a little bit and stopped walking before we got to the table so Serena and Jonny couldn’t hear us. I turned to face Joe as we both set our drinks on the nearest table. Joe was just looking down at me with a pissed look on his face. “What the hell was that, Joe?” I asked him. Joe looked like I was the stupid one before he gestured over to Luke and said, “What the hell was that?” I looked at him like I was missing something. What was his fucking deal? “Me catching up with a friend from LSU and you being a fucking dick before I was able to introduce the two of you, that’s what it’s called, Joe.” I said.

Joe just looked me up and down while biting his lip slightly and said, “I don’t care what it’s called. I don’t like the way he was looking at you. I’m your fucking boyfriend, not him.” I let out a small laugh and shook my head, taken aback. “What, do you not trust me now or something? When have I ever given you a reason to not trust me.” I practically spat at him, getting even more annoyed as we talked. Never in our time as a couple have I ever been unfaithful. “It’s him that I don’t trust. If you haven’t noticed, you’re the most gorgeous girl in this entire bar.” Joe said.

What reason would he have for not trusting Luke? Could he not see by the way I reacted that we were only friends who haven’t seen each other in a while? And anyways, he overreacted before he even got the whole story. I couldn’t help but laugh at him a little bit. “He has a fucking girlfriend, Joe. Why are you so jealous?” I asked him. “It doesn’t matter that he has a fucking girlfriend,” Joe said quickly and looked over at Luke before he looked even more pissed and gestured angrily over to him, “I mean look at the way he’s staring at your fucking ass right now.”

Without even looking at Luke, I scoffed while shaking my head at him and said, “you’re unreal.” Joe squinted down at me. “So now I’m not allowed to be pissed when a random man is drooling all over you?” He asked me. I put my hands on the top of my head for a few seconds before letting them slide off, shocked at how he was acting. “You are blowing this way out of proportion, Joseph. We were friends back at LSU.” I said. “Why, because I don’t want a man who used to be your friend flirting with my girlfriend and staring at her ass? You’re mine.” Joe said.

“Exactly, I’m yours. I’m yours and you are mine, so who the fuck cares that someone I was friends with a few years ago was flirting with me?” I asked him. Joe looked over in the direction of our table and grabbed my arm gently and moved us a few feet away. While he was moving me, I looked back at the table to see Serena and Jonny staring at us, knowing something was going on.

When we stopped, Joe looked right into my eyes. For the first time during this entire conversation, my face flushed red and I could feel myself getting turned on slightly. Why was this so hot right now? “I do. I care. I am the only one that should be flirting and looking at you like that.” Joe said. I tried my hardest to hide my smile because despite how much I was annoyed with him and his jealousy, he was really fucking hot.

After a few seconds, I couldn’t hide it any more and smiled up at him. Joe glared at me in confusion while butterflies flew around in my stomach. “You’re honestly pretty freaking hot when you’re jealous.” I said, my face heating up a little bit from the dirty thoughts in my head as I admired Joe and his pissed off state. Joe started to smirk a little bit but when he realize what he was doing, he cleared his throat and the smirk was gone just like that. “It’s not funny. Do you know how much I wanted to smash his fucking face into that bar?” Joe asked me. With a little glare, I wrapped my arms around his neck and tried to pull him closer, but he wouldn’t budge. So, I tried to go closer to him, but all he did was back up.

I stopped moving and then stuck out my bottom lip jokingly, knowing one of his weaknesses was when I looked sad. With an annoyed look on his face, he wrapped his arms around my waist, hating the effect I had on him. We both pulled each other in closer so I leaned forwards and kissed Joe’s lips. Not expecting it at first, Joe pulled back slightly and gazed into my eyes before smashing his lips against mine. Joe breathed in the kiss as I arched my back. Joe kissed me back hard and right before we pulled away, Joe bit my bottom lip gently. “Was he watching that?” I breathed out with a smile. Joe looked up at the bar past my head and then nodded with a small smile. “Good.” I said and turned around to look in the direction of the bar with our arms still around each other. My eyes caught Luke’s who immediately looked away with an embarrassed, awkward, and nervous look on his face. I looked away and to Joe while running my fingers through his hair. “Let him be the jealous one, I’m not going anywhere Joey. Ever.” I said.

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rafesfavgirl · 1 day

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i just want to know — r. cameron

another sad one bc i apparently don't know when to stop lol

❝ you didn't measure up in any measure of a man and i don't even want you back, i just want to know ❞

pairing: ex-situationship!rafe x fem!reader

context: on the night of your 21st birthday, you run into rafe cameron—the boy who broke your heart.

words: 1.3k+

warnings: mentions of a toxic situationship, drunk!reader, word vomit, alcohol use, cigarette use, might make you cry, so much ANGST

you tumble out of the bar, your vision getting hazy from the amount of alcohol you'd drank, when two hands reach out to steady you.

"woah there, doll," the familiar drawl of his voice catches your attention, the alcohol haze fading for just a second as your eyes meet his.

rafe cameron.

"those are bad for you, you know," you point at the unlit cigarette hanging from the side of his mouth and he narrows his eyes at you, amused at your drunken state.

"and alcohol's not good for you either, but that didn't stop you, did it?" he kinks an eyebrow and you giggle.

"touché," you nod once and slip out of his arms to walk along the sidewalk, before slipping down against the brick wall of the bar to sit down on the concrete.

"alright, what are you doing?" rafe walks over to you when you begin unstrapping your heels from your feet.

"these shoes have been killing me all night," you complain, letting out a sigh of relief and tossing them off to the side.

"then why do you wear them?" rafe asks, taking a seat beside you.

"because they make my legs look hot," you say, causing him to chuckle.

he couldn't exactly argue. when the two of you used to go out, your legs were one of his favorite things about you—especially the way they looked wrapped around his waist.

"where are your friends, doll?" rafe takes the cigarette out of his mouth and shoves it into his pocket.

"don't know," you shrug. "making out with some guys, maybe?"

"and why aren't you?" he asks. "isn't it your birthday?"

that makes you snap your head towards him. "are you stalking me?"

"i-"

"i'm just kidding," you playfully hit his arm and giggle, causing him to shake his head at you, amused. "and to answer your question, i prefer to be single."

"oh?" his eyebrows raise, his blue irises boring into yours. "and why's that?"

"it keeps me focused," you say, pointing a finger at your forehead.

"focused on what?"

"school, college, my career…" you begin listing things off, and rafe listens intently. "i wanna be a doctor, you know. can't be out and about dating guys and getting my heartbroken."

"just 'cause you meet a guy in a bar doesn't mean you gotta date 'em," he reminds you. "don't you wanna have fun?"

"i tried that already, remember?" you allude to the situation you'd put yourself in with him a year ago, the alcohol clearly clouding your judgment—you'd never bring that up to him sober. "it didn't work out quite how i wanted it to."

a sigh falls from his lips, as he glances down. "y/n…"

"hey, can i ask you something?" you cut him off, and he picks his head up to look at you again.

"are you in the state to ask me something?"

"probably not," you shake your head, a smile on your lips. "but i probably won't get the chance to ask again."

"alright, shoot," he nodded.

you tilt your head to the side, eyes locking with his. "why did you end it?"

by the way his shoulders shift and his posture straightens, it was clear he wasn't expecting that to be the question. he always thought it ended amicably because you both agreed to it—or maybe that's just what he's told himself to prevent himself from feeling bad for breaking your heart.

"i mean, was it me?" you continue when he doesn't answer. "did i do something wrong? was i not experienced enough? did you just feel bad for me? what was it? cause i've driven myself crazy trying to figure it out and i just— i thought we were having fun."

you knew that you'd began to ramble, questions slipping out of your mouth with no filter, the alcohol winning over.

his eyes scan over your face, which looked to be in agony, your eyebrows scrunched and your eyes pleading.

"we were," he nods. "y/n, it never had anything to do with you."

"then why?" you asked, voice cracking.

the alcohol was now making you emotional, and there was no stopping it.

"why did you end it, rafe?" you poke a finger at his chest. "i thought you liked me."

"i did," he said, hand reaching up to push a piece of your back. "oh, pretty girl, i did."

his touch lingers for a second before it's gone again, and your eyes are welling up with tears.

"then why were there always other girls?" you ask, surprising him—he didn't know you knew about them. "if you liked me, why was there always someone else? why were you always with someone else when you weren't with me? why wasn't i enough for you?"

"i— i didn't think you knew about them," he admits.

"i pretended not to," you shrug, sniffling. "thought if i said something, i'd lose you. i mean, it's not like we were dating, y'know? i wasn't your girlfriend— it wasn't my place to tell you not to be with other girls. i just thought that if i'd stuck around long enough you'd realize that—" you stop and shake your head. "you know what, it doesn't even matter. it's not like it's gonna change anything."

well now, he felt like shit. you'd played it off so well when it ended—or maybe he was just too high to notice—but seeing you like this… he'd be lying to himself if he said it didn't break his heart. "i didn't know you cared that much."

"well, now you do," you tell him, before pushing off the ground to stand up. "and if you'll excuse me, i'm not really in the party mood anymore, so if you see my friends, tell them i left."

"y/n, wait," rafe scrambles to his feet, his hand reaching out to clasp around your wrist to stop you from walking away.

"what?" you turn to look at him, defeated. this wasn't exactly how you expected the night of your 21st birthday to pan out.

"i'm sorry, a'ight?" he drops his hand from your wrist, shoulders shrugging as his sad eyes met yours. "i never wanted to hurt you, i just— i wasn't ready."

"and that was fine," you tell him. "but you should've told me that. not pretended like you were taking me seriously when you weren't. i asked you so many times, rafe. and you lied, every time."

rafe sighs, hand motioning to you. "you were just so pure. perfect. i didn't have it in me to hurt you."

you scoff, head shaking as you eyes averted to the side. "doesn't mean you didn't."

"i know, i know," he closes the distance between you, taking both your hands in his. "and there is not a day that goes by where i don't kick myself for how horribly i treated you."

well, this was definitely news to you. when he called things off with you, claiming that it'd be too hard because you were going off to college and meeting new people, he made it look so easy. the words rolled off his tongue as if he'd said it a thousand times before. while you were falling for him, you were just another girl.

"i am so sorry," he says, eyes zoned in on yours. "the last thing i wanted was for you to feel as if you weren't enough for me. if anything, you were too much. and i mean that in a good way. i was too much of an idiot to see how special you were then."

though you'd waited for him to say those words the last six months, they didn't mean much to you now. you'd already come to terms with the fact that he just wasn't the one—hearing him say this now only provides you the closure you so desperately needed to move on for good.

"god," he brings a hand up to caress your cheek, and for just a second, you let yourself lean into it. "some guy is gonna be lucky as hell to get you one day."

"that guy just isn't you."

a small, sad smile forms on his lips, but he nods. "happy birthday."

y'all i think this one triggered something in me bc why tf am i crying rn 🌝

promise i'll start working on some cuter fics that aren't so heartbreaking!!!

reblogs and comments are deeply appreciated <33

click here to be added to my tag list!!

tags: @chiaraanatra @ijustwanttoreadlols @wearemadeofstardust0 @rafesgiirl @solanathascientst @10ava01 @werewhatkilledthedinosaurs @emotionsmgcbabe @outerbankspov @letmeintourheart @gublerstylesobrien1238 @deadgirlwalkingirl @my-fabulousness-has-arrived @jul1ettt @ihe4rttwd @samkickikc @ramblingsofadramastudent @maibelitaaura @vilentia

#rafe cameron #rafe #obx #rafe obx #outer banks #rafe cameron x reader #rafe cameron x y/n #rafe x reader #rafe x y/n #rafe outer banks #sad rafe #rafe cameron fic #rafe cameron angst

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meechlamajor · 11 hours

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literally anything for Kate Martin

Kiss and Makeup — Kate Martin x Fem!Reader

In which you and Kate have a heated argument, and you feel conflicted between your morals and feelings.

Warnings: angst (I made Kate into a little bit of a bitch I’m upset with myself for it negl) and fluff!

Author’s note: kudos to @fallofachilles for the prompt idea! + I hope you guys like the new layout I’m trying, despite the simplicity. Consider this a birthday gift from me to you guys, but for my birthday ♡!

You sit on the floor of the off-campus apartment that you share with Kate, pulling everything that Kate had just put into her suitcase out. She quite literally shoved everything in there and there was just no way that she would fit everything she needed in there. You were unsure about how she did this before meeting you.

“Babe,” you huffed. “I keep telling to you to stop waiting until the last moment to pack! You wouldn’t have to rush if you listened.”

“Okay Mom, sorry,” Kate brushed the fly aways out of her face and sat next to you.

You rolled up each item so that you could get the most out of the space in her suitcase.

“Do you have your extra pair of shoes in another bag or something?” You inquired. You’d gone through everything and they hadn’t turned up.

“No baby, they’re in our room,” Kate replied to you, but never got up.

“Go get them!” You widened your eyes, motioning to the bedroom. “Sheesh.”

Kate came back with them in hand, “I thought you were going to get them.”

You swore when you heard that your eye twitched. “Uh— why would I do that? You’re able.”

“Well… you just usually do. It’s a ‘girlfriend’ thing to do,” Kate explained, shrugging.

You chuckled, warmth spreading up the back of your neck and to your face. “So as your girlfriend I’m supposed to baby you and wait on you hand and foot?”

The room becomes tense and your heart beats in your ears. You remain patient though, trying to hear your girlfriend out.

“Well no, but I didn’t ask for you to do any of this,” Kate motions to her clothes on the floor. “It’s our normal routine. What’s the problem?”

You groan, running your hands down your face. “I do it because I want to and because I love you! I don’t have to do any of it— I could literally let you go to the airport and pay a fifty dollar fee because your luggage is overweight, but I don’t!”

Kate shoved her tongue into her cheek and crossed her arms over her chest defensively. “I don’t understand what I said wrong! Why disrupt our routine?”

“You sound like such a man,” you curse. “The problem is that I’m realizing that you don’t respect me or even value me! I know that you work so hard, so I do these things to take some of the weight off off your shoulders, and you’re not even the tiniest bit grateful!”

Kate drops her bright pink shoes onto the hardwood floors, the sound echoing through the apartment. Her eyes glance at them and then you. A staring contest goes on for thirty seconds and you chuckle bitterly before rising to your feet.

You strut toward the bedroom, grabbing your backpack.

“What are you doing?” Kate questions you, following you into the room. But, you ignore her as you raid the dresser for clothes.

You shove your clothes into the bag, not giving nearly as much care to your items as you give to Kate’s. Your toiletries lay on top. You swing the bag over your right shoulder, saving your left hand for your keychain.

“Where are you going!?” Kate continues. “You cannot be ignoring me right now. You- come on!”

“Clearly, you’ve gotten too comfortable and you seem to think that I’m your maid or something. I’m leaving and you can have fun spending a week without me.”

You found yourself staying with your friend Karissa for a few days. You almost went to Jada’s dorm, but there was no way that you wouldn’t end up seeing Kate there.

While you stayed with Karissa, you had some time to think. Were you babying Kate? You just thought that she might appreciate what you do for her, but she made it obvious that now it had become more of an expectation of you.

You felt conflicted. You always told yourself that you wouldn’t tolerate disrespect from anyone, including your partner. If you forgave Kate, would you basically be telling her it’s okay, I don’t mind that you disrespected me?

But at the same time, you love Kate and it hurts you to be away from her.

“Penny for your thoughts?” Karissa asked as she joined you on her plush white couch.

“Thinking about Kate,” you say.

“But, that’s literally all the time so what difference does it make?” She jokes, channel surfing.

“The difference is that I haven’t spoken to her in three days because my pride won’t let me,” you sigh. “I don’t want to give in too easy.”

“You don’t have to,” Karissa chimes. “Okay, listen. Forget about whatever lesson you’re trying to teach her, and instead just think about what you want.

Maybe it’s not about you wanting her realizing that she needs you, but it could be more about the fact that she hasn’t shown you much appreciation.”

You nod, “but, I know that she’s busy. It’s hard for her to do that stuff all of the time.”

“You’re making excuses for her now. Sure she’s busy, but aren’t you, too? You balance your classes, a job, and extracurriculars, but you still find time to show Kate how much you love her and do things that she would like, including packing her bags for her before an away game.

It doesn’t have to be elaborate it, but you do deserve to be considered. That’s all I’m saying.”

You don’t reply, but your phone vibrates at your side with a text from the girl you were just speaking of.

KATE: Will you come home, please? We should talk.

You read over the message a few times, thinking about how you might reply. Truth be told, you were tired of being apart and you did just want to go home to your girlfriend.

YOU: I’ll be there in about an hour.

You kept your text short and sweet. It definitely wouldn’t take you an hour to get there, but you wanted to give yourself some leeway.

With your key in hand you unlock the door to the apartment you share with Kate, and sit your bag down on the floor.

It’s eerily quiet, to which you raise your eyebrows. You stalk toward your bedroom, and are met with the sight of those faux tea candles, roses, and what seemed to be a few gifts on the bed.

The room had been decorated with balloons and a big banner that read: I LOVE YOU.

You turned to look for Kate and there she stood in the doorway, a small smile on her face, but you couldn’t move past the look of guilt in her eyes.

“What’s all this for?” You inquire, taking a deep breath.

Kate’s gaze flickers around the room in hesitation, almost like she’s doubtful of something.

“I don’t want you to think that I’m trying to butter you up so that you forgive me, but it’s time that I showed my appreciation for you.

You’re right, I did get too comfortable and I stopped thanking you. The way that I spoke to you was wrong. I love you, and what I did and lack thereof was wrong. The three days without you admittedly were hard, I forgot to do a lot of the things that you took on the responsibility of.

I’m just… sorry for not appreciating and recognizing what you do for me sooner, babe. You take so much of the weight off of my shoulders every single day, and I promise to put forth more effort when it comes to valuing you.”

Your heart nearly leapt out of your chest at her words because that’s all that you really wanted. You wanted to know that your efforts didn’t go unnoticed and that they meant something to her.

Without words you bring Kate into a hug, your arms wrapping around her neck and hers around your waist. You speak into her neck, “I won’t say that it’s okay, but I do accept your apology.”

When you both pull away she locks her lips with your own, her hands squeezing at your hips. Her lips taste like mint from the chapstick she wore. The kiss was tender and sweet— it felt different from the last ones you two had shared. There was a promise in it, one that the both of you wouldn’t break.

Your foreheads rest upon one another until Kate backs you into the bed, forcing you to sit down. She joins you at your side.

She glances at the two gift boxes, signaling for you to open them. The wrapping paper was your favorite color. The small details were always so cute to you.

You unwrap box one and open it to find some body care products like body wash and body scrub. Kate always knew how much you enjoyed self-care days. It always made you feel good inside and out.

You opened the body scrub and brought the container to your nose, “oo that’s nice!”

Kate watches as you open the other box with a smile, happy that she could make you smile again.

“Should I run you a bath?” She asks. “We can have ice cream after and watch Love Is Blind.”

“Run us a bath,” you beam. “And don’t be mad, but I watched a few episodes without you.”

Kate got up from the bed, “wouldn’t be the first time, babe.”

#meech la major #meech’s thoughts #iowawcbb #iowa wbb #kate martin x reader #kate martin my beloved #kate martin

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kefiteria · 1 day

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FOR YOUR EYES ONLY.

A comfort letter from Scaramouche to you.

So, I've noticed you've been retreating into your mind more than usual lately. It's like you're doing a disappearing act even Houdini would envy. But hey, I get it. People are complicated creatures, and occasionally it feels safer to hide behind our thoughts than to face the chaos out there.

About this facade you've got going on. You know, the one where you're holding on to your inner child like it's a winning lottery ticket? It's almost comical how tightly you cling to it, as if someone's lurking around the corner waiting to snatch it away. Newsflash: nobody's taking it from you, dear.

Now, about those tears. I know, I know, crying is for the weak, right? Wrong. Even the toughest nuts crack sometimes. Take it from me, I've shed more tears than I care to admit, and yet here I am, still standing, still better as ever. You don't have to plaster on that smile 24/7, you know. Let those tears flow like a leaky faucet if you need to.

And speaking of tough times, let's talk about failure. It's not the end of the world, despite what your overactive brain might be telling you. Trust me, I've had my fair share of failures, and look at me now—still standing, scheming and myself.

So, when are you going to cut yourself some slack? Stop beating yourself up over things that are as out of your control as the weather. Tomorrow's just another day in the grand circus of life, and guess what? I'm your ringmaster, baby. You're not in this alone.

And those feelings you've been bottling up? Yeah, it's time to pop the cork and let 'em out. Trust me, it's like a pressure valve for the soul. Cry if you need to, scream into the void if you must. Just don't keep it all locked up inside. That's a recipe for disaster, believe me.

So, here's the deal: you're not alone in this. I've got your back, whether you're crying like a baby or plotting world domination (ugh just do it in moderation though). Just remember, it's okay to let your guard down once in a while. After all, even the sharpest swords need a little sharpening now and then.

Alright, let's wrap this up before I start growing a conscience or something equally absurd. Seriously, who knew pouring my heart out on paper could be so exhausting? I feel like I've been on a marathon run through a field of emotional landmines, and I'm not even wearing my running shoes.

But hey, if this little rant of mine manages to knock some sense into that stubborn head of yours, then I guess it's worth the carpal tunnel I'm bound to get from all this writing. Just promise me one thing: don't go making a habit out of this whole “feeling your feelings” nonsense. It's bad for my image.

So, there you have it. Consider this your one and only free pass to the sappy side of Scaramouche. Don't get used to it. Now go on, get out there and conquer the world, or cry yourself a river, whichever floats your boat. Just remember: you're not alone in this crazy circus we call life. I've got your back, whether you like it or not.

“It's okay, your world, and feelings are precious, so precious just like you are now.”

Fondly yours (don't make it a habit),

Scaramouche.

#kefimenu #genshin fanfic #genshin imagines #scaramouche x y/n #scaramouche x you #scaramouche x reader #scaramouche #scara x reader #genshin scara #fluff #genshin impact #genshin oneshots #genshin x reader #comfort #Spotify

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ruershrimo · 1 day

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take me back (take me with you) | f. megumi x fem! reader | chapter 6: beginning

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chapter synopsis:

'“Why else do you think I am the way I am? I may be shy and scatterbrained, or a horrible woman with a muddled sense of morality or what I think should and should not happen, when in reality it’s just what I want to happen. But this is why I’m so resolute, and so stubborn. This is why I love you so fiercely. All mothers are like that to some degree, even if my own would never let me bear witness to it.”

You haven’t told her you love her too in years.'

'And Itadori seems… like a good person. I think it’s good, that… you were able to find a friend like that.”

“It was. He’s a really, really good guy.”

“You love him a lot,” Megumi says.

---

You and Megumi set out to prevent an emergency involving Yuuji and a cursed object. Unfortunately, that doesn't happen. But at least everyone is fine in the end, even if it means you'll have to walk away from almost everything (or maybe it's the other way around).

You're going to be all on your own. Still, now it seems like this will hurt less now.

word count: ~8k; tws: none for now :)

17-6-2018

The two of you walk down the lane. It’s midnight. There’s a loitering silence in the air, no words exchanged between you and him, and it twists your heart in brief moments of hurt when you’re not trying to keep your mind occupied with other things. Your legs move subconsciously without you caring to think of them, the route to the hospital ingrained in your mind as if intrinsically there.

At some point, you think your hand with its sweat and its grip is going to leave imprints like a marring on his skin, but it’s of your own selfishness that you choose to hold onto his wrist anyway.

There’s a million things you could say to him right now, things you’ll forcefully push to the very back of your throat, things you’ll keep under lock and key in a mangled mix of quiet anticipation and sombre anxieties. Right now you’re holding his wrist and that’s enough for you, to have him walking behind you if not beside, to be two people near each other— not together— in silence since any conversation is not an option; any conversation could lead to the last spark needed to be fanned into the flame for it to erupt bigger and brighter than ever before.

If you asked about Tsumiki right now, or why either of them never bothered to speak to you since 2016, it could break you apart, of that you’re sure. And even without words it threatens to do so to you like a chandelier of melting wax candles hanging above you being suspended precariously from the ceiling or light lightning soon to be thrown down mercilessly from the sky.

“The turning to Sendai Hospital is on the right.”

“I know the routes better,” you let out, and rather disappointingly it sounds brasher and more derogatory aloud instead of the unobtrusive tone you were aiming for— you hope it doesn’t hurt him but then wonder why you still even cared that much about how he felt about what you said or did anyway, “I got myself accustomed to taking the one on the left that leads you through. Quick shortcut and all.”

You’re not looking back, but the light pull of his hand from the hold of your wrist seems to suggest his slight reeling back in a small sense of surprise and an equal amount of shock, as if suddenly remembering the fact you were your own person, that you had your own autonomy as one, because somehow everyone thought you weren’t.

It’s strange to look back at how you were before: meek, timid. Too shy to speak up. Too innocent to be angered by anything. Always dreaming, mind bleary as if on a cloud in blurred skies, hiding behind the backs of others like a petrified forest critter.

And now you’re this— this person who frowns and disagrees and retorts at every little thing, and as much as you have to, as much as it was nearly inevitable the way you turned out, all you can think you share with the person you were when you first met Megumi and Tsumiki was your need to be useful— and even that has been exacerbated by how you’ve grown, how you’ve become this person you grew into. And a part of you— no, just you as a whole— doesn’t like yourself at all.

Your father was right. That little girl was hopeful, obedient, kind, caring— you don’t know why even then you were dissatisfied with the way you were, or why your dissatisfaction would matter because at that time you’d cared so little about everything besides caring for people and having fun with the pair of siblings that you were so rarely bothered by it, that it was still just a slight whisper from the back of your head that could be shushed or tuned out with library visits and nights in front of the TV and the glow of old cartoons. Your father was right and this is proved even more by the fact that the whole situation just infuriates you on the surface, and just makes you feel like an empty, hollow shell left behind when you reach deeper into yourself.

That little girl had potential, potential to be useful but kind, obedient and close to the people who raised her even if it meant abandoning her own ideals. But you’d been so devoted to them, you think, that she was killed and destroyed in the world she grew up in, and now there’s a space for her that’s left vacant due to the way she wasted away. You miss her, the girl you once were, you miss being her, how easy and lighthearted everything was and how all of you felt so content in every sense of the word. But you don’t want her back. Now that’s just what makes you miserable sometimes.

Self-reflection just made you feel revolted by yourself. You keep your eyes on the road.

“It’s here,” you state, pointing at the building in front of you.

Sendai General Hospital is an institution made out of bare concrete. Its walls are yellowed and close in on its wards like a prison, coloured using old paint that hasn’t been repainted over and is as pallid-looking as the skin of the people sitting on the beds it is inhabited by. Just being in it feels like a hit to the body and the brain and the senses, too. There are old-fashioned tiles on its floors, their pale beige hue muted yet the blinding shine on them harshly mopped clean. Inside it reeks of an imminent presence of sickness or death or illnesses and conditions never to be able to be defeated and sterile sanitisers. Looking at the latex-blue curtains in it feels like a blindfold unwantedly, forcefully pulled over both your vision and your ears.

“You and that Itadori seem close.”

“We are,” you say, then you add, not really knowing why, “He’s my best friend.” Maybe you’re trying to make him jealous, rile him up a bit. But even then you wouldn’t want him to be riled up, nor would you be satisfied if he were to keep silent. Maybe you just wanted to hurt him, to hurt him back or something, if only for something small, even if you’d already resolved not to do so.

You’ll make sure not to do that again, though.

Instead he does something else, takes another route instead. “Then it seems you visit his grandfather often.”

“Uh-huh,” you nod as the two of you enter the hospital, and you have to blink a few times as always in order to adjust yourself to the light and how it reflects off the detachedly clean floor. “My mother’s here, too.”

“Oh, I’m sorry— is she alright?”

“She’s okay, I… think. She… she got sick a while back and stays here now,” you explain, “Let’s not talk about that…—I mean, I… don’t really want to.”

“I’m sorry.”

“You don’t have to keep saying that.” It just makes people feel worse.

He doesn’t push further and you suppose that’s okay. Your chest hurts a bit, like phantom pain on a wound that’s still there. There’s not really a way to explain it but almost everything makes you feel that way these days. Everything makes you feel horrible to some degree. Maybe it’s being a girl, maybe it’s being a teenager, but it’s not quite either, you guess.

“He won’t be here for a while,” you say, “He’s either still in the room where his grandfather is or he’s buying flowers for him.”

“Then I’ll just contact them and let them know the whole situation first.”

Who’s ‘them’?

“Okay.” You turn your back on him, “—wait.”

“What?”

“Do you have any emergency contact or something? Like, a trusted adult who could help you with any of this? In case things go really bad?”

“...why would you need one?” he questions.

You roll your eyes, “Just give it to me, damn it… if there’s anything I have nowadays, it’s probably foresight for stuff like this. For emergencies.”

He gives you the number, albeit a bit begrudgingly. Why’d he have to be so pissy about anything and everything?

“Okay, thanks. I’m going to visit my mother now.”

The air and the colour from it seems distant as always, the ward she was basically imprisoned in smelling of the indistinguishable mix of sanitiser and sickness. There her body chains her to her bed, and there is little she can do besides rely on and weakly cling to the nurses who assist her, a frail shadow of what she once was.

“Hi, Mummy.”

She turns to you, and your chest constricts. Her hair, once much longer, the type that you dreamed to have as it billowed in the wind, the type that invited you caressively to bury yourself in and take in that heady scent of roses that emanated from it— that hair is now replaced with a cloth wrapped around her head. Radiation. Chemotherapy.

The wrinkles on her face make the difference between her now and her years ago all the more stark. Every visit you come back here, you’ve forced yourself to be acclimated to this new reality, one where she isn’t waiting at home no matter how tedious the fights get or how exhausting it was eating with someone who remained silent, someone who chose to continue suffering if it meant she could hurt and turn her daughter to guilt (as if that would change anything). At least she was there.

Cancer is a terminal illness, especially the type your mother is facing— regardless of how much chemotherapy she would struggle through and how much you didn’t want to acknowledge a truth so plain and conspicuously bare, she would be confined to this bed until her final days, her illness like gyves tying her limbs and forcing her earthbound; the bed a cage she could never be liberated from.

Sometimes she made it a point to you that she didn’t want to liberate herself from it anyway, and you’d never been so depressed yet irked by anything else. (You’d regret everything— not spending time with her, not appreciating her nearly enough— except for your decision to be involved in the Jujutsu world, if not as a sorcerer then as a doctor. That was, and is— your ultimatum. Your end all be all of this whole situation.”

“Hello. Where’s that Itadori boy?”

“Not here today, he’s still with his grandfather— maybe later.” You swing your bag over your shoulder, rummaging through it a while before pulling it out. “I’ve something for you, by the way.”

“Oh! These,” she exclaims, and she smiles faintly, bits of colour rushing back to her face like watercolour dots on moistened paper. “I used to make them for you, sometimes. They used to be your favourite when you were really little.”

“I know,” you explain, “That’s why I made them. I don’t like them anymore, but… I can’t remember your favourite food or if I ever asked, and I know you don’t like the food they give you here as much as… I don’t know. Your own cooking, I guess.”

“It’s not my favourite,” she states, matter-of-factly, bluntly, “But thank you for the effort. My favourite will always be my own mother’s cooking.”

Silence.

“Now that I look back at everything, there are so many things I regret. Things I should have done but never did out of fear; things I should not have done and never apologised for out of pride. I’d like it if you could be different. Your grandmother went out the same way. At least, even if you had the same illnesses as we did, which I hope the genes for which have been curbed by your father’s— at least you would not leave the world with regret,” she looks down at her hands, staring down at them solemnly like a shadow, an excluded figure. “But it was a good life.”

“...then maybe you can tell me more. While you— while we still have time. What was your childhood like? What was your mother like?” It feels strange, imposturous, maybe— to be referring to someone basically a stranger as “grandmother”, to name someone so far away from you so intimate, even if the only generation between you, tying the two of you together, was your mother’s. If you had a daughter it would be the same for her, most likely. There’s a part of you that would find honour in becoming your mother once you’d grown, but there’s a part of you that would think being such would accost you horribly, for all time.

She sighs, “I’ll tell you later. There would be so much to say, like compressing all my words into one tiny paper. The stories have weight in them the same way letters and words in handwriting can be firm and large. But if I were to start,” she begins, “I’ll say that I was born as the daughter of two very powerful sorcerers. Now, I know how much this would sound like some nonsense spouted by your mother, but I think you should listen anyway.

“My parents loved each other a lot, but my mother had come from an obscure clan whose name I can’t remember, but who had high hopes in them having a child with a powerful cursed technique as their last resort, since, if I recall correctly, there had been a crisis within the clan for it to keep surviving.

“I still remember when they found out I had no cursed technique and how terrified they were. In me I had a bit more than the relatively normal amount of cursed energy most people have, and so I was expected to have techniques as powerful as they did. They loved me and treated me preciously, like a fragile object, so long as I was quiet and demure— and I guess to some extent I still was and still am today. They wondered what they could do to run from the clan, as if they didn’t have enough power when they were supposed to protect me despite my father’s bullheaded industry and my mother’s patience-formed strength. They lacked grit to grapple against them, and only in this did they lack it, I think; only against my mother’s family did they not have the ability to resolve things whether peacefully or violently. And eventually they just gave up and thought they would just… surrender me over when I entered my adolescent years. I was their daughter. I… suppose they didn’t love me enough. I know it sounds awful— thinking that they should have always protected me, through and through—”

“No, it wasn’t.”

“—when it could have been the clan itself that would have been mostly to blame.”

“But they were still supposed to protect you! They were your parents—”

“Why else do you think I am the way I am? I may be a shy and scatterbrained or a horrible woman with a muddled sense of morality or what I think should and should not happen when in reality it’s just what I want to happen, but this is why I’m so resolute, and so stubborn. This is why I love you so fiercely. All mothers are like that to some degree, even if my own would never let me bear witness to it.” You haven’t told her you love her too in years.

“But then when I was an adult I met your father, who was a bit like a country bumpkin, but a formidable sorcerer and a kind, honest person, and I couldn’t help but fall in love with the person he was both inside and out. And for the next few years we struggled to have a child until I found out I was pregnant with you,” she continues, “Even though by that time I was well into my late thirties, we were overjoyed and decided to keep you.”

Suddenly you wish there had been more time before things were ruined. Time for you to know her better, the beginning of your existence. You would have begged her for old photos, stories, mementos of her and your father.

“And now the clan’s faded into obscurity, finally. The younger members left and the older ones passed away peacefully. Happy story, right?”

“...yeah.” It all ended well, but you don’t know if you can say the same for your mother’s. At least, you hope, when she goes away, it can be swift and peaceful like the way her relatives did.

Then suddenly there’s a buzz in your pocket. An inconvenient one, out of the blue.

“You should go get that first,” she says.

“...okay.”

You lift it up to your face and feel like crushing the damn thing. Old number. Stupid number. Number you haven’t called in months because you’d given up on that bastard— oh. The two of you were working together now.

You turn away from your mother, creeping to the edge of the room. “What’s wrong?”

“I just talked to him, but I think it would be easier if you came back and was there with him too since you know him better than I do. And he… doesn’t seem like the brightest. He may think that it’s not important enough to hand over unless you ask him to or something.”

You muffle your voice with your hand and whisper, “Hey, you shut up, you know nothing about him. He’s way smarter than people give him credit for. But I’m— I’m with my mother right now. Wait for a second. Just ask him to wait for me first; he wouldn’t need any of my help for all of this yet. Make a friend or get a life or something.”

“...fine. But you’ll have to join us later. He’s bound to ask about you.”

“Then just tell him I’m with my mother!” you snap, still whispering.

“I’ll see what I can do.”

“Wh— you little— oh, don’t you hang up now—”

Weird thing is, he probably wasn’t even being so infuriating on purpose. And you wouldn’t have burst out at someone for being that way anyway. It was only because it was him, specifically.

You’d sworn to put that past you.

Your immaturity strikes once again.

“If you have to go now,” your mother says, “You should. Just come back again next time. I can tell you the rest. Thank you again for the food, [Name].” She doesn’t call you ‘darling’ anymore, doesn’t she? Just your name.

“Okay. Sorry.”

You swing the bag back over your shoulder, wearing it this time instead of taking it off, easing your way out of the room.

“It’s okay,” she assures you, “Goodbye. I love you.”

“...I love you, too,” you say, but it’ll mingle with all the other sounds in the hospital, and it’ll be drowned out like a ship in the middle of nowhere, your voice soft and thoroughly soused by the cacophony of bleak noises like telephone rings and beeps from electrocardiographs outside of her deafeningly quiet hospital room.

“Hi, Yuuji,” you greet them in the dimly lit waiting area, “...and Megumi. Sorry to keep the two of you guys waiting for so long.”

“Oh, hey; it’s okay!” he goes, although in his voice it seems that there’s been some of his usual energy seeping away from him. “Didn’t know the two of you knew each other until just now or that you were a part of some magic curse society. Are you guys childhood friends who met because of all that cursed stuff or something?”

“Something like that,” Megumi explains.

“It’s a long story,” you say, not exactly denying him nor conceding his words anyway. Once again, there’s a trace of anger despite your promise to be untethered to your puerility like this. “Anyway, are you okay, Yuuji? How’s your grandfather?”

He pauses. “Oh, about that… he just passed away.”

“Oh, I’m so sorry, Yuuji…” you hold the fabric of his jacket (sometimes it still feels wrong to try and hold his hand— it just makes your heart ache again like a scab being clawed at) and pull him into a brief caress, patting his back as gently as you can manage.

“It’s okay, I’ll be fine,” he smiles as you pull yourself away, “Grandpa wouldn’t want me to be crying right now anyway. So don’t worry.”

“Okay, I won’t. But if you’re sad, just know you can always talk to me.”

He laughs, softer than the boisterous manner he usually does so in, “Yeah, I know.”

Megumi clears his throat, pointedly trying to make a sound, “Anyway. Itadori Yuuji—”

“Just call him Itadori. You don’t have to be so uptight.”

“Nah, [Name], I’m fine—”

Megumi sighs. “Anyway, we need you to give the cursed object now.”

“Oh, yeah, that,” you start, “So, Yuuji, do you have the thing that Megumi would have explained to you? The cursed object? We need it for everyone to be safe, and all.”

“Yeah! Hold on, let me get it. I told you I didn’t have it already, but here’s the box,” he says, tossing it over to Megumi.

He retrieves the box. It’s ancient and wooden, the craftsmanship behind it elite and adroit, and the paper on it has the words for a buddhist sutra written on it like an inscription. You’ve heard of it before, the kind of curse it was meant to seal, but it definitely couldn’t be—

He opens the box.

Holy shit.

“Where is it?”

“It’s empty…” Megumi panics, “Wait— hold on!”

Things are bad— as in, they couldn’t get any worse— not only was the school doomed by the loss of its cursed object, the cursed object was Sukuna Ryomen’s finger itself.

You blame your inadequacy, your inability to have stopped everything sooner— if not for that nobody would have gotten hurt. If not for that there wouldn’t even be a risk of anything happening anyway. You should’ve tried harder to sense it, and you should’ve focused more on it to keep the student body safe and sound.

It was your fault. No one else was to blame but your useless self, and even if that were wrong, you’d still have the most to be blamed for.

Megumi has a hand on Yuuji’s shoulder, keeping the other boy from moving, his breathing erratic and his eyes wide in frantic shock.

“...well, they were saying, ‘let’s open it up to see what’s inside it tonight’,” Yuuji clarifies, standing a few centimetres away from the door, “Why? Is that bad?”

Sasaki and Iguchi?

The air in the hospital feels particularly chilly tonight, gooseflesh terrorising your skin all over, and for all the kinds of reasons that would cause anything like such.

“It’s way worse than bad,” Megumi declared, fear and grim so thick in his voice they were tangible enough to be cut through with a knife. “Your friends are going to die.”

“We’ve got to go,” you rush, “Now! Quick!”

It passes by like a blur, as if you’re in that moment and out of it simultaneously. Your mind has been bombarded with and pressed so thoroughly onto the moment, like tissue on a wet surface, that it seems it’s being blanked out, while your legs continue to run despite your mind nearly forgetting, at this point, why you’re running— as if your legs moving so frantically to help them was something intrinsic, something you didn’t need your mind for.

Sasaki and Iguchi are in danger. Sasaki and Iguchi are in danger.

You didn’t know them all too well, really— just through Yuuji, and Yuuji himself wasn’t as close to the two of them, being their junior and all. And although a part of you was doing this just because you could, like the way you did when you first discovered your cursed technique, you knew that another was doing this for Yuuji. If in any way they were hurt or could not survive, he would blame himself to no end. He possessed such a kindness within him, so much that it hit the depths of your soul sometimes; shattered your heart so gently a million times over or heated it in the kindly way mothers heated pans on stoves despite the heat of it being greater than that of blue flame. If anything happened to them, no matter how much or how little he knew of them, he wouldn’t be able to live after that.

The two of them are near the barrier separating the school from the street before you (you struggle with catching up to them— one’s a star athlete and another has been training for much longer than you, you’re sure), the gates tall and enveloped in darkness. You didn’t think much of school except for when it came to your grades and being with Yuuji, thinking of these gates— the ones that you and Yuuji use when you’re running super late— in particular as just a shortcut entrance you paid little attention to, just something treated with indifference as you passed through them whenever you were late. Yet now they echoed denial, refusal, and slim chances— it was unlikely that they’d be alright, especially since this cursed object in particular was the finger of Sukuna Ryomen.

“Is that the building?” Megumi questions, “Where are they?”

“Fourth floor— guh!” Yuuji seems to come to an abrupt halt, nearly slamming into what seems to be an invisible wall. A veil.

“Yuuji!”

“I’ll handle this,” Megumi declares, hopping onto the metal wires, more directed to Yuuji than you. So even he can tell how selfless Yuuji is, even after only having just met him.

“I may not know those two that well, but—” Yuuji starts, “But they’re friends! I have to help!”

“You’re staying here,” Megumi commands, “[Name], if you could— get your father or any sorcerers you know to come here and help.”

He climbs over the gate.

He’s going away from you again. Slipping away from your grasp. And now, all you can do is watch. There’s nothing else— nothing else you can do, at all. If you went inside now, you wouldn’t be able to help except— what?— tend to their injuries? Manipulate your own cells into weapons? The former wasn’t possible with how much you’d strained yourself from running so quickly earlier, and the latter was too dangerous: you hadn’t even started with the basics of that yet, on your father’s obstinate insistence that even if he’d let you play doctor he wouldn’t let you manipulate any of the cells in your body into any kind of usable weapon. Any simple wrong move could make things turn south in the most drastically terrifying of ways. If you went in there, you’d just die, and there’d be more casualties, more trouble, more problems caused by you and you alone.

You can’t even call your father, either. That would always be your last resort— because even if you fought, you still needed him to rest. You didn’t want him overexerting himself by using his cursed technique at all.

(You were selfish. You didn’t want to lose your father. You didn’t want to have to visit not one but two parents lying sick and tired and grey in matching hospital beds.)

“Yuuji?” you start, turning to him. “You’re…deathly quiet. Are you okay?”

His lips quiver slightly, a faint whimpering noise coming out of him. Is he crying?

“Yuuji, look at me. Are you okay?” you ask, as gently and softly as you can right now, despite your ragged, unsteady, unathletic-addled breaths. You place a hand on his shoulder, slowly rubbing up and down from his shoulder and crook of his neck to his back. “It’s okay. …Megumi’s a good and… capable, strong person and jujutsu sorcerer. He’ll be okay, and they’ll be okay too. Just… just put your trust in him, okay?”

“I’m sorry, [Name], but I’ve got to go,” he tells you, “You stay here, and call for help or something. I’m sorry, but I’ve just really got to do it!”

He hugs you, quickly, deftly. And then he crosses the gate, leaving you all alone like Megumi did. You wish he’d hug you longer, that you could take care of him for a little longer— it was your last way to be useful now.

Still, there’s someone you could call, now that you remember him.

The emergency contact.

You snatch your phone out, resolute.

“Hello! Gojo Satoru speaking,” the voice on the other line says.

You’ve heard it plenty before by accident.

When Gojo and Megumi are back, Yuuji’s in the form of a figure slung over Gojo’s shoulders like he’s been reply entrenched into slumber, his body seemingly limp and his torso completely bare. There’s barely an ounce of movement in him, except for slow exhales and inhales you can see on his chest. Sasaki and Iguchi are both nearly the same, the former covered in bruises and in a deep, panicked haze, and the latter as asleep as Yuuji seemed to be while harbouring injuries he may never recover from.

The only non-roughed up one here is Gojo, it seems; Megumi has a stream of blood running from the top of his head in rivulets, staining his sweaty, scraped forehead.

“Wh— you two, what happened? Why are they all asleep? What happened to Yuuji? Are they okay? What—”

“Calm down, kid,” Gojo says, “They’ll be fine. I mean, there’s a 100% chance that your friend can be executed, but…”

“Executed?” you almost scream, “What the hell happened? You said things would be okay!”

“Uh-uh, again, calm down. I mean, we don’t even know when they’re gonna make him kick the bucket! He ate Sukuna’s finger, by the way.” He holds his arms up in faux surrender.

“Gojo you ignorant slut! Don’t you fucking dare tell me to ‘calm down!’ He ate Sukuna’s finger? Why weren’t you able to stop anything? What’s going to happen to him now? You know what— give him to me!”

“You know, it’s not like I’m scared of being hunted down by your father if you use your cursed technique— I mean, I’m leagues stronger than him— but the stuff was too strong. It’s not like you’ll be able to get rid of the finger in your little boyfriend.”

“He’s not her boyfriend!” Megumi interjects.

“Thank you, Megumi!” Your face is going hot like a campfire fanned by the wind.

“Oh?” Gojo adds, a teasing lilt in his voice. “Anyway, we’re going to get him to a place where we can cover everything with talismans to surround him.”

They’re going to execute him at Jujutsu High after.

“I’m coming with you.”

“You sure?” Gojo asks, “Your father isn’t going to like you travelling so far away without telling him.”

Megumi shifts, a little sombre. “[Name], you don’t have to.”

“...I’m doing this for Yuuji, not for you.”

“You okay?” Gojo asks while the three of you are back in the hospital. (You hate this building so much.) Iguchi’s been transferred to a ward, Sasaki having woken up and insisting on staying with him. “I’ve got kikufuku if you want some. You must be really tired since it’s so late, huh?”

The whole situation is so incredulous you’re unsure of whether you want to burst out laughing or dismember someone.

“...nothing. Wait, let me see Yuuji again.”

Everyone is asleep, it seems— all except for you and Gojo. Yuuji’s been knocked out, and Megumi’s stuck in the world of his dreams.

You can’t sleep. There’s just nothing to put your mind at rest.

At least if there’s one thing you can do it’s this.

Gojo picks him up by the sides of his torso (now temporarily clothed with a spare white shirt) like a child with a heavy book. “Woah— he’s pretty heavy for a fifteen year old kid.”

You lay Yuuji face-up on the line of hospital chairs. There are thin scarlet marks right under his eyes— Sukuna’s eyelids, you’ve been told.

You should’ve done more to protect him.

Slowly, reticently, you kneel by the side of the chairs. You press your fingertips onto that pair of thin tiny lines.

Nothing happens. You can’t picture his cells being able to grow back. It’s as if there’s been a slit on his face and its outline has been replaced with brand-new skin. His cells don’t budge.

“Why don’t you help Megumi? I bet he’s got plenty of healable injuries.”

“…I don’t think I’ll be able to help much. I could faint if I try helping him now. It’s better to leave it to Dr Ieiri or something.”

“Pft,” he scoffs, “Shoko? She’s definitely not going to heal all of him. It’ll just be a waste of her time. You can just help him with the tiny scrapes and bruises first. And I’ll even tell her that you did it. She’s really fond of you, you know.”

You give him a shy, modest smile. “Thanks, then.”

It’s time to get to work.

Megumi’s skin is smooth like a baby’s just like the last time you felt it, though the frown on his face, ever-present, is bound to cause wrinkles there in less than a few decades’ time. You place your hands on him, bruised and bloody, watching in your mind and directing his cells as they work.

Once the smaller injuries have been dealt with, you stop. “I can’t really work on the one on his head, since then you’d get another fainted person to carry around, but he should be fine with some bandages and patching-up there, because I’ve already kind of catalysed the start of that area’s healing process a little. Other than that, he should be completely fine. I’ll give it, say… two weeks or so for it to get better completely.”

“Good work!” he smiles, the outline of his cheeks visible on his blindfold.

“By the way, Mr Gojo…”

“You know, I appreciate the respect you’re giving me now, but just Gojo is fine.”

“Okay, Gojo. Do you think Yuuji will be okay?”

“I mean, I’m pretty sure. And I’m going to ask them to suspend his sentence. I’ll just see whether he wants that or not once he wakes up.”

“That’s the thing. I’m not sure if he even will.”

Gojo laughs. “Don’t worry. He was really strong, and able to switch between being possessed by Sukuna and being himself at will. We haven't seen that kind of talent in a millennia! I’m sure they’ll listen to me, anyway.”

“Thank you,” you sigh. Thank goodness. “If you need any type of payment, um… teleport to my house whenever you get inconvenient little cuts like bruises and stuff. I can help.”

“Nah, reverse cursed technique’s got me covered.”

“Oh, wait— I forgot about that— um… I can…”

“Just leave it to me! No payment required,” he exclaims, holding both thumbs up. “And for the record, the one who wanted to save Yuuji was actually Megumi.”

You wouldn’t have imagined that would happen. Megumi— pragmatic, serious, unkind when he needs to be (no matter how kind of a person he actually is— no, was— at heart), different from Tsumiki in so many ways. There was no way he would have been the one vouching for Yuuji, someone he’d only just met, to be spared.

“Really?” you ask, “I… wouldn’t have thought he was the one who would do it. I thought, maybe, you were just… really kind tonight or something…”

“Well, maybe it was because he saw how much you cared about Itadori and did it for you, or maybe he had met Itadori, liked him, and just wanted to save a good person,” Gojo suspects, “But if there’s one thing for sure it’s that your old friend saved your new one.”

“...oh.”

You’ll have to bring it up with him next time— maybe, if he’s still there tomorrow…

“I know you’re mad at him, but a lot has happened,” Gojo states, voice lower, softer like a schoolteacher’s, “Still, I won’t tell you that you have to give him a chance or any of that. If you don’t want to, you don’t have to thank him or anything. I’m sure he did it out of his own volition without expecting anything from you. He knew he probably didn’t deserve to if it were you.”

You pause. “No, it’s just… I’ll talk to him again the next time I see him. Alone, most likely. And I can figure something out. I think that would be the best way to go around things. Thank you, Gojo.”

18-6-2018

The aftershocks are still there, although you’ve come out unscathed.

Last night was a mingled mess, a blur. You’d tried your best to help Iguchi by the time Yuuji was placed in the room of talismans and you could come back to the hospital and visit, but in the end he still needed better help than that. His injuries were too large of scale for how you were at that moment, already tired after healing some of the numbers done on Megumi.

(You were useless. You couldn’t help anyone. You couldn’t prevent Yuuji from being hit with such soul-striking guilt., couldn’t help Sasaki from being traumatised, couldn’t help Iguchi enough for him to be back at school soon—)

Sasaki’s injuries were limited to bruises and scrapes, but though you could help her physically, there was nothing you could do to assist her emotionally.

You stayed with them for a few hours in the ICU and then one of the hospital wards (a floor under your mother’s), your father calling you once the sun had risen.

“Gojo Satoru told me about everything that happened.”

“Yeah. I know you’ll scold me, but… not now. I’m sorry, I’m just really tired.” You hang up.

For all you spoke of wanting to be useful, the night when your powers were needed the most was when you were at your most useless— you couldn’t help them, you couldn’t help attack the cursed spirits, and the only thing you could do was call for an adult’s help like a little, scared and helpless girl.

You needed to train, and train harder than you had been doing for the past few years.

There’s a knock on the door, a dot-dot-dot-dot-dot. dot dot. It’s Yuuji, you know it is. How ever could you not?

Timidly, movements quiet like the room itself, you pull the door knob, seeing him there, relatively unscathed. You sigh in relief, a moment’s respite before you return to the panic you had been living in before since you deserve the respite less than other people do— no, you don’t deserve such a break at all, you’re absolutely sure of that, not after what you pulled, how horribly and utterly useless you were, you’ll remind yourself of that again and again and again— the heart-piercing guilt and the worry and the constant need to care for the people around you, almost like a mother, maybe, but you don’t like that thought as much as you think you should. Maybe if your own mother knew, she’d disagree— maybe she’d tell you that you should be a mother, maybe she’d ignore that you were also a child at certain times— the most convenient ones, probably. When she thinks it good that you, a child, were someone’s caretaker because women should take pride in and appreciate that, she would encourage you to be one; when she thinks it bad that as a caretaker and a so-called ‘adult’ you can have your own autonomy, agency and opinions, then maybe she’d remind you that in her eyes you knew nothing of the world. But maybe, just maybe, there was also a chance that she wouldn’t be like that in any way.

But you wouldn’t put it past her.

“Yuuji, are you okay?” There are questions about to spill out of you, tears about to fall like gushing rivers, but you’re just happy he’s alive at this point.

“Yeah.” His voice is soft. Your chest twinges; it hurts like an awful, intransigent little bruise. “Hi, [Name].” It feels so unignorable, the way it’s filled with such sorrow and worry that it weighs his usually loud and boisterous voice down.

“I thought that—” you start, lips trembling, “I thought there was a chance I couldn’t lose you. The only thing I could do was—” you sniffle, “Hope that they could delay it or something.”

“Yeah. I’ll explain it later,” he says, his voice sincere.

You squeeze the wrist of his sleeve. “Don’t do things like that ever again,” you plead, “Promise me that at least.”

“I promise.”

“And keep your promises.”

“I will.”

“...want to come inside?”

He walks inside, and you step back to make way for him.

“Sorry I came so late,” he says to you and Sasaki, who shakes her head in reassurance. “Hello, Sasaki,” he greets, “Is Iguchi okay?”

They speak for a while— you don’t feel like it’s much of your right to join their conversation, since you did nearly nothing at all when they were most in danger, so you leave them be for a while. It would be better not to bother them right now, anyway. They’ve both been traumatised until it reached beneath their bones within the past twenty-four hours.

When you leave the hospital, Sasaki tells you that she’s going to stay. You tell her to take care, squeezing her hand one final time.

You let her, patting her on the back. You’ll call them later— she’d given you her contact— just to check on the two of them.

“Where’s Megumi?” you ask Yuuji.

“Oh, Fushiguro? I’m not too sure, but that Gojo guy said he’ll be there soon.”

“Where, though?”

Sheepishly, in peak Yuuji fashion, he scratches the back of his neck. “Actually, another reason why I came here was also because… I mean, I know you and him weren’t close, but I’m going to the place where they’ll keep Grandpa’s ashes, and I think… you know, you could come with me. I… I don’t think I’d be able to do it really well alone, even though he had definitely made it clear he seriously didn’t want me moping around after his death and all. Gojo and Megumi will probably be there, but I thought it would be better if you were there because I know you better than those two, and you’re my friend. So… could you come with me? I know that he never really showed it, but I think he had always liked you a lot. Like, he was happy we were friends and stuff.”

“...mhm. I’ll always be happy about that,” you tell him, before pulling him into a hug. The guy must need one right now. You’ve never hugged him before. Your heart hurts.

The air is hot and humid with the breath of summer, bundles of mosquitoes bound to be breeding new ones these next few weeks. Up in the sky is the sun, bold and bright, glaring down harshly at the two of you.

“Before he passed away, Grandpa actually said something. He… kind of cursed me, if I’m being honest,” Yuuji starts. “He said I was a strong kid, so I should help people. And I’m going to do that. So that was why when Gojo asked if I wanted to be executed immediately or just eat all the fingers before dying, I chose the second option. I… I think I want to help people that way.”

‘You’ve already helped people enough. You helped me,’ you almost tell him.

You frown, because that’s the only thing you can do right now. You search for words to say the same way you do looking for dog books in libraries chock-full with those of other genres. “I’m… disappointed, I— I know I should be grateful, grateful that you’re still going to be alive and all, but… you’re still going to be in danger, and you’re still going to be executed one day. I mean, again, I know I should be happy you’re going to have more time alive and that I can still see you, but what if things don’t go as planned? What if you lose control of yourself once you reach, like, the fifth finger or something?”

You’re selfish like that. In a way, you’re just the way your mother is. You should’ve always known— you were her beloved daughter after all, and the people you know would be loved the same way she did you since the day she knew of your existence, and maybe even before that.

“Don’t worry,” he grins, wide as always. Even in an over-enveloping darkness he still manages to be the light. “I’ll be just fine. I’m a strong kid, after all. And we’ll always be friends!”

Gojo asks if he and Yuuji can talk in private for a while. You wonder if this was how your mother felt as she had to give the person she loved most away (but you will have to go away, one day), because you can briefly tell what Gojo is going to ask. You wonder if she felt this twice.

Yuuji can’t stay with you forever. In the same way you can’t remain by your mother and father’s sides for all eternity.

This won’t be the last time you’re here, you think. For a place of death, it’s quite a bit beautiful how there’s such large masses of grass and plants surrounding it.

Megumi nearly walks past you, his eyes on the old photographs of the deceased all around him.

“Megumi.”

He turns around.

“I just wanted to thank you for wanting to save my friend, even if you may not have wanted to do it for me, specifically… um… I didn’t expect that you’d still be here. Are your injuries okay?”

“I’m okay,” he answers you. “And also, I…” he hesitates, the first time he’s talked to you for something actually related to the two of you in a long time— nearly two years if you’re counting correctly, but the thoughts in your head are a bit too jumbled to count at the moment. “I didn’t really do it for you, though. It… it was for Tsumiki.”

“Oh.”

“Wait! I’m sorry, that didn’t… come out right. But I should also apologise for something else. You wouldn’t have been thrown into this world anyway if not for my own demon dogs years ago.”

“No, no, it wasn’t your fault. And I would have wanted to be in it anyway. There’s not many who can heal other people and all, so I just thought… even if I can’t do as much yet, since I don’t have reversed cursed technique and the drawbacks that come from mine are really bad, I can still help people sometimes if they’re dealing with relatively minor injuries. I can, um… make things easier for people. I can be useful like that. I’d keep to it anyway, because I’m stubborn, but… yeah. It wasn’t your fault, really.”

“Okay. That’s good to hear.”

“Yeah. Anyway, I’m happy to know that Tsumiki is okay.”

Silence again for a while. The air turns a little more sombre, and a lot more awkward.

“She is. And Itadori seems… like a good person. I think it’s good, that… you were able to find a friend like that.”

“It was. He’s a really, really good guy.”

“You love him a lot,” Megumi says.

“I do. He’s a really good friend. If there’s something I’ll always know I know that, at least.”

“I can see that. It doesn’t seem like he loves you back in the same way, though.”

“...wow. Way to be blunt, Megumi. And yes, I do know that, too.”

“Let’s just… change the subject.”

“You’re the one who introduced it in the first place.”

“Okay. How… how are you?”

“I’m good. Wait, I think you should… go back to them. Maybe they’ll need you there right about now. He’s probably going to have to go to Jujutsu High, right?”

He pauses. “Yeah. I’m sorry, [Name].”

“No, no. That’s okay. I expected it. It’s just that I’ll miss him a lot,” you tell him, “He took care of me, kind of. You know I’ve always been a bit of an awkward or shy person, but he still approached me since I was new and we ended up hitting off as friends, kind of. We did a lot of stuff together.”

Sounds pretty familiar, huh.

“If you want I can make sure he’s safe for you.”

“...you should be able to do that regardless of whether it’s my wish for you to do so or not…” you state, “But that would help, I guess. And I’m sorry for my attitude towards you for the past few hours or so. Thank you again.”

“...I’m sorry I never spoke to you for so long, by the way,” he says abruptly. ‘By the way’? Classic Megumi…

“I could tell you were. It’s… it’s okay. The two of you kind of have a habit of doing that.”

All your rage, your loneliness, your feelings of abandonment— and this is all you can do. This is all you can say. You can only just let it go, in the end.

“I’ll explain it all one day.”

“You don’t have to if it’s hard.”

He stays. “No, I will. I promise. And I promise I’ll start to talk to you again, as well. I was just… scared of a few things, maybe.”

“That’s okay.”

The two of you aren’t quite friends again yet, but it’ll happen soon. Maybe. And even if it doesn’t, you’re finally able to say, with an open, honest heart, that that doesn’t matter as much anymore.

“I guess this is goodbye again, then.”

“Not really.”

“Oh, right— promise to keep in touch, okay? My patience is running thin with you,” you chuckle at that last part, attempting to joke and make things lighter again.

“Promise.”

“I’m going to go home now, by the way. Please tell Yuuji that I wish him the best and I’ll visit when I have my own money to visit Tokyo and all.”

“I will.”

“And help me say goodbye to him for me,” you add, “Hope that’s not too much for you to do. Sorry for the trouble. It’s just that I’d actually just about cry if I had to do it in real time right in front of him. Be good to him and be good friends, okay? Keep that promise, at the very least. That’s the one thing that I wish for the most.”

“Bye, Megumi.” You turn back in the direction opposite of his.

“Wait—!”

His hand is on your wrist. Now you’re in front of him, like yesterday, and he’s holding your wrist, albeit a bit gentler than the way he used to pull it a whole eight years ago.

His eyes are cast away from you, slightly avoidantly and in a way that’s a bit abashed. “I’ll miss you, [Name].”

“It won’t even feel like I’m not there,” you say. Though his grip is slightly tight, he loosens it as soon as you try to slide it up, as if he’d let you be free of it if you want him to.

You squeeze his hand instead, turning to face him. It feels warm. It feels like there’s blood coursing through you, the sensation more tender and tangible than it’s ever been.

“Goodbye.”

“Goodbye, [Name]. I’ll… I’ll call.”

“Thank you.”

Now you’re the one slipping away from his grasp. You move your hand away and walk back. The door slides open.

2010. Springs, summers, autumns, winters. Hands on wrists, a back faced to your eyes, wide with innocence. Warmth and laughter and happiness and love. Days coloured with vibrant hues and time spent with dog books and in libraries. Frowns were greeted with smiles. Hesitance was non-existent. You didn’t feel a need to compensate for your uselessness. You were a child. You didn’t feel useless at all. You just felt this: a constant leaping in your heart, the corners of your mouth twisting up into a juvenile grin, braiding someone’s beautiful brown hair and tying it with a pretty cherry hair tie.

You want to cry as you walk back home.

You’re pretty sure you do.

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lis-likes-fics · 10 hours

Text

Your Delusion

Pairing: dark!Dream of the Endless x Reader Word Count: 4.8k words Warnings: NSFW, dubcon, somnophilia, fingering, oral (f!receiving), multiple orgasms, forced(?) breeding, swearing... A/N: This was to get me out of Writer's Block. Kind of worked? Dream is a bit (ridiculously) delulu in here. He's doing some mental gymnastics in here, and I applaud him cause same. Anyway, enjoy this strange, strange man.

You look so beautiful like this.

Wrapped in your sheets with your eyes so delicately closed, lips so delicately parted, breaths so delicately passed, you look like a dream. My dream.

And you shall always be mine.

No matter what you may believe.

Your rejection was a white hot burn in my chest, a clawing in my throat. The searing courses through my veins, but I know that I cannot blame you for what you had said. You meant only the best, you meant only not to worry me.

But you shouldn't need to worry. Not about such things.

When I saw you in that field, my field—Fiddler’s Green—I knew then and there that I could await our union no longer. I had to have you, I had to keep you.

You turned when you felt me near, and your eyes filled with confusion for just a moment before the recognition of my presence replaced it. You always knew it was me in the end. No matter how many dreams you dreamt.

“Dream lord,” you greeted me, with a smile so soft and true. Oh, how I love your smile.

I took slow steps across the green grasses beneath me, slowly approaching. “It has been a while since you have come here.”

I usually find you with the brothers of the First Story, or perhaps with Lucienne in the library. Other days, you would wander through other fields or amongst the waters of the Golden Rivers. But not then.

Then, you stood in the flowers of Fiddler’s Green. The very place we first met.

“How are you?” I wondered.

You glanced away. It was a shy little gesture, and a quick one at that. In no time, your eyes were back to me and it meant the world. “Better now,” you mumbled, placing your hand against a tree. “I almost forgot how beautiful this place was.”

Though I would usually acknowledge your words, I cannot help but to stare. “I have missed you.” I cannot always find time to see you with all the work I find myself caught in, but when I do, you never disappoint. It had been a couple of nights since last we saw one another, but it was a couple of nights too long.

“I missed you, too.” You said it as though you truly meant it, and that was all I needed. “How have you been doing?”

“Thinking.” I moved closer. There was still too much distance between us.

You tilted your head gently. “About?”

“Many things,” I shrugged. “But mostly you.”

You seemed almost taken aback by what I said, but you remain as kind as ever. “Me?” you chuckled—a bashful thing, really.

My eyes never left you. You're so beautiful, I mustn't ever look away. Perhaps I may lose you if I do…

“I can't keep you from my mind.” I watched as your smile faltered and your face shifted. “Every moment, I think of you.”

You tried to take a step back, but I grabbed your hands and held them within mine. I let the words spill, and I confessed what I had been holding in all this time. “You come and you go from my realm as you please. You smile and laugh as though any being could resist falling for the very thought of you. I look at you, and I know that what I feel is true.”

You looked away from me, down at our hands joined so firmly in one another. You close your eyes shut, and you squeeze them tight. “Dream, I don't think I understand.”

Then I would help you understand. You needed to know how much I need you, how much I crave you.

“I long for you,” I confessed. “Your beauty, your touch, your heart… And I can't keep from you any longer, my dear.”

I stepped even closer, the distance nearly squashed as I set my forehead against your own. “Dream,” your voice seemed so far away, so uncertain. But you mustn't feel that way.

“Be mine,” the desperation began to become clearer in my voice. “Join me as my wife and queen.” My thumb brushed the finger where your wedding ring would be placed. I would almost feel it now… “I shall protect you with my life and love you with all that I am–”

“No.”

The icy chill of your disagreement, the stern tone of your voice, it created a sour taste on my tongue that I deeply resented.

I did not break away from you, though my grip on your hands may have tightened a bit more than they should have. “What?” My voice is low, upset and full of disbelief. You pulled your hands from mine, and I knew that I had to let you or else I may have hurt you.

“Dream…” you sighed heavily, like it pained you. “I can't.”

My eyes fixed on you, and I thought you could see the sudden darkness in them. Perhaps you did, but it wasn't enough.

“Why not?”

“Look at you.” You gesture toward me, taking another few steps away to establish a distance that left me cold. Your voice was not as steady as I'm sure you hoped it would be, but it was firm nonetheless. “Look at me.”

Your hand slapped back down to your side. It was a defeated movement. Hopelessness filled you in the form of tears, and that's how I knew you cared.

“You are the King of Dreams,” you continued, “one of the Endless, the fucking—ruler of sleep and unconsciousness, who's been alive for eons.”

Your brows knitted together, and your hand reaches across your frame. “I'm some…human you've been talking to for the last year.”

I swallowed thickly, the sourness turning to a bitter agony. “Don't you love me?”

I sound pathetic asking, but I simply could not go another moment without knowing.

“Of course I love you!” you exclaimed, as though it was the most obvious thing in the world. The leaves in the trees around us shook incessantly, yet there was no wind. Your voice was weaker when you spoke again. “How can I not?”

Hope filled me, if only for a moment. If you loved me so, then why do you choose to deny me your hand?

“But I can't have you,” you explained. “I'm mortal, you're Endless. I will die, and you will go on living for damn near the rest of eternity.”

If time was what concerned you, we could take it away.

“I can get you immortality.” I tried to step closer, but you stepped away.

You shook your head. “It's not mine to take.”

It was times like these where I wish you weren't so good. It was times like these where I wish you were more selfish, more possessive.

“Nonsense,” I disagreed. “If you were mine, the whole of the Dreaming would be yours.” You grunted with such frustration that my own crawled up my neck and into my teeth.

“Morpheus.” I still don't like the way you said it…with such a stern resolve, so bitter and broken. “I can't… I've heard about what happens to those who love the Endless.”

I nearly scoff. “Is that what this is about?” I shake my head.

If danger was what concerned you, I would quash the threats set against my love.

“As I said, I can protect you.”

“I'm not afraid for me,” you urged, “I'm afraid for you.” Oh, my love, you hurt me so. “You've lost so much, I can't hurt you like that.” You took tentative steps away from me, looking down and finding it so difficult to reach my gaze. “It is easier for you to let me go and move on, than to humor this ‘relationship’ and get the both of us hurt in the process.”

You looked up, despite the pain, and you moved forward to take my face in your hands. I must close my eyes to relieve the ache of you so close to me now. Oh, how deeply you cut…

“Forget about me,” you insisted, trying to smile for my sake. I could see how much it hurt you. “I know it's not fair, but it's how it has to be.” When my hands land on your waist, you drop yours from my face.

Reluctantly, you set your hands on my wrists and pulled them slowly away from you. Your voice was soft, wavery. You were trying not to cry. “I am not meant for you.” You take a deep breath in. “And you were never meant for me.”

I didn't know what to say. Though, I suppose it did not matter, for the next moment, you were gone. You left from the Dreaming, and you were lost from my sight.

But that was days ago. You have been avoiding me since.

But I've been there. At every turn, I have been there. And I know you feel me, you know that I am always there—lurking, watching, waiting.

You know it's me when you glance over your shoulder for the shadow in the corner of your eye. You know it's me in the shiver down your spine, the phantom billow of my robes as I ghost past. You know it's me in the faintest sound of breath out of sync with your own.

And I can tell that you know it's me now, in the walls of your bedroom while you lay fast asleep. You look so beautiful, soft and serene. To be in your dreams is one thing, but to watch you lost in your sleep is something else. To know that my realm has so much power, so much influence over something as perfect as you… If only I could watch you sleep forever.

Perhaps I could… but I shall not.

I don't understand how you were so sure of how deeply we did not belong, but I did know that you were wrong. Of course you're wrong.

We are meant to be together. We always were and we always will be. I am not prepared to let you go.

You worry so deeply about us, my well-being and yours if anything were to happen. But as long as there was a gap between us, we could never be together. If our eternal marriage wasn't enough to fill that, then I would just have to find something else.

Something deeper. Something more important than bands on our fingers.

And every kingdom needs its heir.

I shed my robes, the sky hidden beneath them as black as the darkest sapphires. My gentle steps are silent as I approach, the moonlight glinting on your skin now blocked by my frame.

Slowly, I sit on the bed beside you, and I cannot resist the touch of my hand against your cheek. You're so soft and sweet, especially when you lean your face into my hand. I smile, and I know you love me.

I lean down ever so slowly, and my lips press to your forehead. Your head shifts, a little keen against me. Oh, how you beg for my touch, my darling.

And I shall give it.

I remove the covers from your body, revealing you to me. Your shirt rides up your belly, exposing the soft expanse of your skin to me. I place my hand there, and hear you sigh. I slide down, my fingers caressing your skin until my hand dips below your shorts and presses to the cotton of your undergarment.

Your breath hitches when you feel my fingers against your clothed clit, brushing so gently, it's like a phantom touch. Still, you do not wake.

Spreading your legs for me, I cup your perfect little pussy in my palm and sigh. Just as I thought you'd be, warm and wet and waiting for me. I tease, stroking gently with my fingers to bring your arousal further. You squirm against my touch, but still you do not wake. You know I am here, you have no reason to fret.

I knew you loved me.

I lean down and kiss you, though you're so tired you do not kiss back. But that’s alright, you are all I need.

I pull away from you, standing once again and standing at the foot of the bed. I grab at the waistband of your shorts and pull them and your panties down your legs, pausing when you stir too much. When you no longer shift, I pull them off completely.

Oh, you are lovely.

My hands stroke the expanse of your smooth skin, and you sigh at my every touch. Your brows knit together, a far off focus in your dreamland. My fingers tease the seam of your sweet cunt once more, delving between your wetting folds to feel how hot you are around me.

You begin to stir again, but my hand to your stomach eases you. I do not want you to wake yet. Not yet. Soon.

Your walls clench around my finger, and I reward them with another. A tiny whimper slips through your lips. I massage my fingers in and out of you, deep and slow movements that coax more and more wetness from your cunt. My thumb presses to your clit, and your hips roll against me very slightly.

I can no longer control myself. I move onto my knees and hold your legs apart. I just want to taste you. And when my tongue meets the arousal seeping from your lips, a deep moan rumbles within me.

Such sweet honey you make all for me, only for me. I suckle around you, licking and sucking and tasting you with a growing enthusiasm. Your tiny whimpers are becoming moans, broken and needy as you keen into my touch. Your fists clench and unclench, your thighs try to close, your hips roll against my mouth. But I keep you steady, steady and still and open wide for me.

As I suck around your clit, I can feel you clenching around my tongue, which licks in and out of you and laps up your sweetness. You're so close, I can feel it, I can taste it. Your desperation for a release is a potent syrup on my tongue.

Your body shakes and your mewling moans fill the room when you come undone. You gasp, a pitchy, wonderful sound that makes me suck harder around your pulsing clit. You try to break away from me, but I only pull you closer, drunk on your taste and refusing to let up until I have had my fill.

It's a wonderful thing, watching you cum for me so deep in your sleep. I can see flashes of your dreams behind my eyes, skin against skin and warmth and passion and even brief images of me. I feel you tremble beneath me, shuddering and whimpering so sweetly.

I work you through your brief overstimulation, groaning around your pussy as your taste overcomes my senses. The intoxication is a precious salve to my hunger for you, but it does not last long. No, I will never not hunger for you.

And I soon shall never have to find myself starved of you either.

The next time you cum, your back arches off the bed and your mewls mix with your heavy gasp. When I hear the sound of your quickening heart and feel the tug of your slowly building consciousness, I pull apart from you.

Shh. Not yet. Sleep, my love. Soon you shall awake and see me giving you all that you desire.

I place my hand to hold your cheek, and your fluttering eyes steady once more as they seal shut in your returning slumber. And when all is right, I smile. Your slick allows my fingers to glide right through.

Perfect.

I move away, stripping the both of us until we're nothing but skin. The bed dips under my weight, and I pull your thighs over my legs.

Taking my cock in my hand, I hiss lightly. You've truly made a mess of me: hot and hard and leaking. I lean down to you, pressing my lips to the side of your face and dipping down into your neck.

“Don't worry, my love,” I whisper in your ear. “We shall be together.”

I line myself with you, and holding my breath, I thrust inside. Warmth blossoms along my body, and I shudder at the tight heat which welcomes me. “All of us.”

You whine as I push farther inside of you, going deeper and deeper until you've taken me all the way. A thick sigh heaves from my chest at the way you clench, and my hips stutter at the feeling. I pull back and thrust in once more, building a steady rhythm that grows with my passion and desperation for you.

You whimper and moan, squirming beneath me as you stir beneath the slumber I've placed you in. The images in your mind—our bodies, our lips, flashes and breaths—they mix like a cocktail that further my intoxication.

My thrusts are perhaps a bit too rushed for our first time together, but I cannot help it. You are better than I have ever imagined you'd be. I want to savor this, to take my time with you, to cherish each feeling and each taste and each sight…

But we shall have plenty of time for that in the future. Right now, I must ravage your body lying so pliant and willing for me.

I kiss your neck, taking the soft flesh between my teeth and sucking. You taste like flowers and honey, a precious taste I shall never tire of. I rut into you, listening to the sweet sounds of your slick along my cock, listening to your weak moans, your needy whimpers. I'm determined to make you cum with me as I rub your aching little clit with the pad of my thumb.

My need for you trumps everything else. I want nothing more than to bury myself as deeply inside of you as I possibly can and fill you with my love, a love that would take root within you and grow our dearest child. I hook my arms underneath your thighs and put you in the perfect position to receive it, chest to chest as I bury my face in the warm column of your throat.

“Oh, my love.” The words spill out of me as the pleasure grips my throat, and I thrust deeply inside of you. In the same thrust, your back arches off the bed and you actually shake in my arms as you cum around my cock, squeezing me so tight that I have no choice but to cum inside of you.

A rough groan tears through my throat and into your ear. As your tight pussy trembles around you, you gasp as the pleasure rips through you. I feel the harsh tug of sleep being taken from you, and you fully awake with me still buried so perfectly in your cunt.

You choke on my name, and the sound is so sweet that my hips stutter in a half-thrust that pulls a moan out of you. I smile, pulling back without pulling out and looking down at you. You're so beautiful like this, dazed from the pleasure, still coated in sleep with the confusion of it all.

“Dream,” you whisper again, your voice thick with sleep and something else. “Dream, what–?”

You don't have time to speak because I have already begun fucking inside of you again. I'm not quite done yet—I want to make certain that you shall carry my heir in your belly, certain that I shall claim you forever.

And I'm already so addicted to the feeling of your body. To be without it would be a crime.

With the relief of a release, I can focus now as I gaze down at you. My hips thrust in and out—a steady, quick, rough rhythm that has you moaning with loud and helpless sounds that are music to my ears. Your hands reach up, clenching my arms with an uncertain goal.

You struggle to speak, so driven by your lust for me that all you can do is form wordless words as I fuck you. You curse and swear, glassy eyes on me as I hold you close.

Suddenly, I pull out of you, and the most pathetic whine slips from your throat. I flip you onto your belly, spreading your legs and pushing your chest down as I enter you from behind. You welcome me, as I knew you would. My perfect girl.

“Hello, my darling,” I whisper through a groan after a particularly rough thrust. “Did you miss me?”

You mutter something of my name, and I smile.

“I missed you, too,” I say. I press my chest to your back, bringing my hand to wrap around your neck so gently. “But I shall never leave you again. And you shall never leave me.”

You try to say something but it doesn't matter. I pick up my pace, my strength. I hold you tightly and fuck into you with everything that I have. As my fingers circle your abused clit, you moan and gasp for breath as all the pleasure stacks on top of you, one right after the other.

“You're so good for me, my love,” I sigh. “You're always so good for me, as you sleep and as you wake.” Another whimper resounds.

I've longed for this moment for so long. This moment where you would be beneath me, moaning my name and welcoming me into your intimate warmth. Your body moves against me, seeking me out and shuddering under my touch as I give you everything you need. All the slick has built with the addition of my cum dripping out of you, coating me and the sheets below in white. The sounds we make together—the moans, the creaks, the smacks—it's a beautiful cacophony of sweet music. I could stay here forever, locked in this room with you and your body and your love, fucking you with all my passion and making love to you with all my heart.

Your hand reaches out to grab something, settling for the pillow, which you grip so hard, it looks as though you may tear into the fabric. The pictures in your mind have become so much more muddled. Now they're flashes of white, the vague movements of bodies and the vague sounds of groans. It's a mess, a beautiful mess of tangled thoughts and watered down cohesion.

Your moans shudder like cries when I pull another orgasm from your weak little body. As I fuck you through it, the pleasure becomes all the better as you go blinded by it.

“So perfect, my beautiful dear.” I pull out of you, and you sigh as I do, as if you think this is over. I turn you back onto your back.

My knuckles smooth gently down the side of your face as you stare up at me, your eyes glazed over. I kiss you, a deep, bruising kiss filled with all of my lust for you. It takes you a moment, but you kiss back. It's a wonderful feeling.

As our lips are joined, I join our bodies once more. You gasp into my mouth as my cock fills you once more. I trail my kisses along your jaw and back to your neck, painting you in love bites and taking you as mine.

My hips snap into you, my hands hold you tight, my lips lave along your skin. Oh, how I love you so. It shows in the way that I thrust, in the way that I sigh, in the way that I kiss, in the way that I hold you close to me. I can't let go.

A couple of stray tears slip down your cheeks, and I kiss them away. Poor thing, so full of pleasure that you're crying for it.

Without giving you much time to recover, my thumb is at your clit again. I've become utterly intoxicated with the sight of your undoing: the way you tremble and shake, the way you gasp and sigh. I love you.

And for a while, we stay like this, rocking and grinding and moaning into one another. The sight of our faces are drenched in utter bliss, and I bask in the moment. I can feel the beginnings of a second release prickling within me, and my steady thrusts begin to falter.

“I want to hear you say it.”

Your dazed eyes look up at me, your question interrupted by a moan. “Say–ah! Say what?”

“Tell me that you love me. As I love you.” I press my forehead against yours, rutting into you with all my strength as I begin to lose control. “Tell me, my darling. Tell me.”

“I…” You clench your jaw, arching your back as you struggle to speak through your pleasure. “Fuck, Dream.”

Your mouth is agape, and your eyes are closed so sweetly. But I need to hear you say it. I need it. “Say it.” My grip on your hip tightens, my thumb on your clit becomes more ruthless.

Lost in euphoria, you gasp and nearly choke on the words you give to me. “I love you.” You huff out a heavy breath, holding me tighter as your lips search for my skin. Their sloppy contact slides against me, wanting nothing more than to feel my skin against you. “I love you, Dream. Fuck, don’t stop, I love you.”

I sigh at the pleasure it gives me to hear those words on your delicate lips. “Again. Say it again.”

“I love you.” A whimpering sound mixes with a groan. “I love you, Dream.”

My fuse is running out, and with the way you tighten around me, I don’t stand a chance as my rough thrusts bring the both of us even closer to our highs. I can taste it on my tongue. The taste of your honeyed flower skin and your sweet arousal is my own personal wine.

My voice is barely a whisper in my haste. “Say it.”

“I love you, Morpheus.”

The dam breaks as I spill inside of you, shoving my cock as deep as I could possibly reach. Your gasp joins mine, and our sounds mingle with heaving breaths, your pitchy moans mixing with my deepened ones. You hold me as close as I hold you, and our lips slot together in the white noise of our ecstasy.

My hips continue their endless pursuit within you, desperate rolls thrusting within you just to make certain we’ve created our heir. For a while, I lay there on top of you, sparing you my weight but offering my warmth as I stay comfortably sheathed within you. Our gasping breaths have settled to gentle sighs, and you lay limply beneath me as you stare up at the ceiling. Contemplating.

When the time has unfortunately come to remove myself from you, I do as I adjust some hair from your face and kiss your forehead.

There was a fog in the room that I had not noticed before—not a physical one, of course. It’s beginning to clear in the aftermath of our combined pleasure. Your eyes slowly find mine, glazed still but the clearest they have been all night. Now that the blinding bliss has settled and you’ve fully awakened, there’s a clarity you’ve suddenly gained. You take in the sight of my face and I smile down at you, brushing my thumb over your cheek.

“Dream,” you mutter gently, to which I hum. “What have you done?”

My smile grows. I place a kiss to your lips, one that you seem to have trouble returning. Hooking my finger under your chin, I ensure you see me as I speak softly, a gentle hum that I know you shall hear.

“No one shall steal you from me now. Not even Death, no one. You are mine and only mine.”

Your eyes are glossy now, unshed tears gracing them that I hope to wipe away. “Dream,” you whisper, holding onto me with a tight grasp that I embrace. You look like you’ll say something, something dire and important. Instead, you close your mouth and smile, the kind of smile that must be pushed for.

“I love you,” you whisper. There’s an undertone to it that I dismiss. You’re tired, that’s all. I know you love me, and that’s all that matters.

I smile, kissing you again with all the love in my heart. My hand on your waist tightens, and I must remember that you are human. Pulling away from your lips, I brush my finger over your bottom one.

“I love you, too, my darling wife.”

Nothing can take that from us now.

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#dream of the endless #morpheus #dream of the endless x reader #morpheus x reader #dream of the endless smut #morpheus smut #the sandman #the sandman fanfic #the sandman fanfiction #dream of the endless fanfic #morpheus fanfic #morpheus fanfiction #dream of the endless fanfiction #reader insert #female reader #fanfic #fanfiction

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meichenxi · 7 hours

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languages, travel, identity, grief

Maybe some of you have heard of Xu Zhimo's Second Farewell to Cambridge (徐志摩再別康橋 Translation: Saying Goodbye to Cambridge Again, by Xu Zhimo | East Asia Student). It's an achingly lovely poem about a Chinese scholar who studied in the UK, and how he left so gently, taking nothing with him as he went. It brought me solace over the last year.

I thought for a very long time about how I felt about having to leave China, and what it felt like to mourn for a future that was never going to mine. I cried. How am I supposed to explain why? I'm not Chinese. I've got no family there, or a childhood to look back on. I couldn't explain it even to myself.

That pain was coupled with a type of uncertainty, a discomfort at myself for feeling so strongly. This feeling was not allowed. It meant - what? Something awful, probably. I was a racist, probably. I should hate myself, probably. Fetishization is the word that gets thrown around for white people and their time spent in East Asia at one end of the spectrum - at the other end it's just seen as embarrassing and deeply, you know, cringe. It's a self-interrogation - why do I feel so sad? Why do I feel this pull so strongly anyway, to a country that's not even mine? Why should it matter so much when I leave? I didn't feel like this grief has any sort of legitimacy. But it has taken from September - eight months after leaving - for me to pick up Chinese again.

I felt, for months, hollow and unsettled and drifting from place to place. I opened my textbook, and closed it again. The memories there were too painful. I'm not going to write about why I had to leave, but it wasn't by choice. I had loved the people in the school, even if it was for a short time. When you have no internet and are training eight hours a day, the days are coloured more sharply: bright and hurtful and wonderful all at once. We had no running water. It was in an abandoned hotel. I miss the monk at the temple door opposite the school, always on time at 6am to open it for our classes. I miss the folk at the local shop who invited me to watch films on their projector; once they killed a chicken for us. I miss the woman in the woods who gave me the chestnuts she had picked. I gave the chestnuts to the cook, and we steamed them and ate them by the lake. He wanted me to marry his son; he wanted it so strongly that he brought me pork, and desserts, and gave me paper, and promised me I could have a jade bracelet, that he would buy me a house. I miss the oldest martial arts teacher, who spoke in such strong dialect I could barely understand him. When I was sad and missing home one night, he told me that I should stay after dinner. In the silence and against the cicadas, he started to play the erhu for me. Later, my friend told me that he hadn't know what to say, how to comfort me; I was a foreigner and a young woman, after all. We had very little in common. But nobody has ever played a piece of music for me like that before.

And I miss X, my best friend there and partner in snack-smuggling crime. She is 19 years old, and a janitor's daughter, and one of the wisest people I have ever met. (She also rides an excellent motorbike, and lent me her hanfu, and we sped through the city giddy with our own daring and trying not to be caught.) We got matching haircuts; she had always wanted to cut her hair like a boy, and was too scared to do it alone. When I left, I told her to stay in touch: she shook her head. She said that some people were meant to know each other for some time, and no more. I think the death of friendship by attrition, by - as Elrond said! - the slow decay of time, is one of the saddest things of all. I deleted Wechat. I don't want to read over the old messages. By having this place - her, and the chestnuts, and the cicadas - as a memory, I can tuck it away it. I can keep it close.

I wrote a poem myself on the plane. That was the last I thought about China, the last thought I let myself have, in eight months. I kept myself away from it. It felt like a wound. And against that hollowness, there was constantly the question: Why should I have any right to miss this place? Who I am there? Why does it matter? We are all different people, wherever we go, and whoever we are with; we wear different skins, large or small. In China I was [...]. She was who I was. That name, that I introduced myself to people with - she was bright and friendly and tried to translate things just so. Everybody who goes as the only foreigner to a place - or the only foreigner that speaks the language - is a little bit self-obsessed. It happens. It's unfortunate, and something to guard against. But it also gives you its own kind of identity in a way: your identity is Foreigner. Your identity is a cultural bridge. Everyone you meet, in a country as friendly and curious as China, has questions about you. You stand with your feet in both worlds, and are not really part of either of them. That identity is easy to slip into, like cool water, like trying on new clothes. It's easier that thinking: who am I outside of that? Where am I going? I don't really know. I don't think anyone really does.

And then the second thing happens. I speak Chinese well, by this point. My accent is there, but it's slight. I am short, and have dark hair, and a generally similar build to many East Asians - so the questions I have got in the last few years have changed. Sometimes people think I have been raised here. Sometimes they think I am ethnically Russian, and nationally Chinese. Sometimes I get asked if I am half Chinese. Usually they know I am a Foreigner, 100% white - but not always. There is a peculiar rush that comes from that acceptance; from feeling the relief, just for fifteen minutes, that you belong. It's not about 'passing', or race-bending, or anything twisted - it's nothing so unnerving as that. It's just the human need to belong. Everyone gets tired of being stared at, after a while. And after a while, you start to think - I wish I understood. I wish they understood. I wish this were easy.

But then the conversation keeps going. You don't know a local word, or you misunderstand. You say something in a strange way, or you make a strange gesture, and the glass shatters, and - there you are again, naked again, exhausted again, explaining yourself again. That's the other half of it. There's solace in the Foreigner identity, because that means that's all you are. You don't have to think about your parents, or whether they worry about you so far from home; of course they do. The Foreigner is good and filial and a wonderful daughter. You can craft her into any shape you like. But it also marks you out again and again, endlessly and again, as Other.

There was a paper published a while ago that showed measures of acceptance of non-natives in native-speaking communities. It highlights a strange, but familiar experience to those who have lived abroad - the people who spoke the language to a medium level felt more accepted and less lonely than those that spoke the language to a high degree. It makes sense, and mirrors what I have found with both Chinese and German. When you speak a little Chinese, you are a wonder - a curiousity! Look at the Western girl go! People are kind, and curious, and will slow down to include you in conversations. You are thrilled with what you can access - all this knowledge, that other people don't have! Look how special you are!

And then you get better. And then you realise, cut by cut, that you will never be one of them. You don't want to be Chinese, per se; but you do want to be accepted. You are happy to be British; but you miss China like a wound, an old one, festering, even when it was never yours. How do you tell your family that you are not grieving a lost romance, a beautiful girl, but a language and a life? That there are words of majesty, of playfulness, that will never be yours? You speak well enough that people no longer bother to dumb things down, or explain them; you sit with your discomfort, smile painted on, because - you know. It's not bad. You understand most of it. And on the edge of that circle, smiling uncertainly, following the vast majority of what is being said, you are not clever enough and not witty enough to keep up with the chengyu, the cultural references, the slang, and the raucous laughter around you erupts, and you don't know what you've missed, and everybody says - she's quiet, that one. Maybe all the foreigners are? And all you are doing is sitting and feeling the distance between You and Them as heavy and as stifled in your chest as an ocean of dark.

So you go back. Back to your people. But when you sit with the other foreigners, you are apart. They laugh; what are these nutters doing? The Chinese don't make any sense. The Chinese do this - they do that. You sit there, and then there is a pressure building in your chest too, a discomfort, the desire to stand up and say - well, actually.

You are responsible for everything the Chinese teachers do, and have to explain things in a way that the students understand - Confucian thought, and Buddhist philosophy, translated in pithy bite-size adages for the West. You have no qualifications for this; everything you assert, you feel unsure. Uncertain. Someone else could explain it better, more nuanced, and you need to do more reading anyway - but here you are, and here they are, and you're the only one. And you do know. Not enough, but enough that their jokes, their pains, make you uncomfortable. You feel the need to defend both parties; to be a diplomat, every second of every day. In turn, when the students come to the teachers with problems, you have to translate their grievances in a way that the Chinese teachers will be sympathetic towards. Once I got asked: why do you never join us after class? Why are you always so quiet when you're not working? As a translator, you are always working. Every time you speak, you are working; what you choose to say, and what you choose to not say, and where you choose to intervene. You are building relationships, and disappearing, and you are becoming invisible, and you're a nothing, and you're everyone and you're nobody and nobody realises you are doing anything more than translating at all.

I wanted to stay. I couldn't have stayed. I wanted to be accepted as one of them. I wanted to be accepted for who I was. That means a foreigner. I wanted to be true to myself, which means that I would always be the Foreigner, which means I would always be apart from them. It is that contrast and juxtaposition which causes the grief. And there was never an ending to it, a resolution, a chance to reconcile myself (in China) with myself (in the UK), because all at once I had to leave. The grief comes most from the second arrow - not the pain of leaving, but the bewilderment of not knowing why I was in pain at all.

It's been eight months. Slowly, as spring comes, I feel like I am on surer ground. I can look at my old books, those painstaking notes, and I could look at new ones too and I'm starting to think, because this is what I tell my students, and maybe there's some truth in it - it's okay if you're not perfect. It's okay if you didn't achieve what you wanted to, and that the language - in its wholeness, and who can ever know that? - will never, not quite, be yours. It's the struggle and the process that means that I will know and understand Chinese in a different way, in my own way, in a slanted-to-reality sort of way, that is a treasure in and of itself. There is beauty in its brokenness too.

And there is sorrow, too. The sorrow that comes with easing yourself into a different life, and it holding you gently for a while. I sat there - I spoke to them. It's not only missing a place; it's missing a person you were, a stage of your life, for a time. It's knowing that a place has reached inside your ribs and taken root there - even if you don't return, you can never fully get rid of that again. You are two people now, with feet straddling two oceans. There are parts of you that loved and suffered and hated and grew in Chinese, not English. You can't explain that. You can't even begin. Sometimes - not often - you are a stranger in your own land. The poets spoke of that. In the age of fast travel, of the weekend break, we have forgotten the ways a place can burrow itself inside you, and find its own home.

It's not the same as the grief that someone Chinese will face. But it's still grief. I have put my life into Chinese. Maybe that is all it takes to grow love.

Now, I turn back to Chinese - as a foreigner, as Melissa, as myself. It's a bittersweet thing. I know that I cannot hold all of it. It will spill out, like the sun, and there is no way I can be that without losing myself and my history and my own green woods. But I think I am ready now. I am surer, and a little steadier on my feet.

#langblr #chinese #languages #culture #china #:(((((((((((

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