#i did in fact search those spoilers myself

[messrmoonyy]

The entire season 2 of the newsreader being released today and me not having access to it feels incredibly homophobic

[kirbybecomesastarwarrior]

Loser Baby~ (Marxolor)

When I first heard this I thought to myself... "this is their song."

In the KBASW AU, they're very similar in nature, and they're brought together through circumstances... both are losers. And that is what makes their relationship so beautiful ~

And yes I changed some of the lyrics to fit Marx better~

Keep reading for extra lore/ spoiler-ish content

I've decided to hit two birds with one stone...knock out a few questions I had...

Yeah, the Marxolor/Magolor asks have been stewing in there... Sorry for taking so long but I FINALLY learned how to draw Magolor.

He plays a big role in the story... he is pretty much very close to his game counterpart, but his reasons and motivations for the Master Crown are very different.

The Master Crown was created and owned by his great-grandmother... Minerva Mim also known as... MAD MADAM MIM. (And for those who aren't familiar with Disney's The Sword in the Stone.) Who was the ruler of Halcandra during her time...

Magolor's full name is Magolor Mim

But she's also a mix with Harry Potter's Minerva McGonagall.

(And yes) she's connected with Lady Celestine (who is this KBASW Merlin), and they were best friends. She's the reason why the Ancients & Halcandrans did business. Halcandran techolong & the Ancients magic. A deal Sir Icarus tried to secure but could not negotiate at all...

However, Celestine managed to get it with ease... (*cough* bribed her way*. ) Over time they did become genuine friends... I'll expand on her later... In short, she was basically the only one whom Celestine told of her alter-ego, Merlyn (Sir Arthur figured it out).

She was snarky, eccentric, and a bit vain at times, but at her core was a good person.

Celestine brought out the best in her and Minerva brought out the adventurous side of her and encouraged her to be bolder. (BTW she was the number one Celarthur shipper).

However, after Celestine's "execution" (secretly they crystalized her): Minvera refused to do business with the GSA & the Ancients due to her friend's unfair trial... despite the threats they made to remove her from power if she continued to remain loyal to Celestine... but no matter how much they threatened her she still couldn't do it...

As a result, the Ancients removed her from her seat as ruler... and the GSA tried to arrest her for siding with a "traitor." However, she didn't go down without fighting. "If I can not have my crown... NO ONE CAN!" Cursing the crown that there will be no more another ruler of Halcandra... and using it to erupt the volcano that resided on the planet... creating its now, current state... becoming MAD MADAM MIM. (But in truth, she was just grieving... loss of her best friend. )

After that, the Ancients ordered to get rid of any descendant of Madam Mim's lineage. And thus the GSA hunted down and exterminated every living relative of Mim's household. However one survived the carnage.

Magolor is the lone survivor of his entire family's... orphaned and on the street... struggling to survive. He did everything to keep himself afloat... even if he had to BEG, STEAL, OR BORROW. HE'D DO IT!(There are a few more things... Magolor had a connection to the Sqeak Squads and Daroach, but that's a story for another day.)

Eventually, he finds out about his heritage and the fact that his whole household was wiped out due to... HER LOYALTY TO ONE PERSON. BAH, DANG IT GRAN WHAT WERE YOU THINKING I COULDA BEEN A KING AND YOU THREW IT AWAY FOR FRIENDSHIP?! From that, you can probably see why Magolor isn't so keen on the value of it since the very thing pretty much wiped out his entire family... And thus began Magolor's search for the crown...

Magolor's betrayal, & redemption does happen like in the game:... does his little shop, makes his amusement park. However, he does a few extra things that connect to the Kirby anime... Magolor manages to revive Chill and rebuild Kirby's robot dog for him (episode 12). (After that, the gang was won over by Magolor...)

Kirby's robo-pet is actually a big thing in the KBASW, he's basically the equivalent of Kirby's iPad/computer.

With this Magolor is fully redeemed, but his arc's not quite done just yet... he still can't help but feel something is missing in his life. Yes, he's learned the value of friendship and junk... he has friends now but... How could he still feel alone when he was people around him.. a feel that he could only describe as underlining emptiness.

Enter Marx. And as I said in the Marx post... Marx saves Kirby ( I won't say from whom yet but) he gets injured the gang wants to help him but... He didn't want a pity party and tried to get away.

Marx: I DON'T NEED YOUR HEL-! *FACE PLANTS ow...

Everyone: You need our help~

Marx wasn't comfortable staying in Dreamland to recover (he knows people *cough* Bun wouldn't take too kindly of him returning), so to compromise, they cashed in a favor from Magolor... Resulting in Marx being delivered by the gang... via kitten in a basket.

Kirby: Hi Mags, this is Marx... Do you think you can watch him for a bit he's we just need you to watch him so he can recover.

Magolor: Okay, sure... but why is he in a basket?

Marx: HISS *shuts the cover*

Meta Knight: He wanted something with a lid on it.

Mags: Oh~kay *picks up basket* I guess you guys can pick him up when he gets better?

Magolor hoped whatever feral creature they had him watching wouldn't be that much trouble or, at the very least, not bite... but Magolor was pleasantly surprised that Marx seemed... to match him quite perfectly...

Shared his love of ancient relics & magic, sarcastic humor, and a wick wittiness similar to his own. And not just interest but personality-wise as well. Marx had an unapologetic straightforwardness that he appreciated, along with a few oddities that he found strangely endearing...This unexpected guest seemed to fit seamlessly into his life... it actually felt nice to have a companion like this.

Marx at first didn't know what to expect when he was dropped off at Halcandranss doorstep. He assumed that he was being sent to some sort of happy hospital facility, where they were gonna baby him and be monitored 24-7. NO FREEDOM AT ALL, HE'S JUST GONNA BE A CAGED ANIMAL!

But no Mags allowed him to do as he pleased... once he realized that he tried to pretty much annoy Magolor into kicking him out. Using his natural crass, sass, and of course, pranks to do it, however, Magolor didn't fall for any of them. Remaking at each of them describing them as "cute"...

Magolor: Nice try, but... You're not gonna to trick this trickster~

Marx: WHAT!?

Marx assumed Kirby that Magolor was another goody-two-shoes, but... did they bring him to some anti-prank master's house. He should've been angry, but he couldn't help but be impressed. It didn't take him long to stop his fruitless effort... there was nothing else to do but wait till he had a chance to escape.

Marx: "Nothing else, Just sitting and watching this guy... uh what is that you're working on... " leaving being instantly enamored and captivated with Magolor's work. Marx's interest and fascination with Ancient Technology is what drove him to use the Galactic Nova in the first place... which sparked Marx's interest and forgetting his original plans to escape.

Which led him to discover all the similarities they had... However, there was this secret unknown wall the other had up. Wanting to keep there both their "unsavory past beginnings with Kirby."

Magolor didn't want to scare Marx away especially when he was finally starting to get comfortable with him. And Marx not wanting to screw up another friendship he was starting to make, by revealing what he was. Both did not want to ruin the only good thing they had in a while.

When finally Marx recovered, Mags was just about to call Kirby and the gang, and immediately Marx pretended to still be sick. Visibly nervous when the check-in call comes in. This doesn't go unnoticed by Magolor,... so when it comes time to call up Kirby for the update, he buys him more time.

Magolor: I gotcha another week...

Marx: Wait, what...

Magolor: Listen I don't think I can get you another when the time comes so... so you think you can tell me what's going on... Kirby's a nice guy I'm sure he'll-

Marx: But I'm not-

This leads Marx to tell Mags everything about the whole "NOVA FIASCO," and Magolor is just speechless as he reveals each detail. Marx loner he spoke couldn't help but feel like he sunk in even deeper believing he blew it again...

Waiting with bated breath for Magolor to answer expecting him to respond in disgust... only with him to respond with. "Yo, same!"

Thus leading Magolor to reveal his past with the Kirby & the Master Crown, along with his road to redemption. This gives Marx a little hope, but not as much confidence that he could do what Magolor did... But Mags assures him that he's still a work in progress himself and that if he wants to be better he should give himself the chance to do better... after all the first step is always the hardest.

Needless to say, everything works out but even after the whole thing, Marx is still hanging out with Magolor... Hmmm... I wonder why! :3

Thanks again to everyone for sticking around and being patient with the asks... I know I'm taking a while to answer (and the things I promised to be done aren't... sorry, my work schedule is hectic.)

I've kinda hit a bit of a roadblock with the fanfic's art style and recently have been wanting to change it up... but anyhow I'm sure I'll figure it out eventually. (So for now I'm trying to knock out a few more asks).

Hope you enjoy the content and have a great day~

[oh-saints]

sunshine becomes you (final)

Being a footballer means Martin possibly has every resources in his whim, and that includes obliterating the blurred lines between him and Eve.

Grumpy!Martin Ødegaard x Sunshine!OC

Word count: 3.7k

tw: 18+ for graphic sexual contents included inside (aka a sprinkle of smut); unprotected sex

Note: i know i've made you guys as frustrated as Martin in the gif above so i'm putting you out of misery (#spoiler) and i hope you guys forgive me lolol but as usual, i happen to write this around dawn so ofc not beta-read yet. oh, and i'm changing the term solstrålen into solskinn (including in the prev parts) bcs it turned out google search failed me, thanks @multifamdomfan12 for correcting me! <3

Tags: my lovely loves @julianalvarez9 @formula1tina @okayline @mehrmonga @mrswhitethornbelikov @notleclerc @laurensficrecs @soccerwag9 <3<3

sunshine becomes you masterlist here

“I expect to see you again soon, dear Eve,” was the last words Martin’s mother muttered before she and the rest of the family boarded the car Martin had chartered to get them to the nearest tarmac.

With the glint on her eyes, Martin knew her mother meant what she said and he, frankly enough, didn’t think he’d be ready to face the day he had to break the news to her mother that Eve and him were no longer happening. Her mother seemed so delighted with Eve, utterly wishing deep down that Eve was already a part of their family by some sort of extension called marriage.

Doors were closed behind Eve, and suddenly Martin’s house was too humongous for the two of them. Instead of appreciating the big space, Eve hated the way the hollow silence that followed after. It was suffocating, to say the least, and Eve wanted to run away as soon as possible.

Martin noticed the uncomfortable shift Eve played between her right and left legs, indicating she was in an awkward situation, and Martin already hated the fact he needed to have a legit justification to have her in his arms without any fight.

To have her in his arms like they still had someone else to impress, but without having to put up the act.

But who was he to wish upon the stars when the object of all his desires repelled him the way mosquitoes repelled the hazardous substance men made to annihilate them?

Who was he to wish something too futile to happen?

“Let me get the car keys—”

“No need, Martin,” Eve wrapped her arms around herself as she looked around the living room in search for her totebag. “I can go home by myself.”

“Out of the question, Angel—”

“You should drop the pet name now,” Eve’s stern tone stopped Martin on his track. To say he was surprised was an understatement, and he wished he’d never seen the exasperated look in her eyes, for it was laced variously with emotions he’d rather not name. “No one’s around. No need to put up an act.”

“But…” At Eve’s outburst, Martin didn’t realise his arms fell helplessly on his sides. “That’s your name.”

“You know as well as I do that’s not what I’m talking about.”

For several, intense moments, neither of them did anything but to hold each other’s stare.

“Fine, Eve. Have it your way,” Martin finally conceded to the pressure because if there was one thing he couldn’t do well was holding grudges. Put Eve as the subject and Martin would be fucked twice over. “But you should let me explain something in return.”

An eye for an eye, Eve realised was what Martin’s modus operandi, so she nodded. Anything to get this agony done and over with, anything to free her of him. Her body and soul couldn’t take anymore of Martin she somehow fell in love with in the midst of this whole charade, knowing that version of Martin never existed in the first place.

“What is it?” She said as she looked up slowly to meet the oceanic blue eyes she had grown accustomed to, but she never expected those magical orbs to be right in front of her in a flash of a moment like a lightning struck.

Before she could register on anything, Eve felt the plush cushion of his lips closing down on hers, sealing her voice box from the world with a surge of desperation lingering in the upper and lower parts of his lips, and she was scared of what he asked of her behind the kiss.

She was afraid of what he asked of her, as he goaded her parted lips for a further access to the mouth he’d always loved for saying all the right and wrong things that made Eve as she was now. The smart, the funny, the witty Eve.

She was terrified of what he asked of her, as she lost herself in the mortifying pleasure of having him traced the inside of her cavern with his tongue while tracing the curves outside with his hands, and before she knew it herself, he’d pinned her into the nearest wall, his hands holding hers up in a lock on top of her head.

She was frightened that, despite her fastened hands, she felt liberated this time around—and maybe Martin had liberated them both with the kiss—because everything felt so right in this moment.

Because while she was now familiar with his lips on hers now, Martin had never poured his body and soul and everything of his existence into a kiss. This was new, and this was raw, and Eve was so overwhelmed by the sensation because only now did she realise this was Martin—all of him, bared to her, desperate to cling on whatever’s left of her that he’d come to love.

This was real.

“Ask me something I never do.”

Eve gasped as she felt the pad of Martin’s thumb wiped away a streak of tear running down her face. She really should tell Martin it was out of happiness now. “Martin—”

“Ask, Angel.”

Another trail of waterworks escaped Eve as Martin’s eyes stared down at her intently, yet somehow so… forlorn. She never wished any of this to happen to either of them, least Martin of all people—the one who’d brought back her dignity the night of Christmas Gala. “What’s something you never do, Martin?”

“I never pretend when I’m around you,” Martin whispered the words against the pair of lips he’d come to love so much, for both the taste and the sensation that came with it, and Eve could feel the desperation lingered in the small space of air between them; of not being able to kiss her, not before she understood his points of elaboration, not before she had all her questions answered. “I’ve always kissed you the way I want to, having audience or not. I don’t care if anyone else sees us or it’s only between us just like right now.”

“But you’re pretending to be my boyfriend at the—”

“You think I was pretending but I never say anything about me pretending from the beginning, Angel,” His eyes reflected immense anguish, yet his words resonated with truth and determination, and Eve’s head was spinning beyond belief. “So I never have. Everything I do whenever I’m with you is within my purest intention and everything I say to you is my outmost honesty.”

It took Eve a full 5 seconds to digest everything, thanks to Martin’s intoxicating scent that was able to short-circuit her brain. “So the gala wasn’t a sham.”

“It never was for me, at least.”

“But it’s your idea to do that.”

“It’s my one and only crazy idea so I can get closer to you,” Martin rested his forehead on hers gently, in hope she could see what he was trying to convey; that he was tired of this charade as much as she was, especially when they were fooling themselves by denying everything that could’ve been between them. “It’s the only way I know how.”

“You used my desperation to—”

“Yes, but I don’t regret a thing,” Now Martin was truly wearing his heart on his sleeve. Eve never said about not giving a fight to him, and he’d expected that. “I don’t regret anything I do with you, and I’m sure I never will. Call me selfish but I was desperate, too, at that time so you can see me.”

Still, it hurt Martin the same every time Eve’s head moved back inches more than the distance he’d managed to claimed before. “But if you never pretend around me, you must’ve absolutely despised to see me every day.”

“What makes you say that?”

“You never reply whenever I say good morning.”

“So ask, Angel,” Martin’s hands headed south and back to cradle her face like she was a fine china—and for him, it felt that way, for how precious she was to him—and his thumb caressed out the crumpled lines between her eyebrows ever so softly. “Ask me why I never reply your good morning.”

“What?”

“Ask me why I never reply your good morning, Angel,” The Norway’s youngest captain repeated, and Eve was relieved when he reached up to her forehead to place a featherlight kiss on the same spot where her crease of confusion appeared, for she couldn’t stand another second of Martin looking down on her as if his world would end the moment she said anything that implied no to him. “No matter how much I want to give in.”

“Why?” She didn’t want to have to end with her asking the one thing she’d been dying to know but the way Martin’s lips tickled her skin and the way he inhaled the scent lingering from the shampoo she donned earlier… she’d choose this over breaking the fragile bubble they were in. “Did you hate them?”

“I abhorred them, Angel,” And there he was—Martin was back gazing down at her, and gone was the gentle but miserable captain that was hanging his sanity on a thread. He’d returned with force under his arsenal yet this time, Eve wasn’t intimidated like the last time she’d encountered this side of Martin. “I hate them because it reminds me that you treat me like everyone else,”

And Eve couldn’t hold back her stupefied gasp.

“I thought I made it obvious on my first day that I’m so… enamoured by you,” It was tragic to Eve that Martin was spewing every of these meaningful words about reality he’d been living with a smile that was anything but, and it took away her joy from the fact that this was real and she wasn’t hallucinating that she thought this was real. That she wasn’t the only one who wanted this to be real. “But you certainly think I’m just being friendly to you when in reality, it’s not it, and I hate it so much,”

And Eve vowed, as well as shooting upon the stars, that she didn’t have to see that bitter, artificial smile ever again.

She didn’t waste another breath to pull Martin down to her, capturing his lips in a deep kiss—so deep she had to close her eyes in contentment, and a sigh escaped her lips. The huffed air was Martin’s sign to ask for entrance, and she granted him the entire access to her body and soul the way he’d bared his earlier, and the clash of tongue was a rather welcomed reaction, along with the messy movements of their hands finding each other’s available exposed skin.

“Please tell me I didn’t mess up my chances with you yet,” While one hand was resting on the nape of Eve’s neck, the other one was tucking away the strands of her hair to the back of her ear. His eyes were roaming from the hair, to her eyes, to her lips, and Martin had to close the gap between them once more because he couldn’t help himself. “I’m so afraid I’ll fuck up and I lose you again before I know it.”

“Just don’t put me through such thing again.”

Eve didn’t have to open her eyes to know Martin was hiding his smile behind the smouldering look he granted her—a slight movement of his lips against the rim of hers was all it took for her—before he closed the gap between them with nips on the corners of her lips, the cupid bow, her nose, and finally landed perfectly back on the middle of her lips, claiming the gate of his existence once more like he never left her bereft.

And to be graced by the silent proclaim was Eve’s honour, for she had never felt an abundance of emotion from deep within of one’s self unlike any other from Martin. Should anyone catch them in their current position, it would be palpable for anyone to see that Eve was close to liquefying herself into a shape only Martin could mould of her, in only ways Martin could forge. Her lips were beyond repairable from the nibbles left on the trail every time the blonde man changed his course to devour her to the very last taste, her garments were beyond salvaging from the harsh movements that reminded her of the captain’s passion on the pitch and yet she welcomed the crude touches full of desperation on her skin.

She was exposed for anyone nearby to see, being the most daring she’d ever been in presence of someone else and her mirror at home, yet she felt so secluded and secured in Martin’s arms, for his body engulfed hers in ways she knew he wouldn’t compromise her dignity—to anyone, even to him.

Her head was busy configuring as to how Martin could orchestrate everything she was feeling like it was second skin to him but she should’ve known better. The moment she lost herself into his touches and was only brought to Earth when his hands grazed her bosom and only teasingly passed by the core of her heat, just to settle one of her leg on his waist, that Martin Ødegaard was truly living up his moniker of the maestro.

No one could’ve played her frustrations down to being close to a string left like he could, no one would’ve played the sanity she was hanging by a thread the way Martin did, and managed to get away with it unscathed of wrath. Yet, Eve was nothing but a puddle of mess under his subtle dominant.

“Martin, please…”

Her moans, masked by broken gasps, were enough for Martin to take her away from the poor plastered wall. Not because he didn’t want to take her against the wall—partly because he wanted only the best for her, partly because there was another time for that—but because he knew if they’d become undone right here, right there, he wouldn’t have the energy to hold them together. He knew they’d be sensational together, conjoined in the hips and lower in an earth-shatteringly manner, and he wouldn’t last as long as he’d like, despite being an athlete.

And he knew, as he lied her against the white faux material of the rug he’d immaculately placed in front of the fire place in this wintry weather, with the faint yellow glow casted on her face and her refined, soft silks of hair strands behind her, that his decision was proven better than he thought it would be.

Eve had never looked so ethereal, and he couldn’t believe this goddess-like being was now captured under him, helpless against the arms locking her sides—his angel, his fallen angel.

“Hello there, my angel,” Martin peered down at her, nuzzling his nose against hers, and Martin Ødegaard was unequivocally enraptured by the bedazzling smile she granted him at the gentle gesture, and he hadn’t even begun the ministration of what he had in mind. “You fit perfectly in my arms,”

And he was truly a goner by the way she was giggling—how much he’d been missing that gleeful sound without the constraint of a mere fake couple play between them—as he settled his nose deeper to the crook of her neck, sniffing Eve’s signature parfum she liked to spray along the length of her neck, while his fingers ran down the outer sides of her arms. The ticklish feeling was what probably enticed the melodious sound of her carefree laugh, her true carefree laugh, not the one he was used to hearing paraded around the London Colney for mere courtesy.

But Martin was something else altogether when Eve let out unrestricted whines as his nose and lips pursued the track downwards, from the neck to the open space of her chest, against the space between her ample breast, on the small space under the mound, across her ribcage. So uncalled for, especially for the effects those sinful sounds imposed on his cock. So dirty, so disgusting, yet he yearned for more.

Thus, explaining his bold move further down south.

Just as he was peppering kisses against the inner parts of her thighs, Eve arched in the ways that could put half-moon to shame, with her agape mouth and breathless pants as her hands were practically flailing to find the most stable ground to help herself, only to end up with plucking the faux material with one hand and another one gripping his shirt for life.

She sat up at the sudden realisation Martin was yet discarded from his clothes, and he stopped his deliverance at her movement. “What’s wrong?”

Eve didn’t say anything verbally but her hands lifting up the colour that complimented his skin very well said it all. Martin halted her rushing hands effectively, like he did hers when they were pushed up against the wall a bazillion years ago. “Oh no, my love. Tonight’s about you.”

Eve couldn’t hide the shivers that ran down all over the body at both the newfound nickname—and she loved being called by nicknames Martin found suitable for her—and the intonation he used to cover his obvious intention.

Martin sat back up on his knees, and the sight of him shedding his shirt was certainly something that would haunt her for days and days after today, especially when he had to be away for his job. Realising Eve was ogling at him, Martin laughed unreservedly for the first time since the both of them scrapped off the last bits of their shitty acting withstanding.

“Oh, shut up, Martin,” and the man could certainly get used to being pulled down by the woman who’d never vanished from the back of his mind, no matter how hard he tried to erase her. She kissed the way she looked; sun-blazingly hot with passion and fierceness like she wouldn’t see the light of the day tomorrow, and he could feel the last restrain of himself melted away as her hands travelled down his chest, his ribs, his well-built abdomen.

“I like this,” Eve traced down the sixpack line stretched across his midriff, her movement so gentle yet it constricted the muscle tighter than the workout machines at the gym. “Don’t show it off to anyone else.”

“Say you’re mine and it’s all yours to see, Angel,” Eve looked up to the man towering her, covering her against the moon wanting to peek at the moment they’d been dying to have, and Martin almost came undone at how innocent she looked, face held in his hands, in contrast to how devious her fingers were at. “It’s always been you.”

Eve didn’t need further reassurance to pull him down to her, crashing their lips together in ways that reminded her of waves crashing against the solid rock on the edge of the ocean. His lips were showering her with cold water against the warmth of hers, and hers were pouring him calmness against the sun. Yin and yang found each other, at last, and they both moaned at the sensation the both of them had been liberated at best from whatever holding them down.

They were floating on the rough waters, so high in each other’s frustrated and desperate kisses to find solace in each other’s undone, but nothing could compare to the moment the lovers were fully, entirely intertwined with each other. Eve felt so full of Martin, and she wouldn’t want to have it any other way.

Martin had to control his breath, just as what his trainers told him to do on the pitch ironically enough, as he felt Eve welcoming him with the warmest hug he could ever receive from someone, both inside and out. He couldn’t help himself but pull her closer to him, flushed against him, every air making their way in between them was something he considered a disturbance.

“Oh, Martin,” Her breathing was ragged, so did Martin’s, and it pushed Martin to drive her closer to the edge. “You feel so good against me.”

At her words, he went the deepest he could plunge himself into the sweetest hellhole that was Eve, and her body went tighter, inside and out he could see veins almost bulging out against her temple. She was halfway there; he could see it in her gaze, in what he could make out of her extremely flushed cheeks. Who was he to grant delayed gratification to her?

“Say you’re mine, mitt solskinn,” One touch against the swollen, pretty clit of hers, and she slowly peaking her highs. She was so beautiful, chasing her release under his touch as he pounded himself into her relentlessly for his own end, despite the dirty, slick mess she was making against his hands. She panted his name like a prayer, and it delighted him to no end that he was the only one who could provoke such a sensuous siren. “No more denying between us, Angel.”

“I’m yours, Martin Ødegaard,” and he felt that down to the bones as he’d reached his high at her words, like the passcode to his own ending, and as the morning came lazily upon them, he’d never felt as whole as that moment. Although he’d had Eve in his arms countless times before, because he now knew that despite the stormy weather outside, he’d always have his sunshine shining brightly in his arms, beaming radiantly as she whispered, good morning, baby.

Martin didn’t have anything else to respond her but to give her the same blinding smile—the biggest he could muster, anyway, which was still pale in comparison to the force in his arms, settling well like a little spoon she was.

“You really lost against me.”

The once-wonderkid could only laugh at her comment. You could count on Eve for her smart mouth. “Well, if this is what losing feels like, I really don’t mind at all.”

“That’s it?” Eve had to pull her head back from the tight cocoon they were sharing, and she absolutely wouldn’t complain to wake up to those clear blue Nordic eyes every day. “Where does your whole athlete competitiveness go?”

“You feel like my biggest victory anyway.”

Because sunshine has become Eve.

＊✿❀○❀✿＊＊✿❀○❀✿＊＊✿❀○❀✿＊THE END＊✿❀○❀✿＊＊✿❀○❀✿＊＊✿❀○❀✿＊

and that concludes my first ever (mini) series! wow, i didn't think this was possible in any way so thank you, to each and every single one of you, who's spared your time to read the entire series and even left comments on the posts. i hope i didn't disappoint you midway or in anyway. bcs really, if i could hug you guys rn, i would so i'm just gonna send loves to you guys ❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️❤️ and see you on the next one!

[fleetingcalypso]

Hello! I just stumbled across your blog, and find the way you write and portray Henry in your stories absolutely captivating. I just finished reading the book for the first time ever today and managed to do so without seeing any spoilers beforehand, so safe to say that Henry's suicide blindsided me completely. In hindsight it made complete sense, but I'm still in denial about it and would love a story about him actually surviving his wounds. Henry gives me the vibe of hiding everything that was happening from anyone but those in the Greek class alongside him, which, in my opinion, would even extend to his partner as well. I think it would be really interesting if his partner comes to visit him in the hospital after he's just woken up (ignoring the logical fact that he'd probably be heavily brain damaged) and is just absolutely devastated because she/they thought he was genuinely taking his life because he was depressed. To me, even then I don't see Henry fessing up to what's actually been happening, and I think it'd be cool to see the way he would try and talk his way out of it. (Henry seems pretty closed off emotionally, but I'd love some genuine hurt/comfort, only if this idea intrigues you of course.) thank you! (:

≋ The dread of losing a loved one, the knowledge that someone's time could have come faster than expected, the paranoid of could have happened had help on arrived on time, the fear of the future holds. These feelings are not foreign to me. At any rate, everyone sails away from Ogygia one day or another, I am accustomed to it. For anyone else, I want to emphasize that themes of this narration are quite heavy, if need be please don't be afraid to reach out to me for help or simple communication. You're not alone and you are deeply loved. Going back to Henry, I am of the opinion he'd try to manipulate his way out of a truly meaningful conversation. He's quite the orator, after all.

≋ Henry Winter x GN!Reader ≋

≋ Word Count: 2190 words.

≋ TW: Attempted s*icide, angst, manipulation, reader feels an exorbitant amount of guilt, somewhat hurt/comfort.

≋ CW: As the themes are quite heavy and Henry is a pragmatic, stoic character, I feel like there could not be much comfort in a scenario like this. He'd be too busy trying to find another way to get out of the mess he's in, to take the time to comfort his loved one. I beg your forgiveness for not including most of the genuine comfort you were searching for, but if you were to enjoy this nonetheless, I'd be thrilled.

On my way to Henry’s hospital room, sprinting through the haunting sterile hallways I ran into Camilla Macaulay, a girl -the only one- in his class, she was just here to bring him some flowers she’d tell me before her body began trembling trying to hold back sobs and I was left to watch her scurry away, I could not get a word in to ask her anything at all, if he was awake, if he was alright, why he did it, why they all waited days before telling me he had tried to end his life. The intensity of the drum beating in my chest could barely compare against the headache I brought upon myself, drowning in my own salty tears. 

I nearly went into cardiac arrest when I spotted him, the only thing reassuring me that he still had a pulse was the rhythmic movement of his chest, rising with each breath he took accompanied by the beeping of a heart monitor I can’t bring myself to glimpse at. “I can feel you staring.” He said, his croaky voice already tugging at my heartstring. I can’t look away even if I wanted to: it’s a sight I never thought I’d see, as abominable as it is I fear that if I avert my gaze then the puzzle pieces might never fall into place and I might never know the motive of his extreme action. 

Does he hate me? I can’t help but wonder if during what could have been his last breaths he thought of me, if maybe he wished I was there to stop him and remind him of how loved he is. The image of him searching for my body next to his as he collapses lifeless makes me shudder. I come to the conclusion that I failed in everything when it comes to Henry. Not being able to read between the lines, I barely scratched the surface of him while I thought I was in deep waters. 

He was content in life, I think. Yes, in one moment where exhaustion took ahold of him and he was more asleep than awake, in the comforting hiding place under my blankets he confessed to me that he had a lot on his mind. I never could have imagined it would lead to this: two gunshots to the temple, according to what Richard -another one of his classmates- told me over the phone, the second being triggered by the gun’s recoil.

I wasn’t there, I thought at that moment, Henry had taken a gun to his head and I wasn’t there. Henry had tried to kill himself and I wasn’t there. He could have been lying in a pool of his hot blood, flowing out on the ground and expanding like a stain on a white shirt, and I wasn’t there to hold him in his possible final moments. He could have died and I would have found out thanks to a desolate phone call from a stuttering man I didn’t know that well, or maybe even from a serious police officer just doing his job. Nonetheless, Henry’s finger had pressed the trigger in front of a handful of people and I wasn’t anywhere near him.

Cement bricks become chained to my ankles, getting heavier and heavier with each hesitant step I take towards him. I would have flown to him if I could have, crashed at the side of his bed, thrown my arms around his neck in ecstatic joy for his survival, kissed him a thousand times for each second I spent unaware of his whereabouts or his feelings.

“How do you feel?” I foolishly ask, being rewarded with his eyes cracking open and settling on my figure which I know will look indistinct and blurry to him given the absence of his glasses on the bridge of his nose, “Dead,” he answers me. To think the fierce storm he held in his irises was something that could very well have been a sight no one in the world could have appreciated in full. 

The mattress shifted and dipped under my weight when I sat at the edge of his bed, the chair at his side remaining empty. I wanted to feel him, touch him, try to be as close as possible and a sad little chair putting even the smallest of distances between us was the last thing I desired. Reaching towards the night table I found his glasses with ease, the only other things sitting on the surface were a pack of unopened Lucky Strike cigarettes, his wallet and the fragrant bouquet of flowers his friend had brought. I cleaned the lenses with a handkerchief and then tried my best to not look at the seemingly infinite bandages wrapping his head as I set the glasses on his face.

He blinks once, twice, thrice before he finally sees me as I am, without a hazy cloud over my face.

“Well, you’re not,” I inform him, swallowing the ‘what-if’ stuck in the middle of my throat, “By a miracle, I heard a nurse say. A miracle saved you Henry, do you hear how lucky that sounds?”

“I hear you.” He exhales, a sinkhole forms in me when I catch that small tone of disappointment hidden layer after layer under his voice, “Lucky indeed.” It’s dreadful how he keeps his gaze low, set in my direction but never quite reaching my eyes. It’s even more embarrassing to admit I do not understand him, I haven’t been able to do so since the very beginning.

That is to say, me not understanding him, does not mean I do not love him. He’d been the best lover a human being could ever ask for, there were no fights, no arguments, no disagreements, just pure unapologetic passion. Only once did we not see eye to eye and even then it was soon enough resolved over a glass of whiskey and a couple cigarettes: when he travelled to Rome with his friend Bunny without so much as a “I’ll be back soon,”  leaving me worried to no end as to where he might be.

“Talk to me, Henry. What happened?” I knew what happened of course, he’d shot himself in the head, but what I craved wasn’t a rundown of events, a bullet point list of the movements he made to get two bullets in his cranium. No. I desperately needed some way to understand what led him to attempting to do such a drastic thing. Were there signs I missed? Was I not loving enough? What hurt him so much? Was he truly that miserable in life, and if so, how had he hid it so well?

“Don’t cry,” he said, lifting the one arm that did not have the tube connecting him to the IV drip, his finger made contact with the corner of my eye and only then did I realise the salty diamonds rolling down my cheeks. I did not want to cry in front of him, not if it would add onto his miseries. As if I was kneeling in a confessional I have to come clean, I did not think I had any more tears left in me after having cried myself to sleep the night prior. Guilty of not appreciating the beauty of Selene as she brightened the darkened world, guilty of living only for the hospital doors to open and seeing him again.

“I have to ask, you know I have to.” Now that I was aware of the tears, nothing could have stopped the stinging feeling that seemed to spread from my eyes to every inch of my being, “Why did you do it?” There was no sugarcoating it, he’s never been one to beat around the bush and he often would not appreciate me going around in circles trying to find the nicest way to say or ask something. 

His jaw clenched and I watched hopelessly as Adam's apple bobbed in his throat. His lips parted but no sound that made proper sense came out. In my head I had already formed some hypotheses, none of them struck me as much as what he said. “I had to.” He apathetically said and I vaguely registered the sharp pain in my palm as my nails digging into my skin to stop my body from doubling-over and breaking into a gut wrenching sob.

“I-” Never has my mind been blank like this moment, it made so much sense and none at the same time,“I- Just- Why? Give me a reason- a concrete reason, Henry.” I all but begged him, sniffling like a whimpering child. That was exactly how I felt, like a child: small, lost and with no way to do something that could actually make a difference. 

Through my glossy vision I observed as he stiffened in pain while he shifted in his bed trying to sit up, the bedsheets moving along with his every movement made me nauseous. They weren’t supposed to be hospital ones, he wasn’t supposed to be here in the first place, this should have never happened. Alas, it has happened and he is not sitting in the armchair he claimed as his own in my apartment, reading a book and letting the cloud of smoke from his cigarette expand until my entire house looks like a misty field.

Ignored and useless was my attempt to stop him, to get him to lay down and not do anything straining, “Come here,” Instead he requested, hinting towards the spot he’d left on the bed, right next to him. Sheepishly I shuffled to his side, my back against the bed’s headboard, hoping and praying that no nurses would spot us and ask me to move away. His arm found its way around my shoulders, pulling me into a protective side hug and I shattered in small, countless, infinite pieces: a pathetic catharsis. Broken sobs, gasps and hiccups filled the room yet i could hear him over the sound of my desperation, “Don’t cry,” he’d say softly in my ear, “There’s no need to cry,” he’d insist kissing my temple, “Everything is going to be fine.” He’d promise me solemnly, with his enchanting way of making me feel like his words were gospel.

My heaving breaths did everything they could to send oxygen into my lungs, but air was not what I needed. Henry was my air, and the idea that I could have lost him for eternity plagued me, it made me look over my shoulder each moment expecting to see the grim reaper. The panic I felt gave me the strength to cling onto my lover as if he was my only lifeline, as if my love filled embrace could be the only thing able to bind him to the mortal realm. I know that could never be, sadly. Love, as much as it is a primordial force in the world, rivalling hate and rage, oftentimes can’t be the holy saviour we need.

“Why?” I found myself once again begging, I could not accept his previous answer, I pitifully needed something concrete, something I could fix. Before I could break into sobs again he leaned even closer, his lips moving against my hairline, his voice barely audible - like he was telling me a secret- only for me to hear, “I have been through some dark moments of my life, ones that I have never mentioned to you, not because I do not love you, the very opposite of it. I love you, my love for you is as incandescent as the sun, you know it, certainly. I did not want you to be concerned with those parts of me, hidden pieces that I rarely even let myself recognize as part of myself. Your pure hands should never be dirtied with the corruption that runs free inside of me. Cease your tears now, it is okay.” 

“So instead of letting me help you, you decided to just shoot yourself?!” It might have been harsh, but I felt at an impasse, raising my voice was my undignified way of getting ahold of control over life, “Are you listening to yourself? What about me? What would I have done without you? I’d do anything for you, isn’t it obvious?! I don’t care what you’re hiding, I don’t care how corrupt you think you are, I love you and I want to assist you through the darkest times of your life.”

He seemed to think about it, perhaps my words had made an impact on him or perhaps he was just tired of arguing with me. When he kissed me, slow and delicate, that was enough for me to postpone the debate I was already preparing in my head. I'd talk his ear off about letting me be a hand in easing his burdens when he would be well enough to be discharged and go home. “I want you to live forever,” Henry all but implored me and I just nodded. Whatever in the world could I say other than yes, but on one condition: he was to live alongside me.

[mysticmistral]

After 97 (98 counting the wolf from the beginning) deaths, I can say that I FINALLY BEAT MY FIRST (90 percent) BLIND BLOODBORNE RUN. DID IT. SPOILERS FOR ENDING.

And so, this is the last Bloodborne Run update and I know I skipped much. Last update, I defeated Rom. Killed Master Logarious after learning you can just visceral attack him to stop him from going into his second phase, Alligned myself with the Vilebloods, gave Alfred the Summons and was shocked yet not shocked to see him going crazy (I didn’t expect him to turn the Queen to mush) and then turns out he just… dies at the altar. I was so sad to see that, my only friendly person just dead, probably by offing himself.

Played a game of tag with Micolash and died once to the people on the stairs, and found a glitch that he just stands right by the cell door when I was fighting off the skeletons and hit it, so I did not kill him the intended way but I did not want to play tag anymore it was 4am. Gained access to Upper Cathedral Ward, lost a lot of Insight by the brain suckers and fought the blue alien people in the Lumenflower Gardens, defeated Mergo’s Wet Nurse and went to check on the lady in white who peaced out after the boss.

The Dream’s on fire, went to the handicapped old man Gehrman at the tree and refused his offer, of which cured his kneecaps and slaughtered me throughly right before I would reach his Second Phase. Since it was endgame, I decided to explore more. Found the Altar of Despair and with the help of NPC acting as a distraction and the fact I was over leveled by this point, killed the Daughter of Cosmos and accidentally revived Queen Annalise making Alfred surely turn beyond the ‘grave’, I’m sorry man. Found the Darkbeast Paarl who by this point, was easily bodied and made peace with Djura, the man with the machine gun until I realized it is endgame, and me probably has loot. So I killed him, then the guy in the Forbidden Woods, and the other guy who came cause I killed the other guy and got a whistle out of it and forgot to kill the Ward man.

DLC was on sale and I am not counting those deaths literally, the hunters in the first arena wrecked me and their weapons have unfair range, Ludwig wrecked me, got a glow stick out of it, the two guys in the hall wrecked me. Got to the Research Hall and gave a woman some brain fluid, died many times to the Living Failures until I realized that the doors are a safe spot from the meteors. Then I met Lady Maria, she can fist my chest any day but wow was she easy with the Augur and just sticking close. Gascoigne does not teach you parrying, she does. Got lost in the Fishing Hamlet and called on online hunter to help me kill the fish giants, Orphan of Kos and Laurence.

With the DLC tackled along with my sanity slain over how damn hard it was, Gehrman was less tough and just when I thought I won, a creature appears as the Moon Presence and smashes me to pulp since I had barely any items left. I defeated it, and became a Black Leech and the Plain Doll is now the mother figure of a new Great One.

The End!

Game is maginificent and now that I can finally search up everything I missed a lot but I did a lot too. 10 out of 10, great music, hate/love gameplay and fun weapons. A wonderful first soulsborne experience. Hunter Hat, Cainhurst Armor, Hunter trousers, Knight Gloves and armed with my Threaded Cane and Holy Moonlight Sword. Currently in NG+, just beat Gascoigne and loving how you can sweep, but not without challenge still. Do I understand the lore? Probably not. But I am to get the refuse ending this time, and with the help of searching finally, try and get anything I missed. 57 Hours well spent!

[darlingshane]

Expensive Delights: Part 4

Julian Kaye x F!Reader

— Read below or at AO3.

Summary: Julian didn’t know how heavily that was weighing inside him. He doesn’t give it much thought nowadays. Hearing you say that, only validates those restless nights in prison that had him wondering if it was his fault or not. He wondered if he should have gone into a different direction after being released, instead of falling into old habits. But he promised himself that it'd be under his own terms this time. 

Word Count: 22,3k (7 Chapters)

— Rating: 18+

Warnings!!!! Explicit, Smut, Male Escort, Voyeurism, Sex, Vaginal Sex, Oral Sex, Menstrual Sex, Public Sex, Public BJ’s, Mild Anal Play, Attempted Sexual Assault, Mention of Attempted Sexual Assault, Murder, Attempted Murder, Mention of Grooming, Mention of Underage Sex, Mention of Past Abortion, Kidnapping, Sex Club, Trauma, PTSD, Smoking, Guns, Non-Con Touching, Non-Con Drug use, Non-Con Kissing.

A/N: This part came out very dark, angsty, and with a lot of warnings. They're all listed above, make sure to go through those before jumping into it.  Julian and Reader go through a lot, so buckle your seatbelt and read with caution. Also, this might contain 2 potential spoilers. I've made up the plot of this part out of tidbits of information about the show, and I'm predicting that at least one of those will happen.

Links: Part 1 / Part 2 / Part 3 / Series Masterpost / AO3

Chapter 1: Exposé

 “How well do you know Julian?”

It's a question you've been fearing. It comes out of one of your best friend's mouth. The three of them– Eve, Sasha, and Yvonne sat you down when you went back to Portland to collect the rest of your belongings and sort some things out in your old apartment.

It was official. You were going to move permanently to Los Angeles, and you couldn't afford to keep a lease to a place you barely lived in anymore. So, after finishing your tour on the east side of the country, you went back to Portland.

Before you could attend to any of that, you found yourself in the middle of an intervention that your close-knit group of friends staged. They found out what Julian truly did for a living and ganged up on you, trying to convince you to really think things through before moving away for good.

They explained that someone recognized Julian in one of the photos Von had on the display wall in her studio. It was a former classmate, Claire from high school, who came into her shop. According to this woman that you’ve only talked to twice in your life, she had a friend who worked with Martina Duvall– young billionaire extraordinaire, big LA socialite, and heir to Duvall Cosmetics along with her three sisters. Claire boasted about being invited to Martina’s 25th week-long birthday party in a yacht and the set of boy toys the billionaire had hired for her and her friends’ entertainment. One of them was Julian– Martina's personal favorite.

Not only that, but they went further and searched for anything on him and discovered about his time in prison too from old news clips on the internet.

It’s not the fact that they found out about Jules that's bothering you. Had it been up to you, you would’ve told them the truth a long time ago, but it was never your truth to tell. It was his. And he chose to keep it a secret for this exact same reason.

The judgmental look on their faces, plus the earnest sympathy for you cause they think he had duped you somehow, and the time they put into investigating him, is what truly shocks you. You’ve always had very open-minded friends, but at this moment they’re showing just the opposite.

“He never lied to me,” you have to explain, “I knew who he was from the beginning and I know what I’m getting myself into.”

“Okay, so he’s an escort, that’s fine. We can look past that,” says Sasha, “but he’s also a murderer. Doesn’t that worry you?”

“No, cause he isn’t. He was set up.”

“That’s what he told you?” Von scoffs, “are you hearing yourself? He was set up. That’s gotta be one of the oldest excuses in the book, along with my dog ate my homework.”

“That’s the fucking truth,” you mutter, exasperated, with an eye roll.

“We’re just looking out for you, hon. You have a tendency of picking the wrong guys.” Eve words out in a condescending tone, “And right now, you’re about to do something drastic you might regret one day. We’re just asking you to really think it through before it becomes another Logan situation.”

“Fuck you, Evie!” you breathe fire through your mouth and nose at the audacity of her trying to compare this to what happened with your ex, “this is nothing like Logan’s.”

“You haven’t been the same since,” Sasha adds, “and you don’t seem like yourself right now… I mean, you even blew that meeting with that agent I set you with the other day. You’ve never done something like that.”

“Are you serious right now? That meeting was a joke,” you pause, “I didn’t blow it. That agent was a fucking sleaze bag. He got all over me in the first five minutes and wanted me to blow him off. How’s that? Do you think I shoulda stay, huh?” you pause again, and swallow, showing a firm hand, “that’s really unprofessional of you to bring that up in the middle of this, Sasha. This is not the place.”

She stares at you, perplexed, and suddenly her gaze falls to the ground, mumbling her apologies.

“If you guys were truly looking out for me, you would ask about how I feel. You’d listen to what I’m saying cause it’s really not sinking in… I love Jules, and he loves me. He’s nothing like Logan. He’s never lied to me or hurt me. And the only thing I’ll regret one day, is doubting myself and not moving out faster.”

This argument was just the cherry on top after the disastrous trip you’ve had. You were prepared to have some setbacks, but everything went from smooth sailing to dire straits the second you flew to New York and then came back. You didn’t have time to recover from nearly being sexually assaulted when you were forced to sit and listen to all this. You haven’t even told Julian yet cause didn't want to do it via phone.

With a heavy heart, you pack half the stuff you had left here and donate the other half.

You were supposed to stay for another week but as soon as the paperwork is done, and all your things are sorted, you just want to go back to your new home. So, you book the first fly available that you can find.

After handing out the keys and leaving the building for the last time to wait for your cab, Sasha shows up.

“Hey, can we talk?”

“I don’t have much time,” you stand on the stoop, clutching the handle of your suitcase in your fist.

“Look, I'll get straight to the point,” she draws some air and gestures with a hand, “I talked to the agency and told them what that creep Gillespie did to you. They just called me back, apologized, and said that they're still interested in meeting with you. They're sending someone new here if you want.”

“Why are they doing that?”

“What do you mean, why, babe? You're killing it right now. They're not dumb. Just tell me when you're ready, and I schedule it for you. It'll be someone legit this time. I'm making sure of that.”

“Thanks. I uh, I owe you an apology…” you look down for a beat, “you’ve been asking me for months to get off duty and I haven’t listened. It was really easy for me just to work with you, cause I’ve known you forever.”

“No need to apologize. I love working with you, but there are some barriers I can’t cut through like someone who’s an actual agent would… I’ve been winging it, really.”

“Don’t sell yourself short. You’re doing amazing. And whoever they send, they'll never be as good as you.”

“So, we're cool?”

“We're cool.”

“Wait…” she then notices your baggage next to you, “you’re leaving already? I thought you were staying a few more days.”

“I changed my mind.”

“Because of our conversation the other day?”

You nod, “there’s nothing to think through. I already did… for months. It’s not a decision that I made overnight, like Evie said. I love Julian and I know what I’m doing. You don’t have to like it, or him. You just gotta accept it. And if I changed somehow… it wasn’t because of him. He’s not manipulating me in any way… this all just me, finally doing what I always wanted to do.”

“That’s the other thing I came here to say. I’m sorry too… It wasn’t right the way we cornered you like that… or how I brought the meeting up without talking to you first in private, that was only our business. I’ve been thinking about what you said… and even though I can’t help worrying about you… I do trust you, and I accept that you’re doing what it’s best for you. I’ll always have your back a hundred percent.”

You bite the inside of your cheek, keeping tears away from rolling down your cheeks.

“I know you do, you always had… and I’m sorry about the way I reacted. I didn’t wanna keep that from you. I can only tell you that Jules has never fooled me and I’m fully aware of what I’m getting into.”

“So, you really love him?”

“I do,” you sigh, watching the cab pulling up at the end of the street.

“Do you wanna talk about what happened in the meeting?”

“No, not now. Cab’s here.”

“Well, call me then.”

“I will.”

She hesitantly extends an arm in your direction, and you release the handle of your suitcase to give your friend a tight hug before parting.

“Don’t be a stranger, hotshot,” she kisses your cheek and lets you go.

By the time you arrive at Los Angeles it’s already night and Julian picks you up from the airport.

Even though you made up with Sasha, you’re still emotionally drained from everything and barely have anything to say during the ride. He knows about your friends, but you still haven't built up the courage to tell him about what happened in New York, and it keeps gnawing at you.

Back home, you change into comfortable clothes, order some food and sit at the breakfast bar to have your meal.

“Are you mad that they found out about me or what they told you about what happened at the yacht?”

“Neither,” you say, playing with your fork, tidying your thoughts, “it's the way that they chose to share that with me… made me feel like a child who didn't know any better.”

“No matter how you look at it, there's no right way to tell someone something like that.”

“Are you taking their side?”

“No, baby. The only side I'm taking is yours … I'm just playing devil's advocate here. I'd like to have friends who cared about me like that. And if I were in their shoes, I'd worry too about seeing you dating someone like me.”

“You're sweet,” you extend your hand to the side and pet his hair, “I wish they could see this side of you.”

“Just give them time to adjust. They'll come around like Sasha did.”

He's right, sooner or later you'll sit down again with them and probably laugh about the whole thing, but right now it still hurts a little.

“Oh, I forgot to show you something,” he licks his thumb and rises from the bar stool to procure his phone.

On the screen, he shows you a picture of a dog, an adult Siberian Husky, with five newborn-pups curled close to her.

“They’re Bailey’s,” he explains, “you said once you wanted a dog, and she’s given them for adoption. Asked her if she could save one for you if you want.”

You stay silent, staring at the lovely picture.

“You don’t have to decide right now… they gotta stay at least another month or two with their mom.”

“No, I’ve always wanted to have one,” you glance at him, as he lays his phone down on the counter, “I’d love to, but… are you sure we’re ready to have a puppy right now?”

“It's not like we’re having a kid.”

“Still, it is a big step.”

“Bigger than you moving in with me?”

You shake your head, and exhale, “can I think about it?”

“Yeah, take your time, baby.”

After dinner, you fall half-asleep on the couch watching TV while he does the dishes.

“C'mere, sweetheart,” Julian carefully picks you up and transports you to bed.

Curling to your side, you tuck your arms to your chest, as he settles behind you, hugging your body.

He then kisses your ear, having his hand nicely massaging your bare thigh in circles, switching from using his fingers to knead and brush his knuckles afterwards. You try closing your eyes but instead of lulling you to sleep it evokes your mind and body to wake up.

“Hmm, Julian, baby, you're turning me on.”

“You say that like it's a bad thing,” he scoffs, and nips at your neck just to tease you further.

“It is. I got my period yesterday.”

“You know, I don’t give a fuck about that.”

“I know you don't,” you smile to yourself, sending a hand back to caress his head, “but last time we did, we made a mess out of the sheets. It looked like a crime scene.”

His laugh is printed on your skin before pulling his head back, “you want me to stop? We have all the time in the world, sweetheart.”

You glance over your shoulder to find his eyes, “no, I don't want you to stop.”

His head bows to capture your lips slowly while his hand slips between your legs. You're so sensitive, he doesn't have to press hard to have you bucking against his hand.

When you press your ass back against his crotch, you feel him swelling. You push harder, earning you a groan that vibrates into the kiss.

“Wanna take your cup out, honey?” he purrs, and pecks your lips twice more, sending a shiver down your spine.

How does he even make that sound sexy is unbeknownst to you.

You comply with his wishes and disappear into the bathroom to remove and clean your menstrual cup while he lays a couple of towels on the bed.

Admittedly, no matter how messy it gets, some of the best orgasms you've had were during your period. Especially with him. You've never had a boyfriend who was as ready to go with your flow as Julian is.

Sans clothes now, you climb into bed with him and return to your former position, lying on your side, with your back leaned on his chest.

“This is how you want it, sweetheart?” Jules peppers your neck with kisses, letting his palm mold the bared plane of your curves.

“Yeah,” it comes almost in a half gasp.

Your body temperature seems cooler than your center, and you drape a thin sheet over your body while he adjusts your top leg, so he can penetrate you better.

“Go slow, baby,” you request as he lines up and breaches your entrance smoothly.

“Like this?” His hips sensually wave, slipping in and out gently out of you.

“Yeah… that's perfect, Jules,” your lips part against the pillow, as your top hand clutches to his muscled thigh, following his movements.

His warm breath covers the curve between your neck and shoulder with sweet praises and I love yous, as his hand massages your tender breasts with great care.

Your thighs are quickly coated in a layer of your fluids the more he moves. When you're close, his fingers travel between your legs, blindly finding your clit. He easily tips you over the edge and has you moaning at his name with gentle circles, and the twitching of his cock.

It feels really intense, and somewhat oddly amazing when your walls clench around him.

He carefully slips out, letting the hot mixture of you and him gush down your leg. You feel it at the back of your thigh and reach with your hand to wipe yourself with the towel and roll the fabric around your waist. Mess avoided.

He wipes his fingers and cock and engulfs you in his arms once more.

“You're so beautiful like this,” he coos, kissing your jaw, reiterating, “so damn beautiful.”

You huff a breathless laugh and tilt your head to the side, so you can see and seize his plump lips.

Sighing pleased, you capture his mouth with love, exploring his kiss as you keep melting, and falling deeper for him, if that's even possible anymore.

Chapter 2: Deep Waters

A few days after you've fully settled, things start looking up again… for a millisecond. This hasn’t been your month so far, and no matter how happy you are when you’re with Julian, there are things happening outside the world you’ve made with him that could burst your little bubble of happiness.

Julian is reclined on one of the loungers by the pool in the patio, clad in flowered-trunks, an unbuttoned shirt, and aviators, reading the paper like an old man while you swim laps.

“Hey,” you stop after a few minutes and splash some water on him to claim his attention, “are you gonna come in, or you're just going to sit there looking pretty all morning?”

He snorts, peeking at you behind the newspaper, “you're the one who wanted to swim.”

“Yeah, it feels good. You should try it,” you brace your arms on the edge of the pool and rest for a minute, kicking your legs slowly in the mass of water.

“I prefer watching you.”

“Oh, I see, you don’t wanna mess up your beautiful hair,” you keep messing with him.

His lips turn into a smirk and after a second he sets the paper on the floor, removes his sunglasses, and shrugs off his shirt as he stands up; making you regret your words by the way he playfully looks at you.

You push yourself off the edge and swim backwards, as he elegantly steps into the water by sitting on the edge first, and submerging himself fully before swimming underwater towards your direction.

When he reaches you, he grabs your waist, and pulls himself up, emerging to the surface in front of you.

“What did you say, again?” He breathes out.

Huffing a laugh, you push his hair off his forehead and link your arms around his neck.

“I said that you’re too vain for swimming.”

“Am I now?”

“Uh-hmm. I’m pretty sure you’ve never used the pool until I got here.”

His lips frown downward quickly, amused, as you kiss the bridge of his nose.

“C'mere,” he secures his feet at the bottom, grabs your legs, and tucks them around his hips.

Having his hands holding your ass, he licks his lips and cocks his head to capture your mouth. His tongue delves past your teeth and twirls firmly with yours.

You hum into the kiss, clutching harder to his neck as his bulge bumps with your center.

“Jules,” you mumble, noticing him getting a hard-on behind the fabric.

“What is it, honey?”

“People are going to see us.”

“You're getting shy now? Didn't you give me a handy in a restaurant once?”

“Ugh, don’t say handy like that. And that was different,” you chuckle, “these are our neighbors.”

“You should've thought of that before getting me to swim with you, huh?” he pushes you further back until you're pressed between his body and the wall of the pool.

All of a sudden, the wind is knocked out of you when he fuses his lips with yours, clearly determined and enticed on having you begging for more. Underwater, he presses and rubs himself against you, earning a moan out of you.

His lips then move away to nibble at your neck as one of his hands finds a way to curl beneath your leg and tease at your entrance over the fabric of your swimwear.

“Jules, baby, let's go upstairs,” you gasp, “please.”

“Yeah?” he gives a final lick to your neck and quickly ushers you out of the pool.

You can barely restrain from tearing each other's swimsuits in the elevator. As soon as you're inside the apartment, clothes fly off and with no time to get to the bedroom, he bends you over the back of the couch. He massages your clit with the blunt, hard tip of his cock before sinking into your opening. He frames your hips and slams into you with unbridled passion until you're filled with him.

It's not even noon when you relax on the couch and go at it once more. Slowly this time. Facing him, you drape your leg over his hip and guide his length into you.

Sharing his warmth breath, you nip at his bottom lip, as you rock your hips back and forth, swallowing him whole.

His top arm curls beneath your hip, extending his fingers to drag your juices to your asshole. He smears them around the sweet nerves of your tight orifice with a nice massage.

“You're gonna make me come,” you heavily pant.

“That's the idea,” he grins, pressing a little harder, “how does it feel?”

“Good… so fucking good,” your lips curve up, utterly mesmerized and overtaken by the electricity of his fingers exploring new places of your body.

“Oh God, I love you,” you moan as your walls flutter by surprise around his cock.

“Not as much I love you, sweetheart,” he exhales, removing his fingers off you, having his cock twitching in the middle of your orgasm, coating your walls a second time.

You’re both absolutely spent after that, and after lunch you take a little nap.

That has been the best part of your day so far.

Things roll into a different direction in the afternoon after Eli, Julian’s friend and associate, shows up, bringing Jules’ convertible from the car wash and his dry-cleaning.

“Can’t believe he makes you pick up his clothes too,” you say amused.

“Hey, he pays well.”

“I bet he does.”

You go out for a walk and pick up some groceries while they talk business.

When you come back, Eli is gone and Julian is tensely braced to the kitchen bar, staring at your phone.

“What's wrong?” you ask, leaving the grocery bag on the counter, standing on the other side of the bar, parking your ass on one of the stools.

“Who's Adam Gillespie?”

You swallow, as your stomach suddenly drops, “where did you hear that name?”

He points at your phone, frowning at you, “you left it here… it was blowing up, so I took the call and this guy started yelling like an asshole about getting fired because of you. He said that you were going to regret ever opening your mouth, and threatened to ruin your life for being a… so, I'm asking who's Adam and what the hell is he talking about?”

“I uh, this is not how I wanted to tell you,” you sigh, glancing at your hand as you anxiously scrape the skin of your thumb. “I didn't know he was fired… on my last day in New York I had a meeting with him, and we barely got to talk when he got…he got his hands on me and tried to kiss me…”

“Did he hurt you?”

Your eyes sting, welling up quickly, unable to put a sentence together.

“No… not physically… he said that… you know, the usual… that if I get to my knees and… he'd make sure I'd have a great career… I just… I pushed him off and ran… I told Sasha, and she called his agency, and I guess they weren't happy about it.”

“Why didn't you tell me?”

“I was going to… I wasn't ready yet.”

“Why not? Don’t you trust me?”

“Why are you making this about you? I just told you that I wasn't ready. I was embarrassed, and wanted to forget about it, alright?”

“I thought we weren’t keeping secrets.”

“That’s ironic!” your anxiousness suddenly snaps into anger.

“What does that supposed to mean? I’ve told you everything.”

“You think I don’t know that you’re texting and calling your clients when you’re home? How I’ve been pretending not to notice when you sneak out to smoke?”

“That’s different. That is for work.”

“Well, that was a business meeting for me, so how is it any different? And I've never given you permission to pick up my phone. I don't care if it was on fire, I never told you that you could.”

You stand up and storm towards the bedroom before letting him see you cry. You're not sure which part makes you angrier and sadder. The fact that he didn't react like you expected him to, or that he invaded your privacy like that. He knows about your ex, so he's clearly aware that picking up your phone wasn't the best idea.

You slam the door shut and bury your face in the pillow, wanting to scream your lungs out of your chest.

Julian, on the other hand, feeling like an asshole, stays unmovable from his position; chocked up and annoyed at himself from not handling that better. He was betrayed by his own insecurities that feared you were keeping this from him on purpose before he could process what was done to you. He couldn't even bring himself to yell at that asshole when he picked up the phone.

He’s now stunned by the thought of someone trying to hurt you, and gives himself a timeout to find the right words to say before talking to you again.

A beep goes off from his phone reminding him that he has to leave in an hour, so ready or not, he arms himself with courage and love and cautiously enters the bedroom. He finds you crumpled on your side of the bed, clutching the pillow.

You’re done crying, but you still refuse to look at him when you hear the door closing.

“Sweetheart…” you feel the bed shifting as he sits on the edge.

“Don’t fucking touch me,” it comes out watery out of your throat.

“I won't. I was just going to say that I’m sorry… You’re right. I shouldn’t have picked up your phone or pry that out of you in that manner. I just… I heard him say all those things about you and I thought… I don’t know what I thought.”

“You thought that I’d lie to you?”

“No, it wasn’t that…” he pauses, “can you look at me, baby?”

You shake your head.

“Then, tell me what to do. I just want you to feel comfortable talking to me about anything.”

“I don’t know… It felt like you were judging me, Jules.”

“I wasn’t, baby. I swear. It’s not an excuse, but this, what you and I have, is very new to me… I've never lived with a partner before, and I have my insecurities too. But I didn't think for a second that you were making it up… you didn't deserve that… and if I could, I'd knock the lights out of that motherfucker right now.”

You sigh, processing his words.

“What are you insecure about?”

“That one day you'd realize that I'm not good enough for you, and see that there are better men suited for you out there. I still wake up every day wondering how I got you… you're everything I've ever wished for and more. And you’re absolutely right, I have my secrets too, and If I screw this up… I don't know what I'd do without you… did I screw up?”

“No, you didn't screw up. You just saved yourself,” you finally glance over your shoulder.

“Yeah?”

“Yeah,” you swallow the knot in your gullet and tentatively reach with your hand.

“Can I touch you now?”

You nod, and he picks your hand, lifting it up to his lips to kiss your knuckles.

“What secrets are you keeping from me?” You wonder, and sit up, crossing your legs.

“There’s…” his voice wavers, “there’s something that I never told you about how I started, how I became an escort.”

“You said Anne introduced you to that world.”

“She did.” He pauses and exhales, “I don’t want you to think less of me if I tell you this.”

“Jules, I'm not gonna, I promise.”

“Okay,” he clears his throat and after a moment of gathering his thoughts he confides in you that he was groomed by Anne when he was only 16. She was 30, and he didn’t know how inappropriate that was, or had any notion of what grooming meant at the time. Being with an older woman was something he and his friends had been fantasizing about since they hit puberty, and he never thought twice of saying no to her offer. He used to clean her pool and care for her garden and plants, and one day she asked him if he wanted to make some extra money. That little extra took him to her bedroom, where she took the top of her bikini and asked him to give her a massage. The first few times, it was just that. Then, it quickly escalated, and eventually she became the first woman he ever had sex with, and the first who ever paid him for it. He was caught in her net and fell for it, completely. She taught him everything he knew, dressed him, and lavished him. But it wasn’t until he was 18 that she’d introduce him into the world, where she set him up with his second client right before he went to college. She even paid for half of that too to keep him close, he believes. And no matter if he did enjoy the experience, there’s no doubt in him that, as a grown ass man, he’d never do something like that to someone that age. It’s unthinkable to him. He got a few moments of clarity in prison, that was one of them. It was really fucked up, and kept him up at night for months.

You listen to it all, perplexed, and absolutely appalled at her behavior as he finishes telling the story…

“Sex and money were the same to me, she taught me that, and at some point I couldn’t have one without the other. Not until Michelle, and then… you. You both showed me what real love feels like, and that broke that idea that was implanted in me at a very young age. I guess finding out about Adam triggered something…”

You inhale sharply, having a huge knot building up in your throat.

“Please say something,” he pleads under his breath.

“I love you,” you say, plain and honest, extending your hand to caress his neck, “I’d never think less of you for that, Jules. It wasn’t your fault to be abused, the same way it wasn’t mine either. Nobody should be subjected to something like that.”

“But I couldn’t say no like you did.”

“Babe, you were a kid. We’re told that grown-ups know better since birth, and it isn’t until we’re old that we realized that half of them are fucked up. I saw how tense you were at the restaurant in Santa Barbara when we saw her; and the way she talked to you and called you Julie… it makes me sick to know that she used you like that and have the nerve to think that you'd even entertain the idea of working for her again.”

Julian didn’t know how heavily that was weighing inside him. He doesn’t give it much thought nowadays. Hearing you say that, only validates those restless nights in prison that had him wondering if it was his fault or not. He wondered if he should have gone into a different direction after being released, instead of falling into old habits. But he promised himself that it'd be under his own terms this time. To be honest, he doesn't believe he's that good at doing anything else, and likes both, money and sex, too much to give that up. He's living up to his promise, however. His work doesn't come first as it used to. His life with you is the most important thing to him, and given the chance, he'd go broke before letting go of you.

“Do you have any more secrets?” You ask, “maybe not as big as that one… if you do, I want you to feel comfortable talking to me too, y'know?”

“That was it. The things I do for work, they're not really a secret, baby. But I gotta keep those for your sake and their privacy. You have to understand that.”

“I do understand. I wasn't asking about work.”

He makes an effort to dive deep into his thoughts and shakes his head, “I got nothing else, then. Now you know everything about me. Is there anything you wanna tell me about?”

“Well… I guess it's only fair to tell you that I did something too when I was young that I never told anyone, not even my friends or my family.”

“What was it?”

“It wasn't anything bad. It was something very heavy and personal.” You grant yourself a couple of beats before uttering those words for the first time since it happened. It's odd to hear them out of your mouth, like it didn't happen to you, “I got pregnant when I was in college and I couldn't… I had an abortion as soon as I could. It really messed me out for a while. Though, I was positive that I'd never have kids, there were a few weeks when I felt like I'd done something really, really wrong.”

“Do you regret it?”

“No, not all,” you quickly emphasize, “I've never wondered what if. I know it was the right choice.”

“Were you alone?”

“No, I had a boyfriend.”

“What did he say?”

“Oh, he was very supportive. I was really nervous to tell him, but he stepped up and said he'd have my back no matter what I chose. He was with me every step of the way, and took care of me when I felt like a mess… I mean, It was as much his fault as it was mine. We were caught up in that haze of being so smitten with the other at the beginning that we ran out of condoms a couple of times and we both just said– fuck it,” you flicker a nervous smile.

“He sounds like a keeper. What happened to him?”

“Caught him cheating on me a year after that. Think he got another girl pregnant too… someone told me right before graduation.”

“Not a keeper, then.”

“Nope.” You smack your lips comically as the beeping of his phone goes off, “do you really have to go?”

“Yeah, it's one of my regulars. Why?”

“I just wanna keep talking to you like this,” you sit on your knees, link your arms around his neck, and kiss the corner of his mouth.

“I want that, too, sweetheart,” he palms your back. “It'll be only a few hours. Want me to wake you when I come back?”

You slide your palm around his head, having your fingers caught massaging his earlobe sweetly, “Yeah, I'd like that.”

That conversation feels like the most taxing thing you've done in a while. But it's gratifying to be open like that with him. You don't like keeping secrets, but there are still parts of you that you hold to yourself because you're often afraid of being judged. And so does he. You could tell he was apprehensive of sharing that with you.

After composing yourself, you work on your computer while Julian gets ready for work.

He kisses you goodbye, and you spend another hour finishing an article for a magazine you occasionally write for.

When you’re done, you decide to go for another swim. It relaxes you. You’ve been doing it every other day before going to bed, and it works like a charm. Especially when it’s this hot.

Mrs. Rosenbaum from 4C had the same idea as you, and you chat some with her before she goes back up to have dinner with her husband.

It’s already dark, and after several laps you catch your breath at the end of the pool where you can stand, listening to the music blasting from a car parked on the other side of the wall.

You swim two more laps, and when your head emerges from the surface at the deeper end, it's suddenly pressed down back underwater by an unwavering hand, or two, you assume by the force that's put into it. It grips at your hair, which makes it impossible for you to swim away.

You can still hear the music muffled underneath as you gasp for air, try to yell, kick your feet in the water as hard as you can.

There’s a distorted shadow on the surface of the water when you manage to look up once. You fight it and fight it, growing weak by the second until the little breath you have left is replaced by water and everything goes black…

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

There’s a pressure on your diaphragm when your eyes open again, like a jolt, you start coughing up water violently. The burning that spreads through your lungs doesn’t ease up until you’ve expelled the tiniest drop that was clinging to your air passage. It leaves your chest hurting terribly bad.

Then, you notice someone talking to you, but you’re not sure who they are or what they are saying. They roll you to your side, soothing your back gently. You can only shiver and meltdown, unaware if this is a nightmare or if someone just tried to drown you for real.

You hear sirens, and suddenly you’re being moved again and checked out by the paramedics, you recognize, before they stretcher you into an ambulance.

After missing four calls from the lobby of the apartment building, Julian finally picks up the phone after stepping out of the shower. His heart almost shatters in his chest, hearing the night concierge giving him the news that one of the neighbors saw a man trying to drown you just minutes ago and that you were just taken to the hospital.

He doesn’t think twice. He quickly collects his car keys and hops into the convertible to drive back to Los Angeles. He’s an hour away and calls Eli to go check on you in the meantime.

With a steady lead foot on the pedal, he doesn’t stop until he’s at the hospital where they’ve taken you.

There are two officers that just took your statement who are heading out, and tell him what they know so far…

According to Robert, key witness and neighbor from apartment 2B– he saw a man holding you underwater from his window and ran down to your rescue. He alerted the concierge at the front desk, who called the police. By the time Robert got downstairs and out to the pool, the man had dragged your body out of the pool and was taking a picture of your almost lifeless body, stretched on the hard surface. The attacker was fully dressed in black, with gloves and balaclava masking his identity, and quickly climbed out the wall before they could get to him.

Your rescuers performed CPR on you, saving your life in a matter of minutes. They said you weren’t out for longer than two. Everything happened so fast, they couldn’t even tell.

It’s a relief to hear that at the end, but you’re still understandably shaken, and terrified.

Eli and his girlfriend haven’t left your side for the past hour, that has felt like a year. And when Julian comes into the room, you burst into tears.

He holds your hand, and you see his eyes become glossy under the fluorescent light.

“Hey, sweetheart,” he says gruffly, gently wiping the tears off your cheek with his free hand. You can’t bring your mouth to say anything, so you just lean on his touch, and hold tightly to his hand.

Your friends quietly step out, giving you two a moment.

You pull his hand, and he settles next to you in the bed, cuddling you.

“I shouldn’t have left you.”

“You didn’t know,” you finally say, chocked up, “it could have happened anyway.”

“Still, I should’ve been with you…”

“You’re here now.”

He kisses your temple, feeling useless on how to comfort you better. The truth is that just him being here, holding you, makes you feel already safe.

Chapter 3: Kafkaesque

There are a lot of sayings about hope… right now, you only feel dread and despair making themselves at home in your chest. There are no feathers, or birds singing for you, only a shadow that shoves all promises and dreams deep into that pool along with you.

You can still taste the chlorine in your mouth when you wake up in the hospital bed. They kept you for the night to observe how your lungs and vitals responded before discharging you in the morning.

You dress up in clothes that aren’t yours, cause the only thing you had on when they brought you in was your swimsuit. It’s such a minuscule thing to care about; and when they hand you that piece of clothing in a hospital bag, you ask Julian to throw it away. That is a reminder you don’t want to hold on to.

When you arrive at the apartment building, you take the elevator straight up to the 8th floor to avoid bumping into anyone altogether. You don’t have much luck, though. When the doors open, there’s a determined woman poking around the hallway, waiting for you. A woman that seems to know Julian already.

“Mr. Kaye.”

“Detective Sunday.”

She then takes a good look at you, and her stoic expression grows more puzzled the longer she stares at you.

After a moment, she apologizes and introduces herself to you, badge and everything, telling you that she's been assigned to your case, and she'd like to talk to you.

“Now is not a good time,” Julian responds for you, keeping you close with one arm around you, as you make your way to the door.

“We can do this here or at the station. Whatever you prefer, ma’am.”

“It's okay, I'll do it,” you nod at Julian.

You'd rather not do this at all, but you wanna see that the person who did this to you is brought to justice.

Your boyfriend opens the door and gives the open space a glance-over before letting you in. He shows the detective to the dining table, where you can settle and talk. He brings you a soda and gets the coffee machine going, listening to you recount what you remember from last night.

Detective Sunday then explains that your file landed on her desk because she's been investigating a series of murders where women are being drowned. Her theory was very far-fetched when she drove here, but after meeting you, she's absolutely certain your attacker is the same who killed those women.

What surprised her a minute ago is the uncanny resemblance you share with the other victims.

Your throat tightly knots as she lays down on the table the pictures, showing the four women in just regular snapshots of their life before they were murdered.

“Do you recognize any of them?”

You shake your head, unable to pull your eyes away from the photos. You can see parts of yourself in these women. They all have a similar complexion to yours, same eye and hair color, features close enough in proportion; and all are roughly the same age.

“What does it mean?”

“We don’t know yet?”

“But you have a theory?”

“My best guess is that someone is infatuated with you.”

What leads the detective to that conclusion is that he not only let you live, but the attacker slightly changed his MO. The other women were drugged prior to being murdered. It’s almost ritualistic, she explains. They were first injected with the drug, then they were drowned and placed somewhere nearby outside the water in a very specific position.

According to your blood work from mere hours ago, you weren’t administered a sedative like they had. He wanted you to feel it for whatever twisted reason he made up in his mind.

There’s also the other factor that got her here–  your tattoo. The officer who took your statement at the hospital saw it printed on your skin and made a note about it on his report.

“Can you show me your arm?”

You lift your arm to let her see the dragonfly inked near your wrist, on the outer side of your forearm.

She proceeds to take a picture of it and question you when you got it and if it has any special meaning to you.

“I got it when I was 18. It was something my friend sketched that I liked,” you shrug and take a sip of your soda, “what does it have to do with all this?”

“Well, we've kept it under wraps, but the four women had the same tattoo temporarily placed on their arms.” She opens the folder placed between her elbows, “I'm going to show you another picture, and you tell me if it's the same or not.”

You nod, and she slides a photo across the table that shows a close up of an arm where you can clearly see the tattoo is basically a copy of yours.

Julian joins you at the table, placing a mug with coffee for the detective, and sits down on the chair next to yours.

“Why me?” You swallow and shift uncomfortably on your seat, glancing at their photos, “why them?”

“I'm not sure yet,” Sunday pauses to taste her coffee. “How long have you two been together?”

You look at the other and respond to a series of questions about your relationship.

“Do you have any enemies? A disgruntled ex-boyfriend, maybe?” she asks next, and you look at Julian.

“Tell her,” he utters, placing a gentle palm on your lower back.

Sighing, you proceed to tell her about your ex, Logan Palmer, and that psycho that called yesterday to say he was going to ruin your life. You doubt Adam Gillespie has anything to do with this, but the detective takes note of everything.

“When did you last see your ex?”

“Three years ago.”

“And you didn’t extend that initial restraining order?”

“No. Last I heard, he went back to Canada, and I didn’t think he’d be a problem anymore.”

“I’ll look into it. What about you, Mr. Kaye, did you make any enemies in prison?”

His lips frown downwards, “No. I kept my head down.”

The detective stays silent for a long moment, going through her papers.

“Why did he take a picture of me?” your voice trembles when you ask that out loud.

Julian’s hand soothes up and down your back.

“We don’t know yet. All women were found in a very specific position, like he was staging a photo, or a painting… and for your neighbor's statement, you were placed just like that.”

“Were they raped?” you question right after that.

Sunday shakes her head, “nothing indicated in the examination that they were forced into having sex.”

“But they could have.”

“For what the records show, they didn't suffer. They were treated gently; worshiped almost,” she says in the same stern, monotone voice.

“Is that supposed to make me feel better?” your voice breaks, “a psychopath held me underwater until I couldn’t breathe. That didn’t feel gentle… It was more violent than you can imagine.”

“No, you're right. I can't imagine. I'm sorry, ma'am,” you see the calculating woman hesitate for the first time.

You look to the side, swallowing a sob, wiping the tears sliding down your face.

“What now, Detective?” Asks Julian.

“She's our only lead right now. I'm going to put a detail on her until we get more information.”

“What about the security cameras?”

“My officers are on it right now, but this guy is highly skilled. He's managed to trespass any security system he's encountered, and there's no trace of him anywhere.”

“Have you checked into that? Maybe he's some sort of… hacker.”

“We're looking into every angle, Kaye,” she tucks everything back into her folder, “if you don't have any more questions or information, we're done for now.”

“Software engineering,” you mumble, without looking at her, “Logan. That's what he does. I'm not sure if that…”

“Got it,” the detective notes that, before reminding you lastly, “It goes without saying that what you just heard is all confidential.”

She leaves a card on the table with her contact information, and Julian shows her to the door.

You walk up to the balcony to see the patio far down below, where maintenance is cleaning the pool like nothing ever happened.

After the door is closed, Julian calls your name softly, and you turn your head to the side.

“You have to call Sasha,” he tells you.

“I uh… I’ll do it later.”

“Babe… you can’t put it off. It’s better if they hear it from you and not the press.”

“Why would the press say anything?

“This is LA, sweetheart. Everyone wants their pound of flesh. As soon as they find out, they’ll be lining up outside… I know it’s one hell of a thing to tell anybody, but your friends need to know.”

You gulp the knot in your throat and pick up your phone with much apprehension and call your friend Sasha.

Julian was right. Hours after you got home, news broke, and reporters started showing up at the doors of the building.

A week later, there are still a few showing up daily waiting for you to come out.

Given that you were the only one who survived out of the five, there’s been a lot of speculation in the news about you. You've kept the TV off, but according to Sasha, they’ve dissected any piece of your life they could find on the internet. Your online print has slowly grown in the past few months, so there’s a lot to dig into. Luckily, most of it is about your work, there are only a few real tidbits of yourself out in the open. Still, you have no interest in whatever the so-called experts in those crime shows have to say about you. And you cross your fingers, hoping this doesn’t splash or reflect badly on your friends or Julian. You’d hate to be the cause this interferes with their lives.

The phone hasn’t stopped ringing, either, to the point you had to shut it off for hours at a time.

It’s not something you're proud of at this moment, but after your identity was revealed, the book sales went off the charts, and suddenly everyone wants a piece of it. Because pain sells, you've been approached by more than one publisher that has offered insane amounts of money for a deal. It'd be great if any of them hadn't come with the pesky condition that in exchange you'd have to write an all-tell book about what happened to you. It might be naive and crazy to pass up an opportunity like that, but as tempting as it is, you don’t wanna cash in your trauma. It’s hard just to live with it as it is, and you’d never be comfortable selling that part of you.

On the other end, you got yourself caught researching the other victims, trying to find a link with them other than the obvious resemblance. Just a click away from your fingertips, you can easily find each of their names, their hobbies, where they lived, what they did for a living… It only serves to unsettle you even further.

You blame yourself for their deaths. Especially after that specific piece of information you got from Sunday. They were marked with the same dragonfly you have on your arm, as if someone was trying to make a copy out of you. For what purpose? You’re not sure. Maybe they’re just infatuated with you, like the detective said. Or perhaps they have a festering grudge towards you, and they’re trying to scare you.

Your mind unravels with all the information you get your hands into. If you had trouble sleeping, this just serves to fuel your restless state.

How does someone bounce from something like that unscathed?  You’ll probably need some help along the way. This has brought all the weakness to the surface you’ve worked so hard to push through, and they all paralyze you at once. It’s actually ridiculous, you can’t even take a bath without thinking of someone pushing your head underwater. You can’t sleep for more than an hour or two before reliving that in your dreams.

Detective Sunday calls a couple of times to give some information after digging into your former boyfriend; and Adam Gillespie. The latter has airtight alibis for each of the murders, and the night you were attacked. Logan, however, seems to be missing. He was in Ontario for a couple of years, but his current girlfriend, and mother to his one-year-old baby, reported his disappearance five months ago. It's really concerning given that's about the time when they found the first victim.

You haven’t left the apartment in 10 long days, though you had gone up to the rooftop, mostly at night with Julian, just to get some air and see the stars. He hasn’t left your side, either, other than to go pick up grocery deliveries and care packages your friends have sent. If something good has come up from this is that you’ve settled your disagreements with Von and Eve, and that’s been a huge help to get through this while the investigation is ongoing.

Julian has been incredibly patient and has put all his energy on making you feel comfortable that you feel that he’s put his life on hold for you, unconditionally. So, on the 11th day of your seclusion, you make an effort to get out of bed before he wakes up and prepare breakfast for him.

He's half awake when you carry the tray to the bedroom. His body stirs up at the smell, and turns to the side, and his mouth lovingly quirks up at the corners.

“Good morning, baby,” you whisper.

“Morning, honey,” he sits up against the headboard, and you place the tray on the mattress, so it’s hovering over his lap, “is this for me?”

Nodding, you lean closer and smooch his lips.

“Hmm, love some sugar in the morning,” she says gruffly, tracing your jaw with his fingers as you pull your head back. “Are we celebrating anything special?”

“You.”

“Me?”

“Hm-huh,” you kneel by his side, let out a sight before rambling, “I just wanted to say thank you for taking care of me. You’ve gone up and beyond to make me feel safe, and I’ve been nothing but useless…”

“Babe-”

“No, let me finish, please… I’ve always been very independent, and now I feel like I can’t function if you’re not here, and it’s not fair to you or me… I know I’m going to be fine eventually. I just wish I could leap to the end. I hate feeling this scared all the time…”

“C’mere, sweetheart,” he opens an inviting arm, and you curl against his side as he presses his lips to your temple, “you don’t have to thank me. I’d do anything for you.”

“I wish we could just go somewhere and forget about this.” You contemplate, pillowing your head on his shoulder, having your fingers playing with his gold necklace.

“Yeah? Where do you wanna go, baby?”

“I don’t know… somewhere we can drink cocktails by the beach.”

“Hmm, I know exactly the place,” he picks up a piece of toast from the tray and starts devouring his breakfast with his free hand, “I’ll take you there for our anniversary.”

You smile to yourself and relax in his embrace while he finishes his food. You end up falling asleep. He rolls you carefully to the side and leaves you resting for a while.

A few minutes after starting his workout, he receives a message from Eli, who's telling him to turn on the news.

When he does, he’s absolutely dumbstruck by listening to the reported death of another woman in the same fashion as the other four. This one in particular, he knows personally. It’s his highest profile client to date– Martina Duvall. He was present during the extravagant celebration of her 25th birthday that lasted a week, and three other separate occasions she’d hired him.

Julian sits on the couch and watches Detective Sunday make a statement, announcing that she was found in her yacht, and confirming that it is the same MO.

One thing that puzzles him is that Martina doesn’t look anything like you. One would believe that it might be a copycat taking advantage of the open case to pin this on The Baptist– the name the media has chosen for the perpetrator. But Sunday herself wouldn't have made that official statement if she had any doubts. He trusts the detective surprisingly. Even if she was who arrested him in the first place 16 years ago.

His level of trust only reaches so far, and after turning off the TV, he texts Eli to come by. He needs to place a special order for something, a gun, and doesn't wanna ask over the phone.

He's not sure how deep this goes, but one thing he's certain is that he's going to do everything in his hand to protect you. If the killer has the intention of coming back here to finish the job, he's not going to get caught empty-handed.

It might not be the best idea, but he can't come up with anything better at this moment.

Julian looks out the balcony to see that the three reporters that were out in the street yesterday have multiplied again into 30 after Martina.

Then, he catches Detective Sunday making her way into the building, ignoring the questioning of the vicious attack of the press surrounding her.

Julian checks that you're still asleep and closes the bedroom door before having Sunday back in the living space.

She's not here for you this time, though. Her objective is questioning Julian after learning about his odd affiliation with Martina Duvall. She had him listed as her driver.

The detective confirms that Martina had the same drug in her system as the others, and the key temporary dragonfly tattoo placed on her arm. Those two clues haven't been made public, so certainly she can tell it is the same killer and not a copycat.

Sunday's theory veers into a different direction, however. She's not completely convinced someone is infatuated with you anymore. But without discarding that possibility, she plays with the idea of someone targeting you because of Julian.

There are a few other coincidences she’s discovered that have her believing someone wants to hurt Julian by going after you. The main reason being that a couple of hours ago, she found out that Martina was about to get married to someone twice her age. Nobody knew about it, except for her family and closest friends.

The man she was engaged to is about to make an appearance on TV, offering a 20k reward to whoever points them in the right direction of the killer.

His name is Richard Stratton, tech mogul and philanthropist, who was once married to Julian's old sweetheart, Michelle Stratton.

Julian told you about her a long time ago. They had an affair before he went to prison.

She visited him a handful of times at the beginning but after a few weeks, she moved to England, where his husband was expanding his business. From then on she'd sent letters that stopped after a while too. Much to his surprise, he received one 5 years ago when he was still in prison, where she explained that she had a kid and apologized for not staying in touch. He tried to reach back, but his letters were always returned. He figured she gave him a fake address, so her husband wouldn’t find out.

Like every flame, that one faded eventually. And Julian understood why she had to move on. They were nothing at all to begin with. He wasn't expecting her to wait for him those 15 years he spent locked up. It'd have been crazy if she had.

Not as crazy as discovering she died six months ago right here in Los Angeles in her house on The Hills. He saw her picture on the papers. Being married to Stratton took her to the front pages, but according to those, they were already divorced by the time of her death. Someone suspected foul play, and Stratton was investigated, but his alibi cleared him from suspicion.

They never said how she died, and Julian would’ve never imagined that today he’d find out she was found in her pool. She had hit her head on the edge and drowned for lack of assistance.

It was ultimately ruled an accident, but Sunday is not discarding any possibility right now.

If her new angle is correct, you might be in danger because of him, and he can’t have that.

Chapter 4: Between Two Lungs

You feel trapped in these four walls. They're like a cage. You could go outside if you wanted to. Nobody is stopping you; only yourself. You’re still too scared to do something as simple as taking a stroll or go swimming like you used to. You doubt you ever will again, at least not on your own. That’s how deep fear has reached you.

You’re holding your breath for this to be over, and you pray internally that it happens soon, so you can move on, start again, and do normal things you used to do instead of being obsessed 24/7 with the case. Every new piece of information just makes the puzzle more complicated. And after finding out about Martina and Stratton, you’re not sure what to believe anymore.

This evening, you shift gears and decide to have a little dinner date. An official one with candles, music, and wine.

You put on a simple wrap dress in your favorite color, and it helps to bring your old self back a little. It’s such a shallow thing to worry about, but you feel like you’ve been slowly disappearing into all those hours when you couldn’t get out of bed.

Julian reaches out from behind and loops the necklace he gave you for your birthday around your neck and clasps it at the back. It has a little half moon pendant that you touch for a moment, as his lips meet the curve of your neck.

“You look beautiful, sweetheart,” he hums, and kisses the other side of your neck.

“Thanks, handsome,” you turn around to see him clad in jeans, and a black t-shirt that hugs his chest and biceps tightly. You smooth your hand on his arm, as you lean to capture his lips.

You have a lovely evening and enjoy a homemade meal you cooked earlier together for a change. You've been relying mostly on takeout for days now, and it feels nice to eat something you've prepared and has turned out to be good.

After dinner, with your hands clinging to his neck, you swing slowly to the music in the middle of the living room without shoes. His palms frame your hips, as his forehead touches yours.

His heart feels heavier than ever at this hour. You can feel it in the way he exhales and suddenly stops moving.

“I have to tell you something,” his voice comes lower than a whisper.

“What?” you scratch his nape softly.

“I uh… I bought a gun. Eli brought it this morning while you were sleeping.”

Letting the silence fill the room for a long moment, you close your eyes and process it.

“Why?” you simply protest, even though you know the answer to that.

“You know why.”

“Jules… I don't want you to get into trouble.”

“I won't. It's just a precaution.”

You inhale sharply, sliding your palms across his chest.

“Say something, sweetheart.”

“I just… I think you should give it back. I don't feel comfortable with it in the house.” While you can appreciate him wanting to protect you, you're not sure that this is the best way.

“It's locked in the safe. If everything goes right, it'll stay there.”

Taking a step back, and pulling away from his touch, you turn around and start clearing the table.

“What did I say?”

“Nothing. You're just not listening to me,” you go around the breakfast bar and put the plates in the sink.

“I’m listening… You want me to get rid of it and I can’t. It’s my job to protect you, and I’m simply not going to be caught off guard if anyone decides to come back and finish the job.” He braces his hands on the edge of the bar, watching you violently scrub the plates.

“That is not your job, Julian,” you counter, annoyed, “that’s what the police outside are for.”

“It’s just a gun. What is it really that you’re worried about?”

“It’s not just a gun. I’m worried…” you pause, take a deep breath, and turn off the faucet, “I’m worried that you’re going to get yourself hurt for me. All eyes are on us now… I hate it, but as long as they’re watching, nobody is going to try anything again… now tell me why you need to have it so badly.”

“I don’t need it. It’s just an extra measure,” he expresses, giving you only half the truth behind that choice of purchasing a weapon.

“Alright, don’t tell me,” you quickly dry your hands in a kitchen towel, and walk past him, heading towards the bedroom.

He swallows his pride and after a moment he trails behind you.

“Look, what do you want me to say? That I’m scared?”

“I want you to tell me the truth, Julian,” you respond quickly, having your voice wavering in your throat, “I know you’re as terrified as I am, but you’re playing with fire. The last thing we need right now is you getting caught with a gun.”

“Look, you’re right. I am terrified, but not for the reasons you think…” his head bows, taking a step forwards, so he can have you closer. He holds your face in his hands, meeting your gaze, as he utters, “I’m terrified cause I know this is my fault-”

“It isn’t,” you interrupt.

“Maybe it is, maybe it isn’t, sweetheart. But I’m not going to let anything happen to you, you got that?” he exhales, stating with passion, “nobody is going to put a hand on you again. So help me God… I don’t give a shit if I end up rotting in prison, as long as you’re safe. That's all that matters. Can you accept that? ”

“No, I can’t accept that,” your eyes well up, “I won’t have you doing anything stupid for me.”

“Well… what are you gonna do about that? How are you going to stop me?”

A tidal surge of mixed emotions makes your heart race between love and fright. It pushes you to lean and capture his lips to shut his mouth.

You anchor your hands to his sides as he lends you his breath and warmth. You feel it pass from his lungs to yours as the kiss grows more heated.

The pain ebbs at the edge of his kiss, and everything else fades as his tongue moves past your teeth.

“Hmm, touch me,” you urge, grabbing his hands and guiding them from your face to your hips.

He presses you against the wall, as his lips shift from sweet to vicious. He sucks your lip into his mouth, at the same time his hands blindly undo the strings holding your dress together and slip beneath the fabric to meet your skin. He smooths the plane of your body and grips at your ass, pushing his hips against yours.

As you circle your arms around his neck and find his tongue again, he molds your skin with desire, awakening your sex drive from slumber.

He hums and pulls away from your kiss, bringing his hands to remove your dress off you. Pushing it over your shoulders, it falls at your feet along with his gaze that scans your body, stripped to only your pair of panties now.

You shiver as his knuckles softly draw the curve of your breast, “so damn beautiful.”

He licks his lips, as one of his hands slide up to frame your chin, pressing your head carefully against the wall. His deep brown stare captures the gloss in your eyes, watching you gasp as his other hand slides under the elastic of your panties to massage your pussy.

“There’s my girl,” he purrs, collecting your arousal around his fingers.

You half-smile and trap your bottom lip under your teeth, holding for dear life to his neck, while he circles your clit with great skill.

His head bows to nip at your neck and capture your moans right from your throat when he presses a little harder.

His lips slide, descending from that point and down your body, stopping to kiss and lick your nipples before letting his tongue leave a wet trail to your navel. You can tell what his intentions are as he subtly gets down on one knee and pulls your underwear down.

Your breath catches as he glances at you with nothing but hunger for a beat before delving between your legs. He lifts one of your thighs over his shoulder, and blows some air on your slicked folds before tasting you.

You can't help but moan and grip at his hair as the wild swirl of his tongue touches every inch of your vulva before sucking your clit. It sends a shiver down your spine, and makes your back arch, pushing your center against his avid mouth.

His hands keep your jerking hips in place as he quickly drives you to ecstasy. The orgasm overcomes your body by surprise, and if he wasn't holding you, you'd totally fall on your face.

Julian gets to his feet without letting go of you. You link your arms around his neck, and he picks you up, bridal style, and carries you to bed.

As he lays your body down, you pull at the hem of his tee, and he takes it off. You extend your hands and undo his jeans before having Jules crawling on top of you. He pulls his bottom layers down, nestles between your legs, and you hug his torso as he tenderly brushes his plump lips over yours.

You're still very sensitive, but you tuck your hand in the small space between your body and his, grab his semi-hard length, and pump him leisurely until he’s fully grown. A pleasured hum falls from his lips as you guide him into your opening.

He catches you trembling as he slowly pushes into you.

“You okay, sweetheart?”

“Hmm, yeah,” you assure, palming the length of his back.

He pecks your lips, as you curl your legs around his hips. Then buries his face in the crook of your neck, fucking you ever so delicately, making you melt around him the longer he drags it out.

As much as you love having him inside you like this, in the middle of it you lose your focus and the pressing need for orgasm wanes out of the blue before even getting to that sweet edge.

He grunts and breathes against your skin, urging you to come with him, but you can't. You're too far away to bring yourself to orgasm again. Must be a first. It makes you anxious, cause he puts all his effort into it, and you can't even reciprocate when he spills inside you.

His breath steams the skin on your collar bones, and he stays there for a moment until he can speak again.

Clearing his throat, he props himself on one elbow, slips out of you, and reaches with his opposite hand to finish you off. He starts rubbing your folds, but you don’t let him finish.

“It’s okay,” you mumble, grabbing his hand and setting it aside

“You don’t want me to?” his brow creases. “Did I do something wrong?”

“No, Jules. I… can you just hold me?” you let out a tired sigh.

He nods, and you shift together, turning to the side, so he can spoon you.

“It felt really good at the beginning,” you reassure after a moment, smoothing your hand on his forearm.

“Yeah?”

“Hmm.”

“Are you sure you don’t want me to try again?” He insists, having his hand slipping down your body to grip at your thigh.

“No, it’s not gonna work.”

“Not gonna work? You’re hurting my ego, babe,” he quips, pressing his smile on your shoulder.

“You can tell your ego to go fuck himself,” you laugh softly, blindly finding his hand and lacing fingers with him.

“Listen, I think it’s time you and I get out of the house. Maybe just for a drive. What do you say? It’ll be good to clear our heads. Think about it.”

After long deliberation you decide that yes, it is time to leave the house, even if it's just for a little drive.

The next day, you step out of the apartment, filled with apprehension, for the first time in 15 days. It’s too hot during the day, so you wait for a milder temperature in the late afternoon, which is near to impossible. One of the things you miss about Portland, besides your friends, is the weather, and the smell of rain. Here, even the grass blades could burn your feet, especially in a summer blaze like this.

No matter what, he was right–  it's nice to be out and breathe the ocean breeze as he drives along the coastline.

Just like the movies, he has the hardtop of the convertible down, so you can feel the sun on your face, and the air blowing your hair. You relax on the passenger seat, having your heart calm the longer you’re out. It'll be nicer if you didn't have the undercover police car following you everywhere, but it's a small price for security.

Safety is an illusion, you realize. Here or at home, anything can happen anywhere, at any time. Being locked up has only given you more anxiety than you ever thought. At least out here, you’re not a sitting duck waiting for something to happen.

Your mind clears as you stop by the beach and watch the sunset peacefully going down before driving back home.

It’s the apartment that flips that internal switch in your head the second you’re inside and takes you to spiraling again. You anxiously sit at your desk and turn on your laptop to check your emails while Julian gets a beer from the fridge. Your phone is pretty much dead to you at this point. You rely only on the written word from your friends and the news. There’s a couple in your inbox from Sasha, the subject line screaming urgency in all caps. You open the first one, where she explains she’s been checking your Instagram and found a few photos you were tagged on at one of your first book signings in Los Angeles from a couple of months ago. There’s a few of you meeting people, reading, and signing some books. And she’s highlighted the ones where you can see the crowd at the back, and in a couple of them, she’s spotted a familiar face– your ex-boyfriend, who is currently MIA. On the second email, she dived further to all the signings you’ve done, and found some more from several cities where Logan followed along.

You’re unsure what her findings are making you feel… obviously, unsettled. Has he been stalking you all this time? You wonder. And if so, why did he wait all this time to try… whatever he had in mind? He was clearly in Boston and New York, where you went all alone. He could’ve easily taken the advantage of that, and he didn’t.

You show them to Julian and send them to Detective Sunday before calling Sasha.

Then you go through every memory you’ve collected of him. He was clearly disturbed, especially at the end of your relationship, but you’d have never pegged him as a killer. He couldn’t have, could he? Despite the way he treated you, you can’t bring yourself to believe this was him. But you’re not in the best mind set right now to form any rational assumptions. You haven’t seen in a long time either, so who knows what his game is.

It’s not the pictures Sasha finds that help crack the case, not at all. It only adds up to the pile of evidence Detective Sunday has come upon against Logan. Because the next day, while you’re taking a shower, Julian realizes that they’ve pulled the police detail off you without notice, almost 24 hours after you contacted Sunday. He runs downstairs and circles the block to see that none of the inconspicuous vehicles he's spotted for the last couple of weeks are anywhere in the vicinity.

“What’s wrong?”

You’ve just dressed yourself and come when you see him locking the bolt of the door and quickly grabbing the phone.

“The police are gone. I’m gonna…” he dials directly Sunday’s extension but doesn’t pick up on the first few tries.

You turn the TV on and flip from channel to channel until you land on the news to see they’ve apprehended their prime suspect, Todd Harrison, aka Logan, who has been using a false identity all this time. Someone saw him lurking around Martina’s yacht, and called in a tip. That’s all the media knows so far.

You don’t receive more insight until later, when Sunday finally calls and informs you that they're absolutely certain your ex was the one who tried to drown you and killed those women. They're still processing the amount of evidence collected from his place that included hundreds of videos and photos of all of you, the transfer tattoos, personal items of each of the victims…

The detective paints a pretty grim picture by the way she speaks. It looks like you were his main inspiration and was currently preparing himself for something bigger. He had your laptop hacked and wasn't shy on recording you using your own camera when you had the lid open.

None of this makes sense to you yet. It's hard to accept someone you dated was capable of something so heinous.

Chapter 5: Enmeshment

In the aftermath of Logan’s arrest, there’s no peace as you once knew it. You can’t find it in yourself yet. Him being in jail is supposed to make you feel better, but it doesn’t. Something is still off, and you can’t quite figure out what’s causing you to stumble into your every attempt of regaining some sense of normalcy because there isn't such a thing as normal, and that’s a fact. You’re still being watched and scrutinized, and the end of this is not coming as fast as you’d want to. The case continues unfolding, and the only coping mechanism to navigate all of that, is to put on a mask and pretend everything’s okay while you bury yourself in your work. Otherwise, you’d fall apart. It’s a lame coping mechanism, but it’s the only thing that keeps you afloat. It only lasts for so long. Soon, the mask starts to crack, and you find yourself acting up in ways you can’t even recognize.

You fill your wine glass a few more times than you’re used to for dinner. It helps you fall asleep faster, especially when Julian isn’t home. He goes back to his usual routine too, though he’s only working on weekends now. It makes you feel helpless having to have someone watching over you as if you were a fucking toddler. You pick up fights with him about nothing sometimes. It feels like the world to you in that very second, no matter how small it is. A minute later, you feel like the biggest asshole. It's very conflicting. At times, you can't leave his side, at others, you can't even touch him or look at him. You engage more often in sex, too, you've realized. On impulse. It has to be quick and rough. It's not like your libido has gotten stronger, it's that you'd kill to feel anything other than whatever is going on inside you.  

Any of this isn't right, you're barely aware of how wrongly you're losing control in very few moments of clarity. They pass just as fast as they come. You can't stop yourself. You've taken pride in always being put together, doing everything by the book, and following every rule that you were bound to break at some point. This is it. You're not processing everything that's been accumulating inside you and can't put it into words either. Not out of your mouth and not in your writing. It's like a void you can't escape.

Julian is not blind to it, he's been treating you with kid's gloves from the start, and he continues to do so. He indulges you, gives you space when you need, and it's always there to hold you afterwards. He also entertains any of your recently acquired bad habits without judgment. You truly don't deserve him. He casually mentions going to therapy a couple of times when you're calm. You've considered it… briefly. Your pride, ego, self-destruction, or whoever is in charge of you now keeps insisting that everything will pass on its own, that this is just temporary.

Your ex-boyfriend isn't speaking to the police. What they found in his possession speaks volumes for him, however. You had to go to the station to identify some items Logan had taken as trophies. You recognize your swimsuit, the one you were wearing that night and that you had Julian throw away.

You shouldn’t have, but you ask the detective to show some of the pictures he had taken of you. Most of them are just candid pictures in your daily life. Seeing through his vile eyes is absolutely terrifying and unnerving. The last one you see, though, that one takes the cake. You almost wanna throw up at the sight of yourself laying by the pool, soaking wet and lifeless. That’s the one he took that night. You’d tear it apart if you could, so nobody could look at it again. You gulp, turning it around and sliding it across the desk.

“Is he saying anything yet?” You ask.

Detective Sunday shakes her head, “word is he’s going to plead guilty.”

“Like he’s making a deal?”

She nods, “he’s got a good lawyer too.”

“Then, what am I doing here?”

“Procedure.” Sunday clears his throat, picking up the irritation in your voice, “listen, I hate this as much as you do, trust me. I’ve looked at these pictures more times than I can count. If it was up to me… he’d never see daylight again.”

Her words aren't very reassuring. You can't imagine what kind of deal he could be offered after what he's done, but no matter how many years he gets, it'll never be enough.

Your lack of judgment was truly poor when you met him. He was very sweet, you said. Nothing sweet about him anymore.

Julian is waiting for you in the parking lot when you get out. He has a cigarette between his lips, and you extend your hand, pick it up, and take a long puff.

“How did it go?”

You simply shrug, “he's making a deal or something.”

“That's batshit… they got him dead to rights. Why would the DA make a deal with him?”

“Beats me,” you blow out the smoke and pass the cigarette back to Julian, “he's got a good lawyer, apparently.”

You believe the absence of irrefutable physical evidence in the crime scenes is what might save the asshole. He really had this planned through and saw to leaving no trace. There's no digital evidence either, he's used his skills too to leave no mark, so anything in his possession is not comparable to what he could be charged with, had there been any of the mentioned.

They keep asking you if you remember seeing something that night. If only you had, this would be much different. So your testimony is pretty much worthless too.

As Julian sets the car in motion, it feels like someone else inhabiting your body when you reach with your fingers to curl around Jules' crotch while he drives out of the lot.

“Babe, you're playing a dangerous game there,” he gazes at you behind his aviators, then back at the road as you start pumping his length.

It's one of those impulses that shuts up all the unnecessary noise in your head. Keeps you distracted from going down on a spiral after what you've learned at the station.

“Let's go to Lorenzo's,” you propose. He's been wanting to take you to his friend's club for a while, and it has always intimidated you to go there. Not anymore.

“I thought you had to work.”

“It can wait.”

“It’s the middle of the day.”

“So? It is open, right?”

His head nods.

“C'mon, I wanna do something fun,” you insist as the car comes to a stop at a red light.

“We could go to the beach.”

“It's too hot,” hastily, remove your hand off him, “you know what? Forget it, let's go home.”

He sighs through his nose and thinks for a beat before grabbing your hand again and putting it back where it was.

“You wanna go to the club? Stop acting like a little brat and earn it,” he chooses to enable you.

You press your bare teeth on your bottom lip and fondle him softly. You don't want him to crash the car, either. You might be in the middle of a crisis, but you're not that far gone, so maybe there's still hope for you yet.

Enzo's club is not like any other club you’ve ever been. Let’s just say it doesn’t fit in the legal bounds of what constitutes a regular club. Part of it, at least. The bar side is legit. The gambling room at the back isn't however. And neither is the underground level, where he's created a safe space for casual sex, and prostitution. It operates closely to a kink club, where only vetted members can enter. Julian, being an old friend of his, has always had access to it. He's been wanting to get you here, partly cause he has been curious to see you in that ambience since the moment he met you and pegged you as a voyeur. There are a few rooms with one-way mirrors for people who like being watched and those who enjoy watching. He's always thought you might like that.

He's not wrong. You’ve been toying with the idea for months, and now you have nothing to lose. The worst thing that could’ve ever happened to you, it already happened. Maybe this is part of getting over all of it. Trying new things, and uncovering other parts of yourself you’ve kept mostly hidden.

You leave the car in a parking garage a block away from Enzo’s and walk the rest of the way.

Julian has an arm around your waist when you cross the door. There's not many people at this hour, so you're able to quickly get a drink at the bar for starters. The music has some people dancing on the dance floor. It's a very high-end space with a VIP section and a small stage.

You pick up your cocktail and since he refuses to dance with you, you stride alone towards the dance floor and have fun by yourself, swinging to the rhythm of a semi-upbeat song.

“Hey,” someone pats Julian on the shoulder while he watches you, and he turns his head to see hide friend Enzo, “never seen you here this early, Kaye.”

“It was her idea,” Jules points at you with the beer bottle in his hand.

“Is that your girl? The one from…”

“Yeah, that's her.”

“How's she doing?”

“She's really hurting right now,” he glances at you and sees you, trying to escape from all that pain by sipping your cocktail from a straw while you move, “she wanted to come here, do something different.”

“I bet. Are you staying long?”

“Yeah, for a while. I'm taking her downstairs.”

“That's good,” his friend nods, “you two have fun, yeah? I have a lot of work to do here today. It's nice seeing you.”

“You too.”

Afterwards, Julian finishes his beer and joins you, curling his arms around your waist from behind. .

“You ready?” he whispers in your ear.

“Hm-hm.”

Then, he guides you to a little hallway at the back, guarded by a security guy. Julian shows him some sort of pass, and he leads you into a room that looks like a coat check.

A woman behind a desk greets you and places a plastic box on the surface for you to leave your phones or any other recording devices. She recites a set of rules that boil down to no recording or photographing. No drugs or smoking allowed. No harassment and no interference with other people's activities. And several important rules about safety, consent, and protection.

You both place your cellphones in the box and check your pockets. You left your bag in the car, so you only have a small wallet that you keep with you.

She hands you a key after locking your phones in a square locker, and Jules tucks it in his wallet.

The receptionist presses a button and a door buzzes on the side. You go through it; it buzzes again as it closes behind you. You climb down the set of stairs to a small reception area with more security and a display of toys for purchase on the side.

You head straight to another door and Julian gazes at you before opening, “are you sure you wanna do this?”

“Hm-huh.”

He grins at you and opens the door to a much bigger space than you expected. You hadn't really pictured it in any way, but by the secrecy of it, one would think it'd be something more dungeon-like. It’s not like that at all. There's a plethora of things that shouldn’t go together, but somehow they do. It's all cream colors and red, neon lighting, with velvet curtains and leather couches in alcoves. There's a bar area and two separate hallways that lead to bedrooms behind those big curtains.

Mellow music playing in the background and a few people just hanging out in the bar. A group is casually conversing in one of the alcoves. Another one is occupied by a couple intimately touching the other. But your eyes are drawn to the man kneeling by an ottoman sucking a woman's toes in a different nook.

“Do you want another drink, sweetheart?”

“Uh… sure.”

You order another cocktail and take Julian's hand. He guides you through one of the curtains to show you one of the main attractions. It leads to a much darker hallway, full of windows on either side. Most of them are covered. There are a few people watching through the ones uncovered, where you can observe people having sex. The first one you pass by, there's a woman lying on her front with a mask on and four people brushing her body with feathers. On the second one, you see a man shoving his cock into his kneeled partner's mouth. The third one holds a picture of a woman with strap-on pegging a man. A fourth window holds a man walking slowly around a bed, observing the form of his partner, tied up to the bed. You stop at the fifth one, where a man is giving the pound of his life to a woman. He has her on all fours, punishing her ass with his hips, occasionally slapping her flesh with his palm, and yanking her hair. There's nothing special about it. It's just rough sex, and yet it evokes that something in you. Even though you can't hear anything that goes in there, they seem to be having fun by the way their faces contort.

“You like that, sweetheart?” One of Julian's arms circles your waist from behind while you sip your drink.

“Hmm.”

“What do you like about it?”

“I dunno… I guess they both seem detached from the other, like… she's acting for him, and he only cares about his own pleasure but not really wanting to connect on a deeper level. It feels… liberating.”

“Yeah?”

“I'm not sure that I've ever done that. You know, I can't fully commit to sex if I'm not cared for, and vice versa.”

“I know what you like, baby.”

“I wish I could do that sometimes… just not to care, you know?”

“But I love that you do so much, and that you have such a big, beautiful heart.”

“Well, it's broken right now,” you sigh, “I'm sorry, I'm such a downer right now. I just…”

“You wanna feel something different. I get it. Don't apologize to me. I got you, okay?”

“Okay,” you glance over your shoulder, smiling at him.

Watching other people having sex it’s entertaining, but not as much as you wanted it to be. Maybe in a different headspace, you'd be able to enjoy a little more being witness to those snaps of intimacy right in front of you.

Afterwards, you go back to the main space and take a seat on one of the alcoves.

“Who pays for all this?” you wonder, settling glued to Julian's side, draping your legs over his thigh.

“It relies on member fees and donations.”

“Hmm. But you don't come here often?”

“Yeah, I don't get as much here for a night as I do out there, but I still pay a fee. It helps keep it running. Make it safe and all for other people.”

“How much would you get here?”

“I don't know. Three or four hundred? Depends on the day.”

“And that's not enough for you, Mr. Greedy?” you utter playfully, “you rather take the risk out in the open?”

“Makes it more interesting,” he palms your denim covered thigh.

“Well, how about we make this more interesting,” you drink from your glass, settle it down on the table and tuck your hand in his pants' pocket to collect his wallet.

Julian stares at you, intrigued about what you’re concocting, as you take out a hundred dollar bill from it before giving his wallet back.

“Let’s say, for a hundred bucks you can do whatever you want with me,” you gesture with the bill in your hand, “what would you do with me?”

“You want me to pay to have sex with you?” he snorts.

“Would you?”

His head tilts to the side, considering, “I would… but a hundred bucks? You’re selling yourself cheap, sweetheart. I’d pay thousands to be with you.”

“What if I wanna be a cheap whore?” You fold the bill in your hand, slide under the hem of your v-neck blouse, and tuck it in one of the cups of your bra.

He clicks his tongue and sends one hand to hold your face, brushing his thumb ever so slightly on your bottom lip.

“Why do you wanna be a cheap whore?”

“Cause…” you exhale and pause for a beat, “I don’t wanna be me right now.”

“You can be whatever you wanna be, baby,” he sighs, pulling down your lip a couple of times, picking up on what you’re inquiring of him, “you want me to use you? Is that what you're asking?”

You nod.

“Yeah?” He brings your face closer, so you feel his warm breath on your lips, “want me to treat you like a little slut?”

Your cheeks heat up hearing him saying that, and you simply hum.

“You don’t mind people watching?”

You shake your head in his warm palm, spread across your chin now.

He quickly licks his lips and then swipes that same tongue on yours before ordering, “then get on your knees and earn that money.”

You swallow and slide between his thighs to kneel on the floor as he opens his fly and belt. You lean your head and kiss his bulge over his underwear.

You’re taken again by that urge of escaping from your entire being that you don’t give a fuck where you are or if there’s people around watching or not as you go down on him. You get lost in pleasing him, you exist only for that right now. And it’s easier to slip into that mindset than you’d ever thought.

You peel back his boxers, and watch him go hard in your fist as his fingers toy with your hair. Immersed in your role, you pump his length with ease, occasionally gazing at him. He bites his lip as you open your mouth to get a taste of his pre-cum with just the tip of your tongue. You swirl around his head, and trace his slit before wrapping your lips around the stately flared cock. Filling your mouth with hit, you bob your head, spreading your spit along his velvet skin. Julian hums and pushes your head down for you to go faster. It’s what you asked for anyway.

You rub your thighs together, feeling the arousal pooling between your folds as he mutters and praises what a good slut you are.

His cock twitches between your teeth, and he buries a grunt deep in his throat as he feeds you his warm load.

You suck him dry, swallowing every drop of him as if it was sweet honey. Pulling your head back, you lick the remains that stick to your lips under the sultry shadow of his stare.

While he catches his breath, he brings his hand closer and inserts two fingers in your mouth, slipping them in and out, as if he was still fucking your lips.

“You're something special, sweetheart.”

Playing your part, you hum pleasantly around the motion of his fingers, shamelessly blowing them off until he pulls them out, letting your spit dribble down your chin.

“Did I taste good?”

“Hmm,” grinning, you reach for the napkin near your cocktail to clean your mouth, as he tucks himself back into his pants,

You get on your feet, and he pulls down onto his lap, sideways, letting his hands roam your body, and his lips nibble your partly-exposed chest while you hug his neck.

You tilt your head back as he covers more ground, noting his hand sneaking under your blouse at the back. His fingers press and glide with electricity all over the plane of your skin, as his opposite hand grips viciously at your ass.

The scent of your skin intoxicates him, making him groan at the top of your breasts.

“Can we get a room?” you pant.

“Yeah, we can get whatever you want, baby.”

He pulls his head back and holds your face momentarily as he kisses your lips. Then, you both shift and stand up to get a key from the bartender.

You hit the ladies' room first while Julian settles himself in the bedroom. He moods the LED lights to a soft purple and lets the curtains cover the mirror, cause he’s not sure if you wanna be watched or not. He also makes sure that everything is cleaned and that they’re stocked with the complementary condoms, lube, and wipes in the nightstand. Everything’s perfect as he waits for you.

After ten minutes, he starts to worry that you’ve suddenly gotten sick, or have changed your mind when you don’t show up. He lets another two or three minutes pass by and then peeks out the hallway to see if you’re close. You’re not. He strides promptly back to the main space, and heads straight to the restroom. He calls your name, knocking on every stall’s door, asking if you’re okay, but there are no signs of you in there.

A woman coming out of one of the stalls gives him a look, and he apologizes. He’s about to get out when he glances at the floor and sees the half-moon necklace you were wearing. With a deep crease in his brow, he picks it up and swallows. Something it’s wrong here, he realizes all of a sudden. He inspects the bathroom further and sees a small trail of blood on the side of one of the sinks.

You’re dead. It’s what first crosses his mind. He’s let his guard down, and he’s killed you.

Julian rushes out of the bathroom and starts asking about you to everyone in his way. The bartender plainly tells him you just left, but he doesn’t buy it.

He makes another swipe around the lower level before heading up. A woman stops him and tells him that she saw you passed out, being carried by one of the security guys, and that you had blood trickling down your temple.

Rushing up the stairs, he collects his cellphone and yours and steps once more into the club. His eyes frantically search for you all around, but you’re still missing. Then, he notices security keeping an eye on him, and there’s no doubt in his bones that there’s been foul play in your disappearance. Someone has taken you. He’s sure.

Julian makes a quick decision and dashes straight to the employee's closed area, and enters Enzo’s office, locking the door behind him before anyone can get to him.

“What did you do with her?” he questions his friend, and quickly eyes a flashy gun with a gold finish on top of a filing cabinet.

“What are you talking about?”

“You knew exactly who she was when you looked at her… Nothing happens here without you knowing it. Who did you call?”

“She’s been all over the news. Everyone knows who she is.”

“Bullshit.”

Suddenly, there’s a relentless banging and pushing on the door behind him.

“Tell them to stop.”

Enzo pulls his palm up calmly and raises his voice to tell his men to stand back.

“Look. The best thing for you to do know it’s to get a drink, calm yourself, and go home, Julian.”

There’s a pounding in his chest that urges him to grab Enzo’s arm, twist it to his back, and push his front flush against the wall.

“What the fuck did you do?” Julian mutters, having Enzo pinned with all his force.

“I had no choice,” Enzo struggles to speak, “I owed a lotta money.”

Julian keeps him secure with his dominant hand, and reaches with the other to pick up the gun he saw before, cocks it and puts it against Enzo’s nape

“You fucking sold her?”

“I didn’t… someone was already after her.”

“Yeah, he’s in jail.”

“No,” Enzo tries to shake his head, “that wasn’t him. Logan was set up, just like you.”

“What the fuck are you talking about?”

“It doesn’t matter. She’s already gone… she's untouchable now.”

“Give me a fucking name!”

“You know his name.”

Julian sighs and lowers the gun, uttering, “Stratton.”

“He was after you,” Enzo explains, “and got obsessed with her.”

“Where is he taking her?”

“I don’t know.”

“Don’t lie to me,” he presses the muzzle of the gun again against his temple now, “I thought we were friends. Where is he taking her?”

“I swear, I don’t know!”

“Then, you’re no use to me, are you?”

“Wait, Julian… I can call him and find out.”

He gives the desk a once-over and locates Enzo’s phone. Without lowering his aim, he lets him move freely to get to it and make the call.

“Put it on speaker.”

Enzo clears his throat and dials Richard Stratton.

Julian can barely keep his thoughts straight for more than a second as the dial tone goes off three times before Stratton answers.

“What do you need now?” the man on the other side asks curtly.

“I uh… I just need to know that we’re squared now.”

 “We are. You delivered. Your debt is gone, Lorenzo.”

“You’re not gonna hurt her, are you?”

 “I promised I wouldn’t. She’s safer with me than with that degenerate, trust me.”

“Where are you taking her?”

“That’s none of your business.” There’s a pause before Richard speaks again, “is he there with you?”

“Who?”

“Julian. He’s there, isn’t he?” Another moment of silence as Julian's rage levels go off the roof when hearing Richard talking to you, “you wanna say goodbye, sweetheart?”

“Jules,” he hears your shaky voice come out of the speaker, and he lowers his gun, “are you there?”

“I’m here, baby, I’m here. Where are you?”

“I don’t know, I can’t… they hit me,” he can identify the fear in your voice as you speak and half sob, “we’re moving, but I don’t know… I’m scared.”

“Shh, shh, I’m gonna come for you, okay?” Julian’s own throat betrays him, as he tears up, “I’m not going to let anything happen to you.”

 “Promise.”

“I promise, baby. I’ll find you.”

“Time’s up,” Richard utters, and he hears you yelling his name in the background before the call is cut off.

“So help me God, Enzo, something happens to her, I’ll come here, and I’ll kill you myself. Tell your men to back off.”

“Logan,” Enzo utters in a last attempt to make him feel better.

“What about him?”

“If someone knows where Stratton is going, it’s Logan. He’s been covering all his tracks. Knows more about him than he realizes.”

Running against the clock, Julian takes Enzo’s gun and sets a lead foot in the pedal, driving straight into the big house. His thoughts go as fast as the car. He calls Detective Sunday on the way and tells her what happened, and to meet him there. He knows he can’t do this alone, as much as he wants to, he’s going to need her help.

Chapter 6: Clipped Wings

“Where are we going?” You keep asking in the back of a very luxurious vehicle.

Next to you is Richard Stratton. On the front seats, behind an opaque glass, are the driver; and the guy that you tried to fight off in the bathroom and hit you in the head with the butt stock of his gun, so you would stop struggling. You saw them briefly, when you woke up about an hour ago, you believe. Stratton closed the glass partition after that, and the car hasn’t stopped since.

You finally managed to stop crying after talking to Julian. Your wrists are restrained with a zip tie over your lap, and your head is still hammering from the blow. The door windows are completely blocked, too, so you can’t see where you are or where they’re taking you.

“If you're going to kill me, at least tell me why.”

“Oh, sweetheart. I'm not going to kill you. I'm saving you from him.”

It's utterly appalling the way he uses that pet name.

“You call this saving?” you show your join hands up in exasperation.

“That's for your own protection. Once you see what I've done for you, you won't need that.”

“You're crazy.”

He slides his hand over your thigh, and you flinch at his touch.

“Don't touch me.”

He laughs at you and squeezes your knee before removing his hand.

“Don't worry. After a period of adjustment, you'll beg me to touch you.”

“I'd rather die.”

“You already did. Four times.”

It takes you a moment to process, but by your count there are five women dead, not four.

“You killed all those women? Why?”

“They were imposters. See, they looked like you, but they didn’t feel like you or smell like you, or talk like you.”

“Why?” you keep repeating, having tears threatening to pour out of your eyes.

“Because I love you, don't you get it? I only want you. I was trying to ruin Julian's life, but when I met you… being with you was the only thing that mattered all of a sudden. I guess taking you away from him is sort of a tragedy for him. Two birds, one stone.”

“You don't know me.”

“Oh, I do. I've been watching you and learning everything that is to know about you to build the perfect place for you.”

He's truly out of his mind.

“Why did you want to ruin Julian's life?”

“If you must know… a few months ago, I found this letter that Michelle wrote to him but never sent. I guess it was too much to explain over paper… she was telling Julian that our son, my son Colin… was never mine, that was the offspring of that fucking bastard all along.”

“And you killed Michelle for that too,” you mutter, slowly processing this new shocking information.

“She had it coming. She's just a whore like him.”

“You weren't married anymore.”

“She was trying to take away my son. I gave that boy everything for 14 years, and one day she decides I'm a bad influence?”

The shoe seems to fit. Of course, you don't say that out loud. You swallow the dryness of your throat and try not to break into tears. You know you'll meet a similar fate, no matter what he says.

“What about Logan? Why did you bring him into this?”

“Hmm, you're such a curious cat, but I'll bite. Logan hurt you and had to pay for it. You know, actually, he's the one who tried to drown you. He thought that you'd be safer if the world was watching you… he never intended to kill you. He did kill Martina to get back at me. Tried to stage it to pin it on me, when we both knew he'd be taking the blame for all of it. Thing is he did me a favor, she was insufferable. It blew my cover, but I'll find another one.”

“Oh, it must really suck to be you.” You spit out ironically before you can stop yourself, “psychologists are going to have their field day when they catch you.”

You must have hit a nerve there, cause your head suddenly jerks to the side, having the backside of his hand striking across your face terribly hard.

“The others weren't this insolent either.” he mutters, “I was going to wait for you to settle in our new home to do this, but I guess this is a good time to start.”

You glance at him and see him produce a small case from a compartment that holds some vials and syringes. He takes out one of the syringes from its wrapper and loads it with one of the injectables.

“What the hell is that? Is it what you gave them?”

“Oh, no. I had this made especially for you.”

You try to squirm out of his reach, but he locks an arm around you, pulls at your hair to have your head tilted to the side, and shoves the needle in the crook of your neck. It goes stiff as you feel the strange liquid invade your body. You wince and tears slip out of your eyes.

“I’m sorry I had to do that,” he removes the needle and pets your head, “It’s going to feel good really soon, sweetheart.”

“What is it?” You let out a sob.

“Attitude adjustment. It’s a drug we’ve developed to help you be more… compliant.”

“You’re a fucking psychopath.”

Your head falls back against the headrest, hearing his evil laugh mocking you. Closing your eyes and clenching your teeth, you focus on fighting the pain of the oddly, cold sensation under your skin, and try not to panic. It’s going to be fine. He promised he was right behind you. Any minute now, you think. Any minute…

Whatever he drugged you with, it works fast. Soon, your jaw goes slack, and so does your body. Your pulse speeds up, and it goes faster the more you try to move. There’s an overwhelming sensation building up in your chest as your anxiety levels skyrocket. You’ve never done any hard drugs or have ever been medicated with something stronger than Vicodin from when you got your wisdom teeth out, but this one has a huge kick.

“Relax. It’ll feel worse if you try to fight it,” you hear him say and notice that he’s touching your head again, cleaning the blood from your wound, “I’m sorry he did that. I told him not to hurt you, but you were a little feisty.”

“Go to hell,” you barely exhale.

You close your eyes again and wait and hope and pray for this to be over.

Then, something creeps out from inside you when you feel his lips touching your neck, as he sniffs the scent of your skin. You wanna move, hit him, kick him, anything… but your body isn't responding to the signals your brain is sending.

“You smell like him,” he utters, as one of his hands slips under your shirt to grope your breast over your bra, “we're going to fix that later.”

“Please, don't,” you babble, bursting into tears.

“Relax, baby. It’s going to feel really good.”

He grabs at you harder, and sucks disgustingly at your neck. You yelp between sobs pleading for him to stop, over and over. You try to move your arms, but they're not strong enough at the moment to get him off you.

His grip hurts so much that it awakens just the ounce of strength you need, strong enough for you to send your hands to dig your nails into his neck and draw blood, forcing him to stop.

“I see you like it rough, huh?” he slaps you again, “you should've said that b-”

Someone must have heard you pray, cause on a dime something explodes, making the car jerk violently before it stops, shoving Richard against the glass partition.

It sounded like the front tires.

You had a seat belt on and all you felt was the whiplash. Stratton however didn't, and ended up with his head smashed against the glass mid-sentence. He still looks alive, but he's completely out, curled in an awkward position between his seat and the partition.

You fumble trying to unbuckle your seatbelt and get out of the car for a long moment until someone tries to open the door on your side. It’s locked. You freeze and don’t say anything at all, wondering if someone is trying to help you, or if it's just one of Stratton’s men.

Then, a gunshot goes off, and you duck your head. There are a couple more afterwards, spaced out, and you hear a man shouting to stay down. It must be the police.

You try to unlatch the seat belt again. With your wrists restrained, and your senses impaired by the drug, it’s almost a victory when you do.

Feeling helpless afterwards, you tuck your arms to your chest and freeze, drowning in your own tears, waiting for someone to come to your aid.

It feels like hours, but it’s only a minute after that you hear sirens going off and someone successfully opening your door.

“Are you okay, ma’am?”

You shake your head, unable to look at this new person.

“Are you hurt?”

There’s nothing you can compare this moment to. This is the most pain you’ve ever felt. Inside and out. You can’t respond. There’s something blocking you from doing so, must be the drug or the shock. Your mind feels warped and dizzy in a way you can’t really explain. All thoughts are seeping in your mind like water through a colander.

“Can you move?”

Can you? You’re not sure. You swallow and hold your trembling hands forwards, so this person can see that they’re bound. You can’t really tell if it’s a man or a woman speaking to you, but you’re aware enough to see that it's someone in a uniform.

You feel a couple of people maneuvering around you with great care. There is a click, and finally you can pull your hands apart from the other.

Someone offers you a hand, and you hesitantly take it and test if you can step out of the car. It's a learning experience. Your legs quiver on you as you stand up to feel the striking heat of the sun in the middle of nowhere.

You let them guide you to take cover in one of the two patrol cars while the other officers take care of the men that held you hostage.

They bring you water and keep asking you questions you can't really answer.

With a lost stare, you watch the scene as they remove the device they set on the road to stop the car. Julian must have called the cops, it dawns on you out of nowhere, otherwise, you'd still be in that car. That thought quickly dissipates when Stratton wakes up as they pull him out of the car and is handcuffed immediately. He yells all sorts of threats at the officers, and he’s quickly locked in the second cruiser.

Ambulances show up next. They care for the two men shot, and your captor. A paramedic mends the gash on your temple and notices there's a bump on the curve of your neck like a bee sting. It itches the same, but you know it was from the needle.

Then, you are set aside like a science project, waiting for CSI to roll by and collect the evidence from your fingernails and take pictures of you.

“She's in shock.” You hear them say. You must be cause you're completely unable to respond to anything the more time passes. It feels like an out-of-body experience. As if you were watching someone else's life.

You can't seem to snap out of it. It's numbing and utterly disturbing. You try remembering what you did earlier in the day to dig yourself out of that hole… You were mad when you woke up. You had to go to the station, and you weren't really up for it. Julian, being annoyingly sweet, drew a heart on your palm to make you smile. You rolled your eyes instead. It was one of those moments you were mean to him for no reason. You should have stayed at home, kissed him, and told him that you love him. Maybe this wouldn't have happened if you had.

There’s your anchor. You focus on Julian and the way he traced a piece of his heart on your palm, while someone brushes the gunk in your nails. You open your opposite hand and pretend that the comic-shape heart is still there, carved over the lines of your palm.

“Baby, can you hear me?” he's choked up, you can tell by the way his voice breaks.

He's there now, and you can’t tilt your head up to look at him. Your gaze states fixated on that imaginary spot until you see his fingers move ever so carefully to wrap around your hand as he crouches in front of you.

“I'm sorry. I'm so sorry, sweetheart,” he bows his head and kisses your knuckles, “we’re going to get you out of here now, yeah?”

Time fluctuates and in that daze from when you were injected to the moment you wake up in a hospital bed for a second time, and there are several pieces missing. It’s night now, you can see through the window having its shutters pulled up, and Julian is seated on a sofa, reading a copy of your book, with a deep crease of concentration in his brow.

After that trip you feel utterly lucid now, sleepy but lucid, thankfully.

He doesn’t realize you’re awake until you mumble a husky, “hey, do they sell those at the hospital now?”

His stare is torn from the pages and looks at you, having his expression soften as he rises from the two-seater, placing the book down open on the page he was reading.

“Hey, sweetheart,” he sits next to you, and tentatively reaches to caress your face, “someone left it in the waiting room.”

“Where are we?”

“I got you a private room.”

“Fancy,” you feel your lips pull up on their own.

“How are you feeling?”

“I don’t know,” you sigh, trying not to think too much about what happened, “better, I think. How long was I out?”

“Sleeping? Just a couple of hours… before that? Three or four without… Do you remember anything?”

“Some of it. He… he gave me something,” you point at your neck with your hand.

“Yeah, they found his stash in the car… Said it was PCP mixed with something else. They’re still trying to figure it out,” he glances at your neck, “the swelling is gone now. I should go get some-”

“No,” you stop him, “not yet. In a minute.”

You ask him to fill the gaps you have. And he tells you how they found where Richard was taking you by doing something impossible. Between him and Detective Sunday, they convinced Logan to give up the location. Apparently, Stratton was blackmailing him and threatening to kill his family. In exchange for their safety, he followed you for months, kept tabs on you and sent all that to Stratton. Logan was just a pawn. He tried to get out of it and keep you safe at the same time by making it look like someone tried to kill you, he never intended to actually do it; like Stratton told you in the car.  That last part you knew, but it seemed like a vague memory of a dream until Julian confirms it. Logan kept quiet and let Stratton pin the murders on him, cause there was still a gun pointed at his family.

In trade for that information, he had Sunday reassure him that she’d see that his girlfriend and baby would be protected.

Afterwards, you try to fill some of those too for Julian. You remember questioning Richard, but  there are some facts you’re completely unsure if they’re real or not. If your memory serves you right, he killed Michelle after finding out their son was actually Julian’s. He confessed to killing the other women too, except for Martina. He said Logan killed her. The situation was less than ideal to gather information like that, but you’re almost 90% sure that’s what you heard before being drugged.

“You have a son,” you say under your breath, and he looks at you as if you were making it up, “I’m not sure if it’s true, Jules, but it adds up.”

Shutting your eyes, you attempt to pry the name he gave you out of your mind. It starts with a C. Maybe Cole or Charlie. It sounded close to that.

“That’s impossible,” his brow narrows as he stands up to look out the window, “she’d have told me.”

Would she? You remember something about a letter that wasn’t sent. Maybe she did, but didn’t have the courage to send it while he was in prison. It’d probably broken his heart. Just as it’s doing now.

He can’t accept it, but part of you knows it’s true.

Chapter 7: Epilogue

They say time heals all wounds… Abigail’s were temporarily patched at best because the moment she stepped into that house, she felt the demons buried in that place prying at every opening of her being. Time stood still between those walls. The same furniture her mother kept spotless was occupying the same space to the millimeter. Except for pictures. There were no pictures of her in the house anymore. There used to be two on the wall leading up the staircase that were replaced by some of her cousins. The Angels. On the mantel was another one when she got her portrait taken at the back of the dollar store when she was 7 or 8. It had one of those fake sky backgrounds. She was wearing the dress she wore for church only, and wasn’t allowed to smile.

Days before she had that taken, Adventurous Abby had fallen on her face while she was roller-skating, and one of her front teeth was chipped after hitting the edge of the sidewalk. It made her feel ugly that her own mother told her to keep her mouth shut cause she looked like a fucking pirate. Sans the curse word, of course. Her palm covered her mouth more often than not when she spoke until she got that fixed years later. She did. Not her mother. And definitely not her father chipped in for her chipped tooth. They say it was a punishment of God for being cheeky. That was their logic. In all truth, those skates she rode belonged to her best friend, who wanted to show her to see how fun it was. Abby never had any of the fun toys. Only a couple of stuffed animals on her bed and a creepy porcelain doll that she couldn’t care less about. She hated her– Christine. That’s what her mother called her doll. She sat on a shelf looking over her bed with her perfect, glossy hair and skin, and beautiful dress, mocking her while she slept. She was convinced it gave her nightma---

“You gotta eat something, sweetheart,” Julian interrupts your flow, holding a plate with food close to your face, while you're typing on your laptop your second novel, “you’ve been at it for hours.”

“So? Can’t you see that I’m on a roll here?” You protest animatedly.

“I can see,” he scoffs, glancing at the screen, “but I can also hear your stomach growling from across the room.”

“That’s not my stomach, that’s the lil guy snoring,” you slide your chair back to show him that the puppy has fallen asleep by your feet, under the desk.

It’s three months later when everything starts to go back to some sort of normal. A new normal. Not better or worse, just different.

The tremor you've had in your hands since the day you were kidnapped finally stops altogether. You’re counting the days it lasts, six so far, and your pulse is as steady as ever. They believed it was psychosomatic, cause physically you’re perfectly fine. Therapy helped. Having a weekly session didn’t seem much at the beginning, but it truly has been a game changer.

Right now, your steady hands are full with your new puppy, working on your second novel, and helping Julian with his situation.

Inspiration struck you a few weeks ago, and you’ve outlined and drafted fully a new story that you feel pretty confident about. You finally got an agent, a trustworthy one, and two publishing houses are interested in your new novel after reading the early draft of your manuscript. Not having to worry about financing another book of your own pocket takes a load off your mind. You’ve broken even, and you’re just starting to see the fruits of years of work.

But the thing that has brought the most joy to your life is your new puppy– Flynn. You decided to adopt one of those doggies from Bailey, and now you have a black and white Siberian Husky with crystal clear, blue eyes. He's cute as a button; joyful, and active as they come. You’ve had him for a month and besides Julian, you’ve never loved anything as much as you love that dog. Caring for him, taking him out and getting into training classes with him is part of your new routine that’s keeping you uplifted. For a while, you thought you’d never leave the house again and now, with a few exceptions, you’re able to go out on your own with him. He follows everywhere you go and tonight, after eating his food, he started licking your ankle and fell asleep on the floor while you wrote. That’s how much time you've been spending writing, you've bored the little thing to death.

Julian on the other hand has been preoccupied with another matter. It took him a while to accept that he had a son. With the help of Sunday, you found out that Colin Stratton was living in England under the care of his grandmother and guardian, Evelyn.

There was no trace of him online, despite him being 15. The only photo you could find was one in Michelle’s Instagram account from when Colin was around 10. You could see a certain likeness to Julian, but it was very inconclusive. He didn’t look like Richard, for sure. He took after his mother, definitely.

It wasn’t a decision that was made lightly, no. The last thing Julian wanted to do was to disrupt a young boy's life. He merely lost his mom months ago, and the man he knew as his father just went to prison.

After long conversations and consideration, Julian decided that he wanted to meet him and go from there. Ideally, he wanted to be in his life at any capacity the boy considered. If it was none at all, he’d have to accept it. He was ready for it. He’d stepped up, had he known, back then; and was determined to do it now. There was nothing he could’ve done from prison, but he deserved to know the truth. If there’s something he could resent Michelle for, it was that, but he understood her reasons. He got a copy of the alleged letter that was in Stratton’s possession that was meant for him all along.

Via lawyer, Julian made his intentions clear to Evelyn Stratton, and added that letter. She didn’t reply right away. The request was simple enough, he just wanted to meet Colin. The lawyer called a couple of times, and she kept dismissing him.

There was another force at work, cause one evening, a week ago, when you two came back home from a walk with Flynn, you found the 15-year-old-boy waiting in the lobby. Up close, it was clear that Colin had grown to look more like Julian. Except for his eyes that were hazel, like Michelle’s, his features were a fresh-printed copy out of Julian’s. His hair was just as dark and abundant, and when you saw them walk side by side, you could see that they both carried themselves the same way. Julian didn’t believe you, of course, but you could tell.

Colin had a proposition of his own, he had been wanting to leave the boarding school he’s been enrolled in since he was 12. He loathed it and wanted to come here with Michelle, but Richard never allowed him to do so. Even now, his guardian was carrying Richard’s plan of not letting come here. He took the opportunity of visiting his aunt, Michelle’ sister, in Burbank during holidays, and found out where Julian lived. He knew about him, his mother told him about his real father a couple of years ago. Colin just needed a paternity test and the chance of fighting Evelyn and Richard for custody, so he could emancipate and live with his aunt.

It wasn’t an instant connection or anything. The boy was very stern in his intentions and was very skittish about meeting Julian, but he did, cause he had been looking to get away from that family that never truly treated him or his mom right. She always feared he’d hurt them if they tried to get away, and she was right. Now that Richard was locked up, this was his chance.

Julian agreed. His mind was already made before the boy came here that he’d help in any capacity he could.

“Did you love her?” Colin asked. It seemed very important to him to know that about him.

Julian stared at him for a long moment before standing up and picking up a book from the shelf. He sat back down and opened the front of it to collect a picture strip of him with Michelle. He just showed it to him.

“She looks really happy,” Colin kept his eyes on the pictures of her mother framed by love and joy in her eyes.

“She was,” Julian simply said.

Close to midnight, you save your document, leaving Abigail to rest for the night. Then, turn off your computer, put Flynn in his crate, and check that the door is closed before getting on with your nightly routine and joining Julian in bed.

“Thought you weren’t coming to bed,” Jules grins, placing the book he was reading down on the nightstand, while you slide into bed.

“Hmm, have you missed me, handsome?” you lean closer, and he links his arm around you, pulling you into his chest.

“Always,” he hushes, having his thumb back and forth rubbing your shoulder.

“Yeah?” you sigh, tilting your head up to look at him, letting your palm smooth his chest up to his neck, “sorry I’ve been absent the last couple of nights.”

“Don’t be. I’m proud of you.”

“I’m really proud of you too, baby,” you say back, touched, and lean closer to capture his lips.

Kissing him slowly, your fingers slip into his hair that it’s gotten longer, and you play with his curls at the back of his nape.

Julian gingerly shifts your body, removing your clothes in the process, so he can make love to you with all of him– lips, tongue, fingers, and cock, all work together to stroke every inch of your body. He claims all of you, including your heart and soul, during those delightful orgasms he gives you in return. His body buzzes, collecting the pleasure that vibrates out of you every time you moan and scream at his name.

He makes you feel vivid and precious, more than you ever imagined, with every caress and word.

“Look at me, sweetheart” he says, locking eyes with you, holding your face, getting you closer to the edge a third time. Your lips part against his, and you can barely mumble a felt I love you as you melt all around him.

[icaruswasadreamer]

If We Were Villains: a book review

Or, the power of environmental storytelling, amazing characterization, theatrics and what it does to a STEM student with a passion for the arts

A/N: This is my first time writing a book review, and I decided to make up a little formula for myself to follow for the rest of my reviews. Truthfully, IWWV is not my first book, but it has defintiely inspired me enough to write something for it that isn’t fanfiction so here it is. Feel free to share your thoughts and bring up discussions, as this book is dear to me in many ways and it deserves to be talked about. Do note all of this is my opinion and that is all it will ever be. Hope you enjoy this review/semi-analysis of IWWV that I am less than qualified to talk about, but that is the beauty of self-expression. Please be warned of spoilers which will be marked as to where they Start. 

How I was Introduced to the Book

I first learned of the book through booktok. And I know the implications of that statement and the reputation of booktok in the bookish community. I, myself, don’t think too highly of booktok (as it is where all the colleen hoover fans worm about), but I have to admit that it is, by far, one of the best avenues to discover authors and books, no matter the romanticization of reading as a hobby or the misinterpretation of these books. Truthfully, without booktok, I would not have asked my friend to buy me a copy of If We Were Villains for my birthday and I wouldn’t be enamoured by its narrations and characters as I am right now. There was a specific tiktoker that I followed for the fact that they have read a lot of dark academia books – which is a genre that I’m getting into right now! If We Were Villains was introduced to me as a really great book with a lot of twists and turns, and I went into it with that expectation.

The Book Itself in My Own Words

Imagine that one picture that comes up whenever you search “dark academia aesthetic” on pinterest. There is a manor at the far end of the photo, distant and castle-like. Vines and greenery cling to it as if it were the old cobblestone shrine of a forest God and its windows are hauntingly grey with dust as if it were lived in by no one except ghosts. You are only outside looking in, and there is no scene you can manage from the manor. What you can observe, however is a lake. It reflects the greyish bluish white sky above it and it does not move against the life, the nature that surrounds it. It is ever present and everlastingly still; ultimately very boring to the people who spare it a glance, but go beyond depths you and I can comprehend or imagine. Think of that image, but in book form. Oh and add several other complicated things in it too, just for flavor.

If We Were Villains by M. L. Rio is a hauntingly, tragic mystery about 7 friends who made the mistake of being gay theatre kids. It’s the found family trope in reverse as you watch as their life fall apart in the incident of a murder that no one is really sure who did. We follow Oliver Marks, essentially the main character and the narrator of the story as he describes what his life is like and how it’s about to be ruined because some guy was too petty to accept that he isn’t always the star of the show. Watch the 6 of them go through the motion, pretending everything is fine and that they’re all not mentally ill in some way while quoting shakespeare that no normal person does. 

As sarcastic as I sound, it is genuinely a wonderful, captivating story about grief, friendship and art. Everything is so complicated (in a good way) and you’re not really sure what to feel about all of it, but at the same time, you stay for the ride because the feelings are worth it, just to see this show to the end just so these characters can reach their epilogue finally. The way I would describe it is imagine all those reading assignments and book reports you had to do in your english class about a sonnet or play, then mix it with all the gay fanfiction one would read in the witching hours of 3 am as you sob quietly to yourself because you know your ship will never be canon. It is a culmination of these two things, and it’s awesome. 

First Impressions/Last Impressions

I struggled with getting through Act I of IWWV. And I do genuinely believe that this was not at all the fault of the author or the story as the set up was interesting and mysterious and curious enough for me to get hooked. It just so happened that the fish was uninterested and busy with other things that I did not get into immediately as I would have hoped. Despite this – and after several months of not reading – I managed to pick up the book again and return to where I left off.

Perhaps it was the fact that there was a large gap of me not reading IWWV and then the sudden bolt of me reading it religious explains why I found the first parts of IWWV quite slow. I do recognize this as a part of the set up and exposition of the book and was entirely necessary for the emotional impact that it would give me by the end, but prowling through those first few chapters was hard as someone with a short attention span and have several hobbies aside from reading and writing. 

But now, after almost a year of trying to finish this book properly, I have to say that I am wrecked and I will never be the same again. I thought I was going to hate the endng, truthfully, as its implications was bleak and somehow, undermines the efforts of its characters. But, the epilogue had me pleasantly surprised and relieved, that I would have to say that the ending was exactly my cup of tea. I’m still not sure on where I stand with happy endings or tragic endings, but I do in fact love open endings – endings left to interpretation, the kinds that will make you tear your hair out because where is the rest of it? Why is the book just- done? And here is where fanfiction comes to play, my friend. 

The journey has been a journey, and I definitely have to say that I have learned a lot from this book and that it was easy to fall in love with the book despite the rough beginning. 

//SPOILERS START HERE//

How I fell in Love with It

The atmosphere IWWV gave me which was extremely immersive and can only be described as delightfully haunting. It is peak gray – and gay – atmosphere that I really enjoyed as it felt like the right amount of theatrics to not be too dramatic and satirical. Something also surprising is the fact that it is oddly humorous despite being a book about murder, shakespeare and what makes a tragedy. Actually, considering it is inspired by shakespeare, the humorous aspect is not so surprising if you take into account some shakespeare being pretty absurd as it is. The unironic things these characters do like randomly quote shakespeare out of nowhere is so pretentiously funny, but also contributes well to what the book is going for. 

As unnatural as that would be for like a normal person, because Oliver and his friends are so deep into the shakespeare of their classes, they make it feel natural and you get used to that as the story progresses. Oliver had a really good justification for this which he explains to Colbourne in a way that I truly resonate with. This book, as well as the characters, are so in love with Shakespeare’s words that it’s hard to not find yourself enamoured by it to. I love the way they describe taking art like this as I feel, as an artist and creative, that this is an artist’s ulttimate purpose. To capture the things that cannot be said properly through ordinary words, and to encapsulate those moments of heightened emotion and feeling. Any piece of art is an attempt to reanimate emotion, and we use art to deliver those emotions that we, ourselves, cannot fully comprehend. 

This is what I love about this book, aside from its brilliant storytelling and interesting and raw characters. It feels like it was made with the intention of appreciation for art, and I really respect that as art means so much to me. This book is art and it is about art as much as it is about this specific friend group dealing with whatever just happened, and I really really love and appreciate that about this book. 

Strong Points/What I learned from It as a Writer

IWWV is genuinely a master class in environmental storytelling. The Castle, where everyone stays at during their time in Dellecher is the most effective use of environment I’ve seen in a book (which I’m sure there’s more, I just haven’t read it yet in which I will at some point). The way the castle has a place for everyone, and the scene wherein Oliver is seen cleaning the different rooms of the Castle goes to show the amount of detail the author puts into each little cranny of their descriptions of the Castle. One specific detail I remember was in Richard’s room where a chess board was described with one horseman toppled over and another missing. I may be tweaking, but that might just imply something about story. Aside from the environments, IWWV also makes good use of its inspiration material which is shakespeare.

I definitely should have gone into IWWV with some knowledge of shakespeare and I would encourage anyone who wish to read IWWV to read at least one shakespear book, because I didnt and I am incredible lost on how IWWV uses those narratives of Shakespeare’s plays to reference its own tragedy and characters and I am extremely upset that I didn’t get to experience that other narrative of the what the play were trying to tell the reader. But of course, you don’t have to have a background in theatre or shakespeare to read IWWV. It would extremely as they constantly quote shakespeare and if you don’t know what those quotes mean, you will get lost at some point, but you can manage through it (as I said, the book does well with these quotes that it starts feeling natural enough that you, too, would start to make sense of these quotes even if you would struggle at first). But, from what I have heard from people who have read the book and Shakespeare, the plays do reference and foreshadow the story within IWWV. 

The play Ceasar directly reference how Richard is going to die and who’s going to kill him. Like Richard is the modern Julias Ceasar, he is someone who has caused tyranny in their group of friends and provoked James to hit him on the head which led to his friends eventually leaving him for dead. I still struggle sometimes with that betrayal because in truth, Richard was their friend for 3 years and then they’re just gonna throw him away like that? I think it’s just how I view friendship, but to be fair I don’t like Richard enough to be angry that he died. And that’s a good way of utilizing source material! Because who killed Ceasar if not his most intimate of friends. 

This is kind of like Chekhov’s gun in a way except we’re talking about multiple guns and you’re in a gun shop and the fact that the guns are constantly being fired. Everytime the environment is being described, it doesn’t get boring or go into super great detail. I’m always seated for those descriptions of the environment because at some point one very specific detail will mean something to the story more than you expect it would. Otherwise, it contributes to the atmosphere and helps you feel incredibly immersive. I think much of what I read are heavily character-driven (which isn’t a bad thing!) and IWWV is also heavily character-driven in terms of plot, but it uses its environment well. Like it exists and isn’t just an extension of the actors themselves, but it doesn’t just exist as a setting, it exists as a plot device. A carefully crafted set for a performance. IWWV was a wonderful case study for me to be able to spot those little details in the environment and try my hand in interpreting what they mean, like a detective looking for clues – which is very fitting!

Characters and characterization was also very good in IWWV. Every character was equally flawed and all of their actions warrant a “What the actual fuck?” from me. The amazing thing about IWWV is that despite its title, none of these characters are bad people, just very flawed with poor decision-making skills. Even Richard, I would argue, is still a gray character despite being an asshole! It was entirely his fault for becoming needlessly petty and aggressive towards his friends, but I don’t really think that undermines their 3 years of friendship together. I genuinely believe that Richard was just a guy with a big ego that was too fragile for his own good and he did really dumb and shitty stuff about that. He isn’t your 2D Villain, because his actions were triggered by the event of something – being casted as someone that wasn’t the main focus of the play. And his friends and the reader have in their every right to be angry at Richard for the shit he’s done, but you have to admit he wasn’t always like that. He changed and that is the most admirable thing about the character writing in IWWV.

Everyone is very dynamic, but not too drastic for it to be jarring. They fit well together despite having contrasting personalities and all of them have something going on in terms of their personal life. It’s a shame we don’t exactly see ther perspectives as we are limited to Oliver’s narration, but we do get glimpses of it and I believe that is enough for the characters to feel real. My favorite character, Filippa, is the most mysterious one from the group in terms of backstory, but I know enough that she is willing to do everything – even hide a murder – just to protect her friends, her family, probably because she doesn’t have one of her own in more ways than one. And I got that from a single line that she said to Oliver when he asked why she hid the fact James did it. 

“You all were the only family I had. I’d have killed Richard myself if I thought it would keep the rest of you safe. [...] I was terrified you’d do exactly what you did.”

Each main character of IWWV have their own tragedy to their character which is rooted upon the “type” of character they are in the beginning of the story. They all both defy and fit perfectly in their own roles in the narrative and that is their tragedy. Oliver is the sidekick who became the center of attention by his arrest, James is a hero who murdered a friend, Richard is a dead tyrant, Meredith is a temptress who wishes she was seen as anything but, Wren is the broken and frankly, no longer as innocent as she ought to be ingenue, and Alexander is the villain with good intentions. Filippa is the curious case as she does not have set role, this does not excuse her from being tragic, but it does makes sense how she is the only able to stay relatively stable throughout the story. In the very beginning we were already told of what tragedy these characters would have and it is all connected to their role in a stereotypical narrative, how they are type-casted in their plays.

I would go into each of the characters and their own personal tragedies and flaws, but that would be really long, so I won’t. But these characters and the play on the type-casting of these actors are perfectly executed. I would like to cite James’ arc for this as he is described as being the hero, but slowly, as we see how he and everyone else copes with Richard’s death and how he gets casted into the villain role, we saw how this changes him and how his archetype of being the hero slowly crumbles to make way for a darker James filled with immense amount of guilt that only perpetuates with Oliver’s arrest. We see how it breaks him as his hero persona is no longer his. He takes up the role of the villain, and that kills him because he was never meant to play that role. Everything about him screams hero and I think he himself believed that, so his sense of self crumbles away as it is slowly revealed that he is in fact, the villain of this story. And yet, what makes him the villain is still technically a heroic act. He killed a tyrant after all. And that is just hella clever.

IWWV almost reads as really complicated fairytale if you think of it as these characters as the archetypes of their roles. It is definitely the most fascinating and creative way of character writing I’ve ever seen and that is a feat on its own. It follows a formula, yet it defies the routinely-ness of that, the audience can understand what’s going on like in the middle of the book and I think that serves well in this scenario because now, it’s only a matter of dread and waiting for the final act to commence. I never felt like I was reading an intermission in any parts of it as everything, both character and environment, serve the plot really well. 

Criticisms/Pet Peeves

But of course, despite all my praise, this book is not free of the criticisms and I did feel frustration for some parts of it whether it was good or bad frustration. It’s not a perfect book and I have a few gripes with it. 

The way it treats Meredith and Wren specifically is appalling. It, sadly, goes into that really bad trope in some queer books of the women getting in the way of the men hooking up. I really feel bad for these women because, even if they still have their own things going on and they are able to be their own characters, they somehow become extensions of the men that they are involved with, and everytime, it is extremely unfair. 

I’ll just say it, Oliver is just using Meredith to forget about James. I don’t doubt he loves her or doesn’t think of her as attractive because he does, but there is an aspect to their relationship that they both don’t deny is really connected to Oliver’s and James’ relationship. This is a flaw of Oliver’s character that I don’t like because it’s so unfair for Meredith and the way they started their relationship is also kind of dubious? I mean, Meredith went for Oliver not only because he was “nice”, she also went for him because he was the only one available and the complete opposite of Richard. Meredith had no interest in Oliver in the first few scenes of this book and Oliver also didn’t really think of her much because she was already with Richard, but he couldn’t deny she was pretty. I just don’t like the implications of their relationship to Meredith’s character and her struggle with objectification and her constantly being sexualized by the men around her. I know Oliver wouldn’t do that, but at the end of the day, isn’t he just using her? 

I desperately want to believe in their love and I do! But it gets so bad when you mix in James because suddenly, Meredith no longer exist to Oliver. He literally went to jail for the guy, of course, his love for James isn’t equal in any way to his love for Meredith. I also just don’t agree with how the ending has Oliver and Meredith together only for Oliver to essentially leave Meredith because he finds out that James might still be alive. He admits that he was still in love with James! I understand that polyamorous relationships are a thing, but clearly Oliver has shown to be neglecting of Meredith whenever James comes to his peripheral vision! I just think that, maybe, Meredith deserves better than how Oliver is treating her. 

And god, don’t get me started on James and Wren. They, frankly, came out of nowhere! I think its because we are limited to Oliver’s perspective so we don’t see how their relationship developed and how their dynamic would go. I do see that James cares much for Wren and vice-versa and that they could totally work, but god, when you mix Oliver into it, Wren just doesn’t exist. I am extremely upset about the part where James gets incredibly drunk and then drags Wren to sleep with him for the same reasons Oliver sleeps with Meredith! And I hate it.

It’s very messy, and very well-written and very in-character, but god the implications. The way these women are being treated in the relationship drama is just to serve the men’s own relationship and how they totally belong to each other, but somehow they’re not together and they have to stay with the women and it’s really messy and Oliver is a disaster bisexual. Maybe I just don’t like love triangles or love squares, but this is just a prime example why you shouldn’t date someone in the same friend group. It’s messy and sometimes, I debate with myself if it was necessary. Either way, it happened and I can’t do anything about that.  

Overall Thoughts/Scoring

I have a lot of thoughts about IWWV and the book itself has a lot of themes and messages that really struck me. One thing that I really liked about IWWV as an aroace-spectrum person is the friend group’s relationship because despite all the tragedy around them, they manage to be really wholesome and there examples there of platonic intimacy that I don’t usually get to see in books. I love how Oliver and Filippa are essentially like siblings with how they are always there for each other and Filippa is always looking out for him and their other friends. I love the brotherly relationship between Oliver and Alexander. And despite my gripes, there are moments in Oliver’s and Meredith’s relationship that remind me that they were friends first and lovers second, and I really appreciate that.

I didn’t mention Oliver’s and James’ relationship as much because I’m pretty sure that’s what you would expect for me to say. It’s a good relationship, I like it since I’ve always been a fan of that kind of dynamic where they transcend the meaning of best friends, they’re gay essentially, but they are also each other’s person and their intimacy is beyond physical. I’m just describing sexual/romantic tension here but everytime they are in screen together, you just know that they are looking at each other with so much emotion. And of course, what Oliver did for James was incredibly stupid, but also just states what James is to Oliver. And it’s really codependent, don’t get me wrong, but it’s a kind of love that makes you feel thing.

I also would like to comment on how it tackles grief and guilt as those are major themes in the story. I appreciate how despite being dead, Richard is still ever-present in Oliver’s mind and everyone else’s that no one even bothers to go to his room aside from Oliver who just has to because he has to clean it. Guilt haunts everyone in If We Were Villains and I feel for that, especially when it comes to grief. It captures perfectly what mourning for someone who did some really bad stuff to you is like with the added guilt that you somehow contributed to his death. And it’s cruel how these people just have to deal with that major change; nothing is ever the same when someone dies and we can’t do anything about it. The show must go on, unfortunately. And that’s what happens to these characters, on or off the stage, life will continue with or without them and they have to go with out, otherwise they might end up drowning in their own misery. I think that is much the moral we can find in IWW, if it even has one.

//SPOILERS END HERE//

My scoring would be an 8/10. It’s really good and I recommend it to anyone who’s a fan of shakespeare or really into dark academia. I wouldn’t say it would be the best introduction book for this genre, but it got me into it so maybe it could work for you too!

[hypovile]

how did ur party discover jackie daytona vasili von holtz? im a dm that wants it to be a cool reveal, but not impossible to deduce

CAUTION TO THOSE WHO NEED IT— this will contain spoilers, both explicit and vague.

In this, I’m explaining our Vasili’s whole thing and how it made us suspicious of him. It’s just a big ol’ dive into him and my thoughts as a player. I also just fucking love talking about our campaign so I ramble like hell. If you just wanna skim through the whole thing— which is totally fine— i did add a little tl;dr at the end thats a little more question-specific so you can just go there :~]

When the party was off for about a week with Ismark and Co., Vasili, as he claimed, walked through the fog and entered the town of Barovia. He was a charming man who decided to take it upon himself to help the town, which was falling into ruin from the werewolves that ran amok every night.

He also took it upon himself to, by some miracle, revive Kolyan. This, I think, was the second red flag. The first was the normal suspicion that comes with a random stranger who claims to have walked through the fog and was suddenly Kolyan’s right hand man after only a week.

I think everyone was also very quickly suspicious of Vasili because the party +Ismark had expected his house to be completely empty. It was definitely a shock to hear laughter coming from inside.

When the party did go inside they had quickly decided to do an arcana check on him and very conveniently rolled well. So, we understood that inside Vasili was a suppressed dark energy, along with a dull sunlight. Vasili also referred to the sun god with a different name.

I think at this point, or a little further in, we had been saying that Vasili was Strahd. The more we said it, the more it became a little bit of a joke to me? Obviously, I considered the fact that Vasili was Strahd and kept it in my head as a definite possibility, and even argued in favor of it a few times in private with the DM (they were doing a very good job pretending to not understand why I thought Vasili was Strahd honestly), but I had never fully convinced myself that Vasili was Strahd.

I think the main reason I was never fully convinced was… actually because Vasili was very reciprocal with my characters flirting, and even initiated it somewhat (…yes, they slept together, and my character woke up to Strahd above him telling him he was a broken man 💀).

But anyways, after that first night, when everyone regrouped back at Ismark’s house, Kolyan refused to let Ismark come with us to find Doru. Vasili quickly volunteered himself to go… half of the party didn’t like that, but decided to let him come anyways.

After a day of travel and an experience with Strahd himself stealing the symbol of ravenkind while one party member was on watch, my character realized that he was missing his special item from Ezra. Everyone was instantly suspicious of Vasili and had my character go search him in private. As my character was about to touch him, he said “touch me and I fucking kill you,” in a completely different accent. There’s a bit of back and forth, but my character promised that he won’t tell anyone in the party. That was when Vasili morphed back into Strahd.

And, again, I was still shocked even though we had been saying Vasili was Strahd the entire time! I think that was part of the fun of it, being suspicious of him and making jokes about it and such.

But the shock isn’t only that Vasili is Strahd, but also that Strahd made his alter ego look exactly like Sergei. It’s a big double whammy that really emphasizes Vasili’s character and the meaning behind him.

TL;DR bullet point list on what made us suspicious of Vasili, leading to his… honestly surprisingly quick reveal:

Vasili’s sudden appearance and seemingly quick relationship with Kolyan in the time we were gone

Directly because of that initial suspicion, the various (and conveniently high-rolled) checks we did on him basically told us that Vasili was hiding something, not necessarily that he was Strahd, but that he was working with him

Him referring to the sun god with a different name (i think; maybe not necessarily important but i think it definitely made some of us a little confused)

An important magical item that connected one of the characters to Ezra going missing around the time they re-entered Barovia. This one only really added suspicion on Vasili because we already were suspicious that he was, at the absolute least, working with Strahd (also due to some conveniently high rolls).

All in all, your players will always surprise you. What may have been a red flag for us may not necessarily be a red flag for them. I think we were a little lucky with getting information on Vasili because we were rolling fairly well during our interactions with him. And I will reiterate, even with everything that made me suspicious, I figured that Vasili worked closely with Strahd, not that he quite literally was Strahd. And even though I guessed that he wasn’t as good of a person as he tried making himself seem, he still was technically making an effort to help us in our travels, which i think was also important.

I can’t give you very specific advice or anything because I don’t know anything about your Strahd or how your players view him. All I can say is to defy their expectations enough to make them think he’s somewhat of an ally, but keep some hints of Strahd’s key traits so he’s not a completely different character. Maybe there’s a little something Strahd is known to like or dislike and Vasili is unable to hide it. Maybe, if Strahd has already met some of them, Strahd dislikes or likes one of the pc’s more than the others and Vasili subconsciously reflects that!

Final reflection: Vasili, to me, has an inherent disconnection from other people. Whether it’s due to entitlement or due to just a flat out lack of understanding how other people work, there’s a disconnection. That’s what links him to Strahd, because when you don’t truly understand other people, it gets hard to pretend to be someone else. Unless, maybe, the thing you’re pretending to be is something you’ve always wanted... I also find it a bit comical

Whatever you come up with, no matter how it turns out or how fast your players solve it, I’m sure it will end up being very fun :~)

[mitsuhirei]

Once is Forever

(Harry x Reader Smut)

The continuation of Harry and MC’s relationship following their special late night call from both "Just This Once" and "Once is Not Enough". And the final part in the Once, Twice, Thrice series.

CW: Please use discretion while reading as there are spoilers in this fic series from day 35+ to roughly day 170, and then a canon divergence.

[Click to read Part 1 | Click to read Part 2]

Not a day passes when the words Harry shared aren’t on his mind.

“Then come here.” He’d said while his weirdo had been on the other side of the line. “Find a way or I’ll go there.”

Being swept up in emotion was something he’d always disliked, yet he’d declared what he had so passionately it’d shocked him. And nothing had become of it.

Meeting his weirdo is easier said than done. With each passing day, his bold declaration that the two of them will meet loses weight.

He’s thought up at least forty different ways to provide his address and get around Piu Piu’s filter, but she doesn’t humour him with any opportunities to offer that information. Never so much as breathes a word of venturing out to meet him.

But he doesn’t ask for hers either.

Travelling to her would leave him without his few comforts. His local acquaintances, familiar landmarks, and his home to seek refuge in should anything go poorly. So, she should come to him. He has all the means and resources.

Yet, wondering when that time will come is unbearable. It eats at him like fire on twigs during a drought. So after weeks of dropping subtle hints and making noncommittal comments about where they would go, what they could do, and things he’s collected in his place for her, he broaches the topic.

“Doesn’t your patience have limits?” he asks that evening while they’re on the phone.

“That’s a weird thing to bring up. Has something happened?”

“I don’t ask about things needlessly.”

“Yes, I’m aware.”

But there’s no elaboration. Instead, he remains in her silence, waiting for a reply that’s unlikely to come.

“What’s the answer?” He presses. “Why are you so quiet?”

“I wondered if my answer is something I should share.”

“I want to know as much as I can about you. Tell me.”

“I used to think I had patience. Now I’m not so sure.”

He notices the reserved tone of her voice and the hidden meaning in it. In fact, after everything that’s happened between them, she hadn’t been the same. Cheerful, sure, but not nearly as forthcoming. Nor as flirtatious.

And that bothered him. What could he do to retrieve what he’d lost? He’d never been this sensitive to another person before.

“If you have something to say,” Harry starts, “say it. I don’t like complicated things.”

“Neither do I. Not anymore.”

“Then talk to me. I like your directness.”

“Being direct also means I get hurt.”

“You say that like it’s a new thing. Haven’t you always known that?”

He hears that same laugh he heard all those months ago before their foolish night together happened. His chest tightens. The impending doom of unwinding progress hangs overhead.

“I knew. But my head’s not in the clouds anymore.”

“Say what you want to say.”

But for the first time in a long, long time, he’s worried about hearing it.

“I waited for you to come see me, Harry. Or to ask me to see you. I tried to give you my information before.”

“That was just once,” he counters.

“Once is enough compared to your zero.”

“It’s one and one. I suggested you come here, but if you’d prefer not to count that because it wasn’t direct enough, fine. Come here.”

“No.”

It’s the firmest denial he’s ever heard from her. And searching far back in their relationship, he can’t recall a time she’s ever said that word and meant it. Perhaps that’s why it’s so jarring.

“I won’t come see you,” she finalizes.

Harry’s grip tightens on his phone as the sentence weighs on him like a thousand bricks.

“Why?”

“Because I doubt I can manage myself well before you.”

“Am I someone you have to manage yourself in front of? When did that happen?”

“It’s been happening. Surely you’ve noticed. You aren’t ignorant of social cues, you just choose to ignore them.” He begins his counterargument, but she continues. “I need this distance to respect what you asked of me. To manage my feelings. So I should stay away.”

“What I asked of you was to come here, but never mind. I’ll go there, so—”

“We’re not doing this. I’d like to sort myself out before I get carried away with expectations again.”

“Can you hear what I say before you decide? You sound like you’re leaving.”

Her silence is answer enough.

That’s when he realizes his mistake. That there’s such a thing as too much time.

He calls her name softly. Hears her breath quiver in his ear.

“I start every day with you. Whenever I don’t hear from you, I wonder where you are, what you’re doing, and in what state. Everywhere I go, everything I do, I always think about how you’ll feel about it, and when I can tell you.” He pauses meaningfully. “Say it again. Do you really think I don’t care about you?”

He can’t breathe because she’s still silent. She can’t misunderstand him when he’s confessed like that, can she?

“Why aren’t you answering?”

“Because you’re good with words, but I won’t get swept away again. I don’t want to be a fool a third time.”

“You won’t—”

“I will. It’s a pattern now. One of us has to break it off.”

“What should I say when you deny it with such certainty? You know I’m bad at this.”

“You don’t have to say anything. I’ll make this uncomplicated and handle myself.”

“I’ve prepared a lot for you, and I’ve changed too.”

“There’s no point in telling me that.”

“Why? You don’t care?”

“Of course I do. I care too much,” she snaps. “Look, reality’s come. That’s all this is. You were right from the beginning. It’s better not to touch something this emotional—This volatile.”

“So you’re leaving, no matter what?”

“...I’ll see you on Tuesday if you feel like talking.”

It’s Friday. That’s a paltry three days to recover.

Yet, although he opens his mouth to argue, he recalls she had a mere handful of hours following his rejection of her feelings. Bringing up any comparison will rend him into a deeper grave.

“Go then.”

But he can’t bring himself to hang up the phone. He waits two long, agonizing minutes until she does so.

It sets in during the minutes afterwards when she doesn’t phone him back, that he’s been rejected.

***

“Harry!” Malong’s cheery voice echoes through his penthouse as he bolts into his bedroom. “I have everything ready for your big day today! I don’t know who you met, but I’m wishing you all the—Why do you look so dejected? Are you nervous?”

Harry is seated on his bed with his head in his hands.

“Shall I leave the basket on the bedside table?”

“If you do, I’ll fling it at you,” Harry threatens.

Malong flinches. “Why are you in such a bad mood? I thought today was an important day?”

“Leave me alone.”

“Did something happen? You can talk to me.”

“Malong.”

“What’s up?”

“Are you deaf? Get out of my sight before I teach you the true meaning of homelessness.”

“Ahaha...” Malong retreats. “I’ll come back when you feel better.”

Where?

Just where had he gone wrong this time? He thought things would work out.

No, he should be happy that someone’s respecting his boundaries. If she’s had her fun and now she’s bored of him, then so what? What’s new about that feeling? He would’ve confessed to her today. He would’ve made things official. But now it’s her loss.

Yet, no matter how much air he pulls in, or what argument he makes, his chest is unbearably tight. He should be used to this, but there’s an encroaching, unexplainable emptiness overtaking him.

It’s fine.

Being alone is nothing new. He couldn’t have been the person she needed him to be. Selfishness, conceit, callousness, those are his essence. Such a bright person deserves to be with someone as vibrant as she is. Yet, he feels so sick at the thought that he covers his mouth and a cold sweat breaks out over his forehead.

No. He should get a hold of himself. Being so emotional is what leads people to ruin. This is fine.

If she hadn’t tossed aside her feelings for him today, then eventually. That impending day she would’ve truly realized he can’t adore her like a normal person could, it would’ve come. He couldn’t have stopped it even if he’d taken a step to be the person she wanted, this was the final destination.

So...This is nothing.

Harry gasps and tugs at the collar of his shirt.

It’s because of the stiff fabric that he can’t breathe. That he feels stifled.

But...

To be left first? To be so consumed by the chance of more without the ability to bring it to fruition. It’s—

Harry forces himself into the kitchen and pours a glass of water.

He’ll enjoy a glass and move on. He’ll shake this off like everything that’s bothered him in his life. Moving on as normal is as easy as hydrating. He’s free to return to how he was before. Loneliness is his status quo.

“Harry!”

Malong seizes his arm and the empty pitcher. There’s water all over the counter, and it’s spilling onto the floor. The glass Harry meant to drink from is flooded. Water leaks everywhere. Soaks his clothes.

Why did this happen? How could this happen? And why can’t he be numb to it?

He covers his face with shaking hands.

“Why don’t you lie down?” Malong suggests. “Go back to sleep today. Whatever happened, I’m sure tomorrow will be better.”

Harry doesn’t respond.

Because this doesn’t feel like normal, or like anything he’s experienced before. It’s more gripping. More intrusive. As if she stripped him of a fundamental part of himself that was just healing.

Malong manoeuvres a shoulder around him. “I’ll take you back to your room. So just rest, okay?”

***

It’s midnight when Harry’s lucid enough to log into the app. There are no new messages. No calls.

So he taps her contact information. The call disconnects before it rings. Piu Piu’s flapping wings blink on his smartphone.

“Sorry, but that’s a bad idea,” Piu Piu’s voice advises.

“It’s my device.”

He initiates the call, and Piu Piu ends it. 

“She needs time.”

“Having time isn’t necessarily a good thing.”

“Harry, go back to bed.”

He sucks in a deep, long breath. “Shall I break you today?”

“E-Even if you do, I’ll fulfil the order I was given!”

Those words cut him.

“She asked you to do this?”

“You got space when you rejected her, so you should reciprocate.”

“If we’re reciprocating, then I should be able to call and send her messages.”

Piu Piu shuts down the third attempt at contact. So Harry throws his phone on his bed and grabs his coat.

“Where are you going?”

“Since my phone’s broken, I’ll buy a new one.”

“It’s midnight!”

“Then I’ll buy one off whoever I see.”

“I’ve spoken to her the most between the two of us! Can’t you listen to my advice?”

“Has your advice ever worked for us?”

Harry has a short fuse today, so the venom comes out.

“We’re here because of you. Don’t forget that. Everything. It’s your fault. You prattled on about love, and pushed, and pushed, and now look where we are? If neither of us ever had these ridiculous thoughts… Then…!”

“Do you really believe that...?”

“I told you from the beginning, since your ridiculous app accosted me, that love isn’t something I’m capable of!”

“Then why are you so distraught?”

He falters, just long enough that something pricks his mind. He seizes his jacket and zips it up hard enough that it bites into his skin. There’s no sense in conversing with Piu Piu. Not when time is of the essence.

“I can reason with her. I’ve had time to collect my thoughts.”

Harry’s palm rests on the door handle. He stuffs his keys into his coat pocket.

“Things won’t go the way you expect if you take the logical approach,” Piu Piu warns. “I’ve made mistakes, but you should believe me on that.”

“I’ve verified something I was curious about.”

“Huh?”

“You didn’t comment on my ability to call her without you. This is the second time you haven’t.”

“Ah…” Piu Piu hesitates. “That’s because–”

“And those photos? Were any of them you?”

“I don’t know what photos you’re talking about, but I unlocked the software to do so on both ends since a month ago.”

“That’s all I wanted to know.”

Harry locks the door behind him.

***

The first call goes unanswered, so Harry phones again. When that goes to voicemail too, he dials again. Perhaps it’s crude and crazy, but he’ll try it as many times as it takes. If he could speak with her just once, perhaps things may change.

“Sir,” the pilot shares. “You can’t stand here. It’s a safety hazard.”

Harry dials again with no success as he follows the worker somewhere safer on the tarmac. Once he’s in place, the old gentleman lingers.

Planes take off overhead, and the vicious wind they stir up nearly steals Harry’s jacket. The industrial lights are blinding.

“Did you need anything else?” The pilot asks. “A watch, or maybe–”

“I have what I need, and I’m tending to an emergency.”

“O-Of course. Pardon me.”

The man wanders away, but he has a guilty walk similar to Malong. Harry scowls at the phone he bought. It’s at least ten years out of date.

“I paid him an exorbitant fee, yet he wants more.” He tries to reign in his irritation. He can’t sound like that once he talks to her.

Every call he makes rings and rings.

“Hello?” His heart jolts when she answers. However, her voice is strained. She sniffles once before clearing her throat.

“Your address,” Harry declares. “I need it.”

“Harry? What? How did you–”

“Give it to me. This isn’t my phone. Piu Piu can’t interfere.”

There’s a rustling sound on her end.

“Do you know what time it is? I’m supposed to be sleeping.”

“Then should I fly all over the world for the rest of my life looking for you?”

“You won’t do that.” She’s alert now. “No, don’t do that.”

He lowers his phone from his ear and waves to the team on standby. “Start the plane.”

The sound of the engines is deafening.

“It’ll take me a few years, so stay put.”

“You’re joking, right? You aren’t actually at the airport, are you?”

“I want to see you or I’ll regret it,” he admits. His gaze falls to his mismatched shoes. “I don’t want to make a mistake. I won’t miss the timing again.”

“...If you’re acting on impulse, we’re going to hurt each other.”

“There’s no way for us to be close without that happening.”

“I’m sure what you’re saying is great, but I can hardly hear you over the plane, you loon.”

He signals again. The tarmac falls quiet.

“I’ve never begged anyone in my life. Do you know that?”

“New experiences are good for you,” she laughs on the other side, but that can’t hide the fact she’s tearing up. He doesn’t know what to do when she cries.

“Then give me more of them. Where are you?”

There’s another rustling sound, then punishing silence.

Will she say no again?

At the height of anxiety, he calls her name. He meant to say it tenderly, but it’s a rougher, more urgent sound.

“It’s [System: /address blocked/].”

Harry swallows. His legs feel weak. He leans against the wall for support. 

“I didn’t get it... The system still...”

“Blocked it? I figured.”

She sounds distant now. As if in that single moment, a wall shot up between them.

“We’ll find another way,” he offers. “I have ideas.”

“No, perhaps this is for the best. I should take the time I need and think about this. I promise I’ll speak to you again on Tuesday.”

“Why?” He panics. “Why are you still going? I’m here. I’m–”

“Because I need time. I’ve never stopped thinking about the sentiment you shared before. Our relationship will have longevity if we stay friends. If we stay friends, we won't feel so hurt, longing to meet when it's hard, or expecting things and being disappointed.”

“Don’t you understand the life I’ve lived that led me to say that to you?”

Her breath stutters. He hears the hesitation.

“All the more reason I should respect your boundaries.”

The underlying guilt he hears in her voice makes him call her name again.

“I’m sorry, Harry. I’ll go first.”

The call ends.

***

Time goes by in a daze following that day. Harry spends all weekend trying to pinpoint where she accepted the call to no avail. She’s always on his mind.

When he sleeps, two types of dreams torment him. On good days, she stays with him, but never long enough to soothe his aching heart. On bad days, she vanishes from his life without a trace she’d ever been there.

A delirium about her existence takes over that’s only soothed by screenshots of conversations with her, and the tattoos she suggested that remain on his skin.

The pleasures of life, of another person’s presence, are a curse now that they’re known to him.

So when Tuesday comes and his phone dings, he dissuades himself from answering. But the unknown string of letters awaiting him on his device haunts him.

When he reads the text message, there’s no denying his relief that she’s still contacting him.

They continue to talk, slipping back into their usual pattern. But there are changes. She never says anything flirtatious anymore. And the way he clings to her every word contrasts with the mutual nonchalance they share in their continued interactions.

Because when he’s alone, truly alone, his mind is dominated by thoughts of her.

He remembers her moans from that night like a siren’s song, and without fail, he drops everything he’s doing and gives in. The decorum he prides himself on falls into shambles from longing, desire, and loss. He strokes his cock more in the following months than he ever did during puberty. His sole saving grace is that he always does so at home, even if the fervour strikes him while he’s about.

She prides him on his new ability to disengage from situations without knowing the true underlying cause. He departs so he can be alone and settle his thoughts of her.

Countless times he brings himself to completion while imagining situations with her he’d never in a million years considered. A taste, a glimpse of what’s been unknown to him, consumes him.

Before long, his desires spill over into other aspects of his life. Like a trained dog, he’s instantly affected by the most mundane things she texts, or says while on the phone, because she’s said as much in his fantasy.

The harder he tries to bring himself to heel, to choke down everything he’s feeling, the fiercer it grips him.

He wants her to want him. He misses her blatant affection. But his poker face remains, as ironclad as he’s always presented it to be in his life outside a handful of moments. Even as he spirals deeper and darker.

Harry, I got new socks today.

He wishes he could tug them off. Promises to caress her ankles better than any fabric could.

I tried this cafe lately.

If only he could taste whatever she’d eaten on her lips. To press her into any table and devour something other than food.

It was so rainy ;;;;;

Rainy enough to leave her clothes socially unacceptable? For him to suck chilled droplets off her skin?

The thoughts are as pleasurable as they are tortuous. After all, he’ll never meet her. Perhaps with enough perverse actions he’ll burn out? That’s the only hope left for him. But he’s at his wits’ end six months later and there’s no sign of it cooling off.

He’s at a function with Malong on a Friday evening, trying to get drunk enough to quit thinking. The event is in a high-rise sixty floors up, with massive tinted windows on all sides flaunting the cityscape below.

Unfortunately, he’s been at the party for two hours already, and Malong has ruthlessly monitored his alcohol intake. To the point that a thimble of alcohol would feel like drowning in liquor.

When Harry gives up and approaches the bar, Malong drags him outside.

It’s frigid and dreary. The clouds will break open with thunder and rain in the next half hour. The streets are eerily quiet for a weeknight downtown.

“Harry, quit trying to drink so much! I need you sharp and focused tonight.”

He should’ve drunk at home, but then he would’ve thought of her. These days, he doesn’t trust himself to be alone with his thoughts.

“We’ll celebrate afterwards, so do your job until then,” Malong continues. “If anyone talks to you while we’re here, you’ve gotta pass them my card, okay?”

“What are you peddling this time? I thought you said I only have to stand with you?”

“And you are. Passing out a thing here or there is the same as standing.”

His glare bounces off Malong. His friend leans against the golden statue of a cog-wheel at the entrance and passes him an expensive-looking card.

“We’re here for my business. I’ve got a great one this time! I just need investors.”

Harry scans the print. “On-demand slipper service?”

“Yes.” Malong puffs up proudly. “Think of it like a subscription service for house slippers.”

“Nobody’s going to use this.”

“Of course they will! Think of all the times you’ve wanted slippers instead of shoes, yet you didn’t have the right kind for where you were going. That’s where I come in! My business will be there for people like that. Eventually, I’ll do themed slippers. I’m also planning to market the health benefits of changing slippers every week.”

Harry sighs very hard.

“Sure. Okay. How many cards are you handing out?”

“Three hundred. I foil-printed every card so I refuse to go home with any. You take two, I’ll take one.”

“Two only?”

“No.” Malong slaps most of the stack into Harry’s hand with a grin. “Two hundred.”

An hour later, when everything but breathing irritates him, Harry wants to go home. He’s weary of pretending to care about the host alongside Malong, who schmoozes for a modicum of the lifestyle he used to enjoy.

So, he tugs out his phone. His thumb hovers over the call button, but it’d be a terrible idea to phone his weirdo. She’s travelling for a few days for work, so they’ve spoken less than usual today. And he’s feeling it.

She said she’d be done with the proposal presentations by ten o’clock, which is about now. Yet, she hasn’t messaged.

“Harry,” Malong calls through gritted teeth. “These people won’t talk to me unless you say something first.”

His friend elbows him as they stand aside at the gala. Then he nudges him again in a gesture Harry understands means for him to glance up and smile, but he can’t be bothered.

“They won’t talk to you because you have nothing to offer them,” Harry replies while scrolling his phone.

When will there be a new message?

“Come on, man. I brought you as my partner for a reason. I need you to address all the people who want to talk to you, so I can talk to them.”

“When are you going to do something worthwhile with your life?”

“I’m trying right now.”

“This isn’t that. You haven’t learned a thing.”

“And you’re the same too! I thought you’d changed, but you won’t help me! You never help me.”

That’s the final straw of the night.

“What? Who’s helped you more than I have? Who?”

“You claim you have, but you haven’t!”

“You realize I bailed you out of jail, but you’re telling me such nonsense?”

“I practically begged you to do that, so don’t lord it over me! You wouldn’t have helped me otherwise.”

“How about you use your brain and think about everything that’s happened between us before you open your mouth again?”

That sets Malong off. “You’ve been especially insufferable lately, you know that? Quit taking your anger out on me!”

Malong storms off post-tantrum. Harry doesn’t have any patience left to follow.

Everyone around him is so ungrateful. Everyone except—He stops the thought there. Comparisons only make him miss her more. He’s meant to shake off his desires for her instead of slipping further into them.

Reconciling with the fact he’ll remain sober until he makes it home, Harry scans his messages again.

“A-Ahem. Hello? Harry Choi?”

He refreshes his messages instead of addressing whoever’s approached.

“Here he is. I told you he was over here!”

“Harry, how’s your father–”

There’re a slew of other voices but he ignores them all. Usually, he’d fake politeness, but that’s truly tiresome at the moment. He wants to drink enough to sleep dreamlessly once he makes it home. That’s it. When will it be appropriate to do that? After he attempts to assist Malong, maybe?

A gathering has formed around him. It’s full of people chatting amongst themselves as if he had spoken to any of them. Ironically Malong is nowhere to be seen, although the crowd he wanted has arrived. Harry reaches into his pocket for the cards and offers one to the person before him.

“Have this.”

The brown-haired woman snatches it up with delight. “Oh, is this your business card? Thank you so much!”

Another person rushes forward. “I’d love one too! Take one of mine.”

“So you know, it’s not my card,” Harry corrects, but it gets lost amongst the bustle of people clamouring over him to have one. As always nobody among them actually listens to him. He was never so sensitive to it before, but it depresses him to no end now.

His phone buzzes while he’s half-heartedly passing out cards.

I know you’re out too, but I’m almost done for the night! Wish me a safe trip back to my hotel! Hope I won’t have to swim there.

His spirits lift when he sees the photo beneath the message.

She’s beautiful in her black dress, posed in a lavish entrance hall. It’s raining heavily behind her.

He’s happy just to see her until he spots something in the background. A golden cog statue.

His eyes widen. A waiter with drinks passes by.

“Take these.”

He slaps the rest of Malong’s business cards into the bewildered man’s palm.

“Huh? Sir–”

Harry dashes out of the ballroom.

Stay put.

Why? I’ve no more work, remember? I’m trying to hail a cab and get out of this rain.

Just stay!

He bumps into someone and hurriedly apologizes without stopping. He slams the buttons for the elevator, but it climbs towards the sixtieth floor at a snail’s crawl.

How far are the stairs? He’s liable to trip rushing down them so it’s safer to take the elevator.

:( Every cab is full. How can I get back at this rate?

Can’t you listen to me and stay where you are?

I don’t want to freeze! Do you want a friend, or a popsicle? Lol

The elevator arrives and from its enormous glass windows, he can see the world outside. It’s dark, and most of the light comes from the city’s various buildings, streetlights, and the few cars that drive by. Rain savagely pelts the world outside, but he hunts for her. There are too many people wearing black, but he doesn’t stop searching while he has the vantage point.

Do me a favour. Look backwards.

What?

He spots the one person on their phone who turns around and glances about. His heart pounds as he tries to maintain his composure on the tortuously slow ride to the ground floor.

No way... Do you see me or something...?

With a chime, he’s free of the elevator. The race across the lobby and out into the rain feels as long as the elevator did.

The same person who’d glanced back tries to hail a cab, and he beelines for her. When he calls her name, she spins around with wide eyes.

The surprise he sees upon her face, the anxiety, it matches his own. Yet he steps forward.

Seeing her in person he doesn’t know what to do with himself. He’s pictured the moment more times than he cares to admit. Of her rushing over and linking her arms around him, and him doing the same. But there’s too much distance now for such a display. They’re frozen across from one another.

Her step forward breaks the trance. Her arms go around him in an embrace he’d assumed he’d lost. And he squeezes her back. As close as he possibly can without crushing her. Finally being able to touch her feels so good that he buries his face against her cold neck. She smells divine. Whichever soap and perfume she uses is as natural on her skin as air is in his lungs.

The rain has soaked her. She’s horribly cold, and he’s gradually freezing too, yet he’s never felt so warm. Her arms link tighter around him. He suppresses a shiver as one of her hands slips through his hair.

Then she eases away. It takes everything in him not to tug her back against him. Especially when she gives him a brilliant smile that completely disarms him.

He can’t believe his eyes. That she’s real despite touching her already. So he swipes a few water droplets off her cheek. While her skin is cold, it’s also soft. It’s really her.

“I think I used up all my luck for the year with this,” she shares shyly. “Suppose it’s a good thing I couldn’t catch a cab right away.”

“I’m glad you couldn’t.”

“Yes, well, I’m soaked and I’m only getting wetter, but hi Harry. It’s nice to meet you.” She gestures behind her. “I will need to catch my cab now.”

And just like that, she turns around and continues what she was doing. He’s drawn forward behind her as if they’re two magnets.

Rain pelts both of them, and he tries to keep his eyes off the way her silken dress clings to her damp skin.

She’ll leave if she gets in a cab. He feels that with certainty. Then they won’t spend any other time together. He can’t let that happen.

But how can he spend as much time with her as possible? The fastest way is to indebt her to him. Nobody who has a debt to repay leaves easily.

So, Harry strips off his coat and covers her wet attire with it. A good choice since she’s shivering.

“Oh, I appreciate it but now you’re getting drenched.” She touches her shoulder and tries to take it off, but his grasp stops her. An unspoken signal to keep it.

“Where’s your umbrella and coat?”

“I took an umbrella, but it was so hot I left my coat in my suitcase. I don’t want to risk opening my luggage in this weather, and I thought it’d be easier to catch a cab.”

His eyes drop to her left palm where the bag’s getting battered by the elements.

“As for my umbrella, the storm killed it.”

She points up the street, and he sees an overturned umbrella with snapped lining billowing further into the distance.

Although he was annoyed with Malong earlier, he’s thankful to him now. “I’ll drive you. Where are you going?”

“That’s kind of you, but it’s okay.”

She steps out of his touch and twists away to hail a cab again. However, she’s noticeably flushed.

Harry glances down at his attire. It fairs about as well as hers. The sole difference is social acceptance.

“Let me give you a ride,” he offers again.

“I have all my work materials with me, I wouldn’t want to burden you.”

“You standing out here freezing is burdening me.”

“I’ll live. Besides, I’m looking forward to putting my feet up after a long day. You want the same, right? Hurry home, we’ll talk later.”

He figured this would happen but not to this degree. All offers in his life have been transactional but that approach won’t work here. She’s an iron wall.

He tries again, “Let me take you where you’re going so I know you got there safely.”

“You hate mess in your car. I’d get water everywhere.”

“You’re more important than some water on my seats.”

“That’s new.” She smiles that dazzling smile again. “There you go tugging my heartstrings. I appreciate the thought, I do, but I’ll do this on my own. Since we’ve met, why don’t we get coffee tomorrow or something?”

She knows he doesn’t drink coffee. It’s a dismissive offer.

So, he takes the last, perhaps most childish route, and seizes her suitcase handle. He stalks towards his car with it.

“H-Hey! Harry!”

She runs after him, so he moves faster. By the time she catches up, he’s already closed her bag in his trunk.

He turns with the passenger door open for her.

“Okay! Gosh, you’re stubborn. Thank you for the ride.”

She eases past him into the seat, and as he closes the door, he relishes in the small victory.

***

Most of the drive is silent, with only the gentle ambiance of the vehicle’s heater and the rain hitting the windows. Harry refuses to turn on the radio as he doesn’t want to miss a single word she says. However, she seems content to sit quietly until they arrive. He has to attempt to start a conversation.

“How was the flight?” he asks.

“Long and exhausting. I had a transfer, a layover, and then my team had those presentations two hours after we landed. I can’t wait to get to my hotel and eat.”

Seems she hasn’t lost her passion for food.

“So your plans for the evening are eating?”

“Yes. Then I’m flopping right into bed and passing out. I’ve heard the hotel is amazing, I can’t wait to see it.”

Just the hotel?

“Have I sent you too many pictures of my place? I thought you’d be eager to visit.”

“Haven’t you considered that phrasing may be too forward?”

“I know what I said.”

The GPS on her phone tells him to make a right turn.

“There’s not much to do at your place,” she aptly deflects.

“If it’d bore you don’t come.”

She sits up in her seat. “Are you pouting?”

“I’m not. Haven’t I always entertained you?”

“Well, I’ll go if you say please.”

He looks at her, then turns back to the road.

“What’s this?” she giggles. “I thought you were a good boy, so I’m surprised you didn’t say it.”

“Please come over at least once during your trip.”

It’s momentarily quiet, the effect of his words landed. Yet, she turns and stares out the window.

“As far as I know, I don’t have much free time off from work, but I’ll try for you.”

His hands are tight on the steering wheel. Being in her presence is far more effective than thinking about her. Despite the innocent interaction, his skin feels tight.

“Pull up here,” she says. “That’s the place on our right.”

He can’t believe the drive is over. It was hardly a whole ten minutes. Still, he parks the car. All the while trying to figure out another way to stay with her.

“Thanks for the ride. I’ll message you later.”

Harry shoves off his seatbelt and leans across to unlatch hers. Her hands are faster.

“I’ve got it. Thank you.”

The latch clicks. Cold air sweeps over him as she leaves the car. The rain is so much harsher than it was ten minutes ago.

She taps the trunk, but he gets out of the car instead of popping it. He removes her suitcase and gestures towards the hotel.

There’s nothing subtle about his stubbornness. He can tell as much from the look she gives him, but he pretends not to see it.

The hotel sports a vista of trees, foliage, and flowers, yet its quaint arched, glass vestibule opens up into an expansive modernist lobby. Gleaming marble, pristine lights, and a respectable mix of wicker and fabric furnishing promise every patron both comfort and luxury. It’s utterly ordinary to him, but his weirdo gasps once she’s inside. Her glittering, awe-filled expression is as adorable as it is enchanting.

She buttons his blazer across her damp clothes as she approaches the front desk. Harry stands back to give her some privacy.

However, twenty minutes later when she hasn’t come to collect her bag, he wonders if something’s gone wrong. He glances at her.

“Please, can you check again?” she asks. “The company I work for guaranteed my accommodation. My name’s spelled…”

He shouldn’t eavesdrop. Yet, from the sound of it, she may need to stay somewhere else tonight. He folds his arms and taps his foot to keep himself occupied.

If she can’t check in, would she stay with him? How long should he wait before it’s appropriate to suggest that?

And if she stays at his place...

He clears his throat. Now’s not the time to get carried away. He can’t rush home as easily as before. Not while she’s here.

Another ten minutes go by before he approaches the counter and stops beside her.

“Is everything okay? If you’re having trouble checking in—”

She flashes him her hotel keycard with a smile. “All good! I’ve got it settled. They found me.”

It’s a good thing, yet a strange sensation burns his throat. His eyes flick over the important information on the key. Her room is on the twelfth floor. Number 1207.

“As I’m practically freezing to death, I’m heading up now. Thanks again, Harry.”

He means to go with her as he still has her suitcase. The kiss she plants on his cheek is unexpected. He lets go, and she snatches it from his hand then retreats into the elevator. When he recovers he follows her, but arrives just as the elevator closes.

Without a keycard, it’s impossible to interact with the elevator to go anywhere except down. So, he lingers feeling possessed. 

“I’m soaked too. Isn’t it too cold to leave me here?” he grumbles. But with his senses returned thanks to her disappearance, he can head home and shower.

Though thanks to the lingering sensation of her lips on his skin, he knows that won’t be all he does. 

He’s halfway to the door when a hand seizes his arm. He glances back. She’s the one holding him. Her expression is genuinely worried.

“I thought you knew I was joking. You aren’t really leaving like that, are you?”

***

Her hotel room is a one-bedroom apartment equipped with everything from a sofa to a kitchenette.

As her guest, she tells him he can shower first, but he declines. He’d rather she were warm. Besides, the cold keeps his deplorable thoughts at bay.

When he showers after her, the ulterior motives of his mind grip him. She used her own shampoo and soaps, so it smells richly of her inside the tall stall.

His cock stays hard although he washes his body innocently. He grits his teeth to keep himself in check, lest he truly pass the point of no return.

Thankfully, he’s flaccid once he’s dried his hair, but the ache settles in his stomach like stones. He tugs on his boxers and somewhat dry pants doing his damndest to ignore inappropriate thoughts. His shirt, unfortunately, is too far gone.

There’s a knock on the bathroom door.

“Harry, I’ve left a shirt for you on the dresser once you’re done.”

That solves the problem then.

He steps out. She’s adjusted the heat since he got in the shower. It’s warmer in the bedroom than it was before.

A large men’s-sized shirt awaits him on the dresser as she said. It’s well-worn. He blocks out any notion of another man in her life who gave her the shirt she’s lending to him.

But then whose shirt is it? 

“Before you misunderstand, I have a variety of shirts like that for different summer outfits and pyjamas.”

She leans, arms folded, against the doorway. Her new attire, dark leggings, and a hoodie, look vastly comfier than what she had on before.

It also hides virtually all of her skin and her figure. A miracle. Perhaps he can survive the visit without doing something foolish.

There’s a deliberate effort from her to keep her eyes on his face. He remembers he’s shirtless.

“I’m the only one who’s ever worn that,” she says. “So change comfortably.”

“I wasn’t assuming anything.”

“Uh-huh.” She points at her brows. “That’s why that crease between your brows vanished suddenly, right?”

“It’s there.”

“It’s not, but nice try—Oh. There it is.”

“Why are you standing there?” He’s flustered and refuses to look in her direction. “Shouldn’t you leave your guest to change in peace?”

“Sure. You were just taking a while, so I came to check on you. I’ll make us something to drink. Meet me in the living room.”

Harry slips on the shirt. However, when it comes to the last button he’d usually snap shut, he leaves it loose. After all, you have to look at least once to intentionally ignore what you choose not to see.

He sinks onto the sofa in the living room as she finishes making two warm drinks. Scanning the hotel room again, it’s decent enough to live in.

“Seems you work for a fine company?” Harry remarks.

“Don’t get me started. I’ve had enough chatter about work for the evening.”

“Just an observation.”

“Yes, well.” She hands him a warm mug. “We can observe more interesting things, can’t we?”

His mind whirls at the suggestive sentence although she likely didn’t mean it like that. So, he maintains a straight face.

She settles beside him on the sofa. He takes the swaying cup out of her palm, passing it back only once she’s comfy.

“I said it earlier, but I’m happy I’ve met you, Harry.”

His name always sounds so good coming from her lips.

“The feeling is mutual.”

She smiles. “Maybe it sounds cliche but I feel like I’m dreaming.”

“I’m real. You aren’t dreaming.”

“Yeah? Maybe I should affirm that?”

“Go ahead.”

He holds her gaze, even as uncertainty causes her to pause.

So, when she sets her drink aside and reaches out, his breath shakes.

She touches his face. Her fingers slide over his skin. His eyes slip closed. Such a simple touch makes his heart quiver. Her thumb sweeps across his cheekbone. Two of her fingers tuck under his chin. It goes on far longer than appropriate, but he’s longed for her.

“Are you still checking?”

“No...”

He opens his eyes to see what face she makes, but she forces her eyes elsewhere. Her hands retreat, wrapping safely around the beverage she sips at. Harry’s left with a pleasant, hazy feeling.

She must feel it too. The attraction. Otherwise, why would she be so quick to turn away? Why would she have reached out, to begin with?

“Are you nervous?” he asks.

“Honestly? Yeah. I’m trying so hard not to be awkward.”

“Don’t feel pressured. Just sitting here with you is enough.”

“But I want to talk to you,” she fidgets. “I’ve always thought about all the things I could tell you once I see you.”

“Talk about anything. I’ll listen to everything if it’s you.”

The silence between them feels electric.

“I’m still surprised. I don’t know how to act.”

“However you want.”

She stares at him again, but her expression is tragic. Saddened. Such honest affection, such care, he’s starved for it.

“You look tired. You know that? Are you sleeping okay?”

“No. Not lately.”

“Is there anything I can help you with?”

“Yes.” He could tell her everything he’s struggled with at this moment, but the timing isn’t right. “Talk to me. Tell me about your day.”

“That’s so simple.”

“I like simple.”

And so, she talks. She recounts in great detail her flights over, how the layover was, and every mundane thing that happened in between that. The things she saw that led her to message him, and the interesting things she saw.

All the while, while Harry listens, he studies her face. Commits every unfamiliar expression he sees to mind. At one point she props her feet up onto the coffee table, and he shifts them across his lap instead. She stays there with him.

For the first time in months, he’s at peace.

It’s well past midnight when their cups are empty and a natural lull falls in their conversation.

The frequency of her sleepy blinks and the growing delay in her responses betray her tiredness. He’s drifting off too when her thumb rubs the second button on his shirt.

“I can’t believe you did these all the way up.”

“I’ve left one.”

“Still. I never fasten that many. Aren’t you stuffy?”

The beautiful image his mind provides floors him.

He’s aware of her proximity. If she leaned in and undid more buttons, he’d let her. He’d let her do anything as long as it keeps her around longer. But the night is drawing to an end. She’s too sleepy to keep him company.

“Stop fighting it,” Harry suggests. “I’ll leave once you’re asleep.”

The room needed a keycard to open, so she’ll be safe when the door shuts behind him.

“That’s why I don’t want to sleep,” she admits. “It’ll be sad to wake up without you.”

“Do you know what you’re saying? How sleepy are you?”

“Sleepy enough to test my luck.”

There are so many things he wishes to say then. But of those things he feels he should say, there are extremely few.

No matter the depth of their closeness, they’ve each taken a step back. A line exists that he fears to cross lest she drift farther away. So he relents.

“...Then I’ll wait a while.”

Her palm settles on his arm, then she doses off.

He examines her as respectfully as he can despite the desire building inside him. Caresses her cheek as she did to him, amazed she’s so close.

His mind is blissfully empty.

This hunger for the touch of another person, he hopes this will be the first and last time he struggles with it. But perhaps, it’s because he’s unaccustomed to feeling anything from contact with another that this is so addictive.

He’s spent his whole life denying himself, but he doesn’t have to do that with her. Or at least, hadn’t had to until the rejection. Yet still, he’s here tripping over himself to catch her interest.

She still feels something for him too, doesn’t she? In person there’s no hiding it like she can in calls and messages.

But how can he coax that out of her? Directness, suggestiveness, she’s danced around it all. So what’s next?

Coming onto her? Pressing her at every opportunity hoping she’ll cave and reciprocate? Or perhaps throwing caution to the wind and tugging her against him?

He can’t stay here any longer. Illicit thoughts fill his mind, and he’s still pent up from earlier.

So, he extricates himself from under her and fetches a blanket from the bedroom. He drapes it over her gently before gathering his things.

“Harry…? Wow. It’s really you.”

He’s tugging on his shoes when he hears that. She stands behind him bundled in the blanket. However, she doesn’t seem entirely lucid. It’s like instinct more than anything else prompted her over.

He smiles. “You said that already.”

“I’m amazed again.”

Would she hug him again if he makes the offer?

“Is that why you’re standing so far?”

“Yes,” she tugs the sheets tighter around her. “I shouldn’t do anything else inappropriate to you.”

His disappointment is heavy on his shoulders.

But what else would she say? There’s a line between them. Now the only place he can have her is in dreams. The same dreams where she haunts him as much as she delights him.

Still…

He straightens with his shoes on. “Did I say you couldn’t?”

Harry opens his arms following that, and she steps into them. He squeezes her far longer than the first hug they shared. Her fingers comb through the hair at his nape. Goosebumps travel down his back.

“I’m glad I could see you,” she whispers. “Have a good night.”

It’s harder to pretend the words don’t affect him in person.

“Don’t you have more time for me while you’re here?”

“You’re cute. Very cute. I’d be a terrible host to keep you while I’m this tired.”

Another dismissal. Especially when she eases out of the hug.

It’s an unbearable goodbye. That thing he’s always found so simple before.

“Drive safe.”

She won’t bend. He has to leave.

Did he send her off in such a similarly brusque manner before? Is that why he’s paying for it now?

“Will I see you tomorrow?” he asks. Then corrects himself. “I want to see you tomorrow. Tell me when to be here.”

“Two o’clock. We can have lunch somewhere around that time. I should be done with work by then.”

“Okay.”

He can’t stall anymore.

When she smiles brightly, a vicious envy of her co-workers ensnares him. They’ll see her before he does. He hopes she doesn’t smile like that at others.

When the door closes an idea comes to him. There’s at least one way to encounter her even if all she does is work the rest of the weekend.

He heads downstairs.

***

The next day they meet for lunch as agreed upon at a new-age restaurant well known for its paninis and salads.

His weirdo arrives in a sundress and Harry wears something casual he knows he looks good in. She excitedly goes over her plans for the rest of her afternoon now that work is done. She’s got the rest of today and Sunday mostly to herself unless she’s called in since the proposal went through.

Thanks to that information he knows when she’s leaving. By early Monday morning she’ll be flying back home.

Last night, once his mind was clear, he vowed to make the most out of their time together. So, unlike last night, their atmosphere is tension-free. He follows her flow, although he can’t perfectly match her energy.

Lost in conversation, the server stops by four times before they finally look at their menus.

While he’s deciding which salad to order, a foot touches his ankle under the table. His date is the only one across from him, and it was likely an accident.

But the touch comes again and lingers. He glances at her but she’s reading the menu in utter nonchalance. Under the table her toes knead and stroke. His heart pounds. The foot play continues as high as his calves. He wants more.

The menu crinkles in his grip as he tries to maintain his composure. Whenever she presses down, he pushes into her touch. The higher her foot travels, the harder it is to keep his breaths relaxed. Before long his menu is forgotten. All he does is stare at her. Yet, she doesn’t glance up once.

Whatever relationship they have, it doesn’t include something like this. However, he doesn’t intend to stop her. Not now that her attention’s returned to him. The soft presses, although nice, aren’t enough. He laments that there’s an entire table bolted into the ground between them.

Harry eases his legs further into her reach so she has better access to his body. Her foot pauses. He awaits the next touches with bated breath. His pants are tight. Something so innocuous shouldn’t entice him, but that seems to be his new reality.

Too bad she draws her feet away.

“What are you doing?”

The question escapes him before he can think about it. But it’s less direct than his following thought, which is to demand she come back.

“Sorry, I’m absentminded today,” she turns the page on her menu. “I’ll mind my manners.”

This is how it usually ends. A slight push, a momentary respite, but never complete fruition. Even in his dreams, she’s like that. Pushing him as close to the edge as possible without relief.

If she keeps dipping her toe back over the line, then he can do the same, can’t he? That way they’ll continue such an amicable meal together, although he’s jealous of the very water passing through her lips. If he can’t push too, then how can he manage his sanity?

“You don’t need to.” Harry asserts.

“To what?”

“Mind your manners.”

She meets his gaze. A subtle red tint colours her cheeks.

“Whoa, Harry! What are you doing here? Who’s that?”

He swears inwardly when he hears Malong’s voice. And swears again when his date glances at Malong so easily when it took so long for her to look at him.

Malong invites himself to their table, sliding in right beside her. The same place Harry hadn’t dared sit.

“It’s nice to meet you. I’m—”

“Malong, right?” she finishes.

“Oh, you know me? Haha, I feel shy.” Harry glares at Malong. “You two out for lunch? I heard you left the gala early last night, Harry, and I wondered why, but I suppose I know now.”

“Did I take him from you?” She giggles. “I won’t apologize though.”

Malong pauses, momentarily astonished. Harry’s mood plummets through the floor.

“Ahem,” Malong clears his throat. “You’re the one who’s been chatting with that grump these days, right? Tain mentioned it before.”

“That’d be me, I hope? I think?”

“It is,” Harry affirms.

Malong leans in. “We’re practically friends through this cantankerous guy, so, why don’t we exchange contact information?”

“Oh, um—”

“Please?”

“Absolutely not.” Both of them turn to Harry. “Aren’t you supposed to be at work?”

“I’m on break from one of my jobs.”

“Then get going. Your break shouldn’t affect others.”

“Are you properly employed now?” she inquires.

“Quit talking to him. He won’t go away otherwise.”

“You’re being mean to your friend who’s just worried about you?” Malong turns back to her. “Come on, I promise you’ll want to know at least one other person he knows if he goes off the map.”

Malong tugs out his phone and slides it towards hers. Harry snatches up her device.

“Enough Jo.”

“Are you her dad? She can answer.”

“I appreciate the offer,” she starts. “But I’m fine without it. Harry and I already have a mutual acquaintance.”

“Like who? Tain?” He abandons her phone with Harry to press more on what she’s shared. “Even if you have him, think about it. Don’t you need an emergency contact for this guy? He’s always disappearing.”

“Then she knows better than to pick you.”

His weirdo’s watch buzzes. So does the phone in Harry’s hand. She stands upon reading it.

“Sorry, I have to take this.”

She excuses herself and Harry’s left at the table with his friend.

“If you stare at her any harder, you’ll punch holes through her face.” Malong remarks.

Harry sips his water, then measuredly sets it down. “Why are you bothering me when you stormed off yesterday?”

“That was yesterday. Today’s today! Besides, I thought she’d catch fire or something if I didn’t sit down.” Malong leans back in his seat. His eyes glint with mirth. “You want something from her, don’t you? Judging by how casual your conversation is, you two aren’t dating. I can’t believe I’m seeing this. Someone as stiff as you—”

“Focus on Audrey. Don’t bother me.”

Malong stiffens. “Why are you bringing her up?”

“You know why.”

“I won’t take that to heart since I’ve seen something so interesting–”

“Malong, since you won’t understand from context, get lost.”

“But if I do that nobody’s here to tell you about things, right?” His eyes flick over Harry’s shoulder. “You might want to collect your date. She’s pretty and someone other than me noticed too.”

Harry glances back. Although she left for a call, now she’s talking to some guy near the entrance of the restaurant. The stranger is showing her something on his device but she shakes her head. Her turned posture tells him she’s trying to leave the conversation, but the stranger’s in her personal space.

Harry arrives at her side. “Who’s this?”

“Oh, Harry. Sorry, I didn’t mean to make you look for me. He says he’s lost.”

His eyes flick over the stranger and the man straightens away from her. When he takes a step back, Harry understands that being “lost” is an excuse.

“Sorry. I didn’t mean to take up her time.” The young man sweats.

“Then leave.”

“Aha, well I’m just lost so—”

“Then ask the staff.” Harry seizes her hand. “Come.”

He leads her back to the table. Unfortunately, Malong’s still there, shifting guiltily in his seat. Harry surveys the table suspiciously but nothing seems out of place. He’s about to tell Malong to leave again, but he stands before there’s a chance to.

“My break’s nearly over so I have to head back. Thanks for having me.”

“We didn’t.”

“Don’t be like that. I’ll put in a good word for you with the chef.”

“Wait, you work here?” she gasps.

“Yeah! Temporarily. Which is why I thought Harry was here to see me until I saw you.”

Then as fast as he came, Malong’s gone. Unfortunately, so is Harry’s appetite.

“I didn’t know he worked here,” she apologizes. “I picked this place because of the reviews.”

“You couldn’t have known. I didn’t know until just now.”

“Well, we haven’t ordered yet. Want to swap restaurants?”

As much as he wants to, they’re already here. So he shrugs.

“He’s already seen us. Hopefully, he won’t come over again.”

Resigned, Harry reaches out for the menu but her grasp stops him.

“Come.”

She tugs him to his feet, and he stumbles behind her before he gets his bearings.

“Where are we going?”

“To eat somewhere else.”

“We don’t have to.”

“You’re bad at it, you know? Telling people no, that you’re uncomfortable, and meaning it. I’d like you to enjoy your time with me. You don’t have to sit here and bear it.”

Ah. So, that’s it. That’s why he feels as strongly about her as he does. Why it’s been nigh impossible to shake off his feelings.

Because she notices and responds to him. Because everyone else he’s ever known has told him it’ll be over after some minor discomfort. Everyone. Rachel. Tain. Big Guy. His parents. Everyone.

Yet, now that he understands, now what? How can he ever be the same again? Just because he knows doesn’t mean she’ll stay.

The free spirit and the puppet—The travelling merchant and the merman—The bird and the scarecrow... Such diametrically opposed concepts coexist together in fiction and in fiction only.

He’s glad she’s striding ahead of him because he doesn’t know what kind of expression he’s making.

***

Following lunch, Harry walks her back to her hotel. She says goodbye to him in the lobby, but they head in the same direction. When they’re on the elevator together, and he remains after she’s scanned her keycard, she turns to him.

“Harry?”

He reaches into his pocket, taps his keycard on the elevator keypad, and clicks the highest floor.

“I’m also heading back to my room,” he says. It’s nice to see her flustered. She wears it well.

“Were you staying here this whole time?”

“I’ll leave that to your imagination. Fantasizing is what you excel at.”

Her blush deepens, but she turns away. “I doubt I’m the only one excelling at that lately.”

He arches a brow wondering if he heard that right. But she doesn’t comment again and her gaze remains stubbornly forward.

They arrive on her floor, but he steps off with her.

“Why are you leaving?”

“What? Haven’t I told you to think about how things come across before you say them?”

“I do. Aren’t you free the rest of the day?”

“I thought we finished our plans with lunch, but if you have time, I’d love to be with you.”

“Then come up.”

Her phone rings for the second time that morning and she apologizes as she steps away to take the call. When she returns her expression tells him something’s called her away.

“Unfortunately, I’ve been called in. I’m sorry to vanish so suddenly.”

Time’s likely of the essence for her, so he opens his arms instead. Unlike last night, she hesitates a second, before stepping into them. Her arms come up, and his settle around her waist.

“Let me know when you’re done.”

“I will.”

She moves away but Harry holds onto her. Vividly imagines himself dipping forward and dragging her into the elevator. Instead, he slides his extra key card into her back pocket. Only then does he let go.

“Come up later. It’s on the forty-fifth floor. I’ll wait for you.”

Her phone rings again. She sighs but answers it.

“Yes? I’m on my way.” She waves at him one last time before stalking away to her room. “I left it in the joint file for everyone to access but if you need another copy...”

Eventually, she’s too far away to hear. He calls the elevator and leans against the wall on his ride up.

His hotel room is more extravagant than hers, yet as he stands alone in it, it feels vacant. Empty and unlived in despite the luxury.

She’ll be a while regardless of how he feels. There’s no sense in standing around aimlessly. So he strips off his clothing and unzips the overnight bag he’d haphazardly tossed onto the recliner after booking the room last night.

The private balcony has a pool, and it’s about time he used it.

***

Post evening shower, Harry finishes dinner alone and has several drinks. The room service is impeccable considering he booked the suite on such short notice.

Although he has a good buzz going, he’s spinning ice cubes around in his third glass of whiskey while he checks his phone. He hasn’t heard from his weirdo, and his message has no response. They got back to the hotel around four in the afternoon. It’s ten now. Shouldn’t she be done with whatever’s occupied her?

He sets his glass aside. “When did I become like this? It’s frustrating.”

“I can keep you company if you’d like?” Piu Piu chimes from Harry’s original smartphone. “We could play a game? Or what about a roleplay? You can be you and I can play—”

“I don’t need that.”

“Are you sure? You can get practice in for—”

“I just forgave you, but you’re testing your luck?”

Piu Piu’s dead silent.

It’d be better to take a night stroll than stay here any longer. A run would be better but he’d have to pick up a change of clothes to do so.

“Stay here. I’ll be back.” He scoops up his keycard and wallet.

“I can’t believe you keep going places without me,” Piu Piu shouts. “At least plug me in you meanie!”

The night is quiet, and the air is warm. Harry walks the length of the hotel’s secluded, man-made beach. Sand slides over his feet and sandals. The gentle lull of the water, the dark navy sky transitioning into blackness, it’s as tranquil as it is picturesque. The entire beach is his to roam. Not another soul crosses his path.

He has time to think. Yet, no matter how much he searches within, or how he pictures his future, he sees his weirdo there. The unbearably colourless, monotonous path he’s walked throughout his life is coloured by her. He smiles and laughs so effortlessly in her presence that he’s terrified how he’d ever gone without.

He wants to take the risk and confess again, even if it leaves him open to heartbreak. Maintaining the status quo isn’t what he wants to do with her. She means more to him than that.

He can’t stand aside and watch her be with someone else if that person cannot be him.

If such a horrible future comes to pass, then he knows how disastrous it’ll be. Whether she has a partner or spouse, he’d drop everything and rush to her side as if he were that person. He’s not strong enough to do otherwise.

If he stays in this nebulous relationship, the real harm will come. Because he knows deep in his soul, he’ll go to her when she’s low and she’ll do the same. The mistakes will pile up, and so will the resentment. Undeniable attraction will bring them together and tear them apart just as many times.

He already sees the beginnings of it. What will it be like five years from now? Twenty years? Or perhaps even forty?

It’s eleven at night when his phone goes off.

She asks where he is and fifteen minutes later she arrives wearing a simple cover-up and a skirt. His eyes fall to the run in her pantyhose, just hardly visible where her skirt clothes her thighs.

“The beach closed half an hour ago,” is her opening comment. “We shouldn’t be out here.”

He hadn’t known. No wonder it’s so empty.

“We can go inside.”

“It’s okay. I’ve always wanted to walk like this with you. As if we’re the only two in the world.”

“And if we’re caught?”

“We’ll run,” she insists. “Though I’ve worked all day, so you may have to carry me.”

“Should I check if I can handle that?”

He reaches for her but she squeals and darts away. He chases her across the sand and scoops her up. She’s the perfect weight in his arms. They’re face-to-face.

“I can handle it,” Harry whispers as he smiles.

“So you can...”

The spark between them sets his heart aflame. He leans in closer, but she taps his shoulder.

“Can you set me down, please?”

Reluctantly, he does. He’s ready to head inside, but she initiates a new stroll. They walk up and down the beach. She dips her toes in the water.

“Is it cold?”

She splashes his ankle playfully with the tepid water instead of answering. It’s a pleasant temperature. The water’s cooling off from the day.

He wonders how secluded the beach is. Sand is easy to wash off. If only it were more difficult, he could wash up with her. How soft would her skin be sliding over his in the shower?

He swallows.

“Say,” she begins. “If I asked, would you take me somewhere?”

“Yes, but we’d have to hire a car.”

“That’s fine. There’s a place I’ve always wanted to see.”

***

It turns out the place she’s always wanted to see is Harry’s home. 

“I’ve seen plenty of pictures but it’s surprisingly exciting to be here.”

“Watch your step. Your feet are wet from the beach.”

“I’ll grab onto you if I’m about to fall.”

She wobbles while taking off her shoes, so he settles an arm around her waist.

“Don’t wait until you’re falling. Avoid it to begin with.”

She frees herself and wanders away. As she enters and gazes around in awe, he wonders if she’ll complain about how empty it is now that she’s seen it.

“Thanks for the invitation. I didn’t want to be another person barging in and making themselves at home in your space.”

“You’re always welcome.”

“Am I?” She grins back at him. “Then what’s your code?”

“Your birthday.”

“Oh.” She looks away. “You should probably change that.”

“I won’t. It’s too troublesome.”

He hangs his coat up, and his heart jumps when he turns to see she’s vanished. He finds her in the kitchen staring into his fridge.

“There’s actual food in here.”

“You told me to eat better.”

“It’s still nice to see that you are.” He steps close. She moves out of reach. “Can I look around some more?”

“Look around to your heart’s content.”

She explores about taking in his space.

“Is it that exciting?”

“Everything’s an extension of you, so yes. You can tell a lot about a person from their surroundings.”

She pauses when she reaches the piano. Her fingers pass over it affectionately.

“Will you play for me? I’ve always wanted to hear you play in person.”

He hasn’t touched the piano in a while, so he’s bound to be rusty. Yet, he wants to meet her expectations. So, he seats himself on the piano bench. She sets the lid down and takes a seat on top of the instrument.

“I’ve got the best view from here.”

“I’m a soloist. The lid should stay up.”

“I plan to accompany you, hence lid down.”

“Do you have an instrument?”

“I’m feeling good. Maybe I’ll improv with my voice.” She clears her throat. “As long as you don’t tease me.”

With that in mind he picks a song she’s most likely to know the lyrics to and sets about playing a slower, piano rendition of it. His fingers travel along the keys, gentle, and light, although he plays with passion. The vibrant music fills the space.

And when he realizes she won’t sing, the piece transitions into the piece he worked on for her. However the melody is slower, an elegantly building crescendo. He delivers the piece based on the emotion he wishes to convey. It surpasses where he’d left off in his composition.

The delicate tune becomes something grief-stricken. Loud. Commanding. Something faster. And at its peak, following a second of silence, it sinks into something consumed by longing. A tale of unfulfilled wants and denial. Of madness. And then, an exquisite tale of affection. Every note speaks of a chance for something beautiful that’s always been unknown to him.

A healing song that conjures a symphony’s worth of instrumentation across a single instrument. The emotional piece is as much a story as it is a serenade.

Then the last note rings out. He releases himself from the music with a breath.

He meets her mesmerized gaze. “In the end, you didn’t sing.”

“I thought about it, but your playing was too beautiful to interrupt.”

Her eyes are dewy. He stands to move her off the piano, but then they’re as close as they were when he lifted her earlier. Her gaze shakes, and after a time, she looks away.

It’s been the trend since they met. He can’t stand being crushed by it anymore.

“Is there something more interesting over there than me?” Harry asks as he leans closer.

She rests a hand against his chest to make space between them. He’s never given someone the power to destroy him, and yet she has it all. One sentence, one gesture, can grind him into dust.

“I’m hopping down now. Can you step back please?”

But he doesn’t.

“Harry?” Her breath is uneven when she calls him that time. “Please. I’m trying to maintain the line.”

“Is that why you haven’t been as forthcoming as you usually are?”

“...Do you blame me? I tease you but, getting hurt once changed me. Although I try not to dwell on it. It’s late. I’ll get going–”

“It’s too late to say you haven’t crossed the line. Or are you the type that dines and dashes in relationships?”

Her face heats. After so long, he has his answer. That she remembers.

“...I wasn’t in my right mind then.”

“Good. Stay that way.”

His hand slides up the back of her neck and into her hair. She blushes but doesn’t pull away.

He wants to tease her, but he’s at his limit. Has been for some time. Yet, if he can push a little more, if she loses her composure while her dewy eyes give him an indignant look, he’ll feel so satisfied.

He needs her, and surveys her with that blatant fact on display.

Between her legs is a perfectly spaced gap for him...

[Character limit hit. Click to continue reading]

[vtmgremlin]

Baldur's Gate has over taken my life

So here's a long ass rant about Astarion because I love him so much my heart bursts with love and joy for this man (Everything will be spoilers under the cut so if you have not completed the game make sure you DO NOT read this LOL)

So...I'm not someone who usually rants like this on my blog but it's my blog and well free will is everything so let's go : )

What I really want to talk about is about how much the trauma and his abuse must have warped his mind...over 200 years of it, I can barley comprehend the past 23 for myself but 200 years

Like no wonder he treats everyone a certain way, no wonder his first reaction is to "go hurt someone", perhaps it maybe was in his nature beforehand(?) but we don't know and I don't think he really recalls either! (other than the fact that he was a magistrate all those years ago, which to me, is still kinda funny to think about hehe, but thats most likely because he wasn't the person we meet in BG3)

And thats the thing, once you help him over come the black mass and you enter the cutscene with him and he shares his old grave to you- I almost assumed that maybe it would have been old family members besides him...but no, just himself. Who was Astarion before his embrace? I suppose it doesn't matter anymore since after that moment he resigns that life and proclaims his past self long dead but...the mind does wander at times.

It does make me sad, how it seems as though he must pick and I suppose it's just me being jaded with the idea that one must sacrifice happiness to do the right thing- when idk the idea of having your cake and eating it too it something he deserves after again- 200 YEARS- of horrid abuse

This is NOT to say that I approve of him becoming evil lord 9000, but rather a catapult into the last option you get to say to him at the end of it all with his final cutscene where he asks you "What do you want?"

There is an option where you can suggest that the both of you continue to search for ways to let him walk into the sun together again and if you choose that well he does seem delighted and exclaims if there is a chance he will seize it no matter what (and that it will lead to more adventures together hehe).

My idea was that what if...it was actually a road to having him regain his humanity, you know? Bring him back to life as our dear evanessence would say- and I don't mean that he must sacrifice something to have this and he must suffer more blah blah blah I MEAN SERIOUSLY!

It was a sorta "final adventure", the gangs all here and somehow it becomes more than just that for our beloved vampire man (because of course it does), but at the end of the day, after possibly IDK saving the world for a second time perhaps LMAO- he gets to finally be rewarded :,))

He fought and fought hard, began the road to self acceptance and love, to slowly heal himself with the help of your BG3 character..to finally be rewarded to breathe air again.

To eat again, to feel the blood rush to his cheeks again- his heart pumping again. More than just walking into the sunlight without harm, but to be able to gain from it. To be alive again...

I could rant more and most likely will later but, I love him so much LOL him standing up to Cazador, his abuser, the way he did, I was shaking because the idea of being able to do such a thing to my own is just unthinkable...he deserves much love :, ( and is worthy of so much patience and understanding.

I am going to draw alot of him and Vyhann, who is my Bard BG3 half-elf, together and just in general if y'all aren't happy with that I understand LOL and anyways if you've read this far my god I would apologize but you've done this to yourself skdjfnskdjnfjdf

[awalkthroughstellis]

A Night Underwater

Warnings: Spoilers for Luke’s SR card “Among the Great Blue”, there is one part early on that is suggestive but not graphic

Summary: When Robin is plagued by sleepless nights, Luke suggests a change of routine to help tire her out. When a date turns into a search for a missing child, his method proves to be useful.

4:54 A.M, an ungodly hour to be awake. Although, to be awake it meant one had to have slept, and I, for three nights now, have barely been sleeping. When I did manage to drift into the realm of unconsciousness it only lasted an hour at maximum, and no matter how hard I tried, or how many remedy’s I attempted, nothing was working.

I couldn’t figure out the reason behind my insomnia. If Luke had been out of town I wouldn’t be so surprised, but that’s not the case. In fact my boyfriend was right here, chest against my back, arm around my waist as he slept soundly behind me. He was warm, the pattern of his breathing relaxing, yet I, for whatever reason, still couldn’t sleep.

The first night this started I kept waking poor Luke each time I got out of bed to distract myself. The second night I moved less, trying my best not to push my wide-awake state onto him. The present night, I didn’t move at all. I didn’t wake him, I didn’t touch my phone, I just laid there and hoped boredom would do the trick. It didn’t.

5 A.M sharp, Luke started to stir. He buried his face in my hair and tightened the arm around my waist, holding the pressure for a few seconds before easing up as if giving me a hug. It was routine for him to get up this early to exercise, a discipline I would never achieve. Usually, if left undisturbed I would sleep until 9 A.M, but if Luke was around he would wake me at 8. He took my medication schedule more seriously then I did.

“Morning.” I whispered, voice scratchy from all the hours of silence.

His coral eyes opened, blinking a few times to focus. “You’re up?”

“I couldn’t sleep.”

“Why didn’t you wake me? I would have helped you.”

Shrugging, I let myself roll over so I was facing him. “I felt bad. Besides, you need enough sleep if you’re gonna be handling cases. You need sharp eyes for those types of things.”

Luke’s hand found my cheek, thumb gently caressing my skin. “I’ve worked plenty of cases while being half-asleep. Trust me, I can handle it. This has been going on for several days now, is there something on your mind?”

“No.” I replied. “I mean, I haven’t been stressed or overwhelmed or anything, and I feel just as safe as I always do next to you, I just… I can’t sleep. Then I start getting tired during the day but the second I lay down it’s gone.”

“Maybe a change of routine would do you some good. Getting your brain excited with something new will tire you out enough to sleep later.” His hand left my cheek, running up and down the bare skin of my arm instead. “I was gonna save them for this weekend, but I managed to get my hands on two overnight tickets for the oceanarium. Why don’t we use them tonight?”

My brows furrowed. “Overnight? Does this oceanarium have a hotel or something?”

“No, but we get to sleep in the underwater tunnels. Surrounded by water, fish and other aquatic life, I bet it’ll relax you enough to fall asleep. Especially after we spend the day exploring. What do you say? Wanna try?”

I nodded against the pillow. “I’ll try anything at this point.”

Luke smiled. “Great. Then tomorrow- no, this afternoon we’ll head over there.”

Dipping his head, his lips found mine. Our kisses were soft and slow, lazy and relaxed like the early hours of morning. Luke’s kisses got deeper, and as he gently rolled us until I was on my back with him hovering above, the blanket fell away to reveal bodies still bare from the night before.

“Is this,” I spoke between kisses. “Another attempt to break my routine?”

He hummed against my lips. “And to put you to sleep for a little while.”

~~~~~~~~~~

I packed an overnight back with pajamas, but for our date I chose an outfit that was cute and girly, something comfortable but would keep me from overheating in the summer sun. I selected a white cropped top with long sleeves with a thin layer of lace over the fabric and a flowy light blue skirt with a button on the front of my hip. Sandals were the best way to go in terms of shoes.

Stepping inside the oceanarium, I couldn’t help but absorb the excitement of a child. The lobby was gorgeous, walls painted white and the carpet had the pattern of an ocean floor. Statues of seaweed and small mammals were scattered about, and a massive orca ornament hung from the ceiling. A large, beautifully decorated tank next to the front desk housed a cluster of goldfish, some brilliant gold while others had orange scales that resembled a flame.

“Wow.” I breathed, examining the place again in awe. “It’s so pretty.”

Luke, who was holding my hand, gave it a gentle squeeze. “Excited?”

“Very.” I flashed him a wide grin. “What do you wanna do first?”

“Why don’t we start by checking in, that way we don’t miss anything.”

Giggling, I nodded in agreement. Maybe it was the lighting, or the background, but Luke looked extra adorable right now and I so badly wanted to kiss him. But, because there were people around, I resisted. Sneaking kisses in public was one thing when no one was around, but in a lobby with staff and other visitors, there was no way Luke and I could casually kiss without being flustered messes afterwards. I’d have to give it to him later.

After checking in, we decided to wander and look at the tanks. We saw fish and turtles and stingrays, even a small species of shark. The view in the underwater tunnels was amazing, and Luke, who had done some research beforehand, was an excellent tour guide.

“Luke, look.” I said, giving his hand a tug as I pulled him over to a tank. “I’ve never seen jellyfish like these before.”

The jellyfish swimming in the tank had seemingly transparent bodies, and if looked at from the top, you could see the pattern of a clover in what looked tiny little lights glowing inside them. They were so beautiful, looked so peaceful that for a second I forgot these creatures were capable of causing harm to people that touched them.

“These are moon jellyfish.” Luke explained, rubbing his thumb back and forth over my own. “They usually live between the seventy degree parallel north and the forty degree parallel south, and can be found in the Atlantic, Pacific and Indian Oceans. They like living in costal waters, like river deltas and harbours.”

“I’m impressed.” I said, looking up at him. “You did this much research?”

“Some of it is prior knowledge from my bioengineering days. Moon jellyfish care capable of regenerating. They can automatically heal puncture wounds and perfectly replace lost tentacles.” His eyes flashed with sorrow just then. “However, they have short lifespans. They rarely live over six months in the wild. In captivity, up to three years if well taken care of.”

There’s that damn number again. The number three was haunting, for each time Luke and I heard it we were reminded of the timer nobody wanted, a timer I prayed every day would extend or vanish all together.

I let my head fall against his shoulder. “Freedom or more time, if these jellyfish could choose, I wonder which one they’d pick.”

“They’d pick freedom, obviously!” A voice shouted.

Eyes widening in surprise I turned around, finding a young boy around ten years old standing behind us. He wore a baseball cap, a soccer t-shirt and denim shorts. His small hands were balled into tight fists, face scrunched in an expression that went beyond anger, it looked like hatred.

The boy continued. “Adults don’t care what they want! Those jellyfish are stuck in a tank waiting for someone to give them attention!”

I was so distracted by the boy that I failed to notice that an entire group of kids had surrounded us by now. The others, however, didn’t pay the boy any mind and instead starting throwing questions at Luke about moon jellyfish. He answered each child patiently and with a smile, stealing the poor guide’s job from him. I loved watching Luke with children but the upset boy was still on my mind, and when I tried to find him in the crowd realized he was no longer present.

Just as I was about to write the boy’s behaviour off as that of a young, passionate animal activist, a man and woman came rushing in through one of the connecting tunnels. They were looking around frantically, and upon noticing the cluster of children surrounding us, came running over.

“Eason! Eason!” The woman shouted, looking from one child to the next.

I stepped towards the couple. “Have you lost your son?”

The man nodded. “Have you seen him? He’s 10 years old, and he’s wearing a baseball cap.”

“With a soccer shirt and short jeans?” Luke asked, appearing at my side. “He was here not too long ago.”

The woman looked relived. “Did you see which way he went?”

Feeling guilty, I shook my head. “I’m sorry, there was so many children around - I looked away for two seconds and he slipped away.”

As quickly as she was relived, she was distraught again. “I see.”

Luke suggested asking the staff to make a broadcast, so we went with the couple just in case they needed our help. The staff was very helpful and made an announcement, but after thirty minutes and no sign of the boy, the woman broke down into tears.

“This is your fault!” She said to her husband, glaring at him through glossy eyes. “You just had to take a work call!”

The man scoffed. “You did the same thing. I told you to watch him while I took an important call.”

His comment only made the mother more upset. He tried to console her but she slapped his hand away. Luke and I were standing on the other side of the room, trying to give the couple space but it was hard not to listen in when they were being so loud.

“Luke,” I called his name quietly. “What if Eason can’t hear the broadcast? Do you think he could have left the oceanarium?”

He took a moment to consider my suggestion. “It’s possible. I didn’t notice any speakers on the outside of the building, so if he really did leave then it makes sense for him not to hear the broadcast.”

“How far do you think he could have gone?”

“If he left on his own, I don’t think he’d stray too far from the oceanarium. There’s a beach outside we can try searching at.”

Not wanting to bother the parents too much, we alerted the staff that we were going to search the beach and would send a message if we found him.

The beach quiet. Not many people were around and the few who were didn’t have any helpful information on Eason’s whereabouts. In a place like this where it was common for kids to run around, no one would think twice about seeing a young boy on his own.

“Luke, I’m really worried.” I said, wrapping my arms around myself. “What if Eason didn’t just walk away of his own free will? I mean, kidnappings happen in broad daylight, and in a busy place like this…”

He squeezed my hand. “If there’s no sign of him here, we’ll go back and get the police involved. They’ll be able to look at the camera footage and see if he left with anyone.”

“Right. I just- is that him?”

Far ahead, a small figure was standing beneath a large umbrella. Hopeful that it was the boy we were looking for, I pulled my hand free and sprinted across the sand towards him. Sure enough, it was him.

“Eason!” I exclaimed, slowing to a walk as I got close. “We’ve been looking all over for you, kiddo. Your parents are worried sick.”

He glared at me, a look too harsh for such a young face. “Go away! I don’t wanna go home!”

I stopped, eyes widened in surprise. I shook it off, deciding to try a more gentle approach. “Is something happening at home you don’t like?”

Eason scoffed, crossing his arms and turning his head in the other direction. “You grew up in a loving home. You wouldn’t understand.”

Luke’s hand found my shoulder, giving it a gentle squeeze before he stepped towards the boy. “What makes you think that? My parents died before I could really remember them, and my wife here has spent most of her childhood in and out of the hospital.”

…Wife?

An intense blush instantly attacked my cheeks. Luke just referred to me as his wife. Not girlfriend, not partner, wife. The ultimate commitment a couple can make and the term just rolled off his tongue so naturally I don’t think he even realized he said it.

Luke’s wife… Robin Marie Pearce… I liked the sound of that a lot.

Coming out of my daze, I sent the oceanarium staff a message that we found Eason. Luke kept him distracted until his parents came to pick him up, apologizing profusely to their child for their lack of attention, then turned to thank us repeatedly as they walked away.

“I’m glad we found him.” I said, folding my hands behind my back and smiling at the retreating figures. “They’re not a perfect family, but who’s is?”

“As long as it’s a happy family, it’s perfect enough for me.” Luke replied, cheeks tinting red as he smiled. “I’d say ours is pretty perfect.”

Our Family.

Because of Luke’s illness and my heart condition, children wouldn’t be part of our future - at least not the current planned one. A pregnancy for me would be high risk and Luke didn’t want to leave his kids to grow up without both biological parents like he did, it was something we discussed early on in the relationship. Still, I couldn’t help but picture children running around our home on top of the antique store.

Turning to face him, I loosely wrapped my arms around his neck. “Do you remember what you said to Eason earlier?”

His head tilted to the side. “I said a lot of things. Which one are you talking about?”

“About how your parents passed before you could remember them.” Standing on the tips of my toes, I whispered into his ear. “And how your wife spent her childhood in the hospital.”

Luke’s face was beet red as I pulled away, eyes wide, shy and embarrassed.

He looked so adorable I couldn’t help but laugh. “You’re cute. Give me a kiss.”

Cupping his cheeks between my hands I pressed my lips to his, giggling against his mouth. It’s been a while since I’ve seen him so flustered, but it was just as sweet as the first time.

Luke’s phone buzzed, cutting off the kiss before it could last too long. “It’s the staff. Dinner’s ready.”

“Dinner already?” I asked, turning my head to look at the sun hovering just above the ocean. “I didn’t even realize the sun was setting. Look how pretty the ocean is sparkling.”

I sensed him stepping away. “Hold that pose.”

I bit back a laugh as he started snapping photos with his phone, resisting the urge to playfully shake my head. I should have known he wasn’t gonna let this date go by without sneaking in some pictures of me like this.

“Got it.” He said, flashing me a charming smile.

Finally able to look at him again, I raised a brow. “You take all these pictures of me yet I never get to see them. What exactly are you up to, Mr. Pearce?”

“You’ll see them one day.” He stuffed the phone into his pocket and held out his hand. “Ready to eat?”

“Yeah.” I pretended to look at something in the sky. “Luke, look!”

The corner of his lips curled up. “Nice try. Even if you did get my phone, they’re in an encrypted file.”

Huffing, I placed my hand in his. “One day, I’m gonna figure out what you’re doing with those.”

He gave my hand a squeeze and started leading me back to the oceanarium. He mumbled something under his breath, and while I couldn’t quite make it out, it sounded like he said something along the lines of ‘I hope not anytime soon’.

~~~~~~~~~~

Leaving the woman’s change room, now dressed in a long-sleeved shirt and a pair of tights, I returned to the underwater tunnel we would be sleeping in for the night. Several sleeping mats were spread out, all an appropriate distance from each group to offer some privacy. Luke was sitting on ours, tapping away on his phone.

“You’re hair’s still wet.” I said, running my fingers through his damp locks. “Didn’t Rosa and her aunt scold you about this enough?”

His head snapped up. “You know about that?”

I smirked. “Yeah, and I know you used to have a bad habit of forgetting to pack a change of clothes. Come here.”

Luke set his phone aside and let me towel dry his hair. I did my best to be gentle, but when I pulled the towel away his chestnut hair looked just as messy as it did when he rolled out of bed every morning.

Laughing, I affectionately placed my hand under his chin. “You’re adorable, you know that?”

He put on a mock frown. “I thought we were here to get you to relax, not make fun of me.”

Giggling, I grabbed his comb. “Stay still.”

I combed through his hair, tapping his nose with my index finger when I was finished. Just as I finished, the staff instructed everyone to get in bed. Luke laid on his back, creating a space for me against his side. I rested my head on his chest, watching the fish swim through the tunnel on the other side of the glass.

“Tired?” Luke whispered, fingers gently massaging my scalp.

“Yeah.” I replied, pulling the blanket tighter around me. “Thank you, Luke. You always take such good care of me.”

“It’s not something you need to thank me for, and you take care of me, too.” His voice got even quieter. “Take slow, deep breaths. Focus on the quiet sounds of the tank.”

I did just that, holding each breath for a second before letting it out. I tuned out the soft chatter around us, watching the school of fish swim by peacefully. Luke’s heart was directly beneath my ear, it’s steady beating evening out my own and encouraging my body to relax. The sensation of his hand in my hair, the pattern of his breathing, encouraged my eyes to close. For the first time in several nights, they stayed closed.

~~~~~~~~~~

When I finally awoke, I felt like I had been asleep for decades. My eyelids were beyond heavy, body felt weighed down, mind unable to register where I was. It eventually came back to me, and as I sat up I realized two things. One, everyone around me was still asleep. Two, Luke wasn’t here.

Confused, I peeled the blanket off and got up, silently passing everyone and turning down the best hallway. I found Luke rather quickly, crouched with his back against the wall and a hand on his chest.

Panic immediately set in. Rushing over, I dropped to my knees in front of him. “Luke? Luke, what’s wrong? Do you need me to call my dad?”

He took a deep breath, shook his head, and dropped his hand from his chest to cup my cheek. “I’m okay. I just swallowed some gum, that’s all.”

Did he really? Or is he just trying not to worry me? Truth be told, I didn’t know anything about the details of Luke’s illness, just that it’s putting his life on a timer. It wasn’t my business and I would never push him to explain it to me, but that meant I had no idea what to look for in case it suddenly flared up.

I had no choice but to trust Luke, and since he was someone who never put himself first, it was hard to tell if he was being honest or downplaying his pain.

“Okay.” I said, voice full of uncertainty. “How did you swallow gum?”

“I bent down to tie my shoe.” He replied, standing up and bringing me with him. “Don’t laugh.”

I bit back the giggle that wanted to escape. “Please be more careful, Luke. You almost gave me a heart attack.”

“I’m sorry.” He took both my hands in his. “Follow me. I’ll make it up to you.”

Confused but interested, I let him lead me down another tunnel that ended with a descending flight of stairs.

“Where are we going?” I asked as we reached the bottom.

“You’ll see. Close your eyes.”

I did, hugging his arm as a way to stay grounded. I trusted Luke not to run me into anything and I knew he wouldn’t let me trip over something, but it was still nerve racking to walk without watching where you’re going.

Luke suddenly you stopped. “Okay, you can look now.”

I opened my eyes and gasped at the sight. The tunnel ended in a glass dome, surrounded my water and all kinds of colourful fish I hadn’t seen before. Stingrays, sea turtles, octopus and starfish, so many creatures shared the tank that I was finding new ones each time I shifted my gaze. If that wasn’t beautiful enough, the morning sunshine broke through the surface, making the coral sparkle.

“Oh, wow.” I breathed, one hand lifting to cover my mouth. “This is… I’m speechless.”

Luke smiled. “I found this place when I was working a case here last week. I knew you’d like it.”

“I love it.” Standing on the tips of my toes, I kissed his cheek. “Thank you for sharing this with me. You’re the best boyfriend ever.”

His cheeks turned a soft shade of pink. “You’re worth finding these things for. Anyway, what do you say we go get some breakfast? Seafood is on the menu this morning.”

I blinked in surprise. “Seafood? At an oceanarium? That’s pretty morbid.”

Luke looked confused. “But that just means it’s fresh, right?”

“Luke!” I exclaimed, lightly slapping his chest. “Way to kill the moment.”

Some days he could sweep me off my feet without even trying, and others made me question if he really understood the concept of a romance. Still, he was Luke and I loved every part of him dearly.

~~~~~~~~~

Several days passed since our overnight trip to the oceanarium and I haven’t had a problem sleeping since. I felt great, fantastic, even - and Luke’s little ‘wife’ slip up still hasn’t left my mind.

“Hey, Luke!” I called from the kitchen, shutting the fridge’s door. “Can we order a delivery for lunch? I’m craving pizza and wings.”

The loud sounds of his video game paused. “Sounds good!”

Pulling my phone from my pocket, I did a quick google search for the closest pizza shop and took a glance at the menu before dialing the number.

A woman picked up, her voice cheerful. “Thank you for calling Portia’s Pizza’s. What can I do for you?”

The kindness in her voice made me perk up. “I’d like to place an order for delivery, please. To Time’s Antiquities.”

“Alright, and what are you looking to order?”

“Can I get a large meat lovers and a side of sweet and sour wings please?”

“Is that the six pack of wings or the ten pack?”

I clicked my tongue as I thought. “Let’s do the ten pack.”

“Alright. I have a large meat lovers pizza and ten sweet and sour wings. Would you like to add any drinks?”

“No, thank you.”

“Awesome. It should be arriving in about twenty minutes. It was to Times Antiquities, yes?”

“That’s right.” Unable to help myself, I decided to try it myself. “My husband will meet them at the door.”

“I’ll let the driver know. Have a good day now.”

Hanging up the phone, I grinned like an idiot and turned around. I didn’t hear him approach, but Luke was standing by the sink, frozen in place with a glass in hand, coral eyes wide in shock.

“What?” I asked, playing innocent.

He coughed nervously, face bright red. “N-Nothing.”

“Did I make you upset?” I asked, looking down at my hands and playing with my fingers, pretending to be uneasy. “I’m sorry, I was just playing around…”

Panicking, Luke wrapped his arms around my waist and lifted me off my feet. “No! No, baby that’s not it. I just-”

Laughter I could no longer control escaped. Placing my hands on his cheeks, I gave them a gentle pinch. “You’re so cute, Luke!”

Relief flashed briefly across his face before his expression fell into a sad one. “You were teasing me again.”

“I’m sorry.” I spoke between giggles. “I’ll give you kisses to make up for it.”

Luke’s eyes shinned with a playful light as he set me down, crossed his arms and turned his back to me. “I don’t want kisses.”

He walked out of the room without looking back.

“Luke!” I shouted, chasing after him. “Let me love you!”

The next twenty minutes were spent running around the house, and we got so distracted that the poor delivery boy had to call us to let us know the food had arrived.

[jiliansky-blog]

The god of dreams. Chapter 7

Pairing: Morpheus x FemaleReader

Rating: PG

Words: 3250

Warnings: Can be spoilers to the Kindle Ones

I was almost sure, that this night Morpheus would invite me to the Dreaming. But that didn’t happen. And he wasn’t in the cabin when I woke up. Cold creeps in my soul. He couldn’t leave, couldn’t he? “Morpheus?” I called him.

Not a sound. He wasn’t in the cabin. The silence surrounded me. Perhaps, he was out there looking for coffee. I stood up, quickly took a shower, dressed up, and hurried onto the terrace. I waited for him for an hour, but he still didn’t show up. And I was hungry. So I decided to have breakfast and to drink coffee in the nearby café again in case Morpheus shows up. Maybe, something happened. I didn’t want to think about it.

After breakfast, he didn’t show up too. I waited again. I declined the excursion. And then I remembered his gift. I can enter the Dreaming, if I fall asleep. So I went to my cabin. I hope it will work. I lie down on the bed and tried to sleep. I thought about Morpheus and the Dreaming. For some time I couldn’t sleep. I opened my eyes in an hour and realized that I did fell asleep, but I couldn’t get in the Dreaming. It didn’t work. Why? Perhaps, Morpheus didn’t want to see me anymore. Or something happened. What if the punishment for our feeling hit me instead of him? I didn’t want this to happen. So what now? Should I let him go? Or should I try to find him? We planned to call Fates. But I don’t even know how or what gifts they want. I need to search for the information first. I can surf the internet or find the library. I decided to combine my vocation and want to learn history with my task. So I decided to ask the guide about the library.

“You are just in time”, said the guide. “We are going to the island”. “I don’t want to go to the island”, I said. “In fact, I want to go to the library. I want to read something about the history. Can you please tell me where I can go?” “To the National Library of Greece, of course”, he was surprised that some tourists want to visit the library instead of the beach. “You can find it very easily”. And he explained that it’s a very big modern establishment near the water. Well, it sounds easy enough indeed. I also can use Google Maps to help me find the way. I felt lost without Morpheus to guide me through the city. And I felt that my life won’t be the same without him. I have four days in Athens to find information about Fates, find gifts, and call them. And I felt that it wasn’t enough.

The guide was right. You can’t pass by this library. The building was huge and modern. And I was expected to see some ancient buildings. But it wasn't important if there I can find the information I need. “How can I help you?” asked me a young woman with olive skin, dark hair, and brown eyes. She speaks with an accent too. “I need to find some information about myths and ancient rituals”, I said. “I am working on research. Also information about the gods and other creatures can be helpful”. “Oh, we have plenty of those”, she said. “You can go to the section on mythology. Olive will help you”.

It took me some time to find the section I need. But a very old woman named Olive wanted to help me. Perhaps, she didn’t have a curious soul for a long time. “Can I ask what exactly you are looking for?” she asked. “I want information about the Fates or moirés”, I said. “How ancient people call to them. And something about the god of dreams”. “Interesting choice”, she said. “No one has asked about them for ages. Are you sure you want this information for the research?” “Absolutely”, I replied. I didn’t want to tell her that I am going to call Fates myself. No one does that.

“Okay, sweetie, pick the place and I found the books you need”, she said. And I found not so comfortable seat near the table. Perhaps, they were designed this way, so people won’t fall asleep in the library. “Here we go”, she brought me a pile of books. “Ask me, if you need more books or if you want to pick another theme”. “Thank you”, I replied.

And I started my research. There wasn’t much information about Fates. Did someone call for them? Or is that possible only for gods such as Morpheus? I found out though that their temple is placed in Corinth. In Ancient Corinth. How do I get there? But I didn’t find the word about gifts. Why I didn’t ask Morpheus what he brought them? I thought we have more time. But I find that they can appear at a crossroads. It makes sense. There are three of them and the crossroad symbolizes different fates. But what should I bring them as gifts? Food? Wine?

“Maybe, I can help you with something?” Olive asked. “You look troubled”. “I just can’t find enough information about Fates”, I said. “More information was lost in time”, she said. “And perhaps, other libraries have other information. Why are you interested in this theme?” “I…write a book”, I said. “About a woman who fell in love with a god and wanted to call Fates to help her break the curse”. “What curse?” she asked interested. “When a god can’t be in love with her because something terrible can happen”, I replied carefully. “She couldn’t live with it”. The woman looked at me with an unreadable expression. Perhaps, she didn’t believe me, but who calls to the gods these days? She couldn’t think that I’m serious, couldn’t she? “What?” I asked. “Is it a bad plotline?”

“No, just an unexpected one”, she said. “I didn’t hear that people decline the god will to be with another god”. “People can fight for their love”, I admitted. “I think it’s pathetic to give up. She doesn’t want her world to be destroyed, but doesn’t want to let him go either”. “She should be very brave”, she smiled. “Do you have maybe books about some sort of ancient rituals?” I asked. “I want to know more about things that were proposed to gods as gifts”. “I think I have something for you”, she smiled and went to the shelves and then return with the very old book. “Are you sure I can take it?” I asked. “It looks like it can fall apart in my arms. And is this even English? I don’t know Latin”. “It will be fine if you don’t take it on the beach”, she smiled. “And there are notes on English».

“You are the real treasure”, I smiled. “Thank you”. “I hope, it will help with your research”, she smiled back and return to her place. Apparently, most of the book still was a mystery. But I found out that different gods preferred different presents. Some preferred dead animals, some fruits or wine. Some jewels. Some gods wanted people to be creative. But I also find interesting information about the symbolism of death and dream. Poppies symbolized both. Maybe I can pick flowers for a gift. Then I saw something else. Some notes were especially sarcastic. And they were written by someone named Constantine. “Checked by Constantine”, it said. Now that was interesting. I wrote down every piece of useful information and came to Olive.

“Excuse me”, I said. “Do you know who Constantine is?” I asked. “Oh, I almost forgot that this lady visited our library and working on this book”, she sighed. “It’s Johanna Constantine. She is an occultist. Very sassy lady”. “Oh, I see”, I said. “Do you think she may know something useful?” “Probably”, she shrugged. “People tell she can make the demon run away. She usually shows up when something strange is going on”. “Do you know where she is now?” I asked.

“Oh, she was British”, she said. “Just like you. But I believe she came from USA. She told something about it”. “Thank you”, I smiled. “You are a lifesaver. You can have books back”. “Or are you leaving now?” she asked. “I need to go, but I don’t know”, I shrugged. “Maybe I will pay a visit one more time before I leave Greece”. “I would love to help you, dear”, she smiled.

And I leave the library and went to the nearest café, so I can search for information on the Internet. It took me two cups of coffee, a sandwich, a cake, and one hour to find some information. She can get rid of demons and curses and I find a lot of articles about it. And even the phone number. And I’m going to call her. “Hello?” I heard the woman's voice. “Who is this?” “Miss Constantine, my name is Melody”, I said. “I need your help”. “Do you need to exorcize the demon?” she asked in return. “Or to break the curse? I’m not taking orders at the moment”. “Not quite”, I said. “I need to call Fates”. “Fates?” she sounds surprised. “That's not what I hear often. Why do you need to call them?” “I need to ask them something”, I said. “I am in Greece right now, trying to find the information. I want to know what gifts I should bring them”.

“Can you be more specific?” she asked. “I need to ask him how I can find one of the gods”, I said with hesitation. “And how can I be with him”. “With a go?” she seemed more surprised. “What a god?” “Morpheus”, I said quietly. There came silence. I even thought that we were disconnected. “Miss Constantine?” I asked. “Do you know Dream of the Endless?” she asked in return. “Well, yes”, I said. “I met him a week ago”. “Can you come to London?” she asked suddenly. “I have a business here. And I’m going to stay for a week more”. “I will return in a few days too”, I replied. “I will check when I can return. Do you know him too? It sounds like that”. “Yes, I met him once”, she said. “But it better discuss when we will meet”. “Can I call you later on this number?” I asked. “When I return to London”.

“Yes”, she said and ended the call. Well, that was already something interesting. She probably can help me. And she knows Morpheus. I would like to hear about that. I was thinking should I return to London the next day or should I wait for the last three days. I felt lost and lonely without Morpheus here. God, how I was supposed to spend time alone there? Now I don’t know what to do.

I decided to go to the beach and check flights home. For a well-known reason, Greece didn’t make me happy anymore. Turned out there was a flight to London around the evening. So I have enough time to say goodbye to Athens. The place, where I found love, spent so many beautiful hours, and then lost my love. I drink coffee on the beach after I packed up all my stuff. The guide was surprised by my determination to go home earlier. But I want to talk to Constantine and find Morpheus more. And find a way to break that rule that forbids us to be together.

Finally, I finished my mini-picnic and return to the cabin to pick up my stuff. I felt like something missing from me. And probably it was Morpheus’ presence. How he can change my life in a single week? And what I am going to do if I can’t find or break the rule? What if I will never see him again? I didn’t even want to think about it.

Well, the moment came, when I should go to the airport. I found in the bookshop a book about Greek mythology. On the plane, I opened a book on the page about Morpheus. Of course, I couldn’t find any new information. The book said that he was one of the children of Nix, the goddess of the night. And that he usually came to people in a human form. Sometimes with the wings. Interesting, who saw Morpheus with wings? Maybe, some religious people, think Morpheus is an angel. That was funny.

So, his mother was Night. And father? Did he even have a father? What was his relationship with his family? He didn’t like to talk about it, so perhaps it wasn’t well. How deep was his loneliness? My heartache at the thought. I already missed him. I wanted to see him, to kiss him, and to say once again I love him. But I couldn’t. Eventually, I fell asleep on the plane, but I didn’t come to the Dreaming again. Why he gave me the amulet and closed his world right after that? If only I can ask someone about it. Maybe, Johanna Constantine will answer some.

Jade, my friend, who was supposed to look after my flat in my absence, was quite surprised to see me earlier. In a good way. “I thought you are going to be in Greece for three more days!” she said. “I need to return home earlier”, I said. “It’s a long story”. “You changed”, she noticed. “You were so upset after your breakup and the argument with a family. What happened in your vocation?” “I met the man”, I sighed. “The most handsome, kind, and incredible man I’ve ever met”. “Oh girl, you sound life”, she smiled. “And where is he?” “I don’t know”, I sighed. “He disappeared”.

“Oh dear, I can’t imagine, what you feel right now”, Jade admitted. “Something happened, I can feel it”, I said. “He promised that we figure out one problem together. I need to find someone who should help me”. “Wait”, she said. “Why do you think he needs help?” “Because I can’t call him”, I replied, trying to figure out how to explain it to her. “And there are some problems with his family”. “Sound dangerous to me”, she noticed. “I just need to speak to one person; that is why I returned earlier”, I said. “But it can wait till tomorrow. Can we go somewhere to eat? And you can tell what was going on while I was away”.

She agreed to that and we went to our favorite place. I ordered waffles and a piece of cake. And then big coffee. “Nothing happened”, Jade said. “Your parents wanted to know where you are. And your ex called a few times too”. “I hope, you didn’t tell them”, I said. “Of course, not”, she replied. “I remember, you said you didn’t want anyone to disturb you. But honey, are you sure that falling in love deeply again is a good option?” “There wasn’t any other option”, I said. “I just did. I saw him on the island and I have this strong desire to know him”. “So what is his name?” she asked. “Who is he?” “His name is Morpheus”. I said. “And I spent almost all the time with him there. And I’m sure, that he couldn’t just leave and break my hurt”.

“And what now?” Jade said. “Are you going to find some investigator to find him? A private detective or what?” “Something like that”, I said. “Is he even in London?” “Probably”, I sighed. “But the detective is in London”. “You are reckless, Melory”, Jade admitted. “Maybe de doesn’t want to tell you goodbye. What do you even know about him?” “He would tell me, I know”, I said. “Listen, you don’t need to help me. You don’t need to understand me even. I just need to make sure he is okay”.

“I will help you if you want to”, she sighed. “I can’t leave you in this statement. So is he better than your ex?” “Yes”, I nodded. “He is also older than me. And he is very serious and unhappy. Was unhappy before I met him”. “I hope, you didn’t find any difficult relationship”, she admitted. “You know, that is enough of this shit”. “I can’t tell that it’s difficult”, I said. “Even though he said that he is a difficult person and we can’t be together. But he is sweet and kind and old fashioned. She made me a gift of this necklace. I’m sure that I want to be with him”.

“I’m not convinced that is a good idea for you”, she sighed again. “I know, you are worrying about me”, I smiled and took her hand in mine. “But I’m actually fine. I want to help him”. “And what if you find out that he just want quietly disappeared?” she asked. “I don’t want to see you in ruin again”. “I already made up my mind”, I refused. “Actually, I need to text someone”. I took my phone and started to text Johanna. “I am already in London”, I wrote. “Where and when can we meet?” “Who did you text?” asked Jade. “Detective”, I replied. “Does she have a name?” she asked. “Johanna”, I said. “I still need to discuss with her some details and meet her”.

“Okay”, Jade gave up. “I won’t stop you from searching for this man of your dreams. Funny, that he has the name of the god of dreams”. “Yes, definitely”, I said. It passed a few hours when Johanna answered back. I almost gave up hope. “Tomorrow, 17 p.m. in «The angel feather”, she replied. “Okay”, I wrote. So I will have time to prepare tomorrow. I hope she will come and help me. I wasn’t sure anymore if I can do this alone.

Morpheus “Where are they now?” I asked. “Somewhere on the borders of the Dreaming”, Lucienne replied. “They killed a few dreams, my lord”. “I can feel it”, I nodded. “But I shouldn’t leave the castle” And I shouldn’t let Melory enter the Dreaming. I can sense her trying to find the way in. But I can’t risk her life too. Even if she hates me for that. “Boss, are you okay?” asked Matthew. “You look sadder than usual”. “Can you go to the Waking world and check if Melory is alright”, I said. “If she is still in Greece and what is she doing?” “Alright”, he said. “Will do”. Why that should happen? The moment I believe that I can be actually happy. I suppose that I can’t after all of this. I won’t see her again if we will survive this.

“My lord?” asked Lucienne. “There is something else on your mind. Where did Matthew go anyway? What are we going to do?” “I need to check if she is alright, that is why I sent Matthew to the Waking world”, I replied. “She shouldn’t come here”. “She is looking for you”, she sighed. “I read it in her book”. “What?” I looked at her. “I…she doesn’t have to”. “It’s love, my lord”, she said. “She is in danger, she needs to stop looking for me”, I admitted. “I shouldn’t agree with her back then and I should just disappear”. “You can’t change the past”, she said. “But she is just the human. She can’t enter the Dreaming without your permission”. “You are right, Luciene”, I sighed. “And when it will be finished, I say goodbye to her”.

@shadowqueen1318 @mypsychoticlove @justathirstyhoe​ @ladymoztaza

[garycxjk]

Second chances

Let's get this out of the way. Throughout this post, I will not name one certain individual, not because she has done anything wrong, but to make ego searching this post a lot harder for her. This also means that this post will not be easily found. The thing is, I don't really even need to mention her to make a point, as her situation isn't a big part of it, it only serves as the backdrop. So I will neither name her previous life nor her current.

Second, I'm not gonna shit on Nijisanji EN. Too many have already done that before, and it's getting a bit tiring. Plus, again, it doesn't serve the point I am trying to make, however, it does serve as a backdrop.

So, basically, to keep it short, recently a certain person had been terminated in a pretty fricken dumb way which I'm not going to get into, which involves them self-exposing their own incompetence. This termination also came after the person who was terminated made two attempts on her own life, fortunately she's still with us.

But that's not the point of this story. Recently, three of the talents have released a not really smart video, basically digging themselves deeper into a hole, if I may so personally, those being Elira Pendora, Vox Akuma and Ike Eveland. Now there are theories going around, but let's keep it as a fact, they were used as spokespeople, either against their will or otherwise, we don't know. We'll get back to the three.

Now, out of all of this mess, one thing was clear. Zaion LanZa, also known in her current life as Sayu Syncronisity, was right. After her termination a month after debuting at Nijisanji as Zaion, she was terminated, and she wrote a scathing expose about how her experience at Nijisanji was, and spoilers, it wasn't great, and later, it turned out a lot of it lined up with what the most recent terminated member experienced.

The thing is, at the time, she was mostly ignored. Not by everybody, but by too many, in my opinion, mainly because she was only there for a month. I know, I was there when it all happened. People either ignored her, or just said that she was salty or straight up called her a liar. Her reputation as Sayu therefore tanked, and it was only after a week after the most recent termination that people slowly began believing her completely.

The thing is, her reputation only improved almost a year after it happened, and from what I understand, her offenses weren't even that severe. People called it mistakes, yes, but not bad enough to warrant a termination. But okay, maybe Nijisanji didn't think she fit into the Nijisanji ecosphere, so she was let go. I'm not going to go into how she got terminated, that's a whole different can of worms, all I'm going to say is, she got terminated, and her reputation didn't exactly recover.

But, and excuse me for repeating the same phrase but, here's the thing. After almost a year, people should have forgiven her. She had already apologized, I'm not sure if she's done it multiple times, but she did at least once. She had admitted she made mistakes.

I'm a firm believer of second chances, everybody deserves one. Now, I do have to say, people don't deserve second chances from everyone, depending on how bad the offense was, but, look. If we can forgive James Gunn for his tweets he made when he was dumb and stupid, we should be able to forgive Sayu for the dumb shit she said, right?

It's as if people don't actually believe in second chances. Now, I'm gonna be honest, I'm not really willing to give Nux Taku a second chance, not after he did Coco's graduation notice dirty, essentially acting like a rrat. But that's my personal issue, I've been betrayed too many times in my life, taken advantage of too many people that my flight response gets triggered quite easily. Fuck, it's why I stopped associating myself with the Steven Universe fandom, despite me still liking the series. It's not that they're inherently bad or that I think they're bad, it's that they're bad for my mental health, which is why I distance myself from them.

And if you ask me what my opinion is of Charlie (penguinz0) or Asmongold, I don't talk about them at all. They just give me too much of an I-don't-trust-them vibe. Not that they're untrustworthy, but I just don't want to burn my fingers on them.

The thing is, yes, the SA jokes were in bad taste, I agree. However, it just feels like people were looking for an excuse to hate on her. And now that all this shit with Nijisanji EN is going on, she's suddenly being hailed as someone who was right all along. It just doesn't sit well with me.

The thing is, we all want second chances, but we don't all want to give them. I personally believe that everybody deserve second chances. Not just one, but many. People continue to make mistakes in their lives, and yes, if it's better for your own mental health, you can decide not to give that person another chance. Maybe there are some people who just don't deserve second chances because they never take them, they never learn from them. As cynical as I am in life, I still believe people can change, either for the worse or the better.

Which brings us to Elira, Vox and Ike. No matter whether they're guilty of whatever people accuse them of or not, their reputation is toast. In the short term, they won't be able to recover it. However, let's look at another case.

Mikeneko. Amemiya Nazuna. Yes, even Uruha Rushia. Her reputation has sunk to the bottom of the ocean. However, I don't think it'll remain that way. In time, there will be people who will give her a second chance. Remember, it's forgive, not forget. People may forgive her, but they won't forget. Honestly, I've decided to stay away from that drama, as I really do not care about it, but I do believe she can, in time, recover her reputation.

I mean, fuck, if Logan Paul can come back from that Aokigahara controversy, as much as I still think there should have been more repercussions from it, anyone can.

So, as a closing thought. Elira. Vox. Ike. Your reputations are pretty much toast, at least at Nijisanji EN, but possibly also in your PLs as well. However, it's not unsalvageable, it never is. As long as you're willing to change, as long as you're willing to better yourselves, as long as you want all of that, you can come back on top.

Tanking your reputation isn't the end of it all. You'll probably have to start over from scratch, and you'll most likely never going to go back to the reputation you had before. But it's not the end. Just live and learn.

But I do think Nijisanji EN is practically done.

[worstutfanonthingpoll]

Hello haters!

Now if you know me you know I like two things:

HATING (and please don't call me an anti)

MAKING DISCORD SERVERS

So! I have decided to combine these two things

Now, some backstory:

(Spoiler warnings for Xtale)

Backstory~

I was coming back from holiday in Port U Gal (it was nice, other than the fact i burned to death a lot) and decided HEY! I DOWNLOADED THE LAST EPISODE OF XTALE TO WATCH ON THE PLANE! I SHOULD DO THAT!

Before this, I had slowly been dragging myself through xtale (adhd means i needed to spread it out). I liked it, other than the fact I had no idea what was going on 30% of the time. Anyway.

So I watched Xtale episode the last, and suddenly Sans was relevant despite only having about two speaking roles beforehand. And suddenly he and CharaFrisk were claiming to be besties. And suddenly FriskChara tried to make him kill them bc... it would force XGaster into reseting, weakening him (i think).

All of a sudden everyone's memories were back and they were about to kick XGaster's ass. WONDERFUL, thought me. THIS CUNT'S HAD IT COMING FOR TEN EPISODES. But then GUESS WHO SUDDENLY DEVELOPS MARY SUE SUPERPOWERS AND DESTROYS THE ENTIRE UNIVERSE, BECAUSE... I genuinely do not know.

Did he feel CharaFrisk betrayed him by overwriting him? Maybe, but I think their actions were justified. They didn't see any other way out and they genuinely thought sans would be willing to help bc theyre besties for some reason.

Did he feel for Gaster bc he raised him? Valid enough, but if that's the case why did Papyrus (who was also raised by XGaster), Mr Spare a Genocidal Maniac, join the Gaster torture?

And again, WHY WAS HE THAT OP? There is no explanation for where those powers came from and I think that it is ridiculous he destroyed everyone and everything with full control over his powers, and then had the gall to wail about it. Like dude. No one was forcing you to do that?? Jeez.

And then Ink, who somehow failed to notice the Ten Variations of Hell Gaster created despite multiversal watch being his LITERAL JOB, comes in like. Oh! Hi sans variant in a destroyed universe! You're invited to the main plotline now! ;D

Wow.

Nothing against Ink, but according to the poll runner server, Ink's inaction is kind of a thing that happens a lot in Underverse. Rip.

End of Backstory~

(Please don't hate on me if you like Cr#ss. If you are a fan of him, good on you! Enjoy the pleathora of fanon content, and feel free to block me. Just no hate pls)

To sum it up, I think Cr○ss Sans sucks but there is nothing on tumblr or ao3 or anywhere agreeing with me

So! I am starting a Cr♡ss Hate Club™ where we complain about him and make that hater content we've been craving, including shipping him with TECtale Sans (an oc of mine who is kind of the worst) and creating the "Cr□ss Sans is a Jerk" tag on ao3 (if swapfell sans gets one, SO DOES CR%SS)

The hate club will be a discord server, the link to which doesn't even exist yet. This is mostly a post to see if people are interested. If not, and I'm right about everyone's undying love for him then that's okay! I'll delete the post and move on with my life.

If you're interested but fear hate, feel free to dm me. But if anyone dms to yell at me for not liking Cr0ss, you're getting blocked.

And remember:

Me saying I don't like someone or something doesn't mean I'm saying you're not allowed to enjoy it, because guess what? People are allowed to have opinions! If he is your fave, good for you! Just please please don't send me hate.

Hell, send me Cr☆ss centered fics that portray him positively if you like, its good for me to broaden my horizons and shit. Also I like the Nightmare's gang found family stuff lol.

Yeah that's pretty much it. Will censor Cr◇ss's name so it doesn't come up when searched.

@inksans-unofficial @worstutcanonthingpoll

[gabenvrhappened]

MoviesOr... Asteroid City

Wes Anderson's aesthetic is all over social media nowadays, which is incredible. There's something about directors being able to create a signature look for their work that makes me appreciate what they do even more, even if I haven't watched their movies. Of course, that's not the case with Wes, since I've already watched two of adventures on the big screen: the great The Grand Budapest Hotel and the not-so-good Moonrise Kingdom.

With that, it's safe to assume I went to watch Asteroid City really excited, and I had three mainly reasons. First, this looks like his biggest aesthetic movie so far, as if he has taken it to the next level and embraced his genius and weirdness to the max, which is amazing. Second, Scarlett Johansson is in it, and I love her. Every movie she's in, I'll want to watch — using common sense, of course. Third, the miniatures are another signature of his work that is incredible and needs to be seen on a big screen.

The movie is great and confusing, in a not too complex. Mainly it tells the story of a father traveling with his three childrens to their grandfather's house after a serious event, when they end up strained on the desert where, not only a convention for young kids is happening, but also where a meteorite (or asteroid, if you prefer) once hit and made the place famous.

The meta-language of the movie, play, and reality is incredible, and I really liked seeing the story being told in acts (especially with one of them in black and white) since I'm a theatre kid myself. The downside is that, at least for me, I was always trying to make sense of what I was seeing with thoughts like, "Okay, in what reality of the movie is this happening again?" or "What does this mean with all the context I'm seeing so far?" which can distract you from paying attention to really understand the movie. And, inevitably, it's one of those that you feel like you will understand more if you watch it again, which is a concept I don't like. For me, you have to watch a movie again because you liked it, not because you didn't understand it.

Like Oppenheimer, this movie shocked me by having actresses I didn't know were in the movie, doing scenes I never thought I would see them doing. If in the nuclear physicist movie, Florence Pugh shocked me by being there and being naked — I haven't searched anything from that movie, including the cast, so her being in it was a surprise —, in Asteroid City, the nature of the shocking moments was the same, but divided: first, Scarlett being naked (speaking of it, I really gasped aloud thinking she had killed herself in that scene), and second, Margot Robbie's appearance. Now that was the crossover Oppenheimer needed.

Still speaking about casting, it was the best. It was nice to see again the faces Wes likes to work with, but the kids Anderson chose were the best possible, especially Aristou Meehan. He. Is. Incredible. Sophia Lillis was also a good choice, and I gasped when I realized it was her — she hasn't changed a bit since It. It was like she did that movie only yesterday. Crazy. I could go on and praise Woodrow's actor and his sisters, but then this review would be too long than it already is, but yes, they were great. The whole cast was perfect, which reminds me of Barbie, but for being completely opposite: the actor choices there weren't all that good.

And even with the spoiler of the movie having an alien right at the beginning because of the credits (remember, I don't like knowing too much about a movie and, ion fact, when I was in the theater last week, I covered my eyes and ears when the trailer for this was being shown. I know, I'm weird that way) and the confusion I felt here and there, I really enjoyed the experience of this movie; and I'm a bit preoccupied to admit it, so I left this for the last part, but the best thing about this whole thing was all the roadrunner's appearance. Ergh, such a show-stealing choice. What's up, Wes?

[tvrningout-a]

ISSA MEME FROM A WHOLE BLOG AGO | @sozokami gets an old meme response!

i think the prompt was something like " your muse wipes my muse's tears. " i happened to think about this response today and went searching for it in the drafts of my old blog! at the time i started writing it, it got so long to the point that i had no idea how to end it, so i saved it for later... and then i went on hiatus and moved blogs asdf well, i hope you enjoy it, space! i couldn't just keep it to myself after re-reading it :' ) to anyone else reading, major spoilers lie ahead if you haven't read the entirety of the kny manga!

     suma knew victory wouldn’t come cheap. she knew her family was lucky to have come out of the corps alive albeit a little roughed up. but they’re together nonetheless -- even as they wait for the sun to rise, even as they wait to hear news of muzan’s demise ( because suma refuses to think for a second that he’ll defeat the slayers this time ), the uzui family is together, and that is something of a miracle.

     the kami only have so many miracles to give.

     suma knew to expect heartbreak after the initial rush of triumph and relief, but there had been a part of her that remained hopeful that most of their comrades would come home banged up but breathing. she remembers an aunt once telling her hope breeds despair, that it is better to expect the worst than to be crushed by disappointment. as a kid, she thought it was a very pessimistic way to view the world and refused to take those words to heart. now, suma understands. 

     she cries a lot during the weeks following muzan’s defeat, and the retired kunoichi feels guilty each time because the others keep themselves together much better than suma can. they don’t ignore their grief, of course, and they all share their regrets ( words they should have told someone, a trip they promised another but never did get around to, missed opportunities they can never get back ), yet suma wonders if consoling her doesn’t become a little taxing. she’s always felt so deeply -- it isn’t easy to stop the tears once they start, nor is it easy to hold them back. to console her when they’ve all lost their friends... well, isn’t it a little unfair to her spouses?

      so suma tries to keep her tears to herself, at least for a little while, until she doesn’t feel so sad when hinatsuru makes sakura mochi or when she sees a butterfly in the garden. as it would turn out, though, suma isn’t very good at hiding things from her spouses. in fact, she’s horrible at it, and the only reason they leave her be for a time is to see if she simply needs to be alone. but it’s hard, and eventually tengen has enough of waiting. to suffer alone and in silence isn’t suma’s way at all.

     when he finds her, she’s holding a garden snake ( who would very well bite the kunoichi were it not for her careful grip of its head ) and openly weeping... but quietly. her bottom lip is caught between her teeth, looking rather red from the amount of pressure, and tengen calls her name only to startle suma bad enough that she loosens her hold on the snake.

     she has a new reason to cry then, as the moment it has a little leeway, the garden snake bites suma’s hand. 

     after a lot of wailing and careful prying of fangs out of flesh, suma sniffles as tengen carefully tends to her injury. she watches his large hand so delicately clean her wound, feeling warmth blossom in her chest that helps ease the pain. why was she holding a snake? he asks. because a bird was eyeing it, she replies. her husband hums and finishes wrapping a bandage around the bite.

     his magenta gaze rises to meet her eyes, soft yet firm when he finally asks, “ why were you crying, then? ”

     there’s no lying to him, and truth be told, suma really doesn’t want to. tears spring to her already puffy eyes. “...it made me think of iguro-san. ”

     tengen is already cupping her cheek when the tears fall. his thumb brushes away the traitorous drops as suma lets loose at last, crying and crying loudly. she misses everyone, she feels sorry for not spending more time with them ( she never even knew iguro-san’s favorite color! ), and she feels so sorry for being so much when her spouses are grieving, too. she’s sorry---

" i'm sorry i'm making it harder for you all! i'm sorry i'm always crying! " she hiccups, leaning into tengen's touch despite herself. her uninjured hand clutches at the material of his yukata, squeezes and squeezes as if that might make it all more bearable. " i wish i could be stronger, but i can't! "

please, don't hate her for it.