#i have a real soft spot for right foot pink sock

[sailorhyunjinz]

~ Stray kids reaction to finding a vibrator in your bag ~

Warnings; fem!reader, istg this is all over the place?!, established relationships, college!au, friendships, nicknames (ok only baby but still), masturbation, use of sex toys, uhm...exhibitionism?, just read it and find out~

Requested: Yeeet thank u anon~~ ;) 

Note: everything about this gif is adorable like look at minho 🥺 and how easy hyunjin falls from changbin pushing him? like changbin got them guns 😩

Bangchan

Your boyfriend chan didn’t need to know about everything...right? With that thought in mind you bought a pink bullet vibrator because why not pleasure yourself in a different way when he’s gone? A couple of days passed and you accidently forgot that you had bought it in the first place let alone taken it out of your bag. It was a usual day in your shared apartment. You were cooking some lunch for the both of you and he always liked seeing you cook for him so he admired the sight before giving you a backhug. You turned your head around to give him a quick peck on the lips but laughed a bit when his dry lips hit yours. 

“Chan baby, go apply some chapstick” you said while laughing. A bit embarrassed he asked you where you held the chapstick to which you responded “in my bag”.

After rummaging through your purse he found it but he saw something in a bright pink colored box. You didn’t notice how he looked at you, box in hand, before he cleared his throat loudly which made you snap your head towards him. 

“And apparently where you keep sex toys as well” looking at the box for one second and at your blushing face the other. 

Minho 

Minho was anti-sex toys because he always wanted to prove how hard he could make you cum without the help of any lousy vibrator but you being the brat you didn’t listen and bought a vibrator hoping to use it when he’s away. The best thing was that he was quite often out of the house, attending meetings and other work related tasks so when he announced that he had a meeting Thursday morning you immedietly put your plan to the test. You gave him a quick peck on the lips and the door shut, leaving you alone. 

The toy was intense. You were on cloud nine as you close to your release, holding on to the pastel colored vibrator for dear life but just as you were about to finish you heard a rastle coming from the door. Before you knew it Minho busted into the room. Not given enough time to cover up he walked into the room, seeing you spread out on the bed with a vibrator stuffed deep inside of you. 

“y/n! I forgot-...” his tongue pressed against the inside of his cheek while his lips contorted into a smirk. 

“CAN’T YOU KNOCK?” you raised your voice whilst trying to cover up with the nearest bit of fabric in sight. 

“Seems like you’ve chosen a toy over me, have fun since you won’t be fucking me anytime soon” he laughed as he walked out the room. 

Changbin

“Y/N! HAVE YOU SEEN MY NECKLACE?” he yelled across the house searching frantically in every corner. 

“NO STOP ASKING ME” you yelled back getting annoyed at him huffing and stomping around you, flipping every drawer over. 

He stomped back to the hallway and once again started to look everywhere, creating a boisterous mess. 

“I CANT FIND IT!” he yelled before a loud crash was heard and then silence. You were busy getting ready and when the noise finally stopped you could continue getting ready in peace. But the silence was oddly long which made you think that Changbin had broken something and was trying to hide it because that had happened too many times. 

“BABY DID YOU FIND IT?” you yelled while putting on your eyeshadow. 

You heard his footsteps get closer to you and as he entered the bathroom you were standing in he looked at the vibrator. 

“No, but I found something better in your bag” he said with one eyebrow raised. 

Hyunjin

Hyunjin and you had just arrived to the hotelroom at your vacation spot. After eating dinner at a romantic restaurant you decided that the two of you had to unpack those carriers that were standing by the small TV in the room. 

“Jinnie~ let’s unpack because if we don’t do it now it will never get done!” you nagged at Hyunjin that was lying down on the white double bed scrolling through instagram. 

“but i’m full~” he whined back before you tickled him and he bolted up like a puppy. 

You opened your suitcase and started sorting clothes into pants, shirts and other such categories. Hyunjin was doing the same, sitting on the carpeted floor and pulling out clothing piece after clothing piece out of his black suitcase.

Upon pulling out your favorite sweater something fell and rolled across the floor. Panicked, you tried to catch it before it rolled over to Hyunjin but it was already to late. The small bullet vibrator stopped as it hit Hyunjins foot and he picked it up. His brown orbs widened as he held the tiny object in his hand. 

“Planned to use it?” he laughed before throwing it at you softly.   

Jisung

Your boyfriend Jisung always had twisted ideas and this time wasn’t an exception. He sat across you at the dark oak table in the local cafe sipping away on his Americano (cue hyunjins ‘americano’). Your coffee was ready and you thanked the lady at the counter. What you didn’t notice is that during that small time period of getting your coffee and sitting down with Jisung you had left your bag wide open. Jisung glanced and saw a silk pouch which he hadn’t seen before and so he grabbed it and opened it. He smirked and put it in his lap, waiting eagerly for you to return. As you placed down your latte and sat down he said:

“Y/n?” 

“Yeah baby?” you answered.

He slid the pouch across the table, holding it down with 3 fingers. In shock you almost spilled your coffee as you tried to slam your hand on his, wanting to hide the small vibrator that had a remote controll connected to it. His reflexes were no joke because in the speed of light he retracted his hand and held the pouch up in the air for everyone to see. Jisung inched closer to you across the table.

“You’ll get it back only if you go put it on right now and I get to keep the controller.”

Felix 

Movie date night at home was Felix’s and your favorite since it meant that you could cuddle to your hearts content. You messaged him a picture of the different dvds you had at home and Felix replied that you should bring all of them, being excited to watch dvd instead of netflix. 10 minutes later you got a photo of the snacks the soft boy had bought and as usual he knew your favorites, so you sent a bunch of hearts in reply.

Another reason to why these date nights were so great was because they most of the time led to sex and so you threw in a vibrator into the bag even though you rarely used toys in bed with him. 

When you arrived at his place you placed the bag down as Felix gave you a peck on the cheek. Before you could turn around after hanging your jacket on the coat rack he stood with the vibrator in hand looking at it in fascination. 

“This is way more fun than movies” he said under his breath as he got closer to you. 

Seungmin

The two of you had been out on a date night and after a late night walk in the blossoming park your feet were starting to hurt. The black heels were cute with your outfit but not on your comfort. Seungmin noticed you limping a bit and a worrying expression was painted on his face. He pointed towards a rusty dark blue park bench.

“Take off your shoes, I’ll carry you back home” he said smiling. 

You hesitated, not wanting him to struggle with you on his back but the pain was excruciating and so you sat down on the bench and lazily put the heels in your bag. He kneeled down infront of you.

“Hop on y/n” he giggled slightly.

You giggled with him and hugged his sturdy back, wrapping your arms around his neck. The late summer breeze hit your exposed feet making them slightly cold but you didn’t care since Seungmins body heat was enough to warm you back up. 

Upon arriving home you hurried to put on a pair of socks to warm yout freezing feet. Seungmin being the cute boyfriend he was took out the heels from your bag but stumbled upon a box. He took it out to look closer at it and noticed that it was a small bullet vibrator that you had bought a week ago. You simply forgot to show it to Seungmin. When you looked for him he turned the box in his hand and looked at you with his puppy eyes. 

“Looks like date night is not over” he said as his eyes glimmered. 

Jeongin

Entering college you knew nobody. Everybody had their acquaintances making you look like the outcast but that was until you met your best friend Jeongin. Just like you he was a diligent student, spending most of his time in the library where you first met him. You often had study sessions with the boy since the two of you could learn from each other and one day he suggested that the two of you studied at his house. You agreed thinking that it would be more quiet in his house than in some cafe or library. 

He smiled as he opened the door and greeted you. His room was small but had a comfortable vibe which was enhanced by the fairy lights over his bed. Before the studying started you asked him where the bathroom was and he politely pointed to the a door that could be seen from his bedroom. You told him that he could unpack your things if he wanted to get started and he nodded while smiling. Upon unzipping the backpack there were a bunch of papers and folders that were necessary for the project you were working on but at the bottom there was a white box. He turned it around and through the plastic window he saw the light purple bullet vibrator. Jeongin was flustered and intrigued at the same time never seeing such a thing in real life. You tiptoed back into the room thinking that Jeongin had already started studying but were caught off guard when you saw him holding the vibrator you had forgotten to unpack from yesterday.

“Didn’t know this was needed for a study session” he laughed hysterically while you froze in the door frame, blushing profusely.

[fruitcoops]

Could you maybe write a “73 questions with Sirius Black” Vogue one? Or something like that.

Yes! I had never seen these videos before and it was a fun challenge to write. Hope you enjoy! Sweater Weather credit goes to @lumosinlove!

The house is large, two stories tall and painted a soft gray with white trim around the windows. Holiday lights have yet to be taken down and shine in all colors of the rainbow from the eaves as the camera crew walks up the front steps. The curtains in the window tremble for a moment, then a dog pokes her head through—she is all-black and curious, and looks quite large.

Dorcas Meadowes knocks on the front door; a moment later, it swings open and reveals Sirius Black. “Hey, guys, come on in! You can leave your shoes by the door inside.”

“Thanks, Sirius.” Dorcas kicks off her flats and follows him inside as he sets a dish towel on the end table and leans against it. “How are you today?”

“I’m doing pretty well. Morning practice was productive and I’m feeling good about our upcoming game.”

“We’re here today to ask you 73 rapid-fire questions while you lead us around. Sound good?”

“Sounds good. You can all come inside instead of freezing on the porch,” he laughs, waving them closer. The door shuts with a gentle click.

“First question: on a scale of 1-10, how excited are you about life right now?”

“Hmmm. A solid seven.”

“Do you have any pets?”

“I do!” Sirius leads them into the other room, where the dog is curled up on the couch below the window; he picks her up and gives her a kiss on the head. “This is Hattie and I love her very much.”

“Cute! If you could do a dramatic love scene in a movie with anyone, who would it be?”

Sirius sets the dog down and thinks for a second. “Aside from my fiancé, I’m going to say James Potter. We would kill it and I don’t think it would be that awkward.”

“What’s the origin of your name?”

“Pretty much my whole family has star-themed names. Sirius is the dog star from Canis Major.”

“Brightest star in the sky, too. What’s one thing people don’t know about you?”

“I’m an introvert. Lots of people assume that I’m super social because of my job, but I’m very quiet in real life.” He walks back out to the entrance and takes the towel off the table, then moves into the kitchen. It’s well-lit and painted a deep, warm red. The countertop is scattered with knickknacks and picture frames—clearly, this is a place people spend a lot of time. Hattie, who followed them in, lays down by the oven with a heavy sigh.

“What’s your wakeup ritual?”

Sirius reaches up and pulls two mugs out of the cupboard. “I wake up around seven am and make coffee while Re is in the shower, then rinse off and get dressed while he makes breakfast. It’s a good system. Want some tea?”

“Sure. What’s your bedtime ritual?”

“I don’t think I have one,” he says as he puts the kettle on and ignites a burner on the stove. “Usually we read or watch a movie, then go up to bed and talk for a while. There’s not a big routine or anything.”

“Sounds nice. What’s your favorite time of day?” Dorcas sits on the other side of the kitchen island while he takes a box of peppermint tea down.

“That’s a tough one. I like the in-between spots, like just after sunrise or dusk. Three in the afternoon is usually pretty chill as well. Does anyone else want a cup?”

There are a few murmurs behind the camera and he takes two more down. “What is one thing no one knows about you?” Dorcas asks.

He raises an eyebrow. “If I told you, everyone would know, and it wouldn’t count.”

“Fair enough. Dream country to visit?”

“Anywhere. I think I want to go to Ireland first, though.” Small wisps of steam begin curling out of the kettle, but it doesn’t whistle.

“Do you ever feel pressure to post things on social media?”

Sirius makes a face. “I used to. Eventually I just got tired of it, you know? The whole point of social media is sharing bits of your life with people and it makes me happy to show off my dog, or Re, or my friends. I post things just for fun now.”

The kettle begins to hiss and he reaches back to turn it off. “Sneakers or skates?”

“Skates.”

“Vintage or new?

“Vintage, especially for t-shirts and sweaters.”

“Who is your biggest role model?”

“Pascal Dumais.” Sirius stops pouring for a moment to look up at the camera. “If you ever get a chance to meet him, listen to what he has to say. You’ll be better for it.”

“Wise words. How do you deal with negativity? Oh, thank you.” Dorcas wraps her hands around the mug and takes a small sip while Sirius passes the other ones to the crew.

“Honestly? I don’t give a shit. It used to really bother me, but I’m happy, I have a job I love, and my family cares about me. Why should I care what people I’ve never met think of me?” He sits on the counter and rests his elbows on his knees, blowing on the hot water.

“What are three things you can’t live without?”

“My dog, Remus, and my family.” There is no hesitation in his voice.

“Not hockey?”

“I’d be devastated if I couldn’t play, sure, but it’s not the central focus of my life anymore.”

“What’s one ingredient you put in everything?”

“Does salt count?” He winces as he takes a drink. “Ugh, burned my tongue. I put salt on a lot of things because I drink so much water that it throws my balance off.”

“What is something you’re completely bored of right now?”

Sirius rolls his eyes. “Gossip columns and tabloids in general.”

Dorcas hums in agreement. “What’s your biggest fear in life?”

“Losing my loved ones.”

“Window or aisle seat?”

“Window. Anyone walking by always steps on my foot or hits my elbow if I’m in the aisle. Plus, I get a good view and an easy nap spot.”

“What’s your current TV obsession?”

“Avatar: The Last Airbender, which I’m watching for the third time already.” He shakes his head. “It’s just so good.”

“Favorite app?”

He takes a second to think. “Spotify.”

“Secret talent?”

Sirius looks at her over the rim over his cup. “This is going to shock you. Ready?”

“Ready.”

“Hockey.”

“You’re the worst.” Despite her words, Dorcas smiles. “What the most adventurous thing you’ve done in your life?”

“Uh, probably going to Europe with some of the guys last year. We had a lot of fun, but it was crazy.”

“I can imagine it was. How would you define yourself in three words?”

“Tall, dark, and handsome.”

“And apparently not humble,” Dorcas teases. “Favorite piece of clothing?”

“Hoodies.”

“Clothing item everyone should have?”

“Hoodies.”

A door opens behind them and the camera turns; Remus walks out of the basement, covered in sweat as he wipes his forehead with the hem of his shirt and holds his skates in his other hand. “Baby, have you seen…” he trails off when he sees the group of people in the kitchen. Hattie’s tail thumps on the floor. “Um. Hello.”

“Hey, Remus, how are you doing?” Dorcas asks mildly.

The camera pans out to catch both Sirius, who is laughing quietly, and Remus, who flushes pink. “I’m good. I thought you were coming at ten?”

“It’s ten-thirty, sweetheart,” Sirius says, hiding his smile in his tea.

Remus glances at the clock before giving an awkward nod and walking toward the stairs. “I guess I’ll take a shower, then. Sorry about that. Uh, carry on.”

“What’s a superpower you would want?” Dorcas asks as soon as he disappears.

Sirius shakes his head with a grin. “Uh, teleportation. That would be really cool.”

“What’s inspiring you in life right now?”

“Ah, une grande question.” He thinks, then tilts his head toward the staircase. “Moments like that. And the Stanley Cup, of course.” He reaches back and knocks on the wooden cupboard.

“What cause is closest to your heart?”

“LGBT+ rights, especially trans rights. I’m privileged enough to have a platform and I intend to be loud as hell about that.”

“Good.” Dorcas sets her almost-empty mug on the table. “What’s one thing you’d say to your teenage self?”

Sirius lets out a long breath and drums his hands on the light blue ceramic of his cup. “I would say…it gets better. It really, really does. You’re going to feel super shitty for just a little bit longer, but then I promise you will be so incredibly happy that you wake up every morning and it hits you all over again.”

Dorcas nods, and the kitchen is quiet for a moment. “What’s a book that everyone should read?”

“The Hobbit, by J.R.R Tolkien.”

“What would you like to be remembered for?”

“This is going to sound so corny, but I want to be remembered for just being a good person.”

“That’s not corny. How do you define beauty?”

“Remus Lupin.”

“That’s corny,” she laughs, making him smile. “What do you love most about your body?”

“I’m a big guy, which can be a little bit intimidating, but it means I give really great hugs. I’m sure everyone saw the video that went around a while ago.”

“Cap Cuddles?”

He snorts. “Right. You’ve got Finn O’Hara to thank for that.”

“In your opinion, what’s the best way to take a rest or decompress?”

“Being alone,” Sirius says. “There is literally nothing better than getting home and sitting down with a book or something while I can hear Re doing his own thing and Hattie’s napping. It’s one of my favorite parts of the afternoon.”

“That’s the most introverted thing you’ve ever said.” Dorcas grins and finishes her tea just as a faint beeping noise begins in another room. “What’s your favorite way to experience art?”

“Through music, for sure.” He slides off the counter and walks down the hall, leading them toward the laundry room. He gives the camera crew a look as he pulls dry clothes out of the machine and heads back to the living room. “What? Did you think I didn’t do my own laundry?”

“You lost a sock,” Dorcas informs him, picking it off the ground and laying it on top of his head.

“Thanks, D.”

“What question do people ask that you wish they wouldn’t?”

“Lots of people have asked me when I decided to be gay, which is wrong on so many levels.”

“If you could master one instrument, what would it be?”

“Guitar or piano.” He dumps the load of laundry on the couch and opens the back door, holding it for the crew as they walk out into the sunshine. Hattie weaves through their legs and disappears into the bushes along the back.

“I might have to take your dog home with me. If you had a tattoo, where would it be?”

Sirius mock-glares at her. “Let me have my girl! Um, I would love to have a tattoo somewhere on my arm.”

“This might be a hard one. Dolphins or koalas?”

“Oh, that is hard. Probably dolphins. The ocean is terrifying but those little guys are just having a blast.”

“What’s the best gift you’ve ever received?” Dorcas asks as he picks up a tennis ball and throws it across the yard. Hattie emerges from the bushes and races after it in a blur of black fur.

“An engagement ring.”

“Yeah, it was.” Remus walks into the backyard and kisses Sirius’ cheek before bending down to catch Hattie in his arms. His hair is still damp from the shower. “Hello, sweet girl!”

“Who’s your favorite musician?”

“Queen.” Sirius laughs at her surprised look. “I’m gay, what did you expect?”

“True. What’s your favorite board game?”

“Monopoly.” Remus and Hattie disappear from the frame, but the bouncing sound of the tennis ball creates some background noise and Sirius watches them for a moment with pure affection.

“Favorite color?”

“Blue.”

“Least favorite color?”

“Orange.”

“Bowties or knot ties?”

He frowns. “Don’t they all have knots?”

“Smartass.”

“Yep! Uh, regular ties.”

“Bowties are superior!” Remus calls.

“Get your own questions!” Sirius laughs.

“Going off your music answers: records or CDs?”

“I don’t own a lot of records, so I’m going to have to go with CDs. I love the way vinyl sounds, though.” His eyes widen as he looks to the side. “Are you okay?”

“Fine,” Remus wheezes. “I didn’t need those ribs anyway.”

“For the viewers, the dog just football-tackled him into the grass,” Sirius says, and Dorcas snorts.

“Your hair is famously luscious. Blow-dry or air-dry?”

“Air dry.”

“Coffee or tea?”

“Coffee, but tea is nice in the evenings.”

“What’s the weirdest word in the English language?”

Sirius laughs. “There are so many. Uh, ‘jeez’ is the one that comes to mind first.”

“What about the French language?”

“Oiseaux,” he says in a crisp accent. “It means ‘birds’, and you pronounce about three of the actual letters.”

“Good to know. Do you prefer dark chocolate or milk chocolate?”

“Dark chocolate.”

“Stairs or elevators?”

“Elevators. I don’t want to walk up three floors after playing hockey for two and a half hours.”

“Summer or winter?”

Sirius bites his lip in thought as they walk around the yard, where small flowers line the fence in beds and colorful pots. “I love summer because I have actual free time to be with my friends, but winter is hockey season. I don’t know, next question.”

“What’s a dessert you don’t like?”

“I’m not a huge fan of caramel. It’s too sticky.”

“A skill you’re working on mastering?”

“Will you ban me from more interviews if I say hockey?”

“Yes.”

“In that case, I’m working on keeping plants alive, as you can probably see.” He taps the nearest flowerpot gently with his foot; it has ‘Harry’ painted across it in sloppy blue letters. “My godson made that for my birthday.”

“What’s the best thing to happen to you today?”

“This, for sure,” he says with a smile. “I haven’t seen you and Marley in ages.”

“We missed you, too. What’s the worst thing that happened to you today?”

He pouts slightly. “Burning my tongue on tea.”

“Hugs or kisses?”

“Hugs! Though I’ll accept kisses from a few very specific people.”

“Do you have a favorite smell?”

He pauses and cranes his neck to look behind the cameras. “Re?”

“Yeah?”

“What shampoo do you use?”

“Uhhh…” There’s a moment of quiet. “It’s something with lavender, I think.”

Sirius turns back to Dorcas. “Something with lavender.”

“How specific,” she laughs. “What’s the best compliment you’ve ever received?”

He smiles to himself. “There was a young woman, maybe sixteen or seventeen, that came to one of the games earlier this season. I saw her standing with a puck and went over, and while I was signing it she looks at me and says, ‘you are exactly what I wish my older brother was like’. Turns out, she was bisexual and her brother wasn’t super accepting of her. That was…” He shakes his head. “That meant the world to me. I’ll never forget it.”

“You’ve definitely made a big impact on the community,” Dorcas agrees. “What’s the last piece of content you consumed that made you cry?”

“I watched ‘Soul’ the other night and almost had to pause it at one point to pull myself together.”

“Do you prefer animated movies or live-action?”

“Animated, mostly because I wasn’t allowed to watch Disney movies as a kid, so I’ve been catching up as an adult and they rock.”

“What’s your nerdiest quality?

“I love watching documentaries.”

“Sweet or savory?” The back door creaks a bit as they walk back inside and the camera catches a few frames of Hattie and Remus running around the yard together.

“Sweet.”

“In ten years, you have a daughter. What age do you let her date?”

Sirius gives Dorcas a look. “Whenever she wants to. I’m going to impose curfews and stuff, but I’m the last person on the planet to police her love life.”

“Good answer. What’s a song you can listen to on repeat?”

“Don’t Stop Me Now by Queen. Absolute banger.”

“If you could switch lives with someone for a day, who would it be?”

“Arthur Weasley,” he says after a moment. “I would love to know what it feels like to get up in the morning and know you’re about to spend another day wrangling our team. It’s a miracle he hasn’t killed us all with his clipboard.”

“How do you know you’re in love?”

“Oh.” Sirius blinks at her in surprise at the sudden topic change. “Well, for me, I think it’s just…being comfortable around someone. Being able to spend time with them without saying anything and knowing you’re safe, no matter what. It’s the best feeling in the world.”

“What are you most excited about at this time in your life?”

A slight smile crinkles his eyes. “Getting married. That’s going to be awesome.”

“Who is your go-to for having a good laugh?”

“James Potter. He’s the best, and I love him.”

“Last question,” Dorcas says, sliding her list into her pocket. “Many LGBT+ people, especially teenagers, have spoken about how you’re an inspiration. Any words for them?”

Sirius hums in thought. “First of all, thank you for being so open and welcoming. I would never have expected the sheer force of people’s love to come through like that when so many people were saying horrible things. Second, to any kids out there who need to hear it: I’m proud of you. It takes a lot to be true to yourself and even if you’re still in the closet, you’re just as valid as the rest of us. Stay proud.”

“That’s a wrap.” Dorcas gives him a quick hug that he happily returns. “Thanks for letting us crash your morning, Cap.”

“Any time. Thanks for tuning in to Lion Pride, everyone!”

[onlyangelcas]

boats and a blue-eyed birthday boy

read on ao3

The boat won’t start, because that’s just Dean’s luck. His son is inside, celebrating his 4th birthday, and his surprise gift is malfunctioning right before the big reveal.

Ever since Dean, Cas, and Jack moved out of the bunker and into their cottage-style lake house, Jack had been obsessed with the water. He was enthralled by the lake, spending hours on the dock watching the fish swim by or dipping his feet in on warm days. Cas fueled his interest by purchasing every book and guide about lake-dwelling creatures and plants.

Jack’s obsession was pushed even further when their elderly neighbor had offered to take him fishing on his boat. From that moment on, boats became all the rage in the Winchester home. Books about boats moved in next to the lake books on Jack’s bookshelf, his cowboy themed bed sheets were swapped for a set adorned with tiny sailboats. Dean and Cas had to practically restrain him from pestering their neighbor for a boat ride everyday.

That’s how Dean found himself purchasing a repaired boat from some guy in southwest Minnesota. He had made the drive to pick up the boat a few weeks ago, it was relatively affordable, not a luxury speedboat or ridiculous pontoon, but perfect for about 6 people to climb on board for a day of fishing or relaxing on the water. Dean had made a plan with El, their elderly neighbor, to keep the boat stored in his garage until Jack’s birthday. El was happy to help, even took apart the motor to make sure everything was working and got it in the water that morning to surprise Jack.

Now, Dean is huffing over the damn thing, trying to decipher why it won’t start. Everyone else, including El, the only person that could actually help him, is inside trying to keep Jack distracted while Dean preps the boat.

“Shit,” Dean curses, after another failed attempt at turning the engine over.

He slams his forehead into the steering wheel, frustrated tears gathering in the corners of his eyes. Four was the worst year of Dean’s life, for obvious reasons, and he wanted to make sure that Jack’s fourth year was everything that his wasn’t. He knows it’s stupid, to get this worked up over a freaking boat, but this boat was so much more than that. It was a promise to Jack that he would always be there, he would always love him. So if he’s a little emotional over the possibility that this boat will ruin his son’s very important 4th birthday, who can blame him?

Dean turns his face toward the sky, the sun peaking through the tree branches to warm his skin. He thinks this is a moment he would pray, if he had anyone to pray to. Considering his two favorite angels are already inside the house, it seems kind of arbitrary. Instead he just looks at the sky, watches puffy white clouds drift by lazily, and wonders pointlessly about what he did to deserve this.

“Looks like you could use some help.” Says a gravelly voice Dean instantly recognizes as belonging to El.

He runs a hand across his face, quickly wiping away any evidence of tears. “You think you can get this thing going?”

“I should have told you earlier, you got to give it some gas as you turn the key.” El says simply, nudging Dean out of the way before pressing his foot to the accelerator and starting the boat.

“Well, I’ll be damned.” Dean declares, slapping a hand to the other man’s back. “I thought the day was ruined.”

El laughs, adjusting his trucker cap and turning to face Dean with a serious look. “Boy, you think this boat not running would have ruined the day?”

Dean cocks his head to the side slightly, a mannerism he’s picked up from Cas after all these years. “Would have been a bummer if Jack’s surprise tanked.”

“You coulda given that kid an old thing with a couple of paddles and he woulda been ecstatic.” El smiles, clapping his shoulder affectionately. “All he really wants is something to share with you.”

In moments like these, El reminds him of Bobby so much that it almost knocks the wind out of him. There’s a lump in Dean’s throat, he quickly turns his head toward the ground and lets out a wet laugh.

“You and Cas,” El starts again. “And I guess Sam helped out, too. You guys raised that boy right, he doesn’t need things to be happy, he just needs people.”

Dean looks up, his glossy eyes meeting El’s, he gives him a soft smile. “Now, how’s about we go get that kid and show him his gift.”

“Yeah,” Dean laughs. “It’s showtime.”

El promises to keep watch of the boat while Dean jogs back up to the house. He pulls open the backdoor and immediately bumps into Kaia, who is looking at him guilty with her hands tight around Claire’s waist.

“Really? This is a birthday party for a 4 year old.” Dean attempts to scold, but there’s no real heat to it.

“Sorry!” Kaia yells as Claire says, “Who died and made you a patron saint?”

Dean laughs loudly at that, pressing a kiss to the side of Claire’s head as he passes. He makes his way into the kitchen, where Sam and Eileen are putting the finishing touches on Jack’s birthday cake.

Where’s Cas? He signs when Eileen catches his eye.

Living room. She signs back, giving him a warm smile.

He can hear Rowena’s laughter filling the room before he even steps over the threshold. She’s standing to the side of the living room, deep in conversation with Jody and Donna. Jack is on the floor with Alex, talking animatedly while he secures one of her braids with a bright pink hair tie. Jack’s wearing a red cowboy hat with a t-shirt that says ‘This is my 4th rodeo’, the shirt was Cas’ idea, along with the matching ‘Jack’s 4th Rodeo’ shirts that everyone in attendance is adorning.

Cas is perched on the sofa, watching Jack and Alex with a fond look in his eyes. Dean slides his hand across Cas’ shoulders and bends down to plant a sweet kiss against his lips. “It’s go time.”

Cas smiles excitedly as Dean sticks his hands under Jack’s armpits and pulls him to his feet. He reaches into his back pocket and retrieves a bandana that he begins to fasten over Jack’s eyes.

“Alright everyone, it’s time for Jack’s big surprise.” Dean says as he secures the bandana around Jack’s head. “Head out to the backyard so we can show our birthday boy his present.”

Everyone files out the backdoor and into the yard behind the house. Dean and Cas each take one of Jack’s hands in their own, leading him toward the dock.

“Okay buddy,” Cas says once the three of them reach the rocky shoreline, the rest of their family gathered behind them. “You ready?”

“Yes! I’m ready!” Jack nearly squeals.

Sam has his phone out, no doubt recording the moment so no one ever forgets it, as if they ever would.

“Everyone countdown with me,” Dean says, reaching for the bandana.

“Three… two… one!” The group counts off in unison as Dean releases the bandana in one swoop.

Jack stands there slack-jawed and in awe for a moment, clearly overwhelmed by the sight in front of him. “A boat?” He asks more than states.

“Yeah, baby, it’s for you.” Dean says, a little confused by the 4 year old’s reaction.

Jack turns to him and Cas, his hands still holding tightly onto theirs. “Our boat?”

“Yeah, Jack, your daddy picked it out for us.” Cas states, running a hand through Jack’s hair.

Jack releases both of their hands then, throwing his arms around Dean’s neck so aggressively that he tumbles from his crouched position onto his butt. “Thank you daddy!”

Dean buries his face into Jack’s neck, hiding his suddenly teary eyes, and says, “Happy birthday kiddo.”

Jack pulls away and places his small hands on the sides of Dean’s face before leaning in and pressing a sloppy kiss to his cheek. “I love you daddy.”

Dean huffs a wet laugh, looking over Jack’s shoulder to see his family watching with eyes as shiny as his own.

“I love you more, Jack.” He says, smacking an equally sloppy kiss to his forehead. “Now, how ‘bout we take it for a spin?”

“Papa too?” Jack asks, eyes lighting up.

Dean looks up at Cas, who has tears slipping unashamedly down his cheeks, and smiles. “Yeah, papa too.”

After they get Jack secured in his life vest, he takes his spot at the front of the boat, kneeling on the seat and leaning precariously over the edge to watch the boat carve through the water. Cas is seated next to him, one hand looped tightly in the back of his life vest, and Dean is at the wheel. The sun is setting over the horizon, reflecting off the lake and painting them in a picture-perfect orange glow.

Jack looks back at Dean, his blonde hair curling slightly from the spray of the boat, his gap-toothed smile is wide and unapologetic. Cas is looking at him, too, affection and love spilling over every feature, his mouth turned up in a lopsided grin.

“I hope I can be 4 forever!” Jack yells, letting out a wild laugh as Cas reaches over to tickle his neck.

Dean knows, somewhere in the back of this mind, that he should be worried that Jack is getting older. One day he’ll grow up, probably move away, and their house will no longer be littered with plastic sailboats and tiny socks discarded around every corner. At this moment, though, he can’t find it in himself to worry. Jack won’t be 4 forever, but he’s sitting in front of Dean with a smile like sunshine, toothy and perfect, laughing raucously, unashamed in his joy, and that will always be enough.

[loveinterestcastiel]

erosion

I wrote some endverse fic based on a @lateral-org post asking a FANTASTIC question:

When/why/how did endverse! cas get rid of the trenchcoat and what was dean's reaction?

Rated M. Warnings: Graphic Depictions of Violence. Word Count: 4.1k

tagged some mutuals and people I thought might be interested in this under the cut, if you want tagged in this/future fic or want me to remove your tag dm me!

erosion

Of course, Sam said yes in Detroit. So why dream about that? He lived it every day. The redundancy was irritating at best.

Where the fuck did I leave my boots last night? Cas cursed under his breath and embarked on a thorough search of their cabin, the coarse words warm and familiar on his tongue as he yanked on his socks. I really am starting to sound like Dean.

Dean’s boots were already gone, his gun and thigh holster absent too. He’d left his green jacket behind, tossed carelessly aside last night and hidden under the trenchcoat on the floor at the foot of their bed. He slipped his coat on over his clothes and shoved Dean’s jacket into their pack- he knew he’d want it later, even if it was just for the drive back. He slipped on the worn coat, habit- he’d stopped wasting Grace on its upkeep a while ago, but it was still important. It felt like comfort, in some strange way, so he kept on wearing it despite the worn-through elbows or the stubborn little bloodstained spot on the hem.

He’d dreamed of Detroit, last night, again. He didn’t know if he’d ever get used to dreaming, as unsettling and involuntary as it was. It felt like the unfair hijacking of an otherwise enjoyable human bodily function, and he resented it altogether. He snagged a bit of weed from his stash and tucked it in next to his flask, sweeping out the cabin door and into the frigid morning sunshine, giving Chuck a lazy wave as he ambled past his cabin to the truck lot, kicking little pebbles across the packed dirt at imaginary targets with a super-human precision that grated strangely on him today.

“Big run today,” Chuck said with a tentative smile, his hands clasping a chipped mug filled to the brim with his ridiculously indulgent tea, wafting a cascade of steam out over the railing of his cabin porch before dissipating into the air. “Don’t forget the perishables if you can get at them, ok? We’re seriously low on-”

“Toilet paper, milk, cheese, butter,” he interrupted, “plus sugar, flour, canned fruit, hygiene products, toothpaste, toilet paper, coffee, meat if we can get it, .35 and 9mm ammunition, mechanical oil, gasoline, propane, rubbing alcohol, gauze, surgical tape, toilet paper, paracetamol, and oh, toilet paper again!” Cas recited dryly, rolling his eyes. “You gave us a written list yesterday. Twice. Couldn’t fuck up blackout drunk.”

Chuck snorted, shaking his head in self-deprecation. “Just doing my job, Cas.”

“We’ll do ours,” he called over his shoulder, continuing down the central path briskly. “We’ve all got our part to play.”

What was it Lucifer had said to Dean, that night Zachariah stole him out from under Cas’s nose and threw him into the future? No matter what choices you make, whatever details you alter… we will always end up here.

It certainly seemed like he was right. Most days, it seemed like they were all hurtling towards the exact same place Dean had caught a wretched glimpse of, once, with the brakes slashed and emergency failsafes offline, and no indicator that the impossible choices they were making every day were anything but inevitable. He knew that Dean still had nightmares about his ending, but he didn’t know much else about Dean’s nightmares anymore but what little snippets he could garner from what Dean mumbled and cried out in his sleep. He’d lost the ability to dreamwalk a while back. Three nights after the Croatoan virus wiped out Fort Worth and they were forced to fall back, he tried to enter Dean’s sleep to watch his dreams in the dubious refuge of a closed down Motel 6 off of interstate 70 as they ran west, to see if there was some piece of information they’d missed, some new choice they could make one day that could change the path they were on.

It simply hadn’t worked. He mourned the loss of one more skill in the darkness of their room that night as Dean slept uneasily in the bed beside him, one more thing which, in its absence, made him ever more useless to Dean, much like the loss of his ability to time travel, or to smite their enemies with ease. Flight was becoming difficult by the day, and he knew in some part of his mind that his wings would be the next to go, and he would be grounded, permanently, on Earth and not in Heaven.

And so it goes.

Anyway, it wasn’t like they had much of a choice about anything these days. Once Michael had taken Adam, they lost their only trump card. Heaven didn’t need Dean anymore, but Hell desperately needed Sam. It was a shame, it really was, that Sam’s gamble hadn’t paid off.

It was a miracle Lucifer let Dean go. He had brushed him off as a non-threat. Unimportant on a cosmic scale, however important Dean was to the vessel. To Sam. So Dean walked out of that run down building alive, and he was the most beautiful, terrible thing Cas had ever seen. His soul shone brighter than even an archangel’s grace in his rage and trembled with the fierce sharpness of grief, and it was glorious, righteous.

Godly.

Even as Cas’s memories softened and blurred, becoming tinged with a mortal haze, that memory of Dean remained in a sparkling clarity. He could imagine no life, no moldable version of the past, in which he did not choose Dean. From the very first moment his soul had reached back to cling to Cas’s Grace in Hell, Cas had fallen, was falling, would fall, for Dean. It was inevitable, his love. They were inevitable. They fell together in the time after Detroit, into battle, into bed, and into cosmic obscurity. Soon, too soon, their losses began to outnumber their wins, and they had to make more and more certain regrettable sacrifices just to stay alive. Cas was used to collateral damage, far more than Dean was, but whatever the other humans in their ragged camp believed of him, he wasn’t unaffected. Just the opposite, in fact. He had never felt anything before, not for billions of years, an incomprehensible existence of light and intent and obedience and war, and now he felt everything. That- not Dean’s disappointment, or the slow loss of his Grace, or his Father’s unyielding silence- was undoubtedly the worst part of becoming something like human.

Some days were better than others, of course. Some days he took precious little blue or white or green pills, all different shapes and sizes and he felt good. Numb, pleased, far away. Quiet. Others, fewer than the days he had his pills, he took shrooms, LSD. Molly, twice. Often he took nothing at all, craving the wicked pain and emptiness it created in him as his sobriety enhanced the ache his dwindling Grace left behind, needing the punishment to feel real before forcing himself into a tumultuous sleep after days spent horribly awake with half a bottle of rotgut sloshing in his stomach. He still liked joints, rolled meticulously, their verdant smoke curling up deliciously in his lungs and setting him up on a lovely little metaphorical cloud the best, and then, they were even more so lovely when he shared them with Dean. There was nothing, nothing like passing it between them, before transitioning into trading hit after hit between their mouths, brushing against his soft lips, breathing his air, watching Dean’s cheeks flush a stunning pink and holding tight to his deep golden hair, dragging him down into slow, languid kisses that desire deepened and turned into a precious sort of holy consumption as the high hit its stride in them both.

He was sober today, mostly, just riding out the last of some gorgeous pink pill from a nearly full bottle he’d just scavenged out a few days before. It made him feel floaty, focused, fearless. He felt almost like he did two years ago, before his reeducation stint in Heaven. Angelic. It was nice. He’d take another, later. Maybe Dean would want to take one, too, and they could fuck high out under the stars on their quilt again like they did last October and feel like the real Gods of this stupid little planet, on top of the world, on top of Dean, cradled in the soft embrace of his thighs, and worship each other.

Take that, brothers. Castiel smiled viciously at the sky. You’ll never fuck God like I have.

Standing impatiently among their motley caravan of vehicles in the sickly yellow light of a midwestern April morning sun, his back to Cas, Dean’s silhouette and the flashing imprint of his soul- the only one Cas could still see clearly- caramelized into a sweet union of tangible and not that pulled at his stomach and swept him into the siren song of Dean’s being and woke up the hungry creature that lived in his heart and craved DeanDeanDeanDean.

No one else was there yet, probably all still dicking around at the camp mess and drinking shitty chicory. His feet fell silently on the earth, leaving behind the sound of the universe and the vibrant humming of Dean’s soul- and oh, he hoped he could always hear that symphony, even when all the rest of his powers had run dry.

Just as he reached out to take Dean by the shoulder and turn him around, Dean moved with a sudden burst of energy, like a coiled snake striking out. He whirled around and met Cas’s eyes, took him by the neck and the waist, and kissed him. His lips moved with a gentleness that contradicted the intensity of the grip of his cold-fingered hands as they worked their way into his hair, wormed their way under his trenchcoat, and touched the bare skin they found where the hem of his t-shirt met his jeans. He met the kiss eagerly, licking teasingly at the seam of his lips, biting down gently and coaxing Dean into opening his mouth. He pushed Dean back until his back hit the nearest rusted army-green truck with a small thudding noise, pressing himself up against Dean and tugging on his hips so they were pressed flush against each other, the contact sending and electric thrill racing up his spine.

“Cas,” Dean gasped out at the sensation of their bodies meeting, the air punched out of his lungs.

“Mmm, morning,” Cas murmured between kisses. “You’re out here early.” Dean’s neck was uncharacteristically bare above the neck of his rough brown sweater, creamy and invitingly unmarked. Cas indulged in the impulse to change that, working his way over the tender skin, sucking and biting until a bruise began to bloom below the junction of Dean’s jaw and neck, worrying it with his teeth until it was a deep reddish-purple.

“Couldn’t sleep,” Dean whispered, letting his head fall back against the truck window, baring his throat further, and closed his eyes. He seemed almost happy, today. He seemed to light up in the lead-up to their more dangerous missions, and Cas didn’t want to think about that right now. Didn’t want to ruin the moment. “Didn’t want to wake you up,” Dean elaborated.

“I appreciate that.” Satisfied with the rather outrageous hickey he’d created on Dean’s neck, Cas pressed it with one last kiss. “How’d you know I was behind you?” he asked, pressing their foreheads together and slowly grinding their hips together lazily, just breathing Dean in.

“Felt you,” Dean said, bringing their lips together again briefly. “Always can.” One more little kiss.

“Dean, last night, when you couldn’t sleep, I dreamed again about Detroit-” Cas started to confess feverishly, almost against his will, Dean stiffening up at his words in his arms, and was interrupted by the sound of people approaching, footsteps, voices, and an earsplitting wolf-whistle directed at their compromising position.

Dean’s face shuttered immediately, and Cas felt every scrap of easy bliss flee his body.

He pulled back with more than a little reluctance, his stomach twisting as a fakely jovial grin tugged at the corners of his lips, and clapped Dean on the shoulder. “Let’s go, fearless leader. We’ve got a mission to run, don’t you know?”

“Don’t start with that fearless leader shit,” Dean said tightly, rolling his eyes away from Castiel’s face and fixing on a point somewhere over Cas’s shoulder. “Who’s driving?”

“Looks like Cas is driving,” Joe called out mischievously.

Risa smacked him in the chest. “Get in the truck, idiot.” She turned her gaze to Dean, an odd glint in her eye. It felt sticky and wrong in his core but Cas stamped the feeling down. “Group brief over the radio on the way?” she asked.

“Yeah, at 8,” Dean said, sliding into his unshakeable militaristic persona with a firm nod. “Should be fairly straightforward in and out supply grab. Intel says the Croats cleared out of Roanoke a couple days ago, left major infrastructure and commerce sites relatively untouched. It’s a good thing too,” he added, “we were getting spread a little thin with most goods.”

“Sounds easy enough.”

———————————————————————

It was not, in fact, easy.

Their intel was wrong, so wrong, and Cas didn’t know how the fuck it happened, but they were fine, they were almost finished, closing up the trucks in the alley behind the supermarket and waiting for Dean and Trish to return from sweeping the perimeter, when out of what seemed like thin air and with no more than a broken shout for warning there were more Croats swarming them than he’d ever seen in one place before, and Joe and Maya and Kris were dead, and Dean was nowhere to be found.

The Croats had the remaining seven pinned down against the main truck, snarling and screeching and reeking of blood and gore, strips of flesh and clothing that once adorned their companions now dangling from their teeth. Their single-minded need for the endless consumption of human flesh and that it was currently being denied drove them to a terrifying frenzy, but the hunters were starting to push back, and the Croat numbers were thinning slowly but surely. Cas thought he saw Allen get bitten, but next he glanced at him he looked fine. He’d need to check on that if they made it out alive. He resigned himself quickly to the idea of killing the man before they got back to Chitaqua- Allen was a nice enough man, quick-witted and skilled with a blade and a loom, but nothing was worth bringing a Croat back to camp. He owed it to the man as a human being to grant him a swift death if he’d been infected before Allen himself could realize it. A shot to the back of the head, unawares, had to be better than a clumsy battle and inevitable stab to the chest (Cas knew he would always have the upper hand against a human, even when he had fallen in full) with fear in his heart.

He buried his angel blade to hilt in yet another Croat’s throat, yanking it out and ducking out of the way of the spray of blood that followed in a well-practiced motion uncanny in its speed. They would win this one.

But still no Dean.

Cas felt a bubbly panic rise up in his chest through the haze of battle as it became clear to him that Dean wasn’t coming back. Even from the other side of the building or from inside, there was no way that Dean had not heard the commotion of such a large fight.

Something was stopping Dean from coming back to him.

“Risa,” he shouted over the din to the woman on his left. “Dean and Trish-”

“I know,” she interjected tersely, hacking the head off of a skeletally thin Croat in a tattered suit. “Retrieval? We’ve got this handled here as long as this all the fucking bastards around.”

“I’m going in,” Cas said quickly, slicing at a particularly bold (stupid) Croat trying to charge him. It crumpled to the ground and twitched once, and was still. Some of its companions fell on the body ravenously, and were subsequently cut down in turn as they began to tear at the corpse. “Leave as soon as you’re able; I’ve got the keys to the main truck. Cover your right,” he warned Risa, and, sensing an opportunity in the parting sea of Croats before him, ran.

He was through the service doors of the building before the Croat hoard could even begin to respond to his escape, and their noises were quickly muffled by the service door as it locked automatically behind him, leaving him in relative quiet.

There were a surprising number of crates and boxes remaining in the storage and unloading zones, either empty or nearly so, and he quickly ascertained the area was, apart from himself, devoid of life or anything of interest to the camp.

Cas.

Dean's sudden prayer hit him like a sledgehammer to the gut.

Aisle... his mental voice trailed off for a second into indistinct sounds, colors, and waves of pain. Aisle seven. It's bad.

Cas shoved through the access door into the freezers, and out into the store with a recklessness he would have been ashamed of had he been so terrified.

He turned down aisle seven and skidded to a halt, frozen at the sight that greeted him, and tried to make sense of the hideously macabre tableau.

Trish's decapitated body lay the furthest from him, her ribcage torn open, her organs spilling over her arms and scattered in pieces over the floor. Three dead Croats, all headshots, around her remains. Then a bloody lake on the cheap linoleum tile, thick and viscous and so, so red, two more dead Croats, clearly more hard-won victories, their arms hacked at, heads partially removed, and nearly blocking the last body from view, wedged up against the shelves and bloody as it was.

"Cas," Dean wheezed, lifting his head laboriously to meet his eyes, blood bubbling up between his lips and staining them. "Cas, I'm so sorry-"

"No, no, don't talk like that," Cas said desperately, kneeling beside Dean. He took their pack of his back with shaking hands and shoved his angel blade somewhere inside. "We can fix this. You'll be okay."

"Cas-"

"You will!" he said, too loudly and startling himself.

"My ribs," Dean panted out in pained little gasps. "Broken. There's something in my back." He twitched minutely as if to show Cas the problem and immediately convulsed involuntarily at the pain the movement caused him, a horrible rattling moan in his throat. "My leg. Right one. Broken too." His jaw was clenched so tightly it was a miracle he could speak at all through the teeth-grinding pain he was in.

"Okay," Cas said faintly.

Cas...

Oh, he hated feeling. Sometimes he thought it made him useless. He missed being cold. Brutal, uncaring about pain or death. But this was Dean, and he'd never actually been particularly good at being a machine, anyway. "Okay. Dean, I need to see your back," he warned him, before moving him as gently as he could and angling his body so that he could get an unobstructed view of his back.

There was a crude metal stake wedged just an inch to the left of his second and third thoracic vertebrae, rusted, twisted and cruel-looking.

"Dean, I- I have to try to heal you," he said slowly, knowing that Dean wouldn't want him to be wasteful with his Grace. But this was beyond what human field medicine could help.

Dean didn't respond. He'd fallen unconscious.

"Oh no, no, no, baby," he babbled under his breath, trying to figure out the best way to extract the bar of metal. "Hold on," he muttered, grasping the stake firmly and bracing Dean's body against his own, trying to avoid fucking his broken ribs up more.

"Father, please, if you're still here, if you're listening, if you care at all," he begged, "help me."

Of course, his Father didn't answer. Gritting his teeth, Cas yanked out the stake and tossed it aside, immediately covering the wound with his hand. He summoned his Grace together and it responded sluggishly, but his hand was glowing and Dean's back was knitting back together.

As the skin merged into a puckered, raw-looking pink scar, Cas dropped his hand away from the wound and found himself utterly breathless, gasping for air and drained.

Dean was still unconscious.

He leaned Dean back up against the shelving and took a moment to figure out what to do next. Dean was still dying. He was still in danger. He couldn't be moved, nor could they stay put. He quickly opened up their pack and realized in horror that all the medical supplies were with Risa and AJ on the trucks and so, so far away by now.

He yanked his coat off with a twinge of regret. It was bloodied and worn and what he was about to do with it felt like a milestone he was loathe to reach.

He shredded it into long, wide strips, not letting himself think of how it was the last piece of Jimmy Novak, or how he had repaid the man's sacrifice by being party to the end of the world they both wanted to protect, or how Claire Novak had stopped praying to him weeks ago, now. He got on with the job, this is just a job, I can fix this-

He managed to wrap Dean's leg up decently tight, straight and stiff, but he had quickly discovered it was broken in several places. He didn't know what he could do for Dean's ribs, and he felt, as if from a distance, how Dean's breath was coming shallower and shallower, and he made his choice.

He laid his left hand on Dean's broken leg, as gently as he could. Leaning forward, he smoothed the wispy little baby hairs he loved to tease Dean about back, off his sweaty, pained, precious face, and, placing his right hand on Dean's crushed ribs, near his heart, touched their foreheads together. He looked at Dean's soul, his shining, beautiful (fading) soul and knew.

"I love you," Cas whispered, his voice wrecked. With that finally said, he grabbed his exhausted, weary Grace, and though it fought him and slipped through his grasp, he got hold of it and he pushed everything he could, everything he was into his hands, into Dean.

When he had done it, when he had drained himself down to mists and vapors, and had saved Dean, he gathered him in his arms, and carried him back to the truck on numb feet, leaving the scraps of Jimmy's coat behind in aisle seven.

When the truck broke down thirty miles from Chitaqua, and their radio too, he turned to Dean, pulling on a blue-ish jacket they'd picked up earlier during the run. It fit well.

"It's a good look for you," Dean said gruffly, staring at Cas with an expression he could not recognize. There was blood still smeared on his cheekbone, he noted absently.

"Oh. Yes. Well, thank you," Cas answered, adjusting the sleeves.

Dean tugged at the tan fabric strips on his leg, wincing at the pressure.

"You did a good job, Cas. With this fabric splint from your coat-"

"I know you won't be able to walk it," Cas said quietly, unable to meet his eyes even as he interrupted him. "I did what I could, but you'll be weak for days. You need time."

"You can leave me, Cas," Dean said, a strange, pinched guilt-pain-tenderness on his face. "You can come back for me."

"No," Cas said, smiling, and choking, and took Dean's cheek in the palm of his hand with a terrible ache rising in his throat. "I can't."

April 19th, 2012, under the peak of the Lyrids meteor showers, Cas flew for the last time, right up to the gates of the camp.

When they landed, a millisecond and millennia later, his wings burned away into nothingness in a wave of electric, minty-white pain that forced him to the ground. In the aftermath, panting and sweating and shaking in Dean's arms and clutching at his handprint on Dean's shoulder, he realized his Grace, or what was left of it, anyway, had consolidated into a bright little ball in his chest. Like a soul.

The realization was followed by another. Despite his earlier conviction that it would one day be lost to him, he could still see Dean's soul- behind his teeth, in his chest, radiant like a halo around his head, and worth, a million times over, and a million again, falling for.

Tagged:

@heller-jensen @sunforgrace @rambleoncas @adhdeancas @evermorecastiel @holmesemrys @plantdadcas @good-things-do-happen-dean @jeanne-de-valois @autisticandroids @sonder-stars @yana125 @faithcastiel @cascreamtiel @seffersonjtarship @i-sing-for-me @purgatorybi @bibelphegor @cowboyslikedean @gracefuldean @dimples-of-discontent @judaskissdean @wafflehousegothic @icaruscastiel @67chevyimpala67 @lesbianjenderenvy

[radiantroope]

Lonely Heart || Rafe Cameron

Chapter Four - Tainted Love

chapter summary: Janelle comes over to talk and starts to show her true colors. You and John B. go surfing where he gets you to open up to him about your mom. An unlikely friend saves you from falling into what seems like a trap.

warnings: angst, swearing, mentions of familial death, a beer is mentioned

word count: 4.3k+

author’s note: yeah uhhh don’t hate me for this lol. i wanna fight her too. as always, please leave me some feedback and let me know if you’re enjoying this series <3

read chapter three here!

series playlist | series masterlist | main masterlist

You didn’t leave the house much. You didn’t want to risk running into Rafe or Janelle anywhere. Topper had dropped by a couple of times just to check on you and see how your mother was doing. Sarah was over the most, refusing to let you waste away in your room by yourself. She was going back to school at Chapel Hill, splitting her time between the mainland and the island. You’d tried to insist she didn’t have to come over every other day, but she wasn’t taking no for an answer. ‘You’re my best friend. You can try and shut everyone else out, but not me.’ she’d said.

Your mother had an appointment that day to have a brain MRI. They wanted to check the tumor and make sure the chemotherapy was helping slow the growth or at least keep the tumor at bay for the time being. Her form of cancer was aggressive and there was a chance the chemo would only work for so long. Eventually the tumor would stop reacting to it and continue growing rapidly. Your parents told you the visit was boring and you’d be in the waiting room the whole time so they made you stay home.

You stared at the fresh cup of tea in front of you, robotically dipping the tea bag in and out of the scalding water. Your mind was consumed with thoughts of Rafe, as much as you tried not to think about him. You couldn’t comprehend why he’d ghosted you and started dating your best friend. Was he ashamed of loving her and feared you’d think you were replaced? Truthfully, it is how you felt. He pushed you out and made more room for Janelle in his life, letting her fill a place you thought would always be yours.

Your whole perspective on your life was forced to change. The dreams and goals you’d had when you were younger, picturing Rafe by your side, you’d instead achieved and chased by yourself. You went to college parties and drowned yourself in booze to ignore how wrong it felt being there. You had mindlessly hooked up with fraternity douchebags, hoping it would fill the void in your chest. It never did. You had tried to go on dates with guys who were so sweet and nothing short of gentlemen, but none of them managed to wow you. They weren’t rough around the edges with just enough attitude to keep you in check. They were soft, men you could walk all over and they’d let you. They weren’t Rafe. You hated yourself for comparing them all to him, but he was all you’d ever known. He was all you ever wanted.

Guilt started eating away at you for focusing so much on the boy who unknowingly broke your heart. Your mother was dying for God’s sake. You should be putting all of your attention on her and making sure she was happy in what was going to be the last year of her life. You were upset with yourself for being so angry with her for not telling you about the engagement. It wasn’t their fault your closest friends were a couple of backstabbers.

The shrill ring of the doorbell ripped you from your thoughts. You abandoned the now cold cup of tea at the coffee table, sock clad feet sliding across the hardwood as you moved through the house. You glanced down at the oversized shirt you were wearing, biker shorts poking out underneath. You had a feeling your unruly hair was sticking out in all directions from the bun it was in but couldn’t find it in yourself to care.

The moment you ripped the front door open, you tried to slam it right back closed. Bile rose in your throat as you pushed against their body, growling, “Get the fuck off my porch.”

“I’m here to talk, Y/N, please!” Janelle protested, trying to look at you through the crack in the white painted door without having it crushed. “Just give me ten minutes.”

You hesitated, pausing against the door. Words couldn’t describe how hurt you were that she’d kept this from you for years. She had been one of your best friends. She knew things about you that your own parents didn’t know — that Rafe himself didn’t know. Could it hurt to at least try and hear her out?

You finally pulled the door open, avoiding her striking green eyes and waving your arm out to let her in. You shut the door loudly behind her and moved to the couch. “Ten minutes,” you stated, sitting at one end while she took a spot on the other.

“How’s your mom?” she started, giving you a sad smile.

You shrugged once, responding monotonously with, “Fine.”

“Y/N, I’m sorry,” Janelle said softly, seemingly sincere as she stared at her lap. You kept quiet and didn’t show any change in emotion on your face, so she continued, “I should have told you. The second things changed with Rafe and I, I should have come to you about it.”

You closed your eyes for a moment and breathed in deeply as to collect your thoughts. There were a million things you could say to her right now, most more unpleasant than others. You sighed, “You knew how much I loved him, Janelle. You were the only person I told. Do you understand how much of a slap to the face this is?”

“I know. I broke, like, the first rule in girl code. I suck,” she replied, shaking her head a bit. She had been avoiding your eyes but looked back over, “We didn’t expect it, you know. It just kind of… happened. Things were really rough for both of us for a while and I guess it made us closer. We were able to connect on a deeper level.”

You stared at her, unable to read the expression on her face. You couldn’t pinpoint one sort of emotion swimming in her eyes. A weight settled on your shoulders, something within you feeling unnerved.

“Do you love him?”

There it was, a smile. The first real emotion the dark haired girl had shown you since she stepped foot in the house. Did she even care about you at all? Did she care that this was ripping you apart inside? “Of course I do. I wouldn’t have said yes to marrying him if I didn’t,” her response lit a fire within your chest, spreading through every nerve ending in your body.

“Then why did you never seem interested in him before?” you questioned, watching the creases form between her eyebrows. “You chased after Kelce for two years without giving up. You never once gave any indication that you were remotely interested in Rafe until I left, apparently.”

You were simmering in pent up anger and betrayal, jealousy sitting just below the surface. Though, you kept yourself calm, refusing to let those emotions through. You knew Janelle like the back of your hand and you knew there was more to this. You wanted to push her until she said exactly what she was thinking. The slow contort of her face into an angry scowl proved to you that it was working.

“You don’t just wake up one day and decide, hm, I’m in love with this person now, Janelle. How do you even know if what you have is real?”

“Well maybe if you weren’t so conceited and wrapped up in yourself you would have noticed,” Janelle spit, the olive toned tan to her face turning a light shade of pink. “Everyday I had to listen to you bitch and moan about how he’d never love you back. All you did was cry because you were too scared to tell him how you felt. I always loved him but you always made everything about you.”

You blood boiled under your skin. Your face became hot and you clenched your hands in your lap to keep them from shaking. Your bottom lip was sure to start bleeding soon with how tightly you bit it between your teeth.

“You weren’t there for the fights with Ward, when he called him names and made him feel less than. You weren’t there for the nights he got black out drunk because he wanted to forget. You weren’t there for the fucking cocain addiction that almost ruined his whole life,” Janelle seethed, leaning closer to you with every word she spoke.

Your jaw clenched painfully as you grit out, “How was I supposed to be there when he’s the one who cut me out of his life?”

“He cut you out of his life to send you a message, Y/N!” Janelle shouted through a laugh, a condescending smile settling on her lips. “He was so happy when you moved to California because he was finally free! He wasn’t being suffocated by you anymore!”

“That’s not true,” you whispered, shaking your head quickly. Your mind flashed back to your going away party. The soft voices and gentle touches. The way he looked at you like you were the only person he had eyes for — at least that’s what you thought.

“It is, and the sooner you accept that, the better. Rafe doesn’t love you,” the raven haired girl stated. Your glossy eyes flickered to hers. The bright green in them was gone and replaced with a cold, mossy color. “He never loved you. He never will love you the way you’re so desperate for him to. You moving was the best thing that ever happened to him — to us.”

You stayed seated on the couch as she got up and slung her entirely too large of a purse over her shoulder. Your eyes were full to brim with tears that you refused to let fall in front of her. You wouldn’t let her see how much this was ruining you. This wasn’t the girl you’d met back when you were ten years old, it was a completely different person. Or maybe she had been this person the whole time, and you had just been a pawn in some sick game. Only did you look at her when she opened the front door.

“And Y/N,” the sweet tone replaced the venomous one she used only moments ago. “Stay away from him. I don’t need you messing with his head before the wedding.”

The door slammed and you sat there, allowing the tears to flow down your flushed cheeks. You didn’t sob, you didn’t scream and throw things around like most would have thought. It was just a silent flow of saltiness that felt never ending. A numbing feeling came over you as you let Janelle’s words absorb into your head. Had you really been so blind by your own love for Rafe you never saw hers? Had you been so stupid to think the Kook Prince would fall for someone as ordinary as you?

You don’t know if it was only minutes or maybe hours that you sat on the couch, blankly staring at the wall. Eventually, you finally pulled yourself up and located your phone. There was one thing you knew would help you escape the depression spiral you were heading down. And there was one person you could call who would be willing to do it with you — despite hardly knowing you at all.

“Hello?” John B. sounded utterly confused as to why you were calling him.

“H-Hey, I uh, I know this is weird,” your voice was dry and you cleared your throat, “Do you, i dunno, maybe wanna go surfing with me?”

—

You sat on top of your board out where the water was calmer, watching John B. pull off an intricate trick with his own surfboard. You hummed in thought, wishing you could pull off some of the moves he did. You tended to just catch the biggest wave you could and ride it out for as long as possible. You’d picked up some things over the years, but just riding out a long wave was your favorite feeling. You loved the rush, like you were flying.

“You’re really good,” you complimented the brunette as he made his way back out to you.

“Thanks,” John B. chuckled, moving to straddle his board just as you were, “You’re pretty good at riding out the big ones. I bet I could get JJ to teach you some things. He’s better than I am.”

You laughed softly and shook your head, brushing your wet hair behind your back, “JJ would rather scrub Heyward’s boat to the bone than hang out with me.”

“He’s not that bad,” the Routledge boy tried to defend his friend. “Well, not anymore. He’s more… tolerant.”

You hummed in response, staring out into the open water where the edges curved at the horizon. The sun was beginning to go down, casting an orange glow over everything around you. John B. watched you, seeing the gears turning in your head. He’d barely seen you smile all day and from what Sarah had told him, surfing always made you happiest.

“You wanna talk about it?”

You turned to look at him, his soft hazel eyes saying It’s okay, you can trust me. You sighed heavily and averted your gaze to the purple and white board below you. You could feel that you wanted to cry again but your eyes remained dry, like you had nothing left in you. The hollow feeling in your chest felt like it was going to swallow you whole.

“You sure you want my demons weighing on your conscience?” you asked playfully, the corners of your mouth upturning slightly.

John B. smiled softly, shrugging a bit, “We all have our demons, Y/N. Some worse than others.”

You nodded and eyed him for a moment longer before asking, “What was it like.. to lose your dad?”

The curly haired boy sucked in a breath. It had been four years but it never got easier. His dad was all he had and then he was alone, still a child having to grow up entirely too fast. He let out a soft breath, “It was hard. I didn’t know what happened to him for nine months, and then to find out he was dead? It was like a part of me died with him.”

You nodded, silently listening along as he opened up to you.

“It was painful and ugly. I lashed out at my friends… It’s still painful sometimes. I try to think about the good things though. The fishing trips on his boat, going to work with him.. His horrendous endeavour to find The Royal Merchant,” he paused to laugh at the memory, and you did too. You’d heard enough stories about him and his friends searching for the lost gold as well. “I know he’s still with me. He watches over me. Your mom will too.”

You nodded again, bottom lip quivering slightly. Your voice was strained as you spoke, “It fucking sucks seeing her like this. Everyday I feel like I can tell she’s getting worse.”

“I regret not being around more the last couple of years. If I had known this was going to happen I would have done so many things differently.”

John B. waded his board closer to you, resting his hand on yours that was gripping your knee. His eyes were remorseful, lips turned down in a frown. His father’s death was sudden and unexpected. He understood your pain but he also had no idea how to handle knowing the inevitable was coming. He couldn’t imagine watching someone you love slowly slip away.

“Don’t think about that. Don’t beat yourself up for what you didn’t do or wish you did. Spend this time reminding your mom how much you love her and helping make these last moments she has some of the best. Make more memories with her that you’ll look back on and smile at,” he told you, squeezing your fingers softly.

You met John B.’s eyes again and nodded, giving him a soft smile. It was nice to talk to someone who didn’t exactly know you on that personal level but could also relate to you. He had experienced a loss like you were about to and it was refreshing to hear how he coped with it and get some advice. You wondered exactly how much Sarah had told him but it was nice that he was judging you. Maybe years ago, he would have thrown it back in your face, called you a snob and any other insult he could think of. Maybe it was dating Kook that changed his outlook, or he’d grown up and matured and realized the stupid rivalry wasn’t worth being a complete dick all the time.

John B. drifted away from you again when he saw you seemed more relaxed, he looked out where the sun was starting to dip below the horizon. He offered, “Why don’t you come back to the Chateau with me? Sarah’s coming over and I know she’s dying to get you to hang with us.”

You contemplated for a moment, unsure how inviting the other Pogues would be to another Kook in their company. But for once, getting out and being around other people sounded a lot better than going home and burying yourself in Ben and Jerry’s while binge watching a show you’d already seen. So you nodded and smiled, “Yeah, that sounds nice.”

—

Rafe didn’t listen to Topper’s advice of leaving you alone. He couldn’t pretend like seeing after all of these years wasn’t a sucker punch to the gut. He kept replaying everything over the course of five years in his head. He couldn’t stop thinking about what he could’ve done differently. The different outcomes of his actions replayed in his head like a broken record. What could have happened if he hadn’t cut you out of his life? Would you have ended up together in the end, despite the distance? Should he have told you how he felt that day, when it felt like your gentle touch was the only thing holding him together?

He traveled out onto the South side and watched from his truck as you and John B. left the beach. He thought about getting out and speaking to you there but instead he watched from the shadows as you strapped your surfboard to the top of your mother’s car and drove away behind the Volkswagen.

Against his better judgement, Rafe followed you. He stayed far enough behind that you wouldn’t recognize his truck. He knew his way to the Routledge boy’s house anyway. Many a night’s he had gone there when he was younger and looking for trouble, or when he got older, to pick up his sister when she didn’t have a ride. He knew that’s where you were heading. He would pretend it didn’t bother him slightly that you were hanging out with the Pogues. He’d grown more accustomed to seeing them around but the roots of the rivalry were still deeply embedded within him. He still thought they were at the bottom of the food chain.

You didn’t think much of the headlights that pulled up behind your car, thinking Sarah had just arrived. You dug around in the backseat, trying to gather the things that had spilled from your bag. The headlights shut off and it was quiet for a moment. You heard John B. curse softly and your heart nearly stopped when you heard the voice.

“Sup, John B.?” Rafe’s gruff voice filled the air, nodding his head at his sister’s boyfriend.

“Rafe,” the Routledge boy greeted back, an edge to his tone.

You slowly removed yourself from the car, turning to face the last person you wanted to see, next to Janelle. You hated the way your heart skipped a beat when his azure irises met yours. He swallowed thickly, waiting for you to make the first move, which you did.

“What are you doing here?”

“I- I uh,” Rafe’s hand came up to rub the back of his neck, eyes leaving yours to stare at the ground. “I don’t know. I wanted to see you.”

You scoffed and shook your head, reaching back into the car to get your bag. He hesitantly moved closer and continued, “I’m worried about you, Y/N. I know things are weird right now and I’m sorry about your mom but I-”

“Don’t,” you snapped, standing upright and slamming the car door, “Don’t pretend like you fucking care.”

“I do care. I just want to talk.”

“You had five years to talk, Rafe!” you shouted, voice shaking as you did so. You bit the inside of your lip and begged your body not to betray you. You didn’t need him seeing you cry. “I waited and waited for you to talk to me. I asked myself ‘why’ for years! You’ve moved on with your life, that’s fine, I can accept that. But don’t expect me to be a part of it anymore. Just go back to pretending I don’t exist.”

Even from a distance Rafe could see the glaze to your eyes. He could see your body shaking as you tried to keep yourself composed. It looked like you were about to fall apart in front of him and it made his chest ache. You always were the one to pretend to be strong for as long as you could until it crushed you. He shook his head and tried again, “Y/N, please, you don’t understa-”

“Yo, Rafe! Didn’t know you were stopping by!” you turned to see JJ Maybank bouncing down the porch steps, an arrogant smirk painted on his chapped lips. His unruly hair stuck out from the edges of his backwards baseball cap. He was shirtless, flaunting his physique in only a pair of grey cargo shorts. He’d heard you yelling and figured he may as well come investigate.

“Maybank,” Rafe greeted the Pogue stiffly, a lot more tense than he’d been around John B.

The younger blonde boy threw his arm around your shoulders as he came to your side, catching you by surprise. You glanced up at him, but his eyes never left Rafe, his smirk widening. You didn’t see the look of anger that flashed across your former best friend’s face, a fire igniting in his eyes — JJ caught it though, and he was going to run with it.

“I heard about the engagement, man, congrats!” JJ spoke enthusiastically and you had to resist rolling your eyes. You suddenly had the urge to throw up like on the Druthers, but you swallowed the feeling down. Your eyes met Rafe’s again as JJ kept going, “Don’t you have, like, a cake tasting to get to or something?”

Rafe’s hands curled into fists, knuckles cracking as he squeezed. If anyone knew how to get under his skin in just the right way, it was the Maybank boy. He breathed out slowly through his nose, choosing to ignore the comments from the Pogue. He pleaded with you, “Can we just talk, real quick? Please?”

“Oh, I’m sorry, bro. Y/N’s really busy right now,” JJ answered for you, tilting his head to look down at you, “Aren’t you, bubs?”

You stared up into the tan blonde’s indigo eyes that were screaming at you not to go to him. You knew he was trying to help you, but you weren’t friends. You didn’t understand why he came to your defense so quick. He could have just let you stand out there and allow Rafe to rope you back in like you knew he could.

“She can speak for herself,” Rafe snapped at JJ who looked back at him with a raised eyebrow. You hadn’t moved out from under his arm so clearly you had no interest in going to the Kook.

“Go home, Rafe,” you said, turning with JJ to walk up to the Chateau. “Wouldn’t want to suffocate you anymore,” you took a dig, repeating what Janelle had said to you earlier in the day.

Rafe stood there, watching as you walked to the porch, wrapped in someone else’s arms — someone he despised. His heart pounded harder in his chest the further you got away from him, like you were taking it with you. He silently got back in his truck and backed out, tires squealing as he peeled off down the road. He gripped the steering wheel with white knuckles, breathing raggedly. Wouldn’t want to suffocate you anymore. Those words bothered him, knowing he’d heard something like that before but he couldn’t recall when, where or more importantly, who.

“Well that couldn’t have been anymore awkward,” John B. stated as he led you into the house.

You’d expected JJ to drop his arm the second Rafe was gone, but he didn’t, guiding you into the kitchen for you to put down your bag. You sighed heavily and rubbed your face with the hand not pinned to your side, “I’m sorry about that. And thank you, JJ, you didn’t have to do all that.”

The boy hummed and waved his hand, finally stepping away from you and moving to the fridge, “The guy’s an asshole and needs to learn he can’t always get what he wants. Especially after what happened on daddy dearest’s boat.”

You felt your face flush, looking over at John B. who held his hands up as if he was surrendering, “I didn’t say anything, swear.”

“Word travels fast ‘round these parts,” JJ clarified, walking back over and handing you a beer. He sat down in one of the chairs at the kitchen table, patting the one beside him for you. “C’mon, tell your good pal JJ what the Prince fucked up this time.”

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[copias-thrall]

Spank Day

As promised, Suey gives Mary his first scheduled spanking.

⬅️ Previous

You promised to give Mary a spanking before his band left for their 2-week tri-state tour, and Mary hasn’t let you forget it.

Just talking about logistics gets him so hot and heavy that the conversation usually devolves into him rutting into you while he talks about all the things you’re going to do to him.

Finally, the two of you had decided on having Spank Day two days prior to his leaving, and you’ve been getting a barrage of texts from him all day with just those two words: Spank Day.

You’re ignoring them, knowing that it’ll make Mary even more worked up if you don’t give him any kind of hint.

No one ever said you were nice.

You place yourself on your couch, the perfect picture of poise and decorum, and start thumbing through a book.

When Mary bangs into your place, you don’t even look up.

“Fuck. Did you get my texts?”

Flip.

“What texts?”

Flip.

“Suey.”

You look up at him.

He’s not quite a mess, but he’s fidgeting, and there’s a high color to his cheeks.

“I do work, you know,” you sniff.

He shifts from foot to foot, looking unsure.

Flip.

“Fuck’s sake, Mare. Stop hovering and go put your stuff in my room.”

You can practically hear the petulance as he shuffles away.

But you smile. 

Not too long ago, you’d made your bed all nice (something that you really only did on the days you put on clean sheets—so infrequently) and laid both the hairbrush and the wooden spoon on it in clear view.

You hear a Fuck, and then Mary’s quick footsteps back into the living area.

His breath is hot on your neck as he leans over the couch.

“You’re so fucking mean.”

Flip.

“C’mon!” He tugs at you, but you remain rooted to the spot.

“Don’t be pushy," you say with your best nonchalance. "I think you need a lesson in patience.”

“Suey…”

You turn your head to him and snap in his face.

“No whining.”

Grabbing a couch cushion, you toss it on the floor next to your feet.

“Calm down first. Then, we can have some fun.”

Well, he can. 

You’re already having fun.

Mary whines again, but you hear him kicking off his shoes and shimmying out of his jeans. When he rounds the corner of the couch, he's giving you stink face, but he complies easily, getting onto his knees on the cushion.

When you hear him grumbling, you bop him on the head with your book.

“Shh.”

He huffs, but quiets down, shifting as he settles into his kneel.

You run your fingers into his hair, and he shivers.

Flip.

A chapter and a half later, he’s lax and swaying into your touch.

You splay the book down on the couch.

“Mary.”

He sighs.

You lean down and press a kiss behind his ear.

“Count down from 50, then join me in the bedroom.”

He gives another shudder, and you vault over the couch.

It’s just enough time for you to double check that everything’s in place before you settle comfortably onto the bed.

Mary shuffles in, eyes black and half dazed, and you point at his remaining clothes.

“Strip.”

He’s quick to suck off his boxers and socks, then yanks off his shirt by the back of the collar—he tosses them haphazardly. His cock isn’t hard, but it’s filling, and you have to remind yourself that it’s not the right time for a sloppy blow job.

You pat your thighs, and after Mary lays himself half across you and half onto the bed, you smooth your palm over his ass.

“Comfy, Mare?”

“Yeah,” comes his muffled response.

“I’m going to warm you up now.”

You feel his cock twitch, and you smirk. Your hand would start stinging before Mary would even shift uncomfortably from an open palm.

Which is why you only use it to warm him up.

You give him ten on each cheek, alternating placement, and—true to your expectation—Mary barely twitches.

Taking up the hairbrush, you tap his ass a few times before rubbing the head around each cheek—to let him know what’s coming.

Raising it up into the air, you hesitate, smirking when you see his ass clench in anticipation of the smack.

“Settle,” you purr, and Mary melts back onto the bed.

You’re already slicing through the air to land the first hit, and Mary gasps (though you’re sure it’s more from surprise than from actual hurt.)

He’s expecting the hit on the next ass cheek, which is fine.

You’re just getting started.

By the time you’ve applied ten more on each cheek to his sit spots, Mary’s breathing hard, but not quite squirming.

He flinches when your hand meets his heated flesh, then relaxes as you soothe out the sting with a few judiciously applied caresses.

You’re pleased by the deep pink blooming on his bottom. (You’ve never understood his inclination to bite your ass as much as when you’re admiring your handiwork on his.)

Instead of sinking your teeth into him, however, you take up the wooden spoon. Mary loves his brush so much—more into a thud than a sting—but he never complains when you switch it up. And seeing as this is inaugural Spank Day—a precursor to his first serious tour while dating you—you want to make an impression.

He saw both implements laid out, so your application of the spoon won’t be a surprise, but you still tap him and run it around his heated cheeks. Mary trembles—subtle, clenched things—but you’re sure it’s more from anticipation than anything.

“You ok, buddy?”

He hums out an Mmm, but you press.

“Yes or no, Mare.”

“Yeah…” he exhales.

“And your safeword?”

“Nickelback, ma’am.”

You smooth your hand around his ass again.

“Good boy.”

Without warning, you bring the wooden spoon down onto his ass.

He hisses, but you’re already bringing the smack down on his other cheek. A grunt escapes him, but it sounds way too pleased for your taste. You spend the next several minutes applying little swats to his each ass cheek in a clockwork pattern, never letting up or taking a breather.

Mary’s slight wiggle turns into squirm. 

His squirm turns into violent jerks. 

Soft exhales of pleasure have turned into pants of endurance.

“Shit. Shit.”

His fists grip the sheets as he tries not to get away from you.

As his ass turns from a pretty blush to a deep pink into an angry red, you look on with an almost detached wonder (even if the slick on your inner thighs belies your invested interest). You almost wish you had a real paddle to switch to.

He’s still not fully hard, but his cock can’t decide if it wants to be soft or semi-full. In the meantime, it leaves sticky trails of precum over the tops of your thighs.

You keep going…12 o’clock…3 o’clock…6 o’clock…9 o’clock….

Mary’s trying not to twist off your lap as he gasps at each smack. You’re giving him no time to recover, and he’s whining into your now crumpled comforter. You’re a little embarrassed that you’ve lost count—but he's very distracting like this.

You stop, and Mary tries not to curl in on himself as he sniffles.

Smoothing a hand over his ass, you ask, “Enough?”

He rubs his face into your blanket.

You grab his ass, and he cries out.

“Yes or no, Mary.”

His heaving chest is now from his tears, but he stutters out, “A-a f-few more?”

“Are you sure?”

“Y-yes. Please.”

He’s crying, but not sobbing, so you say, “Five more on each side, and then we’re done.”

You’re trying to walk the line between giving him what he wants, but recognizing his limits—even if he himself can’t see them.

He whines in assent, and you proceed, raining down your stinging swats as Mary jerks and cries out from each blow.

“Done,” you say on the last one, and Mary finally lets go. It’s not an ugly cry, but he lets it all out into your bed until you shift his head into your lap, and then he wraps his arms around your middle as he sobs into your stomach.

“Very good, Mare,” you coo as your hands travel through his hair and over his bare skin. “You took that so well. You’re a very good boy. So, so good.”

His sobs quickly turn to hiccups, and you soothe him.

“I’m gonna get you your ice pack, ok?”

He whimpers, but his arms loosen from around you. You make sure he’s comfortable on the bed before sprinting to the fridge. The chocolates and arnica cream are already on your nightstand, but you’ve kept the glass of Pedialyte in the fridge and his ice wrap in the freezer.

When you get back, however, his mood has changed completely.

He’s on you immediately, his lips smearing across your face and his hands roving everywhere.

“Can I fuck you? I wanna fuck you. Please let me fuck you.”

You take his face in your hands and make him look at you.

“If I let you fuck me, will you let me care for you after?”

He nods emphatically. “Please.”

You strip before lying back onto the bed. Mary doesn’t seem to know where to put his face first. His lips brush yours before they’re on your neck, then in between your tits…and then back up to tangle his tongue with yours. Letting him have this, you run your fingertips down his skin as you murmur soft words of encouragement at him.

You’re still wet from the spanking, and Mary only needs to rub his cock up and down through your slit a few times before you’re slicking again. He sinks into you with a grunt, his hips not hesitating for a second before he’s pumping into you.

He tries to burrow his face into the juncture of your neck as his sweaty bare skin slip slides over yours, and you rake your nails down his moist back. Too soon for you to even try to get off, Mary lets out a series of low grunts as he cums, and you let him suck into the line of your shoulder as he does.

It’s a little irritating, but Mary’s usually so good about giving you yours that you write this one off.

He pants into your skin, and you run your fingertips up and down his dewy back.

“Good?” you ask.

“Mhm,” he murmurs.

He’s a little cranky when you extract yourself to care for him, but you manage to get everything he needs in or on him with a few firm words and gentle touches.

Soon enough, he’s lying on his stomach, ice wrap on his ass, with his head in his arms as you pick back up with your book. He dozes off easily—and you roll your eyes—but your wand is close enough at hand to ease your frustration that you fade into a doze not long after as well.

When you wake again, Mary is sprawled over you—his arm across your middle and his one leg in between yours.

He must’ve been awake, because when you stir, he’s quick to speak.

“Hey,” he rasps.

“Mmm. I feel asleep.”

He presses his lips into your pulse point.

“S’was nice.”

“Me falling asleep?”

“The spanking.”

You survey the bed and see the wrap has been abandoned.

“Shit. You need more ice, Mare?”

“No,” he murmurs into your neck. Then, “Maybe.”

You chuckle, but when you go to move, he practically shifts his bulk on top of you.

“Not yet.” His hands wander up and down your naked form. “Miss you,” he sighs.

“You’re not gone yet, Mare. And it’s only 2 weeks.” You pat his ass gently. “And you’ll have this to remember me by.”

He grunts and wiggles away from your touch.

“S’not the same.”

His hand comes up and grabs your tit.

You roll your eyes.

“Mare. I’ll be here when you come back.”

He sighs.

“Promise?”

You kiss the top of his head.

“I promise, baby.”

Next ➡️

[julyarchives]

A Little Christmas Magic

On Christmas Day, Czech women throw a shoe at their house to determine if they’ll get married in the new year. How the shoe lands is key: if it lands with the heel facing the house, the woman can expect to be single throughout the next year.

→ Pairing: Wooseok x Reader

→ Genre: Fluff

→ Words:  1.4K

→ Contains: Very sweet fluff; Friends to Lovers.

→ A/n: This is our first story for the Under The Mistletoe event! We hope you enjoy reading it as much as we did writing it!

It was a snowy Christmas night and you were gathered with all your closest friends to celebrate. It was everything perfect, the view outside of snow falling down, the warm candle lights inside, everyone together in the living room celebrating and hugging by midnight. It felt really good.

Even though you were filled with joy and gratitude for such an amazing evening, you couldn’t help but feel a little jealous of all your friends that were celebrating as a couple. It was a perfect romantic night, but you had no one to share it with in that sense. It was especially hard since you currently hold feelings for Wooseok.

You came to terms that having feelings for your best friends was something really complicated, and you just couldn’t risk years of friendship over feeling that you were okay in keeping just for yourself. But you always thought the holidays were the most romantic time of the year, and it was extra hard to ignore all of that.

You tried your best to hide it, but somehow one of your girlfriends ended up noticing you.

“C’mon” she said “I have something my grandma taught me that might cheer you up”

She grabbed your arm and guided you outside.

“It’s freezing! And I’m fine, really, you don’t have to worry.” you protested, but it was useless.

She stopped facing the house, and out of nowhere said the most unexpected thing you could have heard that night:

“Give me your shoe” she announced, reaching her hand out for you

“What?”

“Your shoe, c’mon” he moved her fingers, hurrying you up.

You end up deciding to not protest, just following along, handing her one of your sneakers, trying to balance yourself in one foot so you don’t dip your sock in cold wet snow

“On Christmas Day, Czech women throw a shoe at their house to determine if they’ll get married in the new year.” She explained focusedly, grabbing your dominant hand and placing the shoe on your palm before proceeding. “How the shoe lands is key: if it lands with the heel facing the house, the woman can expect to be single throughout the next year.“

“This is stupid, I’m not even dating anyone, how am I supposed to get married next year?” you rolled your eyes and laughed.

“Just try it, you have nothing to lose anyway” She encouraged.

“Fine” you chuckled “But I’m sure it this stupid shoe will throw in my face that I’m single as hell.”

“Less talking, more throwing” she gave the final word

You stared at her one more time, shaking your head and laughing, before putting to use your poor baseball skills and launching the shoe towards your house.

Everything happened too fast. Your eyes followed the sneaker as it flew through the air, and as it went closer toward the front door, Wooseok came out of it. It was a matter of seconds, you didn’t even get the chance to give him a warning, when it landed forcefully against the top of his head with a loud thump.

“Ouch!” he yelled, rubbing his hand against the sore spot and messing his hair “what was that for?!”

You just couldn’t answer the poor guy straight away, to busy trying to catch your breath while you and your friend leaned against each other, laughing your asses off

“Ok,” you said to your friend “what does it mean when the show hits your crush in the head?”

She winked and motioned her head towards a very wide eyed Wooseok, looking like a confused kid, which you always find so endearing when it happens. Her mischievous grim said it all. You just punched her lightly in the shoulder.

“I’m so sorry, Wooseokie” you finally managed to answer, and started hopping your way to him  “Are you okay?”

“I’m fine, it just got me by surprise” he laughed softly “I came to check what the hell you guys were doing out in the cold, I didn’t expect to be attacked like that.”

He extended his hand to you, helping you balance while you struggled to put your sneaker back on.

“She just wanted to follow a weird tradition from her grandma’s country” you explained to him while your friend sneaked back inside, leaving you two alone outside “let me check your head

You tiptoed whilst he leaned down, your fingers moving some soft strands out of the way.

“The good news is you don’t have a concussion” you joked “the bad one is that I might have just given you a tiny bump” you chuckled embarrassedly.

“Out of everything I was expecting this christmas, getting hit in the head by a flying shoe was definitely not one of them” He laughed, easing off your shame

You just stood there for a while, quietly admiring how the fairy lights romantically illuminated the two of you. When you two felt silent, just staring at each other, you felt yourself blushing

“So,” Wooseok broke the silence “I was actually hoping I could get you alone, I have something I want to say to you.”

“Go on” you encouraged, nervously biting your bottom lip

He took his time, gathering up courage and trying to find the right words to say what he meant to. He started by gently grabbing your hands and holding it in his’, the gesture making butterflies dance around your stomach.

“I’ve been trying to figure this out for a while and the last thing I want is to ruin our friendship.” He was clearly nervous, and you wondered if his heart was beating as fast as yours were. “I like you. Like, for reals like you.”

You tilted your head, a shy smile escaping your lips

“I think we get along so well and, I don’t know, maybe we could date? It’s just...” he continued, and you gripped his hand tighter for reassurance “It’s kinda hard to be near you and feel my heart racing and I get so nervous. You are my best friends and I always thought these feelings were wrong.”

You felt happy tears threatening to fall down off the corners of your eyes, his face tinted with a pretty and delicate shade of pink adorning his hopeful eyes. You let him continue his speech, even though all you wanted to do was to tell him how much you felt the same.

“But it’s not my fault if you have the most beautiful smile in the world.” He sighs “and for so long I’ve really been wanting to kiss you. I always catch myself staring at you and I really hope I didn’t look like a creep at those times, but I always had to stop myself from kissing you out of nowhere.”

“Kiss me.” It was all you could say, your voice so soft it was almost a whisper.

Wooseok looked deep in your eyes before leaning closer, his hands never letting go of yours’. As soon as you stood up on the tip of your toes, your lips met his. It was hesitant at first, you two uncertain of your own boundaries. Being friends for so long, you came to think that this moment would never come, even though you spent uncountable nights dreaming about it. The truth is that those dreams didn’t get any close to reality. It felt more magical than anything I had ever imagined.

It was just a shy peck before you two leaned back again, staring at each other with shy smiles. But you wanted more. You let go of his hands only to wrap your arms around his shoulder, and he reciprocated by embracing you tightly by the waist. The kiss you two shared was deeper this time, and the fireworks exploding inside you were infinite. You two were infinite.

Everything else seemed to disappear. It was just like suddenly all the loud voices inside the house went quiet, as well as the jolly holiday music. The snow didn’t feel so cold and everything else was just blank. It felt like it only existed you and Wooseok. Your bodies pressed together, his hands so gentle on the small of your back, his soft lips and curious tongue exploring your mouth, his silken hair strand sliding in between your fingers. Your world screamed of his presence, and you didn’t want to snap out of it.

When eventually the need for air obliged you two to split, your foreheads reamined pressed together, the embrace on each other still in place. 

“Merry Christmas, Wooseok” you said, the happiest smile plastered on your lips.

“Merry Christmas (y/n)”

[instasiswetrust]

Werewolf AU (Steve centric)

When the wolf finds him, Steve's been sitting on that rock for nigh on an hour. Or at least, he assumes it could've been an hour even when it feels like he's been there for merely a handful of minutes.

He doesn't turn to greet the wolf, doesn't even flinch, heavy gaze entirely focused on the two-story house he can make out at the bottom of the hill. From his place on the raised rock, just at the edge of the trees where the pine forest meets the last remnants of the suburban landscape, he knows no one can spot him from down there. He can see them though.

Two figures, partially hidden by the curtains that frame the open window, sit at a table. He thinks they might be having dinner, trading inane chatter like it was any other day. And you know, maybe it was.

(He tries not to dwell on how much that thought makes his chest ache.)

Behind him, a soft rustle can be heard, the crunching of heavy boots on dried pine needles, before someone sits next to him on the rock. Their legs dangle off the edge of the raised rock, and by the mismatched pink and green striped socks they are wearing, Steve can easily tell who they are.

"It's been two hours, Stevie. Dad thought you had gotten lost in the woods again."

Susie.

(For some reason he had thought Frank would've found him first. He decides not to think about the small spark of disappointment that he feels.)

"Sorry." He mutters, prying his gaze away from the house and facing her properly. She's shorter than he is and it makes him have to look down at her. In her hands is a partially eaten chocolate bar - where she got it, Steve doesn't know - and when she notices his eyes on her, she raises it slightly so he can take a bite from it.

Steve wonders if she's doing it because of the dried tear tracks on his cheeks, or the way his hair is lying limp against his head from all the times he had run his hands through it. Either way, he's glad she doesn't mention it

"Doesn't chocolate make us sick?" Maybe it's ironic for him to ask when he's taking a bite of the chocolate too, but he could do with the sweetness.

"Life without chocolate it's not worth living." And when she smiles, her cheeks dimple in the cutest of ways. It's honest, happy, and slightly manic, childish in a way that reminds him so much of Dustin that he ends up choking back tears.

She doesn't say anything but her eyes soften. Next thing he knows, she's all but pulled him into an embrace, his face smooshed into her shoulder in a slightly awkward angle due to their height difference. The way he doesn't even bother finding a more comfortable position, his whole body relaxing under her touch, is evidence enough of how much he needed something like this.

"I miss them." Whispered like a secret, his words muffled against the fabric of her pink cable knit sweater, even as the first sob wracks through him. “I k-know I shouldn't because they don't s-seem to care that I left but-”

Her hands are on his hair, fingers carding gently through it, even as she hums a lullaby under her breath. It makes him sob harder, face hidden against the curve of her shoulder, hands desperately clinging to her.

Susie never comments on it. She doesn't try to justify his feelings or vilify his parents. Her sole focus is on him, letting him cry it out without caring if her sweater gets stained with tears. Once he's finally calmed down, she waits for him to put himself back together before standing and helping him up.

“Come, Stevie. Let's go back before Dad starts worrying.”

------

The thing about shifting into a wolf was that keeping any coherent thoughts was absolute hell to do, especially when you had only been a wolf for three whole weeks. Thinking he could somehow sneak into town without being seen was foolish to even consider.

That still didn't stop Steve.

Dustin. Robin. Nancy.

Names repeating in his brain that made absolutely no sense to a wolf who couldn't make sense of abstract concepts. But they were important. He could feel it under his skin, like an itch that he couldn't scratch. How he would find them, he wasn't sure, but he would.

And that's how he ends up climbing clumsily into the open window that leads to Dustin's room, making a racket as he topples over half a dozen action figures that were settled on the dresser. His nails clack sharply against the hardwood floors, nose twitching curiously at all the scents that fill the room.

A sudden movement out of the corner of his eye has him turning his head to the side, finding himself at the foot of a raised structure that he vaguely remembers is meant to be den. On it, a human child holds a complicated plastic...thing, pointing it directly at him. He smells of curiosity and fear but under it, all is a scent so familiar that it makes the wolf's chest ache with emotions he can't name, a soft confused whine escaping him.

The child tilts its head at the sound, curiosity seemingly winning over his fear as he crawls closer to the edge of the raised platform, eyes locking on the wolf- No. On Steve.

That single moment of clarity is all Steve needs to trigger back the change, skin morphing and bones cracking, as his body protests with the pain of forcing him back into a form resembling something human. At last, there's no wolf, just a very naked teenager sitting in the middle of Dustin's room with a nerf gun pointed at him.

"Steve?!" He flinches despite Dustin's voice being no louder than a whisper. A cold breeze streams through the open window, making him shiver and reminding him that he's still very much naked.

"Look, I promise I will explain just-" Steve flushes, fumbling with the necklace on his neck until it spits out the change of clothes he had saved in there. "Let me get dressed because this is awfully embarrassing."

"I uh- sure?" And it's clear by his tone of voice that he's choking on a laugh but he does cover his eyes to give Steve some privacy.

It doesn't take long before he's fully dressed, sitting on the corner of Dustin's bed while his friend stares at him with eyes filled with curiosity and accusation. Steve cannot blame him. For all everyone knew he could've been dead no matter what the note he left behind said.

"So you're a werewolf." Not a question but he nods, feeling uncomfortable as he remembers Evan saying he couldn't tell anyone else for the safety of not only himself but the pack.

"You weren't supposed to find out about that but it's hard keeping human thoughts while I remain a wolf." Dustin has that look on his face that Steve knows means he wants to ask more questions but is refraining himself from doing so. It makes him smile at the familiarity of it all. "I'm not actually supposed to be here, in fact."

"Why? Did you get kidnapped by a werewolf cult or something? Is that why you left?"

Steve snorts, shaking his head quickly. "No, no. Nothing like that. It's just for safety, y'know? Monster hunters are common in small towns like this according to Da- according to Evan."

His slip up makes Dustin quirk an eyebrow.

"Were you just about to call this Evan guy, Dad?"

"Look-" But before he could start explaining, the younger boy interrupted him again.

"Wait, you said Monster hunters, not Werewolf hunters. Does that mean other creatures are real? Like Fae, and Tieflings, and Vampires? Is Dracula real? Is Mothman real?" He's firing questions with the swiftness of a TV presenter, Steve immediately putting hands on his shoulders to slow him down.

"Slow down, dingus." He teases, the old nickname making Dustin roll his eyes. "I'm not really supposed to be saying any of this but I guess since you've already seen me..."

"C'mon Steve, tell me at least a little! Please?" And Dustin's known Steve for long enough that he's aware the guy is absolutely weak when it comes to puppy eyes.

He sighs, running a hand through his face before caving in. "Monsters are real, yes. I only know a few, those that have visited the pack for the most part, but Dr. Herman has many Bestiaries around that he agreed to let me read once I graduate from Evan's pack dynamic classes."

Dustin is absolutely beaming with all the new information, a hundred questions waiting to be voiced on his lips but suddenly his expression falls, brows furrowing and teeth worrying his bottom lip. He's avoiding Steve's gaze and his scent stinks of sadness.

"Hey, what's the matter? I thought you would be excited to know Mothman might be real?" He's still saying nothing and Steve is starting to grow worried. Did he do something wrong?

"This means you aren't coming back...right?" It's barely above a whisper but Steve's hearing is so sharp that he has no trouble hearing him. Inside his chest, his heart clenches painfully.

When he shakes his head and Dustin's gaze falls to his lap, Steve feels like his body is being filled with lead.

"I still have my phone with me, and I might be able to visit in the future but... No. I'm not coming back, Dustin." Grief bubbles in his chest, choking him up and making his eyes burn with the tears he wants to shed but refuses to.

Dustin tackles him into a hug, squeezing him so hard that it hurts but Steve doesn't mind, hugging him back just as tightly. If either of them cries they don't bother mentioning it.

It's not important after all.

----

Dawn shines pink and orange over the horizon when he makes it back to the ranch, exhausted to his bones.

Evan is waiting for him in the kitchen when he steps in and Steve is not surprised. The older werewolf had the uncanny ability to know when any of them were getting into trouble, after all. So all Steve does is hang his head, feeling the weight of Evan's gaze on him.

"Sit." He says, and his voice doesn't give anything away. So Steve sits and waits for the reprimanding he's so sure will come.

Except it doesn't.

"You have been crying. Are you hurt?" Evan is truly concerned it seems, his voice firm but not too loud. Is enough to bring the tears back to Steve's eyes, a broken sob leaving him as he hides his head in his hands. And all the older man does is rub his back comfortingly until his sobs have been reduced to occasional sniffles. Only then does he speak again.

"Feeling better?" Steve nods, once, before stopping and shaking his head. Evan chuckles, his gruff voice is oddly comforting. "Ah, here I was thinking you had been taking all these changes a little too well."

"I'm used to rolling with the punches." Steve tries offering him a smile but it comes out looking more like a grimace so he ends up giving it up altogether. He hates how true that statement is but Evan understands.

(Somehow, he always understands when it comes to Steve's parents.)

They are both quiet after that, the silence comforting were it not for the way Steve's stomach roiled with his guilt. He had to say something, apologize, or the shame would eat him alive.

"Look, I'm... I'm sorry I went out to town without telling anyone but it's just- I was homesick, and I missed my friends so much, and I basically left without giving Dustin an expl-" He's babbling out of nervousness, excuses spooling out of him like worn thread but he pauses once Evan settles his heavy hand on his shoulder. Big hands. Hands capable of drawing the softest of portraits with as much ease as they could choke out a deer.

"I'm not mad, pup." Steve has to bite his cheek at that to stop his eyes from filling up with tears again over something so silly as a word. "Kinda expected you to eventually do it. Had Danny's cat familiar follow you last night just to make sure you would be okay."

Steve thinks he should feel offended by that last bit of information but he honestly cannot give a fuck when he's basically swimming in the relief that courses through him at Evan's words. He knows and he isn't mad. Knows and doesn't blame him for showing weakness.

(Knows and still loves him.)

Evan smiles, barely an upturn of his lips but it's there and his words are soft when he says, "Go to bed, pup."

He does. And for the first time in a while, he doesn't dream at all.

[livesincerely]

dress you up, dress you down ch. 2 - the clothes make the man

aka the Tie Fic. Chapter one here.

Also on Ao3

00000

It’s early Monday morning. Davey is working on coaxing Les into his school uniform when there’s a knock on the bedroom window.

“Jack!” Les greets, the untucked tails of his shirt flapping behind him as he rushes over to open it.

“Hey, bud,” Jack says, climbing in from the building’s fire escape with easy grace. “How’s it hangin’?”

“What are you doin’ here?”

“I’m workin’ on some cartoons for Joe today, but I hadta come pick up some stuff from Dave before I head over.”

Les’ expression brightens. “Oh, you mean your new suits and stuff?”

“Got it in one,” Jack confirms, ruffling Les’ hair. “Your brother and Kathy ganged up on me yesterday and made me buy a buncha fancy geddups. They was real serious about it—said it was important for my ‘tential growth as an employee.’”

Jack leans closer, then continues in a conspiratorial whisper, “I think it’s all a waste of dollars, but if it’s important to them I guess it’s important to me.”

“Well it’s real important to David!” Les chirps. “He brought your stuff home but he wouldn’t even let me look at it. He hung it all up in the back of our closet and told me if I touched anything he’d murder me!”

“Well, they did cost a fair chunk of change,” Jack says slowly, blinking several times in rapid succession. “And I’m pretty sure if they got ruined before I hadda chance to wear ‘em out, Kath would kill us all.”

“Go brush your teeth,” Davey tells Les. “Jack needs to get ready.”

“But I wanna see the fancy geddup,” Les whines.

“You can see it when he’s dressed,” Davey says. “Brush your teeth.”

“But—“

“Go!”

Les lets out a huff but finally does as he’s told. Davey turns to Jack.

“The garment bag’s all the way in the back on the left,” Davey informs him, waving a hand towards the closet.

He goes to follow Les out of the room to give Jack some privacy but he only gets as far as grabbing the door handle before Jack’s voice pipes up behind him with, “Wait, where are ya goin’?”

Davey’s brow furrows. “I’m letting you get dressed.”

“But you gotta get dressed too,” Jack says with a frown, gesturing at the pajamas that Davey’s still wearing. “Distribution opens in a hour.”

“Oh, well, I was gonna wait for you to finish,” Davey explains.

“Don’t be stupid,” Jack says, shaking his head. “I don’t wanna make you late. Just go ahead and change, don’t mind me.”

Davey hesitates. “If you’re sure it’s okay...”

Jack rolls his eyes. “Dave, you’ve seen the Lodging House—it ain’t exactly private quarters. If it don’t bother you it don’t bother me.”

Well, actually, it bothers Davey quite a lot, though probably not for the reasons Jack thinks. But he’s not sure how to excuse himself without seeming suspicious so he swallows down his reservations and steps more fully back into the room.

Jack unearths the garment bag and works the clasps open. Davey catches a glimpse of soft cottons and sturdy wools and feels his cheeks getting warm—just the thought of what’s to come is enough to send his heart racing. He takes a steadying breath, then throws open the trunk at the foot of his bed and starts looking through it for a clean set of clothes.

His only plan is to get changed as quickly and quietly as possible. So naturally Jack choses this moment to strike up a conversation. 

“So how’d your meetin’ go?” Jack asks. Davey instinctively turns towards the sound of his voice and is treated to the long expanse of Jack’s bare back as he wriggles out of his shirt.

“...What?” Davey says. His voice sounds distant to his own ears.

“Your meetin’?” Jack repeats. He lets his shirt fall to the floor at his feet, his hands dropping down to start undoing his belt buckle. “Didn’t you and Albie have a thing last week? Down by the water?”

It takes Davey a moment to shake off his stupor. Flushed and flustered, he quickly whirls back around but it feels like the sight’s been seared into the space behind his eyes. Good god.

“Oh, right, of course,” Davey stammers out, keeping his gaze fixed carefully on the wall in front of him as he fumbles through unbuttoning his pajama top. “Yeah, it went well. Better than I thought it would, anyway. We still need to figure a few things out but we’re off to a good start.”

“And Brooklyn didn’t give you no trouble?” Jack questions. “Spottie was nice and hospitable?”

“It was fine Jack,” Davey says, and the familiar banter is working wonders on calming his frazzled nerves. “Spot and Hotshot stopped by and checked in with us, just to make sure we were being honest and keeping to the agreement and all that, but they mostly left us alone.” Davey folds up his pajamas and leaves them in a neat stack on his bed, slips on a clean pair of underwear, then steps into his selling pants and fastens them up. “Honestly, I think they were... not happy, exactly, but proud? Honored? It’s a respect thing, right?”

“Well, ya only get asked to be neutral territory if everyone else trusts ya to play fair,” Jack explains. “So, yeah, it’s a sign of respect. But Brooklyn’s always been real particular ‘bout who’s all allowed to cross the bridge, so they don’t usually do it—I still can’t believe Spot agreed to play host for ya.”

“It helps that I can get through a conversation with him without picking a fight,” Davey comments lightly as he works his arms into his shirt sleeves. “Unlike certain others I could name.”

“I still say he started it,” Jack responds, and Davey doesn’t have to look at him to know he’s pouting.

“Uh huh,” Davey says. “Sure he did.”

“Hey, now,” Jack says, grabbing at the hem of Davey’s shirt and tugging him around to face him. In the time since Davey’s last looked he’s put on his pants and suspenders, his shirt done up but only partially tucked in. He should be easier to deal with now that he’s covered up, but the disheveled, partially dressed look is somehow just as enticing as the bare skin. It’s honestly not fair. “You’re supposed to be on my side.”

“I’m always on your side,” Davey says, perhaps a little too sincerely, feeling a touch lightheaded. “But that doesn’t mean I won’t call you out. And you definitely started it last time.”

“He’s been mackin’ on Racetrack!” Jack says, and he’s adorably grumpy about it. “I can’t just let that go!”

“They’re dating, Jack,” Davey reminds him for the thousandth time. “Obviously they’re gonna be holding hands and kissing and whatever else—you might as well get used to it. And regardless,” Davey pokes Jack in the chest, a gentle scolding, “you shouldn’t be letting your personal feelings about Spot affect your dealings with Brooklyn. You’re supposed to be professional, mister Union President.”

“It’s Racetrack,” Jack insists. “It’s my god-given right to give his boyfriend,” Jack makes a face as he says the word because he’s ridiculous, “a hard time. It ain’t my fault Spottie’s got such a short fuse.”

“And that’s why you’re not allowed to handle business with Brooklyn anymore,” Davey says, and he’s trying for disapproving but he can feel the start of a smile pulling at the corner of his mouth.

“Worth it,” Jack says, utterly unapologetic. Davey just shakes his head. Jack’s bad enough now when it’s just Racer—he can only imagine how overprotective Jack’ll be if Crutchie decides he’s interested in dating too.

Davey finishes buttoning his shirt, then leans down and starts digging around in his trunk for a pair of socks and a set of suspenders.

“Hey, but back to your meetin’,” Jack starts after a moment, picking up the previous conversation where they left off. “You know who you really needta talk to? There’s a kid over in Flushing—I don’t think you’ve met him yet, name’s Paulie—but he’s got crazy connections with somma the dock workers. One time he managed ta—” 

Jack stops mid word, a sudden, sharp inhale interrupted by a series of coughs.

“You alright?” Davey calls over his shoulder, still searching.

“Uh, yeah,” Jack says, an odd note in his voice. “Just, uh, swallowed wrong, but I’m fine.”

“Oh, okay,” Davey says, absently. He straightens up, then frowns when he realizes he’s grabbed a pair of Les’ socks instead of his own. He throws them aside, then bends back over his trunk, rifling even more vigorously through the assortment of clothes. 

Jack mutters something under his breath, too quietly for Davey to make out the words.

“What was that?” Davey asks, finally coming up with the right items. 

“Nothin’,” Jack says, head ducked low as he buttons up his vest. It’s a little hard to tell, but it looks like he’s gone a bit pink in the face. “I just⁠— it was nothin’.”

Davey watches him for a moment longer, brow furrowed. But when Jack doesn’t say anything else, he goes back to his task, pulling on his socks and carefully tucking his shirt into his pants. 

“How’s that?” he asks Jack, turning slowly in place. “Did I miss any spots?”

“Lookin’ good Dave,” Jack says with a smile. “Here, hold still,” he continues, patting at Davey’s hip with one hand and picking up the end of his suspenders with the other. “I’ll fix you up.”

“Oh, thanks,” Davey says tentatively. 

Jack steps in close, his knuckles brushing against the small of Davey’s back as he clips his suspenders into place. Davey swallows heavily around a suddenly dry throat, trying his hardest not to think about how he can feel Jack’s body heat like a tangible weight along his spine, how there’s the barest whisper of Jack’s breath tickling at the nape of his neck. 

He hopes Jack can’t hear the hitch in his voice as he asks, “So what are you working on today?”

“Hmm? Oh, nothin’ much,” Jack says. “Just some line work, and maybe sketching out some ideas for the Friday edition.”

“Is your, uh, desk mate still stealing your drafting pencils?” Davey asks. 

“He sure is, the prick,” Jack answers. “Which is so damn annoying⁠—it ain’t like they don’t give us plenty.” His hands slide up over Davey’s waist: “Turn around for me.”

Davey obediently turns. “Maybe you should call him out,” he offers.

“Maybe I should stab him in the neck with his stupid compass,” Jack says with a snort. He follows the line of Davey’s suspender straps up over his shoulders and down to the front of his pants, clipping the other pair of buckles into place. “There, you’re all set.”

“Great,” Davey says, his eyes flitting across Jack’s face. He’s very handsome. He’s very close. “Thanks.”

“No problem,” Jack says, his voice a little husky. His fingers are still curled around the straps of Davey’s suspenders. “Happy to help.”

“Right,” Davey breathes out. 

“Right,” Jack echoes.

They stare at each other.

“I should, uh, grab my vest,” Davey says, clearing his throat. His pulse is pounding in his ears. 

“Yeah, of course,” Jack says as he shuffles back a couple of steps, running a hand through his hair. “Of course. I’ll just⁠, I’ll finish doing… over here.” 

Davey spends a long while shaking the wrinkles out of his vest, then pulls it on with clumsy limbs. He smooths his hands nervously down the front of it, then pretends to pick away a few pieces of lint, just to give himself another minute to calm his fluttering heart. Oh god, oh god, oh god.

For a brief moment there’s no noise except the rustling of fabric and the sounds of the city drifting in from the open window. Then Jack calls, his voice tinged with a hint of alarm, “Uh… Dave? Help.”

Davey glances over. Jack’s made an attempt at putting on his tie and it’s ended in absolute disaster, the collar of his shirt crumpled beneath a too tight and incredibly tangled knot.

“What on earth did you do?” Davey asks, his lingering embarrassment burnt away by sheer bafflement. 

“I thought I had it handled!” Jack says. He tries to pick the knot loose, but only manages to make things worse. “Christ, these things are death traps.”

“Stop, or you’re gonna strangle yourself,” Davey says, smacking Jack’s hands out of the way. “Just let me⁠—”

Davey reaches up, undoing the mess of a knot with deft fingers, then expertly re-ties the strip of red silk into a perfect four-in-hand.

“There,” Davey says, carefully tucking the tails under Jack’s suit vest, then folding the sides of his shirt collar back down into place. “How’s that?”

“‘S good,” Jack says.

“Not too tight?” Davey checks just to be sure, noting the raspiness of Jack’s voice. He adjusts the knot one more time, then presses a neat little dimple right in the center of it. “I can do it again if it doesn’t feel right⁠—”

“No, it’s great, Dave,” Jack says lowly, and his hand closes around Davey’s own so that their hands are clasped together over Jack’s sternum. Startled, Davey’s eyes dart up to meet Jack’s and their gazes catch and linger⁠ again with that same soft, simmering intensity from earlier. “It’s perfect.”

“Good,” Davey says hoarsely⁠, held captive by Jack’s stare. He almost can’t breathe around the pressure building somewhere deep in his chest; Jack somehow feels even closer than he had before, all dark eyed and broad shouldered and just far too much for Davey to handle. “Good, that’s…” Davey swallows, licks his lips, and tries to think of something to say that isn’t absolutely asinine. “I’m glad.”

An expression flickers across Jack’s face, too quickly for Davey to identify. Then his hand curls more firmly around Davey’s, and Davey can feel the warmth of his skin, the callouses on his palms. Jack takes a breath, opens his mouth to speak⁠—

“David!” Les shouts as he bursts back into the bedroom. Davey jolts away from Jack like he’s been burned, his hands dropping back to his sides. Jack’s mouth clicks shut⁠⁠—whatever he might’ve been about to say is lost. “Davey, stop hogging Jack! You already saw the fancy geddup, I wanna see too⁠⁠—”

He skids to a sudden halt, his eyes going wide. “Wow, Jack, you look swell! Like a real, pr’fessional artist.”

“Hey, I’m already an artist,” Jack counters playfully, though there’s a hint of tightness around his mouth. “All this stuff is just window dressing, ya hear?”

“Yeah, but now you look all serious and business-y and confident,” Les stresses. “Like you actually know what you’re doing.”

Jack laughs. “That’s just the clothes talkin’, bud,” he says. “Believe me, I ain’t gotta clue what I’m doin’ most the time. ‘S what I keep Davey around for⁠, to make sure at least somebody knows what the hell is going on.”

“Well, I think you look nice,” Les declares, like that’s the final word on the matter. He looks at Davey and says, “Mama says we gotta leave soon or we’ll be late.”

“Okay, I’ll be right there,” Davey answers. Les nods, then skips away to put on his shoes and hat.

“I guess I should head on out,” Jack says, wandering towards the still-open window. “I’ll see you in a few hours⁠—”

“Jack Kelly, you are not going down the fire escape in your brand new suit,” Davey says, exasperated. “You can walk out the front door with us like a normal human being.”

“Oh, but where’s the fun in that?” Jack says with a grin, but he slides the window shut and dutifully comes back over. Once he’s close enough, Davey elbows him in the ribs. “Ow, what was that for⁠—?”

“Stop talking down on yourself,” Davey huffs. “You don’t give yourself enough credit⁠.”

“Or maybe I give myself exactly enough credit,” Jack counters. 

“Oh, please,” Davey says, rolling his eyes. “I know you’ve got a functioning brain in that head of yours⁠, you don’t need me to be successful⁠—you’ll get by on your own merits.”

“My own merits, huh?” Jack says with a rueful smile. “You make it sound so easy, Dave.”

“I know it’s not easy,” Davey says. “But I also know that if you really wanted something, you’d figure out a way to get it.”

“But, see, there’s a lotta things I want,” Jack says, and he’s gone a bit quiet in his contemplation. “Probably too many things. I ain’t figured out how to get hardly any of ‘em, and especially not the most important things.”

“But you will,” Davey says. “I’m sure you will.”

Jack stares at him, and for a split-second Davey can see the raw yearning in his eyes for... whatever his latest dream is. Davey hopes he finds it, even as his heart lurches at the thought of some new, Santa Fe-esque fantasy stealing Jack away, maybe permanently this time. 

“God, I hope so,” Jack breathes.

00000

Chapter three here

Tag List: @yahfancyclamwiththepurlinside

[whatmack]

are your fic/snippet requests open? if so, can i ask for something about kevin just... being nb? maybe like a dysphoric day or smth i really don't have a preference just.... i Need more enby kevin content oops

One would think, dating two people, that the time required to finagle everyone out the door for a date would be increased by only 50%. One would be wrong. Jeremy, California-bred, was much better about the fluid nature of temporal plans when considering three busy atheletes each with a tendency to hyperfocus. Jean had made as much of his peace with it as he could by mentally changing the expected timeframe to be two or more hours further along than the agreed-upon. 

“Almost ready?” He called, loud enough for Kevin to hear through the door of the bedroom. It was forty minutes until departure could be expected, which meant Jean needed to check-in. He’d do another in ten minutes. The muffled response from Kevin was more about the routine than any real new information. Jean returned to his book. Renee had taken to gifting him Sudoku from around the world instead of sending a standard postcard. The little bump of pride Jean got from completing a puzzle helped make waiting in the endless lines of LA more bearable. Jeremy was sprawled across the couch, video game controller in hand, his blazer already off and his shirt already wrinkled. He looked good anyway, which was equal parts frustrating and enjoyable. The toe of his left shoe nudged Jean’s thigh every time he jolted forward to make his player character shoot, because Jeremy Knox never did anything but for with his whole body. Jean let himself smile, knowing Jeremy was too absorbed in his game to see it, and tapped his pen against the laces of Jeremy’s perpetually-scuffed oxford while he considered the placement of his most recent 6.

Nine minutes and thirty-three seconds later, Jeremy groaned and threw his hands up into the air, withdrawing his foot to stomp it on the carpet. In his peripheral vision Jean could see the flashing red from the tv screen that signified Jeremy’s character had died. Instead of restarting, Jeremy set the controller down and stood, lacing his fingers behind his back to stretch. “I gotta pee.” Jean raised his pen in absentminded acknowledgement. He tilted his cheek into the kiss Jeremy dropped there on his way to the bedroom door, the spot of warmth a familiar spark of comfort after three years of kisses chaste and not. Jeremy ambled through to the master bathroom, forgetting to close the bedroom door behind him as he always did; Kevin and Jean had shared many a meaningful glance about it.  “No, just bathroom, I’ll be out in a sec,” Jean heard Jeremy say to Kevin. Jean scratched out a 9 and put a 2 in its place. That would mean the square underneath it had to be-- “Oh, nice earrings,” Jeremy’s voice said. 

Jean looked up. He couldn’t see into the bathroom-- not from the couch-- but Jeremy’s tone had been the one he adopted when he was trying with all his might to be chill about something. Kevin’s answer was an inaudible murmur, and Jean found himself sitting up straight and craning his ear to listen.  Kevin had gotten hir ears pierced a few months ago, and had been hiding the fact from most media outlets with a series of stickers, clear retainers, and careful haircuts. Jean hadn’t known why sie had bothered if sie didn’t seem to be ready to acknowledge it, but had known better than to poke too hard at the question. If Kevin was wearing earrings now, however, that meant sie was planning to wear them to the restaurant. That was, out. In public. With them. Jean’s foolish heart beat a little faster. Ten-oh-one minutes. “Kev, we have reservations,” Jean said, trying not to sound out of breath. “Hurry it up.” “Stop being an asshole,” Kevin called back. But Jean heard hir socked footsteps move inside the bedroom, coming towards the door. Jean forced himself to take a moment to settle his features into neutrality. “I’m not the one who held us up getting to the dog show last week,” Kevin said, striding out into the living room and crossing behind the couch to the kitchen. Sie was moving with hir usual purpose, but Jean saw the slight tremble in hir hands, the too-jerky way sie reached into the fridge for hir recyclable water bottle. Against the soft skin of hir jaw dangled two strings of pink gemstone, linked together in such a way that they followed the motion of hir head as sie moved.  Jean stood up, tucking his Sudoku book under his arm, and went to collect his own water bottle. He intercepted Kevin’s chin and held it between his thumb and forefinger, examining the earrings. Kevin was blushing and trying to pretend sie wasn’t. “Those look beautiful,” Jean said quietly. He could feel the tension under his fingertips as Kevin tried not to pull away, to hide. “I just-- saw them. And. It was a charity thing, you know. Children’s cancer. I had to buy something.”

“Of course.” “Weren’t you saying we’re going to be late?” “We’ve got a little bit of time,” Jean said. He tilted Kevin’s face to the side and kissed gently under hir ear. The earring tickled the side of his nose. Kevin’s hands automatically went to Jean’s waist. Hir pulse was jittering. “He’s right,” Jeremy said. He had finished in the bathroom while Jean was admiring Kevin’s new shine and was shaking water droplets off his hands onto the kitchen floor. His grin was as bright as the jewelry was. “They’re really nice, Kev. You look good.” “Stop standing around,” Kevin said, snappish with embarrassment. Jean could taste the heat of hir blush, an answering flutter beating in his chest. Jeremy’s grin turned sly. He stepped closer. “Sure thing, hon,” Jeremy purred, and slid a still-wet hand into Kevin’s hair to pull hir mouth to his. They made the reservations. Jean was used to this sort of thing, after all. He’d alloted time for it.

[angst-fairygodmother]

Otherworldly (Klaus Hargreeves x Reader)

A/N: sometimes, I say words, and the words root themselves into my brain and then fics happen. I am yearning tonight (and also maybe feeling some anxiety based on the angst that slipped it’s way in here?)

P.S. Titles are hard and I hate them.

Word Count: 1426

You yawned, stretching and rolling over in the pile of blankets, pillows, and furs, the mattress sinking beneath your movements. It was much darker than it had been, the only lights in the circular space a thin shred of moonlight filtering down from the chimney hole and the faint red glow of campfire coals.

Sitting up, you kept one of the soft woolen blankets around your shoulder with one hand and awkwardly shoved boots onto your socked feet with the other.

It was noticeably, blessedly silent. You took that to mean that the unwanted guests that had come to visit you earlier were finally gone. But at the same time, you didn’t hear Klaus either, which concerned you and made you feel colder than the air possibly could. Ever since time traveling, you hated him being out of sight, the idea of losing him threatening to suffocate you it was so frightening.

“Klaus?” you called, wrapping the blanket tighter around you rather than hunting around in the dark for your coat, and wandering to the door-flap.

When the cult had been immediately overwhelming, their presence threatening to push you to a panic attack as they crowded about, Klaus had suggested sneaking off, just the two of you to his yurt in Iceland. You assumed at first that it was some sort of strange, Klausian innuendo. But, as it turned out, he had meant a real yurt, actually outside Reykjavik. You two had been here, blissfully isolated in a world of your own for going on three weeks, and part of you never wanted to go back to civilization.

Except when he wandered off into the rolling, snow covered land around you. Sometimes it was only for a few minutes, or not far from the yurt. Other times, he’d leave you for hours, with no idea where he was or what might happen to him. In his defense, you hadn’t told him what it felt like or the fear that gripped your heart in a vice, so used to being strong and supportive for him that you had long forgotten how to let yourself be vulnerable, how to need help without feeling weak. If there was one thing ingrained in you from your childhood, it was that weakness was a personal failing and negated any good or worth in you. Or at least, that’s what your dearly departed father had taught you.

Your breath was coming quicker, short, shallow bursts that warned of worse to come.

“Klaus?” you called again, more frantically this time, voice breaking.

You exited the tent, whipping your head around wildly to find him, blood racing in your ears when you didn’t spot him immediately.

“Y/N?” you heard his soft voice finally, just about the time everything was tunneling, as he rounded the large tent-structure. “I didn’t realize you were up.”

You nodded, not quite trusting your voice as relief washed over you.

“Well, since you are, there’s something I want to show you.”

You took his out-stretched hand, twining his icy fingers with your own, and let him lead you. To the ends of the Earth if he wanted to. You kept your eyes on your feet as you stumbled behind his surprisingly nimble steps up the rocky hills behind your abode. The higher you climbed in the darkness, the more you became nervous for a new reason, fearing that one of you would lose their footing and fall, and then one of you would lose the other as surely as if you were separated again in space and time, with no hope of reunion this time.

Finally, just as you were about to express your concern, you crested the top of the hills onto a wide plateau. A thin stream burbled nearby, cutting through rock and snow in a winding path that crossed yours before twisting away again to a shallow pool on the other side of the space. The wind whistled around you, making you shiver and marvel at how Klaus stood there, so calm and still despite the plummeting temperatures. It ruffled his long hair, promising hours of detangling later, which you found yourself looking forward to, taking advantage of the time to card your fingers through the soft curls in all the ways you both loved.

He turned around to face you excitedly and laughed.

“What?” you asked, frowning in confusion at his amusement.

“You,” he said, shaking his head playfully. “I know I’m beautiful, but this is ridiculous Y/N.”

“I…what is? I was just…admiring how free you look right now. Is that a problem somehow?”

His grin was blinding. “I bring you to this gorgeous sight and you’re too busy staring at me to even notice. It’s adorable.”

“I mean, I guess it’s a nice plateau, but you could have brought me in the morning.”

“Look up, you silly goose.”

You did you were told and felt the air rush from your lungs. “Oh…”

Above you both, the cobalt sky was dotted with stars like shards of ice and the pale white sliver of moon, and cutting through it all in ephemeral ribbons of pinks and green, dancing like the gowns of a hundred heavenly gods, was the aurora borealis.

Despite the stunning sight, your gaze wandered back down to Klaus who was watching you watch the lights, the flickering of the sky above you reflected in his emerald eyes and casting an unearthly pattern over him like some fae king come to steal you away. For a moment, he didn’t seem real, an illusion or dream only and it brought an unbidden sob to your lips. Once the first had escaped, it was like a floodgate opening and all of the fear and pain you had been feeling spilled forth.

Two strong but frigid arms wrapped around you, pulling you close as you cried, and even in your distress you instinctively opened the blanket so that it could cocoon you both.

“Hey, sh-sh-sh…” he murmured, pressing his lips to your crown. “Y/N, what’s wrong?”

“Nothing. Everything. I…I don’t know anymore,” you sniffed.

“Talk to me?” he asked.

And that was all he needed to say. Everything you had bottled up came flooding out of you, your tongue practically tripping over itself in your rush to explain your fears of losing him and how you missed your own time and everyone you knew and even though you wanted to spend forever with him, it was still lonely not knowing anyone and thinking that the rest of the Academy was gone, how being in the 60s and trying to move on made you feel broken and lost.

“I just…feel like everything’s gone and without it I don’t even know who I am, let alone what to do. And sometimes it’s like I can’t breathe because of it,” you finished, shaking your head and pressing your face to his chest and feeling his hug tighten.

“Oh, Y/N,” he sighed. “I understand. And it’s going to be okay. When it was just me, I wanted to be numb, or nothing at all. I wish you’d told me sooner, before it got so bad and I could have helped…”

“I…didn’t know how to.”

You both lapsed into silence for a while, simply taking in each other’s embrace, each other’s essence.

“How can I fix it?” he asked finally, breath fluttering the hair by your ear.

“I think you already did. I just needed to let it out and be told it would be okay,” you admitted sheepishly.

“Promise me you’ll talk to me from now on?”

You nodded. “I promise.”

“Good.”

He brushed a tender kiss to your lips and you felt him smile against you, before breaking away and twirling you in his arms so that your back was pressed to his chest and your head tucked perfectly into the hollow of his throat. You whined at the loss of his lips on yours and he chuckled, the feel rumbling through you.

“The lights aren’t this bright very often. We should enjoy it while we can,” he scolded.

You looked up at him, his profile rising above you, glowing in the night and completely serene, a truly magical sight, countering the very solid, real feel of his hold on you to create a strange certainty that he was indeed an otherworldly being, but he was yours and if he wasn’t real than neither were you. Comforted by the odd thought and by him, you smiled, turning back to watch the sky. And for at least a moment, everything was perfect.

[joonclouds]

The Price Of A Wish | 1

The third time you meet Jung Hoseok, you realise the last ten years has done nothing to the way you were drawn to him, with a force as sure and inescapable as gravity.

CHAPTER INDEX

Hoseok x Reader 

Genre: Idol!Hoseok, Chaebol!Reader, OT7 bangtan show up too, Slow Burn, Unrequited feelings, Friends to Lovers, Pining, Fluff, (we might include some other things later let’s see)

Warnings: None, but emphasis on the Slow in slow burn.

____________

The official opening night of your art conservatory marks your first independent venture from your family’s Aurarts Corporation. The press and public fawn over you, commending your initiative to increase representation opportunities for budding artists. You wanted this place to celebrate all types of art.

The opening ribbon is cut, champagne, popped. Compliments were given on the new space - one with high ceilings, a fully functional theatre, practice rooms. Crafting studios with expansive skylights and clean white walls wait to house artists and their masterpieces. Mirrors have been strategically placed to make the main hall and foyer look even bigger than it is.

The silver gown and warm smile you wear belies the eighty-hour work week you’ve had leading up to today and the way your feet scream in protest at the new satin Manolos that haven’t yet been seasoned by wear. Maybe you eat more than your fair share of tiny canapes, but you are the perfect hostess - you laugh, shake hands, exchange jokes - always sincere, never past the point of oversharing.

So yes, it’s an important night. It has to be perfect. But that isn’t why you’re nervous.

You feel a warm hand on your elbow and you’re pulled into a gentle hug. It startles you, but once you catch an eyeful of colourful prints that smell like a woody bergamot, you relax.

“Hey, ____.”

“Tae! I’m so glad you’re here.”

“Who will save you from all this social interaction otherwise?”

Mirroring Taehyung’s smile, you return his embrace. Though it’s not till you’re pulling away that you realise what’s different about him tonight.

“Your hair!” Your fingers come up to touch the strands at the nape of his neck which, previously bright blue, are now an ashy silver.

Taehyung grins. “You like? I did it to match your dress.”

The gray hair makes his skin glow.

“I love. It suits you.”

You give him an approving once over. Taehyung’s style is eclectic, to say the least. His hair colour changed depending on his mood, sometimes blue, sometimes pink. A few weeks ago, it was a fire-engine red. On most days, he chooses to dress in a mish-mash of designer jackets, some of which he’d taken a can of spray paint to, baggy cut clothing and odd sandals (rarely covered shoes). But that had never taken away from the fact that he was incredibly good looking - maybe even added to it, if that were possible.

Tonight he’s dashing, in a loose silk shirt with wild paisely patterns tucked into dress pants, and a smattering of silver and gold on his fingers and in his ears.

“Who knew Kim Taehyung actually owns proper shoes?”

He doesn’t say anything, just tilts his heel with a cheeky smile, showing you that he’s not actually wearing proper shoes, or even socks for that matter - just loafers that look like actual shoes in that they had no backing to cover the heel.

“Did you seriously wear bedroom slippers to my grand opening?”

Taehyung laughs and eyes your Manolos skeptically.

“They’re my best pair of Gucci loafers. If I’m going to have to endure all this small talk I’m going to do it comfortably.”

You groan quietly, shifting your weight to your other foot. “Don’t remind me. We’re not even a third through the night.”

Taehyung nabs two glasses of wine from a passing server and you accept one gratefully.

“Ugh - “ he pauses to take a big sip as he scans the crowd. “Remind me again why you invited half of the country to the opening?”

“Marketing says it’s good publicity, ecetera ecetera.” You take a substantial mouthful of wine yourself.

“That’s good publicity?” Taehyung tips his glass to point over your shoulder and you turn in its direction.

The both of you cringe visibly.

“Uh. She’s got a million followers on Instagram?”

He makes a small retching noise in the back of his throat. “She’s taking a duck face selfie in front of the - hey!”

Taehyung quickly gets the attention of a server and shoves him in selfie girl’s direction. “Tell her no flash photography, it’s a real Matisse, for fuck’s sakes.”

While Taehyung’s flagging down another server to refill his wineglass and muttering something about how can’t anyone have a shred of respectable gallery etiquette, you’re spacing out a bit.

The soft, unassuming lull of the string quartet sits underneath the rustling of expensive gowns and clinking of glasses. Anyone and everyone who was someone in the entertainment industry was extended an invitation. That tiny ball of anxiety still sits in the base of your gut. It’s like waiting in line, and it’s almost your turn - for what you’re not sure - but not quite yet. Your fingers pick at the thin seam of your dress.

“____.” It vaguely registers that this isn’t the first time Taehyung’s called your name.

You clear your throat quickly. “Sorry. I’m a little tired today. What was it?”

“When was the last time you ate? You better not say yesterday.”

“Don’t look at me like that. I ate.” Technically, not a lie. Stealing the canapes was considered eating.

Taehyung frowns, but he’s sufficiently appeased. “ As I was saying, I saw you chatting with President Kwon earlier. What’d you think of him?”

“I think - ” You suck in a breath through your teeth, taking a moment to find the right words. “He’s competent. Knows the ins and outs of the arts and entertainment businesses. He might be useful so let’s not rule him out yet.”

“Rule him out yet? He’s a big fish though.”

Your expression changes slightly - it’s still a smile, but Taehyung has known you long enough to be able to tell. Its what he likes to call your Politely Disgusted face.

“Like I said. Yet.” You emphasize. “While we were talking, I watched him hand his empty wineglass off to his wife instead of the wait staff. He’s definintely not being friendly to me because it’s his personality.”

He nods in understanding. You were quick on picking up little things like that - you had quite the talent for reading people. “He wants something from you.”

“Bingo. And when we find out what he wants, then we can really - “

A small change in the atmosphere makes you pause. Something’s different.

“_____?”

“Hold on. I’ll be back in a minute, I think someone’s here.” You murmur.

There’s a small hush about the air. It’s less conversation, heavier, quieter with a certain entrancing quality. Whatever it is makes you turn your head and take a few steps towards the main foyer, leaving Taehyung behind in a bit of a confused daze.

Without seeing, you know.

Of course he’s received an invite. But he’s a little late, having missed the opening ceremony. Systematically, you weave through the guests with murmured apologies, that tangle of anxiety bubbling over into something more - trepidation, anticipation, excitement… you can’t tell anymore.

You’re halfway to the main doors when you see him before he sees you.

He’s in a black suit - Dior, by the looks of the nondescript label on the jacket cuff. The bowtie has been forgone in favour of a matching silk neck scarf and the top two buttons of his white shirt have been left undone. His hair is styled such that errant pieces fall boyishly into his eyes as he nods politely to greet the attending press and guests.

Perchance, you catch a glimpse of your reflection in one of the mirrors - cheeks pink with a little flush, eyes wide and shining. It’s unlike you. There’s a tiny curl that’s escaped your bun, but you don’t reach up to smooth it back as you usually would. It looks quite charming, you think.

It can be quite a peculiar experience, to see someone after a long time.

The years make little changes to their appearance, the way they walk, talk, hold themselves, leaving only just enough familiarity for recognition. It’s like a weird sense of jamais vu, recalibrating your memory as you align the two faces - the one you knew, and the one that is.

One thing you know for sure. His face has always been smooth lines and pretty angles. Time has certainly taken those lines and angles, made them smoother, prettier. Made them breathtaking.

He spots you in the crowd threading through it to come stand in front of you. You’re taller now, and in your heels, you don’t have to look up much to meet his gaze. The mirth in his eyes is a little dimmer now, but it’s there and still the same.

“Hi, ____. It’s been a while.” He extends a hand with a smile and you vaguely register the sound of cameras clicking and flashes of light.

It’s not till he glances down almost imperceptibly that you realise your reaction has been left wanting for a second too long. Quickly sliding your hand into his, you smile and perform your part as best you can for the watching eyes that follow.

“Hi,” you breathe. He grips your hand firmly, warmly. “It’s good to see you.”

That short, polite moment is all you get before he’s swept away in the flow of greeting the other guests and influencers who clamber for a photo, but it leaves you with peculiar feeling. Like you’ve missed a step on the stairs and you’re paralysed in a hanging moment of falling and flying at the same time.

The third time you meet Jung Hoseok, you realise the last ten years has done nothing to the way you were drawn to him, with a force as sure and inescapable as gravity.

__________________

 References: 190106 Hoseok  For your enjoyment

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[ticklish-sprout]

The Perfect Pair - Logince

Words: 1,639

Yeah, those were socks alright.

Logan gazed down at the drawer overflowing with socks, a beaming Patton standing behind him proudly. “This is my entire collection! Oh, aside from the ones I’m wearing right now! I’m not sure how many I have, but I think it’s somewhere in the low hundreds?”

Hundreds? “Fascinating,” he murmured, running his hands over the ones with constellation patterns. “You seem to enjoy this little hobby of yours, Patton. I can certainly say I’ve never seen anything like it. What are you wearing now?”

“Oh!” Patton slid off his shoes to show him. “See? It looks like I have little kitty cat paws!” The socks themselves were gray, while the paw prints were a light pink.

Logan nodded. “I see. That is-“

“Pawsome?”

“No.”

He pouted, slowly putting his shoes back on. “You’re being catty today. Something on your mind?”

“That was dreadful.” He turned his attention back to the colorful socks. “Anyways, I may actually get a few of these myself. They are quite...” His breath died in his throat. Were those what he thought they were? No, they couldn’t be. He slowly lifted out a certain pair and blushed, turning them over in his hands. “Actually, I would like to borrow these for a little while.” 

---

Roman was lounging on his bed and staring at the ceiling with a serene smile as he allowed his creative mind to wander, eyes slowly closing. Breaks were the absolute best. No rushing to think up video ideas or deal with a certain someone’s nagging about schedules and deadlines approaching not even that quickly. Just relaxation. 

“Roman.”

His eyes opened and settled on the figure standing in his doorway. Spoke too soon. “Yes, Heisenberg?” he questioned evenly, trying to keep the slight frustration out of his voice. As much as he lo-liked him, now was a time for him to unwind.

“I...” Logan wasn’t sure what to say. “May I come in?”

But he can’t say no to that face. “Sure!” Roman patted the space next to him on the bed, curiosity written across his face when he instead sat down in front of him. “Hi?” He drew his legs up so he could sit criss-crossed. “You never said what you needed.”

He shrugged. “Just wanted to see you.”

Ooh, that sent an arrow straight through his heart. “I’m honored, my precious nerd! I was just relaxing over here, care to join me? Or did you want to talk about something specific?”

“I shall just join you.” Logan enacted the next phase of his plan, which was setting both legs in his lap as casually as possible. He must be so stealthy right now.

He was not stealthy at all right now. Roman raised an eyebrow, noticing he wasn’t wearing his usual shoes as he tended to do at all times. Only socks. “Um,” he began, then quieted. What was he supposed to do? “It’s rare to see you without shoes.” His socks seemed to have something written on the soles. “Are you wearing ones that aren’t plain?”

“Indeed, I wanted to change things up a little today. Nothing too fancy, since the main color is still white. Just a small detail.” He flexed his toes, a light blush spreading across his face. Any time now.

“Let me see!” He lifted both feet to examine them, his smile slowly morphing into a confused frown. The right one read since you are reading this, and the left one tickle my toes with a picture of two tiny feet. Interesting. “Logan, do you even know what is on your socks?”

Logan coughed, glancing away. “I must admit I am not certain, since I borrowed them from Patton. Why?”

Roman’s eyes narrowed. So that’s how he wanted to play this, hmm? “No reason.” He pressed one of his thumbs into the ball of his left foot, smirking at the gasp it produced. “I just have a simple question for you. Are you...ticklish?”

“What?” His toes curled again, trying to catch his thumb between them. “That’s absurd, Roman. I am a being of pure intellect who is not affected by such things. You’ve been spending far too much time with Patton.”

“Right, my mistake.” He pulled his hands away, crossing his arms behind his head and lying back. “Never mind. Let’s just go back to resting or whatever.”

Logan almost squawked indignantly. He did that on purpose, didn’t he?! Frustrated, he leaned forward to poke at his exposed underarms. The prince immediately fought back after a surprised squeal by quickly scribbling his nails over the socked feet, which were luckily still in his lap and just begging for it. 

What followed was a sound sweeter than any music Roman had ever heard in his entire life.

“ROHOHOHOMAN!” Logan couldn’t even try to hold back his reaction, not that he would’ve if he could. It was an amazing feeling and something he should have pursued a lot sooner. Years of avoiding tickle fights in the Mind Palace and pretending he wasn’t ticklish like the others melted away as he laughed freely, and it was pure ecstasy.

“Aw, does the Logical one have tickly feetsies?” Roman teased once he could speak again through his gay thoughts of how cute his friend looked. “Does he? He thought he could hide them from us forever with no one ever finding out and taking swift action? Adorable.” 

He didn’t answer any of the questions directed towards him, instead focusing on the torturous feelings lighting up his nerves and making him want to scream. “YOU AHAHAHAHARE THE WOHOHOHOHORST!”

“I am what?!” he snapped, poking and pinching up and down with no real pattern. “That’s not a very nice thing to say to the person giving you what you wanted!”

Logan tried to glare the best he could. “FAHAHAHAHAHALSEHOOD!”

“And you’re a liar on top of it!” Roman huffed. “I can make this so much worse for you, if you haven’t noticed!” The tickling stopped for a moment so he could understand him better and hear from him directly. “I’ll do it, too.”

Making the most of his break, he contemplated those words. He wasn’t bluffing according to his tone, which was good for him in the long run if he wanted this to keep going. Which he did. Now to just give him a little push. “Bring it on.” “You asked for it!” Deciding to follow what the socks said, all ten of his fingers moved higher to tickle under the wiggly toes. “Ooh, what a reaction!”

Death spot, death spot! “NAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA! STAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAP!” Logan didn’t mean it, no matter how much it tickled. He didn’t yank his legs away even the slightest bit.

Roman cooed, pulling off the socks and going right for the sensitive skin between his toes. “I should conjure a feather next time!” There would be a next time, right? There had to be with how happy he looked. “Just sawing back and forth so ticklishly-was that a snort I heard?!”

He shook his head, laughter broken up by a second snort. His hands covered his burning face in embarrassment. “PLEHEHEHEHEHEHEHEHEASE!”

“Please tickle you more?” He shrugged, pretending he didn’t understand him. “If that’s what your heart so desires! Who am I to refuse such a polite request?” And the tickling went on for several more minutes. Heels, arches, nothing was left un-tickled, with Roman only stopping once Logan tapped his arm frantically. “Breathe,” he reminded him.

Logan did, taking in gasps of air until his cheeks no longer resembled the color of Roman’s sash. Tears of laughter had fallen from his eyes at some point, leaving visible tracks. “Roman,” he began, “that was awful.”

“I’m sure it was, handsome. It’s not like you wanted it so badly you were about to lose your mind.” Roman’s voice was thick with sarcasm. “You can always ask,” he added as an afterthought. Softer.

“You should be aware of how hard that can be.” He rolled his eyes. “I have seen you in your lee moods.” Wait. “What did you just call me?”

Oops. He rubbed the back of his head nervously, not able to come up with anything. “It’s true. I wasn’t lying or whatever.”

“I don’t need you to tell me something I already know.” Logan was smiling now, getting on his knees to be near eye-level with the other Side. “But thank you.”

“God, I love you.” It slipped out before Roman knew what was happening. “Oh. I mean, you’re welcome. That’s totally what I meant to say instead of that.” 

Eyebrows raised in shock, he reached a hand out to gently cup his face and force him to look at him. “You love me in a romantic sense, Roman? Is that what you mean?”

“I know you don’t feel the same,” he blurted out. His eyes squeezed shut as shame washed over his body in waves. “You don’t-don’t feel things, emotions. You-“ A pair of soft lips covered his own, interrupting him mid-sentence. He slowly kissed back and wrapped his arms around his waist, then his eyes opened once the warmth left him. 

“You figured out I wanted to be tickled,” Logan mused, “yet you couldn’t figure out I feel emotions like the rest of you? I love you too, Roman. You are my everything.”

Way to make him feel stupid. “Just kiss me again, nerd.” Roman stuck out his tongue, not expecting his underarms to be targeted like earlier. “WAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAIT!”

“Wait for what?” His expression was blank as he worked methodically to wreck his new boyfriend(?) into oblivion with every possible technique he had observed over the years. “I do not understand. What am I waiting for?”

“IT TIHIHIHIHIHIHIHIHIHIHICKLES!” And the whole time he was tickled, Logan’s eyes were shining bright with pure adoration that not even he could hide.

[magnoliasinbloom]

Crash Course Love

Infinite thanks to @lcbeauchampoftarth​ and @anna-swims​ for being awesome betas. 

AO3 :: Previously

2: Morning [Jamie]

“Wake up!” a voice hissed in my ear.

Holy shit. My tongue felt as though it was covered in sock fuzz, and my eyes were glued together.  I reached up to rub them open and found my hand brushing against soft, curly hair.

I jerked my eyes open. What the fuck? I scrambled back against a headboard. Where am I?

“Where am I?” I croaked, and my head immediately retaliated. Pulsing, throbbing pain flared up everywhere.

“This is my flat. Care to tell me why you’re here?” Her voice. English accent. The Sassenach.

Claire. Sorcha. Light. From that pub. The one who was cheated on by her boyfriend. I recalled some dancing… and Patron. Lots of whisky and Patron. Fuuuuuuck.

“I… dinna ken?” I pinched the bridge of my nose with my fingers, trying to stop the pounding. My hand was rudely smacked away.

“What? Focus! Please, answer this. Are you… are you naked?” Claire’s voice was slightly panicked.

Mary, Mother, and Bride. Had I… did we…?

I wasn’t wearing a shirt, that much I could tell. I reached under the covers tentatively, trying to ascertain whether I was naked. Mercifully, my fingers brushed against the waistband of my boxer briefs.

“Uh, no. I’m dressed. Sort of.” I glanced down at my bare chest. My curly red-gold chest hair stood out starkly in the bright light of her bedroom. Clearly, something had gone down last night. Or someone.

“Shit. Thank you, Jesus H. Christ.” Claire was gathering the bed sheet around herself.

“Wait, are ye naked?”

The light from the window hit her from behind, burnishing her hair into a rich brown. A deep pink blush spread down from her face, across her chest. Was she naked? I could feel my cock stirring and I willed it into submission. Clearly, now was not the time.

“I’m wearing underwear too. You think we—”

“Fuck! I hope not!” I exclaimed. Immediately, her face turned red again, but this time I could tell it was in anger. Then, I realized what I’d said and how it sounded. Blunt again.

“Oh, sweet Bride, I mean, no’ that I… ye’re totally gorgeous, I would definitely want to—shite,” I groaned. Too much thinking for what little brain cells I had left.

“You definitely want to shite?” she asked, raising her eyebrows in mock confusion. At least she seemed mollified by my ranting apology.

“No, I mean, ye ken, not that I’m glad we didna do anything… but I wouldna take advantage of you, but it’s not…” I trailed off lamely.

Claire chuckled softly, shaking her head. “I get it. Sorry. I’m just a little sensitive on that point. Thanks to that arsehole. I, uh, I better get some clothes on.”

“Aye, me too.” I pushed the covers aside, trying to ignore the thumping in my head. I spotted my jeans heaped in a corner, so I pulled them on while I searched for my shirt. I found it, sniffed it. Quite rank. No helping matters now.

I noticed Claire still huddling in the sheet, and I stopped, looking at her. “What?”

“Um, would you mind giving me some privacy? I know we woke up together and all, but I still don’t feel comfortable flashing you.”

Now it was my turn to go red. “Aye, of course. I’ll just… put on some coffee or something.” As she turned away from me, still wrapped in the bed sheet, I caught a glimpse of a tattoo on her right shoulder. It looked like spiraling scrollwork, or flowery vines; it trailed across her shoulder blade and disappeared beneath the sheet covering her ivory skin.

Ifrinn.

I nearly tripped on my way out. My foot caught on something. I shook it off, noticing as I did that it was her bra. Mallaichte bas. I tossed it at her and shut the door behind me.

I looked around as I made my way to the kitchen. The furniture looked very thrift-store-esque, but comfortable. The colors were mismatched, but somehow they fit.

On the walls, there were many framed pictures and paintings. Some photographs were black and white, offset by colorful flowery art. I noticed a lot were missing, the bare spots on the walls and tables glaringly obvious. I wondered where they’d gone.

I couldn’t figure out her coffeemaker, and soon gave that up in favor of a glass of water instead. I called out to Claire who was still in her room. “Do you have aspirin?”

“Here.” Her quiet voice startled me as she came up behind me. She pressed two pills into my palm and pulled a bottle of water from the fridge for herself. “Jason, is it?”

“James. Jamie.” I swallowed them quickly. I could practically feel the water rehydrating my brain. I leaned against the counter while Claire rummaged for food.

“Well, Jamie, I have cereal and cereal,” she said, frowning at the expiration date on the milk carton. “This is still drinkable. I think.”

“Uh, no, thank ye.” This would be awkward enough without a morning-after breakfast. Or was it, technically, since there hadn’t been a… before? I shrugged at myself, quickly gulping down more water.

We sat down at the kitchen table while she tossed Weetabix into a bowl. I grinned at her cereal choice—a little tame for the tequila-drinking tattooed lass. Claire caught me looking at her and blushed.

“What?”

“Nothing. Just… never mind.” I clutched my glass and an awkward silence fell between us, the only sound the clinking of her spoon.

“So,” she finally spoke. She glanced at me and back at her cereal.

“Aye.” I pursed my lips and took a sip of water.

“What do you remember?”

“Mmmphm… tequila. Lots of it,” I grimaced, scratching my head.

“I think I remember… dancing? Did we dance?” she asked skeptically.

“We danced,” I said, nodding emphatically.

“Was I drunk by then? I can’t think of any other way that would have happened.”

“A bit. Ye were past tipsy then, but ye did manage to express certain reservations.”

“No shit.” She glared at her cereal bowl, then stood up to dump it in the bin.

“Och, well, maybe—” I began.

“What the fuck!” Claire exclaimed. She had tossed half the mushy mess inside the bin when she cried out. She picked up the trash bin and set it on the table. She reached in, scrunching her nose.

Claire pulled out a stack of pictures, burned and charred. They were drenched in milk and speckled with soggy cereal.

“Oh, I wondered why there were pictures missing from the walls.” I gestured toward the small living room.

“It’s Frank.” Her voice sounded flat, but I thought I heard a hint of sadness.

“Cheating arsehole Frank?” I asked, taking some of the pictures from her. They were pretty good; the angles, the lighting, it was all very original and artistic. Some featured both Claire and Frank together, laughing or kissing. Others were just him, pensive and brooding. Bloke looked slim and posh. I could probably take him in a fight, I reasoned.

Claire found an empty plastic lighter in the bin too. She frowned. “After we came here, I took these off the walls and you said—”

“That I would help ye—”

“—and we would take out the trash together,” we finished, catching each other’s eyes. I wondered if she regretted what we’d done with part of her memories, before Claire’s face broke out into a smile—the first real smile I’d seen on her face. It was luminous.

“Thanks.” She took the pictures I’d been holding and dumped them in the bin again.

“Anytime.”

[letsbenditlikebennett]

I’ll Make a Wolf Out of You || Ariana & Sammy

TIMING: Late Tonight PARTIES: @letsbenditlikebennett & @inspirationdivine SUMMARY: This time, Ariana and Ace (Sammy) meet up as planned so she can turn him into a werewolf.  CONTENT: Abuse mentions and some medical blood

Sammy was calm. He was completely calm. His knee wasn’t bouncing as he worked by the lathe, there wasn’t a large stack of coffee cups by his side, his eyes weren’t dark from staying up so much last night. Everything was chill, as the house got quiet and he crept through the house. She wasn’t going to catch him again. He shut each door behind him so quietly, it didn’t even click. He held his shoes in his hands as he ran on socks along the hall, and gently cracked the basement door open. Nearly there. Nearly there (and no, no way was Sammy even considering how this sneaking about worked with the being devoted to Lydia), as he bolted down the stairs, not quite remembering to shut the door fully behind him. He slipped on his shoes, moved the hidden basement tunnel hatch, and crept through the passage. He almost ran the whole way to their meetup place, careful not to trip over anything in the dark. Tonight was the night. He bounced from foot to foot, pulling his hoody a little closer around him. There was some clay on the sleeve. He picked at it as he waited, so Sammy, being totally calm, jumped a mile in the air when Ariana approached him. “He-Hey!”

All day, Ariana had been thinking about what tonight would entail. She’d never done anything like this before and she was feeling a bit nervous. To prepare, she’d been sure to eat a heart, meat-packed dinner to ensure hunger wouldn’t make her lose control. Today was the day she was turning Ace into a wolf like her and it left her feeling antsy. Last time he hadn’t shown up, but he still seemed eager to do this. She was as well. The sooner she could take him under her wing, the sooner he’d be away from Lydia. The sooner he’d stop the whole slowly dying from being her meal. It left her both excited and nervous in the same breath. She waited at their spot, her bag filled with first aid supplies so she could quickly patch Ace up after she bit him. When she arrived, she was relieve to see Ace was already there. She quickly wrapped him in a hug and mumbled, “Hey, Ace.” She couldn’t decide if it was better or worse to get this over with right away. “I brought everything we’ll need to patch you up after the bite. Are you feeling okay with everything?” 

Sammy wrapped her arms tight around her, giving her a squeeze to chill his jitters about tonight. He looked up through the tree canopy at the the half moon. In one week, he’d feel it calling him for the first time. Which started…. Tonight. Tonight! “Uhhhhh what?” He asked, realising she’d been asking him a question. “Right, right! Yeah, I’m so ready. I can’t believe this is happening. I mean, it is still happening, right? You still want to bite me?” He had so many questions. Were there special rules about where he got bitten? Did he get to choose? Could she do it like this or would she wolf up? What did she look like as a wolf? What if- Sammy had to slam a brake on his thoughts right there, just looking at her. “I missed you.”

Although she had been looking forward to this, to finally knowing he’d be safe with her, Ariana had to make a conscious effort to keep herself calm. She remembered her deep breaths Celeste always had her do as she hugged him. This was real. After tonight, he’d be like her and Lydia wouldn’t want to keep him as dinner anymore. At least, that’s what she kept telling herself though it didn’t entirely relieve the pit forming in her stomach. She looked up to him and nodded quickly, “Yeah, of course… I mean it only sounds a little weird when you put it like that, but that’s what’s happening so, yes I still want to bite you.” What was she even saying? Her cheeks flushed pink and she realized she was sounding about as composed as he was. Tighten up, Bennett. With another long inhale, she reminded herself this was going to make things better. “So,” she began more coolly this time, “Where should I-- I figure you probably don’t want it to be anywhere too noticeable because it will scar, but I also don’t want to like… chomp into a vital organ or something.” She should have asked Kaden’s girlfriend about anatomy or something. She was always turning things into long science words. That thought seemed to melt away when he said he’d missed her. She looked back up to him and her face softened. “I missed you, too, Ace.” 

Were there places that it would be weird to ask to be bit? Sammy took a long moment to think it over, looking himself up and down. Not his arms - the clay room got so hot at times he only wore a vest/ Not his neck, or his shoulders - well, that was vampires, wasn’t it? No vital organs, she’d said, and truth be told Sammy wasn’t too clear on where his non vital organs were. He’d learned from his family that you could be hurt in a lot places in a way tat could quickly turn fatal, but that wouldn’t happen here, right? Sammy looked his freckled arms up and down. “What about, like, above my knee? Does that make sense?” He wrapped his arms around her again, and he was sure with those ears she could hear just how fast his heart was racing, and just how sweaty he was. “One more week, yeah? We’ve got this. Totally.”

At least he seemed to be thinking over where she’d bite him though she could hear the way his heart pounded in his chest, reverberating and beating in her ears. Ariana reached out to him and placed a hand on his arm. “It’s going to be okay,” she said surely, “I can do above the knee. Just do your best to stay still, I know I’ll probably look scary as a wolf.” Had he ever even seen a werewolf up close? Sure, she was small relative to other wolves, but she was still powerful and larger in wolf form. Despite his obvious nerves, he still hugged her and she leaned into him. Only a week until freedom. No more late nights spent up worrying about him and lightly stalking Lydia. She doubted they’d entirely abandoned nights spent in the woods, but she could almost picture what he would look like smiling under a sunny sky. The thought made her let out a soft breath and look up to him. “One more week. We do have this, I’m ready when you are. I will have to change into a wolf first.” 

Sammy rolled up his shorts until his upper thigh was completely exposed.Goosebumps raised along his skin, it was really too cold to be wearing just shorts at night. But in the daytime it had been hot, and it hadn’t occurred for him to change before coming here. Which, uh, was a good choice, because otherwise he would have had to take off his jeans entirely for her to bite him. The idea made him red around the ears. “Cool, cool. Ready as I’ll ever be to, uh, literally change species. Wow. That’s yeah - uh, I’m ready!” He looked at her, and suddenly remembered the twilight movies his cousins had watched. His face flushed as red as tomato. “Should I, uh, turn around? While you do your thing?” He gestured vaguely at all of her.

This was it. Ariana knew where she was going to bite him all that was left was to just do it. She took in a deep breath and mentally prepared herself for what she was about to do. Ace was ready to go. “Alright then, here we go,” she said more confidently this time to make sure he was at ease. Before she could begin to tug at her shirt his question registered in her mind and she noticed how flushed he was. “Oh, right,” she said with a small laugh, “If that makes you more comfortable, that’s fine. I wake up at least three mornings a month naked in the woods. Kinda desensitized to the whole nudity thing.” Though if she really thought about it, she could acknowledge this felt a little different somehow. Either way, they’d both see each other like this regularly once he was a wolf, too. She shook that thought away as she began to nearly remove her clothes and set them down on her pack. With another slow breath in and out, she focused on shifting her features into the more wolflike version of herself. Her bones moved with ease as tufts of gray and white fur came in all over her body. There was always something so liberating about being in this state. She felt more in tune with everything around her and as her paws hit the ground, she became acutely aware of Ace’s heartbeat thumping away. Twigs cracked under her paws as she took a few slow steps toward Ace. Her connection to her objective pushed her forward, but reminded her to be gentle. He wasn’t like her, not yet. She gazed at him for a few moments, wolf eyes catching the light of the moon, and cautiously waited for his approval to move forward. 

Sammy flushed bright red, turning away from her slightly. Any thoughts of this being the norm in just one week had completely missed him by. Sammy waited, breathing fast as he heard her take off her clothes. Her breathing changed, growing lower and deeper, and when her paws padded on the forest floor Sammy finally looked back, staring back at a wolf. A wolf! “Holy shit, holy shit!” Were his first, highly intelligent words. Sammy tried again.“You’re like a wolf wolf! Which I knew, I know, but the wolf knowing and the seeing of wolfage-” Sammy stammered, realising he was slowly backing away. No, nope, this was what he wanted. But, seeing her teeth in the moonlight, it was suddenly occurring to Sammy, very, very quickly, that this was going to hurt. There were a lot of teeth, glistening white, and they’d be sinking into his leg. “Okay, okay, wow, holy shit. Just, just give me a sec. Do you still understand me? Uh-” He looked around, before carefully lowering himself down to sitting - standing while being bitten on the leg was probably not a good idea. He swallowed, adjusting his collar as he looked at her. “Okay. Ready!”

The wolf remained still and let Ace work out his anxiety. His words sounded odd to Ariana when she was in this form, but she could vaguely connect his body language and tone of voice to mean he needed a moment. So she stood still, keeping her breaths quiet and form small to appear less intimidating. The pounding of his heart rang in her ears, but his scent still had the same soothing quality. Once he sat down and he indicated he was ready, she took slow and deliberate steps toward him. Instincts screamed to charge, but she could maintain balance like this. The moon was far enough away and she was in full form which made it much easier. Her affection for Ace far outweighed her hunting drive. A few more steps and she was close enough to bite. She let out a warm huff of breath on his leg and looked up to him. Now it was. Carefully, she widened her jaw and sunk her teeth into his leg. The taste of blood on her tongue wasn’t unfamiliar. She backed away slowly, not wanting to hurt him. Staying close for too long with the taste of blood on her lips was a dangerous game to play. She could see the grimace of pain on his face and let it be her grounding point. With slow even breaths, she focused on shifting back into the form Ace was more familiar with. 

As soon as he’d said the word and Ariana began to approach, Sammy was not sure he was ready. Sitting down like this, not to make too fine of a point of it, but his neck was maw height. This was fine, it was the right choice, Sammy chanted to himself over and over again, inside his head. He dug his fingers into the ground, bracing himself against the tree roots. Her hot breath rolled over his thigh, raising goosebumps along his skin. He watched her, as if preparing for it would help it hurt less. He was wrong. His muscle jolted as she bit down, until his skin gave way and blood welled around his teeth. He was transfixed, unable to move, this couple second bite stretching into a minute in his mind. As she let go, and stepped back, he bit down on this inside of his cheeks, groaning deeply. Blood ran down his leg and into this forest floor. The groan turned into a yell, and a barely withheld scream as he clutched his thigh. The scream was over as quickly as the bite, but fuck, it hurt. He looked back up at Ari, and forgot to be bashful about the nudity thing. “Is- Is that it? Am I- Can you tell?”

As she shifted back into her more human form, she winced slightly at the sound of his scream. Ariana knew it would hurt, but she had done her best to be gentle, not that it was 100% possible. As much was evident by the blood still on her chin. She used the back of her forearm to wipe it off and quickly rushed over to Ace. “I’m sorry, fuck, I know that had to hurt. Are you okay,” she asked as she fumbled to remove the first aid stuff from her backpack forgetting in that moment that she was still nude. When she remembered, her cheeks slightly flushed pink and she quickly grabbed her hoodie to throw on. Once it was on and she was mostly covered for the moment, she quickly pressed gauze against the wound and applied some pressure. “That’s it,” she answered though she hadn’t actually done this before, “I’ll need to meet you before sunset for the next full moon. We’re going to want to go pretty deeply out in the wounds.” She grabbed one of the sanitizing wipes and warned, “This is going to sting, I’m sorry.” She wiped away some of the blood and dirt to prevent infection though his immune system would likely be stronger now. 

Sammy smiled at her weakly, looking at the small amount of his blood still smeared on her face even though she’d tried to wipe most of it off. “Yeah. Yeah. I kinda… forgot? It would hurt? Nnng-” He groaned through gritted teeth. He looked away as she pulled her hoody on, and winced as she started treating him. “Okay. Okay. Yeah, a few hours before sunset. I’ll work out how to get out earlier, give us enough time to-you know, find some deer to kill.” He braced against the tree again, and yelled as the sanitising wiped burned his skin. “Ow! Yep, yep, the stinging, that’s happening. I- wow. Mmm, that really hurts.” He shifted uneasily, but didn’t look away from her. “I don’t, uh, feel any different. Minus the dozen extra holes, obviously.”

Ariana worked carefully and did her best to be gentle with him. She’d already caused him enough pain and as much made her stomach turn. “I’m sorry,” she said softly as she gave him a moment to steady himself. Even while in pain, he somehow still managed to hold on to his sense of humor. She let out a small laugh and agreed, “Yeah, something like that. I want to make sure we’re far away from people and hunters before we change. It’s kind of nice to watch the sunset before, too.” A big part of her was nervous. Taking him under her metaphorical was no small feat and she was determined to do right by her. This would save him and he wouldn’t end up hating her for it. She’d been so sure before, but somehow Alcher’s warning rang in her mind now. The last thing she wanted was Ace to hate her, but she’d rather he’d hate her and be alive than the alternative. She frowned a bit as he cried out in pain. “I’m almost done,” she assured before finally wrapping it in a bandage. “You won’t feel different until the full moon, but you’re pretty much a guaranteed wolf now.” She pulled an apple out of her bag and handed it to him. “Here, eat this,” she instructed, “You’ve lost a bit of blood.” 

“Watching the sunset sounds amazing. We can hang out and see each other properly, and stuff.” As she pulled out the bandage, Sammy lifted his leg up so she could wrap him up more easily. “You know, you looked so badass as a wolf.” He told her earnestly, with a bit of a silly smile now that the terror was mostly gone. Sammy took a deep shaky breath as she let go, and he carefully lowered his leg back down onto the forest floor. “Which is in a week, right? September 30th? Wow, it’s really not that long anymore.” He’d be freer than he’d been in years. Taking the apple, Sammy smiled widely. “Yes ma’am,” he replied with a teasing wink. He took the apple and bit into it, trying to feel around in himself. He tried to crush the apple in his hand, but no luck. It didn’t even squish, so no super strength yet. “Hey, Ari? Come sit with me?”

“That does sound pretty great,” Ariana agreed as she kept her eyes on him and tried to gauge how he was feeling physically. She hated that she caused him any pain, but she truly believed this was going to make things better for him. Ace still seemed a bit shaky though she noticed his heartbeat wasn’t nearly as rapid as before which meant he was relaxing a bit. As much brought her a sense of relief. She smiled a bit at him calling her badass. “Thanks, I’m sure you’ll look pretty badass as a wolf, too,” she commented. The full moon would be upon them before they knew it and he’d be truly free. As much sent a surge of excitement through her, but she did her best to contain. “Yep,” she answered, “September 30th. It’ll be here quickly. It’ll take awhile before you’re able to remember what happened during it, but I’ll be looking out for you, I promise.” She meant as much and gave him a meaningful look as he asked her to join him. “Of course,” she answered as she lowered herself on the ground next to him. She studied him carefully and noticed that even under the pale light of the half moon, he looked paler somehow. Probably from the blood loss, but still, this was the most at ease she’d felt in a while. She placed her hand on his arm and asked, “How are you feeling?” 

“Oh, nah, I’m going to be the scruffy, gangly looking one with hair growing in all the wrong directions,” Sammy replied with a laugh, trying to imagine it. In a week, they wouldn’t have to. She would know, and be able to tell it. He looked at the bandage, and what he knew was under there.”I trust you. No matter what I remember, I know you will keep me safe.” Although, the idea of not remembering any of it? Fairly freak some.  “How am I feeling?” Sammy looked down at his leg, trying to work all that out for himself. It felt like there were spiders crawling under his skin. He wanted to jump up and do things, but he also felt… breakable? Like thin clay in the kiln, ready to crack under the slightest pressure. “Well, my leg hurts. I think it’s going to be worse tomorrow. I feel…. I’ve got all this… adrenaline, you know? We’ve been talking about this so long, and then I couldn’t last month, and now it’s happening. Like total point of no return. I dunno, I feel excited, and scared, with a whole lot of happy sprinkled on top.” He smiled at her, munching on his apple. “This feels right. Like we were meant to meet, and keep finding each other, or something.”

Ariana shook her head and laughed, “Somehow I doubt that, but even if you do end up being a gangly werewolf, I’ll still think you’re cool.” It was hard to imagine what he’d look like though she was curious. Layla sort of matched her hair color, she wondered if Ace would be the same. She knew her wolf coat was more gray and white which didn’t match her everyday hair color, but she tended to blend in well with her surroundings which made sneaking up on her prey easier. Werewolf genetics were a mystery to her. She swallowed back the lump forming in her throat as he expressed how much he trusted her. She hoped like hell this was the right call. All things considered, she was terrified of making a choice that could get him hurt or cost him his life. She did know she’d fight for him every step of the way. “I will, I’ll always be looking out for you, Ace.” She gave his hand a squeeze before she studied him as he looked at his leg. She could pick up on the extra energy, but it was best for him to rest. All that energy would get to come out on the full moon. “Yeah, it’ll probably be sore tomorrow. You should probably take it easy until the full moon though, let yourself heal,” she explained. She wished there was a less painful way to go about this though the last part brought a smile to her face. “I’m glad you’re happy. The other stuff is all normal. But I agree,” she looked up at him with her lips pulled upward in a grin as she spoke, “I think we were meant to find each other. Even if you’ve never been able to tell me much about yourself, I’ve always felt like it’s easy to connect with you.” She gave his hand another squeeze. It felt important that he knew all of this, knew she really did have his back through everything that was to come. 

“It’s sore right now! But you’re right. I'll do my best to look after it.” But there was a hard limit in that. He couldn’t let anyone know he was hurt, so he had to act as if he wasn’t hurt at all. He could start some bigger project on the wheel and spend more time sitting like that, but still… oh well!   Sammy grinned at her through the dark, his cheeks flushing a little at the compliment. “You’re like, one of the best friends I’ve ever had. Growing up, I kinda grew up in on between two worlds.  Like, not enough of one thing or another, so it wasn’t easy. Even in… uh, well. What I’m saying is. Thank you? For being my friend. I can’t wait to be… less batman like, with you. Or like, fine out how being a werewolf changes me. I always kinda think of them as being charismatic, maybe some of that will rub off on me, you know?” He teased, ribbing her slightly. Sammy finished his apple, sticking the apple sticker on her arm before throwing the apple core deep into the forest. 

“Good, gotta have my favorite guy in tip top shape,” Ariana joked now that she was feeling a bit lighter and playfully nudged his arm. This was a big change, but she could do this. Ace placed his trust in her and she wasn’t going to let him down. As he spoke, she felt a small smile creep up on her face. It meant the world to her that he considered her one of his best friends and she definitely felt the same. While their secret meetings in the middle of the night were far from ideal, she’d grown to look forward to them. “You’re one of mine, too. I don’t know exactly what you mean, but I think I get it. I was a werewolf raised by a hunter, so very in between two worlds that I’m still trying to figure out how to bring together. You don’t have to thank me, you’ve been here when I needed you, too. That’s what friends are for. I will say I look forward to learning more about you though,” she gave him a meaningful gaze as she spoke, “I’m not sure we’re all charismatic, but I think some of my charm will wear off on you.” She laughed as he stuck the apple sticker on her arm and added, “Even if it doesn’t, I like you just the way you are.”

[ohcoolnice]

1:Greatest Punishment

LOVE NEVER DIES (A NATURAL DEATH) MASTERLIST

Also on Ao3

Summary:  Cordelia thought college would be simple: hanging out with Lucie, her best friend, cramming the night before exams. What she did not expect was all of this. Her roommate is hiding a wanted acused murderer in their apartment, Cordelia herself is in a fake relationship with the boy she's in love with, her brother won't talk to her, and Christopher Lighwood keeps blowing things up.

“To burn with desire and keep quiet about it is the greatest punishment we can bring on ourselves.” ― Federico García Lorca, Blood Wedding and Yerma

“How much longer?” Cordelia asked for the nine hundredth time, ignoring Alastair’s annoyed glare in the rear-view mirror.

“About two minutes, Layla,” her mother, Sona, replied with an amused smile.

“You don’t have to ask every two minutes.” Alastair grumbled. Sona hit his shoulder with the back of her hand.

Cordelia bit her lip in excitement as the car sped along the highway, her knee bouncing up and down. Two minutes and she would see Lucie again, she would see James again.

She could see the campus poking over the tops of the trees ahead as they turned into a long driveway flanked by rows of trees on either side. Cordelia turned in her seat to check on the car behind them, filled with Alastair and Cordelia’s clothes and things. Risa smiled and waved at her from behind the wheel. Cordelia beamed.

Sona gasped and Cordelia turned around in her seat immediately. “Maman? What is it?”

“Look Cordelia! Isn’t it lovely ?”

Cordelia unclicked her seatbelt to lean between the two seats, and sighed.

It was beautiful . The Academy was a massive campus just outside London known for it’s (very) high tuition prices, excellent education, and, most notable, beautiful gothic campus. Massive buildings like cathedrals framed a large courtyard overrun with students hurrying about with their suitcases and parents to find classes, dorms, activites activities. Cordelia giggled and clapped her hands. “It’s incredible!”

Alistair rolled his eyes. “I’ve shown you photos before.”

“Well it’s a good thing you’re not a photographer then. Obviously, you didn’t capture the beauty.” Cordelia teased, though it wasn't true. Alastair’s photos didn’t need to be professional to prove the campus was like a fairytale. It was only that there was a difference between being shown a photo and actually being there.

Cordelia squealed suddenly, clutching at her brothers shoulder and squeezing.

“Ow! Cordelia, stop!” Alistair yelled, pulling his arm away.

“Sorry! But look! ” She pointed to their left, where Lucie, her best friend, was jumping up and down, her arms wild as she spotted their car. She wore a pretty pink dress with white flowers and had silver pins in her hair, pulled back into a braided bun. Strands had come loose as she jumped, her bangs wild and just as Cordelia remembered. She squealed again. Alastair slouched in his seat.

They pulled into a parking spot and Cordelia hurried out, running over to her best friend, who was screaming and attracting lots of attention from around them. Lucie wrapped her arms around Cordelia, still jumping. Cordelia giggled. She'd missed Lucie, dearly. They usually spent their summers together but Cordelia had been in Paris this summer with her family, after her father had been arrested.

“I’m so glad you’re finally here!” Lucie squealed. “We’ve been waiting for hours .”

“Well, really only twelve minutes, but who’s counting,” replied an amused voice behind her. Cordelia turned, heart beating in her chest. James! Her mind screamed. It’s James!

I know , she told herself, shut up.

James smiled at her, chin dimple making her forget that staring was rude, and she saw her life flash before her eyes briefly at the sight of him. How was it you could forget the way someone looked? She had thought of James nearly every day, and yet she'd forgotten the way he made her heart flutter in her chest. “Hello, Daisy.”

Cordelia smiled shyly. “Hello James.”

“Goodbye James.” Sang Lucie, tugging Cordelia away. “Come, let’s go take the tour while the boys unload our things.”

“It’s boring!” James called after them.

“You’re boring!” Lucie called back.

Cordelia smiled and took a last glance at her own brother, who was frowning at his phone. She'd barely seen him all summer, despite their literally living in the same place, and when she had seen him he didn't talk to her much. Or, he’d tell her he was too busy. She wanted to remind him that though he had better things to do than watch after his baby sister, she was still his sister in the end, and she'd done nothing to deserve being ignored. He’d been different when he’d returned home after the school year this summer, and she desperatley wanted to know what was wrong with him.

Later. She would find out, she resolved. But first, the tour . Cordelia ran towards the tour group, giggling with Lucie, their future waiting for them.

 .

 “Who knew the future would involve so much standing .” Lucie whined as two and a half hours later, they dragged their feet into their apartment. “I thought it would never end.”

The tour had been exhausting, going through the entire campus and, if Cordelia was being honest, she didn’t even pay attention after the first ten minutes. It was mostly Lucie’s fault, pointing out silly things, like drawings on walls, or making up an elaborate story for some random person they saw carrying a suitcase that looked like a coffin. Apparently he was a Duke that had gone to kidnap a beautiful princess, only to find she was dead, and now he was trying to find a way to bring her back to life. Cordelia had made Lucie promise not to put that in The Beautiful Cordelia .

James and Alastair were still there when they arrived, having brought the last of the boxes. They both looked frustrated, though Cordelia had seen the same expression on her brother when she’d left for the tour, and when they’d left the house, so she didn’t worry too much over it. Alastair had said something vague about having a meeting, and left almost as soon as they’d seen him, though he’d made the both of them swear not to stay up too late before hurrying down the hall.

James, setting a box on the coffee table, brightened when he saw them, and her traitorous heart fluttered in her chest.

“How was the tour?” He asked.

“Boring,” Lucie pouted, “you were right.”

James laughed, eyes glimmering with mischief. “Maybe you should change cruel Prince James to wise Prince James.”

“Wise-ass, maybe.” Lucie crossed her arms. Cordelia snorted, slapping a hand over her mouth. Lucie looked incredibly pleased with herself. James rolled his eyes, though a smile played at his lips.

Cordelia couldn’t help but stare at him. She hadn’t seen James for a year. Spending time with Lucie at the Herondales place after school was fun when it was just them two, of course, but it just wasn’t the same without his presence. She kept expecting him to come in and annoy his sister, or tell Cordelia about the last book he’d read, smiling shyly when he’d ask if she’d like to borrow it. After a few months, she stopped forgetting he was gone, and instead simply missed him.

She hadn’t realised that she’d forgotten how it was to be near him again, his presence suddenly a real, tangible thing that she could feel around her like a soft blanket.

“You’re sure you’ll be alright unpacking on your own?” James asked.

Lucie waved her hand dismissively, her movements much less energetic than they normally were. “Oh, absolutely not. But I think Daisy and I have been both mentally and physically drained from that never ending torture tour.”

Cordelia groaned, nodding. “If I sit down even once tonight, I don’t think I’ll be able to stand up again.”

James grinned at her and raised his hands defensively, “Alright, I’ll let you two get to bed then.”

“Though,” Lucie piped up as her brother turned away, “if you could bring the Thieves ‘round tomorrow at lunch, that would be extremely helpful, and then Cordelia could meet them.”

James nodded, and Lucie trudged to her room, peering inside boxes to find a blanket. He paused at the door, turning to smile at Cordelia over his shoulder. “It’s wonderful to see you again, Daisy.”

“Yes, you as well,” she said, “it hasn’t been the same without Lucie complaining about her brother.”

He laughed, his cheek dimpling. I’m going to die. “I don’t think she missed that bit.”

James’ phone rang and he peered down at it. Cordelia looked over at where Lucie was struggling to pull a blanket from one of the boxes. “She did miss it, I think, and you, more than she says. I missed you too.”

He hesitated at the door, not bringing the phone to his ear, though he’d answered it. The caller was repeating James’ name, clearly annoyed. She could hear ‘ You wet sock! James? Helloooo? ’

James’ attention seemed to be fixed on Cordelia, his eyes on hers in that way he had – where he could make her feel as if there was no one else in the world but the two of them, as if he was looking at her and never wanted to look at anything else again. Like she was the only thing worth looking at.

One side of his mouth lifted shyly. “I missed you too.”

 .

 Cordelia and Lucie had only found one blanket, and both collapsed onto Lucie’s bed as soon as they’d seen it. Cordelia woke to find she herself was sprawled along the foot of the bed, her bra pressing against her ribcage uncomfortably. Lucie was sprawled over the rest of the bed, her brown hair still in it’s bun and crimped, sticking out at all angles. Her legs dangled over the side of the mattress. Cordelia sat up, rubbing her face. She’d fallen asleep on her wrist, and could feel the shape of her bracelet’s charms where they pressed into her cheek.

 Sunlight filtered through the window, and as Cordelia moved to sit up her breath sent the bits of dust suspended in the air into a swirling dance. She watched them as her brain caught up with her body.

Cordelia nudged Lucie. No movement. She nudged her again.

Lucie snorted and flung an arm up, hitting Cordelia in the face. She yelped and stumbled, falling on her friend’s stomach, causing her to wheeze suddenly, groaning as she was successfully, finally , awake.

But at what cost ? Cordelia groaned internally, rolling off the other girl with her hand on her face.

Lucie sat up, pouting. “Ow.”

“You hit me !”

“Well, you tried to wake me up.” Lucie huffed and burst into sleepy giggles. “Sorry.”

Cordelia couldn’t help but smile. She really was lucky to have the friendship she did. She knew not everyone had something like it. Her brother did not, her mother had never mentioned anyone who had been particularly close with her in her life – though she was always loved by everyone she met.

Her father, she supposed, she did not know. She’d never really thought of it. Certainly not, if no one had stepped in to defend him when he’d been sent to jail for something she knew he didn’t do. Her father was a good man – a great man, who had only ever loved and cared for her.

A knock at the door broke her thoughts. The two girls exchanged a frantic glance, Lucie practically flying off the bed and looking around for a comb. Cordelia, who had kept her knapsack next to the bed, all the items inside artfully arranged, produced one, and made her way hurriedly to brush her teeth, hearing Lucie complain as the comb got stuck in the tangled fine stands.

There was another series of knocking and banging at the door. “Shut up, James!” Lucie called out from the bedroom.

“Open the door then!” Came the muffled reply. “I don’t care if you look like medusa, I’ve been living with the horrors my whole life!”

Cordelia choked on the toothpaste. Someone in the hall opened the door and yelled at James to shut up.

“Daisy?” James pleaded. The doors were rather thin, Cordelia thought, James’ voice was only a little muffled.

Cordelia crossed the room to speak against the door, pulling her hair up into a messy high ponytail. “Sorry,” she said, “I won’t betray Lucie.”

There was a pause, “I suppose I cannot say much to that, then. Very honourable—"

“Oh, honestly James,” Cordelia gasped, startled at the sound of a second voice – she hadn’t known anyone else was there, “ enough of all of that – LUCIE OPEN THE BLOODY DOOR!”

“Matthew, shush!” Lucie scolded, indignant, appearing at Cordelia’s side. She opened the door and Cordelia blinked as four young men stumbled over each other into her apartment.

A taller blond had been leaning on the door and stumbled once it was flung open. Matthew Fairchild, she remembered meeting him once when she’d gone to stay with the Herondales over school break one year, though they’d only met for a few minutes and barely exchanged more than a few pleasantries. Though even if she’d never met him she recognised him from Lucie’s letters as exactly the way she’d described him.

The boys tripped over each other. James recovered first, standing up and brushing himself off quickly, his eyes finding her and his easy smile warming her heart. “Good morning Cordelia.”

 .

 She looked over at Lucie, who mouthed Christopher . Cordelia mouthed Oh back. Lucie grinned. Cordelia smiled – they were exactly as Lucie had described them: Christopher as curious and sweet, Thomas as kind, and Matthew as mischievous.

Thomas - she’d recognised from Alastair’s class photos – had shaken her hand upon entry, tall and broad shouldered. He carried himself as Alastair had described once, when she’d asked him what James’ friends were like, since they’d attended school together.

Alastair had shrugged, “I did not really know them, Layla. You know how it was for me.”

“Surely you must know something ,” she’d asked, pouting.

Alastair sighed, “You already know James, the Matthew fellow is quite his opposite, I suppose. A rather impulsive one. And the two lightwoods—” he hesitated, “they’re not horrible, really. Thomas is…he carries himself well.”

“Lucie says he’s rather tall.” She pressed, taking advantage of the fact that he was opening up, even if it was just about others.

“Well, it’s not so horrible as she makes it sound,” he scoffed, “he carries himself well.”

And indeed, he did, Cordelia noticed Thomas did not lumber around, but stood straight, aware of his height and build – there was confidence, she noticed, beneath a quiet, polite exterior.

Cordelia took his hand, “It’s lovely to meet you,” she smiled, “finally after hearing so much from Lucie and my brother.”

Thomas blinked. “Your brother – Alastair?”

“Erm, yes.” She froze, realising that Alastair hadn’t exactly been kind to them in the past. “My apologies, nothing bad, I assure you. I know he was not kind always—”

Thomas blushed, but smiled nonetheless, “He was kind to me in Paris. We are friends, I think.”

Cordelia did not know what to say to that. She hadn’t known he’d met Alastair in Paris, but she didn’t have the heart to say anything, so she simply smiled.

It was a sharp reminder of how little she was aware of, how much she’d missed out in her life, shut out from life, from the world, traveling, never staying anywhere long enough to form connections.

A wave of gratitude washed over Cordelia, and she found herself hugging Lucie a moment later. In a life of loneliness and solitude, Lucie had always been there, bright and smiling, doing everything to make her feel loved and supported, even from countries away.

        They’d spent the day unpacking boxes and collapsed, collectively, on the couch and armchairs in the living room. The image of it all was so very new to Cordelia she’d nearly cried. They’d been so welcoming of her, despite their differences with her brother, and by the end of the day she’d found herself falling asleep to the sound of the Merry Thieves (she found the name adorable, and even more so since they seemed to find it very cool) bickering and singing showtunes over a game of cards.

        Cordelia had lived in so many homes, but now she felt at home.

 -----

“Jamie bach ,” Matthew said, exasperated, “it’s a bloody formality, we don’t need to go.”

James stared at his best friend.

“Fine. I don’t want to go.”

“I promised Lucie and Cordelia, and you are an extension of that promise, so you have to be there.” Matthew made a mocking noise and crossed his arms in a pout. James ignored this. “Besides, Thomas and Christopher will also be there, and Anna as well.”

Matthew groaned and flopped backwards onto James’ bed, the blonde strands of hair contrasting against the black duvet. James rolled his eyes and turned to the mirror to finish buttoning his shirt. The silver bracelet on his wrist flashed under the cuff of his sleeve.

“I don’t see what the issue is, you’ve already dressed.” James pointed out.

It was true: Matthew was, as always, dressed to impress. While most of the men their age dressed simple tailored suits with matching waistcoats, all in one colour as if they were attending a business meeting cosplaying as fruit, Matthew always styled himself for these events in beautiful, brocaded waistcoats beneath matching tailored trousers and fitted jacket in a complimenting colour, every inch of fabric deliberate and thought out. Tonight, his waistcoat was a soft faded mossy green, his trousers and tailored coat – thrown across James’ bed next to him – the same deep green as his eyes.

James felt as underdressed as he always did next to Matthew. He didn’t mind – it was how it had always been.

Matthew looked down at his outfit. “Very true. Waste of a good outfit if it’s not seen.”

James smiled. “Besides,” he said, slowly, not looking at Matthew, “Grace will be there. I should like you to meet her.”

Matthew sat up. James didn’t need to turn to know he was frowning. “ Really ?” Matthew’s voice was as dry as his older brother. “What joy that brings me. I do adore your girlfriend. I suppose I cannot resist, then.”

“She isn’t my girlfriend,” James sighed, “We have an understanding, is all.”

Matthew snorted, mimicking James in a high voice. “I love her, my heart yearns to be with her forever and ever!” He sighed dramatically, rolling around on the bed with his hand on his heart. He sat up abruptly. “But no, she’s not my girlfriend.”

Matthew grinned at James’ dry look and pretended to flip his hair over his shoulder.

“You’ve never met her, Math. I don’t know why you don’t like her without meeting her first.”

“And I don’t know why you do . So, I suppose that, in this instance, we’ll have to agree to disagree.”

James didn’t like arguing with Matthew, they rarely ever did, so he let the topic drop. James turned from the mirror, jerking his head towards the door. “Let’s go, then.”

“Hurrah.” Matthew muttered, but he dragged himself up and slipped into his jacket, following James out the door.

“How did you find Daisy?” James found himself asking as they walked across the large field separating the student apartment buildings. Students were already making their way to the main campus, giggling and chatting loudly with friends.

“Daisy?” Matthew blinked. James noticed how slow that blink was and realised with an inward sigh that Matthew was, again, Drunk. I should say something . He thought. But no, he couldn’t, could he. Not now, not tonight. Matthew would get upset, again, and storm off, likely to only drink more. At least, if he said nothing, he could watch the amount his friend was consuming, and take it away from him if necessary. “Oh,” Matthew was saying, “you mean Cordelia?”

“I-yes.”

“She’s…well,” he laughed, “not much like her brother is she. Certainly, much more friendly. I daresay, though, I was not skeptical since I know you and Lucie would not have loved her as you do if she was as horrible as Alastair.”

Loved her, as you do . James said nothing, the words sitting strangely in his heart. He did care for Cordelia, but something about the way Matthew had said it was sending his thoughts into a frenzy. Was it that he said that James loved Cordelia? No, James was sure he did. And Matthew had said it exactly right – that James loved Cordelia as a friend, which they were. It wasn’t as if—

“Jamie?” Matthew leaned down to wave a hand in James’ face. “Where have you gone, brother?”

James shook his head. “I don’t know. Matthew, do be careful about what you say of Alastair to Daisy.” Daisy. “She loves her brother very much.”

“Says more about her than it does him. Angel knows he doesn’t deserve it.” Matthew grumbled, rolling his eyes at James’ glare. “Yes, alright, I’ll try my best not to mention Alastair Carstairs at all, all night.”

James opened his mouth to respond, but they’d made it to Lucie and Cordelia’s building, and all words died from his lips. Oh .

Cordelia and Lucie were already waiting for them, engaged in conversation with—

“What in the Angel’s name is Voldemort doing here?” Matthew hissed, adding in a low whisper, “you said not to mention him so I shall refer to him as he-who-shall-not-be-named.”

“Matthew.”

“Yes, it’s rather long, isn’t it? Perhaps ‘ horrid creature’ would do better.”

“ Matthew .”

Matthew ignored him, plastering a bright smile on his face as they neared. “ Alastair Carstairs ! What an absolute pleasure!”

James dropped his face into his hands.

 .

 Much to Matthew’s evident relief, Alastair had excused himself once they’d arrived, announcing that he was off to look for Charles, Matthew’s older brother.

Thomas and Christopher and the rest of their set had yet to arrive (apparently Christopher had made some sort of scientific discovery and was holding them up, though James knew Barbara, the younger of Thomas’ two sisters, would soon grow impatient and drag them out).

Music began to swell as the hall began to fill up with students. The room was massive, about the size of their football field, and it’s high gothic ceilings were decorated with lights  like stars, filling the dark space with a dim light. Tables lined the walls on either side, and all the entrances had been turned into arches of light and James found himself watching Cordelia as she looked up, her head tipping back. Her hair was gathered elegantly at the back of her head, adorned with pearls he remembered seeing in his sister’s hair before. James wanted to reach out and take the pins from her hair and watch the red curls spill down her back.

Grace , James told himself, you love Grace .

And yet he hadn’t seen Cordelia in a year. He’d thought of her often during that year, but hadn’t he’d always kept her in his thoughts, in his dreams, since they were young? It shouldn’t have been any different now. And he hadn’t thought anything of his own eagerness to see Daisy as anything other than because they were friends, because Lucie would be ecstatic.

It had seemed not even a bit out of place, not even when Matthew had pointed out that James had been acting very energetic all week. And then he’d seen her again, leaping out of her car and running towards Lucie, her red hair pulled back, a smile – the same smile he’d always known – arresting him where he stood.

She wasn’t beautiful; saying she was beautiful would be to say the sky was simply blue and that was all the qualities it possessed. No, Cordelia – where she’d always been pretty, funny, kind – was suddenly older, more serious, her eyes and lips sharper and her smile more assured.

She didn’t run along with Lucie the way he remembered, but she carried herself next to his sister with her shoulders back and her head raised, looking for all the world like a warrior striding through battle. James knew if he didn’t look away he might die. James wondered if it would be so bad to die.

Grace , he repeated, you love Grace.

Lucie cut through his thoughts, grinning like the devil. “Cordelia looks beautiful, does she not?”

James glared at his sister, who beamed innocently.

It was no secret, since they were young and Lucie tried to marry the pair of them in an ambush ceremony in the forest near their summer home, that Lucie believed very firmly that James and Cordelia were ‘meant to be together’. He pushed the thought from his mind. Lucie had said those words when she was seven. It meant nothing. And Lucie had only said it because she’d discovered that if Cordelia married James, she would be her sister.

James had often asked himself if he should think of Cordelia as his sister, the way Lucie did. But he did not.

They were looking at James, the three of them, Matthew looking from Lucie to Cordelia to James in amusement, a curious glint to his smile, Lucie, smiling despite her earlier attempts to appear innocent. And Cordelia, well, she seemed as put on the spot as he did, and a bit apologetic, as if she expected James not to have an answer. It did not matter, he did.

“She always has.” James said, before really thinking it through. Matthew squinted at his friend, and shook his head smiling. He turned to Lucie with a hand extended.

“I am bored. Let’s dance.” He said, and Lucie giggled as she took his hand, running into the crowd, the layers of her light blue gown floating around her.

James and Cordelia stood in an awkward silence for the first time since the first time they’d met. The only difference now was they were much older, and he didn’t have a pile of books to distract her away from the fact that he was less confident than he supposed he appeared to be. At least now there was comfort in the fact that he knew Cordelia, too, would rather be somewhere else, curled up by the fire reading a book like they had as children, James letting the sound of her voice wash over him, making comments and jokes that would make her laugh or scold him for interrupting a good part of the story.

The song ended and faded into another, people moving to pair up and waltz around the space. He looked up at a movement behind Cordelia. James paled.

Rosamund Wentworth was on her way to him, her eyes frighteningly determined. James made a panicked noise and Cordelia scrunched up her face in confusion. “Daisy, would you like to dance?”

Cordelia blinked. Rosamund was almost on them now, and James could feel himself bouncing on his toes, pleading with his eyes. Cordelia looked quickly over her shoulder, where the other girl was trying to get around a couple dancing wildly off-beat. When she looked back at James, she was nearly laughing. “Well, what kind of a friend would I be if I did not save you from all the mad women throwing themselves at you.”

James gave her a look that suggested he wasn’t amused – though he was smiling despite himself – and took her hand, pulling her into an impromptu dance just as Rosamund was finally on them. He smiled at her apologetically and pulled Cordelia into the middle of the room.

Cordelia laughed. “Does that happen often?”

“With Rosamund?” James chuckled. “Unfortunately.”

“Just with her?” Cordelia asked, and then blushed, her cheeks darkening in the dim light, as if she hadn’t meant to ask.

James tipped his head to the side as the room swirled around them, “What do you mean?”

“Oh, nothing it’s just, well,”  she looked around the room, everywhere but at him. He wished she would, “you’re not hideous, James. And Lucie said you became insufferably popular.”

James laughed. “And do you think I’m insufferable?”

“I don’t think we’ve seen each other for long enough to determine that.” She giggled as he twirled her, the deep blue of her dress like liquid twilight, clinging to her curves, reminding him that they were no longer children, that Cordelia was as fierce as she’d always wanted to be. Did she know? Perhaps he should tell her.

James smiled, “Then I suppose the only way to find out is to spend more time together. I shall be as bothersome as possible from now on.”

“Is that a threat?” She was smiling without thinking about it – wide and easy – as striking now as she had been stunning before.

“It’s a promise. I’ve already written it down and set myself reminders. You will—” he broke off, looking up. Grace had arrived. Grace, who he loved. Grace . He’d forgotten about her completely from the moment he’d taken Cordelia’s hand. He was horrible. This was a sort of emotional cheating, was it not? James felt wretched.

“James?” Cordelia asked. “James what’s wrong?”

James did not answer, did not know what to say. He had already stepped back from Cordelia, had let go of her hands even though her touch sent sparks across his skin. He didn’t look at her as he crossed the room to Grace, his heart wracked with guilt, with the realization that he’d been dancing with Cordelia and yes, it had been horrible to break away from her, but what kind of a man was he if he let himself betray the woman he loved?

Cordelia was his friend, he reminded himself. She did not feel any particular way about him beyond friendship, and if he was confused, it was not because her presence was like coming home, it was not because her laugh made him want to forget his name, or because talking to her was all he wanted to do for the rest of his life – the sound of her voice was soothing, but that did not mean anything.

His confusion was superficial, he told himself. He couldn’t be lying to himself, to Daisy, to Grace, when all he felt was the shock of seeing someone and realising how the curve of their lips made him want to fall on his knees and worship, how the—

James shook the thoughts away. Stop it . He thought forcefully.

James pushed through the crowd and finally reached Grace. She smiled small at him, her eyes wide and bright. “Hello, James.”

“Grace,” He asked, almost mechanically, “would you like to dance?”

She did not smile any wider. Was she unhappy? She seemed like it, almost. She must have seen him with Cordelia. Cordelia, who he would have to apologise to for leaving stranded in the center of the room. Cordelia, who-

Enough .

He took Grace’s hand – small and perfect in his – and led her to the floor as the song slowed.

 .

 “You must be glad she is here.”

“Who?” James asked, though as soon as he asked he’d known who Grace meant.

“Cordelia Carstairs. You are friends, are you not?” She frowned. “You have spoken of her so much, I cannot think you don’t like her.”

“We are friends, of course. But I don’t like her – no, I mean I do like her, she’s so kind, and she’s funny too, not like Lucie but she makes little comments that are-but I don’t like her in the way you mean. I like her as a friend, is all.” And there was so much he wanted to say: their shared taste in books, how she never made him feel alone, unwanted, how she made everywhere feel like home, but he knew he was going on a bit much, and shut his mouth.

Grace raised a brow. “That is what I meant.”

“Oh.”

Grace looked as if she might be smiling, or trying not too, though he couldn’t imagine what part of this was funny to her. Sometimes it seemed as if Grace was not really all that interested in him as more than friends, though he’d mentioned it once and she’d dismissed it. 

James caught a flash of red and looked up. It was Cordelia, spinning around with Lucie as they laughed together, not following the pace of the dance at all. At least she didn’t appear hurt. Though why should she be? He was just overthinking it. They were only friends.

  ----

Returning home that night was strange. Though she could tell Daisy had enjoyed the party, Lucie could tell something was bothering her best friend. But it was late, and Lucie’s meds were wearing off, so she doubted being able to focus on conversation and provide any help. She tried to remind herself to ask Daisy over breakfast tomorrow before class. 

Lucie yawned as they dragged themselves into their apartment. She giggled. “I hope that us coming home this tired doesn’t start becoming a habit.” 

Cordelia breathed a laugh. “I don’t think I’d survive that.” She waved, heading to her room. “Goodnight, Lucie.”

“Sleep well, sister.” Lucie replied, only half paying attention. The light in her room was on. She was sure she’d turned it off. There was a faint breeze as well, as if she’d left the window open. 

It was probably nothing, but being suspicious was always more dramatic.

She swung the door open, and screamed.