#i hope neither of them dies actually!

[astal-art]

I don’t have an excuse for this one I’m gonna be honest

[teabutmakeitazure]

[bluetimeombre]

✩₊˚.⋆☾⋆⁺₊✧ And I wouldn't marry me, either.

You were Azriel's mate, but it took losing you three times for him to realise.

[this is long. i'm talking 5k words long so i've split it into two parts. anyway, azriel is the best bat boy and no i won't hear anyone out. i'm so excited to write for him and hope you enjoy. it's very angsty but that's what i love. i hope i can write more for him and maybe other characters if you like. it's been a while since i've actually read the series so if any information is wrong, do let me know. also it was my first time using the term y/n and yes, i cringed NOT PROOF READ... enjoy]

warnings: references to sexual assault and references to suicide. nothing explicit but please don't read if this is sensitive to you.

Part 2 soon…

✩₊˚.⋆☾⋆⁺₊✧

The first, was the worst...

You were Rhys's half sister, the bastard daughter of his father. But when your mother had died giving birth to you, Rhysand's mother took you in and raised you with your brother and sister. You were so little and adorable that your sister loved you at once. Rhys did to, at some point of your life, you were sure he actually cared about you.

But when his mother and sister had died, his eyes shifted, he started to look at you with contempt. After all, you were only his half-sister. The worst half. He only kept you around because it's what his mother would have wanted.

And because there was no way Cassian and Azriel would ever let anything happen to you.

Besides, Rhysand knew when to use you.

Although Azriel was his spymaster, you were pretty good at staying swift-footed too. And you were frankly, very terrifying when you wanted to be.

You tread with power through the war camps, all of them looking at you as you went. All of their gazes wrecked with a predatory gaze. They either wanted to have their way with you, or kill you. Or both.

Rhys had said you could handle it, it was only supposed to be a check in. Cassian hadn't liked it, neither had Mor but it was Azriel who had almost- and for the first time- disobeyed his high lord to accompany you. But no, your brother wanted you to do this alone, so alone you would.

Just to show him you could.

'I can come with you,' Azriel had said, standing in your room as you tied your boots up. 'I won't even have to be seen.' At that, his shadows wrapped up your calf.

You smiled at them, as if they were his own pet. 'I'll manage just fine. Besides, i'm sure that's what Rhys wants, me needing a man.'

It had done nothing to calm your friend. The worry was still stuck between his brows, marring his handsome features. You'd held his cheeks, your wings hiding the two of you. His large ones (enough to swallow the both of you) over-lapped yours.

It was the last time you'd feel your wings.

The war camp wasn't as easy as you'd hoped. It was terror and horror in a place. You'd been to the court of nightmares, you'd gone to the slaughter of the spring court after they killed your family. But this, this was hell of another kind.

You had no idea how many days you'd been locked up, wrists bound in chains and hanging from the cell roof above you. Blood rolled down your arms from the force you'd tried to use to get them out. Your eye was swollen shut and your body trembled in pain.

All because they wanted to know your brothers secrets, and you wouldn't budge.

Your check was only supposed to be a day, but you were sure it had been longer. Days of endless pain and torture. Your uniform hung in rags of stripped material, your hair matted with blood and hiding your face.

You'd used the last of your energy to keep your walls up. You weren't anyone's mate, you didn't have anyone on the other end trying to feel what you felt. But should Rhys come looking (though you doubted it) you didn't want him to feel it. You didn't want anyone in your mind.

The gates opened with a sickening clash.

One of the Illyrian's knelt in front of you, his wings hiding those coming in behind you. 'Listen sweetheart. I don't want to make this any harder than it's about to get. All you have to do is tell us your brother's hide outs.'

You grit your teeth, staring down at the ground.

'So loyal, to a man who doesn't care if you live or die.'

Suddenly, your wings twitched as hands grasped them. Brute hands, the sort you wouldn't want touching any part of you.

Fear spiked in you, horror twisting your gut. 'What are you doing?'

'I told you I didn't want to get things messier, darling.'

You whipped your head from side to side, trying and failing to get a look at the assailants behind you. Your wings were being held apart, no matter how hard you tried to bat them away. You knew the sort of people they were, and what they did to girls like you.

That's when the begging started. 'No, no please. Anything. I'll do anything! Beat me, kill me, rape me, not my wings, please!'

'Anything?' the bastard asked, tongue poking out from his lips. 'Then tell me where your lord's hideouts are?'

You should betray him, you thought. He would never lose his wings for you. Perhaps it was stubbornness that kept you from, or maybe you were clinging to the last bit of love you want from him.

The bastard scoffed, 'anything, she says. Your brother has his own bitch wrapped around his finger.'

That's when they started hacking at your wings.

Your screams tore through your throat, blood spitting and dripping down your chin. Tears soon joined when they hacked away at the bone, the membrane, the flesh of it all. The three of them worked through your screams and your tears and your pain, tearing and cutting at it like it was nothing more than paper.

Not your whole life.

Let them hear you. You hoped your brother heard you, you hoped all and every court heard the pain.

Eventually, even you couldn't keep screaming. The only sound was the hacking away at your wings and the drops of blood.

'Now look at these beauties. I've got a perfect spot on my wall for these.'

They left you after that. There wasn't much more damage they could do. It already felt like they'd destroyed your life. You had never really thought about your wings, they were just part of you, as much as your wit or hair was. But they'd took it and now, you felt empty. Never would you fly with Azriel again, or use your wings to smack Cassian over the head.

Rhys, your dear brother, had took that from you.

The days blended in together after that. You were pooled in your own tears and blood, vomiting up anything they forced down your throat. No, they'd made it very clear they didn't want you dead. They just took pride in making it feel like you were.

At some point, you'd stopped reacting to the gate opening. You let them do whatever they wanted with you. Your wrists were still chained, arms still hanging up, your clothes hanging on your thin body in strips of dirt.

'No...' you heard a mumble. 'What have they done to you?'

Suddenly, the chains gave way and you lurched forward, with no strength to catch you. Luckily, you didn't have to, as strong and warm arms pulled you into his chest.

'Hey, wake up, look at me, dammit.'

Azriel.

You'd know the voice in the darkest days, in the pit of your worst nightmare you'd know.

You try to speak but your head's heavy, your lips are stone and your arms can't lift to hold onto him. You're exhausted, you're dying. The only thing you could do use all your strength to try to open your eyes.

'Please, please, look at me. You have to look at me,'

You were trying, you wanted to tell hm, snap at him, but you couldn't.

You felt Azriel shake, or maybe you were. Then, there was wet drops landing on your cheeks- you flinched.

'I'm sorry, i'm sorry. Rhys! Rhys! hurry up, please!' he was screaming. You'd never heard him scream before.

You heard the rush of feet at the cell doors, you knew it was your brother. You knew it from the presence of him, from the shuffling of feet and chocked sob. Your brother didn't cry, least of all for you.

'Her wings, oh mother, her wings,' said Azriel, his voice barley above that of a whisper.

Your wings. You didn't need reminding. They were gone, long and far gone. You were without a part of you, the very part of your soul that loved to be free. Never would you watch the stars up close or fly over everyone. Never race Cassian or make jokes with Az.

No, this would destroy you.

'y/n,' your half-brother called. 'No, y/n. Can you hear me?'

Your lips parted, mumbling. 'Hurts.'

Azriel's grip on you tightened. 'I know, we're gonna get you out of here, just hold on for me.'

You wanted to tell him you would hold on, you'd always need to hold on to him. That, no matter what he asks, you'd do it. To kill, to live, to breathe, to die.

And that's when it clicked. Amongst all the pain and the doubt. In your blood soaked clothes. In the fear you wouldn't make it, there was a tug. Weak and one-sided, but there. You knew you'd be safe with Azriel, knew you would always be with him.

Mate.

✩₊˚.⋆☾⋆⁺₊✧

The pain subsided to a dull ache, there and beating but not excruciating. You were warm and covered in a soft material. Nothing like the cell you'd been kept in. Your fingertips sunk into something soft- a bed. Your bed. It was familiar in its lavender scent to you and the silk wrapped around you gave you some semblance of warmth.

Your wings.

Even coming to consciousness was difficult. You were exhausted but light, without the weight of wings holding you down. You'd never realised how much you needed to feel that weight, to feel pulled down in order to be free.

Gone, all gone.

Your hand twitches around something cold, a shadow holding your hand, creeping up your side.

'You're awake, thank the couldron.'

It wasn't Azriel, master of the shadows. It wasn't your mate. Mate. The word replayed like a terrible song in your mind.

How dare the mother do this to Az. How dare he- nothing but loyal and kind- get stuck with a person made in darkness, who bled shadows, who's heart was so full of hate there wasn't room for love. They'd cursed Az, with you.

But luckily it wasn't him, it was Rhysand.

'It really happened,' you whispered, voice hurting from the screams.

He sighed. 'I'm sorry, i'm so sorry. We-we thought you weren't going to make it, you'd lost so much blood.'

In spite of the pain in your shoulders, you made a shift, turning from him as he ranted on about your condition.

'y/n... sister, please,' he said. He'd never called you sister before. He'd always been content to treat you just like you worked for him.

'Leave me alone.' you couldn't bare to look at him, couldn't bare to face him. The shadows at your hand grew heavier, as if more were piling on. You stretched your fingers away from them, trying to get them off you.

'Are you in any pain?' asked Rhys.

'Get out,' you mumbled.

The end of your bed dipped where Rhys settled, hand splayed on the covers, begging for your hand. 'y/n.'

'Get out!' you snapped, body tense and straining. You felt your wounds open up, blood wetting the bandage around you. But you didn't care. You'd happily bleed if you couldn't fly. A part of you, sick part of you wanted to be left there. It would be better than false sympathy.

Be better than your mate being disgusted.

'Get out!' you yelled again, voice tearing through an aching throat.

'I just want to help you! please, let me help you!' said Rhys, standing from your bed and walking around, trying to face you.

'I don't want your help!' you screamed. You reached for the closest thing you could, a jug of water and chucked it toward him. You aim was terrible, marred with pain and exhaustion. 'Get out!'

Though hesitant, Rhysand slowly started walking back to your door. He did it all looking at you, his hands out to show he wasn't gonna hurt you, but you didn't care. You went for the glasses next and chucked them but they landed against the door which he disappeared through.

Before it slid close you caught sight of Cassian , Mor and Azriel. All crowded, all waiting to see you.

You'd be happy if you never let them see you again.

'Can we see her?' you hear Mor ask.

'Give her time,' said Rhys.

The shadows at your hand grew heavier, darker, tighter.

'Go away!' you yelled at them. To anyone else, you probably looked crazy, screaming to darkness. But the shadows understood. They departed, slithering away and under the crack of your door where you could see the shadows of feet.

Tumbling from bed, you stumbled over and locked the door, leaning on it to and catching your breath. Your nightgown was starting to get sticky with blood all over again. When you closed your eyes, you pictured the cell, the rough hands holding you down, the chain keeping you up.

And the pain, it all washed over you. The hacking at your back, the sting of a slap. It hit you like a tone of bricks as you slid to the floor.

There was a knock, rattling the door.

'y/n,' Cassian. 'Please let us in.'

Us. You felt him on the other side. Your mate, his presence lingering. His shadows under the door, wanting to come in but keeping their distance.

He didn't know. It hadn't snapped for him, you could tell. It was one tug on your end, a chord in your heart. At least he couldn't feel what you did. At least you could shoulder it alone.

'Please.' his voice was almost your un-doing. He sounded so sad, so desperate. It hurt you just to think you were hurting him.

Tears streamed down your face as your curled your fingers into a tight fist. You assumed Mor had left with Rhys, leaving you there with the males.

Cass was always like a brother to you. Granted- a brother you had slept with once or twice- but he was your best friend. You'd always been close to him. But you'd always been good, a happy person.

You couldn't be that for them now, perhaps ever again.

It lasted like that for hours. Cassian and Az begging to come in, you curling into a ball with tears down your cheeks and blood down your back.

Eventually, they gave up. You couldn't hear them anymore and the shadows of their boots had disappeared.

Except Azriel's shadows that still lingered under your door. Maybe he'd ordered them to be there while they left you.

Eventually, you managed to find your footing on shaking legs. Your room was large, one of the largest. It was just as much a mess as it was when you'd left for you mission, clothes thrown over the place, books propped open on the pages you'd left them on. Everything was the same but could never be again.

It took you longer than you'd care to admit to get to your windows and throw the curtains close. Candles light at your request, the house looking after you as it had since you were a child.

You caught sight of yourself in the full length mirror. It seemed smaller, everything in the room felt too large and you too small, as if you were being swallowed by the expanse of it.

Your frame was small in the mirror, your hair disarrayed. Your eyes were red and shutting of their own accord from the tears that had drained you. The starving in the cells had made you look weak, made you feel weak.

And your back. There was no more looming black figures there, no more fluttering. There was just nothing. In spite of the ache as you lifted your arm, you felt around your back, feeling the hitch there, the lump from where they'd been torn from you.

You cry. You sob. You scream.

The scars were long and the nightdress was sticking to you by the blood you'd shed. All you could do, was hold yourself up as your body wracked with tears.

A breeze came from your windows, shadows tugging at the curtains.

You felt him before you saw him. You wanted to tell him to leave you but you couldn't talk without chocking. Without feeling like you couldn't breath.

Azriel had you in your arms before your knees could hit the ground. He fell with you, softening your body on the floor. His arms held you into his chest, his legs caging you into his body. His head rested on yours as he held you. He didn't try to talk, he didn't try to help. It was just him, you and his shadows.

✩₊˚.⋆☾⋆⁺₊✧

Azriel remembered dozing off with you, his head on yours. His arms holding you into him, as if it was up to him to keep the sadness away and take it for you.

Afterall, you were his best friend. He should have been there for you, and he'd failed terribly by letting you get hurt and your wings stolen from you. He could hate himself every day for it, for letting you down. But it would never amount to what you felt for yourself and that killed him.

He could see it in the way you cried, in the way you were already keeping everyone out. He'd rather die than let you go through all the pain alone.

When his hands had been scarred by his brothers, you'd help heal him, tell him about everything he still was and all the power he still held in his hands. In the worst days, when he didn't let anyone touch him, he let you.

It was always you.

Azriel wasn't sure how long he'd been asleep, or how deep. He was sure he was still with you, still in your bed.

His shadows crept up on him, engulfing him slowly and whispering to him. Your name, just your name on repeat. It was enough to lull him back into sleep, to keep him calm.

Gone. Missing. y'n. Roof.

He shot up and ran fastest than he ever had in his life. It was as if he'd never been asleep but had been fighting a battle with the way he raced over.

He burst through the doors, the cold hight air hitting him.

You stood facing the stars, your bloody back to him. It wasn't as much blood as when he'd found you, but it was still enough to put a lump in his throat.

Immediately his shadows fell to you, cascading down your body and wrapping around your waist. There was a breeze in the air, pushing your hair back and exposing more signs of the pain and torture you must have gone through.

'I'm not gonna jump, if that's what you're thinking,' you said. You didn't even have to turn to him. The shadows probably told you enough.

'Why are you up here?' he asked, walking to you slowly and with careful steps. As if every step closer could you push you away from him.

'I'll never feel the win properly again,' you answered.

Azriel gulped down his own pain. You’d never sounded so small. ‘Can you get away from the ledge?’

'I'm not on the ledge.'

'You're too close for my liking.'

'Leave if you don't like it.'

'Don't do this,' he said.

'Do what?' you asked, folding your arms over your chest. You were cold, out in the hight but you wanted to see the stars. Needed to see them.

'Make me leave. Make everyone leave you. I know that's what you're doing. It's what you do every time,' you could feel him dawning closer. His shadows were all around you, almost drowning you.

‘Every time,’ you scoff, stepping down and turning on him. ‘It’s not every day you lose your wings Azriel! But don’t let me stop you from leaving, flap them and go!’ You yelled, unable to stop yourself, no matter how hard you tried. You didn’t want to hurt him, you just wanted to be alone.

Mate. Mate. Mate.

'You jump and I’ll catch you,' he said. He was a step away, he could just reach out and touch, just a gentle caress. 'I swear it, whatever you do, I’ll follow. I’m not letting you get away.’

He watched your back shudder as he reached out, brushing knuckles against your shoulder blade. He heard your sharp inhale follow.

'Don’t think I won’t follow, y/n.'

Finally, you turned around in his shadows. You couldn’t meet his eyes but at least you could face his chest.

His hands were gentle on your shoulder as he rubbed it gently. 'Can I get Madja to clean you up?' He asked.

You nodded as he led you away. You truly did not deserve your mate.

✩₊˚.⋆☾⋆⁺₊✧

Fifty-two years later...

When Amarantha had trapped the high lords of Prythian under the mountain, it hadn't be a conscious choice to follow your half-brother down. How Amarantha had allowed it, you weren't sure, but perhaps she wanted to use you just like her brother, or she thought it would bring more pain for him to see you suffer under there too.

You and Rhysand had barley spoke the last two years.

It had took you almost two months to heal fully enough to leave your room, another few months to face your family again. But even then, everyone knew something had changed in you. You didn't laugh as loud or smile as wide.

Rhysand was careful to ever let you out on a mission. Mor tried to take you out every night. Cassian spent all day every day with you and Azriel- he'd healed you better than any nurse.

Still, you had not told him he was your mate.

Still, you thought he wouldn't want it.

Still, you cared for your brother enough to not want him to go alone.

But being under the mountain, you could avoid your mate. At a painful price.

Until her. Rhys's mate. He hadn't shut up about her since he first met her, much to your dismay as you had to sit around and listen- having absolutely nothing better to do. And it only got worse when she turned up under the mountain. She was declaring her love for Tamlin- again, annoying your brother, and throwing Lucien into danger- which rather angered you. You had nothing against the ginger.

Rhysand had once sent you to find the girl to summon her as part of a bargain he'd made. He didn't want to go, he didn't want to look too forceful. You'd been lucky enough to find the two tangled up in each other against a cold wall, clothes ripped and hips moving together.

'Well, well well,' you'd intterupted.

Tamlin all but growled at you, but feyre was looking over you- evidently confused. She had no idea who you were. You, in your skimpy outfit that Amarantha kept you in (they all dipped low at your back, showing off your scars) and your eyes that were like a night sky.

'Amarantha's looking for her pet and Rhysand is looking for his. Honestly, i'd be a bit more worried if I were you. You know, considering Lucien still has an eye to lose.'

The two parted with your words as you sent Tamlin back to his master, the high lord glaring at you as you went. While Feyre tried to fix herself.

'Rhysand is over there, better not keep him waiting.' That was the first time you met her, having no idea how much trouble she'd be worth. The family that she'd become.

But Rhysand made sure you knew it all. From when the bond snapped in him and he'd stumbled. He ranted and ranted as they climbed out.

If only you were so talkative about Azriel. If only you could talk about him with your brother. But you'd tried not to painfully think about him. Climbing out of the mountain. It was all you could think of.

Maybe he'd have forgotten you? it had been fifty years. He'd probably realised how happy he could be without having to take care of you.

Rhys was allowed out of the mountain, he'd felt the breeze in his hair but you hadn't in fifty long years. You stood there a moment, bathing in the warmth as everyone left, as everyone ran off for their families and courts and the war that was inevitable. Eventually, Rhys offered you his arm. 'Shall we go home?'

He winnowed you there, on the balcony of your home. In a cloud of black smoke, the two of you appeared.

He went first, slipping through the doors slowly- like it could all be taken from them any minute.

You were hesitant, taking a moment to glance at the landscape behind you. It hadn't changed, not at all. The mountains were still there, everyone was still alive. Your home. In the last years it hadn't felt like home, but how could anywhere ever feel so close in your heart.

When you could find your feat again, you managed to slip through the doors. You were suddenly aware of how little clothing you were wearing, just enough to cover your chest and run down your legs. A chill settled down your back, your scars would be on show. What a way to great them all after fifty years.

Mor had her arms around Rhys's shoulders, crying into his shoulder.

Behind them you caught Amren, with something like tears in her eyes. You were just about to tease her before a body barrelled into yours in a blur of red syphons and your feet were lifted from the ground.

'Cassian.'

His arms tightened around you. You shoulder started to dampen with tears, his tears. The last time you'd seen him cry around you was when he'd seen a dog with only three legs. 'I'm keeping you on a leash from now on, stupid idiot.'

Your arms wrap around his shoulders, a smile gracing your lips. 'Is that a promise?'

He held you longer, tighter, not daring to let you go but at least settling you on the ground. He sighed against your head, controlling himself. 'He's missed you, you know,' he said. He was the only one you'd told, about your mate. 'Now that you're back, tell him. He deserves to know.'

Cassian slowly pulled away, holding you at arms length and smiling at you. He kissed your cheeks and then your forehead before parting to Rhysand.

Mor approached you next, slapping you in the arm.

'Ow!'

'Why would you follow him?' she snapped.

You blinked at her before she took you by the arm she'd slapped and embraced you, like a sister would. You dared not looking over her shoulder to find the one who hadn't come to you. Maybe Cass had got it wrong...

Mor pulled away, wiping at her eyes.

Azriel was as beautiful as the day you left him. His hair was the same length, he was the same height. He was just as you left him. It was hard to tell fifty years had passed on him.

And inside of you, tugging in your soul and heart you felt the familiar string of gold throbbing. But you still didn't feel that tug. You'd hoped it would have faded from you after half a year separated. Or at least have snapped for him. But no such relief.

He approached you, slowly. As if he was scared of scaring you away. But you just stood there.

His arms were delicate and soft around you as he brought you into his chest. He still smelled the same, cedar wood and shadows. Shadows that wrapped around you, shielding you from the rest of the room. They caressed you, head to two.

You held onto each other for what could have been another fifty years, but this time, it wasn't so painful.

✩₊˚.⋆☾⋆⁺₊✧

Although nobody wanted to part after yours and Rhysand's return, you were exhausted. A trip to Rita's could wait another night or two. The only thing you wanted to do was hide in your room.

Strangely, your room looked lived in. As if somebody had moved in since you'd left. A moment of anger replaced grief. Had they brought someone else and given them your room? but then you smelt it, Az.

Lying in bed that night, exhausted, you couldn't find sleep. You closed your eyes and pictured Amarantha. You'd never been afraid of her, you weren't afraid of anything. But you re-played the horrors. Watching servants beat Feyre, watching Amarantha use your brother and on the occasion, even you. How she flaunted. How the most powerful lords were weak.

Under your door, shadows seeped in, rushing across the room to you. You smiled, watching your hand disappear in their darkness.

'Azriel?' you called.

There was shifting on the other side of the door before he slipped in, clicking it shut behind him.

You sat up in bed, shadows moving with you. 'Couldn't sleep?'

He wondered in, looking around your room. 'Sleeping's been... hard.'

You rolled over, opening the blanket and nodding your head. You couldn't think about the bond, not yet. Not while he looked so.... ruined. Beautiful- the most beautiful person in the world, but sad. As he climbed in next to you, you could see the dark circles under his eyes, his shoulders slumped and his wings too.

His eyes scanned over you. You were in a thin and silk night dress that only brushed your knees, but the way he looked at you, mother you could've been naked. 'Fifty years,' his voice sounded barley controlled. 'Fifty years. You followed your brother down for fifty years? Why would you do that?'

You gulp. 'I would've done it for any of you. Except maybe Amren, she'd probably enjoy the peace for fifty years.'

You go to brush your hair back but Azriel seizes your wrist. He was angry. That's why his voice was rough and his chest rising and falling with barley controlled emotions. Could he feel it? your nerves, your lying?

'You left. You should've stayed, y/n, you know Rhysand didn't want you under there with him,' he said. 'For fifty years I haven't been able to sleep through a night thinking about the pain you must have been going through. After I swore to keep you safe, after I promised to catch you every time!'

'You couldn't have stopped me. You didn't promise, Az.'

His grip grew tighter. 'It went without saying.'

You looked around his eyes, seeing the pain and grief there also. Slowly, you brought your other hand up. He flinched as you took his cheek but eventually settled as your thumb ran over his cheekbone. 'I won't leave again, ok? I promise.'

He gulped, letting go of your wrist and looking down. 'I slept here,' he mumbled, but just loud enough to hear you. 'I couldn't sleep in my room. This was the only place I could rest.'

Your heart stuttered. Your hand dropped from his cheek. This man was your mate. Your mate. Your only love, whether or not the cauldron deemed it.

Azriel took your hesitation. 'I-i'm sorry, you probably didn't want to hear that. I've probably ruined your one place of peace-'

'Stay,' you said, before you could think of what you were asking. 'Sleeping wasn't exactly easy under the mountain either. I just trust I won't have to put a wall of cushions between us.' as if you wanted that. As if you haven't thought about his calloused hands all over you.

Azriel smiled and stayed the night.

✩₊˚.⋆☾⋆⁺₊✧

The third time he almost lost you, broke him...

✩₊˚.⋆☾⋆⁺₊✧

[theconstitutionisgayculture]

My thoughts about the Trump assassination attempt

After having a few hours to process this whole thing and see reactions from across the political spectrum, I'm having some thoughts and some feelings.

First off, as I said earlier, Trump is a fucking boss. Take anyone who ran for president in the last 20 years, put them in that exact situation, and I don't think a single one responds by raising his fist and snarling in defiance and righteous anger. They run. They cry. They keep their heads down and the first statement you h ear from them is hours later filtered through 20 different speech writers. Today proved to me that, whatever else he may be, Trump is a genuine bad ass. He's exactly the person I want at the end of a sword pointed the United States. Because he's going to have a sword of his own pointed right back, and he's not going to run and hide when it comes time to use it.

Second, the modern left is full of monsters. The amount of people screaming and crying because this assassination attempt failed actually sickens me. It's one thing to have fantasies about easy solutions to the things that scare you. Hell, I'm not innocent. I've thought about how much better things might be if this politician was no longer around or this activist group got axed. But one of the things I did today was think about how I would feel if the assassin succeeded. And then I thought about how I'd feel if someone took a shot at Biden and he didn't survive. Neither thought gave me any good feelings. Obviously I'd be more upset if Trump died, but today showed me that I don't want us to start down the path of shooting political leaders. But too many people on the left, people who should know better, at least enough to hide their true feelings, have no problem publicly wishing Trump was dead right now. That assassinating presidential candidates was a legitimate tactic--but only against the politicians they don't like, of course.

Fuck that.

Fuck them.

America is better than that. Americans are better than that. We're not some third world shithole like Mexico. We're the greatest country in the world. We're the last bastion of representative government. The last place in the world where freedom exists. And it's time we started acting like it.

Third, I ain't got no time for conspiracy theories. Sorry guys, but this wasn't staged and this wasn't a CIA hitman. Unless real, hard evidence comes out otherwise, you won't ever get me to believe any of the nonsense I've seen floated around. Don't be so lost in the true things the media has dismissed as "conspiracy theories" that you immediately jump to the most conspiratorial explanations first for everything that happens. It's lame and cringe and a lot of people I've seen seriously putting these theories forward should know better. I know we're in our emotions right now, but keep your heads.

Fourth, my heart breaks for the families of the people who were hit with the bullets meant for President Trump. But that's the kind of evil we're facing. Whoever did this decided that the idea of a Trump presidency was so awful that they were okay with shooting innocent people just to stop him. And this is after he was already president and none of the things the media is fear mongering about happened during his first term. Those people just wanted to see a man speak. To have some hope for the future. And some piece of shit shot them because he didn't like a presidential candidate. Or worse, because the TV made him scared.

Fifth, fuck the media. You think you hate them enough, but you don't. The media is the driving force behind our enemies, and there's no such thing as a good journopig. They're all lying propagandists. We just like some of them because their propaganda occasionally hits on the truth.

And that's all I got. None of this is organized, none of this is proofread. These are just the thoughts I've been wrestling with for the past few hours. This is the only place I can get them all down without being interrupted or feeling like I need to censor myself. Do with them what you will.

[literaryavenger]

Happy Birthday

Summary: It's your birthday and the only person who doesn't seem to be excited about it is you.

Pairing: Bucky Barnes x Reader

Warnings: Mentions of death. Angst. Fluff. Language probably. My poor attempts at being funny.

Word Count: 2.5K

A/N: This story was completely self-indulgent, but I hope someone out there likes it!

Masterlist

You’ve always been very reluctant to celebrate your birthday.

You haven’t had a birthday party since you were 12. The following year your mom died a couple of days before and neither you nor your family were in the mood to celebrate anything.

It wasn’t by any means unexpected, she had been sick for a few years, but it still hit you hard.

You were the youngest and were far too young when she first got sick to really understand everything going on.

You were 8 and all you really remember is watching your mom get more and more sick until eventually there was nothing more the doctors could do.

Her death hit you hard and you closed yourself off, never talking about it or even crying after the day of her funeral. To this day you’ve still never cried, in front of others or even by yourself.

You started exercising to channel all your energy, refusing to do anything more like the therapy your family suggested. 

When you were 15 you discovered SHIELD and decided you wanted to help others, so you signed up for the SHIELD Academy, working your hardest and pushing yourself to your very limit.

You ended up being not only the youngest cadet ever, but the youngest to actually graduate and then the youngest recruit at SHIELD at only 16 years old.

Natasha was very impressed when she heard about you and took a liking to you, convincing Fury to make you part of her team during her missions and teaching you everything she knows.

That’s how you ended up in the Avengers Initiative, not that you felt you didn’t deserve it since you know how hard you worked and everything you gave up to work towards this achievement. 

The team themselves were initially skeptical since you were barely 18 during the battle of New York, but they were quickly proven wrong when they saw how well you handled yourself against the Chitauri. 

You were devastated when SHIELD fell, but carried on as an Avenger, battling Ultron and then moving to the Compound with the team.

You met the actual Bucky for the first time when you were 22, during the whole Civil War thing with Baron Zemo. Like Natasha, you were on Tony’s team, fighting mostly Pietro, but the conflict eventually ended. 

It took Tony some time to get over the whole “Bucky killing his parents while brainwashed” thing, but, as he likes to say, he can’t call himself a genius without admitting that Bucky didn’t have much of a choice. 

Thanks to Tony’s help Shuri was able to find a solution to Bucky’s brainwashing faster than she would’ve alone, meaning Bucky didn’t have to go back into cryo and was pretty quickly cleared to join the team, about a year after the airport battle in Leipzig.

You were warmly accepted by everybody and, the more the team grew the more you felt at home with these people.

And now you wish you could burn down the whole compound because, somehow, Tony convinced you to have a birthday party for the first time in 13 years because, in his words, 'you only turn 25 once'.

Good news is you managed to make him limit the guest list to the team and other people close to you like Maria Hill and Fury. Bad news is you’re still gonna be the center of attention, which you hate.

You couldn’t stop Tony from making everyone dress up for the party, and you couldn’t stop the team from getting you gifts even though you insisted all you wanted was everyone together and to have fun with them since for the longest time nobody ever even knew when your birthday was. 

What you didn’t realize was that the only person more worried than you about your gifts was Bucky.

Since he joined the team the two of you have gotten close, starting with his first training with the team where he very loudly told Steve about his disbelief that someone as young and small as you could actually be an asset to the team.

You quickly put him in his place by taking him down after less than two minutes of sparring, taking full advantage of his underestimating you because he “didn’t want to hurt a pretty little thing like you.”

Admittedly he was impressed and wasn’t shy about letting you know that, while the rest of the team snickered at his initial shock when you pinned him down.

You became friends after that, not as close as you’d like but friends nonetheless.

If you were honest with yourself you’ve been harboring a little crush on the supersoldier, but he’s never shown any interest so you resigned yourself to just being his friend.

Something that you did come to treasure, though, is your and Bucky’s late night talks.

It started with you walking in on him in the kitchen on a late night where you couldn’t sleep, nothing new to you, but the two of you barely talked other than acknowledging each other.

You took a bottle of water and left.

A couple of days later you ran into him again and you stood there in silence while you made yourself a cup of tea and then left for your room.

A few days later again he was just sitting there and said nothing as you made your tea, except this time you put a cup in front of him and silently took a seat next to him at the counter.

Two nights later when you arrived at the kitchen he was already there with a cup of tea in front of him and one in front of the seat next to him.

You didn’t want to assume it was for you, but you took a chance when you noticed it was the cup you always used, a blue mug with Stitch on it that says “Let’s get weird”. Your favorite in fact.

You hesitantly sat down next to him and, without you having to ask or without even looking at you, he told you that the nights you stay up late because you can’t sleep you tend to be more quiet during the team dinners and while you hang out afterwards.

You didn’t say anything in return and just sat there, trying not to overthink how much he seemed to watch you.

But the more nights you spent like that, the more you two talked and you gathered quickly that Bucky is a very observant person, nothing more.

You loved the time you spent together after dark where you’d talk about everything and anything, but come morning it was almost as if it never happened, which you came to accept.

It weirdly made the nights you spent talking even more special, which was almost every night.

But back to the present, you’re currently getting ready with Natasha and Wanda, who know much more than you about hair and makeup and are always happy to help you out with getting ready for Stark parties. 

You put on the black cocktail dress with rhinestones all over the corset and a slit down the left side, then the three of you make your way to the party room and you take a deep breath before entering.

Everyone is already there, all dressed up in fancy clothes as they all shout “Happy Birthday”.

You laugh and say hi to everybody while they all take turns hugging you, there’s not too many people but everyone important to you is there.

Even Laura and Clint’s kids are there, which you consider a second family at this point, since Laura always did treat you like a daughter.

You hate to admit that it's a nice party.

Knowing you, everyone makes an effort to not put you too much at the center of attention and you just go around talking to your friends like every other party.

Eventually time comes for the cake and, the moment you kind of dreaded, opening the gifts.

Since it's the first birthday you allowed the team to celebrate everyone decided to go all in for your gifts, which you picked up on from the very first gift you open.

Pietro got you a first edition of “The Picture Of Dorian Gray” which is your all time favorite book, Wanda and Maria got you a leather jacket and an amazing pair of boots that you knew were expensive because you were all out shopping together when you came across them.

Steve got you a gold heart-shaped locker with a picture of the team inside it, Natasha got you a charm bracelet with a little charm to represent everyone on the team, and Sam got you a cute necklace with your birth stone on it.

When you open Fury’s gift you start laughing since it's a gun, a SIG SAUER P226 to be precise, which is very Fury.

“It was my first gun when I joined SHIELD.” He says with a smile and you smile back, knowing how much thought he put into this gift.

You open Clint’s gift next, a bow and arrow that he already taught you how to use, and Laura got you a pair of diamond earrings.

Your heart melts when you open Lila, Cooper and Nathaniel’s gifts, respectively a friendship bracelet, an Avengers action figure of yourself and a Stitch plushie.

The three of them hug you tightly as you say thank you and now you only have two gifts left, Tony’s and Bucky’s, and they’re both little boxes. 

You open Tony’s next, thinking it’s some fancy necklace or earring but you frown when you see a car key.

“Is this the key to your car?” you ask Tony, knowing full well you’re holding the key to an Audi R8 Spyder, the car Tony’s let you borrow so many times you’re now wondering if he’s gifting you his spare set of keys.

“No.” He says casually “It’s the key to your car.”

You’re even more confused and simply stare at him with your mouth gaped, not really processing the information.

“Y-you… You got me a car?!” You almost yell out of shock and everyone else starts laughing at your antics when you start basically jumping up and down and hugging Tony, squealing like a little girl.

“Well, come on, let’s go see it!” Tony says enthusiastically after you’ve calmed down, and you get up, just as enthusiastic, but are stopped by Steve’s voice.

“Wait, wait. You have one gift left.” He says, picking up the small box and giving it to you. “It’s from Bucky.”

You were so pumped up by the car, you almost forgot about it and completely miss the mischievous look Steve gives Bucky and the murderous glare Bucky gives back.

You also miss Bucky starting to protest before you open his gift, but he instantly shuts up when he sees your face falling the second you open it.

It’s a small necklace with a blue rose in it, it really looks like something you’d give a little girl more than a 25 year old woman.

You look at it for a minute, running your finger on it before you raise your head and look at Bucky.

The whole room goes silent as they all watch you worriedly, everyone noticing immediately that tears are streaming down your face.

Nobody understands what’s happening and nobody knows how to react or what to do, it’s like they’re all frozen by the sight of you being vulnerable for the first time ever. 

Meanwhile Bucky’s heart is beating so loud he’s sure everyone around him can hear it, and he feels himself starting to panic at the thought of having ruined your birthday with that stupid gift.

Everybody else got you expensive gifts and all he did was get you a small, cheap necklace that reminded him of a story you briefly talked about once on one of your late night talks about a necklace you had as a kid.

He saw it at the mall while looking for a gift for you, remembering the sweet smile you had on your face when you mentioned it and the fleeting sad look he thought he saw when you told him you lost it when you were 12.

He was really proud of himself for that gift, but the more he saw the other gifts you got the more he regretted his choice, especially after Tony gave you a fucking car.

And now you were crying, not saying anything while just looking at him.

He doesn’t know what to expect from you at the moment, nobody does, he thinks you might yell, throw his gift back at him, tell him how much you hate it and him.

But you surprise everyone by throwing your arms around Bucky’s neck, hugging him tightly while crying into his shoulder.

You honestly forgot telling Bucky about that story and certainly didn’t expect him to remember it, especially since you always got the feeling that he didn’t care about your talks as much as you.

You just assumed that come morning he deleted everything you told him to make room for more important things, and you didn’t blame him.

But he didn’t.

What you didn’t tell him about the necklace is that your mom gave it to you because blue roses were her favorite, you had that necklace since you were born but you somehow lost it the day of her funeral.

That day you lost the two most important things in your life and cried yourself to sleep, and that was the last time you allowed yourself to be weak and cry.

Until today.

Bucky hesitantly wraps his arms around you, rubbing your back hoping to get you to calm down. He looks around at the rest of the team, panicking a little and not knowing what to do.

Everyone else is as clueless as he is, never having seen you in such a state before.

Bucky starts apologizing, his heart breaking at the sight of you crying, and he feels horrible that it’s because of him.

You shake your head quickly and pull away a little to look at him, wanting to reassure him you’re not sad or angry but incredibly happy, but words refuse to come. You take a deep breath to calm yourself and finally manage to speak.

“Thank you. You have no idea how much this means to me.” It’s quiet, but it’s something, and it’s enough to make Bucky let out a breath of relief at knowing you don’t hate him or his gift.

He brings you back in for another tight hug, almost forgetting about everyone else in the room as you hug him back without hesitation.

You’re honestly not even embarrassed at crying, all you care about at the moment is Bucky, his arms around you while he lets you bury your face in his neck, like you’ve been wanting to do for years now.

“Happy birthday, doll.” He whispers in your ear and, for the first time in 13 years, you really feel like it is.

[merchelsea]

Hi hi

Can I request a Oscar Piastri sister reader x Lando

Maybe she's older than Oscar by a year and dating Lando, I want it to be angst with fluffy ending cus im a sucker for those 😭 either the reader and lando gets into a fight and they take a break and Oscar ends up being the middle person with a happy ending

Or

Oscar didnt know his sister was dating Lando and she introduces Lando to her family as her bf and oscar's just hurt by how they didnt tell him in advance?? and he starts being petty and ignore them...but it also ends in a happy ending

Idk idk I'm good with any as long as it's angst fluff sorry this is long 😭😭 thank you as welllll <3

family matter — lando norris (+op81)

pairing: lando norris x fem!piastri!reader

summary: you introduced lando to your family, as your boyfriend, and your brother didn’t react as well as you hoped

autor’s note: you guys love a piastri sister x lando story. (well i love writing them so keep the requests coming!

word count: 2k

warnings: angst. sad oscar. swearing.

masterlist | requests

lando stood nervously on the passenger seat, while you drove to the restaurant. he didn’t need to say anything for you to realize how insanely nervous he was.

you told him tonight was the night you would let everyone know what he actually meant to you.

you had been dating for a month and some days, and not telling anyone was crazy, in your perspective. you knew everyone would support you, but you were still a little apprehensive. after all, lando was oscar’s teammate, and you didn’t want to make things at work difficult for neither of them.

it was a good opportunity today because your whole family agreed to go out for dinner after a good home race for oscar. lando got a podium, oscar got fourth place. it was good for the team and for both drivers.

even though there was some controversy.

once you told him, the british immediately panicked. your family loved him, and he was aware, but he couldn’t shake this uneasy feeling.

seeing him so tense, you decided it was better if you drove. you were not completely normal about this either, but you felt this was way easier for you.

as you got closer to the restaurant, you felt like you needed to, at least try to, calm him down.

“they already love you, lan. it’s not like us being together changes their opinion about you.” you looked over at him as you parked the car.

he simply nodded, kissing the back of your hand after holding on to it for a while. you stood in the car a little more.

“you’re right. let’s go.” he finally told you.

you both walked together up to the table. oscar had his back to you, so you hugged him from behind. other members of the family smiled at lando’s figure behind you as you kissed oscar’s cheeks.

“you brought lando?” your mother asked, a smile plastered on her lips as she walked over to hug the british.

“yeah… hm. i wanted to tell you guys, something…” you started, making every one face you except your brother, who you were still holding. “well, me and lando, we are together.” you slowly let go of oscar as he turned around, a serious expression on his face. “as a couple, boyfriend and girlfriend…” someone let out an excited noise and all you could see were smiley faces.

“finally!” your dad said from across the table, coming closer right after and hugging lando in his own way.

the driver was clearly nervous, but way better then before. a soft smile in his lips as he looked over at you.

you looked at oscar, trying to get a reaction out of him and he simply smiled, nodded and whispered a ‘congratulations’ to both of you, before turning around to eat again.

you sort of expected a better reaction from your brother, maybe an excited one, maybe a protective one.

the aussie looked like he didn’t care enough to give it a minute of attention.

maybe it was just because today was supposed to be about him, and you ruined it. maybe he wasn’t so pleased to have lando as a brother-in-law. maybe he was just tired because of the race.

you didn’t give it too much thinking, you moved to his right, sat next to him with lando by your side, and ate. making conversation with everyone around and looking over to lando from time to time, to make sure he was doing okay.

that night, you got home with lando and received an extremely good feedback from your family. they loved norris, and were delighted to have him as a part of the family.

oscar, who didn’t seem to be so pleased, never texted you. you noticed it and found it strange, but once again thought there could be other explanations to it. not just that he abhorred the idea of you two together.

some weeks passed away and you were now on lando’s driver room. sitting on the edge of the couch, caressing his hair.

norris knew you loved formula one more than almost everything, so he made sure to have you there in japan with him, since oscar had already gifted his own passes.

your boyfriend looked over at you with a concerned look.

“hey, baby, have you talked to oscar after we told him we were together?” he asked, playing with the zipper of his race suit.

“i don’t think so.” you stopped to think, and realized you hadn’t indeed talked to him. which was odd, as you were always glued to each other. “i think he’s been pretty busy.”

lando hummed and you looked down at his face. “why?” you asked, he shook his head while looking at you.

“nothing, love. it just looks like he’s avoiding me.” with half-closed eyes, you hummed.

after all, your theory might not be wrong. maybe oscar didn’t like the idea of you and lando as more than friends.

“i’ll try to talk to him, lan.” you bent down to kiss his forehead. “you have free practice in a few minutes, don’t worry about this. it will be okay.”

he sat up and hugged you.

“i love you.” he smiled against your neck.

“i love you too. good luck, baby.” you smiled back, feeling his lips on the sensitive skin. he eventually got up and left the room. you stayed back a little to get his laptop and notebook, for after the fp sessions.

lando had two shitty sessions, finishing 10th in one and 12th in the other. on the other hand, oscar managed to pull some really good laps, finishing 8th and 1st.

your boyfriend got out of the car and looked over at you to let you know he was okay, as that was always a preoccupation, and talked with his mechanics, giving them feedback about the car and what could be improved.

oscar did the same thing, not taking so long because there wasn’t really much that the mechanics could do on his car.

piastri’s feedback after the first free practice helped him realize that the problem was how long he took to brake on the corners. improving that, he made an incredible fp2.

“osc, good job.” you smiled at your brother as he passed by. the aussie simply nodded his head before going into his driver room.

you thought of following him immediately and get things cleared out, but maybe you should just wait for lando. this was about him too, after all.

your family wasn’t here yet, because, except for your father, none of them actually liked formula one. they liked that your brother was brilliant doing it, but they didn’t really know anything or cared about the sport. so they only came for the race. never even qualifying.

your dad watched them from home, not wanting to leave your mother alone with all the hosting responsibilities.

once norris was freed, he walked up to you and held you in his arms.

“you were distracted out there.” you stated. the british let out a frustrated sigh.

“i know… it’s just the oscar situation. he’s one of my closest friends in formula one. i don’t want him to hate me.” you chuclked, pulling the man closer to you.

“he doesn’t hate you.” you commented. “let’s talk to him.” lando’s eyes widened and he pulled back to try and see if you were serious.

“now?” he asked and you nodded, grabbing his hand and pulling him though the garage until you reached oscar’s private room.

hearing a knock on his door, oscar ran to the door.

“hi?” he was confused with your presence. it wasn’t you he was waiting for.

“hey. i think we need to talk.” without asking for permission, you entered and dragged lando inside with you.

“we do, actually.” oscar states, closing the door and leaning against his table. lando took place on top of a balcony and you leaned against that same balcony, standing face to face with your big brother.

no one said anything for some seconds. trying to figure out what was the best way to start this important conversation.

“you guys should’ve told me.” oscar said, looking between the both of you. anyone who knew him could tell how hurt he was. his eyes reflecting it.

“we told you!” you remarked.

“yeah, after what? two months?” he sarcastically pointed out. “next time send me a letter, maybe it would be faster.” you rolled your eyes and lando stood still, understanding oscar’s side perfectly.

“this isn’t about you.” you said, lando touched your back gently, trying to calm you down.

“you are my sister, y/n! do you even know how much i care about this? you are my other half, the person i love the most in this whole entire world!” oscar’s voice rose a little as he spoke. “and lando, you are my friend! you both kept this from me and discarded me in the process. i was informed at the same time that auntie joannah was!”

you felt the urge to laugh at the mention of the old lady’s name, but kept your expression still. a little more saddened now that you were realizing just how big your mistake was.

“oscar…”

“no, y/n. let me finish.” he asked. you simply nodded, and he continued. his arms were crossed in front of his chest now and he had his race suit halfway down. “you have been distancing yourself and i have no idea of why. at first i thought you weren’t okay because of hate or how things were going with tennis, but you don’t seem very preoccupied with that, so i really don’t know.”

he takes a deep breath before speaking again. “i’m sure you had your reasons, but you’re my best friend, y/n, and constantly feeling like you don’t trust me anymore, or don’t consider me as you did before… it hurts.”

sadness embraces you as you listen to your brother. lando caresses your shoulder from behind you.

“maybe i should leave you two to talk, this is family matter.” the british suggests.

“you’re family.” both you and oscar say in unison. lando couldn’t help but feel his heart warm, smiling softly to himself as you think of some way to explain things to oscar.

“you know, i would have been your relationship’s biggest supporter if you had given me the chance.” oscar was the one to talk again, and you couldn’t hold back anymore. you needed to hug him, and so you did.

it was a clumsy hug, but it meant everything to you.

“i never meant to hurt you, osc.” you truthfully told him, feeling his grip tightening around you. “it was supposed to be a surprise…”

“what a fucking great way to do it.”

as you both hugged each other, lando watched from the balcony. he too was scared of losing oscar’s friendship, but he was sure that you would do the right thing, and sort things out.

“i never thought you would see this as a good thing. from the start, you and lando got along really really well, and i never wanted to get in the way of that, but i did not control it.” tears threatened to come out of your eyes at any time.

“when it happened, when we happened, i was terrified… but this was strong, i couldn’t stay away from him even if i tried. it was the kind of love you can not put down… and the idea seemed to be less and less terrifying.” you tried to explain. oscar payed close attention to every word you said, and lando, from the balcony, did the same thing.

it was the first time you opened up to someone other than your own figure in the mirror.

“and then i embraced this. this idea of being his, and then he asked me to be his girlfriend and i could never say no. i love him!”

you turn around to look at lando, who hugged his knees and smiled at you. oscar looked too and immediately realized that norris was the one for you. just by his eyes.

“but i still wasn’t prepared to tell you, because of every single devilish thought in my head. so i kept my distance because i know i wouldn’t be able to lie or hide anything from you. but i never, ever, stopped trusting you or considered you less.” you remarked. “you’re my osc, my big brother, you are my everything, and i’m sorry for not communicating.”

you could see in his eyes how hurt he was, and you hated to think it was all because of you.

“i’m sorry, oscar. i really am.”

“i like to know stuff. and i love you,” he pulls you into a real hug this time, allowing you to breathe freely again.

lando, who was still sat on the balcony, walked over towards you and stood next to you, watching the sibling moment with admiration in his eyes.

it was rare to find such a connection.

when you two pulled apart, lando finally broke his silence.

“hey, osco… i’m sorry too man. we both thought about surprising you, and i may have been a little more guilty than y/n there, because i didn’t want you to hate me for dating your sister.”

oscar smiled at the brit.

“i trust you with her, and i don’t hate you. but if you ever even think about hurting her...” lando nodded knowingly, and they touched hands.

“i would never. i really love her.” oscar pulled your boyfriend into a hug and you stood back, watching the two of them.

“i can see it.” oscar smiled as they pulled back.

lando ran his hand from behind your neck until he reached your shoulder, and pulled you close. he kissed the top of your head.

“i’m family now eh?” lando bragged and oscar rolled his eyes.

“don’t make me regret it.”

[cressidagrey]

Lightning in the Bottle - Chapter 10 (The End)

Summary: 

Eira Archeron was neither a Valkyrie, nor a Seer, nor the High Lady of the Night Court. She was actually pretty much useless. The only thing she wanted was to be somebody's first choice for once in her life.

Also known as: Azriel's shadows decide that if he doesn't treat his mate right... they'll just do it for him.

Warnings: 

Elain Bashing, Azriel is trying...meddling shadows

(super pretty dividers by @tsunami-of-tears)

She’s crying, the shadows hissed. 

Again, went unsaid. 

Eira had been crying…pretty much since she had woken up for the first time and had panicked. 

Even Rhys had not been able to reach her then, calm her down, stop the panic…even when Azriel had begged him, his own heart breaking at the utter terror that Eira poured down the bond. Her panic had been enough to break his fucking heart.

As had been the repeat of these three words. Again and again. She should have needed to kill them. That shouldn’t have ever been anything that she worried about. he should have been right there…but he hadn’t been. 

And so she had panicked and sobbed…and they had needed to drug her…The only thing they could do, hoping that maybe a little bit more time…giving her a moment longer… when Rhys didn’t need to drag her out of a nightmare, she would wake on her own. 

And then she had. 

And at first, it had been fine…

He had nervously wrung his hands, forcing himself not to listen to that conversation, forcing himself not to ask the shadows what they were hearing…not to spy on her…

Eira had a right to her privacy. Especially now, when most of it had been stripped away from her. She should at least have some of it left.

Rhys didn’t seem to have these scruples…probably a good thing.  His clenched jaw told Azriel that that conversation between the three sisters was not going in a direction that would help anything. Finally, Rhys had enough…had interrupted before any more damage could be done. 

Azriel didn’t know what had been said there either, but… Rhys’ slumped shoulders when he left her bedroom had been…

“She’ll need time,” Rhys had told him quietly. “Give her time, Az. We did a lot of damage with careless words and actions… She’s…We fucked up and she’s the one paying the price for it.”

With her tears, went unsaid. 

The shadows complained to him, about how she was crying, how Nesta and Feyre were holding her and that didn’t stop Eira from weeping like somebody had died. 

And he supposed in a way… somebody had died. 

Eira’s twin sister…the sister she had loved…she had died. Died the moment Elain decided to keep the vision a secret…when she had tried to make sure that it wouldn’t come true. 

“Did…” he couldn’t bring out the words as he stared at Rhys. 

“I told her,” Rhys assured him with a sigh. 

And? What had she said? What did Eira think about the mating bond? What did she want to do with it? What did… “She thought it was a joke.”

What?

“A joke?” Cassian repeated unbelieving. “A joke? What kind of joke?” he demanded and Rhys just raised one eyebrow. 

“A joke at her expense,” Rhys clarified evenly. “That Azriel couldn’t possibly be her mate.”

Somebody ripping out his heart with their bare hands probably would have hurt less. What was he supposed to say to this? What was he supposed to do about it? 

How was he supposed to assure Eira that…that he wanted her? That he was glad about the mating bond because, without it, he would have walked through his life deaf and blind to the treasure right in front of him.

He would have…he wouldn’t have known...He wouldn’t ever having seen that vision, wouldn’t ever have seen the children they would be able to create, the happiness on his own face, the happiness on Eira’s face…

How was he supposed to beg on his knees for her forgiveness when she was sobbing at just…

Azriel went back to pacing. 

He had no idea what to say to that. He had no idea what to do to make this right. 

He had…

There was nothing he could do. Nothing at all. 

And Azriel hated it. 

Maybe that’s what brought him back to the hallway in front of the room…back to sitting there and staring at the closed door…back to cradling that golden bond in his mind and waiting for Eira to wake up from her crying fit induced nap…

Cassian kept him company, clearly still expecting him to go off and do something really stupid. Like murdering Elain in cold blood. 

Which he wasn’t going to do, for the record. Oh, he wanted to. Eira wouldn’t forgive him for that though. And that was the only fucking reason why he didn’t do it. 

He had killed people for less than Elain trying to make sure that his children would never be born. 

Still, he tried to push down that anger that was embering in his gut. If he didn’t do that, he would just get even more angry and he didn’t think that his anger was his biggest problem right now…it was…

She’s awake, Master. The shadows. Of course. Aren’t you going to talk to her, Master? They pushed him. Always pushy. 

I don’t think she wants to see me, he gave back quietly.

She’s our mate!

And don’t forget we hurt her, he responded tightly.

You hurt her, the shadows sniped at him. We kept her company. She likes us. 

He was pretty sure that if the shadows had eyes, they would be rolling them at him at the moment. 

“Do you want to talk to him?” he couldn’t help but flinch as he heard Feyre’s voice through that closed door. 

“Do I have a choice?” Eira’s voice sounded…broken. He had no other words for it. Nothing but that. Broken. Completely and utterly splintered apart. 

“You’ll always have a choice,” Nesta assured her, her voice hard. “You don’t want to see him now? Then’ll wait until you feel ready for that.”

It was quiet for a moment, and he could hear her breathing…uneven…and then a quiet sniffle. 

“I’ll talk to him.”

It was both the most beautiful and the scariest words he had ever heard in his life. Azriel had half a mind to take off running, but the shadows tightened around his wrist like a manacle. 

Don’t even think about it, they hissed at him. You’ll go in there and you are going to apologise. 

“Are you sure?” Nesta made sure. 

“Yeah.” Her voice was shaking and sounding just as unsure as he was feeling. Neither of them had a clue what exactly to even say…what to…

Nesta was the one opening the door, fixing him with steely eyes. He already knew that there would be hell to pay if he upset Eira. 

But he didn’t even get to think about that closer because the shadows outright dragged him into the room, nearly making him stumble as he entered. 

Eira was sitting up in her bed…wearing a silky dressing gown pulled over her nightgown, hair pulled back into a braid…he had no idea where to stand or sit, but the shadows didn’t have that problem, coming to swarm to her, like…she was their favourite thing in the whole wide world.

They came to curl themselves over her shoulder and then around her hands and she reached out to pet one of them like one would maybe do to a cat. 

“Eira,” he finally breathed out, staring at her. 

The blue of her dressing gown brought out her eyes…somehow making her skin seem even paler…a blush high on her cheeks…dark circles under her eyes…she looked exhausted. Of course, she did. She had been stabbed by a fucking poisoned knife, he berated himself mentally. 

“May…May I sit?” he blurted out, and she nodded, looking everywhere but at him, her bottom lip pulled between her teeth. 

It was…

He managed to cross the room to the chair at her bedside and sit down on it…his shoulders so tight that it hurt. 

She hasn’t thrown you out of the room yet, great job, the shadows sniped at him. 

“I…”

“I…”

They both started at the same time, and she started at him, grey eyes wide. 

“Let me…please,” he blurted out, his heart hammering in his chest. “I am so sorry.”

“You didn’t do anything,” Eira whispered, staring back down on her hands, tightly clenched into her bedding. She waved him off, even when her voice was thick with tears, even when…

“Yes, I did,” he disagreed. “I did a lot of things that weren’t right. And I’ll probably spend the rest of my life regretting them, Eira. I am sorry that I treated you like you didn’t matter…that you felt like you were worthless because of something I did…I am sorry that I never tried to really talk to you or…I am sorry that I let it go this far…and I am sorry because I knew better,” he apologised. It wasn’t enough. 

Nothing that he could say, would be enough. But she still stared at him, wide-eyed, like she couldn’t believe the words that left his mouth. Her surprise poured all over their fledgling little bond. 

“I should have questioned Elain about the earrings, but I didn’t,” he continued. “And I am sorry about the pain that that caused you.”  

“The earrings?” Eira asked, her voice hoarse. 

“Elain told me to buy them. I knew that your ears weren’t pierced but…I listened to her. She told me that you were thinking about getting them pierced and that you wanted them and…I am sorry,” he explained and she swallowed, her delicate throat wobbling. 

“They are beautiful. I always thought so,” Eira whispered. Oh. 

“Rhys showed you…” he stumbled over the words. 

The babies? The shadows whispered excitedly. They were excited about that vision. After their screaming fury had subsided they had danced around him in pure delight at the prospect of babies. 

“Elain’s vision? Yes,” Eira whispered quietly. “I…I understand if you don’t…” her voice shook as she trailed off and he stared at her. 

“If I don’t?” he repeated dumbly. If he didn’t what? What had…

“Want me? I won’t keep you leashed to this bond. You don’t owe me anything,” Eira pressed thickly, a hand coming up to wipe away her tears and he could just stare at her. 

“How can you say that?” he breathed. How could she just wipe away what she had seen and think he wouldn’t…He wouldn’t want his…Wouldn’t…fight hell itself for this? “I saw the future, Eira. I saw our children,” he asked her desperately. “How can you say…How can you say that when you saw that vision? I want that life. I want that garden and I want our daughter and… I want you!”

“You want me because of that mating bond,” Eira whispered. “You…You wouldn’t want me otherwise. How is this fair to you?”

“That’s…” It was preposterous. It was…

“It’s the truth,” Eira whispered. “I am not going to shackle you to me.”

She said that like it was a fate worse than death to be mated to her. And not a gift from the mother herself. 

Like he was going to regret it…and not thank the cauldron for the gift it had given him. 

“Firstly, you wouldn’t be forcing me into anything,” Azriel started his voice even. “Secondly, being mated to you would be my privilege. It would not be a duty, it would be a gift. Thirdly, I was a fucking idiot, Eira. That’s what I was. I let myself be blinded by a pretty face. That’s what happened. Elain may think she is the beautiful one, but you are the kind one. She’s a monster,” he spat out. “I know she is your sister but she… She wanted to keep our children from us,” he whispered helplessly. 

“I know that you are a good person. I know that you were willing to put your life on the line for your nephew… I know that you would protect our children ferociously.”

And that was more important to him than anything else. 

“The mating bond is forcing you to...” She choked out, the tears finally brimming in her eyes and starting to fall. 

Fix this, the shadows demanded sharply.  You hurt her. Fix this now!

“The mating bond works two ways,” he finally brought out. “Is it forcing you?”

“What?” she stared at him, tears still falling and he reached out, with one horrible scarred hand and took her much smaller one in his. 

“I swear to you, Eira…it’s not forcing me,” he promised her. “That’s not how a mating bond works. You could always refuse me,” he promised her. 

The last thing he had expected was for her to snort. 

“If I refuse the mating bond you could go mad, or worse,” she whispered. “You want me to believe that the Night Court would be alright with losing its spymaster and shadowsinger because I refused him his cauldron-given right?” 

He could just stare at her in outright horror. 

“Yes, of course,” he promised her hoarsely. “Eira, that’s not even a question. I would never force you.”

His father had done that to his mother. 

“I was born and raised to be sold off to a man, any man that would be willing to take me because I wasn’t smart enough to find a Prince and I wasn’t pretty enough to marry for love and beauty like Elain. My mother liked to say that I would make a good farmer’s wife,” Eira said, her voice nearly emotionless. “Somewhere along the way, I started hoping that maybe he would actually want me for me. I should have known that that was ridiculous.”

No, it wasn’t ridiculous. It was…

He could understand that. 

“It’s not ridiculous he said quietly. “And the mating bond is not forcing you on me, or doing anything that I do not want…If anything…it only opened my eyes to something I should have seen earlier.” 

He watched his shadows twine around her hands again, obviously trying to comfort her. 

“They were always much smarter than me,” he said quietly. 

We are, they preened aloud so that Eira would hear them too. Master will not force you, and you didn’t force Master into anything. We still exist, too…we wouldn’t let either happen.  They promised her brightly. 

It was…something. 

“Of course, you do,” Eira whispered with a wet little laugh, the sound so beautiful.  “They kept me company sometimes. When I was alone in the evenings,” she said softly…a peace offering of sorts. 

“They do tend to be smarter than me,” he reiterated and she gave him another little laugh. 

And he watched her play with them for just a moment, thinking about what she had just told him. 

Eira had never truly expected to have a choice in the man she was going to marry. Not as a human…and not known as a fae with a snapped mating bond. 

So how…

Still…her humanity had been ripped from her. Taken away. Never to be returned. 

So how…

“If I were human…how would this work?” he asked her, as a plan began to take shape for him. 

She looked at him, startled, the shadows forgotten twirled around her fingertips. 

“What?”

“If I were human and wanted to declare my intentions…if I wanted to court you… what would I do? If I wanted you to give me a chance? To let me grovel on my knees for your forgiveness,” he asked her. 

Her eyes widened. 

“You would ask my father’s permission to court me,” she explained quietly. “But…”

“He’s dead,” he ended the thought and she nodded. 

“Yes,” she whispered.  He was dead. But Nesta wasn’t. 

“So if I were to ask you…would you give me a chance?” he said softly, lifting her hand to his mouth, ghosting a kiss across her knuckles. “We’ll do this your way. However, you want. So you are sure that you are not forcing me into anything and I am not forcing you. Everything at your pace,” he promised and she gave him a shaky smile. 

And then she nodded, nearly shily. 

But that little nod…that little nod…promised him a chance. 

A chance to win her hand…a chance to earn that vision. 

There was a knock at the door, and then Feyre and Nesta returned, a tray filled with food in Feyre’s hands. 

“We brought you breakfast,” Feyre said, her voice filled with forced cheer. “I thought you may be hungry. Did you…two…clear the air?”

Eira nodded, a blush rising on her cheeks and he stood, letting go of her hand with a squeeze. 

“Nesta, I would like to formally ask for your permission to court your sister,” he said, crossing his hands behind his back. 

Surprise registered in Nesta’s eyes as she leaned her head to the side, mustering him. 

“So that’s how you’ll go along with it?” she asked him, something like grudging respect and amusement in her voice. 

He inclined his head. 

“Granted,” Nesta said calmly. “Let’s have a talk about human courting customs. And how I’ll rip you into a thousands little pieces if you break her heart.”

[prentissluvr]

take my breath away — sam winchester

pairing : sam winchester x gn!reader ➖⟢ genre : angst, hurt/comfort, fluff ➖⟢ cw : features dean x reader (platonic), near death experience, suffocation, other canon violence and death, injuries, blood mention, swearing, so much pining, case fic, stereotypical witch, (not) unrequited love, petty fights/arguments, petty sam, kissing, crying, guilt, reader vaguely implied to be shorter than sam, pet names, food mentions, (baby, honey - from sam, darlin'/kiddo from dean), no use of y/n, mentions of end of season 2-4 spoilers, poorly edited, lmk if i missed something! ➖⟢ wc : 13.7K summary : because of an unexpected witch's curse, it's almost too late for you and sam to confess your feelings to each other.

you see sam when it rains. even if he’s sitting right in front of you, you’ll look out the car window and at the rivulets of water rushing down the glass, distorting the image of an empty highway and summer-time trees at dusk, and you’ll see him at seventeen with rain in his hair and running down his cheeks. you’ll think of that smile he gave you as he took your hand and how that look he had in his eyes haunts you worse than any ghost you’ve seen, because you think it could’ve been love. sometimes, you’ll still see glimpses of that sam, but he can be rare. so, you go as far to wonder if maybe he still looks at you like that when your gaze is turned away. 

once, when the windows were down and he was sitting in the back with you for a change, the spring air was nice and clean as it filtered into the sometimes stuffy car, and you felt his multicolor gaze watching you. the look on his face changed when you locked eyes, but for an imagined moment, it seemed that you—your eyes closed against the wind and a light smile on your face that, for once, wasn’t grim—were his everything.

you press your temple to the cold glass of the window, hoping it’ll sober you up a little from your love-drunk state. it’s so goddamn stupid that you’re even thinking about him like this right now, because he’s still sort of mad at you for something rash you did during your last hunt. only you don’t think it was stupid, so you’re half pissed that he won’t let it go. staring at the back of his head and the pretty curled ends of his hair, you sigh quietly. even his shoulders rising up past the seat are handsome. you miss him, and he’s close enough to reach out and touch.

dean’s voice breaks your reverie, and you have to draw in a deep breath. without you even noticing, thinking about sam so hard makes you breathless, almost every time.

“so, why don’t you give us the full rundown, sammy? ‘fore either of you decide to conk out on me,” dean suggests. that means he’s bored, because neither of you will fall asleep for at least another hour or two, and you’ll probably take your turn driving for a few soon.

“sure,” sam agrees, and you hear the shuffle of papers as he digs out a newspaper article and some notes. “three people in the last three weeks all died from suffocation, but with no apparent cause. they just,” sam’s shoulders move a little as he motions vaguely with his hands, “stopped breathing.”

“sounds witchy to me,” dean says, very predictably. you think you could’ve said those exact words at the exact same time if you wanted to tease him about it.

“yeah. what’s weird is that the vics were reported feeling out of breath up to 16 hours before they actually died. says it looks like they slowly died from oxygen deprivation,” sam adds.

“huh. so not hex bags, but another sort of spell?” you wonder aloud, easily talking about the case despite the remainders of tension between you and sam. that’s just how it is, with all of you. even when you’re mad, you still work the case.

“most likely,” sam agrees, “the vics went about their days pretty much normally until they died, so they were in different places as they were dying. seems like a hex bag wouldn’t work unless it was on them the whole time.” you nod, and though he’s not turned around to look at you, you’re sure he knows anyway.

“alright, well. looks like we’ve got our work cut out for us,” dean states, “we’ll be in town in the morning, so we’ll rest up real quick then head to the police station. you two can do your interviewing magic with the vic’s families and hopefully we’ll know more by then.”

this was easily predicted as well. for as long as you’ve been able to pass as an fbi agent, he’s mostly left interviewing the families to you and sam since the two of you tend to be more socially appropriate, and thus, more able to get information without raising alarms. though, the questions you ask never cease to be weird and confusing to the world’s oblivious civilians. of course, dean makes exceptions for pretty girls who he can flirt his way into telling him just about anything. this time, you wish dean would make an exception because it kills you that you and sam aren’t getting along perfectly right now. you know that you’ll work it out soon, probably within the week, but you still hate it.

through the impala’s windows, you watch the sky turn dark and the moon come out. you drive, then fall asleep to the rumble of the engine for a few hours, and wake to see the sky turn light again. keeping it all to yourself, you revel in the sunrise and the way it turns the sky bright and the clouds cotton candy pink around the edges. 

you sink into the sight of sam sleeping in front of you, the early morning light kissing his features and shining through his mousy brown hair. if you lean a little to the left, you can soak up the image of his softly closed eyes, the mole by his nose, and the relaxed curve of his lips. you smile to yourself at the way his hair is all messed up on the side of his head that’s resting against the window until you catch dean’s gaze on you through the rearview mirror. you tear your gaze from both brothers and latch it to the moving countryside out the window. for a while now, you’ve figured there’s no way dean doesn’t see that you’re in love with his brother, but despite such, he doesn’t say much outside of lightheartedly teasing for the both of you. he’s the only one who knows that sam looks at you just like that when you’re the one who’s asleep. he’s the one who sees sam turn, trying to be subtle, just to look at the way the moonlight kisses your lips, wishing it was him.

it’s eight in the morning when you pull up to the first motel you see. you wished sam hadn’t woken up on his own half an hour ago. that way, you could’ve put your hand on his shoulder, shaken him all soft and gentle like you do just for him, and mumbled, “wake up, sammy. we’re here.” then he’d stir, still sweet-looking from sleep and give you a little smile if he’d managed to dream without nightmares before remembering he’s supposed to still be upset with you.

instead, he’s fully awake when he climbs out of the car and pops your door open like he does every time you can’t beat him to it. he doesn’t talk about that habit, because he knows you can take care of it yourself. but if it’s so easy for him to do it as you grab your bag, then he thinks there’s no harm. besides, you’ve never told him off for it, so he does that and just about any other little thing he can get away with for you. and much to your chagrin, he still does it all when he’s pissed at you. he’s too good like that, even if you think he should just get over what happened a few days ago.

the three of you are just about wordless as you check in and pile into the room, all tired and without anything of importance to say. when you catch sight of the couch in the room, you sigh in relief. it would’ve been sam’s turn to share the bed, and you’re not sure you could do that this time around. sometimes it’s hard to breathe when he’s right there, so close after you’ve spent literal hours in the car just plain old pining over him. so, you find an extra sheet in the closet and steal a pillow from dean’s bed, all but collapsing onto the couch with a morning-time “goodnight.”

you don’t care that your feet hang over the edge unless you curl up or mind the way the springs dig into the flesh of your side, all you want is to welcome quick sleep. you’re lucky, and drift off moments later. you barely have time to think about how glad you are that you won’t have one of your nights where you lay awake, staring at the ceiling as you wonder why you would fall in love with someone you can’t have. him and dean are all you have, and no matter how your heart aches to pull sam close, you’d never do anything to jeopordize what you have, here and now. he’s your best friend, that’s all you can ask for in this life, maybe even more than you should.

waking as you normally do to the sounds of sam and dean moving about the motel room, you sit up, a little groggy. you glance at the clock, and you’ve slept for about four hours, just as predicted.

“up ‘n at ‘em,” dean says as he walks past you, giving you a playful clap on the back.

“mhmm,” is all you respond with, swinging your legs off the couch and digging through your bag for your pant suit and toothbrush. dean’s already in his, and sam’s brushing his teeth in the bathroom, still in his tshirt and jeans from yesterday. you don’t even have to say a word for sam to move out of the bathroom as you approach. so he won’t have to wait with a mouth full of tooth-paste and spit for you too long, you change quickly, leaving your clothes on the bathroom floor and opening the door for sam as you begin to brush your own teeth. the two of you maneuver around the cramped space with practiced ease, and when he’s done, he disappears back into the bedroom space without a word. when he’s petty to other people, you think it’s kind of hot. but when he does it to you, it makes you want to ring his neck. 

“asshole,” you mumble to yourself. it’s a classic tango between the two of you; you want him to just get over it, and he wants you to admit that he’s right, or the other way around. and both of you are far too stubborn to be the one to relent first, so you’ll be pissy at each other for a few days until you get bored of it or dean gets too annoyed. all it takes to get past it is you putting your head in his lap after a long day, maybe him resting his head on your shoulder, or the two of you laughing too hard over something together to keep being mad, and maybe just a few mumbled apologies from the both of you. if it’s really big enough for none of those things to work, then you talk about it until things are okay again.

dean drops you off at the first victim’s house, with the promise that the second is close enough to walk to, and the third he’ll join you for once he’s done at the coroner’s office.

sam still won’t talk to you as you wait on the front porch of the house after ringing the doorbell. a young woman opens the door, probably around your own age, and you smile at her before flashing your badge.

“hi. i’m agent green. this is my partner, agent smith. we’re looking for natalie goh?” you greet, comfortable and at ease in your ruse.

“that’s me,” she confirms for you, sounding nice enough. “how can i help you, agents?”

“we would just like to ask a few questions about your late boyfriend, henry,” sam explains, “may we come inside?”

her face falls when he mentions her boyfriend, but she nods her head. “of course, come in.” you follow her to the living room where she motions for you to sit. “let me grab you something to drink,” she offers, disappearing into the next room before you can refuse. “is lemonade okay? my next door neighbor brought me so much when she heard about henry… you know. i can’t possibly drink it all.”

you want to say no, not wanting to make her go through the extra effort, but you accept for both you and sam out of sympathy. she sounds like she needs to keep her hands busy to distract herself. 

she sets the drinks down in front of you, asking as she sits, “what, uhm, what is the fbi’s interest in … in henry?”

“we’re investigating a few odd deaths, like your boyfriend’s, in the area,” sam explains, “now, was there anything unusual the day of or the days leading up to his death?”

“i, um, i don’t– i don’t think so, like what? and, i’m sorry, the police told me he most likely choked on something, how is that strange?” natalie frets. you glance at sam and catch him readjusting his features as a brief look of surprise crosses over his face. it makes sense that that’s what the police told her, but you hadn’t known they’d said so.

“well, natalie, the cause of his death wasn’t entirely clear, and because a few more people have died similarly since, we’re just being extra thorough,” you do your best to placate her before she starts getting too wary of you and sam. “it really could mean nothing, but it’s important for us to cover all of our bases. so, can you tell us if there was anything out of the ordinary? was he acting strange, or did you notice anything unusual around the house, like maybe cold spots or flickering lights?”

she furrows her eyebrows in confusion, “um, no. no, nothing like that. he was just being him, you know, he was such an amazing boyfriend, he made me breakfast that morning even though he said he was tired. i already told this to the police, but he sounded kind of out of breath when we called. that was the last time i talked to him,” her voice begins to tremble, so you reach out a comforting hand and place it atop hers from across the table. “i had to stay late at work, and when i got home, he was … he was gone. i found him in the kitchen.” a tear slips down her cheek, and she moves her hand away from yours to wipe it off. you shift back in your seat and glance at sam, trying to give him the hint to get moving. but, he keeps his gaze trained elsewhere.

you resist the urge to roll your eyes at him, almost ready to pull the “may i use your bathroom” ruse first. it’s almost always sam who does it, and sure enough, he clears his throat to ask.

“would you mind if i used your restroom?”

“oh, sure,” she says, “there’s one by the pantry, through the kitchen and to the left.”

he stands, thanking her a bit awkwardly before disappearing through the doorway to the kitchen.

once he’s gone, you turn your attention back to natalie. “i know that this can be a difficult question, but is there anyone that comes to mind who might want to hurt henry?” absentmindedly, you take a sip of the lemonade after speaking. it’s sweet, but not too sugary. you discover that it’s just about perfect, and you can’t hold back from continually taking a few sips here and there to fight back the heat of the afternoon.

“oh, goodness, no,” she sounds horrified by that prospect, “henry was just the kindest. the best boyfriend i could ask for,” she reiterates. “you think that someone– that someone…?”

“no, no,” you lie, “there would be signs if someone else hurt him, but like i said, we just need to be completely thorough. i’m sorry to even have to ask. now, if you’re okay with it, could you tell me more about henry?”

“yes, yeah, i can do that,” she sighs in relief. it’s clear she wants to talk about him, and probably how much she misses him. you do your best to pay close attention and keep her focused on you and your questions as sam takes forever “in the bathroom.” nothing she says is very useful, it’s all about how loving and kind and just about perfect he was to her. at first, you’re able to listen without a qualm, but the more she rambles about how much she loved him, and maybe even more so how much he loved her, your mind inevitably wanders to sam. sam and your bothersome, bottomless pit of unrequited love.

you kindly cut natalie off and stand when you hear sam’s footsteps approach. “it sounds like henry was a wonderful person. i’m so sorry for your loss.” despite knowing those words don’t mean or do much, you still fill them with as much sincerity as you can. sam is at your side again. “we really appreciate you taking the time to talk to us. we’ll get out of your hair now.”

she shows you to the front door out of courtesy, and you give her one last thank you and kind smile before turning your back and heading to the sidewalk, sam just ahead of you. pushing off the ground a little harder for a few steps, you catch up to him and his long strides, unable to resist the urge to let your gaze wander to his face.

“anything?” you ask, hoping he’ll look at you too.

“nope,” he shakes his head, “no emf, no hexbags, nothing out of the ordinary.” pursing your lips, you let your gaze fall to the sidewalk ahead of you when he doesn’t make eye-contact. “anything on your end?”

“not really. she just rambled about how in love they were. said there was nothing strange about the day, or him, and that he had no enemies. she made him sound like a complete angel.” without you realizing, your lip curls a little in jealousy.

sam just huffs in response, likely bothered by the lack of information. “let’s hope we can find something about the other two.”

you repeat the ruse at the next two homes, and sam’s hopes are dashed, because by the time you, sam, and dean are back at the motel room, just about the only thing of value you bring back is a paper bag of takeout.

spread out in the room, with your respective assortments of food, notes, and computers, you share all the details you can think of to hopefully find a pattern. dean’s on his bed, sam on the couch, and you at the dingy table. the biggest discovery is on dean’s part. according to the coroner, each of the victim’s hearts had inexplicably shrunken and shriveled up. this detail was kept out of the public eye because of how strange it was; it happened after each victim died, as it very clearly did not contribute to the cause of death. that, and the coroner is absolutely stumped by how such a thing could possibly happen.

dean asks if the first two interviews were as fruitless as the last, and you sigh as you explain just how unhelpful they’d been.

“the only common threads are that they were young adults, all in a relationship, and all sounded to be just about the perfect partner,” you report. “i mean, maybe the witch is targeting people in loving relationships? jealousy? or maybe they have some sort of secret we couldn’t dig up just by interviewing. the people we talked to were obviously biased. the first victim’s girlfriend wouldn’t stop talking about how amazing he was, the second’s sister told us she was the sweetest girlfriend out there, and you heard how the third’s husband described them.”

“really?” dean asks. “i mean, yeah, i heard the last guy, but i ran into the first vic’s girlfriend’s sister at the station. she was doing something for her sister there, and she did not seem too impressed with the guy when i asked about him.”

you raise your eyebrows, about to speak again when sam beats you to it.

“so maybe we are looking for secrets. did she say what she wasn’t impressed with?” sam says just about the exact thing you were about to.

dean shrugs. “jus’ said he was sort of a lazy boyfriend. didn’t take good enough care of her or show his love all that much.”

“maybe he was cheating?” you suggest.

“maybe,” dean repeats. “how’s this? you can dig into records and see if you can find any dirt on the vics. sam, you can look for a spell that might’ve caused this, and i’ll scout out a few local places. the officer i was talking to gave me a few places the vics probably spent time at.”

“sure,” you agree, a teasing edge to your voice, “just don’t get too distracted. we all know by ‘local places’ you mean bars. no sex unless you solve the case, and if you solve the case, no sex because you have to report back to us.”

“so no sex?” he plays along, acting all offended.

“nope!” you confirm, giving a firm shake of your head. 

dean’s already on his way out the door as he chimes, “no promises!”

“seriously!” sam calls after him, “we need info!” he groans and shakes his head when the only response he gets is the shutting of the door. when he doesn’t make a snarky comment about dean to you, you clench your jaw.

“sam.” it takes a lot of willpower to sound bothered by him, rather than say his name all sweet.

“mhmm?” he’s purposely keeping his gaze on his computer and his response short.

you roll your eyes, “c’mon, can’t you just get over it? it’s not like you haven’t done stupider things to get a case done.”

since you insist on arguing about it, he lifts his gaze, looking unimpressed. “doesn’t mean you shouldn’t have done it. you almost got dean hurt.”

“and i already apologized for that!” you say indignantly, annoyed that that’s his argument. he knows full well, better than anyone, that dean can deal with a measly vamp, even if he wasn’t expecting it. “it’s not like dean can’t handle himself!”

“you should have at least run the plan by us,” he says. you roll your eyes again.

“it was a spur of the moment decision. unless you wanted me to shout it out, compromise my position, and let every single vamp in that nest know exactly what i was gonna do?” you retort. sam sighs, in the way that you can tell he knows your argument is better than his. so, you still can’t figure out why he’s still upset about it, outside of his usual stubbornness.

“it could’ve gone so wrong,” is all he can come up with, “and you know that. it was stupid, and you could’ve gotten hurt. or worse.” there it is. his voice changed when he said you could’ve gotten hurt.

it’s your turn to sigh, this time because you finally understand. it makes your heart flutter a little, and it makes you even more annoyed. “sam, i can handle myself. you know that. sure, it was kind of stupid, and not a fully thought out plan, but i had to figure out a way to get us out of there! four vamps were about to find you, so i had to distract them. easiest way was with my blood. one vamp found dean, but he handled that just as easy as he always does. i knew you’d have my back, so i let the other three come after me. and look! we’re all here, alive and kicking! this is such a stupid thing for you to get mad over.”

“it’s stupid for me to want you to be more careful?” he counters.

“sam, we have to take risks in this job, we do it all the time. that’s just how this works, what’s different about this time?” you question.

“just–” he presses his forefinger and thumb to the bridge of his nose as he tries to come up with a reason that’s good enough. a reason that’s not “i worry about you,” because that’ll make you even more angry, make it sounds like he doesn’t think you’re a good enough hunter. and he certainly can’t explain that that’s not it, he worries because the worst possible thing to him is you getting hurt. because then you’d ask why and he wouldn’t be able to tell you the truth.

“can’t we just be done with this?” you ask, and the tone of your voice is one he can’t deny. you’re upset, bothered, and tired of his pettiness. more so, you’re just plain old tired. it takes too much effort to stay upset with one another. he lets your question sit in the air for a moment longer.

“yeah,” he relents, voice quiet now. he’s holding back words, touches, feelings. he wants to tell you, “just please don’t put yourself in danger, it scares me. i get so worried. it makes me want to pull you close and protect you even though i know you don’t need it. that’s why i’m upset.” he wants to get up from the couch and set his computer across from yours, sit across from you, just so you’re a little bit closer. he wants to touch you so bad that it sort of hurts.

instead, he has to live for the relieved breath that huffs out through your nose, so quiet it couldn’t quite be counted as a sigh.

“good,” you say, voice matching his own quietness. there’s still tension hanging between you, but soon enough, it’ll dissipate altogether, and tomorrow, you’ll be back to joking with one another, brushing shoulders, and hiding how in love with each other you are. maybe he can even convince you to share his bed tonight. the couch is horridly uncomfortable.

only after you’re convinced that sam won’t be all pissy to you until the next time you find something silly to be angry about do you begin on your research. it’s just as fruitless as everything else today, and after hours searching and drawing banks, you go back to the interviews, jotting down all the details you can remember in case seeing it on paper helps something new and useful jump out at you.

all you get is a dull ringing in your ear, probably courtesy of some old motel appliance. but the ringing grows louder, and in your tired state, it becomes completely bothersome. you press your hand against your left ear—it’s loudest there—and shut your eyes. it’s been an hour or two since sam has shifted to sit across from you to escape the digging springs of the couch, so the movement catches his attention quickly.

“you alright?” he asks, already with a little pinch of his eyebrows in worry.

“yeah, ‘m fine,” you say, realizing the ringing must be the beginning of a headache, since sam can’t seem to hear it. “just a headache,” you explain.

“want me to get you some advil?” he offers.

“no, no that’s alright, i’ve got it,” you deny, but you don’t get up. your head doesn’t really hurt, and the ringing fades as fast as it appeared. you’re about to sigh in relief, when suddenly, you’re sort of breathless, and you gasp to take in air. the moment passes, and you shake your head to yourself a little. it’s weird until you remember that sam’s looking at you with that little furrow to his brow, sweet and concerned, like the last thing he wants is for you to be in pain, even if it’s just a measly headache. that look in his eyes as his gaze focuses on you and only you is certainly enough to take your breath away. it just took you by surprise this time.

“you sure you’re okay?” he asks again, worried by your gasp.

“mhmm,” you hum, trying to keep your tone light and trying not to look too hard into his pretty hazel eyes. “jus’ hurt for a second, but i think the headache’s gone away.”

“okay,” he relents, not fully convinced, but willing to take your word for it and refocus on his computer screen. you turn your own attention back to the papers in front of you, away from his face, so close that it sends your heart into wild palpitations every time your mind wanders from the case and to his presence. in other words, it happens often.

you’re determined to find something, some detail that clicks and leads you to anything important. but after another unfocused hour, your eyelids are heavy, almost as much as your head as you wish to just sink down and fall asleep right there on that little table.

“you should get some sleep,” sam says, no stranger to the way you look when you should quit being stubborn and just go to bed. and normally, you’d resist, but the idea of sleep, of closing your eyes and letting your breath even out, slow down, is far too inviting.

so, you relent, and close your laptop. “yeah,” you say as you shuffle the sheets of paper together and set them on a neat pile on top of your computer.

“take the bed, too,” he insists, “you look exhausted.”

“mm, glad to hear it,” you joke halfheartedly, “but, no, sam, that couch is too small for you. it’s small for me, even.”

“and it’s seriously uncomfortable,” he adds.

“so we’ll share. i’ll leave space for you. you should come to bed soon, too. ‘s not like we should wait up for dean,” you snicker. sam rolls his eyes, but easily agrees with your conclusion. as you settle into the covers of the motel bed, you consider waiting up for him so you can feel the dip of the bed, then the warmth that radiates off him as he lays beside you. you want to feel the brush of his long arms, the heel of his foot or nudge of his toe, sometimes you’re treated with the broad expanse of his back. but sleep claims you before you can even make the attempt.

sam’s big hand on your shoulder brings you back into consciousness, and you breathe in long and hard since it seems like you can’t quite fill your lungs. then your eyes flutter open, and sam’s figure is hovering over yours, his hand lingering, then slipping away as he sees you wake. he doesn’t stand fully upright yet, unsure if he should say something or not.

he keeps his voice low, not wanting to alert dean, who’s changing in the bathroom. “are you feeling fine?”

groggy as you sit up, you peek at the clock. 8:43. you slept through the 8:30 alarm. odd.

“uh, yeah, i’m fine,” you answer, voice gravelly from the morning’s first use, “why?”

sam shifts to sit on the bedside opposite you. “nothing just… i don’t know, you were just breathing really light last night. i could barely even tell you were breathing at some points and normally you breathe pretty noticeably while you sleep. and, you know, given this case, i just wanted to check.”

sam notices the way you breathe when you sleep. that’s just about all you can take away from his words. sam pays enough attention to the way you breathe when you sleep to know when your breathing is different. sam thinks about the way that you breathe. maybe that’d be creepy from anyone else, but you think about the way he breathes too. the way it lulls you to sleep when he’s close, the way it catches when he’s surprised, or the way it changes when he’s about to laugh.

then you remember he’s said something you’re supposed to address. “it’s nothing, sam. i feel totally fine, just tired from working back to back cases, is all.” you say this because you’re sure of it; you do feel just fine. and sam makes you breathless all the time, so there's nothing out of the ordinary there.

“are you sure?” he presses, “you slept straight through the alarm, like a rock.”

“i’m sure,” you say.

“okay,” you can immediately tell that he’s not entirely convinced as he says this, “but if anything happens or changes or you feel like you’re out of breath, you promise to tell me or dean?”

“of course.” you may not want to be fussed over, but you certainly don’t want to go out in such a stupid, horrible way. “i promise,” you add, just for his sake. dean’s phone starts ringing, and he appears out of the bathroom.

“either way, let’s get this case done, and quick,” sam insists.

“don’t have to tell me twice,” you agree, throwing off the covers to get ready for the day.

dean’s voice keeps you from lingering by sam’s side. “hey, crazy kids, let’s hurry it up. just got off the phone with the sheriff, there was another death last night.”

“dammit,” you and sam swear in unison. 

on the way to the scene, dean updates you on his findings from last night. he was just as unsuccessful as you in finding major dirt on any of the victims, though he recieved similar testimonials to the sister’s about the first, henry. otherwise, he was able to find the witch’s possible hunting ground in a bar where all three victims have been seen with their partners. sam reports that he’s getting close to finding the right spell after discovering a few similar ones. 

when you reach the victim’s house, sam and dean check in with the police officers, and you immediately head to interview whoever found the victim’s body. he’s obviously distraught, and probably still in shock from losing his boyfriend. you do your best to stay gentle, kind, and understanding as you lead him through the interview, interrupting your questions for the occasional “he sounds like he was a wonderful partner,” or other such comforting phrase as the man, tyler, rambles about how great he was, how guilty he feels, and just about nothing helpful except for adding another data point to the one pattern you have.

“thank you for your help,” you say, giving him a tight lipped smile before standing and drifting over to sam on instinct as you mull over the information you recieved. he’s poking around in the kitchen, subtly searching for anything abnormal and most likely coming up empty as this house follows the unhelpful trend of the rest.

“anything?” he asks once you’re by his side.

you shake your head, “just the madly in love bit. everything was pretty much the same as the other vics as well.” sam sighs like he expected that answer.

“i think we should look more into the first victim,” he suggests, echoing the same thought that you had. “maybe interview natalie again, see if she admits something different about henry if we push it a little.”

“i agree, though i’d say let’s hold off on interviewing her again unless we can’t find the spell soon. even if she admits that he wasn’t as good to her as she said before, i’m not sure how much good that does in comparison to the spell. if you keep looking into that, i’ll check henry’s records more thoroughly. i looked into him less last night since we already had something on him.” you revise the plan a bit, and sam nods in agreement, making that sort of awkward face with his lips pursed and eyebrows raised that he does when someone without the knowledge you have comes in hearing range. you glance behind you to see the figure of a police officer through the kitchen doorway and are fast to quit all talk of spells and witches to avoid sounding insane.

“dean can scout out the bar again to see if this most recent couple frequented there as well,” sam puts the last piece in place for your plan, just as you imagined it. once it seems like there’s nothing left to glean from the house, you grab dean and head out back to the car. the brothers walk a bit ahead of you as sam fills dean in on the plan.

“excuse me! agent,” a voice calls from behind you. the three of you turn, and you wave the two of them away to indicate that you’ll deal with it.

“yes?” you respond as an officer approaches.

“your partner asked for the full coroner’s reports on paper from the first three victims,” she says, holding out a file as she reaches you.

“ah! right. thank you, officer.” you give her a polite smile and take the papers before turning away. sam and dean have made it to the impala, parked a bit away due to the police cars surrounding the house. you jog at a casual pace to catch up, but falter about halfway there as your breaths turn all shuddery and quick. you stop, trying to right yourself and desperate to brush this off, but you just keep gulping in breaths, feeling like you’ve run a mile at top speed without warming up. 

shit. shit, shit, shit, is all you can think. fuck.

as you stare at the car, dean’s already in the front seat and sam is pulling the passenger’s door open, and you will with all your might that neither of them will turn to look for you. you don’t want them to catch you like this. instead, you want to explain it to them, calm and collected and full of breath because your body’s beginning to readjust and you should be fine to walk over in moments and dammit– sam’s twisted around to find you, his hands resting on the top of the car and the door. the second he catches sight of you, just standing there with your chest heaving up and down, he’s launched himself away from the car and towards you. he calls your name, worry flooding his voice. you had tried to recompose yourself the second you saw his head turning, but it was too late, and now he’s jogging your way.

sam is in front of you in moments, his hands on your shoulders and his face fallen in a deep frown.

“you’re not okay, are you?”

“i– i’m–,” you can’t think of what to say, and though your breath is returning to normal, you can’t deny him. “let’s just get in the car. please.” 

his jaw clenches and his eyes flick all over you, from the top of your head to the point of your shoes like he always looks at you when he thinks you might be hurt. he’s taking you in, quick and almost panicked so he can fix it right away. he takes a steadying breath because he’s so ovewrought he can barely think. “fine,” he says, voice carefully hushed. if he doesn’t control it, he might start shouting, panicking even. sam can’t bear to leave you untouched now, so he leaves a hand splayed on your shoulder blade as you finish the short walk to the car. he opens the back door and climbs right in, completely foregoing his spot in the passenger’s seat. you realize he wants to sit in the back with you, and it would’ve been sweet if it wasn’t because you’re probably dying.

jaw clenched, you follow him in, and dean’s already twisted around in his seat, gaze shifting between the two of you to try and read what just happened.

“what was that all about?” he questions, eyebrows raised. you put a hand on sam’s knee to stop him from telling dean.

“the witch got me,” you drop the news without much hesitation, more focused on getting your two cents in before either of them start grilling you with questions and making stupid suggestions to try and fix it, “it’s gotta be someone we met or passed by yesterday. one of the people we interviewed or someone from the diner we had lunch at; these types of spells normally require the victim’s dna. and before either of you do anything stupid or crazy, we’re gonna stick with the same plan. dean, you can drop us at the motel so we can find the spell and reversal, and you find out what you can at the bar. got it?”

dean looks at you like you’re crazy, and you ignore sam’s gaze altogether. 

“got it?” dean repeats back to you, incredulous, “not so much, kid, i’m gonna need you to explain this to me a little better. what do you mean the witch got you? you mean you’re gonna stop breathing in some odd hours that might not be enough time for us to find and gank this witch?”

“yes, dean, that’s what i mean. try to keep up,” you turn a little mean as your frustration takes over in order to compensate for your growing fear. “and i’m not going to die, so quit being so pessimistic. we’ll find the witch, as long as we stay focused on the plan. unless you have a faster way, which i’d be happy to abide by.” neither have a good enough retort to that, so you continue, “can we go now? we might not have that much time.”

with much effort, dean turns back in his seat and starts the engine. his voice is low when he asks, “what do you mean by that?”

“well, i don’t know exactly when this whole thing started!” you answer as he pulls into the street, “sam said my breathing wasn’t totally normal last night. if that means anything, well, i went to bed early last night, around eleven. that could mean it’s been at least, i don’t know,” you check the time, “eleven hours. which gives us five, minimum.” you think you can physically feel sam tense up next to you.

“five hours?” sam repeats, his voice taut, like he’s holding back anger, fear, maybe more. “and were there any times before that you felt out of breath?” 

you think back to yesterday. sure, every time i looked at you, isn’t quite an answer that you can give. “um, i’m not sure,” you say, sounding more cryptic than casual, as you had meant. you see dean’s eyebrow raise through the rearview mirror.

“you’re not sure?” dean asks, unbelieving. the two brothers are starting to sound like a broken record as they repeat every other thing you say back to you.

“yeah. nothing comes to mind,” you say, more firmly this time.

sam sighs. “you can’t seriously think it’s a good idea to hide that sort of thing from us if it happened. this is serious.”

you scoff, “oh, really? i wasn’t aware, it’s not like it’s my life on the line, or anything like that.”

“alright, let’s not get pissy,” dean intervenes.

“pissy?” you scoff again, “right, because this is serious and i’m apparently unaware of that.”

dean says your name, voice a little chiding as he tries to disperse some of the tension that’s building within the small space of the car. “let’s focus on the case here. sam is right, we need to know everything you do. was there anything else weird you noticed last night?”

“i don’t know!” you exclaim before calming down a bit and taking a deep breath. “i had this ringing in my ears for a minute, around ten. i thought it was a headache. and … i did feel breathless, but just for a second. i thought it was … something else.”

“why didn’t you say anything?” sam asks, immediately remembering this. you had pressed your hand to your ear. he believed you when you said it was a headache, but he should have known better. you’re far more likely to rub your temples when you feel a headache coming on.

“i thought it was something else,” you repeat.

“like what?” he presses.

“like–” you hesitate, “like nothing. just nothing, i don’t know.”

dean interrupts again to get things back on track, “so that could mean four hours, not five.” you see sam’s jaw clenching out of the corner of your eye.

“yeah,” you confirm, hoping your voice doesn’t reveal how anxious you really are.

“my question is why just you?” dean asks. “i’d normally figure it’s because they suspect you to be a hunter, but if they were able to get your dna, they probably had access to ours, too. the witch think you’re madly in love with sammy or somethin’?”

you fluster at that, mind scrambling, why in the goddamn hell would dean say that? does he want me dead faster? “uhm, uh,” you laugh a little, completely awkward about it, “why would they think that? we were clearly, you know, in a working relationship, not a, hah– romantic,” you clear your throat, “relationship. i’m sure it’s just the hunter thing, maybe they couldn’t get your dna… or they thought i was more worth killing,” you attempt at a joking insult, but you’re still sort of jerking through your words and reeling from someone saying “you’re madly in love with sammy” out loud.

to your left, sam looks almost as flustered as you feel, which brings you an ounce of comfort.

“whatever you say,” dean shrugs.

when you get back to the hotel, sam’s practically running inside to pull out his laptop, and dean speeds away the second the car doors close behind the two of you. both of you are fidgety and antsy as you conduct your research in silence. you think sam’s even more nervous than you, with his leg bouncing and teeth chewing away at his lower lip. you’re not sure if you should comfort him, or let him be in favor of getting the research done. it doesn’t take too long for him to find the original spell, and as he tells you about it, some nervousness dissipates when the both of you get back into the groove of a normal hunt, trying to pretend that this time, the consequences aren’t as personal as they could ever get.

you can’t find any dirt on henry in any records, so you focus on staff from the bar and diner from yesterday to see if there’s any overlap that could have gotten dna from both you and all the other four victims. something else entirely jumps out at you as you check employment records.

“sam, it’s natalie,” you blurt out into the silence of the room. he raises his eyebrows, and you explain before he can even ask. “she works at the bar. and i drank some of that lemonade she gave us. she had easy access to everyone’s dna, and henry was the only deviation from the pattern.”

sam stands as you explain, “okay, let’s go.”

“no, let’s call dean and finish finding the reversal spell. i’d like to have a backup plan, if that’s alright.” sam purses his lips, looking like he wants to argue. you propose something more rational than his idea, “we’ll call dean and let him know. he can go to her house and make sure she’s the real deal before we go, too.”

“fine,” sam agrees, pulling out his phone, just as it begins to ring. he answers it and puts it on speaker, “dean, it’s natalie.”

“yeah, i know. that’s what i was about to tell you, the idiots from last night didn’t bother to mention it,” he complains. “i’m headed to her house right now.” to prove it, you hear the car door open and close. “how’s it going on your end?”

“we found the spell, we’re looking for the reversal right now,” you answer. “call us if you need help.”

“mm, you just take care o’ yourself, alright? i’ll call you back.” after that, all you get is the hang-up tone. 

a bit later, your concentration is interrupted by the pinging of sam’s phone. you watch him as he checks the messages, then looks up at you with a poorly hidden scowl.

“she wasn’t at her house,” he explains, “dean’s headed to her sister’s to look for her there. but it’s definitely her, he found a secret room full of, y’know, as he’d say, ‘witchy stuff.’”

you try to hide your disappointment and the uneven rise and fall of your chest. sam’s stayed mostly focused on the research, but every now and then, you feel him looking you over, brow furrowed and eyes concerned as he checks for anything abnormal. he’s looking at you like that now.

“damn,” is all you manage in response while still trying to stay casual about it.

“how are you feeling?” he asks. you expected the question, but you still don’t want to answer. you’re about to tell him you’re fine, since you’re not really running out of breath yet, until he speaks again before you can, “and don’t say ‘fine.’”

“i am fine,” you insist immediately, “just extra tired from getting a little less oxygen than normal. but nothing crazy. i can still focus on this research and i can still hold a weapon.” you demonstrate by grabbing one of the knives you keep strapped to your thigh and twirling it a little in your hand. sam’s face spells out the word “really?”

“just– tell me if it gets worse. please,” he’s just about begging, and with a bit of puppy dog eye action, you’re crumbling.

“okay, sam,” you relent, letting your voice go soft. he’s really scared for you, and it makes you feel just about every little thing. you want to comfort him, reassure that you’ll be okay, even when you’re terrified for yourself. you want him to comfort you, for that exact reason, and you want to hold his hand. maybe you can be scared together, a little closer than you are now. you want to kiss him, because what if this is the only chance you get? that thought horrifies you. then you wonder if it’s for the best. maybe you should die as his best friend, because dying as his anything is better than scaring him away first. it’s hard to concentrate on the research, but it’s not hard to find the motivation. the hope is to avoid death completely.

finally, you find it.

“i got it, sam!” you’re excited, then a bit breathless after pushing so much air out of your lungs so fast. the breath you take in is sort of shuddering, and it makes sam frown. he doesn’t even try to hide how worried he is. his face is nothing but unadulterated concern and care and … and something else before that expression melts away and he’s focusing on the computer screen that you tilted towards him. the crease between his brows only grows as his eyes flit down the list of ingredients.

“we don’t have the half of these ingredients,” he worries.

“no,” you admit, “but there’s a witch in town who’s away from home who might.”

to get there, sam doesn’t hesitate to steal a car from the motel parking lot, and this time you can’t even argue given the fact that you’re pretty sure you have less than two hours to live at this point. you promised sam you’d tell him if it got worse, but as it does, you want to say something less and less.

sam picks the lock of the door, entering the house carefully with you right behind. weapons drawn, you walk the route that dean gave you to the hidden room, the door in the wall of the hallway left open for you by dean.

it’s much darker than the rest of the house from the lack of windows and bright lights. this, paired with the eerie assortment of basic herbs to what might be jars of blood, makes it look like natalie really leaned into the witchy aesthetic, which you’d find understandable if she weren’t using her magic to kill people.

sam walks faster than you know is wise to match paces with, so you follow behind him slowly as he rushes to set the computer with the list of ingredients on the table in the center of the room abd begin the spell. you’re a split second too late to shout in warning when you see a figure emerge from behind a shelf of herbs.

sam whirls around at your cry, gun raised, only to be hit on the side of the head, hard, by a wooden bat in natalie’s hand. he crumples to the ground despite his size, and without batting an eye, your knife is flying through the air, straight for the spot between natalie’s shoulder blades. but at the last second, she spins around, and with a flick of her hand, the knife falls to the ground. you reach for your gun, but through your hindered breathing, you’re slow. she has no trouble launching the bat at you at an unnatural speed. the wood slams into your chest, sending you sprawling and gasping in your weakened state. you’re fighting for breath so hard that you can barely register her hauling you up and tying your hands behind your back, then doing the same to sam. somehow, she’s able to get his weight on a chair and tie him to the wobbly piece of furniture. then, it’s your turn, and by the time you come back to your senses, breathing far more labored than before, you’re tied to a chair, back to back with sam.

natalie gives you a horrid smile as she tugs at a knot to tighten it.

“well, isn’t this fortuitous! such a lovely surprise for you two to visit me,” she chimes, just as you feel sam stirring behind you. his head lolls back, brushing against your own. you completely ignore her in favor of calling his name. a rumbling groan escapes his lips as he stumbles back into consciousness.

“that’s right!” natalie grins, “it’ll be much better with pretty boy awake.” she walks around you, and you hear a smacking sound that you presume to be her hitting his cheeks to wake him further.

“don’t touch him,” you practically growl. it sounds far less intimidating than you hoped in your breathless voice. she laughs and sam lets out an audible huff of air as he wakes.

“there he is,” natalie grins. “now i’ve got two love birds at my mercy! much better than i could have imagined. you know, i couldn’t watch the deaths of the others, so this is far more exciting. i thought i’d have to miss yours, too!” she motions to you. “but now i get to watch you die, watch pretty boy watch you die, and then kill him, too! lovely isn’t it? i’ve never had such luck, thank you idiots for bringing it to me.”

“you’re not killing anyone today,” sam retorts, anger filling his voice. with a bit of an uncomfortable stretch, you twist your fingers around to grab a hold of his. it’s awkward, but you take advantage of her horrible ramblings to keep her distracted and try to guide sam’s hands to the tiny blade attached to the seam of your jacket sleeve.

“i’m not?” she laughs, “mmm, you don’t really seem like you’re in the position to determine that, pretty boy.” you hate her calling him that. “well, love will do that to a person. makes you easy targets, blinds you. you two were just too easy, so busy making eyes at each other to pay any proper attention to me.” you conclude she’s crazy, rambling on about what made her angry enough to kill. you’re sure she caught you making eyes at him, but she’s crazy talking like he’s visibly in love with you too. immediately catching on to your plan, sam’s hands are fumbling around with your jacket sleeve, trying to get the knife unstuck so it can slip down and into your hands.

“it’s so goddamn irritating when people are just so in love with each other. makes me want to hurl,” she complains.

“sounds to me like you’re just jealous your boyfriend didn’t treat you like that,” you prod at her weak spot. she whirls on you, grabbing the front of your jacket and yanking you towards her.

“so i killed him. and everything he was supposed to be,” she hisses. “and know i’m going to kill you two pining idiots. you know, you don’t have very long,” she feigns sympathy in the condescending tone of her voice. when she slams you back against the chair, it takes your breath away for a frighteningly long time. sam’s so worried, calling your name out over and over again as you choke on nothing, that he almost doesn’t realize that the movement also helped dislodge the knife and let it fall into your hands. it slices a thin line down your arm, but you couldn’t care less as you begin to work on cutting through his bonds.

“oh, shut up, lover boy,” natalie growls, hating the way he says your name with so much care as she stays leaning over you, a sick smile on her face. why the hell is she calling him lover boy? you know that’s not what you should be so worried about in this moment, but it’s the one thing that you can think about. “i’m busy watching your little lover die! i think you’ll look so good crying over them, won’t you?”

when sam’s ties snap, he stays in place, holding onto the rope so it doesn’t drop to the ground and alert her. he just shimmies the knife from your hand to his and begins working on your own ties. through it all, he pretends to struggle helplessly, cursing at her wildly.

natalie rolls her eyes, then stands straight. “if you don’t shut it, i’m going to make you,” she snarls, stalking around to stand in front of sam. in an instant, he brings the knife to the rope binding him to the chair, snapping it and lunging towards her. judging from the choked cry that escapes her throat, sam’s already plunged the knife into her neck. you hear him grunt, then the sound of her body hits the floor before he’s turned back to you, quickly freeing you all the way and pulling you to your feet. he’s halfway to the door with his hand gripping yours when you tug back.

“wait… sam, wait!” you gasp, and he’s immediately face to face with you, sweet eyes looking you up and down with confusion and worry. “it’s not– it didn’t work. the spell, we need to do the spell.”

“what do you mean? that’s impossible, killing the witch who performed the spell always–,” he fully takes you in for the first time. your chest is still heaving, your breath rattling, and it’s undeniably getting worse by the minute. “okay, okay. just sit down.” he guides you back to a chair, turning it to face the table so he can keep an eye on you as he works. this time, you’re having a hard time hiding the fear from your eyes, and he reads that loud and clear. he lets you have his strong hands cupping your face for just a moment. “you’re gonna be fine. i’m gonna fix this.” he says it with such conviction that you’d do anything to believe him. then his warm touch is gone, and you’re again hit with the reality that it’s getting harder and harder to breathe, to get any satisfactory amount of air.

your eyes follow him desperately as he rushes about the area, checking and rechecking the spell as he adds ingredients to a small cup he finds. his movements become more and more panicked by the second as he notices your breathing getting worse, more fluttery and gulping. sam’s muttering to himself as he works, too scared to look at your face for too long. unable to find one of the ingredients, he curses loudly as he searches, shoving a whole rack of ingredients to the ground. glass shatters and the metal rack clangs against the ground, the sound echoing throughout the space.

flinching at the sound, you cry out his name, struggling to speak, “you have… you have to.. to calm .. calm down.”

“i can’t!” he practically shouts, and you think you’ve never seen him this distraught, this helpless before.

“why?” is all you can manage between gasps.

“because you’re dying! and i can’t let you die, i won’t.” he’s still rummaging through ingredients as he speaks. he’s still refusing to look at you.

you want him to say it, the truth, so you repeat the question, “why?” you wheeze out, desperate to hear it in case he can’t finish the spell on time.

“because i love you!” he’s no longer shouting when he says it. his voice is all desperation and helplessness and utter sincerity, said like all he needs in the world is for you to understand that. you’re not sure if the shuddering breath you let out could count as a sigh of relief, but it’s the closest you’ll ever get.

you take him in. tears running down his cheeks, lips pursed and eyebrows pinched like he’s holding back from crying out. he’s pretty like that, you think. maybe that’s a cruel thought, but you love him too much to think otherwise. he’s always pretty; when he’s mad at you, when he’s bleeding, when he’s stitching himself up, when he’s biting his lip in concentration. when he talks about something that makes him excited or when he’s crying. when he’s oblivious of the way you look at him while he sleeps, and when he makes you love him so hard that it hurts worse than anything a monster could do to you.

you’re lightheaded, and taking in so little air that you can’t say it back. all you want to do is say it back. you slide out of the chair and onto your hands and knees, shaking so hard you can barely hold yourself up. from the ground, you can hear sam, moving around, letting jars fall and shatter to the ground, crying.

when you collapse to the floor, writhing and gasping for any semblance of air, sam snaps. he can’t find the goddamn rosemary, such a simple and common herb, even for a normal kitchen, especially compared to all the other ingredients, but he knows it’s essential for its protection, purification, and healing properties. he can’t give up, he can’t let you die, but you’re writhing on the ground and crying inbetween gasps and all he wants is to hold you close, brush your tears away and tell you it’ll be alright. he barely catches the sound of your voice over the noise of his searching.

“please…”

“what? what is it, honey?” he asks through tears, unable to look at you as his eyes scan a new shelf for the basic pine-needle shape of the leaves, maybe even the little purple flowers to help it stand out.

“hold me,” you wheeze, afraid of dying alone on the stone cold floor as you feel your consciousness slipping through your fingertips like the sand of an hourglass. sam feels like he’s had his heart cleaved in two by a blunt ax coated in the world’s most vile poison.

he chokes on a sob before he can speak again, “i can’t. i’m so sorry, baby, i can't. i just need the rosemary, it’s so close, please, baby.” he’s not sure who he’s begging to. you, to stay alive? god, to intervene? himself, to finish the spell on time? anything and anyone who will listen, most likely. you don’t have the energy to ask him to hold you again.

that moment of silence is the most horrible of them all, then the door swings open with a bang, letting the bright lights from the rest of the house flood into the dark space. dean’s eyes zero in on you on the floor, grasping helplessly at your throat, and he’s on his knees by your side in a second.

he scoops you up in his arms and to his chest. “hey. hey, hey, hey. it’s okay,” he comforts, his eyes wet because he doesn’t know if he believes himself, given your state. “sam’s gonna fix it, darlin’. you’re gonna be just fine.” he’s holding you too tight to wipe away the tears that helplessly stream down your face and he clings to the fact that your hand is gripping his wrist tight.

“dean, rosemary!” sam barks. dean looks up from you, eyes scanning the mess around you; natalie’s dead body and the blood from her wound seeping slowly over the floor, the shattered glass and clutter of dried herbs along with other magical ingredients. sam realizes dean probably won’t recognize it on his own. “dried bundle, purple flowers, thin leaves,” he instructs as best as he can as he continues his own search. dean feels awful as he lets you fall back to the ground and your weak hands fingers scrape at his arms, but he thinks he sees it, rolled far away and invisible unless you’re crouched to the ground. he scrambles across the floor to grab it and tosses it to sam, who barely manages to catch it with his shaking hands.

sam rips at it with thick, clumsy fingers, crushing the brittle leaves between the pads of his forefinger and thumb into the mixture. he’s silently praying it’s enough as he mixes it in, letting a few drops slosh over the side of the cup in his rush. dean’s back with you, holding you up in a sitting position for sam with a hand smoothing up and down your arm in his best effort of a comforting gesture. he presses a kiss to your temple as sam drops down in front of you. sam uses one large hand to cup the side of your face, and the other to bring the cup to your lips. for a moment, he’s terrified beyond comprehension when the first bit of the liquid he pours into your mouth just dribbles right back out and down your chin.

you’ve gone nearly completely still; your eyes are barely open and your breathing so shallow that only dean knows you’re still inhaling because he’s got you so close.

“please,” sam begs, whispering your name with such conviction, such desperation, that it pulls you away from the claws of unconsciousness just enough to get you to swallow weakly. sam tilts the cup up, just a bit more, and the rim knocks against your bottom teeth as more foul tasting liquid seeps into your mouth. you swallow again, then gag a little when he pours too much for you to handle in your current state. sam’s hopeful when half the mixture is down your throat and he tilts the cup for you again, but the liquid falls down your chin this time, and your eyes are closed. you’ve gone totally still in dean’s arms.

“no, no, no, wake up. c’mon, we’re almost there. you gotta wake up,” sam begs again, more tears spilling onto his cheeks after his hope is stolen away, more cruelly than ever. “please, please, please, honey. please wake up.” his voice breaks as he calls out your name again, setting the cup on the floor and taking you from dean to pull you into his own arms. dean lets him, swallowing hard and not daring to move an inch as he takes in the sight, maybe just about the most horrible thing he’s seen in his fucked up life. that’s the second family member he’s had die in his arms, and the first is holding your limp body as he shakes, cries, and begs, beyond distraught as he denies the fact that he couldn’t save you. dean curses his life. he wishes it was him, thinks about the fact that he’s always too late to make a difference. he’s ready to sell his soul again, ready to go to hell and back.

you’re dead weight against sam’s chest, your clammy forehead and tear-sticky cheeks pressed against the sweaty skin of his neck. he gathers you closer, his hand tugging at your jacket and rubbing up and down your back, begging for you to wake up.

dean’s about to interrupt sam’s mourning to tell him he’s gonna look for the nearest crossroads, that all sam needs to do is keep your body safe. then you shudder in sam’s arms and he’s calling your name again, far beyond desperate that you’ll hear him. he says your name like a prayer, with so much reverence, far more than he could ever muster up for the god he wants to believe in.

you take in a sharp breath, your eyes fly open, and you’re gasping for air, grasping at sam’s sturdy arms like you’ve almost just drowned. sam just about sobs in relief, comforting you through his own tears, “oh, you’re okay, honey, you’re alright. i’ve got you. just breathe, baby, just breathe, that's all you gotta do.” his voice instantly calms you, and you wrap your shaky arms around his neck to show him you understand. he’s got you. he buries his face into your neck, trying not to hold you too tight for fear of restricting your breathing. you feel the wetness of his tears on you, warm and so tired. you don’t want him to cry. he loves you.

his hands smooth up and down your back, helping you set a pace to calm down your erratic breathing as you let a fresh wave of tears fall on his hot skin. they’re tears of relief, most of all. of exhaustion and leftover fear, and oh, glory, tears because he loves you. he said it, and now he can’t take it back because you love him far too much for that.

“sammy,” you breathe out. he just holds you tighter. “don’t cry, sam. it’s okay. i’m okay.” you slip your fingers into his hair, your hand so gentle as you run it through his pretty locks. you just want to comfort him, take away all the fear from the last few hours that he's been holding onto, letting pile up and up into an unmanageable, unruly, ugly tower. you suppose him crying so much is him letting the tower topple over, almost as simple as a toddler’s chubby, innocent hands to a wooden block castle. but it still tugs at your heart, pulls at you so hard because you hate to hear him cry, feel him shake and stiffen up around you, too scared to let you go for even a second. “i’m okay,” you repeat, voice fragile from the whispering brush of death’s fingers to your palm, but you try to make it strong and confident for him, “you saved me, sammy, i’m alright. it’s alright. it’s over. you don’t need to worry anymore.” 

you think he relaxes just a touch at your words, but he doesn’t move an inch from his spot on the ground, or say a thing to interrupt the sound of your breathing. all he does is cradle you close, one hand to your back so he can feel it shift when you take in or let out air, and the other splayed from the curve of your neck, up to the base of your head. without moving too much, he presses a long kiss to the ambiguous space above your ear. that’s not enough, so he tilts his head more to press his lips to the skin of your forehead.

dean hates to break the silent reverence between the two of you, and it means more than the world, the whole goddamn universe or anything else he could ever think of, to see this instead of you dead in sam’s arms. you might be the love of sam’s life, but that just makes dean all the more protective of you. to dean, you’re family, and you have been for a long time. that’s why he needs to get the two of you away from here, before anyone finds you and the dead body.

“sam,” dean interrupts, voice somehow both gentle and extra gruff, “we gotta go.” he knows sam can get you up on his own, but he still places a firm hand on your elbow as the two of you stand. he doesn’t want to let his hand fall away from you, but he does anyway. on the way out and to the car, you’re tucked safe into sam’s side, and dean’s got his gun in hand, ready to protect the both of you need be.

dean expects it when sam climbs in the backseat with you, just thankful to get away from the damned house and back to the motel. the ride is mostly silent, save the rumble of the engine, and sam’s hand stays securely wrapped around yours, itching to pull you even closer. you yawn and sam tugs at your hand, then drops his gaze to his lap when you look at him, offering to let you lie there. you can’t resist, because historically, your head in his lap has been heaven, and you figure that this time, after having heard him say “i love you,” it’ll be something better than heaven, something undiscovered and infinitely more precious than all the gold and silver in the world. so you drop your head to his thigh, and his hands are immediately on you. you’ve got the warmth of his palms on your head and your shoulder. your own hand is on his knee, taking in the feel of his time-worn jeans, and the muscle, sinew, and bone underneath.

you fall asleep, just 10 minutes from the motel, and sam doesn’t want to wake you, but you always do anytime he tries to carry you to bed.

he calls your name, all tenderness and sweet as he rubs your shoulder. you stir easily, only having fallen into a light slumber. the sigh you let out when you sit up is soft, and sam thinks it’s cute. then he thinks about the fact that, when you both settle down, he won’t have to hold that thought back. “you’re cute,” he can say, and make you both a little flustered before pressing a kiss to your lips. until then, he’s getting out of the car with you, only letting his hands stray from you when dean pulls you into a hug, right then and there. he holds you tight, showing you how scared he was too, so you squeeze back with extra care.

“don’t scare us like that again, kiddo. you got it?” he mumbles into the embrace. 

you nod, “i got it.” he lingers for a moment, then presses a quick kiss to the side of your head before parting and letting sam take over again.

he’s got a hand stuck to your back on the way into the room, all the way to the bed you shared last night. you don’t hesitate to peel off your dirty shirt and go to put on a new one, but sam’s already holding one out to you. dean disappears into the bathroom, despite not wanting to let you out of his sight.

you tug on the shirt, then collapse into bed, taking sam with you.

“you stink,” you complain lightheartedly, looking at him with honey-sweet love in your eyes. he wants to joke back, but he’s not quite there yet.

“i’ll shower after dean, if you want,” he offers, nothing but sincere. you smile at him, his nose inches from yours.

“but then you’d have to get up,” you say.

“sure, but if that’s what you want,” he repeats. he’d do anything for you, you think.

you shake your head. “that’s not what i want. i don’t want you to go. but i also want to fall asleep in your arms, and it sucks that you smell like blood, sweat, and nasty potions.”

“so what do i do, baby?” he asks, voice light, but you think he really means it. you melt at the pet name.

“hmmm,” you consider, truly not sure. you’re all quick in the shower after years of experience in motel bathrooms, but that still feels like such a long time to be away from him, especially since you should probably shower, too. you decide to suck it up. “you shower, then me. dean said the water was still hot yesterday, even when he went last.” you’re not sure when your voice dropped to a whisper, but it’s quiet now. he sighs, half disappointed, but knowing it’ll be much more comfortable that way.

the second you’re out of the shower and dressed, sam’s tugging you back into bed with him and tucking you into his chest. his hold is still protective and a little wary. you want to make him relax, so you wiggle away just a bit to look at his face.

“sam, i’m so hungry,” you complain. he smiles at you, thinking you’re too cute to resist when you whine just a little. and he just loves it when you say his name.

“you’re gonna make me get up again?” he asks, and you hold back a triumphant grin because his voice has turned pleasantly lighthearted.

“you’re gonna let me starve?” you tease back.

“fine,” he huffs, “we can go to the vending machine together.” he really doesn’t want to be far from you.

“no,” you protest, dragging out the ‘o’ just a little. “we had that earlier. and chips don’t count as a meal. poor dean probably hasn’t eaten at all today! we deserve a treat,” you argue.

sam can’t deny you anything you want in this moment. “we do,” he agrees, “what d’you want? maybe we can convince dean to pick it up for us.”

you smile. “mmm, that’s not fair. dean deserves a treat, too. i’ll satisfy myself with vending machine food for a few hours, then we can go out to an early dinner.”

“are you sure?” sam asks. you smile more.

“mhmm,” you nod. “i have the excuse to buy a candy bar too now.”

dean, splayed out on his own bed, has likely been listening in on this whole conversation, and graciously chosen not to interrupt. he smiles at you as you exit the room.

with a glance that no one’s around, sam slips his hand into yours as you make your way to the vending machine down the hall. your heart blooms at the feeling, at the way he’s been looking at you without shame and suddenly you realize you never said it back. sam punches in the number for an excessive amount of snacks, getting all of yours, his, and dean’s favorites, waiting til they all fall down to collect them. he bends over, gathering them all in his big arms and wide pockets and handing a few to you. the crinkling of plastic fills the quiet air as you watch him with a sort of worship and adoration dripping from your eyes. you take in the curve of his back, the peek of his spine that you get from his tshirt riding up a bit, and the pretty brown hair on the back of his head. when he stands, he catches that gaze, and for once you don’t hide it away or tuck it into that corner of the drawer where you keep all the little trinkets you don’t need, but can’t bear to get rid of. because you need this, and you can have this.

“i didn’t get to say it back.” your voice comes out hushed, reverent.

“say what?” he asks, matching his voice to yours without even trying. you take in all the subtle ways that his face changes, as he thinks about what you could mean. the left side of his mouth quirks down, just a bit, and his eyebrows pinch together. it’s not quite the expression he makes then he’s worried or upset, just thinking.

“i love you, too.” when those words finally escape, finally make themselves known and heard, everything is different. it’s like you’ve never really breathed before this, because the simplest of things, like an inhale that fills your lungs with stale motel air, is so good, so satisfying, so much better when he looks at you like that. “for as long as i can remember, sam, i love you. when we were kids at bobby’s, seventeen and getting soaked in the rain, every moment before then and every moment after, and–”

his lips are on yours and there’s a messy ruckus of plastic wrapped snacks being dropped to the floor, because he couldn’t care about anything except kissing you. his warm, rough hands are so gentle cupping your cheeks and pulling you into him, and you follow suit in disregarding the food in your hands to place them firm on his waist, almost squeezing his sides because you need this to be as real and as solid as it possibly can be.

some might question the merit of this being your first kiss with each other. but it’s so you and sam, standing in an empty motel hallway next to the vending machine and it’s crappy food scattered around your feet. plastic crinkling and rustling when you get closer, and a hunger so insatiable that it makes it hard to breathe.

when you finally break away, panting just a bit, sam’s eyes swim with concern as his mind flashes back to you just an hour ago.

“i’m okay,” you interrupt his paranoid thoughts and loop your arms around his neck, “i’m okay, sam. ‘s just you. baby, i know this is a horrible time to say this, but you always take my breath away, in the best way. you’re so pretty, and i’m so in love with you that when i look at you for too long, i forget to breathe, and–”

his lips are back on yours, telling you me too, me too, me too. saying as they push and mold against yours, you take my breath away and i love you for it.

[wilcze-kudly]

I do find it annoying how a lot of Zutara fans tweak the character's stories, personalities and even the timelines to suit their own needs.

Once again, there's nothing wrong with fanon and headcanons, however if looking through the lense of canon, you're objectively wrong.

I ended up stumbling on a post from a Zutara shipper. (At this point I'm regretfully considering not following the tags for Zuko or Katara because I get way too much Zutara content lol) I'm not replying directly to her because I don't want this to turn into an argument, and I know she doesn't take criticism very well.

Ok, So let's break this down.

The character who was first out of the group to trust Zuko?

I'm quite sure this is referring to the scene in Ba Sing Se's caves. And yes, that is a very important scene. I think it's a very important scene preceeding Zuko's 'relapse'. It shows how he's matured during his time in Ba Sing Se and therefore it serves to add to our dismay when he joins Azula. I adore the fact that Zuko's journey to redemption is not linear, it certainly adds a lot to the character and shows us how his trauma affected him.

It's also a horrific moment for Katara. To have her worldview on Zuko and firebenders as a whole challenged, and then for it to go blowing up in her face. It rips open old wounds of her childhood. It refreshes her resentment of Zuko and the Fire Nation as a whole. It parallels the death of her mother when Aang dies due to Azula's lighting and she is unable to do anything about it. It places her back in that spot of helplessness. Even though she's grown up, even though she's a master waterbender, she still comes a hair's breadth to losing one of the most important people in her life.

No wonder she hated Zuko so much after this.

It's an important moment for both characters, but I wouldn't say it is that in a romantic sense. It's a sweet, hopeful moment that then turns absolutely horrific and visceral for both parties.

I could argue that there are other characters who could be given the title of 'first to trust Zuko'. Funnily, Appa being one of them lol.

But other characters trusting Zuko dovetails nicely into the next point.

The character who emotionally connects to Zuko?

Well, technically, I'd argue that most members of the Gaang connect emotionally on one level or another with him?

But I'd argue that Aang is the person Zuko connected with the most. Aang is Zuko's parallel. Aang is the first person to reach out to Zuko. Aang is the person who showed mercy to Zuko, multiple times. Aang is the person who valued Zuko's life, the life of someone whose whole life goal is to capture him.

This was also an incredibly important moment to Zuko. This is the thing he brings up when trying to convince the Gaang to let him join.

Zuko: Why aren't you saying anything? You once said you thought we could be friends. You know I have good in me.

The character Zuko feels safest letting his guard down around?

It's Mai. Love her or hate her, her relationship with Zuko is incredibly important to him. Maiko isn't my favourite Zuko ship, in full honesty. But even platonically, Mai and Zuko are one another's reprieve from their respective shitty lives.

People often talk about Katara touching Zuko's scar while discussing healing his scar, however one could argue that she did so as a medical examination. Mai touching Zuko's scar is a casual thing, neither of them really make a big deal of it and that's the beauty of it.

I'm mainly talking out of my own personal experience, as someone with a huge amount of burn scars, but there is a world of difference between someone inspecting my scars like Katara did and simply accepting them as a part of me, like Mai does for Zuko.

With Mai, Zuko isn't the scarred banished prince, Ozai's son or Azula's brother. He's just Zuko. And they speak freely with one another, arguing like real people do. Often, being comfortable having arguments is actually a sign of being comfortable with one another.

The character who helps Zuko heal from his trauma?

Once again, this is a bit of a flawed question. By the end of the show, Zuko isn't even fully healed, in my opinion. He has made leaps and bounds on the road to recovery, but when he will truly heal if ever is yet to be seen.

Zuko's journey to recovery includes plenty of people. This includes Iroh, Aang, Song and Jin. People who show him the error of his coping mechanism. Who challenge his worldview, who coax him out of the his shell of pain and anger.

The character known for showing most compassion to others?

Yes, Katara's compassion is a huge part of her character. Her need to help and protect those who cannot do that for themselves cannot be understated.

But Aang's compassion for others and all beings is just as great, if not greater than Katara's. Compassion and nonviolence are huge parts of his culture and his own philosophy.

Aang: Wait, we can't just leave him here. Sokka: Sure we can. Let's go. Aang :No, if we leave him he'll die. Aang airbends himself off Appa and retrieves Zuko, bringing him to Appa. Sokka: [Sarcastically.] Yeah, this makes a lot of sense. Let's bring the guy who's constantly trying to kill us.

Friendly reminder that Aang could've absolutely wrecked Ozai, but held back because his own moral compass was so powerful. Hell, he was friendly and nice to Azula, the woman who literally killed him.

This is why Aang and Katara work so well together. They're both incredibly compassionate people who will immediately jump in to help others in need. Like they did during the Painted Lady, destroying the factiry together.

The character who primarily bears the burden of having to step up into a parental role?

I think "parental role" is an incredibly vague term. There's a lot of things that go into a "parental role". Katara plays a stereotypically "maternal" role, while someone who plays a "paternal" one would probably be Sokka.

Katara deals with very "homemaking" tasks like sewing and cooking, etc. And Sokka often takes on the role of leader, hunter, gatherer and also protector, despite being a nonbender.

This coincides nicely with their core childhood traumas. The loss of Katara's mother impacted her greatly, leading her to have to step up into a motherly role. While Sokka was clearly heavily traumatised by his father departing and the crushing responsibility of having to care for his entire village.

Sexism also probably played a part in this dichotomy.

The character who represses their emotions to be strong for others?

I'd argue that this could apply to all the members of the Gaang in some capacity.

Aang's pain is something most of us will never experience and cannot hope to understand. The complete horrific destruction of his culture and home followed him through the entire show. He was entitled to his grief and rage, yet he supressed it. We see during Appa's kidnapping, how easy it would be for Aang to rage, to let himself be destructive. And yet, he wakes up every day and chooses to smile and goof off, because his friends need someone to remind them how to be children.

Sokka puts on a very impressive bravado, despite having a lot of insecurities. However, as the oldest member of the Gaang (pre Zuko) he puts on a facade of the confident and unbothered older brother. Even if he's the butt of almost every joke, he still keeps that demeanour up, letting it slip only a few times.

I'd actually argue that Toph is the person whom this label fits best. While we know Toph as witty, callous and strong, we have to remember that she kept up the facade of her parents' good, helpless little blind girl for no reason other than her mother and father's comfort. She actually hides a lot of her hurt, covering it up with a prickly exterior.

I want to do longer think pieces about Toph and Katara so apologies if this isn't complete.

I'm actually baffled by the idea of Katara repressing her emotions. She's actually quite straightforward and open about her feelings. She yells and feels a lot of emotions and lets them be heard. She gets angry and sad. She's actually kinda bitchy sometimes and that's honestly why I love her so much.

The whole inciting incident of the show was her getting so pissed off she somehow pulls a giant iceberg from the bottom of the sea.

She is anything but repressed.

She is angry.

She's angry at the fire nation, at Sokka, at her father, at men, and with good right to be so.

This is what makes her an amazing character and one who broke the mould of a lot of female characters at the time. Her anger and unrestrained emotions rang true with a lot of watchers at the time. I'm not sure why this is being taken away from her rather than celebrated.

I reiterate the point I made at the beginning of this post: there is nothing wrong with headcanons and fanon interpretations for one's enjoyment. I do find it a bit odd when it changes a character too much (because then, why not just create an oc?) but it's all in good fun. However, you shouldn't push that onto other people and how they perceive canon and you certainly shouldn't use it to take away from other characters. It's a very unfair way of entering discourse.

[bakugoushotwife]

blessing and curse

summary: yuuji is a wonderful boyfriend...you just wish he was able to fuck you... warnings: post shibuya, aged up duh, yuuji struggles with ptsd, night terrors, as well as anxiety, you both see therapists, oral (fem receiving), penetrative sex, fem!reader, pet names, (pretty girl, baby, cutie, etc), rough sex. wc: 3k a/n: this is my first yuuji piece nom nom nom i'm actually obsessed and soaking wet tbh i'm thinking thoughts for yuuji.........anyway to my lovely requester i hope you enjoy this <;3 jjk masterlist here

yuuji feels things very intensely. it’s a blessing and a curse, though the latter is more often experienced than the former. guilt, loss, regret–all things that nearly swallowed him whole while he fought for his friends and the people of japan–for the whole world. it’s so hard to be him, to live with what he carries on his shoulders–on his soul. he’s unloveable. he’s the one who caused all of the pain—things would have been easier if he died. there’s a number of people whose lives ended because of and for him. he was only just adjacent to a murderer. months after the fighting ceased and the war was won, he would wake up numerous times through the night with night terrors. he couldn’t even call them nightmares because they weren’t fabrications of his imagination. they were all too real memories that kept making their rounds–reminding him that he would be forever burdened with a layer of hell no one else could claim to know about. 

he met you in the waiting room of his therapist’s office. he remembers seeing you and wondering what you could be talking to his specialist about. it meant you also had to be a sorcerer—clearly he couldn’t see a normal one about his specific traumas and baggage, and apparently neither could you. he remembers not even knowing you and his heart still hurting for the pretty young girl that must be hurting like him. he remembers hoping that you hadn’t been through anything like what he had—the anxious voice in the back of his mind wondering if somehow he caused your pain via sukuna’s rampages or the destruction and death that followed him. he remembers you meeting his eyes on a seemingly unremarkable thursday afternoon, catching him in the middle of one of his staring way too long episodes. you narrowed your eyes and tilted your head at him in amusement. 

the rest was easy. you were easy to talk to, to admire, to hold, to love. you made him feel intense things in a good way–in a way he had nearly given up on. his world had slowly become a mixed palette of blacks and whites and muted grays–but your smile brought color back. your touch made vivid purples and yellows; your laughter the brightest of pinks and the most warm oranges. you became the blessing where he was the curse, the savior of a damned man bound to paint on smiles and pretend that sacrificing his soul and everyone he’s ever loved was worth it. now he felt unimaginable comfort and love by getting to know you. his smiles weren’t so fake anymore—and the only things that woke him in the night was losing you. truly the only fear that yuuji itadori has left: cursing his blessing. 

you thought he was the best boyfriend around and an even better man. you’ve slowly but surely unraveled the reason he was visiting the therapist through his eventual opening up to you and telling you just a fraction of what he’s experienced in his life and you can understand his intimacy issues. see…yuuji is easy to love. he’s wonderful, attentive, sweet, careful, strong and chivalrous. but he won’t fuck you. you’re too nervous to push him any further—all too aware of his fears of letting anyone in, of loving and showing that in ways that make you vulnerable. he’s all too conscious of what it would mean—of the danger he would be putting you in.

there’s been many times here lately that you’ve thought that line will finally be crossed—heavy petting and make-outs that get you squirming in his lap and soaking through your panties. it always goes this way, no matter how innocent the two of you try to keep your dates. move night, game night, even cooking together ends up with yuuji’s tongue down your throat and his hands under your shirt. tonight is no different, some youtube video plays in the background—a forgotten video game walkthrough that yuuji had been paying careful attention to until you leaned in to rip it away with those teasing kisses to his jaw. you know exactly what buttons to press after four months of nothing past second base driving you to a point of restlessness. 

you just wanted him to see your perseverance. you would do this for as long as it takes, anything to prove that you’re here to stay. you want to make him comfortable enough to tear those walls down—the ones that make his eyes flutter shut and his hands fist at his pants in order to keep them to himself. his eyes close to will himself to concentrate on something–anything—other than the feeling of your warm lips tracing his pulse, smooth fingers sliding under his shirt to outline the dips and muscles of his torso. it’s not that he doesn’t want to this, he craves you like nothing ever before. your touch is the medicine bringing him back to life, but he can’t allow himself to ruin you—taint you. but as you move into his lap and change your kisses to more intense nips and sucks at his skin, his body betrays his mind. he can feel the blood rush to his cock as your thighs trap him beneath you, and he moans out at the same time you do. the pressure of your clothed cunt sitting against his needy dick has his hands moving before he can tell himself to stop. he grabs your waist, accidentally and automatically rutting up against the friction you offer with a hiss. 

“fuck, cutie.” he groans, your lips covering his parted and pouty ones to keep him from protesting further. his fingers only dig into your side as the two sides of his mind argue with each other. he wants you badly, your body slotted against his perfectly and the way you kiss him like you’re trying to touch his soul drives him crazy. anyone with a girlfriend as hot as you would be a fucking idiot to keep denying himself of her. his hands knead the warm flesh of your body as an instinct, his body knowingly responding to your advances. his tongue slides over yours in a frenzy, his head becoming fuzzy as saliva trails down his chin—something in him telling him to stop when his hands slide upwards to palm your chest. you cry out at the feeling—so starved for his affection that you know you’re soaking wet already. just his rough hands scraping over your sensitive nipples sends you into rutting rhythmic circles of your hips over the tent in his pants, breaking your sloppy kiss in order to remove your shirt fully in a silent show of what you wanted to happen next. 

“aw baby—you know i can’t,” he whines, his lips swollen and even pinker than usual. he drops his hold to your hips, making comforting circles over the bone beneath his grasp. your face drops to instant heartbreak and he can feel his own heart try to rip itself apart for making you so sad. he never thought about how this must affect you, a woman with needs and desires for her boyfriend. he knows this can’t last much longer or he’ll lose you anyway. the room is just a mixture of your heavy breathing and the monotone droning of the tv for a few moments, and then you whine in retaliation, picking up his hand and moving it back to your breast. you search his eyes, seeing the fear flickering in those brown embers of his. you just need to show him there’s nothing to be scared of, that you need him worse than you need the oxygen in this room and would do anything for him today and forever. 

“yuuji,” you gasp out in such a voice that he knows he won’t be able to hold back this time. four months of seeing your body in your cute date outfits and in his shirt after you’ve spent the night; the feeling of your curves under his fingers as he guides you to the safe side of the sidewalk or the swell of your hip as he guides you through the door he’s just opened—four months of draining his balls after he’s sent you home with nothing more than a few wet kisses and tit-squeezes. the way your eyes shine like you’re about to cry if he denies you one last time…it’s too much. “please—i need you,” you breathe out, reaching those gorgeously soft hands out to sweep against his cheeks, to plead with him to be a good boyfriend. he can’t make you suffer any longer—”i need you so bad yuuji, please don’t push me away…i’m your forever girl!” 

oh fuck. he might cum in his pants from hearing that alone. suddenly, silence falls upon his mind. he can only hear the echoes of your cries for him–no more voices in his head arguing about the best way to continue, only you. a guttural groan rips from his throat and he stands with your legs wrapped around his body, a broad hand snaking up your back to keep you pressed against him. you squeal a little at the sudden shift and the deep growl that he let out, his face now devoid of that playful man you’ve come to love. he looks so focused, so serious, his brow furrowed as he looks over your face. 

“i’m sorry i made you wait so long, pretty girl.” he nods, letting your body bounce on the bed as he’s set on immediately removing the remainder of your clothes. he pulls you to the edge, legs dangling over the sides. you almost think it must be too good to be true, sitting up on your elbows to catch a glimpse of that ravenous fire consuming his previously kind eyes. he’s leaned back to peel his own clothes off, but his eyes never leave your body. he looks over your lip pinched between your teeth to your pebbled nipples to the glistening slick coating your inner thighs. he doesn’t even know where to start, but he’s going to ensure that you’re finally taken care of. “i’m a dumbass—thought i was keeping you safer like that.” he mutters, leaning over to kiss the space between your ribcage. he makes his way to your jaw, licking a hungry stripe between your breasts and claiming your neck with bruising nips at the delicate flesh that greeted him. 

you’re set to mewling immediately, the flip switched in your boyfriend making you rub your legs together in anticipation. he chuckles and you can feel him smile against your skin as his hand snakes down to keep you from squirming. he quickly pecks your lips. “m gonna make it up to you now, baby girl.” his eyes are wide, but glazed over with affection. you nod, feeling his strong fingers dig into the supple flesh of your thigh to keep you from closing them, his abs raking over your sensitive clit as he lowers himself to his knees at the foot of the bed. your face burns as you realize what he’s going to do, but he doesn’t give you time to think about it before turning your mind to mush from the feeling of his fat tongue splitting your lips apart and breaching your tiny hole. he seems pleased by the way you react—back arching off the bed and hands gripping at the sheets from the surprising burn. it’s a good burn, the kind you’ve been craving for the months you’ve been with a man who loves you like he does, your wanton moans just cementing that his choice was the right one. he’s growing addicted to this already; your flavor on his tongue, your moans echoing in his ears and your thighs pressing in to the sides of his face. he feels your silky walls clamp down on his tongue, making his eyes roll back at the thought of putting his dick in something so tight. he slurps at the arousal slipping out, sliding his tongue to the hardened bud waiting at the top of your cunt. he wraps his tongue around your clit, making you jolt at the sudden increase in sensation. it’s amazing—goosebumps prickle out over your skin and you reach down to tug at the silky pink locks woven between your fingers. you can feel every nerve running through your body and how it builds with a fiery pleasure that you know only yuuji can give you. “oh my god—yuuji!” you cry out as that pleasure mounts to a tipping point. his teeth scrape against your hood to encourage you to fall over that line so he can see what he’s been denying you of for four achingly long months. 

you make the sweetest face when you cum, it has him closing a fist around his own dick to calm himself—the promise of having your pussy making him jerk at his own touch. you even sound so pretty as you shatter, legs jerking and your grip on his hair yanking almost painfully hard. it only makes yuuji smile wider, feeling a bubbly sense of satisfaction ripple in his own gut from making you feel so good. 

“nngh, yuuji–” you whine, your vision returning to normal after a few seconds of respite. he’s already pushing you back to the pillows, manhandling you into the bent position he wanted. you’re on your back, knees by your ears and a boyfriend giving you no time to be anxious about the angry and leaky horsecock sliding through your folds. you thought he was a sweet man, and maybe he still is–but his own excitement to have you has him forgetting his normal chivalrous behavior. “fuck–yuuji!” you claw at his biceps, fighting against that true splitting burn. his tongue was nothing compared to the girth he pierces you with—and he’s smiling so tenderly at your wiggling and struggling. 

“s’okay, cutie. you can take it, you’re already taking it!! didn’t you ask me to?” he raises a brow, face flashing with mock-confusion as your hands shove at his chest, all in an effort to get used to the feeling of him inside you. his thumb brushes your cheek, his other hand keeping the back of your thigh shoved back. “nyeh—you begged me! come on pretty girl–you gotta loosen up!” he laughs airily, moving the hand from your face back down to pinch and roll your aching clit. you jump at first, the touch sending another jolt of pleasure circulating to your brain–and then you relax enough for him to move. he’s got you folded in such a way that you can hardly breathe–or maybe that’s from how he slams into you recklessly, tip catching on your poor, innocent, cervix each time. it hurts, it burns everywhere—but it’s the best feeling in the world. his breathing grows ragged once he settled into a pace, brutally slamming into you in a way that led you to believe he wasn’t doing this on accident. 

soon, your hands around his biceps slip to your sides, eyes lulling into a pleasure-induced haze. you watch him, the twitch of his nose and the way his hair gets curly once it sticks to his forehead from his sweat. he’s perfect, and he’s finally giving you all of himself, really devoting himself to you, conquering any fear. you don’t mind if you’ll be bedridden for the next week—feeling his heavy cock in your chest from how hard he ruts into you—it would be well worth it to hear his grunts and whimpers of satisfaction, to feel the bruising grip he has on your body like he’s afraid you might disappear. it’s all so good, and exactly like you craved. “there she goes—takin’ it like a champ now!” he cheers you on, panting a little as he leans over your body and grabs the headboard, deepening his angle as if he wasn’t already fucking you brainless. 

the new angle makes your jaw drop in absolute earth-shattering bliss. you two could be the only people left on earth and you would never know—to consumed in yuuji itadori to notice anything else. you’re back to pawing at his chest, the coil in your gut building rapidly as he fucks into you like his life depends on it. you wanted everything, he’ll make sure he gives you everything. the headboard creaks, the bed moans with you and you truly do worry he might break it for a split second–but his broken moan of your name swallows up any wandering thoughts. a bead of sweat slides down the slope of his nose before it drops onto your cheek, the evidence of his hardwork. he moans your name again, warning you that the end was approaching. you nod as he moves your legs to his shoulders, leaning as close as possible to wrap you in his arms and kiss you in short, desperate bursts. he treasures you more than he thought possible, that look you give him right before your eyes roll back into your head from your orgasm makes his own dick jump within your vice-grip of a cunt. you make that sweet face again, a face he knows he’s hooked on—your pussy spasming around him to welcome his fat load gets him to make his own kind of special and beautiful face, lip between his teeth and adam’s apple bobbing at the same pace his balls slap into your backside. you swear you can feel his heart beating, his lungs filling and emptying as he flattens his chest to yours and fills your guts with his loving cum. he keeps thrusting even after he’s done, just watching your face contort and shift, your body bouncing in his arms. he likes the ache of overstimluation, and loves the way you mewl and hug him, eyes all sleepy and far away. 

“that’s it, you did it, so so good.” he praises in a soft tone, kissing your lips and then your nose and then your forehead with equal adoration. “can’t believe i kept us from feeling like that!” he shakes his head, kissing your cheeks to continue showering you in his love if not to keep you awake. he sits back up and slides out of you, quickly snatching his t-shirt up to catch the spillage. it’s hot, watching his seed trickle from your abused pussy—he whines a little at the sight, puppy dog eyes flickering over your body as if to wonder if you could take another round…

now that you’ve gotten him to start, you may never get him to stop.

[drunkenkissesatdusk]

MORNIN’

pairings — jason todd x fem!reader

warnings — mentions of scars (tracing healed ones), talk of marriage, being a normal mundane couple, VERY domestic romance (i crave!!), mentions of having children but nothing actually happening!!

summary — moving from gotham into a more rural and quiet area was the best decision you two had made, because it turned out perfectly.

━━━━━━━ WAKING UP TO YOUR side empty was normal, but still scary, for jason. he knew you were safe, he could smell the breakfast you were cooking downstairs. still, a part of him forced him up. he continued the same routine he’d normally follow now that you’d moved from Gotham together.

your marriage solidified your hopes of leaving Gotham behind. finding the house was the final straw, and Jason jumped at the chance to buy the house. thank god he’d been adopted into a rich family, since neither of you two had to work.

occasionally, you had part time shifts at a bakery in the small town nearby. you loved it, and Jason loved coming in to see you with flowers. the longer you two lived out here, the less people that cared how Jason was related to Bruce Wayne.

your lives had become a very mundane manner, your stomachs filled with a consistent warmth that eased you into the knowledge of safety. Jason no longer kept a gun under his pillow — you agreed to him keeping it in the beside table.

downstairs, Jason met your face in the small soft yellow kitchen. you’d painted over the original white color, in hopes of creating a very fairy-like cottage. it was working out, and you spun around to face your husband.

“hey, Jay.” you extended your arms, gathering him into a soft hug. Jason smiled into your neck, spinning you around. he peppered your face with kisses, muttering a greeting into your body.

“hey baby.” he said.

“y’hungry? i made pancakes.” you motioned your head to the plate on the table. there sat a plate of pancakes, bacon, eggs, and fruits. Jason felt the warmth bubble, and an indescribable feeling of pure love towards you filled him. he didn’t know how else to explain it, he stared lovingly at you as you plated up your own plate, pouring two cups of coffee and handing one to your husband.

together the two of you fixed up your coffees before walking together to the rocking chairs on your back porch. there sat a small table between the two chairs, and you both set your things down.

you jogged back inside, turning on your guys’s favorite cd — a collection of love songs from the 60s. the familiar Skeeter Davis song flowed from the open windows, setting a calm mood over you two.

you both began drinking from your cups of coffee, as well as taking portions of your carefully prepared breakfast.

“i’ve been thinking, y’know.” you spoke after taking another sip of coffee. Jason looked up, intrigued. you met his eyes, hesitation crossing your features for a second — you never had to be afraid of saying anything to him.

“‘bout what?” he spoke, taking another bite of bacon.

“i think im ready, for a kid. i talked to my manager, i can get the time off when it happens.” you reached for his hand, and he happily took it. this statement by no means meant the two of you would try to rush it, you were both ready, and wouldn’t want to rush through this cherishing moment.

“really?” he was smiling brightly.

the rest of the day was spent relaxed in the bedroom you two shared, his head on your stomach and your hand crossing his back across every one of his old scars.

he didn’t mind, you wouldn’t cause them to reopen. ever since his old scars had died out, you noted how calm he was, how serene this entire portion of your life was.

“im so grateful. i love you so much.” you muttered, running your hands through his hair.

“i love you too, baby.” he rose up to kiss you gently, rubbing your jaw with his hand.

this was all you ever wanted.

masterlist — reminder that my requests / inbox is open

[help-itrappedmyself]

Dead on Main Part 9

My apology for the earlier mishap. Hope you like it!

Masterpost

A few hours later, a fourth of the way home, they start arguing about who should drive the next shift. There seem to be two main arguments. The first is between Dick and Bruce on whether Bruce even needs a break.The second is between Dick and Tim about who should take over for Bruce.

Bruce has been driving for four hours, and it’s now about midnight, so he should take a break to sleep. Dick had napped for about an hour after the panicked stop when Jason’s ectoplasm had gone haywire, and he was the only one who had slept so far. He’s winning the argument between him and Bruce. Because he was the only one who had napped so far, and apparently Tim had been awake for a terrible amount of time, Dick is also winning the argument between him and Tim.

Danny is pretty sure even sleep deprived most people would drive better than his father, and he doesn’t have a driver’s license so he keeps quiet. It’s funny how intense they get in their arguments without ever becoming serious. Danny appreciates that no matter how intense they get there’s never any anger in their voices.

“Tim, you haven’t slept more than five hours in the last two days, you are not driving this car. There is no way you are driving this car. Neither of us are going to let you.”

“Bruce has been awake for 23 hours straight!” Tim argues.

“Which is why Bruce should also not be driving anymore!”

“Tim you are definitely not driving, go to sleep. Dick, If we switch drivers we have to stop and we can’t afford to stop and waste time. We’ll switch drivers when we need gas next.” Bruce states rationally. Danny thinks this is a good argument really.

“If we crash and die we’ll also waste time.” Tim points out, sulking.

“Switching drivers will take all of two seconds and so help me If I am not driving in the next two minutes I am commandeering the radio for the rest of the trip and you know neither of you will be able to stop me.”

Danny isn’t sure why that is so serious of a threat, but that shut both Bruce and Tim up immediately. Bruce pulls over and they do a quick seating change. Since Bruce and Tim need to sleep so one of them can drive later, Danny switches into the passenger seat while Dick slips into the driver's seat. That way Bruce and Tim can stretch out in the back.

“What do you listen to that they dislike so much?” Danny asks a little later. Danny can’t tell if either of them are sleeping, but neither of them have moved at all in the last ten minutes. He’s quiet just in case.

“I mean, I like a lot of music. They just know that I can put on circus music for hours. I grew up in a circus, so I'll even enjoy doing it. It annoys them after like three songs at most though.”

Danny has a moment where all he can think of is Freakshow’s circus, but he shakes it off.

“Did all of you grow up in the circus?” Danny could have sworn Bruce was more like Vlad. Grew up wealthy, ran a business (less illegally, he thinks, but that's not hard considering), and went to parties and stuff. Dick laughs at his question.

“No, only me, I’m afraid.” Dick glances at the back seat, before refocusing on the road. “Bruce adopted all of us, except for Damian. But even Damian grew up with his mother before coming to live with Bruce. So all of us have very different upbringings actually. Circus for me. Jason was next, he had a hard life before Bruce found him, and after too. He’s been through a lot. Tim had rich parents, they loved him but weren't around much. Duke was adopted after his parents died but he was raised by both of them, he had the most normal life growing up.”

“Tim and Damian both found Bruce more than the other way around. Damian’s mom… loves him a lot, but she was in a dangerous situation and wanted Damian to be safe. So she dropped him off with us.” You could hear the love in Dick’s voice as he spoke about his family.

“Your family seems happy. Nice. I mean, you all dropped everything to drive me home. I appreciate it.” Danny thought carefully for a moment, he didn't want to learn too much second hand. He'd rather get to know Jason personally. But some things only family can tell you. “Do you think Jason and I will get along? From what I've heard I know we have similar senses of humor, at least relating to our own deaths. And, well, we have that experience to bond over. But our lives seem like they've been very different.”

Dick’s face softens. “I think that Jason has spent his whole life fighting. For anything and everything. He's not going to stop now. You guys’ll figure it out.”

Danny looks at him. “Have you met your soulmate?”

Dick���s whole face lights up. “I have. We knew each other before the switch, but.. it was still a lot of drama and awkwardness at first. I think Bruce almost had a heart attack when it happened, and then an aneurysm when he found out who it was. That was hilarious.”

Dick glances at Danny, saw him biting his lip and twisting his hands together, eyes in his lap. “We had met, but we still had a lot to learn about each other. Getting to know him has been one of the best parts of my life. He’s my best friend.”

Dick reaches over and ruffles Danny’s hair. “Why don't you try to sleep Danny. You'll be meeting him soon.”

Danny nodded, giving Dick a light smile and settling himself into his chair.

[mrspasser]

I'll lay my head down here

Sterek fanfiction Stiles needs a place to sleep. He chooses Derek.

Also available on A03.

image source

“I’m not sleeping on the floor again, you assholes!” Stiles throws a balled up burger wrapper at the infuriating werewolves who took over his intended sleeping space. 

Isaac bats the greasy paper ball away with a quick flick of his hand, hardly having to look at it. “You snooze, you lose, Stilinski,” he says meanly, as he snuggles deeper inside the couch pillows to drive his point home. “Besides, I gave up my bed, I shouldn’t be the one to sleep on the floor.”

Stiles perks up when an idea crosses his mind. Upstairs, in Isaac’s room, are Lydia and Cora. Maybe he could -

“Don’t even think about it, Stilinski!” Jackson cuts his unspoken thought off with one sharp remark. He glares at him from his spot on the couch he’s sharing with Isaac: one asshole werewolf on each side. The guy is extra touchy because Lydia picked Cora as a sleeping partner over him - which is more than fair, if you ask Stiles, both Lydia picking Cora over Jackson and Jackson being sour over getting the cold shoulder from his girlfriend.

“I’m sorry, Stiles, I don’t think you’ll fit,” Allison offers apologetically from his right. She’s squeezed in the large armchair with Scott, who’s already fast asleep and snoring softly. 

He waves her offer away. If he’d try to squish himself in the chair with them, neither one of them would sleep a wink all night. Same goes for the couple in the other available chair, although Stiles is more sure to survive the night with Scott and Allison than with Boyd and Erica. That only leaves - 

“You could try Derek?” Allison blinks innocently at him. 

Stiles huffs a laugh, letting the sarcasm bleed through in generous helpings. “Yeah, right.” He leaves it at that, too tired to hope to put up the proper facade of pretending to dislike the Alpha werewolf. Hey, we all deal with our crushes in our own way! Stiles has to do what he can when literally living with a pack of wolves, who can smell pheromones and who knows what else.

Eventually, he settles for stretching out on the rug that Lydia made Derek buy a while back. It’s not overly cushiony, but it’ll do the job. It’ll have to. Besides, he hasn’t had a proper night of sleep in four or maybe even five days, staying up researching and worrying most of the night. The Big Bad is dead, the worrying is over and his research paid off: he should be able to sleep now, right?!

At first, Stiles uses his hoodie for a pillow, yet after about twenty minutes he gives up and pulls it back on because he won’t be able to sleep if he’s cold. Derek patched up most of the holes in his loft and it’s actually resembling a nice apartment these days, but it’s still the middle of the night in February and Stiles is lying on the floor without a blanket or a pillow. He misses his own bed. His comforter. His pillow. His other pillow, the one that’s older than him and oddly lumpy, but it was the one that was in his mother’s bed until the day she died. It hasn’t smelled like her in a long, long time. Stiles has also washed it a couple of times during the years, he’s not that much of a pig, despite popular opinion. But it’s familiar and comforting and he still takes it with him for sleepovers with Scott. 

He considers whether or not he would’ve brought his pillow if this impromptu sleepover had been planned in any way. He’s known Scott since kindergarten, he’s his best friend. He wouldn’t say or even think anything bad about Stiles still needing a special pillow to sleep even when he’s almost twenty one years old. And while he knows most of the people in this room for five years or even longer and trusts them with his life, that doesn’t mean that they’re not a bunch of dickheads who will tease him every chance they get.

It’s a pointless thought exercise, because nothing about this sleepover was planned. They were supposed to kill that wyvern during the day, when it slept in his creepy little cave. That's what all Stiles’ research was for! He even found a way to kill the beast without having to hack it to pieces, which was nice because in the end he was against animal cruelty, you know? But then there were witches, two of them. They weren’t planned, neither was the ensuing fight in the woods. The unexpectedness of it all had left everybody antsy, especially the werewolves. And even though they recouped with a movie night and a nice pack pile, nobody wanted to be very far away from the others. Hence the impromptu sleepover that had Stiles sleeping on a rug, between the coffee table and the couch. Which wasn’t fair, because he totally knocked a witch out with his bat! He did his fair share and pulled his weight and what not. The least he deserves is a nice night of sleep.

Another hour later, Stiles is sore all over and chilled to the bone. There’s no way he can sleep like this. “Desperate times call for desperate measures,” he whispers to the leg of the coffee table that he knows has Isaac’s claw marks on it. 

As quietly as he can he makes his way upstairs on the rounding stairs. On the landing there’s three doors to choose from: the one on his left leads to Isaac’s bedroom, where Lydia and Cora are sleeping. The one in the middle is the bathroom - with a bath, for heaven’s sake, Derek has a tub! - and that leaves the master bedroom on his right. The Alpha’s den. Stiles has never been inside it. He even doubts if Isaac has set foot in the room very often, besides for cleaning purposes.

Stiles never really intended to go into Derek’s room, because despite what the others seem to think, he actually values his life. And his dignity. He thought it better to take a chance with the girls, take on the risk of Jackson wanting to kill him the next morning when he discovered Stiles had slept in the same bed as his girlfriend.

But…

The door to Derek’s bedroom is cracked.

Stiles can see inside. 

He can’t see that much, with it being the middle of the night and the only light coming from a gap between the curtains in front of Derek’s window. But the moonlight is just right, illuminating the sleeping form of the Alpha in the bed. A bed that is more than large enough for two people and Derek is neatly sleeping on one side of the bed. If Stiles is quiet enough he might even be able to slip into the bed without waking Derek. The werewolf got hurt pretty badly today and healing always takes a lot out of him. There’s a pretty good chance the guy is sleeping like a log.

Stiles takes a deep breath. He’s gonna risk it.

***

He didn’t think he’d actually do it, but after a few minutes of indecisiveness on the landing, Stiles quietly tiptoes into Derek’s bedroom. He rounds the bed to the unoccupied side of the mattress and gingerly lifts the tip of the blanket.

“You’re not getting in with your jeans on,” Derek says, without opening his eyes.

Stiles yelps and he’s already stammering halfway through an apology when he suddenly shuts his mouth. His back teeth actually click together. There’s a few seconds of silence and then: “You’d let me into your bed?”

“Not with your jeans on,” Derek repeats. Usually he wouldn’t do this, but he’s been listening to Stiles toss and turn downstairs for a while now and with all of his pack members sleeping peacefully, he’d like the last one to get some rest too. Besides, Stiles would continue to keep him up with his restless behaviour otherwise; Derek just can’t seem to tune him out. It’s been that way for years already, maybe even from the beginning.

“O-kay.” He can feel Stiles staring at him in the dark and he patiently waits for the decision he knows the boy is gonna make. No, not a boy. Stiles will be 21 this Spring. Derek has seen him grow up, literally and figuratively, along with the rest of his ragtag pack of teenagers. Stiles still wears jeans and plaid most of the time, but the garments don’t hang as loose on him as they did when he was 16. He’s grown into a handsome young man, with a good head on his broad shoulders. Derek counts himself lucky to have Stiles as part of his pack, to have him close. Not as close as he sometimes might wish, yet Derek is always conscious of not playing favourites. So he usually keeps Stiles at an arm length and takes care to treat him just like everyone else. It helps that the two of them elevated snark and banter to an effective communication style. Despite all the sarcasm and barbs, Derek is pretty sure there is no-one in his pack who sees through him like Stiles does. It was scary at first and it made him lash out, but Stiles stood firm. Derek is immensely grateful that he did.

There’s the rustling of clothing hitting the floor, jeans and a shirt, then the blanket lifts and Stiles scoots underneath. Derek feels him settle in behind his back, a foot or so away. “Thanks,” Stiles whispers in the dark.

“Go to sleep,” Derek grunts, eager to go to sleep and not think about the young man who is sharing his bed.

***

Derek’s bed is pretty comfortable, Stiles thinks to himself as he digs himself in. Oh, who is he kidding?! Derek’s bed is amazing. The mattress is just the right combination of firm and soft, the pillow hugs his head and shoulders just right and the comforter is warm but still light to the touch. It’s a million times better than his bed at home, even when he’s not counting the fact that he’s sharing the bed with a hot werewolf.

Yet Stiles can’t sleep. 

Yes, the pillow is heavenly. Yes, the mattress allows his tired body to finally relax. Yes, the comforter hugs him nicely. But there’s something missing and Stiles knows exactly what it is. His pillow.

He needs to hold something. He needs to be able to curl around something. Or someone, his traitorous brain suggests as he feels Derek move across from him.

“Why aren’t you asleep, Stiles?” Derek asks in that long-suffering tone he uses when Stiles is doing something to annoy him. Which is pretty often, although Stiles knows the annoyance is mostly for show these days. He has turned onto his back, his eyes glinting in the moonlight where they are looking over at Stiles.

“Can’t,” Stiles laments, trying to catch the comforter between his arms in lieu of his dearly missed pillow. It doesn’t really work, because the comforter also has to cover Derek’s bulk and there’s little left to use. Little to none, especially when Derek snatches the comforter back from where it was probably leaving a cold gap on Derek’s other side. The sudden move has Stiles sort of falling over from where he was laying on his side. He’s more on his front now, filling up the space that was between them at first. He can feel the warmth of Derek’s body from just a few inches away. It’s actually kind of comforting.

“Try harder,” Derek commands and he closes his eyes again.

Stiles thinks of answering ‘Yes, Alpha’, but thinks better of it. It might make Derek move again, to push Stiles out of bed instead of pulling him in to have a cuddle. So he stays quiet and closes his eyes, focussing his mind on the almost tangible presence of Derek’s bare shoulder mere inches away. Derek is warm and smells nice and if Stiles was a werewolf, he’s sure he’d feel even better about having his Alpha so close. Yet even though he’s not a werewolf, he still enjoys it. A lot.

He falls asleep.

He knows that, because he wakes up at some point, at an unknown hour of the night. He’s warm, so warm. And comfortable, even though his pillow is a lot firmer than he remembers it being. It also moves a little, because his pillow is Derek and the Alpha werewolf gently moves his arm in what Stiles suspects is a more comfortable position. He would panic about sleeping half on top of Derek if he were not so damn comfortable. It’s hard to keep his eyes open. Surely if Derek wouldn’t want him sleeping on him, he’d push Stiles off. Instead, Stiles feels Derek’s arm wrap around his back, accompanied by a soft sigh from the Alpha.

Stiles sleeps.

***

Derek is not the first to wake up, although he is certainly not the last. He becomes aware of the world with Stiles wrapped around his torso, his head pillowed on Derek’s chest. He’s only a little surprised by how good it feels to wake up like this and it takes a while before he brings himself to carefully move out of Stiles’ embrace. The boy mumbles a little, but doesn’t wake up. Derek watches him for a moment, standing beside his bed. He’s not sure how to feel about this, except for some embarrassment about wanting to crawl back into bed and slot himself back into Stiles’ arms.

Downstairs, most of the pack is still asleep. Isaac has his arms wrapped around Jackson’s lower legs, as if he’s cuddling a particularly bony teddy bear. Jackson is still asleep, even snoring softly. Scott snores too, curled around his girlfriend in the large armchair. In the other armchair, Boyd is watching him carefully, his arms wrapped around his sleeping girlfriend. 

“Morning,” the dark man rumbles quietly, not to wake Erica.

“Morning,” Derek answers, keeping his voice down as well. “Coffee?”

Boyd inclines his head in thanks and Derek ambles on to the kitchen, where he finds Lydia, immersed in a science journal. She has a cappuccino sitting in front of her, the cup half empty. “Good morning, Derek,” she says, briefly glancing up from her reading material.

“Morning,” he repeats, busying himself with the coffee maker. He brings a cup to Boyd when he’s done and returns to join Lydia at the table. He sits back in his chair, his coffee in front of him, to catch the rays of pale sunlight that slant through the high windows. It’s quiet in the loft, with most of the people still sleeping and the ones that are awake quietly starting up their day.

He sips from his coffee, listening to the sounds of Cora waking up and going into the bathroom. She comes downstairs not long after, dressed in sweatpants and a T-shirt - same as her brother, her bare feet hardly making a sound. He points to the mostly full pot of coffee on the counter when she enters the kitchen and he gets a hair ruffle as thanks from his little sister. She pours herself a cup and leans against the counter, enjoying the sunlight on her face just like he is. 

It’s Stiles who comes down next, although Derek can hear from the way he drags his feet that he’s barely awake. Why he’s not sleeping in like he should be, is anyone’s guess. He expects Stiles to stop in the living room, to wake up Scott or maybe even Jackson if he’s feeling particularly cheeky, but he doesn’t. The footsteps pretty much make a beeline from the stairs towards the kitchen. Derek opens one eye from where he closed them against the sunrays to see Stiles shuffling towards him in his boxers and T-shirt, rubbing a hand over his face and yawning soundlessly. His hair is standing up on one side. He’s wearing socks, navy blue ones with a red line near the toes.

The werewolf opens his mouth to point his packmate towards the coffee maker, but before he can say anything, Stiles has reached his chair and slings a hairy leg over his lap. He plonks down unceremoniously and lays his head on Derek’s shoulder, arms wrapping loosely around his waist. 

“You were gone,” Stiles mumbles disapprovingly, his mouth moving against Derek’s collarbone. And just like that his heartbeat evens out and he’s fast asleep again.

Derek sits frozen in his chair, his heart beating loudly inside his ribcage. If Stiles were awake he could probably feel it pound against his own chest. His hands hover uselessly on either side, not knowing whether to wrap around Stiles or pick him up and toss him to the floor. 

Stiles is oblivious, his sleeping body moulding easily against Derek’s. He’s warm and pliant, just like he was when they were sleeping together in Derek’s bed. 

When he chances a look at Lydia across the table, she’s already watching him steadily with a sly smile playing around the corners of her lips. “Glad to see you two finally got your heads out of your asses,” she comments eventually, before primly taking a sip from her cappuccino and going back to her reading.

Behind him, Cora snorts quietly in amusement. She comes up at his back and puts a hand in his hair again, running her fingers through the short strands. It’s grounding and Derek only notices how much he needs that when she lightly scratches her nails across his scalp. 

“He’s cute like this,” his sister remarks and even though he can hear the humour in her voice, he can also hear the truth in her heartbeat. “Best not wake him up, big bro.” She runs her hand through his hair one last time and then she wanders off, leaving him to carefully wrap one arm around Stiles’ lower back.

Slowly, Derek feels himself relax. The loft is quiet and peaceful and Derek is in his own little bubble, with the sunlight on his face and Stiles in his lap. Almost automatically, he starts to rub his hand slowly up and down Stiles’ back. Aside from some sleepy snuffling, there’s no real response. Derek picks his coffee back up and slowly drinks it, tilting his face towards the sun. It’s a nice morning.

[chimielie]

girlfriend

summary: Iwaizumi x F!Reader. you might be his girlfriend—but she's his girl.

word count: 2.4k

cw: hurt/comfort. a lot of reader insecurity. fear/mention of emotional cheating but there is none

a/n: this actually fills @akimind's request for my 500 follower event one million years ago but the formatting is tooo hard so. here it is!!! iwaizumi + angst + college au + "that's not what i said." LOVE YOU SORRY HOPE IT HURTS AND IS ALSO ENJOYABLE. <<<<3333333

You didn't mean to fall in love with your boyfriend.

You hadn't gone into this expecting Hajime to become your boyfriend at all, actually. You liked him. Liked how easy it was to be with him. How warm he was when you let your touch linger on him and pretended it was more than a flirty friendship. You hadn't ever predicted it would become so, because Hajime was hung up on his ex-girlfriend.

They'd traveled over oceans to be together, coming to Irvine from the same prefecture in Japan. They had still been together when you met him, her head tucked beneath his chin, his arms wrapped around her waist. Your first thought was "oh, he's beautiful." Your second thought was "they look like they're made for each other." You shoved the first thought deep inside a secret crevice of your brain and stuck out your hand to introduce yourself with a bright smile.

The strain of new adulthood got to them, though, or so you assumed: you were never privy to the gory details of the breakup. They remained friendly, in the same friend group, and it just always seemed obvious to you that they would someday reconcile. It wasn't until two years after their break that you were able to start showing regular, platonic affection to Hajime without feeling like an attempted homewrecker.

It was just before graduation, having dragged him away for a late-night bite to eat so neither of you would starve to death studying for finals, when everything flipped on its head. Your plan to energize the both of you had backfired; you were yawning every other sentence and came close to laying your head on the table before Hajime put his palm down in front of your face.

"Come sit next to me," he'd said, so you maneuvered around into his side of the booth and been promptly pulled into his side. You had looked up at him, murmuring a sleepy question that was more wordless noise than actual English, and that was it. Something you didn't understand softened his gaze, and then he tilted his head to the side and brushed his lips over yours.

It was a perfect first kiss.

In the weeks following it, you had bounced violently between insisting to yourself that he hadn't meant for you to read too far into the kiss and your natural instinct to go after what your heart wanted. And the more he proved that it wasn't a one-off anomaly, that he could kiss you right out of drought into a superbloom, the more you were convinced. Iwaizumi Hajime wouldn't knowingly break your heart.

When Hajime asked you to be official, wildflower bouquet in hand, the lights of the now-empty graduation pavilion shining down on the both of you, you said yes, your whole heart and none of your brain in the matter.

As you entered your apartment hand-in-hand with him, greeting all the friends who had gathered there to celebrate the end of undergraduate school, you remembered that the key modifier in "Iwaizumi Hajime wouldn't knowingly break your heart" was knowingly. He seemed happy enough announcing the development to everyone else, and then she had walked in, carrying a bottle of wine that almost slipped from her grasp when she saw your proximity. He had dropped your hand—just for a second, but it had happened, and then picked it back up like his sentence hadn't died in his mouth at the sight of her.

He'd always gotten a little defensive when people mentioned their relationship, his features shutting down into a blank, tight expression. Though they obviously weren't as close as they had been for most of their lives, they were still both part of your friend group, and he always seemed to laugh just a little harder at her jokes, kept eye contact a little longer, got embarrassed more easily around her. You didn't want to be jealous or insecure or possessive, but it just felt more increasingly obvious that you were a rebound, a cheap, temporary dupe meant to fill in until Hajime realized and returned to the love of his life.

It was hard to be angry at him, though, because you knew with every fiber of your bleeding heart that he wouldn't do this to you on purpose. You knew he thought he cared for you, that he thought he had moved on. He did a good job almost every day coming very close to persuading you of it, enough to keep you from breaking up with him and leaving him behind, but never quite erasing your insecurities for more than a few weeks at a time.

One of the first mornings you woke up in his bed, well rested and sore in all the right places, he was missing. You got up, mourning the softness of his sheets and the scent of him on the pillowcases, and slipped into one of his shirts before leaving his room to explore.

He was cooking, shirtless in the kitchen, and if that wasn't one of the yummiest things you had seen in your life.

"Good morning," you said, leaning against his counter.

"Very," he returned, flipping an egg in the pan. "Looking like that. I think—I mean, it seems like that shirt always gets chosen to be the boyfriend shirt." He had narrowly avoided saying her name, but you had heard it threatening to tumble out of his mouth. You bit back a response, but your smile still dropped, and he spent the next hour making allusive, sorry overtures without either of you actually acknowledging the slip.

You never wore that shirt again. He gave you another one, you accepted it, and life moved on.

Except you had somehow become mired in the past with a relationship that was long over, and without university or a job to distract you—you were starting at the end of September, which felt aeons away—it was eating you alive, especially as Hajime left for a preliminary return trip to Japan.

"Did you hear how Mattsun and Makki greeted him when he landed?" You sit in the car on the way to the airport, packed in with Hajime's ex, successfully hyping yourself up to see him again until she addressed the group.

"Oh, yeah," you laugh. "So funny." You haven't had a conversation with Hajime that had more depth than "how are u? miss u" for the trip's duration. She's your friend, too, though you've never been close, but there's something unbearable about admitting it to her now, when you're so unsure of your relationship's current status. It has to mean something that he was keeping her updated and active in his life, didn't it?

You find solace in knowing that you don't blame her at all. If you could find an ounce of resentment for her in your heart, you would probably have left Hajime by now—isn't that the mark of a truly evil plot-pushing girlfriend?

You cry when you see him again.

"Happy tears," you assure him, and hide your face in his shoulder.

Later, alone in his apartment, you bite your lip when Hajime asks if you want to sleep over.

"Okay, babe, I don't want to pressure you," he says, and you can feel yourself tensing up as he speaks. "But I feel like you've been—off all day. Is everything okay?"

You blanch and focus on the cowlick on the right side of his head, the one that's endeared him so much to you, so you don't have to look him in the eyes. Too much is bubbling up in your throat, your brain thrown into overdrive, and he's staring at you with so much worry in his eyes it's just not right to leave him hanging:

"No."

Hajime makes a noise you don't understand, low in his throat. "Is it because I didn't call enough while I was gone? Because I can explain that, I promise."

"No," you rush to explain. "I don't—it wasn't you, exactly. I've just—ever since we started dating—I think you still love her."

You're picking at your nails, a bad habit you've had since you were small, and he takes your hands in his, smooths his thumbs over the torn cuticles.

"I don't," he says, finally, neutrally, though his face hasn't formed into the cold mask you're used to seeing when she's brought up. "Ever since we started dating?"

"Before," you admit. "I always thought you would get back together. You just seemed so made for each other."

"But we weren't," a little pucker between his eyebrows forms. "So—what did you think when we started dating?"

"When you first kissed me," you say, "I thought maybe it was a one-off. That you wanted something casual. And then it got more serious, and I thought maybe I could just suppress my insecurities until they went away, and I mean, I really thought you liked me."

"I do," his voice grows more agitated, his lips thinning out.

"Yeah, but..." You trail off. "You would do things that made me think, oh, he's just the perfect guy, they just looked so amazing because I was jealous, and then every so often I'd see you interact with her and it wasn't like how we are at all. I know the insecurity is my own fault, that's not on you, but I feel like it's holding both of us back."

"What do you mean holding us back? You don't think you make me happy?" He snaps, and you wince.

"Not like you are with her! Every time she comes in the room you get this look on your face, like you're speechless. Like-like the songs, Haji, I just..."

He lets go of your hands, crosses his arms.

"Do you really think I'd do that to you?"

"No, Haji, I know you'd never cheat. That's why I fell in love with you! You're a good guy, but I don't want you to wake up one day and break both our hearts because she's meant to be your girl and I'm just your fucking girlfriend." Your eyes sting, your chest heaving by the end of the sentence.

"You love me?" He's quieter now, giving you a little more space to breathe.

"What? That's not what I said."

"Yes, it is," he says, a little smile growing at the corners of his mouth, as though he can't control it. "You love me."

"I'm sorry, I don't understand why you're focusing on that," you wipe at your eyes with the back of your hand. "It's true, I just don't get it."

"Because you make me happier than she ever did," he promises, crowding you up against the counter and motioning for you to jump up to sit on top of it after you can go no further. "I'm weird when she's around because she's my ex, sure, but not because I still want her. It... ended badly. It's a miracle we didn't pull the entire friend group into it, and I never wanted to make her look bad to them, so I'm always trying really hard to look, uh, normal around her. We're on better terms now, but I haven't wanted her in years, honey."

"She knew about what you were doing when I didn't," you mumble, feeling small in the stormy release of emotions. "And she knows so much about you I don't in general."

"We grew up together," Hajime reminds you. "It would have been one of the guys. I know I didn't tell her anything. You can check my call history, my texts."

You shake your head. "I believe you."

"Really?" He arches a brow, and you laugh and push gently at his shoulder.

"Yes, really."

"You know how long I had a crush on you before I did anything about it? I thought you weren't interested, and then you finally started being even more affectionate with me than you were with our other friends, and I took the chance."

"Rookie numbers," you preen under his gaze. "I liked you... pretty much as soon as I met you. But I suppressed it 'cause I didn't want to be a homewrecker."

"You're sweet," he chuckles. "I promise, you have nothing to worry about there. I'm never gonna wake up and not be grateful to see you drooling on my bed."

"You're the worst, you know that?"

"Yeah, yeah," he looks at you fondly, swiping his thumbs under your lower lashes. "You love me, though."

"Oh," your lips part. "And the not calling in Japan?"

He scrunches his nose. "I was trying not to spoil anything. I wanted to, uh, discuss it with you first, but you should know my friends and family are all waiting to embarrass me if I have to turn everything around now."

"Okay? I'll consider your dignity, but I make no promises," you tease. He drops his head to your shoulder for a moment, taking a deep breath, and you wind a hand into his hair, petting him until he straightens.

"So, you know how I have that paid internship opportunity back home?" You nod, not wanting to be reminded. You'll do it for him, but... long distance sucks. "I went to their office and turned it down. I want to go through with my doctorate."

"Oh, that's huge!" You gasp. "That's incredible, I'm so happy for you!"

"So the part that has to do with you is, um," he says, "you're planning to stay here, right?"

"Yeah," you say, "my next step is like a twenty minute commute, thankfully."

"I want to finish my schooling in the States," he tells you, "and then after that, I want to go wherever you go."

"Hajime," you start, but he puts a shaking hand on your knee, and that shuts you up.

"I love you," he says seriously. "It's like I said, okay? You make me happier than anyone else. I know you're the one for me, if you'll have me. If not, I get—"

You grab his face and smash your lips into his, and if that doesn't get the message across? You don't know what will.

[okthatsgreat]

did anybody see the newest episode of danganronpa 52 lollllllll

#there is something deeply wrong with team dr im afraid #A DEATH SO SOON JESUSSSSSS where was the ult cardiologist at......... #dr52 liveblog #dr52 spoilers #lee chat

5 notes

🐻 dangronper Follow

Gonna try getting into the new season lol, I stopped watching at season 37. No spoilers please

🐻 dangronper Follow

Okay wow a lot has changed! Everything is so high tech now??? I kinda miss when they just kept it more simple and had them all locked in a school ngl but maybe thats just me liking season 1 lol. Im really liking Jiro so far Im hoping he at least makes it to chapter 3 because I really wanna know more about that guy

🐻 dangronper Follow

You've gotta be kidding.

#CHAPTER ONE? HE DIED CHAPTER ONE? #THIS IS WHY I HATE ALL OF THE NEW SEASONS SO FUCKIGN BAD #THEY ONLY CARE ABOUT SHOCK VALUE AND THEY DONT CARE ABOUT STORY #THAT DEATH MAKES NO SENSE THERE ARE YOU ACTUALLY JOKING #Im logging off.

4 notes

💀 youvegotthatrite Following

12,433 notes

🫖 nagitosleftleg Follow

just a reminder that wishing death on any of the danganronpa writers makes you a terrible person and all of your favorite danganronpa characters hate you if you do that! 🤗 this is danganronpa so a lot of them will die 🤗 that doesnt mean you get to be a dickhead to team dr 🤗 get over it! 🤗

🍳 naeggieggin Follow

oh my god can anybody in this fandom just be normal and not use this weird passive aggressive tone for every single post. the writers do not give less of a fuck and neither do the actors theyre all dealing with their own shit

#i hate this fandom istg. and stop calling them characters the flashback light doesnt make them entirely fake #theyre still actual people #with feelings #danganronpa 52

769 notes

🍀luckyguy Follow

this is NOT what ultimate hope makoto naegi would have wanted

#dr52 spoilers #lucky student killed first chapter &lt;;/3 #shut up you [txt]

4,013 notes

🔧 sorryiwasbornstupid Follow

kazuichi sighted in the new post-season promo video he looks so g.ood .... . id let him do anything to me

🌸 neverminded Following

@kazuichisodaofficial @kazuichisodaofficial @kazuichisodaofficial @kazuichisodaofficial @kazuichisodaofficial @kazuichisodaofficial @kazuichisodaofficial @kazuichisodaofficial @kazuichisodaofficial @kazuichisodaofficial @kazuichisodaofficial @kazuichisodaofficial @kazuichisodaofficial @kazuichisodaofficial @kazuichisodaofficial @kazuichisodaofficial @kazuichisodaofficial @kazuichisodaofficial @kazuichisodaofficial @kazuichisodaofficial @kazuichisodaofficial @kazuichisodaofficial @kazuichisodaofficial @kazuichisodaofficial @kazuichisodaofficial @kazuichisodaofficial @kazuichisodaofficial @kazuichisodaofficial @kazuichisodaofficial @kazuichisodaofficial @kazuichisodaofficial @kazuichisodaofficial @kazuichisodaofficial @kazuichisodaofficial @kazuichisodaofficial @kazuichisodaofficial @kazuichisodaofficial @kazuichisodaofficial @kazuichisodaofficial @kazuichisodaofficial

🔧 sorryiwasbornstupid Follow

HELLO?

34 notes

🔪 danganronpa Following

Puhuhu! New episode of DANGANRONPA 52 out TODAY at 1pm JST! Make sure to bring your popcorn and your bagels, this episode sure gets.... despairful 👀You won't wanna miss it!

🍀luckyguy Follow

K

🔱 ultscubafan Follow

U

🎆 chickencoopexplosion Follow

N

🫖 nagitosleftleg Follow

G

🎸 lightmusicplayer Following

P

9,012 notes

🍳 naeggieggin Follow

can early season purists please get their heads out of nagito komaedas ass. he does not want to fuck you

106 notes

🎞️ kirigiririririri Follow

Waiittttt Jiro is so cute actually XD He keeps tripping over his shoelaces in the background of scenes LOL he's so smol ..............

🎞️ kirigiririririri Follow

I'M GONNA KILL MYSELF

#he's DEAD?????????????????????????????????

2 notes

🍳 naeggieggin Follow

keep in mind the danganronpa actors are still real people and they can see all of you thirsting over them ok. please be normal. just because they went through the effects of the flashback light doesnt mean its ok to be a fucking weirdo to hajime whenever he walks outside

🧊 kokoroicebox Follow

They're celebrities. People are going to find celebrities attractive, especially if these are people they see on screens and billboards every day. If you pick up the nearest magazine you find you're probably going to find Junko Enoshima in it. And maybe you should consider that those "weirdos" who are walking up to Hajime are simply fans that want to greet him. We've watched these people fight through hell, cry, laugh, and find hope along the way. Of course we are going to get attached to them, especially to those of us who have been keeping up with them for a long time now. You're basically asking a bunch of teenagers to close their eyes and pretend their favorite media doesn't exist.

🍳 naeggieggin Follow

i literally did not say that

🌀 cageofdeath Follow

have you maybe ever considered that maybe some people get hyperfixations??

🍳 naeggieggin Follow

oh my fucking god.

🎸 lightmusicplayer Following

anybody in this thread smoke weed

1,034 notes

🍊 hinataorangejuice Follow

OKKKKK WAIT WHY IS RANTARO KINDA 👀👀👀

#the way he got so serious while investigating.............. #wasnt a huge fan of him at the start but he's growing on me lowkey #dr52 #danganronpa 52 #dr52 #orange speaks!

29 notes

💀 youvegotthatrite Following

JIROOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO 😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭

#FUFUUUCUCKKCKCCKKKCKKCKC I REALLY LIEKD HIM!!!3!@!#(!# #FUCKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKKK #ORUUGH WHY COULDNT HAVE BEEN MOMO #dr52 lb

8 notes

🍧minimarruuuu Follow

no chapter 1 death is ever gonna beat sayaka imo #girl

#it just really started the series off so well and no other chapter 1 victim has impressed me tbh #ugh but idk shes kinda annoying now with all of her interviewssss like girl its ok to not smile sometimes lmfao #sayaka maizono #dr52 critical #maru.txt

11 notes

🎸 lightmusicplayer Following

guy ists ok hes not actually dead hes just sleeping guys

#guys #danganronpa 52 #danganronpa 52 spoilers #<- ??? just in case

🔍 kirigiri Following

a

🍊 hinataorangejuice Follow

ok queen speak your truth i guess

🌸 neverminded Following

THIS MIGHT BE A CLUE THIS MGIHT BE A CLUE TO JIROS KILLER IM LOOKIGNGGGGG SO HARD AT AKEMI RIGHT NOW

🎆 chickencoopexplosion Follow

i think she might have just accidentally posted a draft lol

🌸 neverminded Following

I dont know............. team dr has done this before where they leave littel clues in places and this seems a little TOO coincidental

🔍 kirigiri Following

I hit the post button too early.

🌸 neverminded Following

KYOKO KIRIGIRI?

43,033 notes

🐰monomini Follow

okkkkk im kinda over rantaro already lmao. heres hoping we dont get another season of him

1 note

[theamberfist]

I'm a Grandpa! | Dad Alastor Headcannons

Familial! Alastor is Reader's Adopted Dad from life

Description: When you, Alastor's adopted child, end up in hell, he's surprised to find that you took in a kid of your own sometime after his death, making him a (not so enthusiastic) grandpa.

(Notes: CW Alastor, mentions of murder, death, violence) (gender neutral reader) (Reader is Alastor's adopted child) (Reader is an adult) (Reader has an adopted son in this)

Words: 1,249

♡ Alastor died before you did. You had been a young adult at the time, but you were still left pretty much on your own in the world after that

♡ Being the adopted kid of a now-known serial killer tended to be very isolating, so you moved to a new place and took on a new name and identity in order to avoid the negative effects of what your dad had done

♡ Being his child, Alastor had always loved you very much and you really looked up to him. While you'd never been a killer or committed any serious crimes, you liked to believe he'd had good reason for what he'd done, and so you'd continued looking up to him despite it all after his murders came to light

♡ Which is why, when one of the kids you were in charge of looking after at the daycare you worked at turned out to be in a bad home situation, you stepped up

♡ Alastor had adopted you at a very young age from a similar situation and you cared deeply about this child so you ended up taking them in yourself and becoming a parent that day

♡ Your kid was an absolute terror. Alastor had always said you reminded him so much of his mom with your sweet and calm nature, so you supposed it was only natural for your own son to remind you so much of his grandpa with his dramatic antics and slightly violent tendencies

♡ Luckily, you were very good at having the kid's behavior under control and he always listened to you. It was everyone else that needed to worry when he was around

♡ You always hoped that, wherever your dad had ended up after his death, he would have been proud of you for following in his footsteps like this and that he would have loved his grandson if he could have met him

♡ So when you and your son both died in a horrific accident and ended up in hell, one of the first things you did was go looking for your dad so the whole family could be together

♡ Alastor found you long before you would have found him and he happily reunited with you, his child, after so long

♡ Appeared out of nowhere, hugged you, began talking about how much he'd missed you and how good it was to see you again, only to then notice the little boy standing behind you and growling like a feral cat

♡ Assuming the kid had been planning to attack you, Alastor started using his powers to get rid of your son, who immediately fought back like the little animal he was, but you put a stop to it all before anyone could get hurt, shouting for both of them to cut it out

♡ They both froze and you took a deep breath before picking up your son and turning back to your dad, explaining that you'd adopted a child while alive and introducing them as grandfather and grandson

♡ Neither of them were happy about that reveal but since you seemed so excited about the family reunion, they both hid their disdain behind fake smiles

♡ "I see..." Alastor said as he wiped his hand on his suit after shaking your son's hand, "then I suppose it is a pleasure to meet you...Child."

♡ Your son barred his teeth at your dad and that became the start of a deep dislike between them

♡ After that, the three of you all moved into a home together within hell. Alastor had insisted on you living with him again, especially now that you 'had a charge of your own to support' and claimed he simply wanted the chance to spend more time with his child and new grandchild

♡ Yeah, right

♡ Alastor and your son are both very good at acting like they get along while in your presence, but the second your back is turned, they're at one another's throats

♡ He would never actually harm your kid because he knows you would kill him if he did. However, that doesn't mean he won't 'defend himself' if your son attacks him so he takes it upon himself to provoke the child as much as possible and is quite good at it

♡ Several times, you've left Alastor in charge of watching your son while you went out, only to come home to the house nearly on fire. When you find them, they act like they just got carried away baking some treats but it's not hard to tell that that's a lie

♡ You routinely remind them both of how much you want them to get along and they both always claim that they do but it's a complete lie

♡ For how much Alastor loves and adores you, his own kid, he finds that he probably hates your son just as much

♡ You mentioned it to Rosie once when the three of you came to visit her in Cannibal Town and she said it's probably because the two of them are just too similar. Your son, in many ways, is like a younger version of Alastor and that's probably what gets on his nerves so much. That, and the fact that he feels his grandchild takes up way too much of your time and attention

♡ It's not until the two of them gain a common enemy that they finally find a way to be civil

♡ You had never dated much in life, either because of your slightly overbearing father or, later, your slightly overbearing son. Maybe you were never interested in it anyway

♡ But now that you're in hell, you end up finding someone you like enough to make your partner (whether romantic, queerplatonic, or anything else) and then that person starts taking your time away from both of them

♡ Common Enemy: Unlocked

♡ Now Alastor and your son find that they both hate your partner and want them gone so they reluctantly begin working together to subtly get rid of/scare them off

♡ Whenever your partner is over, they'll split up so that one of them makes an excuse to spend time with you while the other goes to your partner. One makes sure to keep you distracted while the other promptly terrorizes your partner in ways no one will believe them if they tell

♡ This goes on for a while, and eventually, between their shared chaotic natures, it works and your partner breaks things off with you

♡ And guess who's there to support you as you mourn the loss of the relationship? Your two favorite men who definitely didn’t plan this at all

♡ Cue them both in a group hug with you but behind your back they exchange glances with one another and Alastor nods approvingly

♡ Even though he still doesn’t really like your kid and feels like he has to compete with him for your time, the kid’s earned his approval today

♡ And who knows? Maybe if your son cares almost as much (he could never beat your dad as far as how much he loves you) as him, maybe there will be more times in the future in which the two of them work together to ‘protect’ you

♡ Either way, your son is safe from the anger of his grandpa, at least for now, and vice versa

……….

One shot based on this