#i made dream like. way too self aware in the first draft of this. then i had to go back and make him LESS self aware lmao

[cuubism]

I see your "Dream yelling at Desire because 'how dare you make me have feelings for Hob!!'" and raise you "Dream yelling at Desire because 'how dare you make Hob have feelings for me!!'" because it's the only logical explanation for why Hob would claim to want someone like Dream

[ cat screaming crying . jpg ]

Dream storms into Desire’s realm, steps thudding on the uneven floor, rage propelling him forward. He cannot remember ever feeling such anger, such betrayal towards his sibling, not even when he had learned they were behind his imprisonment.

Desire’s games have always gone too far, but this is beyond trying to teach him a lesson, this is beyond what Dream can reconcile, this is simply cruelty.

“YOU,” he thunders, the air shaking around him as he stalks up to where Desire is lying casually on a chaise lounge as if they haven’t just ripped Dream’s one comfort in this life out from under him. “How dare you.”

“Brother, dear,” drawls Desire, popping a grape into their mouth with not a care in the world, “it is rude to simply fly in without even knocking on the door. You wouldn’t like it if I did it to you.”

Blind with fury, Dream grabs them by the throat and hauls them to their feet. Desire lets out a choked gasp, genuinely startled by his vitriol. Their pulse trips under Dream’s thumb.

Desire cannot be killed through something as simple as strangulation, but it truly is tempting to try. “What,” Dream snarls, grip tightening, “what have you done to Hob Gadling?”

Desire blinks at him, torn from their alarm by confusion. “Whomst? Listen, I know you know everybody’s name and their kinkiest fantasy but I honestly can’t be bothered with the details, you’re going to have to fill me in.”

The rage in Dream’s core only flares hotter. “Enough of this charade, you know exactly what you’ve done.”

“No, seriously, I have no idea what you’re—”

Dream whirls away, leaving his sibling staggering in the wake of his grasp. “Was it not enough?” he demands, staring sightlessly into the gleaming red curves of Desire’s realm. “Was the vortex not enough? Was a century of imprisonment not enough for you?” His voice cracks halfway through, and it’s mortifying. “Truly, your hatred of me is untempered by even the slightest compassion.”

Desire’s voice is quizzical when they next speak. “I am starting to wish I was behind whatever this is that seems to have pierced you straight through the heart. I’m afraid my own arrows have missed that organ thus far.”

“Hob Gadling,” Dream insists, but Desire’s seemingly-genuine confusion has him wavering. It’s not like them not to revel in their own victory, and oh, this has been a victory, Dream feels laid lower than even a century in a cage had managed. “You are manipulating him.”

“Once again, I don’t know who that is. But he’s clearly excellent ammunition so I’m certainly going to find out once you leave.”

Dream flexes his hands at his sides, summoning his control. If Desire truly was not behind this, then he’s already made a mistake in coming here. Best not to offer anything else.

Being in Desire’s realm makes this stoicism difficult. The very space brings emotions to the surface, drags feelings up from his stomach that he’s tried so very hard to tamp down. He tastes blood at the back of his throat, his stomach churns, his skin prickles with sweat.

Desire stalks up behind him, sensing all of this. “Now I am curious,” they murmur, dragging a finger up his shoulder, over the collar of his coat and along the back of his neck. “Now I must know what’s go you so riled up.”

“You think you have earned such things?” Dream says through gritted teeth. His heart is pounding hard and uneven such that it physically hurts in his chest, the weight of the Threshold bearing down.

“No need to earn, you can hide nothing from me here.” Desire circles around him to his front, dragging their finger along his collarbone until it lands right at the base of his throat. They look at him from under their lashes, all smug satisfaction. “You are all tangled up in the realm of Desire, aren’t you?”

Dream moves to storm off, but Desire blocks him, nails pressing into his skin.

“Nah-ah, no running away. Let your little sibling help you, hm? As you may know, I am rather wise in matters of the heart.”

The look on Desire’s face is craftiness, glee, not charity or wisdom.

“I neither need nor wish for your assistance,” says Dream, voice hard. “On this, or any other matter.”

“But there is a matter.” Desire leans in and speaks right in his ear. “I can smell the heartsickness on you, Dream.”

There is nothing Dream can say in response to this. Any denial would only be read as falsehood, for Desire does not lie – of late, Dream feels sick with wanting in Hob’s presence, hunger so sharp it turns over into nausea, much like the first time Hob had pushed him to eat after his captivity. How cruel, then, to have his pain eased, his desires sated by a reciprocation that cannot possibly be truly felt.

There is nothing to say, so Dream doesn’t speak. Silence, of course, is its own answer.

“You know, if there’s one thing I have always admired about you, big brother, it’s your willingness to destroy yourself for the sake of passion,” Desire continues. “You’d think that’d be my sort of thing. Who’ve you lost yourself on this time? Demigod? Demon? Dryad? Vampire?”

Dream glares at them, but does not speak.

Desire’s face absolutely lights up as they realize. “Oh. My. God. Is he human? Dreeaaammmmm, my my, maybe your little time out did change you, after all.”

Dream turns away, refusing to give them the satisfaction of confirming. Though he knows this reaction is also a confirmation.

Desire claps their hands. “Oh! I’m so proud of myself. Look at this! Look at the softness of your heart. Look how I can bruise it.”

Dream’s heart, indeed, gives a painful thump. “Should you dare to touch him, even the old laws will not protect you.”

Desire sighs, flopping back onto a couch, legs crossed, head propped in their hand. “Why bother? You’ll destroy it yourself, and that’ll be much more fun.”

I hate you, Dream thinks, like a petulant child. He hates, also, how any argument with Desire makes him feel that way, feelings crowding at the surface of his skin, throat tightening, mind spinning in a chaotic churn. His muscles clench so hard he thinks they might have snapped, were he human, then he forces himself back into a semblance of ease.

There is no extracting himself from this situation with any dignity.

“Interfere with my affairs again,” he warns darkly, “and I will destroy you.”

Then he storms out of the Threshold.

“Love you too!” Desire calls after him, a grin in their voice. “Good luck with your human!”

--

When he’d found Hob at the New Inn, thirty-three years after he’d meant to arrive, Dream had not known how he might be received. Friendship extended once may not be extended again after so brutal a rejection, and so prolonged an absence, no matter that the latter offense was not within his control.

Being met with a smile, then, and an easy acceptance of his apology, like Hob had already forgiven him long before Dream had stepped through the door, had been a revelation. Something had settled in him that he had not known was knocked askew. Could there, truly, be one thing in his life that was allowed to be easy? Where Dream’s missteps were not met with scorn or vitriol or world-shaking consequences, but with grace and the chance to try again?

It seemed improbable, but still Dream had grabbed for it with cold, shaking fingers. Had held that unlikely flame between his palms. Had watched as it grew, hotter and brighter with each smile Hob sent his way, with each gentle brush of fingers as he pressed cups of tea into Dream’s hands, with the hug Hob finally managed to wind him into, once Dream had told him of the true reason for his absence in 1989.

Hob’s grace, Hob’s generosity in inviting someone, something like him into his home, into his life… Dream did not quite know how to hold it, so unlikely it was. He tried, though, oh he tried. And he swore he would not mess it up, not like he had when Hob had first offered his friendship.

He has now, quite royally, messed it up.

He very much doubts Hob will be so generous this time.

He finds Hob where he left him, sitting on the couch in his flat, a book in his hand. He doesn’t seem to be concentrating on it; his thoughts feel scattered in ragged, disturbed daydreams.

He doesn’t even startle when Dream materializes next to him. Though he knows it can be startling to humans, Dream has not been able to break himself of just appearing where he needs to – traversing the long way from point to point is not how he works. But aside from the occasional, teasing, I have a door, you know, Hob never truly complains about these disturbances to his day.

Dream means to offer him an apology. To say, I should not have walked out when you said that you loved me. To say, I am supposed to be better, I am trying to be better.

Instead, just as Hob looks up, the words that trip out of Dream’s mouth, pushed by the flurry of Desire’s realm still pounding within him, are, “Did you speak truly, Hob Gadling?”

Which is a ridiculous question. Dream does not think he has ever heard Hob speak a lie. Still, Dream must have the answer.

Hob’s expression shifts through several incarnations, none of which Dream feels capable of reading. Finally, it settles on the same soft, exasperated understanding Dream remembers being presented with when he’d said, I know thirty years is truly quite late, at their reunion, before he’d told Hob why he was late.

Grace, then. He is to be offered grace, again.

His emotions are still so close to the surface that he has to physically swallow down what he feels about that.

“Of course, I did,” Hob says, and there’s a hint of nerves in it, but he pushes through, he always does. “I wouldn’t lie to you about that.”

His gaze is genuine, open, and no, Desire had not lied – Hob’s feelings are no manipulation of theirs. And while it is tempting to search for other answers, spells or illusions or any number of other causes, Dream knows, deep down, that he will come up empty.

Hob’s feelings are true, are his truth, confounding though that is.

Dream no longer feels capable of holding any of this in his hands.

Instead, he kisses him.

It’s like he is pulled forward by a force outside his own body. He goes to Hob like he had gone to the sugar in the tea Hob had made him, that night at the inn when Dream had first realized how long it had truly been since he’d eaten; he goes to him like he had gone back to the Dreaming after being freed, returning home breathless, lost, changed.

Hob catches him against his mouth, hands cradling Dream’s face. His grip is solid and warm, and he kisses Dream like he looks at him like he speaks to him, with a care Dream hardly knows how to accept. He leans into it anyway, he leans in.

“I wasn’t fishing for a kiss when I said that, you know,” Hob says when they part, still lingering close enough that Dream can feel his heat, his breath. “I meant it in more of— well, that way, for certain, but really, any way you wanted to take it.”

“Any way,” Dream repeats, not sure he comprehends Hob’s meaning.

“Yeah, you—” Hob cuts himself off, letting out a breath, thinking. His hands slide from Dream’s face down to his shoulders, and he holds him there. “I. You just. I want you to know that you’re loved. Not demanding anything of it. Just telling you. Take it however serves you best.”

Dream stares at him, his whole being tripped and restarted at a new rhythm, and Hob gives him a sad smile.

“It’s too big to hold,” he says, and taps his chest. “In here. And besides, I wanted you to have it.”

Dream had had it. Only he hadn’t quite known what he had. The sunshine of Hob’s smiles, sustaining him, a bridge between distant points of light.

Finally, he manages to say, “I felt it. You have been my succor. My… only.”

Hob has captured him more effectively than Burgess’s snare, but this capture is not a prison. It hurts, oh, it aches, but it never wounds.

Hob smiles at him again. There’s still something pained in the creases around his eyes. “I know.”

He’s still touching Dream. His hands run over him, up his neck, over his throat, along his collarbone, and—

catch, on the collar of his shirt, above his heart.

“What happened?”

His voice is tight, now, worried, and— yes. There are bruises on Dream’s chest, crawling up over his breastbone. He had felt them form, and hadn’t stopped them.

Hob’s expression darkens further the longer he looks; he drags the collar of Dream’s shirt down, trying to see how far the damage spreads. “You’ve got bruises all over you. Dream, what happened?”

What happened is Dream stood in the Threshold and his heart beat so hard it drummed right through to the surface of his skin. What happened is it hurt so badly his form shifted to give reason for the pain.

“Desire,” he says, and he does not mean his sibling.

Hob doesn’t seem to understand, but he smoothes a hand over Dream’s heart as if to wipe the bruises away. Dream could will his body to return to its original, unharmed state, but he does not. He lets the blood stay pooled beneath his skin.

Hob sighs, tugging Dream’s coat tighter around him, shielding him from further injury. “Come here, you. You strange creature.”

He pulls Dream in, though he does not have to pull hard. Dream tucks his face into Hob’s neck, reveling in the warm scent of him, woodsmoke from the fireplace down in the inn where they’ve now spent many a long evening, basking in the heat of the flames. Hob’s arms go around him.

Absolution. Dream does not think this is a gift that has ever been granted to him.

“I would also love you,” he says. “If you would accept it.”

“If I would accept it?” Hob repeats. “Darling, your love is a privilege.”

Dream’s heart, in all its bruises and blood, finds rhythm again, and he thinks, though he certainly doesn’t pull away from Hob to check, that his skin clears up partway, too.

[eolewyn1010]

Do you ever suspect that Mary Shelley had an incest fetish? Because I do TBH...

Huh. I guess there could be a point made for Daddy issues, what with her difficult relationship to her father and the animosity she held toward her stepmother and all that. Maybe a little too dilettante psychologist for what you mean tho. So, from another standpoint (watch out, I'm babbling here):

I think her writing the Frankensteins the way she did was very much for the purpose of the story rather than self-serving, especially regarding Elizabeth. iirc, her first draft involved Elizabeth as Victor's actual cousin, and she only changed it to adoptive sister when people complained about the incest situation, removing the blood relation while very much keeping the emotional aspect of incest, with Victor intending to marry her who grew up alongside him in his household. I wouldn't exactly call it fetish material bc their relationship is kept in very non-sexual terms - there's only two notable instances where he gets physical with "Elizabeth". 1st, the dream sequence in which he embraces her and she turns into the corpse of his mother, and 2nd, when he embraces her actual corpse. While the former doubles the incestuous connotation, tying in with how in Victor's mind the relationship to his mother and that to Elizabeth overlap, he never expresses a desire of physical intimacy with a living Elizabeth; he only gets close to her when she's already lost to him. Hell, even his descriptions of her beauty read much like his descriptions of his mother; I swear he's more passionate when talking about Henry...

Thing is, all of this goes hand in hand with Victor preferring ancient philosophers over his contemporary scientists, with his failure to be a sufficient father figure, with him refusing to take criticism from outside, with his outright rejection of change even in the form of recognizing his own flaws and doing some character development. For a scientist who pushes the boundaries of progress, Victor is a remarkably backward character, averse to change even insofar as it would be his own maturing. And I think Shelley, daughter of a feminist and given a pretty thorough education by her father, was very aware of this when she wrote Victor. The incest motif is her way of illustrating Victor's refusal of growth and of opening to the world outside his familiar surroundings.

tl;dr - no, I don't think she had XD But it's a hell of an interesting question to discuss!

[keyofw]

CW: Misogyny, incels, cringe

Back in 2020, I finished the first draft of a musical, and because the timing could not have been poorer, I've been essentially sitting on it and waiting for places to open submissions while I do minor revisions. So I made a full demo of the show and have decided to actually share the whole thing for both of my fans, piece by piece (it's also available on streaming services because I am that vain).

My snarky elevator pitch is that it's about the first ever incel to go to therapy. Or even better, a harem anime meets A Beautiful Mind.

This is the opening number, and I'll post the full script for this number below:

1. Everybody Has a Dark Side

(Music begins with a pitched sound effect. Onstage band begins cue. In the back is a mechanical egg-shaped pod, big enough to hold a person. With smoke and lights, the pod opens, and out comes NIKO. They are mid-20s, looking like an archetypical “neckbeard” or “nice guy.” Despite being the apparent frontman for the band, NIKO can’t seem to pull off the edgy look they’re going for, though they try to rock out during the intro. Finally they take their place downstage at a mic. They deliver their edgy material without a hint of self-awareness.)

NIKO EVERYBODY HAS A DARK SIDE, EVEN THE QUIET ONES, ESPECIALLY THE QUIET ONES. EVERYBODY HAS A DARK SIDE NO ONE WANTS TO SEE. BE CAREFUL WHAT YOU SAY TO ME.

UNDERNEATH THE SURFACE, HIBERNATING EVIL WAITING FOR THE MOMENT, FEELING DENIED. PLASTIC LITTLE SMILE, SHELTER IN YOUR SHELL, PRESS IT JUST A LITTLE AND CRACK IT OPEN WIDE.

WE LIVE IN A SOCIETY THAT WORSHIPS MEMES, THAT LIVES FOR MONEY INSTEAD OF DREAMS. WE LIVE IN A SOCIETY WHERE NO ONE READS. THE GENIUS DIES, THE MORON BREEDS. WE LIVE IN A SOCIETY WHERE MEN OF MEANS TREAT WOMEN LIKE WHORES INSTEAD OF QUEENS.

EVERYBODY HAS A DARK SIDE, SOMETHING BURIED DEEP INSIDE, SOMETHING YOU CAN’T BEAR TO HIDE. EVERYBODY HAS A DARK SIDE, DESIRE TO CONTROL, DOMINATE A SOUL.

I, COLLEGE DROPOUT, TOO SMART FOR SCHOOL. GENIUS IS ALWAYS IGNORED IN ITS DAY. I AM STILL STANDING, NOBODY’S FOOL. AS THE YEARS GO ON I GO MY WAY.

(Music break. NIKO rocks out for a moment, then straightens up to address the audience directly.)

Hi. I’m Niko. Just Niko. Some people say my music is too loud. Welcome to the show. “Did that guy really just say all that incel bullshit? And that’s the hero?” Yeah, I’m the hero - don’t get ahead of me now. Every hero needs a villain, an antagonist, an obstacle to overcome. That’s me. I’m the villain.

EVERYBODY HAS A DARK SIDE. THOUGH THEY LOOK A LITTLE MEEK, DOESN’T MEAN THAT THEY ARE WEAK. SO BEWARE, I HAVE A DARK SIDE. EVERY NICE GUY HAS AN END, A POINT HE CAN NO LONGER BEND.

(Screamo - NIKO is not particularly good at it.)

DON’T YOU AWAKEN MY DARK SIDE! DON’T YOU AWAKEN MY DARK SIDE! DON’T YOU AWAKEN MY DARK SIDE! DON’T YOU AWAKEN MY DARK SIDE!

(A phone alarm rings and music stops instantly. NIKO drops the persona and pulls out their phone.)

I’m late for therapy.

[ellsellmesoull]

Every night you dream that you talk to a genie, when you wake up you can't remember what you wished for. One morning you wake up with a giant crab pincer replacing your right arm. What do you do?

A genie stands before you, maddeningly beautiful like one might find the ocean. A being of immense power yet contained by simple laws. One wouldnt expect a human when asked what species a genie could be. The most right answer being a demon trapped in a bottle. Yet each night, you find it harder to brace yourself for the unflattering mess of limbs not quiet human yet not resembling even an animal and a visage of monstrous proportions.

You used to wonder why you dreamed repeatedly of this one fascinating creature. Deep down you knew what it was without ever remembering how you did. Even though your take on a genie wouldnt differ from everyone's familiar animated movie.

Yet each night the creature seemed even more real. Such big ears you have- the better to hear wishes. Such big hands you have- the better to build wishes to reality. Such big eyes you have- the better to see the changes I make.

The alarm rings dragging you back into the land of the concious. You toss and turn trying to switch the noise off but failing as you know the alarm to the floor. This makes you more aware and as you get up and reach towards the ground you notice your right arm is red and large.

With white pots and a hard shell.

With a picer like a crab instead of fingers.

And suddenly you wonder if your dreams really had a meaning. That maybe, it was all real. Fear engulfs your mind as you try to remember what you could've wished for. For as long as you've seen the genie, you could've asked for more wishes than just one crab pincer in your dreams.

Yet you find no other significant changes in your life. You couldn't help but wonder why you wouldn't wish for something to help pay rent or pay out your debts.

You watch you right hand- pincer?- move as it answers to your every beck and call like it was made just for you. And you decide to see what it can really do.

You walk to the beach near you. Covered in trash, it is a fairly isolated area. As you remove your jacket, you pick up trash to recycle or salvage as you please. But this time, you try cutting into thinks and punching it with your right hand. But disheartened to find your magic hand to not be as strong as you had hoped.

Perhaps you need to work out.

You move and houl trash out to a small gathering, freeing the occasional animal stuck beneath the fallen debrie.

There were crabs in the beach along with dogs and cats. You would find them stuck under risky piles of trash that crumpled down the first chance they got. You had made sure to create a pathway from the ocean to the road, incase the little guys need a clear way to escape instead of treading through more trash. But sometimes you would take one or two crabs for yourself.

Fresh crab meat was too good for you to pass up.

Now as you sit on a sturdy looking old refrigerator facing the sunset, you think of what to do with your life. You thought you could tell people, make a name for your self. Maybe you could make even more money that way. Mysterious Human Crab! Or maybe you could live as a mystical cryptid. You wondered how much a cryptid would potentialy earn. Not enough to convince you.

I am randomly finding posts here in my drafts and I have no memory about them tf? So im gonna post here meh~

[lilblueorchid]

Thought process and easter egg on the Digimon Anniversary Illustration! 

Hello everyone, today I feel like explaining some stuff over my Digimon Illustration, mostly why I drew thing this way or point out some little details and easter eggs you might have missed. ;)

Click on read more if you want a LENGTHLY explanation with a lot of rambling from me, or if not you can just enjoy the process gif. <3 

The Digimon illustration was a special one for me for different reasons. Firstly, obviously, Digimon! It was a show I grew up with, and I find it quite fitting that after a tough year of graduation movie under a pandemic, in which I really experienced the pain of growing up, I ended up finding back Digimon. 

Secondly, as a child, I remember spending HOURS looking for fanarts online! I would save all the ones I found pretty and keep them preciously, i still have the folders actually haha. While pursuing art, I always had in mind thatI wanted one day to make a fanart my child self would have gone crazy over! And, i think I achieved that with that one haha. 

Anyway LET’S START! Shall we? 

First off : the illustration process

When I do an illustration I always do a quick draft first, and most of the time, in colors. I think I’m more of a “color” person than a “line” person, I tend to need to see colors quickly in order to see if it’s ok. 

For this one, I’ve always had in mind it would be a double illustration, with the older Tai’s silhouette acting as a frame for the children illustration. It was a bit tricky, I had to make the children illustration fit nicely into his silhouette, it was hassle around the neck area, that’s why I made little Taichi stand up haha. Also used Mimi’s hat to balance the picture : the bottom part is very heavy and there’s only sky in the upper part, adding the hat helps making it more balanced. 

The character were the longest and the most challenging part by far. As you can see I had 3 different steps : super rough, they’re almost like stickmen and smiley face, a more detailled one in which I figure out their actual pose and anatomy, then a last one in which I fix some proportion, add details and clean. Fun fact I don’t clean over a new layer... i just erase the unwanted part of my sketch. :’D

I did a quick pass over the BG after that, then I colored the characters in flat colors before rendering them. It was a back and forth between the BG and the characters to make sure everything was working together nicely. 

Now was the time to render the BG, I did the tramway first, the flower field after. Fun fact, I did my flower field study in order to know how to approach the flowers in this illustration! If your have the time, i totally recommend finding a photograph close to the kind of BG you wanna do, and make a study of it so you can try your hand at it first and go into your own BG later with an idea of how to approach this.

Adjust colors, add flower petals and butterflies and emotional text, slap over a paper texture, and THERE. You have it! On to the next part now...

The meaningful details and easter eggs

Be aware there will be spoilers for Digimon Adventure 01 (but I assume you already know it), but also for Digimon Adventure : Last evolution Kizuna, which is the conclusion of the first serie. So read at your own risk! 

The tramway is obviously a reference to the end of Digimon Adventure 01. The kids used it to go back to their world, so It was their goodbye to their Digimon at this moment. In Kizuna, Tai and Matt find the tramway trapped in crystal in Menoa’s fake memory world. Hinting that had they been caught by her, their memories would have brought them back here.

Tailmon has Kari’s whistle! At the end of Digimon Adventure 01, Kari gives it to her as a memento. 

When I drew Sora, I had in mind how she was in Kizuna, very stressed out by her mom’s expectation, which led her to neglect Piyomon. She realized it too late, and after that she refused to fight because she wanted to keep Piyomon with her as long as possible. Tragically, she was the first one to lose her Digimon. Here I tried to convey a softness and a kind of “I won’t forget to appreciate you” vibe in the way she holds Piyomon’s hand. As for Mimi and Palmon, in Digimon adventure 01 Palmon was very emotionally affected by Mimi’s departure, so, a hug was fitting. :’) 

The screens on the Tramway display DA for Digimon Adventure, and also 01.08.1999 which is the date of the children’s journey’s beginning. :) 

The little drawings also show the 8 crests. 

There are butterflies flying over the illustration, it’s a reference to Butter-fly, the first Digimon opening, by the late Koji Wada. 

"I'll become a happy butterfly, and ride on the glittering wind, I'll come and see you soon. “

Now, let’s the see the counterpart of the illustration. The one with the grown up Tai from Kizuna.

I made him wear the hoodie he had in his very last adventure with Agumon.... but truthfully the reason is that I think hoodies are cool lol. And the hood’s volume gave me more space in the silhouette, which made it easier for me to do the other illustration inside.

You don’t see it clearly, but he is holding his Digivice, albeit the darkened version once his partner bond with Agumon is broken. The Tai in this illustration has already lost Agumon. (Yes it was painful for me to go fetch the screenshots)

He is also holding his dear signature google he used to wear as a child. Fun fact, I rewatched the older movies, and as a kid he even used to sleep with it, how cute haha. 

Also yes, the crest of Courage over his hand, which is his own. I’m so dumb I realize I should have made the time counter from the movie instead of the crest for a maximum emotional hurt impact. 

And the quote is from one of the trailer for Kizuna, I think.....................

But then you go : Oh that illustration is so depressing then! Well. Yes. But no. but yes. But not really. 

One of my favorite shot of the movie is this one : this is after Tai and Agumon learn their time together is limited. Agumon asks him if they will have to go separate ways once Tai is all grown up. Tai doesn’t answer, and takes him to eat something instead, as Agumon was hungry. In this shot Agumon eats to his heart content next to Tai, who’s not eating at all and just watches him fondly. I love that the framing doesnt show agumon. It’s a foreshadowing of their unavoidable separation. 

At the very end of the movie, Tai write in his thesis about Human and Digimon’s relationship that Agumon was like a part of himself.

In a way, Agumon symbolizes childhood, the carefree days we would spend as a kid, with our big dreams and hopes. When you grow up, you tend to forget those simple emotions because you get swallowed into the stress of studies, figuring out your carreer, your life path. Just like us, Tai forgot this part of himself. In the madness of growing up, he lost Agumon. 

However, it’s not the end. He will pick himself back up. He will move forward in life despite his worries and incertainities, and he will find himself again. Therefore, he will find Agumon again. The kids in the illustration are waving goodbye, but it’s not goodbye, it’s a see you later.  In the meantime, Tai is holding on to these precious memories, until they meet again. 

[lyrical-panic]

Love Letters

Tenya Iida X Writer!Reader

(This is absolutely a self insert leave me alone)

Requests are open!!

Tenya's morning routine was always the same. He was awoken by his alarm at 6:20 A.M. He went to the bathroom and washed his face. Then he'd get dresses, comb his hair, and go downstairs for breakfast. After he'd eaten, he would brush his teeth, and head to class with his peers.

This system was so ordinary, so methodical, that he almost missed the folded sheet of printer paper on the floor in front of the door.

Probably Mr. Aizawa, he'd thought, stooping to collect the note. His teacher occasionally left notes taped to the class rep's door, asking him to take attendance or start class if Aizawa knew he was going to be late. Still nothing out of the ordinary for Tenya.

When he unfolded the paper, though, he was surprised to see not a message from his teacher, but rather a very sweet note; something that Tenya was not accustomed to getting at all.

I hope it does not alarm you to hear that I adore you. Your unbridled passion for heroics, your eyes; which are oceans of kindness, and your aptitude for helping others. Every little bit of you never once ceases to amaze and enamor me. Though you are a vessel for speed, you choose to walk alongside your friends, instead of tearing off into the future. You build me up and make me feel strong, whether you realize it or not. You make me feel like I'm actually worth something. You keep my head up when I feel as though I'm drowning in a sea of my insecurities.

Perhaps one day I'll have the courage to tell you this in person. For now though, this will suffice.

The letter was not signed off, but rather ended with a red pen sketch of a heart. Tenya's eyes nearly doubled in size. He re read the note several more times to make sure he hadn't imagined the loving words. Who could've possibly written it? He wasn't aware of anyone in his class who harbored these kinds of feelings, much less for him, but he had never been particularly good at reading emotions.

Realizing he was going to be late for breakfast if he dwelled any longer on it, Tenya pocketed the love letter and headed downstairs. The mystery would have to wait until after school. His responsibilities always came first, no matter how often his mind still wandered back to the letter in his pocked, yearning to pull it out and read it yet again, just to make sure he still wasn't dreaming.

. . . 

Whoever had written the note was smart, Tenya realized. They had typed it, leaving no room for the possibility that he could recognize the handwriting. The only part that had been done by hand was that little red heart, but a doodle wasn't nearly enough to tell him who the author was.

He turned instead to analyzing the words themselves.They were well chosen, poetic even. The fifty cent words like "unbridled" and "enamored" led him to believe that the author was an experienced writer, or perhaps simply read a lot.

Yaoyorozu was a good contender, she was an eloquent speaker. Kaminari also read a lot, he was good with literature. And there was Tokoyami, who seemed to speak exclusively in poetry. Tenya jotted down his ideas, crafting a short list of his classmates.

"Oh, (L/N) writes a lot," he mused, adding their name to the list. (L/N) actually made a lot of sense.

Oh, but maybe it was just wishful thinking. Perhaps he only read the love letter in (L/N)'s voice being he wanted it to be them.

...or maybe it actually wasn't a bad idea.

(L/N) was always writing. They viewed it as a privilege, a challenge. They leapt at every creative writing assignment they got in English class, and the few stories they had shared were spectacularly inventive and elegantly crafted.

Tenya halted, scanning the message again. It suddenly seemed more and more likely that (L/N) was in fact the author.

He chewed his lip. It was too easy. Too convenient. Too perfect. How could someone he already cared for so deeply send him something like this? It was too good to be true. Besides, it was only one note. How could be possibly-

"What if they write more?" Tenya suddenly said out loud, his train of thought coming to a screeching halt. "I'd have a better line up to analyze. I could also ask Present Mic for the short stories assignments he's grading so I can pass them back. I could probably be able to look over at least a few of them and see if I recognize the writing."

A man on a mission, Tenya resigned himself to waiting until the next day to see if another note appeared, and to ask Present Mic about the stories.

Too anxious and oddly excited, he hardly got any sleep.

. . . 

Sure enough the next morning, there was a new note. Tenya all but flew out of bed and scrambled to unfold it.

I find myself caught in a storm of uncertainty all too often. I'm tossed from wave to wave in an ocean of fear. You are my rock. You hold me fast and secure in this ever-changing and frightening world. You are safe. You are my home.

You are my everything.

Tenya unconsciously read the letter in (L/N)'s voice again. He felt his heart beat harder at the thought of them penning these beautiful words.

"You don't know that it's them," he scolded himself, unwillingly placing the new note on his desk next to the old one. He tore himself away from them to retreat into the bathroom to get ready for the day.

The new message did offer one new clue already, though. It used the same ocean metaphor as the first one. It was a comparison the author seemed to favor. Maybe he could find it in their other works.

He had to get his hands on those short story assignments before he lost his damn mind.

. . . 

Tenya felt slightly uneasy about telling Present Mic he wanted the stories to pass back, even though he was technically telling the truth. He was eventually going to pass them back. When he was done looking through them.

A lie of omission is still a lie, that annoying voice in his head insisted, but he pretended he couldn't hear it, pushing it down. It wouldn't do any harm, he rationalized. And he had to know.

Tenya flipped through the papers, looking for (L/N)'s first. It was a desperate wish that they were the author of the anonymous notes, but it also seemed to make just enough sense to justify thumbing through their assignment.

There. (L/N) always went above the beyond with creative writing, and the five pages of neatly typed text was a testament to that. It was the longest assignment in the stack by two pages.

Wait.... typed?

It was probably a coincidence. After all, (L/N) hadn't been the only student who'd opted to type their story. Tenya was too convinced already that they had sent him those letters for him to entertain the idea that it was simply just a coincidence.

He skimmed the story quickly before class started. He found himself impressed, not for the first time with (L/N)'s abilities as a writer. Each word was carefully selected to craft perfect sentences and immaculate paragraphs full of feeling and vibrant imagery.

He stopped suddenly a page in as the protagonist compared their anguish to a stormy sea, heavy waves tossing them to and fro.

There it is again.

The sentiments from the letters, which Tenya had all but seared into his brain, echoed that of what he was reading now. The vocabulary, the imagery, the deep feelings evoked by each sentence, and even the fact that it was typed.

It had to be them. It had to be (Y/N). It was just too perfect.

. . . 

(Y/N) sat a few seats ahead and to the right of Tenya, so he spent quite a bit of class time staring unabashedly at the back of their head. They were scribbling madly on a sheet of lined paper. Lecture notes? Short story?.... Love letter?

People often say that opposites attract. Tenya was just realizing how true that was as he sat in class, half listening to the lesson, half watching (Y/N). He was all angles and sternness, whereas they were flexible and soft. Perhaps it didn't always show physically on their features, but in their mannerisms, and even in their writing, they were stunning curves, twists and turns. With them, you didn't always know where you were going, but it was an adventure all the same. They were a warm, comforting feeling. They felt like home.

An idea bloomed in Tenya's mind, a delectably wonderful way for him to show (Y/N) that he reciprocated their feelings. Having a difficult time smothering his smile, Tenya fished through his school bag for a sheet of lined paper.

. . .

You frowned thoughtfully at your paper, lips pursed. You tapped your pencil against your dorm room desk as you considered your next words.

This was the hardest, part, but still the most fun. The first draft. You could change whatever wording or dialogue you wanted while you were typing it up, nut you still needed a good base. You still had to carefully choose every word that you wanted to use to move your audience.

Tenya Iida

You grinned giddily just thinking of him. He had given almost no indication these past two days that he'd gotten your letters, but you could tell. His eyes had darted around, scrutinizing everyone they landed on. It had felt a bit like being dissected when his gaze had fallen upon you.

There's no way he knows, you had reasoned, giving him a tight smile in return. He's just trying to sus me out. For all he knows, it could be literally anyone.

You had ridden that wave of shaky confidence in your anonymity, all the way to that moment, where you turned around in your desk chair, intending to grab your phone, only for your eyes to fall upon a folded up piece of paper next to your door.

You felt an anxious lurch in your gut as you shakily picked it up. "If this is Iida telling me to never speak to him again I'm going to cry."

You unfolded the message, fully expected the worst, and praying to whatever god was or wasn't out there that you were wrong and that Iida wasn't completely creeped out and now hated you.

You remind me of the ocean waves you write about so often. You're a crescendo of carefully chosen words, actions, and kind thoughts. You're soft yet strong, never backing down from a fight or a friend in need. Your determination and drive impress me to no ends, and make me want to impress you as well.

You've cast a spell on me for quite some time now, but your hold over me was only strengthened by the heartfelt messages you sent me. I'm beyond happy that you share my feelings.

The letter wasn't signed, but it was written in what was distinctly Iida's penmanship. He had ended his message the same way you had ended yours; with a hand-drawn heart.

"Oh my god," you whispered, paper crinkling as your grip tightened around it. You read it again. Then again. And then again. "Damnit, he's right. I do use the stormy sea metaphor a lot."

Note still clenched in your hand, you sped-walked to Iida's dorm room, heart thundering in your chest. The thought that Iida; sensible, respectful Iida would have feelings for a disaster like you was a little discombobulating to say the least, so you were determined to hear it straight from the horses mouth.

You rapped on his door, foot tapping impatiently. The few seconds it took for Iida to answer dragged on for what felt like an eternity. When he finally did open the door, a pleasantly surprised look crossed his face upon seeing you.

You held up his note. "Hi. Um, so."

Iida chuckled, cheeks reddening. He gestured you in as he stepped back to his desk, where he produced the letters you had sent. "So."

"Y-you're not messing with me, right?" you asked nervously. "'Cause if you are I'm going to kick you."

"Trust me, everything I wrote is 100% true." He smiled earnestly. "And you...?

"I think those letters are the most honest I've ever been about my feelings ever." you admitted, shifting your weight from foot to foot. A wry smile played on the edges of your lips. "I was drafting you another one, but you just had to go and find me out and ruin it."

"You can still give it to me," Iida said hopefully, palming the back of his neck with his hand, flustered.

You laughed a little, your own cheeks warming up. You twisted the hem of your shirt. "Uh, can I hug you?"

"O-of course!"

You wrapped your arms around Iida's torso, resting your head on his chest, listening to the drumming of his heart. He slowly followed suit, snaking his arms around your shoulders. He let out a contented sigh, relaxing into your touch. He was so warm. He was a cozy fire in the dark of winter, a blissful reprise from a cold and harsh world.

You pursed your lips, stifling a snicker. I've gotta write that down.

[laurenairay]

Prove You Wrong - J. Skinner

Summary: Audrey James, the girl with the loving heart, and Jeff Skinner, the boy with the brilliant smile, had been best friends for most of their lives – will their friendship ever develop into anything more?

Word Count: 9.1k

Warnings: pining, childhood friends to lovers, a little angst, a lot of cute fluff

A/N: I’ve wanted to write for Jeff for a while because I love this smiley pretty boy - and now that I’ve reached a new follower milestone (600!!) I thought I’d finally crack this out! I hope you all like it 💖

Tagging some lovely people who make hockeyblr a better place for me: @itsbadgerbadgermushroom​ @danglesnipecelly​ @texanstarslove​ @princessphilly​ @broadstbroskis​ @denis-scorianov​ @chicagoblackhawkslover96​ @kallmekmk​ @thebookofmags​

*

“Whatever our souls are made of, his and mine are the same.” – Emily Brontë

Audrey James had known Jeff Skinner for as long as she could remember. Having grown up together in Markham, Ontario, Jeff the second youngest of six siblings and Audrey the youngest of four siblings, they’d bonded so quickly – and so strongly. Where Jeff went, Audrey was sure be by his side, most often a calming presence, a balancing figure, even from a young age.

When Jeff started skating like his siblings, Audrey was scooting along beside him.

When Jeff started figure skating lessons, Audrey twirled right there with him.

When Jeff started hockey practice too…Audrey helped him practice in his backyard.

She kept his many emotions as level as possible – he made sure she strayed out of her comfort zone. Friends came and went, schools changed, injuries healed, but things never changed between Jeff and Audrey. She trusted him as wholly as he trusted her, and their friendship only grew stronger every year. It didn’t matter that they couldn’t have been more different in appearance and personality – her long straight blonde hair versus his dark brown curls, or her grey eyes versus his brown eyes, or even her sweet retiring nature versus his joyful energetic nature. They complemented each other perfectly, balancing each other out and boosting each other up, and this only strengthened as they grew older.

Summers were spent practicing hockey in the backyard with all of their many siblings, road hockey games leaving sunburn, grazed knees, the occasional tears, sticky ice-cream and fond memories. Whenever Jeff got cuts on his knees, elbows or on one occasion his chin, he accepted Audrey’s pretty princess bandaids with a shaky smile. Whenever Audrey got knocked on her ass (by accident) by one of the older girls, she blinked away her tears as Jeff fiercely defended her, yelling at his sisters and hers in turn. When Jeff’s curls got too much for the summer heat, she held his hand as his dad clipped his hair short, watching sadly as the curls fell to the ground. When Audrey broke her arm in the last hockey game of the season, Jeff pestered his sisters to teach him how to braid their hair, so he could surprise Audrey by braiding her long blonde hair back out of her face for her, earning him the biggest smile he had ever seen. Every summer held a special memory for Audrey and Jeff, the sweetness of childhood and the beauty of friendship, and it didn’t matter what else was going on, what other friends joined or left – they always made time for each other. Summers were their thing, even more so when Jeff went to Kitchener – this made summers even more special, their time to spend together without normal-life distractions, and Audrey treasured it more than anything.

Time seemed to only be going past faster as they grew older though, and with that came changes. Growing up came with growing out of love with figure skating for Audrey.

While her interest in figure skating waned by the time she was 12, she never lost interest in his skating, whether that was figure skating or ice hockey. Audrey was even there watching with his family at the Canadian Junior National Figure Skating Championships (she couldn’t have been more proud of his bronze medal) before he chose to focus just on hockey. And as for hockey – Audrey truly was his biggest supporter. She went to every game possible, with either his family or with hers as well, and whether it was a win or a loss, Audrey was ready with a big hug and a smile. And Jeff appreciated it more than he could ever say. When he heard murmurs of people commenting on his small size, she would fiercely defend him, insisting that his speed, skill and heart were more than anyone could ever hope to measure up to. Because it was true. Jeff had always been special, Audrey knew that, and her heart could only fill with pride as he continued to prove people wrong.

But he never proved her wrong. She always knew he was going to be magnificent.

That was the funny thing about love – when you know, you know. And Audrey had known how she felt about the boy with the brilliant smile for a very long time. Her heart had been Jeff’s before she even knew what it meant, and as they grew older, especially as early teenagers, Audrey realised just what her feelings for her best friend meant.

She knew there was a glimmer of hope that Jeff felt the same. She knew that Jeff shared things with her (thoughts, feelings, fears) that he shared with no-one else. She knew that there were moments that lingered with a what if? She knew that the boys on his teams always teased him for having a girl best friend and that he always shrugged it off. She knew that the way he blushed around her sometimes was more than just nothing.

But she also knew that she could never tell him how she felt. Why? Because even at 16 she knew that he was destined to play in the NHL – and she wanted a career of her own too. Was it selfish? Perhaps. Was there a hint of cowardice? Perhaps. The thing is, Audrey had only ever known herself by Jeff’s side – and she wanted the chance to know who she was without him, as much as the very thought scared her.

So when Jeff was drafted to Kitchener, Audrey buckled down in school to get herself into college. She still went to as many games of Jeff’s as she could, still told him all the time of how proud she was, still phoned him every week to talk about anything and everything, still went with him family to his draft day and cried when he was selected 7th overall by the Carolina Hurricanes.

He was finally living his dream – now it was time to live hers.

Over the next four years, Audrey completed a civil engineering degree from University of Toronto. Staying in Toronto meant she got to stay close to her family – and to Jeff’s, who she saw in some capacity at least once a month. And naturally, regardless of exams or school events, if Jeff was in town playing the Leafs, Audrey would be there watching with his family – always with that big hug and a smile.

And as Jeff’s career continued to soar, Audrey’s narrowed into focus. After another year in education, completing a Masters in Environmental Sciences, she graduated straight into a job for a green energy company, staying in Toronto like she always had done. Same old Audrey.

That was, until the summer of 2018. That was the summer that Jeff got traded to Buffalo. That was the summer that Audrey’s company offered her a promotion with the condition that it came with an office transfer…to Buffalo. She would be managing her own pollution project with a small team, her first by herself but an opportunity that she knew she was ready for. And Jeff had been ecstatic – the nerves and anxiety of moving to a new city, to a new team, was lessened by the promise of being in the same city as his best friend after all these years. Audrey called it a happy coincidence. Her mom called it fate and a kick up the backside.

She ignored her mom on that one.

Two years passed and that happy coincidence was working out perfectly. Around both of their busy schedules, they tried to see each as often as possible, whether it was dinners after a long day in the lab, meeting each other for lunch nearby Audrey’s office, weekends off chilling on the sofa, or going out for drinks after her meetings or after his games.

With that came the standing tickets that Jeff always put aside of Audrey for all home games he played in. Audrey had yet to miss one, so happy she got to give him that big hug and a smile like she used to when they were younger.

And Jeff couldn’t have been happier. He had his calming rock, his confidante, the person he could be his most vulnerable self with. Just like he listened to her vent over her frustrating lab results or her long admin days in the office, she listened to him vent about his stresses in hockey. She listened to him get angry and sad and frustrated and desperate about the slump he had last year – and every time she reminded him of the love he has for the sport, for his career, always encouraging and telling him that if nothing else, she thought he was wonderful. She also listened to his nerves and excitement about Eric getting traded to Buffalo this summer, knowing that as much as Jeff was worried that things would be different within his friendship with his old mentor, their reunion would be a good thing for both players.

Audrey was his everything, and Jeff only wished he could show her how much she truly meant to him.

*

One thing that moving to Buffalo did change about their relationship was that they both saw the other one go on dates. Sure, Audrey was well aware that Jeff’s charm had worked well for him in Raleigh, and Jeff was more than well aware that Audrey turned heads wherever she went, but before they’d never seen the other one going on a date or being in a relationship.

Not that either of them had lasting relationships over the past two years, but there had definitely been enough dates to affect both of their hearts.

Audrey was the one that was currently dating – had been on a few dates now with the same guy. David. Jeff had weird vibes from this one already and he hadn’t even met him. But just from the way that Audrey described him, recounted their dates, Jeff had a bad feeling about this guy. David was an attorney, ambitious and confident, and he’d taken Audrey out to three fancy cocktail bars, a night out watching a play, and two very fancy restaurants, but…Jeff didn’t know. He just had that niggling thought that something wasn’t quite right about him.

And unfortunately, Jeff was proven right.

It was 10pm on the night of their seventh date that Jeff’s phone rang. Audrey. A pang of dread ran through him, and he quickly answered.

“Hey, Aud, you okay?” he asked, worried.

“No. He…”

He heard her take a shaky breath, and immediately felt sick.

“I’m coming over,” Jeff said, walking over to his front door and shoving on the first pair of shoes he picked up.

“Jeff, no, it’s okay,”

“I’m coming over,” he repeated firmly, before sighing, “you sound like you need a hug,”

Audrey choked out a laugh, settling Jeff’s stomach a little. At least she could still laugh.

“I’ll be with you soon, okay?” Jeff said softly.

“Yeah, okay. See you soon,”

He wasted no time in driving over to her apartment, potentially pushing the speed limit a little, but as soon as he saw her tear-streaked face he knew it was worth it.

“Hey, it’s okay, I’m here,” Jeff cooed.

As soon as he pulled her into his arms, Audrey started crying into his chest, making Jeff curse under his breath. He carefully walked her backwards, shutting the front door behind himself, and manoeuvred them both over to the sofa, letting her curl up on his lap. It was all he could do to hold her tightly as she cried, rubbing her back and murmuring nonsense into her blonde curls, trying not to tense up too much as he plotted David’s murder in his head.

Eventually she calmed down enough to lift her head, the smudged mascara under her eyes breaking her heart. He rubbed at the marks with his thumb, making her laugh a little watery, before he sent her an encouraging smile.

“So what happened?” he asked softly.

Audrey’s bottom lip wobbled briefly, before she took a deep breath.

“He broke up with me,” she whispered.

Jeff immediately scowled, and Audrey’s lips twitched in a smile.

“That asshole,” Jeff growled.

“Well, it wasn’t a break-up break-up because we were never official, but it was 7 dates, y’know? I thought we were exclusive and heading somewhere,” Audrey sighed.

“It was still the end of something important, Aud. And you liked him,” Jeff said firmly.

“Yeah, I did,” she said shakily, sniffing as her eyes filled with tears again.

“Hey, no, don’t waste any more tears on that asshole,” Jeff said sadly, cupping her face with both hands.

Then he squished her cheeks making her pout like a fish until she giggled, batting at his hands to let her go. Jeff smiled again, earning a soft smile back.

“Did he say why he wanted to break up?” Jeff asked, wincing.

Audrey swallowed heavily, dropping her eyes from his face, before she forced a smile on her lips.

“Apparently he didn’t want to waste any more time trying to get into my pants when he could get sex on tap with his secretary,” she said as calmly as possible.

Jeff’s jaw dropped, rage immediately flooding through his body. Audrey saw this and held her hand up to stop him exploding, which barely made him simmer down.

“Oh that fucking asshole!” Jeff spat, hands gripping onto her hips where she was still sitting on his lap.

She just nodded, smiling sadly. “At least I never actually slept with him,”

“Thank fucking god for that,” Jeff scowled.

Audrey placed her hand over his heart, making him look at her properly. “Hey, it’s okay. Well, it’s not, but it’s better that I know now than before we went into anything more, right?”

Jeff’s anger melted down a little, realising that she was trying to be brave, trying to protect herself, and steeled himself, nodding.

“Yeah, you are so much better off without him. He never deserved you,” Jeff said firmly.

“I know you didn’t like him,” Audrey said dryly, making Jeff blush a little.

“No, I didn’t. But you did. I only ever want you to be happy,” he said softly.

Now it was Audrey’s turn to blush.

“I know. And I appreciate that,” she said sweetly, although the sadness in her eyes told him she wasn’t quite there yet.

Jeff smiled sadly, leaning forward to press a gentle kiss to her blonde hair.

“I’m here for you, no matter what. You know that,” he said, looking into her grey eyes.

Audrey’s eyes filled with tears again, and she looked away, trying to blink away the sadness that he didn’t deserve.

“Are you okay?” he frowned.

“Yeah,” she sniffed, nodding.

Jeff paused for a moment, looking over Audrey’s exhausted face properly.

“Honest answer?” he pushed.

She choked out a laugh, a small smile teasing at her lips. She should’ve known she couldn’t fool him, not the one person who knew her better than anyone.

“No,” she admitted.

Jeff nodded, smiling sadly, as if he had expected that response. “Would it help if I stayed?”

“Oh god, so much. But you-”

“If you’re about to finish that sentence with don’t have to then I will be so mad,” Jeff interrupted, raising an eyebrow, making Audrey blush lightly, “You’re my best friend, Aud, of course I want to stay,”

“Okay then,” Audrey said softly, “let’s get to bed then,”

Jeff followed her silently, smiling at the familiarity. This was far from the first time they’d shared a bed, sleepovers when they were younger a very common thing, and it wasn’t the first time they’d shared a bed in Buffalo either, a few drunken nights out leaving them passed out snuggling. But it was the first time they’d shared a bed after a broken heart – and that changed things.

They stayed silent as they got ready for bed, Jeff just pushing off his sweatpants to leave him in his t-shirt and underwear while Audrey changed into short-shorts and an old t-shirt, but Jeff was basically vibrating with the need to talk by the time Audrey came back from the bathroom.

“You know what, this isn’t enough,” Jeff said suddenly.

Audrey jumped at the sharpness in his voice, earning a sheepish smile from her best friend.

“You deserve to be happy. I want to make you happy,” Jeff said softly.

“You already do, Jeff,” she said, a little confused.

“I just mean…you deserve a date that makes you happy. You deserve to be so happy. So I want to take you out,” Jeff explained.

Audrey inhaled sharply. What did he…

Take her out?

Jeff saw the confusion, the nerves, the hope on her face, and swallowed heavily. Maybe he hadn’t been thinking when he first opened his mouth, but now he couldn’t take the words back. He didn’t want to take the words back.

He wanted to take her out.

He’d wanted to take her out for so long, the urge getting stronger and stronger with every terrible date she went on, with every terrible guy she met. He’d loved the girl with the loving heart for as long as he’d known what love is, but she’d always been just out of reach, never the right moment. And he didn’t want to scare her off, not after her heartbreak tonight. So…a dinner could work, right?

But he had to do this properly. She deserved that.

“Go out to dinner with me. Tomorrow night?” Jeff asked softly.

“In what context?” Audrey found herself asking.

Because as much as she wanted to curse herself for not just saying yes, she needed to know. Jeff chewed his bottom lip, thinking over his words carefully, and Audrey just waited with a fluttering heart.

“I want to make you happy. Can we just say that for now?” Jeff eventually said.

Audrey let out a breath she didn’t know she was holding but nodded. That…perhaps that was for the best for now. The thought of anything more, so out of the blue, after such a bad break-up, was extremely overwhelming. The thought of anything more with Jeff in itself was overwhelming after so long. Maybe it would feel too weird at dinner with him – keeping it low-key would limit any damage to their friendship, right?

“I would like that,” she nodded.

The smile that Jeff sent her was devastatingly happy, and it was impossible not to smile back.

“So we’ll have breakfast together before you have to leave for work, and then I’ll come come back around 7 to pick you up?” Jeff suggested.

It was all Audrey could do to nod, the smile still on her face. Whatever tomorrow night would bring, whether it was just a nice dinner out or the start of something new, she couldn’t wait.

*

7pm came around for Audrey before she even realised it. Her outfit was on, her hair was curled and pinned half-up half-down, and she was wearing a cute little pair of heels she had been saving for a special moment. And this was a special moment, no matter what they’d agreed. The butterflies in her stomach told her that much.

Of course she’d gone into work and told her colleagues all about what happened with David (who were all completely shocked and disgusted – and she had her suspicions that one of them would send him a glitter bomb to his office), as well as letting her older siblings know in their group chat. Her oldest sister Laura offered to send an anonymous tip to his work place to ruin him. Her older brother Simon offered to fly down and punch him in the throat. Her sister closest-to-her-in-age Dana offered to visit for as long as Audrey needed. She smiled and thanked all of them, but said it wasn’t necessary and that Jeff was taking care of her. Laura and Simon teased her like they usually did (and she knew that Laura, who was good friends with Jeff’s sister Jennifer, would be telling the Skinner family too), but Dana messaged her separately.

Because after Jeff, it was Dana who knew her best. And Dana could tell that something was different this time.

So Audrey had confessed everything during a call on her lunch break, telling her sister how Jeff had asked her out to dinner, admitting that it wasn’t quite a date but that he wanted to make her happy. Dana, naturally, had been over the moon, basically squealing in excitement down the phone, but Audrey had sworn her to secrecy. It wasn’t a date date. Nothing had been said between them. And she didn’t want to get her hopes up. Reluctantly Dana agreed to keep quiet for now, but she did insist on helping Audrey get ready for their not-date after work.

And to be honest, Audrey had really appreciated the confidence boost. Over video call, her sister her helped her narrow down her outfit to a cute long sleeved blue dress with a swishy skirt, knowing that blue really made her hair and her eyes pop. Pairing that with the cute comfy silver heels and a matching silver bag, Audrey was waiting by the door with her grey coat in hand, trying not to chew off her lipstick.

Then her phone buzzed. Dana.

~

From: Dana

Have fun tonight!

I know you’re trying to keep things low-key, but just see what the evening brings.

Go with the flow.

Be open to opportunities.

Call me tomorrow!

~

Audrey couldn’t help but smile, sending back a trio of heart emojis. Her sister really was the best. It was only moments later that Jeff arrived, and she rushed downstairs to meet him with a smile. She could do this. She could be open to possibilities. She could go with the flow.

“Wow, you look amazing,”

Audrey blushed at Jeff’s words, earning a blush back. She looked him up and down dramatically, making him laugh, but to be honest? He looked incredible. Jeff was wearing her favourite dark grey suit, a slight tweed in the pattern, with a white shirt that had the top two buttons undone. Incredible.

“You look great yourself,” she replied.

Jeff’s answering smile made her heart skip a beat. They walked to his car without further hesitation, just talking about their days as he drove, until Jeff parked up outside of a nice sushi restaurant.

“I hope this is okay?” Jeff said hesitantly.

“You know I love sushi,” she mused.

“I know, but we’ve never gone into an actual sushi restaurant, we always just order take-out,” Jeff pointed out.

She put her hand over his on the gear stick, making him inhale sharply.

“Then it’ll make a nice change to try a new setting, Jeff. I’m excited, let’s do this,” she said happily.

Jeff just nodded, the nerves in his stomach settling a little. They ate sushi all the time – this was just a nice dinner. Nothing weird or unusual about this at all. He could totally do this.

The way she looked shyly at him as they walked to the door still made his body thrum with nerves though.

But neither of them should’ve been nervous. The dinner went past so smoothly it felt like magic to Audrey. The food was fantastic – both of them daring the other to try at least one dish they hadn’t had before – and their conversation flowed like it always did. To be honest it felt like their usual nights – if Jeff hadn’t added that level of what if then it wouldn’t have been any different. But he did add it, and neither of them could forget that.

As always, Audrey made Jeff feel like the only guy in the world, her warm smile focused only on him. As always, Jeff made Audrey feel like the most important person in the world, so sweet and kind. And as always, they laughed and smiled and talked, and Audrey couldn’t have been happier.

Jeff achieved what he had promised to do – he had made her so happy. So what next?

They arrived back at Audrey’s apartment building late, having taken a walk after dinner, not wanting the night to end so soon, wanting this idyllic moment to continue on as long as possible.

But eventually they had to call it to an end, both of them having early starts in the morning, as much as they wished otherwise. Like the gentleman he always was with her, Jeff walked Audrey up to the front door of the building, both of them pausing.

“I had a really good time tonight,” Audrey said softly, looking up into Jeff’s eyes.

“So did I,” Jeff replied.

They both blushed, Audrey ducking her head, before she looked back up at him. She’d always seen him look at her like this, so open and happy, but for some reason tonight added another level. He was looking at her like there was nowhere else he’d rather be. And that sent a thrill through her body that both excited her and overwhelmed her. But in a good way?

“I know you’re busy for the next couple of days, but we could do something on Saturday?” Audrey offered.

Jeff nodded so enthusiastically that she couldn’t help but laugh.

“That sounds perfect,” Jeff grinned, not deterred in the slightest, “I’ll bring takeout?”

“I’d like that,” Audrey nodded in agreement.

She bit her bottom lip, hand reaching out to brush against his hand briefly, before she stepped away, heart pounding in her chest.

“Thanks for tonight Jeff. Call me tomorrow?” she said, a little breathless.

“Yeah, of course. See you,” he said, smiling a little hopelessly.

They lingered in silence a little longer, before Audrey laughed, opening her front door as Jeff rubbed the back of his neck sheepishly.

“Bye Audrey, sleep tight,” Jeff smiled, finally starting to walk away.

And she absolutely did.

*

Audrey spent the next day in a daze. She’d woken up with more butterflies in her stomach than she ever thought possible, a stupid smile on her face as she read Jeff’s good morning :) text. Last night had been different. So different. But she liked it? She had definitely liked exploring this new side of Jeff, the guy she’d known since they were toddlers, but who walked to their dinner table with a hand on the small of her back and pulled out her chair for her.

He showed her the romantic side of him last night, and she definitely liked what she saw.

And when she gushed down the phone to her sister Dana on her lunch break again, she knew her sister was at least a little smug.

~

“I told you that being open to opportunities was a good thing!”

“I know, I know, but I didn’t expect this,” Audrey laughed.

“What, the boy who’s always been in love with you making you just as happy as we all always knew he would?”

Audrey blushed at the dryness in her sister’s voice, and shook her head.

“He’s not always been in love with me, don’t be ridiculous,” Audrey said simply.

“If I was with you right now I would be shaking you by the shoulders. Talk to him. I swear to god. You know I wouldn’t say it, not now, if I didn’t mean it,”

Audrey swallowed heavily. Dana’s voice had so much conviction in it, like she truly believed what she was saying, and that only sent Audrey’s head into more of a spin. Jeff…was in love with her?

~

That phone call hadn’t helped, to be honest. This was all still throwing her for a loop. Her feelings for Jeff had been building up for two decades, two long decades, and to have the potential of his feelings matching hers? It was almost too much to bear.

And she had to wait until Saturday to be able to see him in person again. This was so much more than something she could do over text, or over a phone call, but she knew that maybe waiting was a good idea. Maybe it would give her time to get her thoughts together, to not be impulsive. Maybe it would give her enough time to get her head around the thought of Jeff’s feelings. Maybe.

The day after that passed with a blur as well, going faster than she thought possible, and even after another phone call with Dana on the Friday night, Audrey still didn’t know what she was thinking. But she knew she had to try. So just after midday, changing into a pretty pale blue dress and curling her hair lightly, she headed over to his house. Jeff opened the door with his usual smile, and he welcomed her in straight away. She bit her bottom lip as he not-so-subtly checked her ass out in the dress, trying to stop the smile that threatened to break out. Maybe. Just maybe.

“So I told Dana about our dinner the other night,” Audrey blurted out.

Damn it.

Jeff’s eyes widened in fear, making Audrey laugh slightly, leaning against the kitchen counter.

“I swore her to secrecy, she’s not going to say anything to anyone,” she reassured.

“I mean, if it was Laura you told, I know she would’ve already told Jennifer, and then everyone would know within the hour,” Jeff admitted.

Oh god yeah, that would’ve been the worst idea.

“So, um, what did you tell her?” Jeff asked hesitantly.

“That you took me out to dinner because you wanted to make me happy. And that I had a really good time,” Audrey summarised, not wanting to admit the full extent quite yet.

Jeff’s instant brilliant smile made her heart race a little, before he blushed. “Okay, that’s not so bad. What did she say in response?”

Audrey hesitated, not sure how much detail to go into. She definitely couldn’t say that Dana thought Jeff was in love with her…

“That I should be open to opportunities, that we should see where this goes,” Audrey eventually said.

Jeff bit his bottom lip, but nodded, looking deep in thought, which Audrey didn’t know whether it was a good thing or not.

“She makes a lot of sense,” Jeff said softly.

Audrey inhaled sharply. Just like that?

“What if something goes wrong between us?” she whispered.

“What if something goes right?” Jeff countered, stepping towards her.

Audrey didn’t dare move, Jeff getting closer and closer until he was standing right in front of her, barely a foot of space between them, his beautiful brown eyes dark and intense, making her head swim. So she shook her head, trying to clear out the haze.

“I can’t lose you. If something didn’t work out between us, I couldn’t bear to lose you, I don’t know what I’d do,” she said firmly.

Jeff licked his bottom lip nervously, his eyes going through various emotions.

“And if we didn’t let ourselves feel? We just carry on as we always have done, never knowing?” Jeff frowned.

Let ourselves feel. Was he admitting his feelings? Did he know hers already?

“I don’t know, Jeff. I just don’t know,” she mumbled.

Jeff reached out with both hands, cupping her elbows gently.

“I don’t think we can just go back,” Jeff admitted.

Well, shit.

“So where does that leave us?” Audrey asked softly.

“I don’t know! But I can’t stand the thought of you giving your heart away again to some guy who doesn’t appreciate it! Who doesn’t deserve it!” Jeff snapped, stepping away from her sharply.

Audrey’s jaw dropped slightly, her heart beating faster as a lump rose in her throat.

Jeff swallowed heavily, taking a deep breath to calm himself down. “I didn’t mean to raise my voice at you, I swear. But can’t you see that these other guys have only ever treated you like shit?”

Audrey’s lips pressed together in a tight line, trying to control her emotions, and she clenched her fists.

“I know that I haven’t exactly had a good track record, but you haven’t really had the best taste in dates either Jeff. All the exact same type of woman traipsing through your life and not a single one has stuck around,” Audrey said angrily.

“That’s because none of them ever measured up to you!” Jeff retorted.

His words hung in the air, Audrey inhaling sharply. Jeff groaned and closed his eyes, wishing he could take his last statement back, but knowing that he couldn’t. It was out there now, the real reasoning, but he was nervous to open his eyes and see Audrey’s reaction.

Would she be angry? Disgusted? Happy?

“Jeff, please look at me,” Audrey said softly.

“I don’t know if I can,” he said, choking out a laugh.

“Please?”

Jeff took a deep breath, before doing so, the pleading in her voice making him powerless. When he finally looked at her, he could barely read her face, the first time in a very long time.

“None of them measured up to me?” she said quietly.

It was the sheer volume of hope in her eyes that made Jeff brave enough to speak.

“You’ve been it for me for a long time, Aud,” he admitted.

There it was.

The noise that Audrey made was so full of both surprise and hurt that Jeff flinched. But she quickly reached out towards him, tugging him back towards her with her hands at his waist.

“I’m it? You…you really do love me?”

Jeff laughed a little wetly, full of emotion, but he nodded which only made Audrey’s heart clench. After all this time…

“I love you Audrey Marie James. I have done for a long time,” Jeff said simply.

“Oh Jeff. Jeff, I love you too,” Audrey whimpered, “so much,”

Jeff grinned, so hard that he made his cheeks hurt, before raising his hands to cup her face. He squished her cheeks into a fish pout like he always did, making her laugh and bat at his hands, breaking the tension.

“Fuck, I love you,” Jeff said happily, hands moving to rest on her shoulders.

“I love you too. Oh my god. I love you. I can’t believe I finally got to say it out loud,” Audrey giggled.

Jeff just laughed as well, giddiness overtaking him, not letting him think of anything but her.

“We’ve wasted so much time,” he huffed.

But Audrey just shook her head, her smile a little sad. “I was just so scared of not having you in my life that I didn’t dare risk you rejecting me,”

“There is no parallel universe in which I would reject you,” Jeff laughed.

“Nerd,” she said fondly, earning a brilliant smile, “I just…I wanted my own career too, y’know? And I didn’t know what would’ve happened if I just followed you for the rest of my life,”

Jeff swallowed heavily at her confession, but nodded.

“I don’t know what would’ve happened either. We’ll never know. But what I do know is that you’re a brilliant woman, who is crazy smart and wonderful and beautiful, and I’m so proud of everything you achieved. Like, you’re literally a civil engineer and an environmental scientist! That’s so cool! I’m just happy you could possibly want to be with boring old hockey-playing Jeff,”

“You’re not boring or old. And I fell in love with hockey-playing Jeff a long time ago, so I really don’t think I’m losing out here,” Audrey mused.

Jeff huffed a laugh, his heart racing a little more at her firm words, leaning his head down to rest his forehead against hers. “Well would you be this hockey player’s girlfriend?”

“Only if you’ll be this engineer-scientist’s boyfriend,” she countered.

Jeff grinned, dimples out in full force, making Audrey tilt her head back to laugh. This was real life. This was really happening. Holy shit.

But there was just one thing left…

“Hey, Jeff?” she said suddenly.

“Yeah?” he asked, one hand rising to cup her face.

It was when his thumb stroked over her cheekbone that she knew this was everything.

“Will you kiss me?”

Jeff looked a little astounded, jaw dropping a little, before that brilliant smile came back.

“Yeah, ‘f course,” he murmured.

Audrey inhaled sharply, before tilting her head up, leaning up towards him as Jeff leant down to her. Their lips touched softly, sweetly, both of them breaking off to laugh, both a little stunned, before Audrey pressed her lips to his again a little firmer. Jeff made a soft happy noise, kissing her back, his free hand sliding around her waist to bring their bodies together. She moaned in surprise at the feeling of his strong body against hers, but melted in his arms, lost in the motion of their kisses, completely consumed in a way she’d never been before.

Jeff broke away briefly with another soft moan, eyes searching her face a little desperately, before he kissed her again, clutching her a little tighter. And then he broke away for a final time, taking a step back with wild eyes, leaving her head spinning.

“I don’t want to get carried away,” Jeff panted, cheeks heating up in a blush.

Audrey bit her bottom lip but nodded, knowing her was right even if her racing heart didn’t want to admit it. “At least it was worth the wait?” she offered.

Jeff just groaned, making her laugh. Then her breath caught in her throat as Jeff adjusted his dick in his pants, alerting her to just how riled up he gotten. Oh fuck. Carried away indeed.

“You’re worth so much more to me than rushing into sex. I want to ease into things, y’know? I’ve waited this long for you to be mine, I can wait a little longer,” he said seriously.

“I love you too,” Audrey said happily.

Jeff just smiled that brilliant smile.

~

To: Dana

He loves me.

He loves me!

~

From: Dana

Holy fucking shit, about time.

Can I actually tell everyone now?

*

The next two weeks were the happiest that Audrey could remember. They had three days in a row together where Jeff wasn’t doing anything other than light training and rest, ahead of a 10 day roadtrip, and they made the most of it. Well, after another long talk about their emotions, because they could do that now, and fielding various calls from their many family members, they’d also spent a lot of time sweetly making out on the sofa whenever Audrey wasn’t working. Because hey, they could do that now too. To be honest, Audrey was a little addicted to the feeling of his lips on hers anyway – she fantasised about it for years on the occasional forbidden burst of weakness, but the reality of it blew away all fantasy.

Jeff was finally hers, and she couldn’t be happier.

The 10 days that Jeff was away on his sweeping road trip was harder this time though too. She didn’t expect it to be this hard, but she supposed that the emotions she’d locked away for so long were finally out and they were vulnerable in this newness. It did help with Jeff calling her every night though. She did tell him he didn’t have to, that she sure as hell didn’t expect it, but he just said that he’d always wanted to call her every night but he felt like he would be pushing boundaries. So how could she say no to that?

And it did make having him home finally a sweeter moment.

Tonight was the first home game since they got together officially, and Audrey was a little nervous. It was tradition for the players’ partners to wear a special customised jersey, and Jeff had presented her with one in the hopes that she would wear it to the game tonight. She had immediately agreed, of course, but it didn’t make this new step any less daunting. It was a big declaration, so public, but she did want people to know that Jeff was hers just as much as she was his.

It wouldn’t be so scary, right? She hadn’t missed a home game since he’d been in Buffalo, and she wasn’t about to start now.

So after kissing Jeff goodbye, leaving him with a sweet smile as he headed to the rink early to prepare for the game, Audrey got herself ready to enter the arena as Jeff Skinner’s girlfriend, a little more make-up and hair curled a little neater than usual, just like armour.

“Oh my God, Audrey!”

Audrey jumped at the sound of Tanya Staal’s shriek as she entered the family box, unable to stop the smile that spread across her lips. There had been a few occasions in Raleigh, when Audrey had visited while Eric was still playing there, that Audrey had met the former captain’s wife, and she had always been so sweet and welcoming. And although Tanya mostly stayed up in the family box with their kids, there had been a few team occasions since Eric was traded to Buffalo this season started that Audrey had attended as just Jeff’s friend (as that’s obviously all she had been until recently) where she’d been able to make friends with the older woman properly this time round.

Audrey always had the impression that Tanya thought she and Jeff were more than friends, but obviously now with the statement of the jersey, it was clear that the situation had changed.

“Is this true? Is this really happening?” Tanya asked hopefully.

Audrey blushed but nodded, earning a happy squeal.

“Yeah, Jeff told me he loved me two weeks ago and we’ve been dating ever since,” Audrey admitted.

“Holy shit, about time,” Tanya laughed.

It was all Audrey could do to nod, laughing a little wetly, still a bit overwhelmed.

“Okay, let me introduce you to the other player’s partners? It’s totally different than just being a friend,” Tanya offered.

Thank fuck for a friendly face. Audrey nodded in relief, letting Tanya guide her around the various women and children, the partners that she’d met previously thrilled with the news of the relationship status change (most of them saying finally or about time, which really made Audrey reconsider how obvious she’d been), and the rest of them just as welcoming. She’d done it. She was officially introduced, and she felt almost giddy with it.

The game itself was choppy, rough with hits and scrappy with goals, but the Sabres managed to pull out a win making all the people in the family box cheer. Tanya walked down by her side to wait for their men, linking their arms together like she knew just how much Audrey needed the support. As soon as Jeff saw her by Tanya’s side in their customised jerseys, his face got a really dumb lovestruck look, making Tanya laugh and nudge Audrey over to him.

“Hi, wow,” Jeff said happily.

“You like it?” she asked softly.

“You know I do,” Jeff murmured.

It was all Audrey could do to lean up on her tiptoes and kiss him, earning happy sighs and coos from the other women around them. She broke away with a laugh, moving so that they were just holding hands, but couldn’t stop looking at him despite how sappy she knew it was.

“You were amazing. I’m so proud of you,” she said softly.

“Couldn’t let you down, not when I knew you were watching as my girl,” Jeff grinned.

Audrey just laughed, rolling her eyes fondly. More players started walking out now (Jeff must’ve rushed out, bless him), including…Eric Staal.

Eric took one look at the way they were looking at each other and whooped.

“Holy shit, about time,” Eric grinned, unknowingly mimicking his wife.

“Nice to see you too, Staal,” Audrey said dryly, although she leaned up to kiss his cheek in greeting with a smile.

“Oh god yeah, you’ll know about their long suffering pining, won’t you Staalsy?” Jack laughed from behind Eric, joining their little group, Tanya already under Eric’s arm.

“So much pining, it was painful,” Eric said solemnly, although the laughter in his eyes mostly ruined the effect, “Audrey visited a few times down in Raleigh and she was at every game against the Leafs too, and Jeff’s smile was always at it’s brightest when she was there,”

“Gotta support my best friend,” she said simply, nudging Jeff with her arm.

Jeff nudged her back, but she didn’t miss the pleased smile on his lips.

“Oh come on, it was so much more than that! Jeff’s crush was so damn obvious, right from the very first time Audrey visited,” Eric mused, looking at Jack.

Audrey grinned. Was it now? Jeff just rolled his eyes, making her laugh.

“We literally only started dating two weeks ago,” Audrey pointed out.

“You’re shitting me, I thought you were joking Jeff,” Eric said, jaw dropping.

“I can actually confirm that. That day that Skinny came in to practice smiling like it was Christmas and his birthday all rolled into one really was the first full day,” Jack smirked.

Jeff blushed furiously, making Audrey laugh. Eric just shook his head, still shocked.

“All that time and you never did anything about your crush?” Eric asked, confused, “I thought you were just keeping things low-key,”

Hah, not quite.

“We tried telling him,” Jack sighed dramatically, although he was clearly loving this.

“Holy shit Skinny, took you long enough,” Eric snorted, Tanya just giggling.

“If we’re done gossiping like old grandmas?” Jeff asked dryly.

“Never,” Eric grinned.

Jack just looked delighted, and Jeff knew there was no way that the rest of the team wouldn’t hear about this.

“I’d say it was worth the wait,” Audrey said happily, squeezing his hand.

Jeff’s irritation immediately faded to a soft happiness, and Jack made a loud gagging noise at their heart-eyes.

“Okay, I’m out. Hurry up and shower, Skinny. We’ve got team drinks to get to,” Jack said firmly.

Jack sent Audrey a wink, letting her know how happy he really was for them, before leaving them.

“So does this mean I can tell Jordie? He’s going to be thrilled,” Eric grinned.

Jeff just groaned.

*

Dancin' in the kitchen, You singing my favourite songs, Swinging on the front porch, Just laughing at the dogs, Now you swear you love me more, When you're whispering goodnight, All those little moments are every reason why.

Jeff watched from the kitchen door as Audrey sang to herself, swaying slightly as she stirred whatever she was cooking in the pot on the stove. He didn’t think he could love her anymore than he already did, but seeing her like this in his kitchen, blonde hair loose and messy, wearing one of his t-shirts instead of one of her own, well…he was happy to prove himself wrong.

Then she spotted him out of the corner of her eye and shrieked, swirling around to face him with one hand clutching her heart.

“You almost scared me to death,” she gasped, pouting.

Jeff laughed, shrugging apologetically. “I couldn’t help myself. You looked so cute singing and dancing to your music,”

Audrey blushed a little, but shrugged too. “I’m obsessed with this Kane Brown song right now. Although if I’d known you were watching I probably wouldn’t have sung…”

“Aww no, don’t ever stop because of me,” Jeff mused, shaking his head, earning a smile from her, “maybe I can make it up to you?”

Audrey frowned in confusion, before Jeff moved his hand out from behind him, revealing the flowers he’d been hiding behind his back.

“You bought me flowers? How sweet!” she cooed, reaching out for the bouquet.

“Yeah? You like them?” Jeff asked hopefully.

She nodded, smiling widely as she inhaled deeply, making Jeff smile in turn. “I love them Jeff. And, um, no-one’s ever bought me flowers before,”

Jeff’s heart flickered with rage, at all those stupid guys she’d dated, who never deserved her, who never treated her like she deserved, before he forced himself to take a deep breath. No, past assholes weren’t worth thinking about any more. He was going to prove to her that he was worth it instead of them.

“Well I happen to love buying flowers, so be on the look out for more,”

“Jeff!” Audrey giggled, “You know I don’t want to buying me things, spoiling me,”

Because it was true. She didn’t want it or need it. And she never wanted him to think that it was expected.

“Oh they’re definitely not for you. They’re for me,” Jeff grinned, clearly lying.

Audrey rolled her eyes fondly, before smiling. “Oh, well, if they’re for you then that’s definitely acceptable,” she teased.

Jeff just laughed, moving to slide his arms around her waist, Audrey sliding her arms up around his neck, the flowers still in her hand.

“Will you dance with me?” Jeff asked softly.

“Right now?” Audrey laughed.

“Right now,” Jeff nodded, deadly serious.

Audrey laughed again but nodded, letting him sway her from side to side in a simple two-step shuffle, resting her forehead against his. It was little sweet moments like this, Jeff surprising her with his romantic notions, that made Audrey’s heart ache a little for all the potential missed moments over the years, but also made her heart sing that she got to experience them with him now.

Because this guy was everything to her, and even something as simple as him buying her flowers, or asking her to dance in the middle of the kitchen, made her realise just how lucky she was.

*

Mornings were quickly becoming Audrey’s favourite time of day. Whether it was waking up in her own bed or waking up in Jeff’s, seeing his face first thing as she woke up just made her day started so perfectly.

How could she not love feeling his arms wrapped around her? How his face was usually buried in her hair? How his leg slotted between hers?

She knew she loved that first sleepy smile, his wonderful dimples soft and gentle, always giving her butterflies without fail. She definitely loved the way his groggy voice murmured her name, how he pressed a closed-mouth kiss to her lips, never wanting to wait for that first simple pecked kiss before he brushed his teeth.

It was everything she could ever have asked for, everything she could never have dreamed of. With the highs came the lows, of course, and being in his arms those mornings was just as important. Like this morning, for instance.

“Last night was rough…” Jeff sighed, scrubbing at his tired eyes with the palms of his hands.

The game. The game was so stressful even just watching, so Audrey could only imagine how it would’ve felt being on the ice. Turnovers, stupid penalties, sloppy passes – it really just wasn’t their night. And when Jeff had finally walked out of the changing room ready to go home…well, it was all Audrey could do to go to bed in silence and let him curl into her side.

“…but waking up with you by my side makes me feel a million times better already,” he finished.

“You, Jeffrey Skinner, are a sap,” Audrey said fondly.

“Well you already knew that,” Jeff mused.

True, she did.

“Kiss me?” she prompted.

“I haven’t brushed my teeth,” Jeff said hesitantly.

“Don’t care,” Audrey shrugged, “you didn’t kiss me last night,”

Jeff’s face looked horrified, making Audrey burst out in laughter.

“Babe, I’m so sorry,” Jeff insisted, eyes wide and serious.

Babe. Huh. She could get used to that.

“Well luckily for you, you’ve got all day to make up for it,” Audrey teased.

Jeff’s eyes lit up at that, making her laugh again, before he rolled on top of her. He looked down at her fondly, face soft in the morning light, before he leaned down to kiss her slowly, softly, sweetly, over and over again. One of Audrey’s hands reached up to slide into his messy curls, the other clutching at his waist, Jeff just moving in to lie between her thighs, making Audrey’s body stir with excitement. Yes, she could definitely get used to this.

Eventually their kisses slowed down to a final few pecks, Jeff leaning back to look down at her properly.

“Have I told you that I love you?” he asked, resting his weight on his forearms as he hovered over her.

“Not today,” she grinned.

“Well let me rectify that,” Jeff grinned back.

Audrey shrieked as Jeff pressed a flurry of kisses to her face and neck, saying I love you between every few.

*

6 months later

Jeff’s hand was resting on Audrey’s thigh as they drove through the familiar streets of Markham, two weeks of vacation booked for her and invitations to come home from both their families guiding the way. To be honest, Audrey was pretty excited to experience their childhood homes with this new evolution of their relationship, to see things through a different perspective, and she knew that the childhood friends that were still around were excited to see them as them too.

It was a long time coming, after all.

“My mom is thrilled that I’m bringing you home as my boyfriend for the first time,” Audrey said softly, when they were about 5 minutes away from her family home.

“She’s known me for nearly three decades…” Jeff pointed out, trailing off in confusion.

“And she’s been cheerleading us for at least half of that,” Audrey admitted.

Jeff’s face froze briefly, before it shifted into fear.

“We’re about to be ambushed by your whole family, aren’t we?” he sighed.

“Definitely. Potentially all of yours as well, if I know my mom,” Audrey smirked.

And Audrey did know her mom – she knew in her gut that the moment Audrey told her that she would be bringing Jeff by as her boyfriend, that her mom rang Jeff’s mom to organise a joint group effort. There was no way that the women weren’t going to see them both at the same time, and there was no way their siblings wouldn’t be around to say I told you so. It would be ridiculous…but it was just who their families were.

Jeff just groaned, making Audrey giggle.

“There’s still time to turn the car around you know. Say we changed our minds, hide away in a cabin somewhere for a couple of weeks?” she offered.

No amount of stress was worth losing Jeff, not now she finally had him by her side.

But Jeff anxious face split into a smile. “As much as I would love to avoid the combination of our giant families…we can’t avoid them forever,” he mused, “and besides, you’re worth it,”

Audrey didn’t think she could love him any more than she already did, but there he goes, proving her wrong.

[greenshirtimagines]

Armin x Reader - A New Dream

A/n: Welcome to fic 3 of “I tried to work on one of my drafts but listened to a song and made this instead”

Word Count: 1.1k

To kill Titans and save humanity.

That was your goal since your childhood. You remembered all the times you had watched the Survey Corps from your window, wishing you could be like them.

You weren’t blind to the chaos that followed. You saw the rioting and the grieving, and you understood that many people who joined would die.

But you didn’t care. Even if you died, you wanted to go out doing something good for the world.

Unfortunately, your goal of killing Titans began to consume you. The only thing you could focus on was training and studying, all day and night long, without rest. Years passed, and suddenly you found yourself alone, without a single friend. You told yourself it was fine, that you didn’t need friends anyway. That it would be better this way.

And then you met Armin Arlert.

The two of you didn’t speak much to each other at first, until you heard him speak of the sea. When you asked him about it, he spoke with so much passion that it reminded you of how you once were, of how you could be, and all that you were missing.

You wanted to help him achieve his dream, but you didn’t want him to lose himself on the way, so from that day on, you started hanging out with him. Soon, you found yourself spending more time with him than you did training.

Soon, you found yourself falling in love with him.

But you were content with just being near him, and having his friendship. However, that didn’t mean your heartbeat didn’t start accelerating when you were alone with him.

Like now.

The two of you were polishing your ODM gear, all your friends having mysteriously vanished.

Everyone, even Captain Levi, knew of your crushes on each other. The only ones who remained oblivious were you and Armin. You thought the two of you had been left alone so you could confess to Armin, and Armin thought you had been left alone so he could confess to you.

As they listened from underneath the window, nobody really cared who confessed first, except for the ones who had placed bets.

“So, Armin,” you cleared your throat nervously, “how’s it all going?”

You internally cringed. ‘How’s it all going? Like you haven’t seen him in weeks or something??’

“O-oh. It’s going good,” he said, awkwardly smiling at you.

“Yeah, same here.”

“That’s good.”

The “conversation” came to a lull after barely four sentences. It wouldn’t have to be so awkward if you two weren’t alone. Before you had developed feelings for him, you didn’t mind so much. Now you were painfully aware of your beating heart and shaky hands. You couldn’t even focus long enough to think of something cool to talk about.

Armin, in his mind, was also berating himself for being awkward. He was so in love with you, he wanted to think of something new to say. Something that would make you smile like you had before, or make you laugh like you always did with Conny.

He had spent so much time dreaming of that distant sea, that he didn’t think of what was in front of him on land. He still wanted to visit the sea, but you made him realize that he could also dream of a future here. Maybe even a future with you. As long as you were with him, he felt like he belonged.

“Armin,” you said his name softly, “what’s it like being such close friends with Eren and Mikasa?”

“Oh,” he brightened, “they’re amazing friends. Ever since we were little they’ve…”

You smiled. Only Eren and Mikasa could get him talking with as much fondness as he did with the sea. You really were happy you got to witness is happiness. It was incredibly contagious.

As Armin continued his rambling, he noticed the way you were looking at him and stopped. He blushed, nervously looking away. “W-what is it, (Y/n)? Do I have something on my face?”

“No no, I was just… thinking.”

“Thinking?” He asked.

“Yeah, I…” why not be honest with him? You wanted him to know how grateful you were to him. “I was just thinking of how lucky I am to have met you.”

The blush on his face deepened, and he looked at you with wide eyes.

You started blushing too, but continued, “Because I’ve met you, I feel like I have more clarity. I was so lost in the dream of doing nothing but killing Titans, that when I woke up, I couldn’t really return to reality. But now that I know you, I don’t feel so rushed or pressured to do anything. So thank you, Armin, for changing my life.”

Armin looked at you in shock, and you started thinking you had made him uncomfortable until he spoke.

“You don’t have to thank me, (Y/n),” he smiled. “I-I really didn’t do anything. B-but still,” he rushed to say, “I’m happy that you’re happy now.”

You smiled back at him before turning to your ODM gear. The silence between the two of you was no longer suffocating.

“(Y/n),” he said, looking at you once more, “I’m glad we’ll get to visit the sea together one day.”

A warm feeling of happiness settled in your stomach.

“I am too,” you said, picking up your ODM gear. “Well, I’m just about done here so I guess I’ll turn in for the day. See you tomorrow, Armin,” you waved before walking to the door.

“(Y/n), wait!” He called out to you.

You stopped, your hand on the doorknob. “What is it?” You asked, your heart skipping a beat.

“Um,” he paused for a moment, fiddling with the hem of his shirt, “I heard there’s going to be a mini festival tomorrow. A lot of different people will be there showing off things from their towns and I think it would be cool to look at them.” He looked up at you, an uncertain look in his eyes. “Do… do you want to come with me?”

Your heartbeat started picking up, and it took all your self control to not pass out.

“Yeah, I’d love to,” you smiled brightly, feeling the happiest you had in years.

Your dream had only turned into a nightmare, but you were free now, and you had a new one.

His name was Armin Arlert, and lucky for you, this was a dream you would never have to wake up from.

~~~~

“Hey, technically neither of them confessed. Does that mean the bet is off until next time?”

“Of course not, Armin still was the first one to ask the other out. Now pay up.”

“Oh come on! That’s not fair!”

“Shut up! They’re going to hear us!”

[maddiewritesstucky]

Rating: Explicit (18+)

Pairing: Stripper Bucky / Architect Steve

Words: 3790

Tags: Sexy shower antics, post-exercise endorphin highs, Steve is a badass for like 10 minutes, Bucky is not a morning person (until he suddenly is), enthusiastic morning sex

A follow-up one-shot to the slow death of Steve Rogers. Many thanks to my radiant cassowary @kalee60​ for giving it your clever eyes. Infinite birdseed for you 😘

(Also on Ao3)

When Bucky wakes up, he is aware of two things, and two things only.

One - it’s way too fucking early for his eyelids to have peeled themselves back the way they have, if the rosy tint of the sky outside is anything to go by, and two - his foot should have connected with some part of Steve’s anatomy by now on it’s customary post-waking stretch across the mattress.

His body is coming online one limb at a time, and he grunts his displeasure into the rumpled sheets; gaze firmly averted from the clock on the bedside table. Putting a number to it will only make him angry, and the stupid beautiful soft dawn light filling the bedroom tells him everything he needs to know anyway. 

Why they had decided to move into Steve’s apartment when Bucky’s actually had things like properly functioning curtains, he has no idea. 

"Steve,”  he groans, voice thick with the remnants of sleep and the injustice of waking before he intended to. 

He kicks his foot out a little further; throws an arm out to join the search party too, but finds Steve’s side of the bed decidedly more vacant than it had been when he fell asleep last night. 

Running, some vaguely helpful part of Bucky’s subconscious supplies, you fell for a man who goes running at bastard o’clock in the morning. 

He flops over onto his back and scrubs his hands up over his face; up through the tangled mess of hair that seems to find new ways of defying its scrunchie-prison every night. His vision sharpens into focus and sticks a moment on the giant canvas print photo of himself and Steve smiling back at him from the far wall; a grinning relic of a Bucky who was not woken before his time.

It still makes his stomach flip a little, that picture - the two of them stuffed into the heavy-knit sweaters Bucky’s ma had made them last Christmas; both in the  throes of losing their shit over the comically absurd miscalculation she’d made on size. Steve’s got tears in his eyes, and Bucky’s aren’t even open, and they’re clinging to each other with that special kind of desperation that intense, prolonged laughter seems to spawn.

It’s everything good about their life together, that photo; the sheer warmth and joy they’ve found in one another over the past year, the sense of  home and family and right. 

It’s even more heartwarming, Bucky finds, when the sun is a reasonable distance above the horizon.

He drags his protesting body out of its sleep-warmed cocoon, his intentions set on the brand new bag of espresso grind that Last-Night Bucky had so wisely left sitting on the kitchen counter. 

He’s going to use Steve’s favorite mug, the one he’d happened across in a yard sale that reads ‘architects do it on drafting tables’  with a lewd stick figure drawing. Partially because it holds the most coffee, and partially because if Steve had remained in bed this morning, with all his familiar warmth and dependable big-spoon behavior, Bucky would have remained blissfully unconscious until his alarm went off. 

...Steve’s not here to actually  see  this particular middle-finger of a gesture, but that’s beside the point. Bucky will  know.

It’s not until he’s shuffling his way down the hall, already two steps past the closed bathroom door, that Bucky registers the faint sounds of water hitting tile, and the sporadic, off-key hum of a post-run Steve. 

His feet halt in their tracks before he’s even made the conscious decision that coffee can wait.

He wants to keep walking, to get his precious cup of bean nectar and crawl back into bed for another hour or three, it’s just...

Post-run Steve is kind of Bucky’s jam. 

He’s sweaty, and loose-limbed, and hopped up on exercise endorphins which, more often than not, make him inexplicably horny and give him the closest approximation of a bad boy complex that someone with Steve’s demeanor could possibly get. 

Post-run Steve is the only good thing about being awake at this god forsaken hour. 

The sunrise, and the stillness, and the smell of fresh dew can get fucked, but Bucky will carpe the hell out of a diem for some Post-run Steve.

He slips quietly into the bathroom, and is immediately grateful for the time he spent descaling the shower door yesterday when he’s met with an unimpeded view of Steve’s glorious back. What goddamn right an architect has looking like that, Bucky has no idea, but you wanna talk about some aesthetically pleasing angles?

Steve’s got one hand braced against the wall, head dipped to draw out the line of his back. His skin’s a little flushed; water channeling in fast-flowing rivulets between the soft ridges and swells of his drawn-taut muscles, and he’s breathing those quiet grunts of the recently-exerted. 

He’s a living, breathing thirst-trap, and the knowledge that he’d only blush and change the subject if Bucky told him so just makes it a thousand times better. 

Bucky pushes his soft flannel sleep pants off his hips and lets them fall to the floor, sending up another silent salute to Last-Night Bucky for going commando, and steps forward to pull open the shower door.

...Later on, when Bucky is reflecting on it all, he’ll blame the early hour and his pre-caffeinated state for the fact that he didn’t realise. The soft noises falling from Steve’s lips, the very particular bunch and flex of very particular muscles…

Any other time of day, Bucky would have known straight away. 

Any other time of day, and Bucky wouldn’t have even needed to be in the same room - he could be at the bodega down the street, and his nipples would inexplicably harden at the pluck of Steve’s distant arousal on the cosmic spiderweb. 

But as it happens in the moment, it’s not until Steve’s head is falling back on a low moan that Bucky realizes exactly what it is he’s walked in on. 

“Oh, shit...”

It’s off his tongue before he can reel it back in, and Steve almost jumps out of his skin. 

His head whips around, and for the briefest flicker of a moment, he looks shocked and uncertain and embarrassed as all hell. 

But this right here is no weekday-afternoon Steve. This is not the blushing, bumbling hunk of love meee that occupies the corporeal form of Steve Rogers 95% of the time. 

No, this is Post-run Steve, and it’s all of about two seconds before he’s schooling his features into something more akin to vaguely-smirking indifference; turning until he’s facing Bucky front on, and settling his weight back against the shower wall.

“Babe, I’m sorry, I didn’t--” Bucky begins, as close to apologetic as one can really be about seeing their significant other in a compromising yet Very Sexy position. But the words dry up on his lips as Steve lifts a finger to his own in the universal gesture of ‘shush.’   

He watches, rapt, as Steve first reaches over to the tap and shuts off the water, and then takes up the bottle of Bucky’s conditioner, squirting some into his hand before wrapping it back around his cock. 

And then that jacked-up idiot, that neuro-chemical flooded pseudo bad bitch, looks Bucky dead in the eye...and goes right back to jerking off. 

He’s putting on a goddamn show with it too - pulling at his cock, long and slow and tight; dropping his head back against the wall and letting his moans ricochet shamelessly off the tile. The sound of his fist working over his dick is lewd as hell, so much more audible for the fact that there’s no rush of running water to mask it anymore, and Bucky wonders briefly if he ever actually woke up at all, if this isn’t just all a very believable wet dream. 

It certainly contains all the usual elements - intense eye contact; a big fat dick getting rubbed off by a beefy, naked, wet dude (bonus that it’s Bucky’s actual, real-life boyfriend); the kinds of sounds you usually only hear in porn…

For all Bucky knows, he could still be tucked up in bed asleep, and not standing here naked and painfully erect in this steamed up bathroom, watching his boyfriend jack it like he’s starring in some locker-room porno.

“You need somethin’, or you just come in here to watch?” Steve drawls, arching a brow at him, and yeah  - there’s a  lot of things Bucky needs all of a sudden.

He rakes an assessing gaze over Steve’s body, stepping into the shower and pressing his palms to the swell of Steve’s pecs.

“I just wanted to make sure your run went okay,” he shrugs, “no pulled tendons, shin splints...aching muscles…that kinda thing.” 

He squeezes at Steve’s shoulders and his biceps and his tiny waist; threads his hands up through Steve’s hair and slots a thigh between Steve’s to push their hips together. 

Steve’s skin is so warm, and slippery, and he smells like soap, and Bucky starts mentally calculating just how much time they have and how much energy he can feasibly expend before their respective work days start.

He’s not on stage tonight, but he is on shift for his day job at the community center, teaching a preschool ballet class at 10am, and then a seniors ballroom dancing session at midday before his contemporary classes in the afternoon. Steve’s working from home today, so hypothetically it wouldn’t matter if Bucky wore him out a little…

“Buck...” 

“Mm?” 

He rubs his whole self shamelessly against Steve, pressing in so the barbells spiked through his nipples drag across the wet expanse of Steve’s chest. He kisses Steve’s neck and his tits and his mouth, hungry and handsy and a little frantic, and Steve laughs softly against his lips as he turns them to push Bucky up against the slick tile of the shower wall.

“Your concern is deeply moving,” he deadpans, caging Bucky in with hands planted either side of his head, “but I think we need to talk about your bathroom etiquette...didn’t anybody ever teach you to knock?” 

He’s staring Bucky down with eyes lit up something wicked; his body so very nearly touching Bucky’s but not quite, and it hits Bucky all over again that his boyfriend is, physically speaking...really fucking imposing.

It’s easy to forget, when he’s being...well, Steve. Perpetually polite, kind-hearted, goofy...Bucky feels like when he looks at Steve, he sees the softness of his nature, the quiet goodness that radiates out of him. 

He sees the sensible shoes and the khaki pants, the careful artist hands and the way Steve still sometimes carries himself like the much-smaller man he claims to have once been. 

He’s Stevie, and Bucky wouldn’t have him any other way. 

But all of that also happens to be contained within a 6’2”, 200lb frame, and right now...Bucky kind of wants to suffocate under it. 

“I am so sorry, Steven,” he says, though it’s entirely negated by the raging hard on he’s sporting and the giddy, gratuitous manner in which he’s still feeling Steve up. 

He skates his fingertips down the rippled plain of Steve’s stomach, down to the trail of dusky blond hair leading south from his belly button, but Steve catches his hands and pins them up above his head. 

“I’m sure you are,” Steve hums, “but I don’t think you appreciate the gravity of the situation here. See, you caught me in a very private moment, one that I was very much enjoying, and now I’m all thrown off. You got me feelin’ shy.” 

...There’s some very compelling evidence to the contrary rubbing up against Bucky’s hip right now, but that’s beside the point. Steve’s teeth are scraping a line all the way down Bucky’s neck to nip at the ice fractals tattooed across his shoulder, and Bucky’s more than willing to play along.

“However can I make it up to you?” 

He arches into the press of Steve’s body, the hard line of Steve’s cock nestled into the crease of his hip.

If Steve shifted just slightly, he’d be rubbing up against Bucky’s dick. 

It’s not an accident that Steve isn’t making that shift. 

“You really want to?” Steve kisses the question against his skin, making his way slowly back up to Bucky’s mouth, and Bucky nods vehemently.

He’s already wetting his lips in preparation for all the ‘making up’ they’re about to do; signalling his knees to get ready to bend and pulling at Steve’s grip on his wrists, but Steve doesn’t release him.

Instead, he pulls back just far enough to look Bucky square in the eye, and smiles entirely too sweet for the authoritative edge that rumbles into his voice. “Go back to bed, Bucky.” 

Bucky has to blink a few times as the words circulate in his ears. His expression turns from I’m about to get some D!  to  oh god I’m being denied the D in about 0.2 seconds flat.

Bed is very far away from the dick that is currently in need of reparations, he can’t achieve anything from bed.

“But—you said—I was gonna—”

“Go. back. to bed.”  Steve tightens his grip on Bucky’s wrists and leans his whole weight against him, right up in his space so his lips catch against Bucky’s as he speaks, “...and wait for me.” 

Oh. 

Oh. 

A big, stupid, ‘bout-to-get-railed grin stretches across Bucky’s face. He wriggles free of Steve’s grasp and stumbles out of the shower, stopping himself just shy of a wildly enthusiastic ‘yes sir!’

He thinks he can hear Steve’s laughter as he takes off back down the hall toward the bedroom, but it might just be his own echoing back to him. He throws himself down onto the unmade bed, still warm from when he got up not ten minutes ago, and honestly who needs to sleep in anyway? Sleeping in is for people who don’t have absolute poundcake boyfriends to screw them into the sunrise.

He should have toweled off, he realizes as his damp skin rubs against the bedding, but he cannot be blamed for life choices made before six am, and there are far more important things afoot anyway. 

Things like the sound of the shower turning back on for approximately forty-five seconds, then the muted pass of a towel being scrubbed over hair, and footsteps on the hardwood growing ever closer to the bedroom.

God, this is gonna be a good day. What  a beautiful day to be greeting the dawn, making the most of his youth, seizing everything life throws at him!

He has the good sense to snatch the lube out of the bedside drawer just as Steve walks into the room, eyeing him with amusement and hunger in equal measures. 

“You know what the problem is, with what just happened back there, Buck?” 

Steve saunters toward the bed with all the nonchalance of a man whose work day doesn’t start for another three hours. 

He wraps his sizable hands around Bucky’s ankles and yanks him down the bed a little - for no other purpose than to hear Bucky’s breath hitch at the unnecessary show of strength - and climbs up onto the mattress to straddle Bucky’s shins. 

“The problem is, I don’t like to make a spectacle of myself.” He plucks the lube from Bucky’s hand and pours some into his own, spreading it over his cock in lazy pulls. “Being the center of attention, having eyes on me...that’s more your speed.”

“Mhmm, yes, I am an attention whore,” Bucky nods, reaching grabby hands out at Steve who refuses to shift any further up his body, “and you are humble and handsome and have a big dick. Make out with me.” 

Steve tuts and shakes his head, reaching his unoccupied hand to flick at one of Bucky’s nipple piercings. 

“Oh, I don’t think you get to make requests right now. See, the worst part of you throwin’ me off back there? I was so fucking close.  So now what you get to do, James, is flip the fuck over, and let me finish what I started.” 

...Jesus, Bucky loves Post-run Steve.

He’s gonna marry Post-run Steve and have his hopped up little post-run babies, and make sure Steve never misses a single day of early morning exercise so he can bask in the glory of this magnificent bastard every goddamn day of his life.

Bucky flops over onto his front and gets his knees under himself, sticking his ass up in the air with a wiggle that’s probably a lot more comical than it is enticing. But the heat of Steve’s palms hook around the front of his thighs and pull them out from under him, sprawling him flat against the mattress.

There’s a sudden clamping of teeth on his ass cheek and the sharp swat of an open palm, and then Bucky’s being pressed firmly into the sheets by Steve’s weight settling high up on the backs of his thighs. 

“Here’s what’s gonna happen,” Steve sighs, planting his hands on the dip in Bucky’s spine, “I’m gonna use your ass to get off, and then I’m going to get back into bed, while you go make us some coffee.”

Bucky nods into the mess of blankets under his cheek, futilely trying to rock his hips up against Steve’s considerable weight. “Yes, agreed, punishment fits the cri-hi wow okay.” 

A wholly undignified sound is wrenched from Bucky’s chest as Steve skips all pretense of tease, and thrusts his slicked up cock into the crease of Bucky’s ass, rubbing off between his cheeks with a very singular purpose. 

Bucky scrabbles to grab hold of his pillow and drags it down, wedging it under his hips with as much success as can be expected when you’re being pinned by a 200lb adrenaline-testosterone cocktail. It’s enough though, to very favorably cushion the rub of his dick, and all things considered…this whole thing is working out pretty well for him.

He’s expending precisely zero effort, but the wet glide of Steve’s cock over his hole and the push of Steve’s hips rubbing him into the pillow is very much Doing It for him, and he lets his body go loose and pliant as Steve does all the work for the both of them.

And Steve is putting in work - rocking Bucky into the mattress with a fervor that knocks the breath out of him and sends the headboard careening rhythmically into the wall. 

“Y’hear that, Buck?” Steve pants, not for a second breaking his frankly devastating pace. “That’s what a fuckin’ knock sounds like.” 

“Oh my god.”   

This is exactly how every single day of Bucky’s life should begin. Naked, giddy, cocks enthusiastically rubbing up against holes, and Steve running his mouth like he won’t be turning ten shades of red about it later. 

If this is the payoff, Bucky will bust in on every single shower Steve has for the rest of his life.

“I love you,” he laughs a little breathlessly into the bedding, biting off a moan at the heat coiling low in his belly. 

It’s entirely sincere, and he says it because he means it...but if he also happens to know by now that those words are a direct hit to Steve’s prostate during sex?

That’s just a happy coincidence.

Steve makes a sound like he’s been punched, his thighs twitching and tensing where they’re clamped around Bucky’s hips. 

His breaths are coming sharp and shallow, his movements taking on a frantic edge that betrays exactly how close he is, and Bucky would ask him to slow down, except he really, really doesn’t want him to. 

“I love you, Stevie,” he says again, letting his own building climax bleed into his voice, “love you so much...come on, baby...” 

“Fuck,  Bucky, I...oh...” 

His weight falls forward over Bucky as he comes, and it’s all the shove Bucky needs to tip over the edge with him. 

He spills all over his pillow, burying a moan into the sheets and huffing under the weight of Steve’s body going lax on top of him.   

“Oh my god, Buck,” Steve groans, vaguely awed like it wasn’t his own efforts that just brought them both to sticky ruin, and Bucky reaches a hand back to swat weakly at him. 

“You said it, pal.” 

Steve nuzzles into the crook of his neck, planting breathless kisses against his skin and running his hands over every part of Bucky he can reach. 

It’s so tangible, that shift back to normalcy, back to  Steve.  It always hits Bucky square in the chest, the way he can feel Steve’s edges softening, feel that boisterous energy turn sweet and mellow in the aftermath. 

It’s kind of precious, actually, though Bucky would never phrase it like that to Steve’s face.  

He squirms beneath Steve’s weight, getting himself turned over until he’s on his back beneath him. “Good morning,” he smiles up at Steve softly, running his fingers through the still-damp tufts of his hair. 

Steve sighs happily, letting his eyes drift shut and tilting his head into Bucky’s hand. “Good morning, pervert.” 

“Hey, come on, you know I didn't do that on purpose!  ” Bucky laughs, cupping Steve’s face and kissing him all over his cheeks. “I didn’t mean to embarrass you, I’m sorry.” 

“Yeah, yeah,” Steve rolls his eyes, though the smile on his face says Bucky’s doesn’t really have anything to be sorry about. “Guess I can forgive you this one  time.”

“You’re a gracious man.”

Bucky drags him down and kisses him right on his smile, sweet and lazy. When they pull apart, Steve’s got that dopey look on his face like he’s feeling a whole lot of something, and Bucky knows exactly what’s coming before Steve says it.

“Glad you love me, Bucky Barnes.” 

...He knew it was coming, but it still gets him every time. 

“Glad to love you, Steve Rogers.” He feels like he’s glowing a little as he leans up to peck Steve on the tip of his nose. “Now if I’m not mistaken, I owe you a cup of coffee...you’re gonna have to let me up if you want me to follow through on that.” 

“Mm, counter offer - we both go wash off, together, and then I’ll make us breakfast while you handle the coffee?” 

Bucky pretends to consider for a second before he nods, stretching his body out as Steve rolls his weight off him. 

“Agreed.” He waves a hand in the general direction of the door, shooting Steve a wink and a lopsided grin. “Lead the way, pal. I believe you are intimately familiar with where the shower is.”

[dallonm-archive]

[image description: three monstera leaves. The leaves and wall are tinted purple by string lights behind the plant. In the middle, in a white serif font and all caps, reads “LIFE CYCLE OF MASSIVE STARS”. At the bottom, in the same font but smaller, reads “update #1″ /end id]

LIFE CYCLE OF MASSIVE STARS | UPDATE #1

Before I start, this is an autistic OwnVoices novel and it’s Autism Acceptance Month! Remember that awareness is passive and acceptance is active. And whilst this book is autistic OwnVoices I want to stress that it doesn’t cover the full autistic experience; autism is so individualistic and  this story only stems from my experience. Make sure you to listen to all autistics, not just those who can speak and live independently and present in a way that suits neurotypical society. Support autistic creatives and if you’re also a creative, include autistic characters in your work! Autism is not a disease. It does not need to be cured. 

Hey y’all! This has sure been a week! I gave myself the goal of 15,000 words for Camp Nano and somehow hit that in 5 days? I have literally never written at that pace before so I’m a little shocked lol. I don’t intend to keep that pace but the momentum has made drafting very fun and? drafting this has been a literal dream. I was really worried because March was a month long slump I expected to carry into April. I want to disclaim that I’m currently out of school and work because of the pandemic so I have all the free time to write and that definitely contributed! But also as a neurodivergent and disabled writer, free time does not always equal writing, so to know that I am capable of writing like this, even if not always, it is Such a gamechanger. Also this story makes me miss University so much I actually can’t take it :( 

LCOMS has been a dream so far because the protagonists are all characters I’ve had for 5-8 years, and | spent those years struggling to figure out their stories. Even when I settled on this story, originally Patchwork, there was like 4 versions of it before I landed on this - none ever drafted beyond a couple thousand words because they just Never Worked. But the wait was worth it because holy shit I feel like I struck gold. This story feels so me, it’s so much fun to write, and I don’t think a story has come to me this easy before. It’s given me such a zest for storytelling again that I didn’t realise was missing. I’m slowing things down now because creative boundaries and self care >>>>, but I just passed 19k words - though some of the chapters are very unfinished because my priority has been mapping out the story’s skeleton as far as I can, then filling in the gaps based off what I learnt. I wanna put a passage before the cut so it’s not just me rambling about bullshit and no content, but it’s hard to pick just one, so here’s a non-linear scene that I :) cannot elaborate on :)

(CW: alcohol)

[image description: the side of a ferris wheel against black sky. The wheel is lit white, but at the bottom it’s coloured a mix of pink, blue and green. At the top, in a white serif font, reads “The ferris wheel lights blur between turquoise, magenta, mint, lavender, casts the puddles into technicolour. “ /end id]

Picture this: December 17th. End of term. End of year. Cloudless night, stars winking. Fargate glows, market stalls lit by yellow fairy lights line the street like candle stubs, gently burning. It’s raining. It has all day. Dampened your new beanie and scarf but you’re not mad, even if you’ll cringe at the texture when you take them off later. The ferris wheel lights blur between turquoise, magenta, mint, lavender, casts the puddles into technicolour. Your eyes and feet ache, but you’re not mad. And the mulled wine that buzzed warm in your bloodstream now coils in your stomach, but you’re not mad. You’re queuing for the technicolour wheel, even though you know it’ll be underwhelming and a waste of £4, but you’re not mad. Chocolate is usually too sweet for you, but he bought a pack of snowflake shaped ones - each carved with their own design - and when he passes the paper bag over you don’t say no. They taste like raspberry. He grins at you.

I have once again written a long update because I am autistic and have no self control; more excerpts and chapter-by-chapter rambles are as usual under the cut!

(content warnings are specific to the respective excerpt, but as a general warning there’s a lot of alcohol mentions!)

Originally I wanted 3 parts for 3 semesters, but I might do 2? Especially because in the UK at least the spring and summer semester kinda blend into one. The chapters are grouped by 3 - one for every POV character - but that’s more to help with writing because I get more done if I break it down like that, but I also like how it’s shaped the story structurally. 

Sometimes the three chapters will be each of the character’s POV on a single event, sometimes they’re more individual but still follow a general idea (for example, one of them is how each character’s first three weeks of the semester goes). As usual for me the plot here is ~non-existent, especially at this stage, but everything is still connected and threaded together and thats all we really need. The chapters are also pretty short at the moment, none of them are over 3k and only tackle 1-3 scenes. This is something I feel is working really nicely now but I’m not gonna commit to it for the entire novel. I like chapter length variety! But right now we are just going with the flow :)

The most unexpected part is this being in second person, which I decided impulsively the night before Nano because I have :) zero self control :). I was unsure if it’d work in Multi POV, but it’s created such a unique tone that I can’t imagine the story without anymore, even if it’ll need tweaking over drafts. I think it suits the story so well! I’m just torn about it being in past or present, so if you see tense jumps in the excerpts no you did not <3 I’m not naming chapters right now beyond the character’s name, but part one is titled Growing Pains.

[image description: photo of a city at night. To the left are skyscrapers with lots of lit up windows behind a chain-link fence. To the right is an unlit building. Near the middle is a bright streetlight. In the middle, in a white serif font, reads “growing pains”. /end id]

 1: Tomas

We start in the most overrated part of Uni, fresher’s week <3 The drinking and clubbing culture of UK university is a big part of this novel but in a way that’s like “hey this can be fun sometimes but sometimes it’s really not and it’s also really not for everyone.” Our three POVs go to a club night and really don’t care for it. Tomas does not want to be here, is in a weird as shit mood, and instead of looking for his friends he goes to the smoking area with a man he just met called Damiano. I really wanna rewrite this because I wrote it with Zero Idea of where the story was going, so here’s the one part of it that I consider salvageable <3 

Damiano shoves his phone in your hands, brightness puncturing darkness. You hadn’t noticed the dimmed lights until then, but the room blued, music and time slowed. Though his notes are on dark mode, his phone brightness is on two fucking high. Your eyes sting. Cracks travel up the screen like veins.

Each character also has a specific image they keep seeing in things that are never actually there and they all make me like 🤠 hey besties what do these mean are you okay?? I Do Not know what they mean yet, but Tomas’ is veins. (Also shout out to me for finally settling on a spelling for his name after 5 years and by that I mean thank you to my friends for peer pressuring me into choosing Tomas lol)

My absolute favourite part of this story is the character voices. They are all SO fun to write, and I feel like I settled into a good combo of My Literary Prose Bullshit and they’re very specific, often very sarcastic voices. They also say fuck like, so many fucking times. RIP to me if I decide to query this <3 

2: Kristen

Okay first off Kristen is THE funniest character I’ve written. He is SO fun. I wish I was his bestie but he’s also been my bestie since 2013. We meet him in the gender neutral bathrooms being annoyed by a very rich and very tone deaf girl. Classism and the UK class divide is one of the biggest themes of this novel, and Kristen is a very proud working class Northerner (the North is massively underfunded and unsupported by the Gov compared to the South) and cannot stand the Tories (Conservative Party). Extremely fucking valid of him

(CW: blood)

“I’m Floss. Florence.” Of course she was. Fucking Florence. “Where are you from?”

You don’t look at her. Eyes on your reflection, the glittered cheekbones. You busy yourself with your eyeliner, gliding the pen over gaps and smudges that don’t exist. “Barnsley, babe.” It’s only a half lie this time - if you tell her you were born in Liverpool she’d probably look at you like you’re a dead rat on the side of a dodgy alleyway. But maybe that’d be better because then she’d leave you the fuck alone. 

“Oh! That’s like well close isn’t it. I’m from Reigate.” Her voice breathes trust fund and Waitrose, tries to speak like it doesn’t. You try not to laugh.

“Reigate! I bet your parents are right little Tories, aren’t they?”

She playfully slapped your shoulder. She thinks you’re friends. "Not every rich person is a Tory!” Don’t roll your eyes don’t roll your eyes don’t roll your eyes. “Is that blood on your hands?” 

“Huh?” You look: faded red dye dried to your palm, blotted on your fingertips. It is dye, because your hair is as of four hours ago a fierce “Real Red”. But it could be blood. “No, it’s hair dye.”

If you think he’s being harsh, she literally calls him a slur like 3 lines after this <3 Fuck rich people half of this book is me clowning on them. 

Kristen’s recurring Imagery is blood, except sometimes it’s less clear if it’s actually blood or not. Once again, besties are you okay ????

3: Junie

Junie my beloved <3 love her so much. She finds Kristen in the bathroom, and they agree to look for Tomas, until Tomas texts to say he already left. But the biggest part of this chapter is the absolute crisis she has over kissing for a girl for the first time to ABBA :) 

(CW: alcohol)

[image description: a disco ball against a red-purple background. The disco ball casts dots of light against the across the ceiling. At the bottom, in a white serif font, reads:  “Dancing Queen bounces against the walls. The disco ball casts specks over the ceiling, floor, walls, your skin, hair, eyes like broken glass.” /end id]

You don’t listen to 80s music, or 70s, but this room is smaller than the main floor, not claustrophobic, less freshers. Yet, even without the mask of a crowd, nobody notices the girl in the corner kissing the other girl. A girl you don’t know. You’d only gone up to her because she has purple hair and you had to tell her how much you love it - what dye is it? Professional or homemade? Did you have to bleach your hair? Professional or homemade? Will your hair fall out if you bleach it at home? If you dye your hair purple, do you become part of the Milky Way or part of Andromeda? She turns and sticks her tongue out to display her fresh tongue piercing, like a silver bullet lodged in flesh. “Dance with me, you look lost.” She has an allure to her, the Andromeda hair, the bullet in the tongue - do you want to pull it out with your teeth, or lodge it in your own skin? But she asks you to dance, and you fall into her orbit, if only for a few songs. Dancing Queen bounces against the walls. The disco ball casts specks over the ceiling, floor, walls, your skin, hair, eyes like broken glass. Her tongue in your mouth, yours in hers, bullet grazing against your lips. She tastes of vodka and cherries and metal.

I really, really feel for Junie. She’s recently out, and she’s only just navigating what it means to exist as a lesbian. She kisses a girl and immediately regrets it, because she’s a hopeless romantic and was hoping her first kiss with a girl wouldn’t be in the back of a club, but she also doesn’t regret it because it was a good kiss and they’ll never see each other again lol. Junie’s recurring imagery is glass and once again, besties are you okay 

4: Junie

I don’t know how I feel about back to back POV chapters but that’s just how this set worked. The next 3 are immediately after the events of the first 3, after they’ve all left the club. Kristen and Junie walk home together, and most of this and his subsequent chapter is establishing relationship dynamics and <3 this story made me love writing dialogue y’all. This story has a lot of dark elements, so it’s really refreshing to be able to have the light-hearted moments as well. Like these characters are all going through it but they’re also Gen Z 20 year olds who grew up using humour to cope like what else are they meant to do 

“We should’ve got that flat on Brunswick. It’s literally down the street from the SU - we’d just have to walk down a hill and then we’d be home.” He complains.

“Kristen, that flat had a rat problem. I saw one scurrying behind the oven.”

“Yeah, and we live with Tomas Meijer now, so what’s the difference?” He faces you, walks backwards, grin plastered on his face.

“That was mean.” You feign annoyance. You sound like a schoolteacher. 

“It’s just how we are, you know. The love hate relationship. Like night and day or some shit. I’d kill for that boy but like, he’s still a rat. He’s the same to me - did he tell you he called me a malnourished ferret once in first year? In English and Dutch. Don’t even remember what it is in Dutch but he really came at me with two knives like that.” 

Kristen and Junie don’t really know each other well - Junie is Tomas’ friend from class and Kristen and Tomas met in dorms, and a series of shitty housemates in second year brought them all together. It’s funny because I really worried Junie would end up with no clear place in the group and more like a third wheel to Kristen and Tomas but as I started writing I realised that her and Kristen are gonna become besties like. Instantaneously. Love this for them <3

5: Kristen

Essentially mirrors the last chapter. Him and Junie arrive home and have a heart to heart in the living room about gender <3 I love this for them <3 

6: Tomas

Tomas goes home with Damiano and they hook up, which is very out of character for Tomas so it’s like his I Am So Random. I Can’t Believe I Just Did That moment. Damiano is a really sweet dude though it’s all good, but he’s here to stay and I can just tell it’s gonna get messy :/ I actually really love how this chapter came out but whilst I have no problem with reading or writing non-explicit sex scenes I’m also like a would rather die than put that on tumblr dot com oops 

7: Kristen

we’ve skipped a week ahead to the day before semester starts, and the next three chapters are basically like a character study of where each of them are mentally. It’s not the best :/ This is also the point where Day 1 Of Camp me had literally no idea what I was doing. LCOMS is different from the way I pants Revelations, Revelations because with the latter I find it much easier to brainstorm scenes in my head but with this one, it really is a surprise until I open the doc. It’s created some really interesting moments though. 

Kristen visits an amateur photographer friend named Kasia to model for her. I struggled to find anything that included info I’m fine with sharing, but I learnt a LOT about Kristen and his mental state, which was surprising since he’s lived in my head rent free for 8 years now. It’s messy <3 The summary: he sees himself as a mannequin, and he decides that he likes it that way, but he also doesn’t know who’s moving his joints into poses. Bestie???

8: Junie

Junie unpacks her room a week after moving in. Autistic queen <3 This is one of the unfinished chapters, and I have zero motivation to finish it because there’s a scene missing and I cannot for the life of me figure out what it is. The gist of it though is she FaceTimes a friend from secondary school that definitely was her gay awakening that she only realised was her gay awakening in the last year. Messy <3 

9: Tomas

One of my favourite chapters. It’s split into two halves, a light-hearted moment of all three housemates at a superstore because <3 grocery store scenes my beloved <3 and then Tomas’ Everything Is Bad exploration at the end. There’s a moment in the first half where Tomas and Kristen have a heart to heart in the candle aisle, and Tomas asks Kristen where he thinks they’ll be in their thirties. I winged this in a sprint and I’m obsessed with it, it’s all about the ~dynamic~

“Well, he has student debt for one. But that’s not on him. That’s on the Tories. But I like to think they’ll be out of power by then. Boris might even be dead, if we’re lucky. But again, not on me.” He’s quiet again. You watch him think. “He’d be a music teacher probably, or an English teacher. But like, a cool one. He doesn’t teach secondary school because he doesn’t hate himself. Maybe a Sixth Form, or even better a Uni. His students would love him because he’d be able to take a joke and also like, not hound on them for having mental illnesses or life struggles?” Neither of you look at the aisles anymore, just circle the home section of Big Tesco. “He’d also do a lot of charity work. He has a foundation-charity-thing for queer and autistic kids to get accessible music lessons, because creative therapy is like, the best thing - besides Prozac but I digress - and it’d be better than the old white men from CAMHs who act like you don’t exist by your eighteenth birthday. And he’d have a cool little flat in Sheffield where the landlord lets him paint the walls so every room is a different colour. Turquoise kitchen. Magenta Living room. Lavender bedroom. Mint bathroom.” He looks at you like he forgot you were there. “You really let me ramble like that in the middle of Big Tesco, huh? That felt like a fucking therapy moment.” He laughs a little, like he’s nervous.

“Nah, it was a good answer. Maybe if Tomas-in-his-thirties doesn’t move back to the Netherlands, he’ll rent the apartment next to Kristen-in-his-thirties.” 

Kristen pouts. “Aw, you don’t wanna be my roomie anymore?” 

“No, you called me an animal for eating pineapple on pizza.” 

“Deserved. And you called me a malnourished ferret.”

You smile. “You’re not gonna let that down, are you?”

He smiles. “Of course not.”

Kristen tells Tomas he knows Something Happened to him over summer, and gets him to promise to tell him when he’s ready. The second half of the chapter takes place back at the house. Tomas is grieving, and it’s starting to creep into all elements of his thought. In this one specifically, he’s reminded of his top surgery and his memories in the hospital for that starts to blend with his memory of being in the hospital to grieve. Tomas is interesting as trans rep because like, he is trans rep curated for me specifically <3 Tomas was a huge comfort character for me when I was younger and when I realised I was trans, I looked at him and was like oh. He had a very smooth coming out and transitioning process (bc mine is the opposite and I need to project :) ), but right now he views his transness as like, a chapter of his life that was important but is now closed, so he doesn’t think about it a lot anymore, but the combo of grief and its mental impacts causes him to think about it more and he realises he has a very unhealthy internal relationship with his transness. Whilst the big idea at the start of Tomas’ arc is to show trans peace, I really wanted to take a moment to acknowledge the grieving process that comes with being trans. Literally the moment that made me realise “oh god, this is real and I can’t ignore it” was googling “im scared i might be trans” and realising how normal those tangled feelings are. Tomas’ experience of it is only fleeting, but I wanted to show that it’s normal. That being said, there’s no transphobia in this story. It is ultimately a Trans Peace story but also a trans story that, for me at least, is realistic. And the thoughts don’t last long, because his mind circles back to the grieving process. 

(CW: graphic surgery and hospital imagery, vomit mention, death)

[image description: a darkened picture of an empty hospital room. The only light comes in through the window through thin white curtains. In the middle, in a white serif font, reads “ Scalpel gliding across the chest; were the cuts they made as thin as the line between surgery and autopsy? “ /end id]

Picture this: The hospital room. Clinical lights like exit wounds in the ceiling. Everything hurts. Haven’t slept properly in weeks. Can barely eat without it coiling and tangling in your stomach only for nothing to come up when you heave over the toilet. Messy hair, sunken eye bags. Dull eyes. The hospital room. The hospital halls. The hospital waiting room. The hospital car park. The drive to the hospital. The sleepless night before the hospital visit. The locked in the armchair next to the phone waiting for the hospital to call. The silence shrills harsher than the phone’s ring. But ask yourself this: who’s in the bed? You or him? The memories are different but the same. Oil and water. Shouldn’t be mixed. But it’s hard not to. Picture the two of you on the operating table and on the metal slab. Too far from reality to feel skin slice. Scalpel gliding across the chest; were the cuts they made as thin as the line between surgery and autopsy?

There’s a lot of paragraphs in the story that start with Picture This:. I have no idea what it means, it just reads cool lmao

10: Junie

we skip around 3 weeks now to see how the kids are dealing with the start of semester and well. They’re managing! Junie actually has a good chapter here, because she experiences Baby’s First Queer Class Crush 

[image description: a purple sunset with a large pink cloud. In the middle, in a white serif font, reads  you notice her background is of a purple sunset. You wonder if purple is her favourite colour like you and if she took it and if she likes photography and if she’d take photos of you “ /end id]

You listen, touch type your notes without properly processing the words yet, but instead of studying the PowerPoint, you study her: how she tucks a strand of black hair - free from her messy bun - behind her ear. The three studs in her earlobe, three little gold stars. The way her eyebrows furrow when she’s confused, and the way her face relaxes when she figures it out. How she touch types like you, how her two brass bracelets  jangle and how you’re the only one that hears it. She minimises Word briefly, and you notice her background is of a purple sunset. You wonder if purple is her favourite colour like you and if she took it and if she likes photography and if she’d take photos of you. Lavender polo shirt, lavender perfume. She doesn’t wear make-up, but a tiny black heart sits under left eye.

Junie’s dreams of a photographer girlfriend are quickly shattered when she admits the photo’s from Pinterest, but otherwise this is so <3 the sapphic crisis of it all.

You walk out together, and she tells you she only got into Sheffield that weekend, and it was a nightmare to explain to the tutors why. “It’s like, they forget we have lives sometimes. Lives we can’t control.” She shakes her head. “It’s okay now though, I’m here now.” 

You almost trip on the stairs up to the main floor, and her hand is warm against your wrist. Your cheeks redden, but she just asks if you’re okay, smiles when you are. Tells you she’s late for a seminar, but it was lovely to meet you. Thanks again for the lecture notes. Calls you a lifesaver. Fades into the between-classes rush. You’re glad she’s here now.

again she is so <3 i get it babes i get it <3 

In other news, at the end of the chapter Kristen drops the most relatable line of the entire fucking book:

“You know how like, when it rains, all the worms come out and do a funky little dance? Yeah so basically: the rain is LIT3001 right. And the worms are all of my mental illnesses.”

11: Tomas

Tomas turns 21 on October 13th so naturally like anyone in his early 20s he has multiple crisis’ about it. I still haven’t figured this chapter ~out yet but it sure exists! It just sucks the same way it sucks to be a young adult in the late 2010s. But here’s Kristen being the most relatable character in the book again and getting bullied for it :/

(CW: alcohol)

"I still can't believe you both do a science. Like, it actually baffles me - I could not be more further from that." Kristen refills his glass, measures the vodka level with his index. "Just a babe and his silly little BA against the world." 

"You know if you wanna be a BA babe you have to actually, like, graduate."

12: Kristen

Kristen is personally like I will pretend my degree does not exist and honestly? I get it King. He visits his Dad, since he only lives 30 minutes away, but most of the chapter is him thinking about Tomas and their messy friendship and the fact that Tomas is kinda ghosting him despite literally living together :/ Anyway here’s Kristen’s cat :)

Mar snoozes on your pillow, half curled like a croissant. Orange fluff against grey sheets, and you’re not mad at the fur debris she’ll inevitably leave. Her head pops up when you sit next to her, “you forget about me yet?”. You scratch her head and it’s like you’re 12 again and you don’t have to worry about rent or degrees or masters applications or careers or groceries or housemates and you haze through Sundays snoozing in bed with your new kitten. Technically she was a birthday present, but dad couldn’t wait an extra month to adopt her. Said he saw it in her eyes at the shelter, that she belonged here. You named her Marmalade because you were a dumbass eleven year old and also thought marmalade was the shit back then. She stretches her legs and yawns. Plops her head back down, back to sleep. “Yeah, me too.”

13: Tomas

The next three chapters centre around each character’s Halloween, because <3 Halloween my beloved <3. Tomas’ starts off with him and Kristen being ~homoerotic and him being a ~disaster about it. 

w[image description: a photo of a blue planet - Neptune - against a black background. In the middle, in a white serif font, reads “You don’t know which palette he’s using, but you remember his favourite is space themed: Mars red, Neptune blue, Jupiter orange - you try to guess which planet he thinks looks best against olive. He taps the brush against the palette. Imagine the planets. How they dandelion in the air.” /end id]

When you sit in front of him, your knees press together. When he tilts your head up, thumb on chin, nail grazing the curve of your lip, his hand is ice on your skin. He studies your face, you close your eyes. When he pulls back, you swear you still feel his thumbprint on your skin. You don’t know which palette he’s using, but you remember his favourite is space themed: Mars red, Neptune blue, Jupiter orange - you try to guess which planet he thinks looks best against olive. He taps the brush against the palette. Imagine the planets. How they dandelion in the air. He holds your head in place, hand sprawls over you cheek like veins. Brushes colour into your eye socket. Underneath the radiator, your phone buzzes twice. Don’t say anything. Ignore your heartbeat.

(before this Tomas threw his phone at the radiator because someone texted him :) yeah okay mood :) )

this story is really about the ~gay disasters and also the ~dialogue 

You flop onto your bed, arms crossed over your face. “I dunno. I might just print off all the emails Uni's sent me about my dissertation. Staple them to a jacket and tell people I'm going as mental illness." 

"Tomas, if you want to go as mental illness then you don't need a costume at all."

Unfortunately the rest of the chapter is not as fun because plot had to happen but this first scene was :)

14: Junie

Junie is not a fan of Halloween so she gives up halfway through the night and invites the girl she met in her lecture over to bake cookies at 1am instead. Fellas is this gay?

(CW: alcohol)

The girl in the kitchen brought cookie cutters in pink Tupperware. She explains she’s had them since she was eight, but she hasn’t had a chance to use them this Autumn. She has seven: cat, butterfly, crescent moon, heart, three stars matryoshka’d together. “I have more, these are just my go to ones. I’m a bit of a collector.” She lines them up on the counter, you trace the outline of the cat. She says she didn’t want to bring too many, but she likes having the options with no plan, the potential. You want to tell her that, after you invited her over, you spritzed the counters with lavender surface cleaner twice and tucked the discarded vodka and raspberry liqueur bottles in the cabinet you can barely reach. You piled unfolded laundry into your closet and hid drooping plants behind your closed curtains when you had zero intention of her inviting her to your room. You want to ask her why she said yes, why she replied in two minutes at one in the morning, and you want to ask her why people feel the need to cookie cutter themselves into a false potential. She asks if you want to bake with coconut or chocolate chip.  

she is actually such a disaster around girls i love her so much

The girl in your kitchen clears up glass that isn’t hers. You drop the measuring jug and it fireworks against tile. No shards lodge in your skin. Whilst she cleans, insists that it’s okay, you brew peppermint tea because you insist it’s the least you can do. The girl tells you a story about how she did the exact same thing, when she was nine, and her mother shrieked so loud the neighbours banged at the door a minute later. She laughs, muted. You apologise again. She insists it’s okay again. Rain hardens against the window, looks like TV static. You breathe in the peppermint steam.

The biggest thing I’ve learnt since drafting is that, at it’s core, this is a love story. And that makes me so excited because so many people, especially in mainstream media, still think that autistic people are incapable of love - or even worse, undeserving. 

15: Kristen

Kristen’s favourite holiday is Halloween so naturally on his special day I had to make him go through it :) I can’t share a lot of this, but it feels right to end this beast of an update on this beast of an excerpt because it came to me out of absolutely nowhere and it is one of my favourite passages I’ve ever written OOPS

(CW: death, parental death)

[image description: a cluster of stars against a dark blue, almost black sky. In the middle, in a white serif font, reads “You want to ask your dad how something can end if for you it never began, but he’s asleep in his armchair back home. You look at the stars. You wonder if any of them are her.“ /end id]

You’ve mapped Sheffield’s streets since 13 so you know you’re walking the wrong way. This isn’t the way to Crookes. This isn’t the way out the city centre. You should order an Uber. You keep walking. You stop at a crossing. There’s no cars. You don’t cross. The traffic light flashes red and bleeds on your face. The stars are out tonight, and now it’s 2004 and you’re in the lounge with Lion King in the VHS. You’re off sick and your neighbour - Mel, recently retired, recently widowed - nurses a glass of brandy in your dad’s armchair because you don’t know it yet, but he can’t afford to miss work. You’re sprawled on the dusty-red rug when Simba and Mufasa sprawl in the grass and Mufasa tells Simba that all the stars are the Kings of the past and they are watching over him. You ask recently retired, recently widowed Mel if that’s true; her smile is happy but her eyes are sad and she says “yes, and not just Kings. Nobody leaves Earth, they just move to the stars.” 

Ten minutes later, Mufasa is flung off a gorge’s edge; you haven’t studied storytelling yet, but you understand those two moments are connected. And when you relay this to dad over ready made pasta that evening, you ask him if people really live in the stars: Sometimes, when they can’t live here anymore. Then you ask if they can come back from the stars: No, but people remember them. They’ll tell stories about them, so people don’t forget. Then you ask if memories and stories are like stars: A little. Then you ask why they can’t live here anymore: It’s hard to explain, Kris.

After dinner, he lets you play on the plastic slide in the garden as he scrubs the dishes. You climb to the top and try to see faces in the stars, but it’s too cloudy. And after that but before bedtime, you’re sprawled on the dusty-red rug again, and Lion King is in the VHS again, and as Simba and Nala are bathed by their mothers again, your five year old mind connects what’s different about you. You go to ask dad about it, but he’s asleep in his armchair. It’s 2018, you’re stood on a phantom street in Sheffield. You want to ask your dad how something can end if for you it never began, but he’s asleep in his armchair back home. You look at the stars. You wonder if any of them are her.

And I usually don’t do this, but I think the playlist for this wip is absolutely fucking elite, so here’s a handful of the songs that I think encapsulate the story the best:

The Wombats – Greek Tragedy

Duncan Laurence – Arcade

FKA Twigs – Two Weeks

Peach Pit – Alrighty Aphrodite

Khalid – Saturday Nights

Alfie Templeman – Stop Thinking (About Me)

Rina Sawayama – 10-20-40

If you read this far, then I love you and we shall have a platonic wedding this summer. But I cannot express how excited I am about this story and to see where it goes!

[morimakesfanart]

Sindria's Prophet #13

[1] [2] [3] [4] [5] [6] [7] [8] [9] [10] [11] [12]

[AO3]

((edited because I figured out to add some more history facts that I think are important))

~POV Sinbad~

"The Kou Empire, huh?"

"That is going to make things risky."

With all of the Generals caught up with what happened in Balbadd, they needed to start planning for King Sinbad's trip to the Kou Empire, as well as catching him up with everything that had happened in Sindria while he was gone.

"LadY YamuRAI H AA AA A" A yell came from the hallway accompanied by the sounds of running.

((Sinbad is hidden on the left. There's a hint of him poking out.))

A panting magician gave apologies for disturbing their meeting and ran to the head of Sindria's magicians. "I wish I knew you were here so I didn't search the tower first~" Then he started explaining about some magical proof. Most of his words sounded like gibberish to the rest, but it was clear that he had made some kind of break though.

Yam jumped out of her seat. "How did you finally figure it out?! Who figured it out?!" She whipped her head to her King, "Sorry your majesty," and then looked back to the other magician.

"It was the work of the Prophet!” the magician answered. "We were talking about her illness and she pulled out scrolls that- you just have to read them for yourself!”

Mori had said that she had written other scrolls before she started coping down Fate. This must have been what she was working on.

Both magicians bowed out to go test out this new information. Before they could leave, Sinbad ended the meeting; there was no way he was going to wait to learn what other information Mori had blessed them with. Ja'far followed as did a few of the other Generals.

When they got into the court yard, the doctors that had been sent to take care of Mori were already pushing their supply cart back to their main building. The magician that had stayed behind spotted them and raised two scrolls up triumphantly. "She let me take the scrolls!"

---

News of the scrolls written by a Prophet spread throughout the Black Libra Tower within an hour. Yamuraiha and the doctors explained their significance to King Sinbad.

If even a fraction of the theories in the scrolls proved true it would completely changed their understanding of how illnesses work. If Mori wasn't sick she would undoubtedly be swarmed with questions and demands for proof. According to the magicians, nothing in the scrolls went against any known information. Instead, they gave explanations to why certain things that had been attempted in the past had failed. What she wrote about 'cells' was what really caught the eyes of the white magicians and doctors. As an example, according to Mori's writing there were blood types and most couldn't mix; that would explain why most past attempts at blood transfusions had failed.

The 2nd scroll showed a break down of even smaller particles, and how the structures of different particles made up everything. This was going to bring alchemic magic to a whole new era. Sure, such things would most likely be limited to high magicians, group efforts, and the Magi, but it looked possible now. A lot of common magic of the current day took extreme amounts of magoi in the past because they hadn't found the right formula yet. Mori's writing -if true- could easily be used as a guide to finding the right order of commands for many spells.

And even more than that, Mori had said that she had even more information to share; she had just ran out of scrolls and ink.

Mori's presence in Sindria, and everything that went with it were Fate and the Rukh's guidance. King Sinbad could see it -the future he wanted.

---

~POV Mori~

In Sindria's Palace there is a Great Bell. It is rung during celebrations, and to signify the King returning home like it did earlier that day, but it's main use was to ring every 2 hours to tell everyone the time since clocks weren't invented yet. So even though I was a sick person trying to rest during the day, I was woken up by the Great Bell every 2 hours... which of course is also situated right on top of the guest tower.

For obvious reasons, I was awake again.

I wish I knew how the others responded to the scrolls. I really wanted to know Yam's opinion most. Those scrolls basically gave away the secret to Yunan's signature alchemy magic.

I still had the first scroll I had worked on -the one on the science behind blimps-, and the last science scroll I had started. That one was on DNA, and reproductive systems. It was the last one I started in Balbadd. I hadn't started working on it until sunrise on my 2nd sleepless night and it showed; there were missing words everywhere, many incomplete sentences, and I couldn't stay in topic.

These mistakes were too great to fix with an ink knife. Editing was going be super annoying and time consuming since I couldn't work digitally. I'd have to physically cut up the first draft to put everything in the right order before making the next one.

Wait- Did this world have scissors???

Back home the first evolution of shears that could be labeled as scissors was in Roman barber shops in the last hundred years or so before Rome fell. China would spontaneous also create something akin to scissors not long after. Reim and the Kou Empire seemed to line up with Rome and ancient China for the most part, so I tend to use them to place the time period, but the dress Princess Dunya wears is centuries off and throws all historical accuracy questions out the window. Rome was long gone by the time boning was added to women's undergarments, and that dress had all the signs of boned corsetry.

Fuck it. I'll ask for scissors and if they don't have them I'll just invent them myself. I had been drafting professionally for the past 4 years. That may have been for microelectronics, but it uses all the same skills; I could do this. I needed to get a ruler -or at least a straight edge- and a drafting compass which they probably have based on the look of maps in the series, and pencils, or at least colored inks if they had them. I probably needed to reinvent the French curve(stencil tool used in art & drafting)...

Since I was struggling to fall back asleep I moved to the table and pulled out my test scroll. It was full of random marks and some of my early drawing attempts that I used to practice with the dip pen -it's also where I wrote down the dreams from the Rukh. I'd write the list of things I needed, rip the section out of the scroll, and pass the list to someone who could get me what I was asking for. I added some living necessities too like sleep wear and a comb.

The maids that came to give me dinner, and next dose of medicine were not pleased that I wasn't in bed -I was an important guest who was sick after all. And I wasn't pleased to have to drink more of that bitter medicine, but we can't have nice things all the time, now can we?

My voices was strained but I managed to communicate enough. I gave them my list, and laundry (the clothes I wore on the boat) before they left. They'd get me the things the next day. I was instructed to sleep until someone brings me breakfast the next day... which is what I was going to do anyway since the sun was practically gone. I might be a bit of a workaholic but I'm not going to let myself pull an accidental all-nighter when I know I'm still sick. I'm far more self aware than that.

And besides, the Great Bell didn't ring at night.

---

Maids brought my breakfast (& meds) the next morning and let me know that my clothes would be cleaned and dry by the end of the day. I guess they didn't use magic for everything.

They also gave me all of the drafting and inking supplies I asked for except for scissors. In one of the omakes Sinbad was shown cutting his hair with a knife as a part of his normal grooming. I had hoped he was just old fashioned.

For the greater good and the future of my own hair care, I drafted up detailed designs for a few different types of basic scissors. They wouldn't look fancy, but hopefully I had put enough of a detailed explanation on everything for the smith to figure out what I was asking. Steel wasn't developed until the middle ages and some of the counties of this world matched that so I hoped

that God and anime were on my side. I really wanted scissors that would be a good quality.

And if that didn't work I'd just have to get used to using knives and bladed rollers like a regular person.

The Great Bell rung for 10 am. There were at least another 2 hours before someone would show up, to give lunch, that I could ask to take my draft for the scissors to a black Smith.

I should be resting as a sick person. I should be more exhausted and in pain as a sick person. What was making me recover this quickly?

I still didn't feel like laying back down, so I decided to start drafting up the materials and equipment for proving everything I had written in the scrolls I gave the previous day.

Globally, micro-organisms, viruses, and bacteria were not really accept or proved until the late 1800's. Since Magi seems to take place some time around our 100AD-1300, and Yunan hinting at chemical compounds was seen as shocking by Yam, I knew that my bio scrolls were probably causing an uproar in the Black Libra Tower. I refused to use actual people or wait for an outbreak to prove it like how it happened in history -like how John Snow proved it when finding the cause of cholera outbreaks in 1848 and 1854 England. No, I needed to show how to prove these things in a lab, and to do that I was going to need to explain how to keep samples and invent a way to see microorganisms.

First was for a glass petri dish and other containers for samples. I'd need at least 3 -preferably more. I know glass works have been around since BC, and that this world had glass windows in some scenes, but I worried about the quality of the glass contaminating the experiments. I was going to have to boil them beforehand to sterilize them anyway.

Gosh I wish I had access to nonporous, air tight containers, and a temperature controlled environment. The heat and humidity of Sindria could easily mess everything up.

Wait... I suddenly remembered a scene from the Magnostadt arc when they showed how a sample was being stored. They already had good enough glass. I knew there were magic bio experiments but I had no idea how they worked.

With the realization that I was getting ahead myself, I switched to writing about how to use the scientific method to test for germs. It was basically the bread in a bag test to teach young children about germs but with petri dishes. I also wrote about how to analyze samples with a microscope to see micro organisms so I was going to have to figure that out next.

Lunch came as the perfect break.

Just thinking about reinventing this thing made me nervous. I knew magnifying glasses existed in ancient Rome, but they would be nothing like what I was used to. I had to explain how light moves and made multiple diagrams showing how concave and convex lenses affect light as well as the material of the lens. I ended up also showing how to make a telescope even though I knew Yam already had one.

Magicians were the only ones shown with glasses. Maybe now the rest of the world could have them too.

4 o'clock came and so did 3 doctors and a magician. It was less than yesterday, but still more than necessary to treat or analyze one person. I only recognized one of the doctors from the previous day. All of the new faces looked nervous. None of them looked young by any measure, so I really doubted this was their first time treating someone.

They weren't happy to see me at the table and made me return to my bed -their loss.

The doctor from the previous day was the one doing most of the talking. "Your recovery is amazing. You will most likely be better in another 3 days at this rate if not sooner. It's practically a miracle."

I smiled. "It's pretty shocking for me too." As long as I spoke quietly and kept my comments short, I found I could talk again for a bit.

The doctor was silent for a moment before changing the subject. "I know you need rest, but would you be willing to answer a few questions about those scrolls from yesterday?

The 3 other men looked expectant. This was why they were here.

"I don't mind as long as you don't make me talk too much."

Then came the question I was expecting since I had first made the scrolls. "I know you are a Prophet and the information came from your visions but is there any way you can prove what you wrote?"

I pointed to the table with the scroll I had started earlier. "I can't prove it with the current equipment I have, so I've been drafting up the needed equipment and processes for proving it."

They all turned to look at where I was pointing.

I added, "It's not done, but you're welcome to read what I have so far."

I was thanked as they went to the table they had called me away from when they entered.

'He called it 'visions?' Really?' I had to ask Sinbad later what he was telling his people about me so I could keep the story straight.

The magician confirmed for the others what I wrote about light bending. There was magic to do that, but not everyone is a magician. I had just invented a way for non-magicians to bend light.

Just wait until I show them a prism that can split light into colors. Or teach them how light is perceived in the eye. Or even better, show them the double slit experiment that proves that light is a particle not just a wave... Did they know light was a wave yet?

"Lady Prophet."

I was pulled out of my thoughts.

"You said this isn't finished and there is plenty of space in this scroll for more, but would you let us take this back to the tower so we can get started?"

I wanted to say 'no.' I was still coming up with things to add to it, but I also knew that holding things back because I wanted to save paper was a fool's game. Besides, I could always add more to it later.

I nodded and they thanked me before making me promise not to leave my bed. They were grateful for this new scroll but not at the expense of my health -they were doctors after all.

And then they left.

It was probably about 5pm if my internal clock was on schedule, so I had about an hour before the next ring of the Bell.

Even if I wasn't a man of my word, I would have lost the motivation to work with my current project taken from me while I was still in the middle of making it.

So, I did the thing I grew up doing when I was bedridden from illness: I looked out the window. From the bed I could only see the tops of the buildings on the other side of the courtyard. The Tower that was just poking in from the left had to be the Black Libra Tower.

The waves in Sindria were calmer yet stronger than those in Balbadd. It was probably due to Sinbad's influence. He brought stability and security to his people. I could understand why so many chose to follow him or ally with him. But I knew where all this would lead. As he obtains more power and influence he will stop being able to see himself from the pedestal that he and everyone else put him on; his greed will make him blind to the wants and needs of others, and like a middle aged parent that isn't ready for their child to leave the nest he will take out his frustration on the world that was moving on without him. When Sinbad dies at the end of the manga, Drakon realizes that they all put too much on Sinbad's shoulders.

To change Fate, I was going to have to make sure I never put him on that pedestal nor rely on him for much. And I was going to have to convince the 8 Generals to do the same -or at least to start pulling more of the weight.

The 6 o'clock Bell came faster than I expected, as well as my dinner not long after. They brought my clean laundry, a sleeping gown, and some other common clothes and things for my convenience.

I would have preferred something much shorter for the night gown since I hate having a lot of extra fabric around my legs when I already have blankets. I was not going to risk being walked in on by doctors or whoever when sleeping naked, so I would make do for now.

There was no way King Sinbad wasn't going to reward me for those scrolls. If it was some kind of treasure I'd sell it and buy a new wardrobe for myself that actually suited me, and if the reward was a request then I would ask that he pay for everything directly.

The light coming in my windows changed, and I watched my 2nd sunset in Sindria.

When Sinbad found this island 10 years ago, he completely terraformed it. He didn't get rid of all of the vegetation that was here, but he did break down one of the sides to allow for easier access by boat. The side he carved out faced northish towards all of the other known countries, so no boat would have a reason to circle the island. It was a decision that would benefit the merchants and make it easier to defend.

It also meant that my windows faced west, so I could watch the Sun set every day. I couldn't help but see that as a blessing and a curse. Sure not getting the sunrise meant I'd need to put more effort into

waking up in the morning but that wasn't the part I was worried about.

See- The thing is... I have synesthesia (having 2 or more senses overlapping). I see sounds, letters, and numbers as colors and textures. I have it mild enough that I can normally block it out so it's not too distracting (thank God because music is a main stim), but sometimes I'll hear something and get overwhelmed by how it looks.

Each letter and number is a color. So every voice can make every color, but language, pitch, tone, and accent all affect the colors and textures I see from a person's voice like a filter. There have definitely been some people that I struggled to give my full attention to when I first met them because I was entranced by how their voice looked. The more I hear a person's voice the more I'm able to move its visuals to the background so I can focus -desensitizing myself to it.

Luckily, Sinbad's voice is normally not so distracting that I stop paying attention. Since it's like a merger of every voice actor I've heard play him (All the characters I had met so far were like this.) I'm already desensitized. The similarities across all of the VAs meant that his voice looked like a sunset -full of deep purples and magentas, and bright reds, peach, and gold, and with a smooth and flowing texture like painting in acrylic with a wet brush -like a painting of the last moments of a sunset.

His voice was as pretty as he was.

I hadn't actually gotten to see or hear him for a whole day. But I'd get to look at his voice's equivalent every day while living under his protection.

It was frustrating to admit -I barely knew him as a real person- yet I couldn't deny that I missed him. I feel asleep watching the sun set.

((I wasn't going to write about my synesthesia, but this is my fanfic and I thought it might be fun to reference the colors peoples voices make when the characters talk. I'm not going to paint every VA and head cannon, but I will describe them as I go. Ja'far's Japanese and English VAs have voices that look very different so finding the middle ground is proving tricky.

Also, anyone who noticed that the purple I see in Sinbad's voice is the same as the purple I've been using for the illustrations and comics is super smart and cool.))

[whats-rambled-rambled]

Smoke & Mirrors - part 5

Neil x Reader

Chapter 5: Blue blood

(see chapter 4, 3, 2, 1)

summary: everything should be easier from now on, right?

warnings:  language, alcohol mention, 18+

author’s note: I know part 5 was supposed to be a finale. 

It’s not.

This is just where the story took me, and I think splitting it this way is going to pay out in the end.

song for this chapter: Laurel - Blue Blood

Anyway, enjoy! And let me know what you think, please?

-----

You stared at your boss, trying to wrap your mind around everything you’d just heard.

“Does that technically make me--?

“An assistant squad leader, yes,” said The Protagonist. “At least for the time being.“

He didn’t need to say anything else - you were well aware he meant it could go both ways from now on.

You nodded, glancing to your left at Neil.

“As long as it’s not an assistant to the squad leader...” you said and shrugged, trying to keep a straight face while Neil snorted loudly at your comment. You exchanged quick looks and you finally allowed a small smile to appear on your lips. It felt good to catch him off guard for once, and him getting a reference was a nice surprise as well.

“What’s so funny?” the boss asked, eyeing you warily.

Just as you opened your mouth to apologize, Neil collected himself enough to let out a long musing sigh.

“Ah, one could dream.”

You let out an exasperated huff and kicked him in the ankle, stifling a giggle. Fucking hell, you didn’t know what had gotten into you. Or him, for that matter, almost choking with laughter at your reaction.

TP must have been thinking the same because his eyes darted between both of you from under a raised brow. He cleared his throat.

“Are you two done?” he asked, and something in his tone made you straighten in your seats instantly as if you were two misbehaving kids in the principal’s office. “I need the first drafts from you by tomorrow noon.”

“Of course. Thank you, sir,” you said, internally cursing at yourself for losing your cool.

Your boss shook his head slowly and you could swear his usual polite expression cracked for a split second, revealing a glimpse of a smug smile hiding in a corner of his lips.

“Now go, before I change my mind.”

You grabbed the documents from the desk and mumbled a quick goodbye on your way out.

Neil followed you closely, his sparkling eyes showing no remorse for what had just happened.

“Would be easier if you still despised me, wouldn’t it,” he teased as he closed the door behind you.

You groaned and smacked his arm with the papers.

“What makes you think that I don’t?”

“Oh please,” he let out a throaty chuckle and sent you a roguish smile. The way he seemed to be almost obnoxiously confident in how this combo worked on you drove you mad every time. Not that he was wrong, it simply didn’t help the case he was trying to make. “Meet me at my place later?”

You gaped at him. “Can’t we use the conference room?” you asked and started walking down the empty corridor, hoping that being on the move would help your clearly malfunctioning mind.

Neil matched your pace. “It’s gonna take hours and the chairs there are far from comfortable.”

“Who would’ve thought you have such a sensitive ass,” you snickered and narrowed your eyes. “Admit it, you’re just looking for an excuse to lure me to bed.”

You stopped by the elevators. Neil hummed as he reached out to press a button to call one to your floor.

He leaned your way slightly and lowered his voice. “I think we’ve already established that we don’t really need a bed for that.”

...fair point. 

You swallowed with effort, turning his way. He was looking at you with an amused expression on his face, but you saw the way his gaze darkened under your stare. You could be annoyed with him being inappropriate all you wanted, but you had to admit - it was kind of reassuring how some things stayed the same after the recent events.

“Promise to behave?”

Neil raised a brow and a corner of his lips twitched.

“Only if you do.”

“Deal,” you said and walked into the elevator, nodding in a greeting to a couple of agents inside.

As the door closed with a small hiss, you caught a playful twinkle in the blue eyes.

“And only till we finish preparing that draft.”

His voice could be the prime example of corporate professionalism, and that one out-of-context line was obviously not enough to send an elbow to his ribs without raising suspicious looks from your colleagues.

...but you did it anyway.

---------

The time in Neil’s apartment could be counted by the emptied cups of coffee, the amount of scratched ideas, or the number of times you caught each other glancing at one another. And when you finally got close to cracking the case of planning that temporal pincer movement, it was already late in the evening, and you were glad you’d spent the last couple of hours on a comfy sofa instead of one of those god awful chairs in the conference room.

Neil kept his promise and was surprisingly easy to work with. His take on things, not yet tainted by years in the field, provided many fresh ideas, while your experience allowed you to catch and assess any potential risks on the fly. The way he paid attention to your words and cared about your feedback made you feel heard and appreciated, and that was something you weren’t quite used to. You didn’t have too much time to muse over it though, because there were still some parts of the plan you had to go through and the exhaustion was slowly catching up to you, making you less and less productive with every passing minute.

You crumbled a piece of paper in your fist and groaned, tossing it on top of a small pile of paper balls on the floor. As you moved your hand to your face to pinch the bridge of your nose, you noticed red and blue smudges from permanent markers covering your palm. Fucking hell. Choosing to rest your forehead on your knuckles instead, you closed your eyes and exhaled slowly, gathering your thoughts. You heard Neil standing up and moving to the kitchen. Seems like he needed a break as well.

A moment of silence was abruptly interrupted by the clanking of glassware. You raised your head and stretched your arms, only then realizing how stiff you felt after so many hours curled in one spot. Just as you got up, Neil came back with two glasses of what seemed to be a whiskey.

“Drinks?” you asked, puzzled. Anything with caffeine would be more fitting with your current state, especially since you were not done with the work yet.

Neil smiled as he handed you the glass.

“Thought we could take five minutes off to celebrate.” Seeing your perplexed face, he beamed a bit wider. “...your promotion?”

You laughed at your own confusion. Right. Shrugging lightly, you stirred your glass.

“Oh, it only means I got stuck with you, and I don’t know if it’s a thing to celebrate,” you said, holding back a mischievous grin.

Neil rolled his eyes and let out an amused sigh. “Drown your sorrows then.”

“That I can do,” you arched a brow and chuckled. “Cheers!”

The glasses clinked and you met Neil’s glance with something new shining from under the usual playfulness. He noticed the curiosity in your stare and smirked as he took a sip of his drink, sitting down on a sofa.

“You know what else we could use those five minutes for?” he asked casually, leaning back on the pillows with a roguish smile you knew too well.

You looked him up and down slowly, hoping the whiskey would help with the sudden dryness inside your mouth. That slightly unbuttoned navy shirt with rolled-up sleeves and the way he spread his legs made you weak. You mustered all the self control your tired brain could scramble before speaking again, the lit-up eyes being any indication of the effect he had on you.

“It’s closer to four now, I’m afraid.”

Neil put down his glass on a coffee table and knitted his brows together, pretending to run a short calculation in his mind.

“Ample.”

You downed your drink and teased, “Is it now?” as you placed the empty glass next to his.

“We’ll figure something out,” he said and reached out for your hand, pulling you to him before you could say anything else. As you fell on him with a quiet yelp, Neil wrapped one arm around your waist, securing you on his lap.

A faint protest about the draft not being finished got stuck in your throat. Captivated by the look in his eyes, it dawned on you that it was the first time you were so close, now without the rage boiling in your veins, without the danger of someone walking in on you; just you and him, focused on each other, too awestruck to make the next move.

You brushed a wild strand from his forehead and your fingers traveled further through his hair. Neil’s forehead creased, his jaw went slack and he searched your gaze, trying to figure out your intentions. As your eyes wandered around his features, your fingertips followed them unhurriedly. Grazing lightly against the eyebrows, gliding over the cheekbones, trailing along the sharp jawline till his breath hitched and his lips parted ever so slightly. You noticed how longing his stare became and you smiled softly. Was he always so gorgeous?

Leaning in and cupping his face in your hands, you could feel him tense for a split second, but as soon as you pressed your forehead to his, the arm wrapped around your waist pulled you closer to him and Neil exhaled slowly. He lifted his hand from your lap and his long fingers combed your hair and slid down, rubbing your neck gently.

You closed your eyes and let out a small sigh, relaxing under his touch, under the heat of his body. Breathing in the scent of his cologne, both arousing and grounding at the same time. Tilting your head, you nuzzled his nose and you could feel his brows furrowing as he followed your motion, stroking your nose up and down slowly. Tenderly. Brushing his lips with your fingertips, you lost yourself in this moment. In the warmth spreading through you. In the way your breaths intertwined.

Your hands traced back to his jaw and you felt it clenching in response.

Neil’s hand left your neck and you opened your eyes, only to notice his conflicted expression. And a glimpse of sadness tainting the blue irises. Seeing the confused look on your face, he palmed over your hand on his cheek, pulling it away hesitantly.

“We should get back to work,” he said, avoiding your gaze, his voice raspy and hollow.

The heart sank in your chest as you sprung from his lap. Of course.

“Yeah, right, sure,” you mumbled, suddenly feeling lightheaded, with the cold sweat slowly drenching the back of your shirt and the pulse pounding heavily in your ears.

You were such an idiot. Should have known better. You were never gonna learn, huh?

Gritting your teeth, you grabbed the markers and a fresh stack of papers and sat down on the floor at the far end of the coffee table, trying to ignore the enigmatic stare being sent your way.

Neil let out a deep sigh and reached out for his unfinished drink. As he put down the empty glass, he shook his head, looking somewhat defeated.

You cleared your throat and resumed where you'd left off, determined to get over the last details of the operation as soon as possible. Luckily, focusing on the work numbed down the crippling embarrassment. At least for the time being.

And although the initial flow was nowhere to be found, the plan was ready and bulletproof in a little over an hour. The presentation was finished. And so were you. Or at least that’s how you felt, collecting various blueprints and schematics covering most of the flat areas within your reach. 

You looked around, checking one last time if everything was ready to submit.

“Guess that’s it,” you said and started gathering your things, getting ready to leave. 

Neil followed you to the hall and watched as you put on the coat.

“Listen, I...” 

Holding your breath, you turned his way. Waiting for his next words.

Meanwhile, he struggled to find them, and a frustrated frown clouded his features.

“...let me at least call you a cab?”

The void in your chest grew an inch. Right.

“I’ll take a walk.” Your mouth contorted in a weak attempt to smile. “See you tomorrow, blondie,” you said dryly and walked out of the apartment, nauseous and desperate to get some fresh air.

How silly of you to think that it could be about anything other than sex. 

That’s what you get for being willing to open up.

Yet another painful reminder that you weren’t a relationship material. 

You exhaled shakily as your legs carried you to the only place able to stop your mind from spiraling.

Aim and pull the trigger. 

Repeat.

Simple.

(next chapter->)

[richincolor]

Interview: Michelle Quach

We have a special guest today. Michelle Quach was kind enough to answer a few questions for us about her debut, Not Here to Be Liked. It's being released today so you can grab it right away.

Summary: Eliza Quan is the perfect candidate for editor in chief of her school paper. That is, until ex-jock Len DiMartile decides on a whim to run against her. Suddenly her vast qualifications mean squat because inexperienced Len—who is tall, handsome, and male—just seems more like a leader.

When Eliza’s frustration spills out in a viral essay, she finds herself inspiring a feminist movement she never meant to start, caught between those who believe she’s a gender equality champion and others who think she’s simply crying misogyny.

Amid this growing tension, the school asks Eliza and Len to work side by side to demonstrate civility. But as they get to know one another, Eliza feels increasingly trapped by a horrifying realization—she just might be falling for the face of the patriarchy himself.

Crystal: First off, I read Not Here to Be Liked all in one gulp. You had my attention from the first page and I absolutely needed to know what was going to happen next. The plot was intriguing and the romance had me smiling so many times. On a side note--I also seriously considered simplifying my wardrobe.

From the title, it's fairly obvious that likeability is not Eliza's priority. How do you think likeability plays out along gender lines?

Michelle: Aw, thank you so much—I’m glad to hear that you enjoyed the book!

I think it’s possible for people of all genders to be unlikeable, but it plays an outsize role in the way a girl’s worth is determined. Being liked isn’t always a requirement for a man’s success, but it is almost always for a woman’s. On top of that, the standards for female likeability are quite fickle. Your appearance factors in disproportionately, as does your ability to make others feel comfortable. Sometimes you can even become unlikeable just for being too popular (think of basically every young female celebrity ever). And the worst part is, these expectations can continue to shape your behavior even after you’re aware of how absurd they are.

Crystal: Are there unlikable female characters in other novels that have caught your attention in the past?

Michelle: Probably my favorite of all time is Harriet from Harriet the Spy. She’s self-absorbed, judgmental, and nosy—but she also learns, which mean there’s hope for all of us. More recently, I also found Ivy from White Ivy by Susie Yang to be terrifically unlikable. I won’t say whether she learns anything, though.

Crystal: What kind of relationship do you have with the term and concept of feminism?

Michelle: I definitely consider myself a feminist, though my relationship with the concept has evolved a lot over the years. In fact, I’d say it’s still evolving! What makes sense to me right now is the idea that feminism needs to be as inclusive as possible, which means it should dismantle not only sexism but also all other forms of structural inequality, including racism and economic inequality. That said, I do also support all kinds of progress, even if it’s incremental.

Crystal: What was the most fun aspect of writing Eliza and Len's story?

Michelle: Their banter! I love writing dialogue in general, but it’s so fun to throw two well-matched characters together and just let them go at it.

Crystal: Were any of the characters more challenging to write than the others?

Michelle: I would say Winona, because her experience as a Black teen in a majority Asian and White community is most outside my own, and I wanted to do my best to make sure her story felt authentic.

Crystal: Can you tell us a little bit about your journey to publication?

Michelle: I started writing Not Here to Be Liked about four years ago, after almost a decade of not writing anything at all. Before that point, I’d basically given up on my dream of even finishing a draft, let alone getting published. But I gave it another shot as part of a 100 days challenge…and this time I made it to the end! Everything happened really fast after that: I got my agent through PitMad, we went on submission a month later, and then the book sold at auction within a few weeks.

Crystal: If you're able to share, what's up next with your writing?

Michelle: I’m currently working on Book 2, another YA contemporary romance, and trying to read and watch as much as possible to get inspiration for Book 3!

Crystal: We wish you the best with the book release and look forward to reading more of you work in the future. Thanks so much!

Michelle Quach is a Chinese-Vietnamese-American who also spent a lot of time working for student newspapers--including The Crimson at Harvard College, where she earned a BA in history and literature. Currently a graphic designer at a brand strategy firm in Los Angeles, Not Here to be Liked is her first novel.

[cherry-ber]

“You notice how wine makes people wanna feel, like sexy?”

Pairing: idol! Mark Lee x female reader

Plot: Lonesome creeps into everyone's mind, even those who seem to have it all.

Genre: fluff mostly, angst.

Warnings: mentions of alcohol, extremely painful for me to write this since I feel lonely idk if that triggers you too.

A.N: inspired by the first draft of too drunk to fuck and my bff's dependence of wine to exist 😳 this took me 10 hours to write but it might still be pretty shit. And yeah Clueless some how

After a long, long week of continuous recordings, dance practices, re-recordings and photo sessions, all he wanted to do, was sleep for twenty hours straight. He knew that he was a very lucky man, he was really living the dream. Not everyone was able to do what they loved, with people they genuinely liked, and still get payed for it, but he was. He had always been grateful, he knew the real value of things in real life, and sometimes he felt like he didn't even deserve it.

An insane amount of people knew his name, knew him, and constantly made sure that he knew how appreciated he was, but he couldn’t understand it at all. Sure, he proved himself over and over again how great he could be, and he was proud too, but why did people really loved him? Sometimes it's easy to lose yourself, but lately he was struggling even more, he felt lost and unworthy, he felt guilty, even, because he shouldn't feel this way.

Mark was home alone, after his friends went out to have dinner and drinks. He excused himself out of the reunion saying that he would call his parents and then heading straight to the bed. He wasn't lying at all, he did have a small call with his family, and then went to his room, expecting that he'd fall asleep soon and forget about what he was feeling, he was done with that for today.

He played a movie in his computer, knowing that whatever it was, he wasn't paying attention anyway. He hated to admit it, but he felt like he was missing something, rather, someone. He felt ridiculous, knowing how much people loved him, how many friends he had, but he couldn’t help it, he would be lying if he didn't say he could use a little company. Mark was busy most of the time, which, although tiring, was an escape from his loneliness, it was moments like this where he'd have enough time to sink in this small puddle of angsty feelings, that just grew until it was as big as an ocean. He couldn't explain why he felt so bad, he had enough friends to count on, and even when he considered he was only in need of a physical affect, it turned out to not be the answer, even when he masturbated, when he was finished, those feelings were still there. As the movie went on without him noticing, he turned his head to the side, and imagined someone next to him, wearing his clothes and stealing his blanket. He giggles, imagining cuddling someone to sleep, their heat making him feel home. He finally closes his tired eyes with a smile, hoping his dreams will be sweet and last long.

He wakes up in a bad mood, and doesn't really want to talk to anyone, his older friends notice, and decide to let him be, they know that if something is really wrong, he'll come to them eventually. After a quick shower, he decided he needed some privacy, some time alone, despite being scared of being stuck with himself, and went out on his own, ignoring the texts on the group chat, where everyone wondered where he was going. He had breakfast in a small Cafe, went to a movie matinee, an art gallery, a theater play, and then to a mall to buy himself expensive clothes. He had an okay day, and he grew a little bit of joy, finding himself alone and still almost enjoying his time, but mostly, ignoring his mind when he saw a couple, and wished he could have that too. He enters a restaurant, intending to order something take out for his friends, as an apology for being moody and worrying them. He waits stand up next to the door, with a cup of coffee they offered him, until he suddenly turns around after hearing his order being ready, and ceashes with someone as he does. He spilled his drink over his and their clothes. He starts apologizing, but all he gets as a response is a soft, sweet giggle. He looks to the stranger's face, and is met with a fond smile.

“It's okay, go get your food, I can fix myself”

He's caught off guard, and all he can do is shake his head yes and do as he is told, coming back to them, apologizing again.

“I'm such an idiot, I'm so sorry” he's totally embarrassed, and he feels a blush running through his face.

“It's alright, it wasn't your fault”

The stranger walks inside to take a table, and he rushes out, walking back home. That giggle makes its way to his mind a couple times as he arrives.

After eating, he goes to bed, feeling somehow full with himself, but he doesn't know if it was after forcing himself to like him, or if he was so desperate for someone that a small interaction like that would get him sleepless thinking this person would be his person.

On that same week, he founds himself running into that same stranger everywhere. When he goes get coffee with his friends, when they go to buy groceries, when he heads to the studio, and he wonders if he should be worrying, but decides not to.

Surprisingly, he founds her again, when he is entering a new coffee shop, and she walks her way out. He opens the door for her, and is met with her fond smile again, that grows larger as she recalls his face. She mumbles a sweet 'thank you' and keeps walking. Some courage grows inside Mark, and blurts out whatever his brain was fast enough to say.

“Thanks for not spilling that coffee back” the young lady finds the sentence, although awkward, funny, and turns back to him to reply.

“Maybe I should pay for your coffee, though, you were enjoying it until I crashed into you” Her melodic voice is enough to put Mark in a trance, and loses control of what he's doing, disconnecting from his awkward self.

“Actually it was my fault” he giggles remembering how sweet she was, even after Mark probably just ruined her day “Did you get a horrible stain?”

She walks closer to him, small steps that make his heart beat faster.

“It wasn't horrible, I wouldn't say that, it was just, slightly bad”

“I don't want to be a weirdo, are you busy right now? I could use some chatting, and I really owe your laundry money”

She was never an outgoing person, but she was flattered by his proposal. She was meeting someone, but she figured it wouldn't be important enough to not cancel.

“I would love that, but you owe me nothing” she giggles and walks beside him into an empty table.

“I'm Mark, by the way”

“I know that” she laughs it off, attempting for things not to be awkward “My name is Y/N”

It was only after several months, that Mark found himself, again, over thinking about how lonely he was, and how desperate he was for it to end. Whenever he had the chance, he'd spend time with his new friend, and for some weeks, thats was enough, until he realized that, all she wanted from him, was a friendship. His friends noticed, too, how after a while, that wasn't enough for him, but he was terrified he'd lose her, but they'd often try to help him out in whatever way other men would think was best, teasing her when she was at the dorms, insinuating how cute of a couple they'd be, and shamelessly asking if by any chance, she'd have feelings for him, never really giving away Mark's crush on her, not explicitly at least.

One afternoon, when they were all watching a movie together, when suddenly, Johnny and Taeyong convinced everyone to go out and have dinner, even after Mark suggested they just called the restaurant, because he was too tired to go out.

“Oh” Taeyong said, grabbing his keys and putting on a hat “then you can stay here with Y/N and order something and we can take our time”

The girl was a little disappointed, she loved spending time with the other guys two, but she agreed, knowing that Mark wouldn't want be convinced to leave the couch.

She sees then leave, and turns around to look at her friend, somehow aware of what his friends were trying to do; leave them alone, after last night they discussed Mark should just accept the reject, and confess. The boy asked, pleaded and begged them not to leave them alone, after he opened up about his feelings, but of course, his friends thought they'd know better.

“Can you order pizza while I take a shower?” his attention called back to where he was, as the sweet woman walked into the living room, with a bottle of wine and two cups. Mark chocked in his spit, when the thought of her showering, and how much he'd love to enter the scene, crossed his mind.

“Yeah, sure” he watched her walking away “Do you want some clothes?”

“Well, if I could steal one of your hodies tonight, I wouldn't mind”

He does as he's asked, calling a pizzeria and taking off his hoodie, hoping that she'd appreciate the smell of his cologne, that he wears only when she's coming around.

When she comes out, wearing her jeans and tank top, he throws the sweater at her, she puts it on and sits in the couch next to him, ready to start eating, reaching out for the bottle to serve them a cup after the first bite.

“I don't want to drink that” he'd never been a fan of alcohol, he knew he could use a boost, but he was still afraid of it.

“Huh? Why is that?”

“I don't drink wine” She recalled how he'd often drink with Johnny and her, whenever Johnny wanted to open a bottle, which happened quite often, but decided not to insist, although she did pour a cup for herself.

Mark, and any other men, really, always wondered what could she be thinking about, she was wild, energetic, but calmed and peaceful, she was always kind, but wouldn't hesitate to start a fight if to defend herself or someone else, she was never scared, but she was sensitive and fragile. He couldn't help the sigh that left his body, remembering why he had feelings for her in the first place. He knew how much she'd hate to be in a relationship, they had already discussed it, after some girl confessed to Mark, and she mentioned how relationships to her were useless, since she got all the love she wanted from her friends, and that way, she made sure that all the love she gave was reciprocal. When he told his manager about his feelings, expecting him to give him helpful advice, he just told him to forget about her. “women like her are too complicated, it's not worth it”. He wondered then, how many other guys would think the same, and refused to be one of those.

They were both full, and cuddling in the couch, she was sipping her second cup, when Mark suddenly poured a cup for himself too, and drank it in one large sip. He felt a rush through his body, his face flustered, and a numb sensation in his limbs. He was trying to keep himself still, but the sudden alcohol in his body made him bubbly and the woman next to him realized. The cheesy romcom that was playing on the back made him giggle in every other scene, and with every minute that went by, he felt looser and looser. He served another cup and drank it just as fast as the first one. Soon, he found himself leaning towards the body that sat next to him. Y/N pat her thigh, inviting Mark to rest his head there, which he did, while fidgeting with his fingers.

“You notice how wine makes people wanna feel, like sexy” he lets out in a serious tone.

Giggly, his friend shakes her head no, and places her cup in the table in front of them. “Do you feel like sexy?”

He sits himself back, eyes wide open, same serious expression in his face.

“I guess so?” he laughs at how dumb he must sound “I feel... Jiggly”

Her sweet, loud laugh fills the room, and Mark is proud of himself for making her so happy.

“Love, you should go to sleep already” he feels his face hotter and hotter, and can only imagine how red he must be “you were already tired, I'll clean up and meet you in your room-”

Mark bursts out of his bubble and speaks

“Don't do that” he says softly, as if he was genuinely hurt by her words “Please, don't do that”

Worried, Y/N walks closer to him, “Do what?”

He looks down to his feet, feeling tears forming in his eyeballs, product of his low alcohol tolerance, and his overall emotional state. “Dont call me love. You don't love me”

She reaches for his hands, attempting to make him look straight at her eyes “Of course I love you Mark”

“Not the way I want you to”

She had never been good with other people's feelings, especially romantic feelings, she had a hard time catching indirects.

“In which way is that?” hesitant, Mark stares at her for a couple seconds, before staring at her lips, too numb to do better, he grabes her chin and pulls her closer to him, a sweet, slow kiss surprising her as much as himself. When he pulls away and expects a response of any kind, all she can do is try to look at him.

“Oh, Mark” she finally manages to say “is this the way you feel?” he nods, still nervous but hopeful that she'll feel the same “You're drunk, go to sleep” she turns around as she cleans as quick as she can, as mark makes his way to his room, or to the first room he sees open.

Before the other men living in the dorms arrive and ask questions that she doesn't want to answer, she leaves, leaving a post it note in the fridge for Mark”

“Drink water and have a painkiller,

I had to go home. Thanks for the wine

-Y/N”

Too many weeks after, Mark calls her phone one more time before he enters the dorms, wondering if he had really done the worst thing in the world, for her to ghost him like that. He let a tired sigh out, grateful that he was home alone again. He goes to his room, ready to sleep for as long as he can, but when he opens the door, the lights are on, and in his bed sits what could be only described as an angel, beautiful as always, smiling and kind Y/N, with a cup of wine in her delicate hands, and another one on his nightstand, that she offers him as he's taking off his shoes and sweater.

With pain and regret in her eyes, as he's taking the first sip, she attempts to break the silence. “You ever notice how wine makes people feel sexy?”

[punkpoemprose]

December 12th- A Convenient Arrangement Part 4

Universe: Canonverse Arranged Marriage AU Rating:T Length: 5336 Words A/N: Brain-rot I tell you. Brain-rot. Yes I’m aware it would be easier to catch up writing or finishing the drabbles and oneshots I have in my drafts but I can literally only think about this AU anymore.  I do have other ideas I really want to tackle though, so maybe I’ll try one of those next. We sure will see won’t we?

[Part 1] [Part 2] [Part 3]

Anna had not been particularly pleased by the knock on her door before the rising of the sun. That was, of course, until she’d heard it open, and saw a somewhat familiar figure through her one open eye. They’d been married for just a little over a full day and a half, and already seeing him there, hearing his voice, brought her comfort.

“Anna,” he’d said quietly, “We’ll have to leave soon if we want to get back before dark. I think I’d like to show you some places on the way.”

So she’d dragged herself from bed, and now in the closest thing she owned to travel clothes, she sat at his side, watching the sun rise in his wagon. She’d offered to have the horse master prepare the royal carriage, but he’d shrugged at the idea. She could already tell that he was the sort of person who wouldn’t have others do for him, what he could do for himself.

She could appreciate that. She’d spent many years trying to dodge the staff when they’d wanted to bathe her or dress her or clean up her quarters for her. She’d given her poor governess a run for her money in her younger years, and now there was some special satisfaction she found in the tacking of her own horse or the styling of her own hair.

She wore it down today, in a pair of braids to make it almost proper. Being with her husband she supposed she should be allowed to wear it however she liked. She did feel a bit bad for the surge of annoyance she’d felt the day before when she’d watched him brushing his reindeer when she just spent time ruminating on her own insistence at doing things on her own. She was stubborn, and he seemed to be as well in many ways.

The odds of that causing problems were likely high, but she still liked their odds.

“What’s it like to live so far from the city?” she asked, just to break the quiet between them as they made their way along the road, few others traveling along as they did.

She wondered if Kristoff knew that normally she’d be accompanied by guards for any trip like this outside the walls of the castle’s gates. She wondered if he knew that he now should be afforded the same guards, and whether he knew that she’d intentionally had him exit a rear gate so as to not catch attention when they’d left.

The last thing she wanted on her first day left entirely alone with her husband was to have an entourage of guards a few feet behind them at most. She’d thought to leave a note in the servant’s quarters for Kai and Gerda, as well as one under her sister’s office door before they set out, at least so that no one would think she was kidnapped, but she was still uncertain as to whether they’d send a platoon out after her anyway.

“Simple,” he said, “Quiet. When I’m in camp with the other harvesters or in the market selling ice it’s so loud. But at home it’s peaceful. Sometimes someone who knows me well enough to know where my home is will stop by to visit, usually family or another harvester, but otherwise it’s just me and Sven and the forest.”

It sounded nice, she thought. To live out in nature and see untamed plants and animals each day. But the quiet aloneness was something that made her uncomfortable to think about. She’d spent too many years in solitude, quiet, alone. She couldn’t imagine wanting that.

But he was free to go where he liked, and he has family and he has friends.

His self-imposed solitude was different than her enforced one.

It’s better to have a choice.

His hands were on the reins, leading his reindeer off the well-traveled road and toward a smaller wooded path ahead. The city was shrinking behind them, and while she thought that it might be nice to get away for a short time, she also couldn’t help but fear what would come ahead for them. The forest was probably less dangerous than the conversations they might have now that they were well and truly alone, away from the ears and eyes of staff and dignitaries and citizens of her castle and kingdom.

She wished that he’d let a hand fall, so that she could grip it for comfort.

***

She was leaning into his side a bit as Sven climbed the familiar path up and into the mountain. Trees lined the dirt road and in some places, he felt the wagon’s wheels crunch over fallen branches and encroaching shrubs. Had he been alone, and had he had his hatchet he may have spent some time clearing the road. It was used by only a few during the summer months. There were others that lived in his section of the mountain, but they were mostly older and while they helped keep the path, it was a job he took mostly for himself.

Hermits have to stick together.

But he wasn’t a hermit, at least not anymore. She was warm at his side, and he enjoyed the contact. It was not a cold morning, the summer sun rising was already warming their surroundings, but the shade of the branches above was keeping it cool. They hadn’t been speaking for a while, and he wasn’t sure what to say. She’d been doing most of the talking, and he’d answered her when prompted. He’d told her about ice harvesting and the work it required, about his preferences for hands on work over more cerebral tasks despite doing well enough with them to keep himself and his ice business afloat.

She’d told him about growing up in the castle, being trained for duties she’d not been asked to fulfil when the gates had been closed, and how she wasn’t truly certain what was going to happen next. She’d mentioned that they’d be expected to make appearances, and that while they didn’t rule, they’d be prepared to do so in the event that Elsa could not.

“My sister has no interest in providing the kingdom with an heir,” she’d said, “The throne will be mine someday, whether I want it or not. People are going to want me to ensure someone will fill it after as well. Our kingdom is peaceful, the monarchy is well liked, but a power vacuum could be deadly nevertheless.”

It had been the last thing she’d said before the quiet had overtaken them. They’d spoken briefly of heirs and children on their wedding night, mostly to assure her that she’d never have to provide him with any, but he wasn’t sure now if it were something that she might have taken the wrong way. He tried to recall whether he’d qualified the statement with a willingness to someday have children if she wanted them, but he was uncertain.

“Do you want children?”

She was quiet, but she didn’t shift from his side. He took it as a good sign and let his hand drop from the reins, knowing that Sven knew the path ahead and that he could control him well enough with a single hand.

She took it, her fingers lacing through his as they both kept their eyes on the path ahead.

“I never thought about it much,” she said, “Well I thought about it sometimes, but not about whether I would want to or not. Princesses married, they had children, they raised future monarchs, and with Elsa being as she is… well I just always knew it would be my duty. I was very romantic as a child though, I liked to dream of weddings and things. I always thought I’d marry for love like my parents did.”

He squeezed her hand, trying to be as reassuring as possible.

“I’m sorry you didn’t have a choice.”

She looked at him then, he saw it out the corner of his eye and so he turned to her in return. Her eyes were rueful, her smile weak. “I’m sorry you didn’t either. I never asked… was there someone else that you…?”

“No.”

He thought maybe he answered too quick, especially when there was a spark of surprise in her eye. He couldn’t imagine why it would, he surely had to be blundering enough in his attempts at supporting her that she could tell he’d never been in a relationship before. But then again, she’d been alone for so long, and while he didn’t know much about her last relationship, he knew that she was also new to their situation if nothing else. Maybe she wasn’t sure of what being in a relationship was supposed to be like either.

“Sorry, I… no. I’ve never been interested in anyone before you.”

She flushed, her face going bright red. He wasn’t really sure what he’d said that elicited the response until she looked down at her feet and quietly replied.

“So you are interested? In me… that is?”

It was his turn to flush then. He looked away from her, toward the brush along the side of the path, taking note of the plants they passed, staring at trees and stones and anything but her. Because he was interested.

She’s beautiful.

She’s kind.

I’m not worthy of her.

She’s my wife.

“How could I not be Anna?”

***

The light breeze that swept its way across the small clearing buffeted the loose hairs around her face, tickling at her nose. Her sleep addled hands had done their best in braiding, but clearly she’d missed some pieces.

Kristoff’s hand was in hers again, helping her down from the wagon. It was a lucky thing too, her legs feeling like jelly with how long she’d been sitting.

She fell a bit, into his chest, and she didn’t mind at all when his other arm wrapped around her back, stabilizing her, holding her until she righted herself. She hadn’t been able to stop thinking about the various conversations they’d had on their way, but particularly the one where he’d told her that he was, in fact, interested in her.

It shouldn’t matter really. They were married after all. But the idea that her husband might have an interest in her beyond the title and duty to be wed, meant something. She was interested in him too.

He’s funny, and kind, and…

She had to tune out her own thoughts in order to quiet the commentary on his arms and chest and the attractiveness of his features. She lost the battle though, at least thinking about his strength, when she righted herself again and let her hand run down his chest.

“I hope you won’t be too disappointed,” he said, not dropping her hand as he led her toward one of the two buildings that filled the space. “It’s nothing fancy.”

She knew that she couldn’t possibly be disappointed. All she’d wanted from this trip was to get away from the castle for a bit, to get to know him a little better. She’d already been given that and more. His hand was in hers; he’d said that he was interested in her, and nothing had fallen apart around her yet.

The grass in the field around them was a bit taller than it was in the pasture where she rode her horse, but the ground was mostly level and easy to walk on. He’d already unhitched Sven who was munching on it happily. He wasn’t tied up, but stayed in the bounds of the space without difficulty.

The animal was smart. She could tell that he was either well trained, or had a bond with Kristoff that at least made him appear so. She wondered how old the reindeer was, and how long Kristoff had been his “best friend”.

She thought that maybe sometime the information would come up naturally. Or at least she hoped so. There were some mysteries she wanted him to answer for her naturally, rather than offer in response to her many questions.

The building was small, larger than the other that appeared to be a stable and storage space, but still smaller than even her smallest drawing room. It was built of logs, long, but thin compared to the trunks of the trees around her, and bare of bark. They were stacked high, perhaps ten feet, and appeared to be expertly aligned to create the walls. Into the face a few small windows were inset into the wood, and the roof, made of thick wooden shingles that were well aged with the sun and weather. A few appeared to be split, maybe as a result of the freezing and thawing of the winter’s snow and ice.

She’d seen winters split the flagstones in the garden path at the palace and supposed it might to do the same to shingles. She took note of the simplicity of the structure, just a rectangle of wood with the space broken only by the windows, the single front door, and the stone chimney that had been laid up the end.

Nothing about it was perfect. The logs that made up the walls were tightly laid together, and she had no doubt that it was weather tight, but the logs were cut to different lengths on the end, almost lined up, but not quite. The chimney had a slight lean to it, and the door and windows were not even close to centered on the buildings front. It had been made by eye, she could tell, and it was lovely.

She wanted to ask if he’d made it himself, but she felt as if she might be disappointed to learn if it hadn’t been. She was already imagining him, maybe a year or two younger, without a shirt and hauling the heavy supplies across the clearing himself.

She supposed his family must have helped. That’s what families did, or at least that was true to her memory of what having a full family was like. It was fuzzy around the edges, even with her parents death not having been long ago, because Elsa hadn’t really been part of the family since she was quite small.

When they made it to the front door, he opened it for her and helped her take the step up into the interior which was lit warmly by sunlight through the two windows that had been visible to her on the front of the building as well as another slightly larger one on the back. Small dust motes danced like fireflies in the light, and she realized rather quickly that it was a home of practicality rather than fashion. The main room was, less of a room and more a space. She saw a stove, a small fireplace, a table with a single chair, a chest, and a cot in the space with little else.

“It’s not fancy,” he reiterated, stepping into his home behind her, “Nothing like what you’re used to, but it’s mine.”

She thought for a moment about what it would be like to live there.

She’d want to hang curtains, maybe polish the stove a bit, and add a rug to the center of the floor, and maybe some hooks on the wall to hang jackets in the winter, but otherwise it was someplace she could, at least, imagine staying for a few nights.

She didn’t really think that she needed much. The amenities of the castle had always been nice, but she thought that she might be able to, perhaps, be happy without them. Running water was, however, one thing that she knew she’d miss if she were ever to live anywhere without it.

“It’s perfect,” she said, and she meant it, because it was his, and that’s all it needed to be.

***

He’d left her with express permission to do all the exploring and digging through his home that she liked. He had nothing to hide from her, and he supposed that it might make her happy to see his home and his things. He was getting to know her home, and while he supposed he wouldn’t be spending much time in his cabin anymore, he thought it only right for her to get to know his too. Her zeal after being given permission was something that surprised him, as if she had wanted to know if she could explore but had been too scared to ask.

I don’t want her to ever be afraid to ask something of me.

Still though, with her joy, there had been some visible sadness when he’d told her that he needed to leave for a short while. Normally he would ride Sven the moderate distance to the valley where his family lived, but instead he left the animal in Anna’s care, or perhaps he left Anna in his care. Sven was, for a very long time, the only living being other than his family that he trusted without a second thought. He was starting, even after such a short time, to put Anna in that category as well, and so he knew that he could trust the animal to keep her company or get her back to the city if need be, just as he also felt comfortable with leaving her to keep the creature from running off or getting tangled up in anything he shouldn’t.

She already seemed to like him, he’d noticed the way she’d scratched his head gently before they’d left in the morning, and somehow a small pile of carrots had appeared in the wagon while they were on the road. It may have been bribery on her part, though it was unnecessary. Sven in his own way, had already shown that he liked her too. It was another reason why he thought that being married to Anna might be something he would not only be able to bear, but to enjoy. Sven was an excellent judge of character.

When he reached the valley it appeared empty, void of everything but the occasional mushroom, tuft of grass, and bit of moss growing on the oddly placed stones in the space. He knew better of course, but to the untrained, unknowing eye, who probably couldn’t find the valley in the first place, it would just be another stretch of the mountain to pass through.

“I’m home,” he called.

He could feel the love in the space as a few stones slowly unsettled themselves from the dirt and rolled toward the shaded area of tree line he’d just emerged from. The mossy stones were large but didn’t come up much higher than his knee as he walked back into the shade to where they’d settled.

“I’m sorry to wake you, but I have something I need to tell you.”

The rocks rocked a bit, then popped apart into small humanoid figures. The one he called his mother gave him a sleepy smile as the one he called his father yawned, and the one he called his grandfather looked on expectantly. Grand Pabbie was always the first to have his wits about him when he woke, being the oldest and least effected by the exhausting light of the sun.

“It must be urgent,” the old troll said, already reaching out to grasp Kristoff’s hand in support, his brow scrunched as he tried to determine what was going on.

The two trolls that he called his parents came to shortly after, reaching for him and clasping his larger hand in between their smaller ones.

“I wanted to come and tell you yesterday, or before I even left but… I’m married.”

“Married?”

His father looked skeptical, as if he were about to start checking him for head trauma. Then rubbed his eyes with his unoccupied hand.

“Married like wed? To another human?”

His wife, Kristoff’s mother, bumped the troll with a look of cut-it-out-right-now-or-so-help-me on her face, then turned to give Kristoff a radiant smile.

“It doesn’t matter if she’s human or not… or if he is… or if it is. Our baby is in love! When do we get to meet… uh… your spouse?”

Kristoff flushed and it had nothing to do with the warm afternoon air.

“I’m not in love… or at least I’m not… I think I could be but we’re… We’re just married…” He found it much more difficult to explain than he could have imagined on his walk over, and so he just settled for the most basic information he could manage, “She’s human. Her name is Anna. Actually, well… Princess Anna.”

“Oh God,” his father said, “He’s kidnapped a Princess. I told you that we needed to stop pressuring him into finding someone Bulda. We’re going to have to move the valley, raise the protection crystals, explain kidnapping to the kids...”

The elder troll gave the other two an exhausted look, and then shook his head as he and Kristoff watched the two begin bickering. It was a loving sort of argument, but a boisterous one nevertheless.

“Princess Anna…” Grand Pabbie said thoughtfully, “The daughter of Agnarr and Iduna, yes? Is she the one with ice powers? I’m old and I can’t quite recall which one had which name. Elsa was one and Anna the other as I recall. One should be Queen by now I suppose. I know King Agnarr and his wife have passed.”

Kristoff shot the old troll a confused look. Of course, the trolls knew some of the goings on in the kingdom below and surrounding their valley, but Kristoff wasn’t aware that he knew of the girls beyond anything he’d mentioned. In the time before the last three days, he’d rarely if ever mentioned much about the human world below to his family, assuming that they wouldn’t be interested.

“I’m sorry Pabbie, I don’t understand… Ice powers? You mean those rumors about the Queen…”

Pabbie gave Kristoff an uncharacteristically wry smile.

“You have trolls for family, and you thought people telling you that the Queen of Arendelle had the ability to control ice was too wild a tale to be true?”

He would have laughed at himself were he not so confused.

“They say she froze the land, but I never noticed anything. My cabin wasn’t struck by an ice storm and while I didn’t leave home often when they say the event occurred, I’m sure I would have noticed the drop in temperature, or my clearing being covered in snow.”

“You wouldn’t have noticed a thing unless you left our area of protection and your cabin is well within it,” the old troll answered, “I forget sometimes that while you’re our kin, you’re not of our blood. You couldn’t feel the surge of magic when it occurred, or when it ended. I imagine an act of sacrifice, or perhaps one of true love. I lack the details. But you say you married the Princess then? So not the one with the ice powers, the one with the red hair. A strange thing that is given your history.”

“You don’t mean?”

His mother was the one who asked, done bickering with his father. She released his hand to cross the space to where her father, Grand Pabbie, was nodding sagely.

“I do. I doubt he recalls as we do Bulda, but there’s fate at work here.”

“Fate?”

Kristoff felt, not for the first time amid his adopted family, utterly confused. They often spoke cryptically, jumped to conclusions, or otherwise reacted to things in ways that befuddled him. They were kind, loving creatures, but he knew that in some ways they would never understand each other as completely as they loved each other.

“Kristoff,” his father asked, “How much do you recall of the day you became our son? And your wife… Anna… does she have red hair with a streak of white in it?”

Nothing can ever be simple, can it?

***

When Kristoff returned it was well into the afternoon. Anna had managed to not only fully make her way through the features and belongings of his home, but also of the stable and storage space. She’d taken in the neat rows of his small garden, and picked wildflowers from the clearing around his home, accompanied by the loose reindeer. She’d made them into a crown which sat delicately on the beast’s head, well designed to account for his antlers.

She’d seen little that surprised her amongst his things. Clothes, tools, a ledger of his business expenses and earnings, some miscellaneous personal affects like soap and linens and various things she’d never found interesting until it was his. His little home was neat, and tidy, and while a bit dusty in some places, overwhelmingly clean. She thought perhaps, from the variety of things she found of his, the worn but well cared for tools and the simple but clean stove with few pans, that he took pride in his simple life. It was reinforced by what she knew of him.

The standout in his things had been in the bottom of the chest that held his clothes. Amongst shirts and trousers and vests and winter things, she’d found three small but lovely crystals. One was blue, one was yellow, and one, which she thought for half a moment had glowed at her touch, was pink. She’d run her fingers over their facets, noted their clarity, and had then settled them gently back in with the rest of his things. She had plenty of jewels of her own, but nothing so simple and lovely. She wasn’t certain as to why they sat in the bottom of the chest, and while she thought that she might sometime ask him, she still felt nervous about the fact that she’d snooped at all, even with his permission.

She’d been feeding Sven carrots when he arrived, looking almost harried in a way she was unused to seeing him as he quickly broke through the tree line and walked towards her. She couldn’t help recoiling a bit from him in surprise when he walked up to her and with speed and little tact, lifted one of her braids from her shoulders and studied it.

She dropped the carrot she’d been holding, and the reindeer huffed as his owner held, not tightly, onto her hair and held it up a bit to the sun.

“Where did you get this?”

It took her a moment to understand. So much time away from people who didn’t know her had lead her to sometimes forget that having a shock of white hair mingled with the rest was something that was uncommon. It stood out rather well from her red hair, and while she’d often forgotten about it when styling her own hair, she supposed that they had intentionally hidden it as well as they could for the wedding. She probably shouldn’t have been surprised that it would have taken her hair being styled down for him to take notice of it.

She was just surprised to see him so interested in it while being so agitated. It almost scared her for a moment until she caught sight of a gleam in his eye. There was interest there, and nothing malicious in the least. She thought that she might be able to refuse telling him and that he would drop it, but there was no reason for it.

She wasn’t vain, and he may as well think that she was silly.

Everyone else always has.

“I think I was born with it. I don’t remember it ever not being there. Though once, when I was young, I  dreamt it appeared because I was kissed by a troll.”

Kristoff ran his fingers over it gently then. She saw him look almost adoring as he did so, her eyes glancing between the soft curve of a smile on his lips, and the stroking of his fingers against her braid. He set it carefully, almost reverently, back on her shoulder before he smiled more solidly and reached down to take her hand in his.

She let his fingers lace through his and felt her heart race a bit as he moved even closer to her and  loosened his grip on her hand to rub his thumb in slow circled over her palm.

“Anna.”

His face inches from hers so all she could see were his eyes, his lips. He was suddenly her whole world.  

“Yes?”

Her response was barely louder than a breath. She might not have believed that she said it at all if it weren’t for the way his smile broadened. He made a sound like a soft chuckle, but seemed almost as breathless as her, when he whispered.

“Do you believe in fate?”

I want to.

“I… I don’t understand.”

He gave her an understanding look, and then took a half step away from her, still holding her hand, beckoning her to follow him back towards the forest he’d exited moments before.

“I don’t think I could explain it… But Anna… Would you stay here with me a night if it meant meeting my family? They have something to tell you.”

She knew that she should be worried, that warning bells should be going off in her head. She wondered if her parents were rolling in their graves, screaming stranger danger. She wondered if she had been crazy to trust him and follow him into the middle of nowhere.

He won’t hurt me.

You thought that once before.

Her thoughts were warring again, but her feet were following him.

Trust him.

When you trusted before you almost died.

She could feel the ice in her blood, in her chest, but she could also feel the heat of his hand, the slow circles he was still drawing, almost absent mindedly. She didn’t let the cold overtake her, the memory of someone putting out fires and laughing at her foolishness put aside until there was only this moment, there was only Kristoff.

Trust.

So she did.

“We’ll have to send word to the castle somehow, if we plan to stay longer than dark… I don’t want my sister to be worried about me, but I… I would like to meet your family. Yes.”

His grin was the brightest she’d ever seen alight his face. His brown eyes practically glowed with the afternoon light and the warmth of his expression settled on her like a blanket on a cold day.

Kristoff. My husband.

She followed him to the forest edge, leaving behind the clearing and entering the shaded wilds knowing that he would carry her through.

[sparklygoblin]

I've been really into the concept of past lives recently, and I thought it would be really fun to post my take on the Haikyuu pairs, and past lives/historical au's. So here is some steamy, self indulgent T R A S H! This is going to be pretty flawed and there is definetly some movie references in here as well as some historical inaccuracies but I did my best. Also there are no happy endings because I thought that might be pretty unrealistic based on treatment of actual gay men in history.

TW: Suicide, Hate Crimes, Gun Violence

Iwaioi is obviously reminiscent of Alexander the Great and his "best bro"😏 Hephastion. Oikawa was the Grand King, destined for greatness from the moment he was born. Iwaizumi was born among corpses and dirt, exiled to Oikawa's kingdom, a twelfth son, useless. He lived as a lonely peasant, starving, until he joined the king's guard. He liked to tell himself he trained with Oikawa because he admired Oikawa's hard earned skill, and he believed that right up until he died at the end of the prodigy, Kageyama's blade. After intercepting a strike that would've inevitably killed the Great King. He falls, looking into Oikawa's shocked eyes, bright, and full of tears as he cradled Iwa to his chest. Iwaizumi merely sighed, still unable to touch the man he loved, lest he ruin his life by exposing his feelings. He dies to the violent, primal screams of his love, and he becomes distantly aware of a missed opportunity, as Oikawa's reciprocation of Iwaizumi's feelings becomes more obvious with each throat tearing wail. It's clear that he will die without Iwaizumi, but everyone already knew that.

Daisuga has just graduated in the summer of 1967, and they've been stealing moments with each other from the moment Suga transferred to Daichi's school sophomore year. And Daichi hated himself for it, he was quarterback, and he had the prettiest girl in school. So why was he so smitten with this nerd? This delicate pretty boy made his blood run hot and his heart skip. He was in love, and damn it if Suga hadn't made it obvious that he felt the same. Daichi had to put a stop to this before someone found out and it ruined his life. Suga heard it from a freshman, the handsome senior, Daichi was going to marry his girlfriend, Michimiya Yui. It made it so much easier to go to Vietnam when he won the draft lottery system. Daichi came to apologize only to find that Suga was gone. Forever. He wrote. Suga ignored it all. Daichi talked with Suga's mother every weekend hoping to collect any information he could, until the news finally broke, Koushi wasn't coming back from 'Nam. Daichi married Michimiya with an empty heart and dead eyes, the fact that they found Suga's corpse clutching one of Daichi's letters replaying in his mind as Michimiya read her vows. They had three kids, Daichi killed himself on what would've been Suga's fifty first birthday.

Kuroken has been side by side for years, Kenma serving as prohibition criminal Kuroo's right hand man. Kuroo has never shown interest in a woman, the rest of the gang doesn't say a word though their suspicious glances between him and Kenma speak volumes. And they're absolutely right, Kenma is everything short of a mob wife. All pretty hair and violent tendencies, Kenma values no one's life, not even his own, but he can't help but value Kuroo in a such a loving way. They die together, when everything falls apart and the feds are chasing them, bullets shatter the car, ripping everything but their hands apart. Those will stay intertwined forever.

Ushijima was okay with his job, he lived such a sparse simple life, and it was enough for him, the life of a holy man. Until he saw Satori, a young man no older than him, residing in a dark hole of the desolate mental facility he was blessing. The sisters merely dismissed him when he inquired as to why the man was in there in the first place. So he took upon himself to talk to the boy and get to the bottom of this. He didn't mean to fall in love with the beautiful, unhinged and unholy Tendo. He didn't mean to commit the ultimate sin, to forsake his faith, but he couldn't bring himself to regret feeling what he felt for Tendo. The only thing he actually regretted was never protecting Satori the way he wanted to. Never scooping his love in his arms and running away from that foul life. The tears that caught in his throat when he came to Tendo only to find him bald, scarred, and permanently empty, shook him to his core. They dug in his brain and ripped out everything dear to Ushijima, they tore a part that beautiful mind all because they couldn't understand it. Ushijima swallowed his tears, and mustered his courage, he was going to save Tendo now, even if it would cost him his soul. His big hands wrapped around Tendo's throat, and didn't release until Tendo's empty eyes went out. He died years later in a prison cell. Maybe he and Tendo could have each other, in the next life.

The village did not like Nishinoya, nor did his family. He for the life of him, could not be modest and quiet like the rest of the puritans. He did not go to church, nor did he read the gospel, he ran about in the woods, tricky and mysterious. The governor's son, Asahi, can't help but be entranced, he is a scholar after all. And he only follows Noya into the dark wood for "scholarly" purposes, he definetly wasn't thrilled when Noya pinned his large body against one of the dark twisty tree trunks deep within the wood. Asahi comes to two very troubling conclusions that night, the village was wrong, Noya was not a witch at all, and Azumane would never be able to keep himself away from Noya not matter the cost. It was over for them the moment they were discovered, Noya wrapped in Asahi's arms. The villagers convinced themselves that Asahi had been put under a curse by Yuu, despite Asahi's violent objections, and surprisingly brave declaration of love. Noya smiled softly as they touched the torch to his feet, and as the flames ate the innocent man up, Asahi screamed begging the whole village to burn him instead, Yuu was innocent take him instead. Asahi stayed only long enough to press a gentle kiss to Yuu's now burnt face, just to show the villagers their love was true and deep, not the by product of some cheap curse. While they were all in shock, he slipped into the dark wood, and never was heard from again.

Hinata considered it an insane stroke of luck when he secured a third class ticket aboard the ship of dreams, the Titanic. He bid his mother and Natsu farewell, hoping to secure a job in the new world, and make enough funds to secure them a passage to America one day. His shipmate is horrible though, all cold blue eyes and pompous attitude, until one night when Kageyama surprisingly offers Hinata a drink. Not wanting to refuse, they obviously get smashed drunk, and with pretty pink cheeks, Kageyama grabs Hinata's face gently. " i jus' think no guy should be so damn beautiful" kageyama whispers sleepily, and maybe it's the liquor, but Hinata doesn't hesitate to lean in and initiate a kiss. When Kageyama doesn't pull away, Hinata crawls into his lap. They fit like puzzle pieces and now Kageyama can't even imagine wanting to kiss anyone else. They make plans to take the new world on, learning fairly quick that they are stronger together. And then there's water and panic and Kageyama and Hinata are trying to rush a gate because Jesus, there are kids down there. Just because they are poor doesn't mean they deserve to die, but unfortunately someone seems to think otherwise, because the gate remains in place. They finally stop when the water is up to their waists, and a sad looking elderly woman tells them they've done what they could. Tearful children and somber mothers nod in agreement, and it is unsaid that they would go to their respective beds and try to rest so that they might go in their sleep. They lay together on the top bunk and even as the water slips above their heads and they begin to die, their arms hold tight, and Kageyama mouths one last "I love you" Hinata's fingers in his hair the last thing he feels.

Bokuto is in love with an heiress across the lake, he's never met her but is sure she is made for him. Akaashi is in love with a rich man right next to him, but that man sees Akaashi as no more than his lowley servant. Akaashi is in love with Bokuto, maybe that is why he involved himself in that horrible mess. He was always getting involved in horrible messes for Bokuto's sake. It was the height of Gatsby era glamor, and Bokuto, though he never did really like parties, was always throwing them, insisting Akaashi rather than work the parties, served as his right hand man. Akaashi always knew Bokuto was hoping he would meet his heiress at one of his parties, and if it made Bokuto happy, Akaashi hoped she would show up too, no matter how much it would hurt. And eventually she did, along with her husband, and she broke Bokuto's heart after a very miserable and short lived affair, for her it was nothing, but Bokuto always fell so hard and fast, he was distraught. Akaashi acted on instinct, pulling Bokuto into his arms no matter what line he was crossing, and smoothing his hair in attempt to sooth the crying man. Things became clear to Bokuto then. His tears ceased as he breathed in Akaashi's soft scent, wrapping his arm around the beautiful man's waist. They were in love then, finally on the same page for a blissful few months, until Bokuto's affair was made public, and he was found beaten to death in an alley. Despite all of his generosity and glamor in the past years, Akaashi and Kuroo were the only guests at Bokuto's funeral. Akaashi never recovered from the loss, he knew Bokuto wouldn't have wanted him to do it, but that didn't stop the smile on his face as he smashed the heiress beneath his tires.

Tsukishima had been protecting Yamaguchi for as long as he could remember, always getting in fights and taking beatings to protect his beautiful best friend. He knew boys weren't supposed to be pretty, he knew what happened to boys like Yamaguchi in the eighties, but that didn't ever stop him. Not even when Yamaguchi worked up all his courage and told Tsukki he loved him during their freshman year. Tsukki was angry at Yamaguchi for saying that, because he felt the same and he knew that he had to hide it if he wanted to survive. His controlled slipped for a second when Yamaguchi pressed their lips together gently, Tsukki allowed himself to dream one last time before he yanked himself away. He immediately began hurling slurs and abuse at Yamaguchi, things he knew would send the other boy running. And it did. But soon Kei felt an unexplainable urge to go after him, a sinking feeling that something horrible was gonna happen. Yamaguchi did not cry, he held his chin high, no matter how hard the boys hit him or cut him. He didn't care if he died but he wasn't gonna do it staring at his feet like a kicked puppy. Kei found him like that, full of fire and courage as he stared down his abusers. The love he felt made Kei's legs shake, and he knew he'd do whatever he could to save Yamaguchi. Yamaguchi smiled with too much glee for a dead man as Tsukki forced his way to his side, gripping his hand. There were eight of them, with murder in their eyes, Tsukki knew before he even got to Yamaguchi that they weren't making it out of this one.

Lev and Yaku find each other in 1700s France, Lev is a soft pretty boy, living a luxurious life in the aristocracy. Until he is thrown to the wolves after the loss of his parents, he is ten when he spends his first night on the street. He is nearly taken by a brothel right away, until he is saved by a particularly feisty thirteen year old street rat, Yaku is half his height but serves as his protector nonetheless. They pass the years protecting each other, growing to love each other, but never daring to hope for more than that. As many people in France were at the time disease riddled and starving, so were Yaku and Lev. Of course Yaku went first, he made it all the way to eighteen before he succumbed to his disease, clutching a crying Lev, comforting him even on his death bed. After that, Lev made the mistake of having hope, he joined the revolution in honor of Yaku. He just wanted to make the world a better place, a place where Yaku could've survived. He died bleeding from a soldier's bullet on a barricade, but he was warm, all he saw was Yaku, holding him, carrying him into their next life.

Yahaba always talks and Kyoutani might be always listening, but it's hard to tell. Until Kyoutani murders his whole family in 1978. He shows up at the gas station him and Yahaba always have their one sided coversations at to find Yahaba working the counter like he always is. He ignores Yahaba's greeting and begins frantically explaing his situation and motive, all while Yahaba looks on in shock, this is the first time Kyoutani has ever spoken to him. When he asks why Kyoutani is telling him all this, he simply sighs dismissively and says "you're my bestfriend", and that's enough for Yahaba. Clearly he's crazy, a cute boy he's never spoken with is in the back of his car and they're leaving the country. All because Kyoutani actually was listening and not only that, he viewed Yahaba as the most important person in his life. They had been in love from the first one sided conversation they had, and that was becoming clear now. They get caught, sent to different facilities, Kyoutani gets life, Yahaba gets a lighter sentence for being an accomplice. Though they never see each other again, Yahaba always writes letters, and for once, Kyoutani writes back. They spend their lives finally having a two sided conversation, their love never even flickers, and for them, that's enough.