#i swear it was just going to be today's warmup fic | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

whoseholtz · 4 months

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today was a fairytale | alexander holtz

pairing : alexander holtz x fem!reader

warnings : one of my first fully written fics, swearing, use of y/n, switch of pov (will be written in italics!)

summary : when reader goes to a devil's game and decides to make a sign asking #10 for a puck in exchange for a lego set and he actually notices her and the day turns out to be like one in a fairytale.

word count : 1.6k

y/n pov

“Girl, it’s a stupid idea, there’s a bunch of signs around the rink why would he choose yours?” your best friend says looking at the sign you made for your favourite player.

She always knew how to ruin the mood.

You slightly adjusted the sign in your hands which read, ‘Can I trade you a Lego set for a puck, #10?’ in a goofy font. The white card had been something you picked up from the craft store on your way home from work, an impulsive decision as always.

“But but but there’s barely any with his name on it, plus who cares, it’s fun okay, and if he actually spots me it’s a bonus,” you smiled clinging onto that little bit of hope that he would see your sign.

“Yeah, I guess,” your friend shrugged as a smirk grew on her face.

“What is it?” you asked knowing that when that smirk appeared there was always a plan brewing in her head.

“Oh nothing, just the fact that you are a beautiful hot girl who likes lego oh and he’s a guy who likes girls and lego, get his number girl,” she said jokingly nudging your shoulder.

In what world would ALEXANDER HOLTZ notice you?

“Okay get out of your Wattpad-loving brain, let’s just enjoy warmups and the game,” a smirk forming on your friend's face, “but no high hopes of anything more than the game.”

The lights started dimming in the arena, the colours of the devils shining bright with the booming voices from the speakers announcing the players would be entering the ice soon.

Your friend slapping your arm, “Look how cute they look, they’re Disney princesses with pads.”

“Yes, yes, I know to calm down, we don’t wanna look like the crazy ones,” you replied, being conscious of when #10 entered the ice.

Then there he was, gliding smoothly across the ice.

He could easily be on one of the top lines but he gets treated like shit from the shitty old coaches.

Warm-ups went on like normal, the silly superstitions, and pucks across the ice in every direction.

“He’s good at skating I guess,” your friend said smartly, “he plays for the NHL dipshit, of course, he’s good at skating.”

“I know but I looked at his stats and his ice time is really low and like that means he doesn’t have any chance to get good plays,” your friend shrugged, her eyes following his every move.

All she said was true, he dealt with the game. all he cared about was that he was in the league, the best league in the world for hockey.

Being a player's biggest fan came with the depression of the issues at hand, their places on the lines, their falls and other setbacks that come with being an NHL player, and every day you wish they could be the best and biggest player in the league.

Even harder being on a team with two top first-round picks and a bunch of other players who are raved about all around the league.

“Girl snap the fuck of out, he’s looking at you, right at you holy shit,” your friend said slapping your shoulder, pointing at him skating around in circles, locking eyes with you.

“Oh my god, no way he’s looking at me,” you said, jumping up and down not knowing what to do, stay weird or keep calm and try your best to look hot.

The Lego Ferrari car shook in your hand, the other shaking against the glass trying to keep your cool as he skated towards where you were situated.

—

alex pov

Skating towards such a pretty girl was scary, but the sign caught his eye. he didn’t get many signs, trades even and Lego is his favourite thing, so why wouldn’t he be excited?

The white, red and black sign with the pretty girl holding it couldn’t pass his way, maybe he’d even get a point this game.

Going home after a win but with little ice time and no points didn’t help with his mood. he’d sit on his couch in the dim room questioning why he could never be enough for the team and the league.

He has tried so hard.

—

y/n pov

“No way he’s gonna actually want the set. no way you are getting a puck, oh my god y/n this is crazy ahhh he’s coming towards us,” she said, slapping you repeatedly in the same spot, it was starting to hurt.

“Okay just stop, calm down and look cool girl,” you said, wanting to look as normal as possible for Alexander Holtz.

Tap, tap, tap on the glass.

A red glove right in front of your face, the culprit of the tapping noise.

His adorable smiling face looking at you, signalling to get ready for the puck to be thrown over the ice.

You smiled back and nodded, pulling the sign down, holding your hands ready to catch it, not believing what was going on.

You almost wanted to keep your eyes on him even when the puck had been thrown from his hands, but you obviously couldn’t.

The puck weighing in your hand, your eyes fixated on it.

"Y/n, y/n, y/n the lego set, stop googling at the puck and hand him the bloody lego set,” your friend said, slapping you once again.

“Oh fuck yeah wait, hold the puck while I chuck this thing over the glass,” you said, questioning if all those years of skipping gym were back to bite you.

First try, failed.

Second try, failed.

Third try, failed.

Fourth time, WE GOT IT.

He grinned at you one last time before turning around and skating to the bench to place the set down.

A weird feeling flowed through your body. Almost as if you’d just lost something, a presence and a sense of comfort just poof, gone.

But that thought quickly got taken away when the stadium filled with screams of die-hard fans, with you being one of them.

Somehow you’d made it to your seat already getting ready for the game to start.

You realised your head couldn’t stop thinking about the interaction with him, the puck clinging to your hand.

“Hey hey y/n, maybe loosen your grip on the puck, your knuckles are turning white and we don’t want to leave before the game even starts,” your friend said, nudging you to get your attention.

“Oh shit sorry, it’s just he’s so ahhhh, like oh my god he’s got something in his possession that I bought, with my own money,” you grinned, immediately the wave of regret of spending that much money on a lego set, washing away.

“Well let’s just enjoy this game and hope for a win and a Holtz point,” she said, holding up her overpriced drink to yours.

“I’ll toast to that, to Holtz getting a point and maybe a devil's won.”

—

“AND THE DEVILS WIN THE GAME WITH ALEXANDER HOLTZ AS THE STAR OF THE GAME”

The shock on your face shouldn’t have been that big but when a fourth-line player gets chosen as the star of the game it is huge.

“Girl he did it for you, you are his good luck charm, you need to give him something every game,” your friend yells beside you jumping out of her seat.

“Okay, I get hockey players are superstitious but girl there’s no way, let’s just leave it,” you sighed, your life couldn’t be all butterflies and rainbows.

It was not a Wattpad story, and you couldn’t treat it like it was. He probably just threw out the Lego set, you thought you were insane thinking there was a chance he actually remembered who you were; there’s no way he did.

—

alex pov

He couldn’t stop thinking about her smile, how it was the prettiest thing he had ever seen. and he got a goal, points, the fucking star of the game.

yeah, he laughed at people saying hockey players are suppositions and yeah he was a tiny bit. he had his routines but it was never that serious, the only thing different about his game was seeing her, locking eyes with her.

The Lego set sitting on his living room table was a reminder of how her smile made him feel, all bubbly inside like he could rule the world.

“Bro stop zoning out it’s scary, you just got star of the game let’s celebrate,” Luke said as he walked past you, he had invited himself in like he did every other night. win or lose he was there.

“Sorry sorry just trying to figure out what happened today that made me play so good.”

“It was totally that girl you were spying on from the start of the game to the end,” Luke joked, “this is the Lego set she gave you right?” he questioned picking it up off the table.

“Hey, don’t touch that,” he yelled, running towards Luke.

“Shit, sorry didn’t think it was such a big deal,” he said dropping the Lego set onto the table again.

“No sorry I just can’t seem to get her out of my head, and the thought I probably will never see her again,” Alexander said slowly sitting down on the couch.

“Okay don’t think about it that way, be happy you’ve somewhat met her and that you are the star, be present,” Luke replied sitting down on the couch like it was his own home, grabbing the remote and flicking some random show on.

“Never say something like that again, it's weird hearing advice from you,” Alex replied, shocked by the words coming out of his mouth.

“HEY,” Luke yelled, slapping him in the process.

It wasn’t like Luke thought, he still felt her presence somewhat, a faint smell of grapefruit which you would only notice if you really paid attention.

He couldn’t get away from the thought of her.

He couldn’t stop wondering when he’d see her again.

a/n :: hi guyssss sorry i've been lacking motivation so this took... a while to publish and stuff so i hope u like it!! tysm for all the love on if i could tell her <33

also i might be making this a series? maybe? don't hold me to that though :}

#mira⌇🌷#alexander holtz #alex holtz #new jersey devils #nhl fanfiction #nhl imagine #nhl x reader #nhl fanfic #nhl fic #alexander holtz x reader #alexander holtz imagine #alexander holtz fanfic

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driftycities · 1 year

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Okay everyone, take this as my official introduction to the LITG fandom! I haven't written any fanfic in 5+ years, and this is my first LITG fic, so please be kind!!

I'll be uploading to ao3 as soon as I'm off the waitlist (didn't realize there was one, whoops), so for now please enjoy it here!!

Excited to talk and theorize this season with you all 🥰

💕 MC/Lewie fluff

🏠 Post-villa AU

📝 7.2k+ words

“Babes, fuck, I’ve really gotta go!”

Lewie rarely swore. Sage had noticed that about him pretty early on, and she found something so charming and pure about it. When he did swear, it came out of him as more of an aggressive whisper than anything else, and sometimes he even apologized after. She’s pretty sure she had uttered a curse at least once every time she spoke in the villa, but he never minded. He always gave her his softest, cheekiest smile, like he was amused with the language that would come out of her mouth. The first time she heard him swear was when he stubbed his toe on the end of their bed one night, a few nights after they were finally allowed to be a couple for the first time in the villa. The “Oooh, shit” had come out of him so quietly Sage wasn’t sure if she even heard him correctly. But for some reason, the innocence of it all had made her heart flutter.

Since then, Lewie has only cursed aloud in front of her if one of four things were happening: 1) he hurt himself (for a professional midfielder, Sage always wondered how he could be so clumsy around his own furniture), 2) he was drunk, 3) they were fucking (Sage’s personal favourite; the first time she heard his low growl ‘fuck’ she nearly came right then and there), and 4) he was running late to the pitch. Today was number four.

It was their last game of the season, and if they won, they would be promoted to Championship football. They weren’t expecting to be this successful this season and Sage could see the pressure was starting to mount on Lewie over the past few months. It had been even worse for him over the past week after an unexpected loss, and she worried he was spending too much time taking care of his teammates instead of himself. She did everything she could to ease his stress - two-hour back rubs, making his favourite dinners, motivational pep talks that she wasn’t sure were working or not, and a lot of blowjobs. She never imagined herself enjoying blowjobs as much as she does now, but it was something about the way he reacted to her - his low moans and subtle gasps as his body shook from pleasure - that made her go just as crazy. And Lewie never let her go without returning the favour. In those moments Sage could see his stress crumble as he allowed himself to breathe, but it never took long for his walls to go back up. He tried to hide it as best he could so as not to worry her, but she felt him toss and turn at night, noticed how often he was zoning out, and saw something that resembled fear behind his small smiles. He brushed it off as nerves, but he was a terrible liar.

Sage came out of the bathroom, scrunching her damp, blonde hair in a towel to see Lewie hurriedly tying his training boots and muttering to himself. He was dressed in his warmup gear - a blue training jacket that complemented his blue eyes perfectly and fitted black and white joggers that left little to the imagination - with his duffle bag already thrown over his shoulder. He hadn’t had time to fix his hair that morning so his blonde strands looked like a dishevelled mess, but hell, she didn’t mind. He looked so fucking good.

Almost two years later and she still couldn’t believe her luck. Their luck. They had won Love Island with over fifty per cent of the vote, her sister had come in second with Marshall, and her and Lewie’s best friends, Grace and Ozzy, had come third. Lewie’s old football team had been promoted to a higher league that same summer - something he described as only the second best thing that had happened to him that year - and shortly after, he had been transferred to Charlton United, a London team that brought him into the third tier of English football, and right into Sage’s flat. They had excitedly made plans to move into a larger place if his team got promoted this year, somewhere a bit closer to the training facility, and she was planning on opening up another gym in Greenwich.

Everything was going a little too perfectly with them. It scared her sometimes, and each day she woke up half expecting World War III to be burning outside because at least that would make a bit more sense than whatever fucking perfection was going on here. Both of them got along with each other’s parents (even their parents were good friends now), Sage had been preparing to move to Cardiff until Lewie landed here by some miracle, they were planning to get a dog together (and both wanted a Bernese Mountain Dog since they were children, go figure), and if she thought she was in love with him the night they won, she wasn’t sure what to call it now. Something even deeper, more profound, something unspoken between the two of them that gave way in small touches and glances.

They had fights, of course, but Lewie was almost just as perfect during an argument. He handled her hot temper with grace, never raising his voice and allowing her space to cool down before they could talk calmly. He owned up to his mistakes and apologized whenever he did something wrong, which was rare. Sage could see why he made captain at his new club within just three months. He just had a natural easiness and camaraderie with everyone he encountered. She would spend the rest of her life wondering why he chose her if he gave her that gift.

“Babes, gimme a kiss real quick, I have to go!” His hurried Welsh accent snapped her out of her thoughts and she smiled at him, kissing him with sweet haste. “I’ll see you at the game, yeah?”

“I’ll be the one wearing number eight,” she winked. She found it funny that he still asked when she hadn’t missed a game - home and away - since they’d been in London together. “Don’t forget, Amelia and Marshall and Ozzy and Grace are coming too!”

“It’d be hard to forget with all of Ozzy’s good luck messages,” he laughed. He gave her another kiss, this time letting it linger with a soft hand on her cheek. “I’ll see you lot there. I love you.”

“Good luck babes, I love you. You got this.” They shared another smile before he left, and she had to laugh as she glanced at the clock. Lewie considered himself “late” if he wasn’t at least two hours early.

Sage would always be grateful that Lewie was on the pitch and not with her in the stands, screaming a curse every other word and maybe bullying the referee just a little. He may appreciate her passion, but be utterly horrified by the words coming out of her mouth. She blamed her dad, who had season tickets to Arsenal games while she was growing up, and exposing her to football culture at a young age. She cursed for the first time when she was 11, calling the referee a “fucking wanker” in her oversized Thierry Henry shirt, and perhaps the first time she made her dad proud. She did get a lecture about her language afterwards, but it was hard to take her dad seriously when he couldn’t stop smiling.

Thankfully, Amelia was with her today, so she didn’t have to hide it like when she watched games with Lewie’s parents. God, that had been torture. His parents assured her they didn’t mind, but they shared the same tranquil nature as Lewie and she didn’t want to ruin their peace by screaming at a man just trying to officiate the match, however poorly he was doing it.

“Oi, what a piece of fucking garbage!” Amelia huffed and sipped her beer, shaking her head. “What piece of shit let him graduate referee school?”

“They’re all pieces of fucking shit!” Sage countered, shaking her head and sipping her drink in unison with Amelia. They were only twenty minutes into the match, but that was more than enough time for their blood pressure to spike. Behind them, Ozzy and Grace silently watched the match, chuckling at Sage and Amelia.

“You two are the real entertainment here,” Grace laughed, wrapping her arm around Ozzy’s. “Who would have thought I’d enjoy a football match this much?”

Marshall slung his arm around Amelia’s shoulder, wearing a bright smile as he watched the match. “I’ve gotta bring you to more games, love, your yelling is kinda turning me on.” With that, Amelia giggled as she buried herself into him. Sage was about to tell them to get a fucking room, but the referee then allowed the opposing team a penalty kick after a very unintentional and barely noticeable “handball” and she felt her anger being redirected.

“Oh, what the fuck buddy?! Did you even pass your last eye exam?!”

“I’ll pay for your new frames you fuckin’ shithead!”

Grace stifled a giggle as Ozzy playfully shook his head. “You know he can’t hear you two, right?”

“If he could, I’d be banned from this place a long time ago,” Sage mused, watching as the other team scored an easy goal from their penalty. “Oh, fuck.”

Amelia’s face fell as she swapped glances with the rest of the group, a knowing look on all of them that resembled the subtle fear Lewie had been carrying around with him all week. Marshall hugged Amelia closer, quietly whispering, “It’s alright, he’s got time. Still early.��

Sage found Lewie on the pitch as they fell back into their starting formation, watching as he energised his teammates and ensured their heads were still in the game. He moved to the crowd then, lifting his arms and clapping to make sure they were still energized too. Sage loved how much he loved his fans - he knew they were an integral part of the team’s success and their noise always motivated him. Once he got the crowd roaring again, he looked for her face in the seat that’s been reserved for her all season, and smiled sweetly when he caught her eye. As he waited for the whistle he placed his hand subtly over his heart, and she mimicked the motion, smiling knowingly at each other until the whistle forced his attention back to the game.

“God, you two are so perfect,” Amelia sighed, smiling at her sister. “And you’re going to have very blonde and perfect adorable little babies one day.”

Sage couldn’t help but smile, shaking her head a little. “Well, you’re going to have little Jason Mamoas running around, so you’re one to talk.” She wrapped her arm around her sister and leaned into her, sighing softly. “Babes, this is the biggest game of Lewie’s career so far, and if he loses this one I’m afraid I won’t be able to comfort him in the way he needs.”

“Oh please,” Amelia scoffed, squeezing Sage’s shoulder. “That boy lives to make you happy. He’ll be okay as long as he knows the people around him are okay, especially you. Besides, he’s got a lot of reasons to fight for this one.”

Sage would’ve questioned her further, but Lewie had the ball and he was making the Oxford players look like they still played in youth league. She cheered as he showed off his footwork, manoeuvering himself and the ball out of small spaces, eventually serving a perfect cross to the box and right at the feet of their striker in waiting. He hit the ball perfectly, and it soared into the back of the net, triggering the crowd to erupt in a crazed hype of applause and yells. Sage was confident she was the loudest of them all.

It stayed 1-1 until halftime, and Marshall and Ozzy left to retrieve everyone another round of drinks. With a bit more alcohol in their system, Amelia and Sage grew a little louder and a bit more brazen in the second half, with Grace joining in on the referee shaming, laughing every time she insulted him. “Oh shit, this is fun!” she mused.

Eighty-eight minutes in and they were all a bit more rigid as the game came down to the wire. A tie wouldn’t matter, they needed to win if they wanted to be promoted, and the whole stadium felt it. Sage had her eyes fixed on Lewie for the past ten or so minutes, watching as his sweat coated him in a sweet glisten and made more noticeable the tan he’d been developing over the spring, and his already insane quads. He adjusted his captain’s armband as he waited for a throw-in, running his hands through his drenched hair, although it was no use. He subtly battled with an Oxford player as they awaited the throw-in, deep in Oxford’s territory. When the ball landed at his feet, Sage swore she had never seen such determination and hostility in his otherwise innocent blue eyes. Fuck, she thought, biting her lip. He’s going to get the fuck of his life tonight. He won the battle (as he usually does), and started dribbling toward the Oxford box, only one defender in his way-

“What the fuck?!”

Lewie had yelled so loud when he hit the ground that she was sure the TV audience at home probably heard it. The defender had tackled him savagely just outside the box, prompting a quick whistle and a yellow card that most certainly should have been red. Sage watched as Lewie got up and wiped some grass and sweat off his forehead, shaking his head. She breathed a quick sigh of relief knowing that he was okay, but her anxiety refused to let up as Lewie prepared for the free kick. He lifted his shirt to wipe his face, his abs peaking through and glistening in sweat as he chattered with a teammate about their tactic.

Lewie was going to go for it. She knew he was, and the team would be stupid not to let him. Whereas he wasn’t always the most confident around her, he was confident on the pitch and he was confident as fuck when it came to free kicks. That was his speciality. Her magician.

He waited for the whistle as he quickly looked in her direction, giving her that signature smile and hand on his heart. She replicated the motion, giving him an encouraging nod that she wasn’t sure he’d be able to see.

“Come on, Lew,” Amelia muttered anxiously, her hands on her face. The clock was at ninety minutes now, and the assistant referee announced there would be just two added minutes.

“Oh, for fuck’s sake, two?! What a fuckin’ shithead.” Sage was practically bouncing up and down now, shaking her head at the referee and holding her hands together to calm her nerves. Grace put her hands on her shoulder, giving them a quick squeeze.

“He’s got this, love,” she whispered encouragingly.

The whistle sounded, and Sage watched as Lewie’s chest moved with a deep breath, his hands at his hips. His vision narrowed on the top right corner of the goal, and then the ball, and he delicately jogged up to it, kicking it forcefully with a curve to get it behind the wall. The entire stadium held their breath at that moment, a deafening silence as everyone watched the path of the ball…which made the ding of the crossbar that much more painful. Sage’s breath hitched as the rest of the stadium groaned and yelled unpleasantly, but she could barely hear them. Her senses were locked on Lewie, who was trying to save the play after the ball bounced back into the box, but a defender quickly punted it out of play.

The whistle sounded to declare the game over.

The Oxford away fans stormed the pitch from the other end, where their players met them halfway, shouting and celebrating like it was their home pitch.

But she couldn’t tear her eyes away from Lewie. He had collapsed to his knees after the whistle, his chest heaving as he tried to catch his breath, hands on his hips. He was completely zoned out, staring at the crossbar. She didn’t want to imagine what kind of shit the fans yelling at him behind the goal right now. He ran a hand through his hair before leaning forward on his arms, his head in the damp grass, and she hoped that would help muffle the sound of the stadium. If he needed to be in his own world for a moment, then he deserved to do that for however long he needed.

It seemed like he was in that position for ages before he slowly climbed up to his feet, the life drained from his features as he used the end of his shirt to wipe his eyes. He walked over defeatedly to his teammates who had also let their legs collapse from underneath them, some of them sitting in the grass, some laying on their backs, some just standing motionless as they tried to drown out the celebrations on the other end.

He hoisted each one of them up, telling them something in their ear and slapping their back affectionately. He gathered the entire team before they walked to the stands, applauding and thanking their fans for giving them their Saturday afternoon and sticking with them.

They made their way around the stadium, and Sage saw Lewie crack a small smile for the first time as he met a young fan in the first row. The little boy had been crying, but something Lewie said made him smile, and his eyes lit up when Lewie took off his jersey and handed it to him.

What a fucking man, Sage thought, her own tears glistening in her eyes. Just had the worst heartbreak of his life and he’s out here making sure this boy has something good to leave here with.

As the team made their way into the tunnels, Lewie looked up at her seat for the first time and mustered a small smile, shirtless and fiddling with his captain armband in his hands. She offered a smile back, but he had already switched his gaze to Amelia. He shook his head subtly at her before looking down and heading into the locker room.

Amelia sighed sadly next to her, and Sage glanced over, asking, “What was that about?”

“Nothing,” Amelia smiled, wiping a tear from her eye. “C’mon, let’s go wait for him outside.” She wrapped her arm around Sage before they joined the rest of the crowd shuffling out.

An hour later and Sage was climbing into the car with Lewie, who had switched into a white t-shirt and grey joggers. He had taken a quick shower, but his hair was still a mess, and his eyes were red with strain.

“Lewie, you still up for dinner, mate?” Ozzy called gently, opening his passenger door for Grace.

“Yeah,” Lewie replied through the window, and it wasn’t lost on Sage that his voice was just slightly hoarse. “We’ll see you lot there at 8, yeah?”

“See you there, Lew!,” Amelia called, smiling at him encouragingly. “You did great today by the way.” Lewie just nodded as Amelia and Marshall got into their car, driving away behind Grace and Ozzy. Lewie watched as they drove off and once they were out of sight he dropped his hand from the gear shift and leaned forward, resting his forehead on the steering wheel and burying his face into his hands.

“Fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck,” he muttered softly, his body slightly shaking.

Sage had never seen him like this. He’d lost before, but he never carried it like this. He always tried to find the positives after a loss - “we just need to work on our defence more”, “I’ve gotta get the guys to play with a bit more heart next time”, “we can beat them next time, it was just a bad day”, “I’ll train harder next time”, “we need to work on our set piece tactics, that’s all”. She understood why this loss was so different - he had been so fucking close to the Championship league and it fell apart right in front of him, at ninety minutes and not enough time to recover. There was no ‘next time’, at least not until the new season in three months, where they’d have to start from scratch again. She felt his pain then when the crossbar dinged, when the final whistle sounded, and she feels it now. She felt everything with him. But she wanted more than that - she wanted to make him feel okay with the loss, at peace with it, she wanted him to know that she was still so fucking proud of him and that was never going to change.

She rested her hand on his back, rubbing it softly as he tried to steady his breathing. “Babes,” she started gently. “I know this one fucking hurts, but you have to know how fucking proud of you I am. One bad moment does not define you. You played your fucking heart out there today and you were bloody amazing. Can we talk about that fucking assist? Blew my fucking mind. And after the game, you let yourself process your thoughts for however long you needed before getting the team together and thanking the fans, who don’t always deserve it, but you do it anyway because that’s who you are. You made a little kid’s whole fucking week because you want others to be happy even when you’re not. You encourage everyone around you to be better, you make sure everyone around you is okay, and you deserve that peace too. This one will take some time, yeah, but next season you won’t just be fucking promoted, you’ll win the whole fucking thing. I’ve never met anyone as determined or modest as you, and you deserve the whole fucking world.”

He sighed and sat up straighter, looking over at her for the first time and taking her hand softly into his own, kissing it sweetly. “I love you. Thank you for always being here, win or lose, or…tie.” He squeezed her hand gently and smiled sweetly, but she could tell he was still holding something back. He looked down at her hand, sighing softly again. “I just…” he started, swallowing. “I didn’t know what to say to them. In the locker room. I had no idea what to fucking say. This one was big and it was my bloody fault.”

“Hey.” Her voice was soft as she held his cheek in her hand, his stubble tickling her slightly. “It wasn’t your fault. You led this team so fucking well this year and brought them to where they are right now, isn’t that right, Mr. Leads-The-League-In-Assists?”

He smiled a little wider this time, nodding hesitantly. “Yeah,” he mused. “I just…” He trailed off, waving his hand slightly. “Never mind, it doesn’t matter.” He gave her an almost-convincing smile as he squeezed her hand again. “I love you more than anything, you know that, right?” His eyes were as sincere as she’d ever seen them, and she felt his love just through his gaze. Two years later and she was still getting butterflies.

“Yeah, I know. I love you just as much, if not more.”

He scoffed at that. “Mmm, sure. Let’s get you home so we can get ready for dinner.” He leaned over to give her a kiss and she held him to her lips, kissing him hard, trying to convey all of her love and pride for him in just that single moment.

They didn’t get to the restaurant until it was almost 8:30 - Sage’s fault, and definitely not Lewie’s, who had been ready an hour and a half earlier. He had come to expect this after nearly two years together, hell, he knew it way back in the villa when she was always the last to come downstairs. He never minded it, he actually loved it - she was always worth the wait. And once they moved in together he started being something like her hype man, watching her try on outfit after outfit and telling her how fucking amazing she looked in everything. He wasn’t much of a help in that way, he supposed, but he wasn’t lying, and he definitely wasn’t planning on stopping. Once an outfit rendered him speechless, she knew she had found the one. Tonight, it was a sleek, pastel pink dress that hugged her curves with a slit that travelled to her thigh, and for a few moments, as he stared at her, he forgot all about the match.

They walked into the restaurant hand in hand, scanning the room for their friends until Amelia waved them down from a corner table. Lewie moved his hand to Sage’s lower back, guiding her over and awaiting the surprise when she saw-

“Our parents?!” She exclaimed, looking up at him in shock. He just smiled, nodded and led her over to see them.

They greeted their parents happily, and Lewie pretended not to notice his mum’s lingering gaze on his still reddened eyes. He was surprised when Sage’s dad opted for a hug instead of their usual handshake but took it appreciatively. They had grown quite close over the past couple of years - her dad was well into his football and tried to convert him into an Arsenal fan but with no luck. He went to a lot of his games, always sitting with Sage, and Lewie was pretty sure he’d heard them wildly insult the ref on numerous occasions. He never said anything - he didn’t want to embarrass her, and he loved the image of her and her dad acting like lunatics in the stands. It never bothered him, he was proud that she had his back like that. He just smiled to himself and played harder for her.

“I’m sorry about the match, Lewie,” her dad spoke quietly into his ear. “You played great as always, but I’m sorry you couldn’t go through with your plan.” He gave Lewie an encouraging smile as he pulled away, squeezing his shoulder affectionately. “Right, now that they finally showed up, can we eat?”

Throughout dinner, Lewie’s hand never left Sage’s thigh, like letting go of it would just bring him back to the ding of the crossbar. Her touch was like a fucking drug, starving off the bad thoughts that he had after every poor match. He tried to keep it to himself most of the time, which was usually pretty easy, but this one was nearly impossible to keep in. He had plans. And he worried that the ding of the fucking crossbar would ruin everything. He gently squeezed her thigh as he tried to convince himself that the fucking ding wouldn’t haunt his dreams tonight.

He listened as Sage laughed with Amelia, trading stories of their childhood like they always did when they were together. He was surprised at how many stories they had, but they always left him amused as he imagined a young Sage getting into trouble. He talked with her parents a bit more, going over his plans for the summer and when his pre-season training would start up again. He reminisced on villa memories with Marshall, Grace, and Ozzy, bringing him back to one of the happiest times of his life as he held Sage closer. His mom had told him what a great game he had, and that it must’ve been a gust of wind that moved the ball to the crossbar. He appreciated the effort, but it left him feeling worse. Sage dropped her hand to his thigh then, squeezing it assuredly and smiling at him. He mustered up a smile of his own, but it couldn’t help the pit in his stomach.

After they had finished eating, Lewie reluctantly left Sage’s side to get a drink at the bar at Ozzy’s request. He ran his hand through his hair as he leaned on the bar, fiddling with one of the coasters. “You can still do it, y’know,” Ozzy muttered, looking over at him.

Lewie shrugged defeatedly, sighing sadly. “You know it’s complicated now.”

“She would follow you across the fucking globe, mate.”

“I don’t want to put her in that position.” He glanced over at their table, watching with butterflies in his stomach as she tipped her head back and laughed intoxicatingly at something her dad said. The pit returned soon after, though, as he was reminded of the circumstances. “I’m not moving her away from her family.”

“You remember when she almost moved to Cardiff with you?”

“I went along with it because I knew I had the London offer coming in,” Lewie admitted, flipping the coaster in his hands.

“Well,” Ozzy sighed. “What I’m trying to say is that was further than where you might be going now.” The bartender came over and took their order, pouring their two scotches quickly before handing it over. “You just need to talk to her. Let her have a say in this decision.”

“I’m not going, Oz,” Lewie said, taking a sip of his scotch. “I’m staying in London. We have plans here. She has family here. We have you guys here.”

“So you’re going to deny the opportunity you’ve been given because what?” Ozzy was facing him now, waving his arm around, growing a bit impatient. “Because you think she’s going to say no? Because she’ll miss her family? You guys will be a train ride away from here, and all of the plans you have here can be done elsewhere.”

“It’s more than a train ride,” he muttered. “Her life has always been here, Ozzy. She’s happy here. She has family here, her business is here. We have another shot next season, I’ll just make damn sure it happens for us this time.” He rubbed his face in his hands, shaking his head. “She’s done so much for me already, mate, I have to give her something in return. She deserves this at least.”

“Lewie, at least give her the fucking option. If she found out you had this offer on the table and you didn’t take it, she’ll never forgive you.” Ozzy took a swig of his scotch, shaking his head. “Scratch that, she probably would eventually forgive you, but that’s just how much she fucking loves you. And if we’re talking about what she deserves, she deserves to know what’s going on with your life right now.” He gave him a pointed look before walking back to the table, sitting down beside Grace and wrapping his arm around her, getting himself up to speed with the conversation.

Lewie slowly drank the rest of his scotch at the bar, battling himself in his mind and mulling over the past few months. He would have bet on a promotion two months ago when the team was in top form and playing well together. But one bad game after another, and here they were. He blamed himself for a lot of it - as captain, he should have led the team better. He should have kept them motivated. He should have done a better job at reminding them what was on the line. Maybe he should have been harder on them. Maybe he should have been more understanding. Maybe he should have been practising his fucking free kicks a lot more. He had no fucking clue, but he would be going over every moment in his mind for a long time, no matter where he ended up at the end of the summer. He would’ve loved to keep playing with this team - he was proud of how much better they’d gotten over the season, he was close friends with a few of the guys, and they were in London. He’d been here for a year and a half now, and he liked to think this is where his life was. Surrounded by friends, Sage’s family, her business, and her. Her life was here and he’d worried she wouldn’t feel at home anywhere else. She’d been more than willing to move to Cardiff with him after the show, but he made her wait until the January transfer window, knowing he had a few clubs interested in him. The London move was a dream come true for both of them, and he knew she’d been relieved. He’d hate taking that dream away now.

His eyes flashed up to the screen above the bar, seeing the match’s highlights playing over. He sighed as he watched the free kick, cringing at seeing how fucking close he had been. He swore he could hear the ding all over again as he finished his scotch and returned to the table.

Sage looked questioningly at him as he sat down, but he squeezed her hand under the table to let her know everything was alright. He had no fucking idea if it actually was, but he did know Ozzy was right. She deserved to know what was going on with him.

Everyone said their goodbyes not long after, and Sage thanked their parents for the surprise. Lewie shared another hug with her dad, thanking him for coming to his match and to dinner. “You still have my blessing,” he just replied quietly. “Win or lose, or tie, her answer will be the same.” Lewie smiled and nodded his appreciation, trying to ignore the pang in his stomach.

As they climbed into their car, Sage sighed loudly. “You alright, babes?,” he asked, looking over at her as he shut the door.

“Lewie, what the fuck is going on?” She asked, looking at him pointedly, her soft green eyes pleading with him. “Why are our parents out for dinner with us? And more importantly, why are your parents here from Wales, and why was it such a fucking surprise?” She sighed again, running her fingers through her blonde waves. “Amelia has been acting weird all day, you’ve been acting weird, my dad has been acting weird, Ozzy has been acting weird - and what happened at the bar with you two? It didn’t look like he was very happy with you.”

He sighed softly, moving his body awkwardly in the car so that he was facing her. He took her hands in his, fiddling with the rings she wore, and noticing how empty her ring finger looked. She deserves to know what is going on in my life, he told himself, taking a deep breath. No matter how much it scared him, she deserved a choice. He looked up into her eyes, admiring how the moonlight bounced off them. He noticed that on their first date in the villa, when he was telling her his dreams and his dream date, and he felt his body fill with warmth as he remembered taking her on that very date a week after the show ended. They had been through so much since then, but he never doubted their relationship, never doubted that she was his person, never doubted that they would grow old together with their five plus dogs and a house on the beach.

“Are you breaking up with me?”

The question caught him off guard, and he shook his head, looking at her incredulously. And he couldn’t help but laugh a little. “Babes, if I were breaking up with you, why the hell would I invite our parents?”

“I don’t know,” she admitted, looking down and laughing. They giggled together for a minute, and he welcomed the sound. It calmed him. “But you’re being very serious and very weird tonight, so it crossed my mind.”

He shook his head again, smiling softly but confidently at her like it was the wildest thought she ever had. “We weren’t supposed to lose today,” he started finally, squeezing her hands. “It wasn’t the plan.” He sighed as she moved her body to face him.

“That’s okay,” she started softly. “You still played amazing, and next season you’re going to win the whole fucking thing. You guys are more than-”

He nodded, gently putting his finger to her lips. “I know,” he smiled. “Thank you for saying that, but please, let me finish.” She nodded, kissing his finger and letting him continue. “I had a plan for today - I’ve been thinking about it for a while. Once we started climbing the table earlier in the season, I thought about it. For a bit, I thought no way in hell we wouldn’t be promoted. We were doing really well, in top form, and so I planned something for the last game of the season. But then we had a couple of bad matches, and everyone else started playing good all of a sudden, and I just…” he trailed off, sighing again. He tried to keep himself on track. “My plan isn’t important, but losing the game today just mucked up a lot of stuff in my head. I just had this vision, and now I’m a bit scared, to be honest.” She gently squeezed his hands as he caught his breath. “My agent told me a few weeks ago that some clubs were interested in signing me this summer. I don’t have a whole lot of say in this stuff, but I can say no, so please remember that.” He squeezed her hands, meeting her eyes pleadingly, wanting to make sure she knew that no is an option. She just nodded, waiting for him to go on. “Most of the offers are from other level three teams, but one…”

“Oh my god, Lewie,” she started, her eyes widening. She couldn’t help the smile that crawled onto her face, having a good feeling about whatever it was he was about to say.

“One of them is from the Championship, and specifically, Middlesbrough.”

“Middlesbrough?!” She threw her hands around his neck, hugging him as best she could in the close confines of the car, but she didn’t care. Any offer from the Championship was huge, but Middlesbrough?! They were a good, solid team, and looked to be promoted to top-flight football in the next few years. She was so fucking proud of him, and he deserved all of this.

He held onto her, letting himself smile into the crook of her neck. He knew she’d be happy for him, but her happiness was still so fucking contagious that for a moment he forgot why he didn’t tell her sooner. “Babes, fuck, I’m so proud of you,” she whispered.

“I haven’t anything on paper yet, don’t get too excited,” he told her, smiling as she pulled away. “But they’re looking to restructure a bit heading into next season, and they want a ‘solid, leading number eight’”. Her smile just grew wider, and he was grateful for the night sky for hiding his small blush.

“Lewie, this is fucking great news! You deserve all of this,” she told him, the moonlight giving way to the sincerity in her eyes. “Why didn’t you tell me sooner?”

“It’s Middlesbrough, babes, not exactly a stone’s throw away from London. And I knew if I told you, you’d want me to take it. But you have your whole life here…your family, business, friends…I can’t let you move away from all that. And I’m not going anywhere without you.” He sighed, running a hand through his hair. “That’s why winning the match today was so important. We get promoted and I get to stay in London to keep building this life with you. Your dreams are here, and I’m not taking that away from you just so we can go chase mine. I just want you to be happy.”

She smiled sweetly at him, cupping his face in her hands. “Lewie Griffin, you are my dream. I can run a gym anywhere. I’ll arrange visits with friends and family, and we can spend your offseasons here during the summers. But there is absolutely no fucking way you’re saying no to this. I am happy wherever you are. London is not my home, you are. My dream is to wear your kit number to all of your matches until you’re a cranky, forty-year-old captain who can’t bring himself to quit. And when they finally make you, we can retire to our house on the beach with our five-plus dogs.”

He smiled at her sheepishly, leaning into her touch. “Babes, I feel like it’s easy to say that, but I’m gonna be pulling you out of London into a place where you don’t know anyone, away from your gym, not to mention how cold it gets there.” He looked sadly at her, his mind replaying all of the plans they had made when they thought he’d stay in London for a while longer. “I don’t want my job to dictate where you live, it’s not fair.”

“Lewie,” she sighed softly, still smiling at him. “You worry about me too much.” She softly caressed his cheek with her thumb. “I don’t care where I live, as long as you’re with me. I can handle the cold, I can make friends with the other WAGs, and Middlesbrough has miles of gorgeous coastline. Maybe we can invest in that house on the beach before we’re old and grey.”

He took her hands and held them to his forehead, shaking his head. “Why you gotta make everything sound so perfect and convincing?” She giggled. “Nah, I’m serious,” he laughed. “I’ve been really struggling with this, y’know.”

“You don’t have to hold this stuff in, babes, I promise it’s always scarier in your head,” she assured him, looking into his soft eyes. “It’s you and me forever, we’re a team of two.” She winked at him before adjusting herself. “Now tell me about this plan you had, because it seemed pretty fucking important, and Amelia was being weird as today.”

He contemplated for a moment, wondering if he should ask her now. He’s known he wanted to marry her as soon as she stepped out of the villa on the first day, so he really wasn’t sure what he was waiting for after two years. He just knew it had to be perfect - that’s what she deserved from him, always. And a parking lot was far from it.

He glanced at the backseat quickly, making sure his duffle bag was still in the car, where he had safely kept the ring for eight months now. The pitch would be locked up now, but his manager had given him a spare set of keys after he found him waiting outside at 4 am one day to start training early. Lewie decided then that he would still go through with his plan that night, but not in the parking lot of a pub called The Cow.

His parents would be here all weekend, they could still celebrate tomorrow.

“Buckle up,” he just told her, smiling cheekily.

“Lewie Griffin,” she mused, doing as she was told. “Full of surprises today.”

#litg #litg lewie #litg s6 #love island the game #help I wrote this for three days and I kinda hate it now #but alas

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heizlut · 1 year

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i’m here, im alive. i’ve been getting my shit together. not sure if i’m gonna drop my dottore dark fic just yet. i’m figuring out if i want it in parts because it’s fucking massive and i’m not even done with it. it’s a whole ass novel i swear. i’m gonna go through my requests and might do a warmup piece if i don’t post my dottore one today

#heizlut thoughts

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kushnovice · 2 years

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|TRIGGER WARNING!!! Mentions of bullying, swearing, fighting, fainting, wounds, mild concussion,

Word count: 3.5k

Low-key a song fic but you don't need the song. I LOVE CHRISSY!! IT IS JUST FOR THE STORY! I can only think of Eddie, I'm sorry for my spam <3 |

I sat in the middle row of the classroom in my favorite outfit. People always made fun of how I looked and what I wore. Luckily, I wasn't the main target by many of the bullies here. Just the cheerleaders. Chrissy Cunningham was the worst. Every day, without fail, she goes out of her way to make my life a living hell. My headphones blasted beats into my ears as I used a pencil and a pen as drums while tapping my foot. After the track ended, the teacher walked in with papers. "Alright class, let's settle down." Mr. Burke spoke as he erased the words written on the chalkboard by one of the students. 'Battle of The Bands, tomorrow gymnasium" It was obvious who wrote it, I looked to the back of the classroom at Eddie who was also listening to music and pretending to shred his guitar. Eddie was the man target for most of the bullying here. I always felt bad for him too, he's not even a bad person.

Taking out my headphones and turning the music off, I started to pay attention to class. I wrote my notes and paid attention as the teacher talked, eying the clock anxiously. All I wanted for was this school day to be over, but I knew shit would go to hell as it always did. I tapped my foot anxiously as the teacher glanced at the clock then looked back at the class. "We are going to test tomorrow so be prepared, it will be worth 20% of your grade so I recommend studying what we learnt today." The class groaned as I was the only one to take notes. Luckily, then the bell had rung loudly, and I jumped up and rushed out of the classroom, hoping to get to the girls locker-room before the cheerleads did. As I walked through the halls, my head down and headphones blasting music in my ears, I couldn't help but think about the Battle of the Bands. Eddie's 'band' wasn't filled yet. He still needed a drummer and a vocalist. Anxiety clouded your mind as you thought about seeing if you could join him. No one else knew this but I have been taking drum lessons since I was kid and have continued it throughout my years.

I pushed the door open to the locker room, happy to see no one here yet. I placed my bag in a locker and locked it with a lock. Last time I had left it unlocked, the girls went through my stuff and cut up my clothes. (Ragitna Geroge vibes) I had my extra clothes and water bottle and went into an open stall and changed my clothes. When I was changing, I heard all the girls file in, talking shit as per usual. I took a deep breath before opening the stall and looking around at all the girls around me. I walked over to my locker and unlocked it, throwing my clothes in before locking it again and walking out in the gymnasium.

Gym class went by VERY slowly. After warmups they had us break up. The jocks played basketball while the girls cheered at them. It was annoying honestly. I've never understood the point of this stupid game where they just want an excuse to rub up against other guys, like just admit you're gay. I softly giggled to myself but breaking out of my thoughts to see the ball flying towards me with everyone's eyes on me. I didn't even try to catch it, instead letting it fly past me and into the storage closet. I walked in and looked around for the basketball that was rolling around. I bent over and picked it up, hearing the sounds of footsteps behind me and then feeling a kick on my back before I was face down on the hardwood floor. I let out a huge breath as I snapped my head back at them, seeing Chrissy and her little bitches behind her. "Awh, did you fall? Here let me help you." Chrissy offered a hand to me, and I looked at her skeptically before taking it. She pulled me up and pulled me close to her, her eyes just barely above mine making her look threating. "Can I have the notes from today's class?" She smiled at me, but her hand was now squeezing mine tightly. "Uh no, I don't have them." I stared blankly while lying. "That's a lie, I saw you writing in your notebook." Her smile fell as she pushed me back into the ball carriage. The whole thing tipped over as my back flew into the carriage and into it with balls all over me. "I wasn't taking notes." I tried not to let any tears fall, I can't let them see how they affect me. I looked over at the other girls who were snickering and blocking the doorway so no one could see what happened. As I picked myself up, I looked at Chrissy who had her back now faced to me, picking up something that caused the other girls to gasp and laugh. "You see, I need to pass this year Harrington. Your brother's not here to protect you anymore." Chrissy then whipped around, swinging the plastic bat as hard as she could at my side. I couldn't help but let a whimper out of my mouth as the bat impacted against my arm and ribs. I stumbled over slightly before steading myself again. "Now I'll ask again, can I have the notes?" She smiled again. Fake ass bitch. "Same answer cunt, I don't have them. Go sleep with him like you do all of your other teacher's and don't bring me into this." I snapped, getting angry at this entitled bitch. Chrissy lifted the bat again with anger in her eyes as she swung repeatedly until Jason walked in, "Babe, you need to stop before they know she didn't just fall." He grabbed the ball and passed it to the others as he wrapped his arm around Chrissy's waist. "I need to pass this quarter, Jay." Chrissy whined but Jason kissed her softly before speaking. "We can find someone else; she clearly is not going to budge." They all walked away, and I just sighed, getting up slowly and wincing. I walked out of the storage closet and pretended to be fine as I sat down and drank from my water.

The rest of the day went by fairly fast. I stumbled through the school as the last bell rang. I immediately started towards the music room and past the band kinds. A few of them waved at me while others just stared. Before Steve and Robin graduated, they had protected me and helped me make friends but now I was alone with barely anyone knowing who I really am. I made my way into the sound booth that the school committee paid for after the band got too loud for anyone to focus in school. I slid off my bag and placed it on the ground next to the door before walking over to the drums and making sure everything was turned on and sounded right. Going up to the speaker and popping in a Metallica tape and putting on the headphones as the music started, I slid into the seat. I pounded the sticks on the drum at the songs beat, putting everything into it. I chose Master of Puppets knowing it was one of the hardest and longest songs that I could do. Hearing a mix of the song and myself playing the drums, I started singing. I didn't even notice Eddie walking by and stopping, seeing me drum my heart out. He touched the soundboard, turning it up so he could hear what was going on. His eyes widened with shock as he instantly recognized the sound of the song. Watching intensely, he thought about joining in with his guitar and battling himself with if he should or not. Eddie shrugged and said fuck it as he opened the door, noticing that I didn't notice anything still, He started shredding the guitar making me now look up at him. I slid the headphones off and continued as we played in sync with each other. Banging my head as I continued to pound on the drums and Eddie head banging as he played his guitar. "Your life burns faster, obey your master, Master, Master of puppets, I'm pulling your strings!"

When the song was over, we were both huffing for breath. "That was fucking awesome, Harrington!" Eddie shouted and placed his hand up in the air. Laughing I slapped his hand, but he didn't let it go, he softly pulled me closer. "Please, join my band. We need you." He started to beg me. I laughed and smiled, "Of course I want to be in your band. We will rock that shit." Eddie laughed and pulled me into a hug, blushing I hugged back. "Oh, I'm so sorry." He pulled away awkwardly and stood there smiling. I walked over to my bag and grabbed a sharpie, grabbing his arm I wrote my number on his arm. "Cause I know you lose everything." I smiled at him, and you swear you could see a light blush form on his cheeks. Looking over out the window, I sighed deeply at the rain. "That's going to be a blast to walk home in." I sarcastically remarked as I looked in my bag for a hoodie but it's not there. "I can give you a ride home." Eddie smiled at me causing me to melt. "Are you sure? I don't want to make you go out of your way." I already felt back for even thinking of accepting his offer. He chuckled and nodded as he wrapped his arm around my shoulder, walking with me to the exit. "I'm sure, it's not a problem for me at all." I smiled as we walked out the doors and into the hooded part of the school. "Are you ready to run?" Eddie asked with a goofy grin. "I'll beat you there." You ran off as fast as you could and laughing as you heard Eddie yell, "No fair!" and footsteps running up closer to you. I touched the van and turned around to see him right on my heels. He quickly unlocked the car and we both jumped in, soaking wet now. "I would have won if you didn't cheat." Eddie rolled his eyes playfully at me. "Or I'm just that good." He chuckled, "Sure, whatever you want to think."

I started shaking and saw Eddie peeling off his shirt and grabbing a blanket from the back of his van to dry himself off. After he felt dry, he looked at me and saw me shaking, offering the blanket. I peeled my shirt off, fine with it since I still had a bra on. Eddie was looking but not sexually. "What hurricane did you run into?" He joked looking at all of the bruises littering my body. "Chrissy Cunningham and Jason." I sighed and winced as I dried my body and hair before throwing the blanket into the back. Eddies face shifted as he examined the bruises, holding my arm up and running his fingers over the fat bruise on my ribs causing me to gasp in pain. "These aren't punches or slaps." He stated, obviously confused. "They were upset I wouldn't give them the notes for class, and they decided using me as a baseball would be fun." I sighed, sliding my shirt back on. Eddie was in shock. His hands gripped the wheel tightly, his knuckles turning white. "How long?" He asked out of nowhere. "Years." I laughed sadly as I answered. He sat there, thinking as he drove. "I won't let them hurt you again." He spoke seriously, not in his joking manner anymore. The mood was completely different. "It's alright, I'll be out of here soon enough." He didn't like that answer. "It is not alright; they think they rule the school and it's bullshit. You don't deserve that." "It doesn't mean it will change." I sighed, looking out the window and telling him when to turn. "It will change when I put Jason in his fucking place." He growled as he pulled up in my driveway. "Thank you, Ed's." I smiled at him, and his face went from anger to happy quickly as he smiled back. "No problem, Princess. I'll be here at 6:30 tomorrow to pick you up." He drove off before you could question anything. I ran off inside and immediately got into the shower.

I woke up later than normal since Eddie had told me he was picking me up for school. I slid on my clothes and did my hair and added a little makeup before hearing a beep from outside. glancing out the window I smiled brightly and grabbed my bag, slinging it over my shoulder as I made my way outside. I lightly jogged over to the van and slid in, smiling at Eddie. "Thank you so much, I was able to sleep in for once." I laughed causing him to smile goofy at me. "I'll pick you up every day and drop you off." I immediately stared at him, "No, no, no. I could not ask you to do that." Eddie scoffed, "I love hanging out with you, princess." I blushed bright red and smiled down at my hands. "I do too..." Eddie continued to drive and he slowly slid his hand over onto her thigh, softly squeezing it. Looking up at Eddie, and I smiled. I placed my hand on his and giggled as I bopped my head to the sound of the metal music playing.

We eventually arrived at school and we both got out. "Ugh, I hate this fucking place." I groaned as we walked into the school, walking side by side with Eddie Munson causing all eyes to be on us. As they walked into class, Eddie moved to sit next to me in the middle. Eddie never sat anywhere else. In fact, he would kick anyone out who would sit in his seat. We talked until the teacher came in, unaware of the stares and chatter around us.

After the class and the bell had rung, I knew I had to go to gym. The only class that Eddie couldn't protect me in. He stopped outside the Girls Locker room with me, holding my hand and pulling me into a hug. "I'll see you in 10." Eddie winked before walking off to class. I was left there confused but knowing Eddie, he would find a way to sneak into my class. I did my thing, changing and locking my stuff up before heading to the gymnasium. Looking around I didn't see any teachers but I did see the group of popular kids all staring my down as I walked across the gym to sit down on the bleachers.

"You're the reason I failed!" Chrissy marched up to me causing me to roll my eyes. "Sorry he wouldn't let you suck him for an A like everyone else." She growled and raised her hand, slapping me in the face. Jason immediately pulled her back and yelled for the teachers. I wasn't about to put up with this shit anymore. "Wow imagine not having any control that you'll fuck everyone in the school and fight anyone that has an issue with you. Grow up." This was it for Chrissy and her cheerleaders. Suddenly, I was being jumped by a bunch of girls with the basketball players watching. I let them hit me, knowing it was worthless to they and fight. My vision started getting fuzzy and I saw white dots with tingling in my ears.

"Get the fuck off of my girlfriend!" Eddie yelled, throwing chicks off of your body, not giving a fuck about anyone else but you in the moment. He was pulled back by Jason, "Don't touch them you freak!" Eddie, having none of it, just reached back and punched him in the jaw, knocking him out. He shook off his hand before he saw the other boys jumping him. Eddie didn't just let them hit him like I did. He fought back, the while time. Looking at him, I realized this time I wasn't fighting for just myself, but also Eddie, Hellfire, all the outcasts, and losers. I raised my knee into the gut of the chick on top of me and then turned around, kicking the other in the face. I grabbed Chrissy by her hair and threw her to the ground with Jason before tackling one of the basketball players. Eddie loved watching me protect him. That was until they got off of Eddie and held me back, making Eddie watch as the girls take turns hitting me. I coughed up blood and spit it right in one of the basketball players face causing him to punch me in the jaw and my head to go limp. Eddie was now livid.

I can't remember what happened after that. It all went by so fast, or maybe I fainted. I can't tell. All I know is that I woke up in the nurses office with Eddie next to my side, holding my hand and all bandaged up. I tried to sit up but my head immediately started to pound causing me to grab it instinctively. "You're awake!" Eddie was much louder than intended causing me to flinch but then quickly apologized to me. He got up and shut the blinds and turned off the lights. "Are you feeling better?" He asked, sitting on the side of the bed and rubbing my head softly. I purred softly in his hand, "better now..." I mumbled. "Are you okay?" I asked, scanning him and seeing bruises all over him as well. "Don't worry about me. I'm not the one that got knocked out trying to protect me." Eddie smiled goofy but happy. Not that you were hurt, but that you cared enough to put yourself in danger for him. "What even happened?" I asked, pulling his arm closer and hugging it tightly to my chest. "Well he knocked you out and I saw red. I know that sounds crazy but I lost all control. Let's just say they are still asleep." Eddie smiled cockily. "I'm sorry..." I muttered, playing with his rings anxiously. "For what, Princess?" He cooed, already trying to take away my anxiety as he played with my hair and softly whispered. "I'm sorry you got hurt and in a fight because of me...I'm sorry I couldn't p-prote-ect you like you-u do me..." I broke out sobbing uncontrollably. "I-it's-s all my fault-t..." I started hiccuping causing Eddie to cradle me into his chest against his heart. "Y/n...none of this is your fault. Not even close. Those assholes use us and other people to squash so they feel better about themselves. Listen to me and listen closely...I did fight because of you, but I fought because I love you, every part of you. Even the parts you don't like. I have loved you since the moment I met you and the thought of anything hurting you, it kills me. I will never let anything happen to you and not because I feel pity but because I want to protect the most important person in the world to me. I know we are meant to be and I will never let you go..." Eddie hadn't let go of me the entire time, not stuttering it showing any sign of deception, just passion in every word. I slowly turned around and rose up onto my arms, pinning him down, and our nose touching. The tears were now drying on my face. Staring deeply into his eyes, words couldn't even explain how I felt about him, how I've felt about him forever. Tears must have fallen back down my face since he raised his hand and wiped one away. He left his hand there and I leaned down slowly, hoping he knew I was trying to kiss him since my head was pounding still. He sat forward, now wrapping his free arm around my waist snd holding me close while the other hand tangled in my hair softly and rubbed in my head as we softly but passionately kissing.

I pulled away, catching my breath and I rested my head on his chest as both his hands were now in my hair, rubbing my head softly. "So, I'm your girlfriend?" I asked him, raising my eyebrow. Eddie blushed, "If you would like to?" His voice soft and shy. "It would be an honor!"

#eddie munson x y/n #eddie munson x reader #eddie stranger things #eddie munson #stranger things season 4 #stranger things

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atlabeth · 3 years

Text

fever - sokka x reader

this has been sitting in my drafts half finished for 3 weeks so i thot it was prime time i actually finished it

this is kinda based off the song w dua lipa and angele so you can listen to that if you want

summary: sokka's convinced there's a mystery illness keeping you from focusing, but somehow he's completely oblivious that the only 'sick' you are is lovesick, and he's the reason you can't focus.

a/n: i have never written a sickfic. but this is like. a fake sick fic. its an idiots in love fic. i mean this is coming from mr "is he taller than me? is he better looking?" himself so. it makes sense. as usual, this is not proofread bc im a lazy mf

also im sorry for being vague with the calc but i was NOT about to do math during summer who do you think i am? ??

wc: 1.7k

warning(s): mentions of being sick and 🤢calculus 🤮 but otherwise tooth rotting fluff

How could the smartest man you knew be so, so incredibly stupid?

You thought that you were being obvious, so obviously that you were sure he knew. It was embarrassing how obvious you were.

You had met Sokka in your calculus class at the start of the new semester after you ended up sitting next to each other, and it wasn’t a stretch to say that you were immediately smitten. With eyes like the ocean and a face that had to have been crafted by the gods, you were almost too distracted to respond when he asked you for a pencil. But when he winked at you after giving his thanks, it only solidified what you had already suspected: you had known this man for all of five minutes, and you already had a crush on him.

Little did you know, it was going to turn into the most infuriating crush you had ever experienced.

You and Sokka became fast friends even though calculus was the only class you had together. Unfortunately, it was also something that you completely sucked at. Bad news, it was required for your major. Good news, Sokka was some sort of genius and offered to tutor you — Wednesdays in the library turned into a weekly occasion, and served as an opening for your calculus skills, your feelings for Sokka, and your exasperation to all grow stronger.

You normally weren’t someone to beat around the bush. If you started to like someone, you told them and dealt with whatever happened after, but something about Sokka just kept you from spilling your feelings outright. You knew that if he didn’t feel the same way, your relationship likely wouldn’t change, but there was still that tiny voice that said it’s better to stay like this in case things do go wrong — and this was the first time you listened to that voice. You simply valued your friendship too much.

But that didn’t mean you were going to be completely quiet about it — you hoped that if you did enough, he would be able to realize you liked him and do the whole process for you. A bit of a dim hope, but crushes make people do stupid things.

Things like bringing an extra coffee to every session, laughing at all his jokes (even the bad ones), sitting a little closer to him than usual, not dropping out of this wretched class so you could spend time together (it might’ve been required, but you still counted it). He didn’t make a point to object to anything, so you knew you weren’t making him uncomfortable — but you had concluded after nearly a whole semester of working and studying together that he was the most oblivious person in all of Ba Sing Se. He could teach you all kinds of formulas, but had no idea that you liked him. Grand.

Today was arguably the most important session out of any of them, seeing as your next class was the final, so it was only fitting that Sokka unknowingly made himself more interesting than any material you could’ve been working with. His arms were going to be the death of both you and your calc grade. You swore that the heat rushing to your cheeks was actually emanating off of you.

“Hey, Y/N!” Sokka grinned as he saw you and raised a hand in greeting, a sentiment you would’ve returned had it not been for the coffee cups in your hands. You settled for mirroring his grin and settled down in the seat across from him. You slid his coffee cup over, set your own down, then shrugged your bag off all before taking a seat.

“You ready to study ‘till your eyes bleed?” he asked, prompting a nervous laugh from you.

“You jest, but my eyes might actually start bleeding depending on how long we go,” you sighed. “There’s a reason I got an extra shot of espresso today.”

“Come on — by now you should know that you have nothing to worry about! I am the best teacher there is, and you got me all to yourself.”

Your eyes widened momentarily and you coughed, purposefully averting your gaze to give yourself some time to recover. Okay, he was going to make it really hard to focus today. “Let’s just get into it.”

He nodded and flipped open his notebook, beginning to talk as he rifled through his bag for a few extra things. “Okay, we’re just gonna start with going over the basics, then we’ll work our way up. There’s a couple practice problems on that page, so you can go ahead and answer those as a warmup.

You slid the notebook over in front of you and after approximately five seconds of looking at the first problem, found yourself studying Sokka rather than the material. Who could blame you? In the battle of cute tutor boy versus calculus, he was going to win every time.

He turned around and you immediately averted your eyes once again, trying to appear extremely involved, but you found that your mind was empty on anything to do with math. “Hey, uh— how do you do this first one? I’m totally blanking here.”

“We use limits in everything — this is actually something you’re really good at!” He studied you intensely and frowned. “Are you okay? Like, you’re not sick or anything, are you? You seem kinda out of it.”

You choked out a laugh and shook your head. “No, no — I’m fine. I guess I’m just a little tired.” As if to demonstrate your lie, you took a sip from your coffee and cringed internally. Love had turned you into an idiot.

He seemed to buy it as he nodded and picked up the pencil, scribbling a couple of notes as he explained the first problem to you. “Does that make sense?” You nodded and he handed the pencil back to you. “Okay — the other ones follow the same kind of process. It should be easy enough.”

You managed to get a little further in the second problem, but your lovestruck mind would not stop focusing back on Sokka every time you tried to do, well, anything. Curse him and his perfect arms, and eyes, and hairstyle, and everything.

You shook your head and set the pencil down once more, letting loose a frustrated sigh. “I don’t know what’s gotten into me.” Yes, you did. “I just can’t focus at all.” Because of you. You picked up your cup once more and took a sip, hoping it would do something to get you back into the math state of mind.

Sokka frowned once more as he put the back of his hand against your forehead. “God, you’re hot.” You nearly choked on your coffee as your eyes practically bulged out of their sockets — he had to know what he was doing by now — how could he not? “Like, you’re completely burning up. Are you sure you’re okay?”

“I’m fine, I swear— I just…” you set your cup down on the table and heaved a sigh that was a touch more exasperated than necessary. “Are you telling me you seriously haven’t noticed? Like, not a single thing this whole year?”

“I’ve noticed a lot of things this year,” he chuckled. “It’s kind of our whole job, so you’re gonna have to be a lot more specific.”

You finally couldn’t hold it in anymore. “Sokka, I’m not— I’m not sick! Haven’t you noticed that I’m only ever flustered, or running into things, or forgetting info, or— or just a complete idiot when I’m around you? I like you, like, a lot, and I have for an embarrassingly long time! The reason I can’t focus is because I am hopelessly attracted to you in every single way.”

His brows creased for a moment and you clamped your mouth shut, worried that you had just ruined everything. It was only after a pause that felt like a century that he finally responded, the hint of a smirk on his lips.

“Well, why didn’t you just say something?”

You stared at him, eyes wide and lips slightly parted in pure surprise before the annoyance set in. You set your jaw as your brows furrowed and you hit him lightly on the side of his arm with the back of your palm. “You can’t be serious! You— you’ve gotta be messing with me by now. I really can’t believe that you can be that smart but this oblivious!”

He finally let the grin play across his lips in full force and he shrugged nonchalantly. “I mean, I don’t know how you don’t expect me to mess with you when you scrunch up your face all cute like that every time you get mad. Besides, I started liking you after that fifth class; I offered to help you out so I could spend more time with you! I didn’t realize you felt the same way. I kinda just enjoyed the free coffee and getting to look at you all the time.”

“I can’t believe you!” you cried as you hit his other arm. “You’re telling me that I had to deal with this- this mental turmoil about whether you liked me back, while you were just enjoying the free eye candy and coffee the whole time?”

“You have nothing to worry about! I enjoyed the company far more than the coffee,” he joked, a certain twinkle in his eye. “But, you are probably out a couple twenties after all of that. So, what do you say about this Saturday, the cafe by the shoe store? My treat.”

“Damn right it’s your treat,” you shot back, though you couldn’t stop the smile forming on your face. “You owe me a lot — you have to make up for those coffees and all the emotional distress you caused.”

“Oh, I think I’ll have plenty of time to make up for lost time. After all, we do have a lot of coffee dates to get through.” And when he winked at you just like that first day, you remembered just how impossible it was to be angry at Sokka. “But first, we kinda have to get through this study date. The final’s still happening tomorrow.”

You responded with a raised brow. “This is a study date?”

Sokka shrugged and grinned. “They’ve all been study dates. You just didn’t know it.”

idiots in love idiots in love idiots In LOVe

perm tag list: @dv0412 @siriuslyslyslytherin @maruchan77

atla: @marianne1806

#sokka x reader #sokka x you #sokka x y/n #sokka fic #atla #avatar #avatar the last airbender #avatar the last airbender fic #avatar x reader #reader insert #sadie writes

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sickficsforthesoul · 3 years

Text

Twin Idiots - Osamu

For @punkozume

Prompt: sick Osamu, caretaker Suna ft. caretakers Kita and Aran (Michinari is here too, but he doesn't do that much tbh)

Osamu with the flu and a very high fever, he tries to hide that he's sick from Suna and almost passes out on the school, has a lot of nightmares and is kind of delirious

Word count: 2433 words

If you couldn't tell, there will be a separate Atsumu version of this fic coming soon. I didn't include any nightmares, but if this fic does well enough, I'll write a (hopefully) short ficlet to follow this fic up and focus on the nightmares and delirium, so let me know what you think!

(Suna doesn't have an accent because I remember reading somewhere that he's from Tokyo originally, but idk if that's right, so if it's not, please forgive me and pretend it's my own headcanon, not me forgetting where Suna's from.)

‘It’s really chilly today,’ Osamu notices, shivering under his coat. While winter was never warm, Osamu can’t remember the last time he’s felt so cold. Even his long walk to the Inarizaki gym does nothing to warm him up. Osamu snuggles into his jacket as he trudges on. It’s not snowing yet, but the sky is cloudy and ominously gray, so Osamu doesn’t expect the ground to stay snow-free for long.

Osamu doesn’t have to put up with his idiot brother today, at least. Tsumu had left for his fancy volleyball camp in Tokyo for the entire week the day before, so Osamu is on his own in Hyogo. Osamu and Tsumu attended together last year, but when Osamu’s invitation failed to arrive along with Tsumu’s this year, he can’t say he was too surprised. Osamu has never been as into volleyball as Tsumu.

Osamu has his own interests, like cooking and chemistry, that he’s far more passionate about. Volleyball is fun, but Osamu knows he won’t be doing it for the rest of his life like Tsumu probably will. Tsumu will always put more into volleyball than Osamu, and that resulted in him being invited to the All-Japan Youth Intensive Training Camp while his brother was not.

Osamu’s not upset by any means. He’s enjoying the separation from his twin. For one week, Osamu can have his own room, cook whatever he feels like, and watch as many cooking shows as he pleases. It’s a weeklong vacation from his ridiculously loud brother, and Osamu intends to enjoy every second of it.

When Osamu finally reaches the gym, he relishes in the warmth of the cozy gym. It’s a welcome change from the frigid air outside, and now Osamu is finally warm enough to shed his coat after shutting the gym door. Most of his teammates are already in the gym, either changing or warming up. Inarizaki may be on winter break, but Kita was adamant that his team continue to practice, even with Tsumu away at camp.

Osamu is already in his practice gear, opting for donning a sweatsuit over top of his shorts and tee-shirt due to the freezing weather. Osamu dumps his coat, bag, and other belongings along the wall before stashing his water bottle on the bench. Suna hasn’t shown up yet, so Osamu begins his warmup stretches alone. By the time Osamu has stretched his legs and hips, Suna and the rest of the team have finally assembled in the gym.

Once everyone is ready, Kita gives out instructions for what everyone will practice today. Most players are assigned exercises or drills for their current position, but Osamu isn’t so lucky. With Tsumu gone, Kita decides to use his absence as an excuse to work on Osamu’s setting. Osamu isn’t thrilled about the idea, but at least Kita, Michinari, and Suna will be working with him today, so practice shouldn’t be too miserable.

They begin simply, with Osamu setting to just Suna. Suna spikes Osamu’s set, Michinari digs up the spike, and Kita sends the ball over the net for Osamu to practice setting mid-rally. They continue the drill for a while, so Osamu can get in a grove before he tries more difficult sets later on. Osamu doesn’t love setting as much as Tsumu does, but he will admit that he’s enjoying the easy rhythm of the drill a lot. It’s a nice change of pace from his usual blocking and spiking, and Osamu enjoys setting to his best friend much more than he thought he would.

But Osamu’s enjoyment doesn’t last. When Kita finally sends them off for a water break, Osamu is feeling off. His muscles ache constantly, and he’s oddly cold despite the snug warmth of the gym. Osamu takes a sip of water from his bottle and sits on the ground in front of the bench. He leans his head against the bench and glances up at the gym ceiling. This proves to be a mistake as the bright ceiling lights cause a headache to flare in his temples. Osamu lowers his head and focuses on finishing his water, hoping futilely that he was just a little dehydrated.

Kita calls Osamu, Michinari, and Suna back to the court for more practice. This time, Aran joins them too. Kita explains the new drill they’ll be working on now. ‘It’s basically the same as the other drill,’ Osamu thinks quietly. The only difference between the drills was that now Osamu can choose between setting to Suna or Aran.

They get to work, and Osamu quickly adjusts to having a new spiker. His sets to Aran aren’t as clean or precise as Suna’s, but Osamu knows his sets are improving with every toss. Osamu’s headache also increases with every toss, but he doesn’t want to think about that. Kita will give him hell for practicing with a headache, and Osamu doesn’t want to get chewed out like Tsumu did when Kita caught him practicing with a cold. So Osamu stays quiet while they practice. Even as his headache gives way to nausea, and his body trembles with small shivers whenever he stands still for too long.

By the time Kita calls for another water break, Osamu is miserable. His arms ache fiercely from setting, and his legs are so shaky that he barely makes it back off the court. Suna fixes Osamu with a blank stare as soon as Osamu manages to stumble to the bench. Kita and Aran also stare at Osamu, but they remain silent. Osamu shifts awkwardly, eventually opting to lean forward and stare at the ground because that position lessened his headache the most. Osamu’s teammates still say nothing. The minute of silence between the four of them is almost as painful as Osamu’s raging headache, and that’s saying something because Osamu is pretty sure his brain is trying to escape from his skull with how hard his head is pounding.

Finally, Suna opens his mouth. “You’re an idiot, Samu.”

“No ‘m not,” Osamu mutters weakly.

“You are,” Suna insists. “You’re one big, sick idiot, Samu.”

“But ‘m not sick,” Osamu whines quietly. He knows he is, but he can’t bring himself to admit to being sick because then Kita will lecture him for practicing when he’s sick. Osamu can handle a lot of things, from a moping Tsumu to an Instagram-crazy Suna, but Osamu cannot handle a Kita lecture. Kita isn’t the type to yell or swear, but he always sounds so disappointed, and Osamu can’t stand disappointing someone he admires so much over such a stupid mistake.

“I hope you’re lying, Samu, because if you’re not, you’re a lot stupider than I thought you were,” Suna frowns slightly. “Maybe even stupider than your dumb twin.”

“Take tha’ back, ya jerk,” Osamu slurs, lifting his head to look at Suna’s near-expressionless face.

“Then stop acting like an idiot,” Suna counters, his voice still a steady monotone. “You need to go home. Like, now.”

Osamu sighs tiredly, lowering his head to face the ground again. His body agrees with Suna completely, but somehow, Osamu still doesn’t want to leave. Maybe it’s his hypercompetitive instincts from practicing with Tsumu so much, but Osamu doesn’t want to leave until practice is finally over. It’s completely ridiculous, Osamu knows, because he doesn’t even love volleyball that much. But Osamu hates leaving things half-finished, even if his body burns with fever, and his head throbs with every breath.

Osamu remains silent, so Suna takes matters into his own hands. Suna slides off the bench and stands in front of Osamu. Suna bends down and takes Osamu’s shaking hands in his own warm, steady ones. Then he gently pulls Osamu to his feet.

Osamu’s body strongly protests the sudden position change. Osamu’s headache intensifies to a new level of excruciating pain, and intense dizziness makes Osamu’s head spin. Osamu desperately tries to keep his balance, but his weakened body doesn’t stand a chance against the sudden but fierce wave of lightheadedness. Osamu’s body pitches dangerously as shadows creep into the edges of his vision. He feebly reaches for Suna, trying to steady himself before faints onto the gym floor.

Osamu tilts forward, his chin coming to rest on Suna’s shoulder before Osamu’s knees give out completely. Suna squawks in surprise as he suddenly finds himself bearing all of Osamu’s weight. Suna carefully guides them both to the floor as Kita and Aran dart off the bench to offer aid.

Osamu is still conscious (somehow), so he is distantly aware of everything his friends do to help him. Kita and Aran grab Osamu’s shoulders and pull him off Suna. They settle Osamu on his back lying prone on the gym floor. Suna takes Osamu’s ankles and holds them up at chest level to get some blood flowing back towards Osamu’s head. Michinari zooms off, returning seconds later with his and Aran’s duffle bags. Michinari stacks them to an acceptable height, and Suna rests Osamu’s feet on the bags.

Kita pillows Osamu’s head in his lap. “Osamu,” Kita calls softly, “are ya still with us?”

“Hm…? Yeah…” Osamu mumbles as his hazy eyes lock on Suna, who’s still kneeling by Osamu’s feet. “’m with ya…”

“Tha’s good,” Kita smiles gently. He rests a soft hand lightly on Osamu’s forehead. “Ya have a wicked fever there, Osamu. Do ya want some water?”

“Ya,” Osamu nods weakly. “‘m thirsty.”

“Here, Samu.” Aran offers the sick boy a water bottle, but Osamu’s hands are shaking too hard to hold it without splashing water everywhere, so Kita helps Osamu sit up more while Aran holds the bottle.

Osamu drinks greedily, only stopping to gasp for breath every few gulps. Aran sets the bottle on the floor once Osamu empties it completely. Osamu’s appearance has improved considerably by now. His face is regaining color, his eyes aren’t foggy, and his body has stopped trembling like a leaf in the autumn wind. Kita and Aran help him sit all the way up, and when he still looks okay, they beckon Michinari and Suna over to help them get Osamu standing.

Once Osamu is on his feet, Aran and Suna support the sick blocker by his shoulders. Kita goes to explain the situation to their coaches while Michinari does the same for the rest of the team, who had slowly stopped practicing once they noticed what was going on with Osamu.

Suna and Aran slowly walk Osamu to the door. They stop briefly to haphazardly dress Osamu in his coat as well as Suna’s hat and Aran’s scarf. Ginjima, who has slipped away from the team gather with Michinari, holds the door open for them. Ginjima has the trio’s bags. He passes off Osamu’s bag to Suna along with Suna’s own bag while giving Aran his bag too.

“Ginjima,” Aran says as he and Suna maneuver Osamu out the door, “please let Kita know we’re leavin’.”

“Sure,” Ginjima agrees, eyeing Osamu worriedly. “Are ya takin’ him home?”

“Yeah,” Suna replies. “He’s going straight to bed when we get there since he won’t rest unless we make him.”

“Okay. Good luck, then.” Ginjima wishes them well with a wave before he closes the gym door.

Suna and Aran make the agonizingly slow trip to the Miya household. It takes them over an hour to get Osamu home. By the time they reach the front door, snow flurries are falling onto their hair and eyelashes. It takes another fifteen minutes to get Osamu upstairs, changed, and settled into bed.

Osamu’s parents aren’t home, so it’s up to Aran and Suna to find Osamu medicine, water, and food. Suna tackles the food because Aran admits that he’s never done more than boil water, and Osamu will kill them for destroying his kitchen, even if he’s burning with an extremely high fever (the thermometer Aran finds in the bathroom reads 39.5°C after resting under Osamu’s tongue for a minute). Suna reheats leftover rice he finds in the Miya’s refrigerator and dumps it in a bowl. It’s hardly gourmet cuisine, but Osamu will be too loopy to care anyway. Suna also fills a glass with water before carrying both things up to the twins’ shared bedroom.

Aran is sitting on a chair across from Osamu, who is snuggled up on the bottom bunk. Aran takes the water from Suna and forces Osamu to swallow both the fever reducers he’s found and the entire glass of water. Once Osamu’s finished, Suna presents him with the bowl of reheated rice. Osamu only finished half of it, but Suna didn’t expect much more, even with Osamu’s reputation for his voracious appetite.

“I have ta go home now,” Aran admits as he gathers the bowl and glass. “Are ya goin’ to stay with him?”

“Yeah, at least until his parents get home,” Suna nods. “We can’t leave him alone when he’s like this.”

“Ya,” Aran agrees. “I’ll clean this up before I go. I left the medicine on tha bathroom sink, and the thermometer’s right there.” He nods to the thermometer lying next to Osamu’s pillow. “Thanks fer stayin’ with him, Suna.”

“S’not a problem,” Suna hums lightly. “You should get going before your mom comes looking for you.”

Aran laughs, “Good point. I’ll see ya later, Suna.”

Aran leaves, taking the bowl and cup with him, so now it’s just him and Osamu in the bedroom. Suna reaches out to ruffle Osamu’s gray hair. “You’re still an idiot, Samu.”

“I know,” Osamu cracks his eyes open slightly and smiles, “but yer not.”

“Obviously,” Suna smirks, “but you’re not as stupid as Tsumu. Not yet, at least.”

“Gee, thanks, Suna,” Osamu laughs faintly. “Thanks fer stayin’.”

“You didn’t seriously think I’d leave with you like this, did you?” Suna raises a slim eyebrow.

“Nah,” Osamu smiles, “yer too good of a friend fer that.”

“You’re getting soft on me, Samu,” Suna smiles back.

“I’m sick, ya jerk,” Osamu huffs. “I’m allowed ta be soft.”

“You are sick,” Suna concedes, “but you’re still an idiot, and sick idiots need sleep.”

“Who’s gettin’ soft again?” Osamu quips, but his eyes still slip shut without protest.

“Goodnight, Samu.” Suna pats Osamu’s head gently as he settles himself onto Aran’s now vacant chair.

“G’night, Suna,” Osamu yawns, finally drifting off into a feverish but natural sleep.

Suna adjusts Osamu’s blankets and pulls out his phone. Knowing Osamu, the night won’t be as peaceful as Suna is hoping for, so he plays stupid mobile games on his phone and waits for what he knows will come in a few hours.

#osamu miya #suna rintaro #kita shinsuke #aran ojiro #akagi michinari #haikyuu!!#haikyu!! whump #haikyuu whump #sickfic #sickiesoul writes #fever #fainting #sort of #request #haikyu whump #whump #anime whump

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eelistolvanen · 4 years

Text

Atlantis - Ryan Graves

Pairing: Ryan Graves x Y/N (established)

Warnings: mentions of depression, angst

Word count: 6.1k

A/N: So this is my first NHL fic. Warning: I didn’t proveread and my first language isn’t english. This idea is based on those tiktoks about people losing their sparkle. The title is from the song Atlantis by Seafret.

Hope you enjoy :)

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You hurried along the concours at Pepsi center, swearing under your breath. You had already missed the warm ups because you had been held up at work. You didn’t really want to miss puck drop as well. Out of breath, you made it to your seat, happy to realise that you had, in fact, not missed puck drop. You plopped down besides Mel Landeskog and groaned.

“God, I wish I could kill my boss. What a dick.” You said between trying to regain your breath. Mel chuckled beside you. “I wish you did, I don’t know why you keep working for him. I know I wouldn’t.”

Mel had briefly met your boss when she visited you over lunch at your workplace once. And she quickly let you know about her dislike for him. You weren’t a fan of him either, but besides him you liked the job and was one you had worked hard to get.

You and Mel caught up, even though you had seen each other only a few days prior. Then the players started to trickle out of the tunnel and onto the benches. Both you and Mel put the conversation to the side to focus onto the ice. Your eyes went on to search for your boyfriend immediately. It didn’t take very long to spot him, given that he was towering over all the other guys.

As if Ryan had know that you were looking for him, he turned towards the Wags section and locked eyes with you. And although you were too far away to see it properly, you were sure Ryan gave you a simple nod. He always gave you one in warmups when you were watching him. Since you weren’t able to make it in time for warmups, you got the nod now.

The game passed quickly. Both the Avs and Dallas had been playing a good and very tight game. In the end the Avs won it 4-3, thanks to a late 3rd period tiebreaker by Mikko. Ryan played a good game as well, getting an assist and a plus 2 rating.

Soon enough you found yourself down in the families room waiting for Ryan to emerge. You were holding conversation with Mel and some of the other Wags, happily letting them distract you from your long day at work.

The moment Ryan stepped out of the locker room, your eyes moved to look at him. Your subconscious was so in tune with him, you always felt his presence as soon as he entered a room. A few quick steps and he had scooped you up in his arms. This is exactly what you needed after a long day at work. A Ryan hug could fix everything.

“Good game, babe. Sorry I missed warm ups, the boss kept me in today.” You muttered into his neck, while he seemed to melt into your body. He pulled away to look at you.

“Thanks, love. It’s fine, you didn’t mean to miss it. And you made it in time for the game, that’s the important bit.” He gave you a smile and a quick wink while wrapping his arms around you and turning to say goodbye to the team. He took your hand in his while leading you out to the car and driving home.

Unfortunately the long day at work wasn’t a one off. Recently your boss had kept you in longer seemingly every day, excusing it with you needing to more effort into work since many would love to have this job. And it was starting to war you down. You knew Ryan was understanding but you still felt bad that he had to wait up for you.

By the time November rolled around, you were more stressed out and exhausted than ever. You were drowning in work and you felt like the wasn’t any end in sight soon. It didn’t help that the Avs weren’t having a good time. Instead of being at the top of the standings they were battling to stay in a playoff spot. Ans even though it was still early in the season they wouldn’t want to drop back now and even fall out of the playoff race early.

You were currently standing next to Mel and Mikko’s girlfriend waiting for the team to exit the locker room. You knew the mood wasn’t good. The team just lost against the Preds. A team who was battling against them for a playoff position. Also, you were pretty sure that Ryan noticed that you missed the first period due to being held back at work. A few players started clearing out of the locker room and you could see the loss imprinted on their faces. Riding a losing streak was bad enough, but losing against a division rival made it even bitterer.

You felt like you were barely able to breath, not knowing what Ryan’s reaction was gonna be like. Once he finally exited the room, as one of the last out, he held his head low and you could see the disappointment on his face.

He didn’t really lift his head walking over to you but still pulling you in for a hug once you were within reach. He engulfed you with his huge body and held you tight. A huge weight lifted off your chest almost immediately. And you suddenly felt like everything was going to be okay. That you had just worried to much, he would never be angry at you for missing part of a game because of work. You tried to pull him even closer, while he gave you a kiss on the head.

It was nearing the end of November and you had just pulled yourself out of bed an hour ago. It was already 2 pm and while you hoped that sleeping in on your off day would help you with the constant fatigue you were facing, all it did was making you feel even more tired. And you felt like you couldn’t get anything done recently and sitting around in your apartment all day lazily wasn’t helping your guilt at all. But you felt too lethargic to move, the grim weather wasn’t helping. You knew you should get outside more, recently only spending time at work or being holed up in your apartment, but you just couldn’t get any motivation to get up and go outside.

It wasn’t helping that Ryan was away on a road trip and wouldn’t be back in almost a week. The avs had been playing better but the still weren’t where they were supposed to be. HE had been so focused on playing well recently, you didn’t really feel like bothering him with your everyday problems. His career was important to you and you didn’t want to mess with it.

This week passed slower and you felt yourself being sucked into the black hole even further. Then on top of all the stuff that was doing badly at work at the moment, your boss had decided to bring in a new intern. He also made it pretty clear to you that the intern was trying out for your job position. You slowly felt like the weight on your shoulders was staring to crush you. Once Friday evening came, you were wrapped up in blankets on your couch, binge watching some Netflix series and eating ice cream. Ryan would fly in after his game, presumably late in the night. So you didn’t bother staying up, you would only fall asleep on the couch anyway.

You were woken up by sounds outside of your bedroom and not soon after you heard Ryan slip in. He was trying to be quiet, but you were awake now anyway.

“Hey Babe, you’re back.” Your whispered statement probably sounded more like a question but you didn’t care. His reaction told you that he wasn’t expecting you to be awake.

“Oh hey, baby. I’m sorry for waking you” You barely heard him, his voice quiet and hushed. Soon enough he slip into bed and wrapped his arms around your waist pulling you close. He must have sensed that you had a hard day at work, just from the way he was holding you close to him. And you tried your best to relax into his touch and fall asleep again.

November passed and you just couldn’t seem to catch a break anymore. Today was another horrendous day at work, where everything seemed to be going wrong lately. Your boss was more than displeased with your performance and it didn’t seem like you were able to get out of your slump anytime soon. The new intern threatening your job position was obviously not helping in easing your nerves. Now you wanted nothing more than to get home and curl yourself up on the couch in Ryan’s arms.

Finally making it to your shared apartment, you had never been so glad that Ryan wasn’t on a road trip than tonight. As soon as you were inside the door you dropped your coat and the purse in the entry, kicked of your shoes and made your way to the living room. You let out a deep sigh, the tight feeling in your chest that you had all day still letting itself be known.

As soon as you entered the living room Ryan looked up from his space on the couch. His gentle greeting went mostly unrequited. You felt a lump in your throat forming. The team had hit a rough patch time lately again and you didn’t really want him to have to deal with your problems. You knew that he had enough on his mind. So you quickly tried to give him a smile but he’d already risen from the couch, knowing you well enough to see by your posture alone that something wasn’t right.

With a couple big steps he closed the distance between you two and wrapped his arms around you tightly. You were trying to relax, let yourself drown in his big embrace but then you slowly you realise something that you had been dreading for a while now. The tight feeling in your chest was still there. You anxiety didn’t lift of you like it used to. His embrace didn’t seem to let you forget about all your worries. It didn’t seem to heal you, put your pieces back together anymore. And suddenly you realised that it hadn’t for a while now. Slowly hug after hug his power to keep you together, to calm you down, had weakened. You used to call his hugs his superpower, that no one hugged you like Ryan did. No one else’s hugs made you feel at home, made you feel safe.

But now his hugs just felt like… hugs. Normal hugs. Nothing special. Simply a hug you could get from any person you knew. No magic, no superpower. No sparkle…

You could feel your heart shatter at the sudden realization. He hugged you still the same way. He still put all his power into trying to keep you together, to pick your pieces up, to heal you. It wasn’t Ryan who lost something. It was you. You had lost your sparkle, your magic. And Ryan wouldn’t be able to fix it. Not this time.

You hadn’t even realised that silent tears had started to run down your cheeks. You let out a shaky breath, trying to steady yourself. But all it did was making it worse. You let out a sob you didn’t knew you were holding deep inside you.

“Hey, hey! Shhh, it’s okay baby. Everything is gonna be okay.” Ryan slowly rubbed your back, trying to soothe you. But you knew Ryan well enough to know, that even he himself wasn’t believing his words anymore.

You quietly cried into his chest and he held you close to him. You had stayed like that for a while after. But the tight feeling in your chest didn’t lift. If anything your sudden realization made it worse.

You hit your breaking point in the beginning of December. You felt like you fell apart. You hadn’t been going to games for a while now. You came home after work and holed yourself up on the couch or tired to cry yourself to sleep.

Ryan tried to reach out to you as much as possible. He tried and tried and tried, but no matter what he did he wasn’t able to help you. His presence didn’t relieve the pain in your chest and that heavy feeling you’d been carrying around for a while now. It had gotten so bad that you had started to pull away. You didn’t consciously want to, but did it anyway. He just wasn’t able to get through to you anymore.

And this killed him. Nothing hurt him more than to see that light in you fade. Day after day, week after week, your once so bright sparkle had started to dim. And no matter how hard he tried he couldn’t fix you. Not anymore.

You had been thinking about it for a while now. You hated your work, Denver started to turn all grey on you and you felt like a burden to Ryan recently. You needed change.

Now, you were standing in the living room, a couple steps away from Ryan. You knew he wanted to close the space, hug you, try giving you comfort but he wasn’t sure if that’s what you really needed anymore. Silent tears ran down your face and you could see Ryan shatter right in front of you.

“Tell me we can fix this. Please Ryan, tell me that leaving isn’t the right thing to do.”

“You’re not happy here anymore, Y/N. You don’t have to stay here for me, you know? I can’t expect you to stay.”

You wanted him to be wrong. You wanted him to tell you that everything would work out, that you would be able to fix your life in Denver, that leaving wasn’t the right thing to do. But you knew better.

“Ryan, please tell me you know how to fix this. You always find a way to fix me!” You were desperate now, your voice shaking.

You hated how you could read the answer in his eyes before he even parted is lips. You knew this was it. Game over, you had nothing else to give.

“I look at you and see the ghost of someone you used to be and nothing hurts more than knowing that there’s nothing I can do to fix you. To save us. I can’t save us.” You felt yourself shatter. Game over. Nothing made it more real than him telling you. He finally closed the space between the two of you. But he didn’t hug you, he simply put his hand on your face and gently stroked the tears away with his thumb.

“I know you’re trying to look out for me, thinking about me, about us first. But you need to start looking out for yourself now. This life here isn’t treating you right anymore. It’s breaking you! You know yourself that you won’t be able to fix this here.” You inhaled shakily.

“I know, I just…” Your voice gave in.

“You know that if there was a way for me to fix this, to heal you, to do something about it, I would. You need to go, cause you won’t get better here. With me. And as much as I love you, this life here is ruining you.”

His forehead was touching yours now and both his hands were placed on your cheeks. You could feel his silent sobs. You could feel the way his heart broke when he said the following words.

“How do you look at the person you love the most and tell yourself that it’s time to let her go?”

“Don’t let go then!”

Slowly he pulled away. You tried to catch his hands in yours but of no use. Slowly he lowered them and pulled his hands from his grasp.

“Just promise me you’ll try your hardest to get better. To get that light back, that sparkle back. You will get better, but this time you have to fix yourself. I love you so much, Y/N, but I just want you to be happy. Maybe one day this will include me again.”

With that he gave you a last kiss on your forehead and turned around and walked towards the door. That’s when you broke down. You knew this was real know. The bags you packed would actually be used, the calls home you made to tell your family about coming home would actually hold its promise, the resignation on your job would actually be sent in. You knew this was only supposed to be a break for you to find yourself again and come back after. But right now this felt more like a finale breakup than anything else.

At first being home seemed to do you good. You spent a lot of time with your family, you didn’t have to think about your job anymore. But it didn’t take long for that cold, nagging feeling in your chest to return. So you had started to visit a therapist. And you tried your hardest to do the little tasks she sent you home with after each session. But somehow you just felt so broken. You felt so exhausted, so lifeless. It was hard for you to find joy in something nowadays. You felt… empty.

Weeks passed. Christmas came and went. You tried to set yourself some goals, some solutions for the new year. But things didn’t seem to get better.

Ryan really didn’t want to look at his phone. Another loss, another season that seemed to go to waste. An now he couldn’t even go home and hold you in his arms for consolidation. He already dreaded the empty house he would come home to. He really couldn’t call it his home anymore. Just a place he used for sleeping or the occasional nap. Nowadays he spent as much time at the rink or at teammates houses as possible. The house was just so cold without you. Like all life had left it. Once he was seated in his car he finally gave his phone a quick glance. He did a doubletake to make sure his eyes weren’t betraying him. But there it was you name on screen. Had had left him a voicemail.

His chest tightened as he realised that you probably called him on purpose during the game. You knew that he was playing, he was sure of that. He had to take a couple of deep breath before being able to press play on the voicemail.

At first he could only hear your shaky breath, presumably teary eyed. He felt a sudden stab to his heart.

“Hey Ryan, I know this is out of nowhere but I just…” Your voice went silent again. This time he was sure that you were sobbing quietly.

“I’m trying so hard, but I don’t know how much longer I can fight… But I want you to know that there was nothing you could have done to help me, Ryan. You did your best.” He could hear your sobs now loudly and clearly, and it broke his heart.

“And you have to know that if I ever lose my battle to depression… know that I fought, know that I tried, know I did my best to overcome it. I love you so much, Ryan.”

And with that the voicemail ended. Ryan felt like someone ripped to ground from underneath him. Felt like he was spiralling down a dark hole. He let out a gasp, feeling himself tear up.

He knew he had to call you back, as soon as possible. But it was proving to be a challenge. His vision was blurry from his teary eyes and it wasn’t helping that his hands were shaking uncontrollably. It felt like he was just sitting there in his car for ages, before he had calmed himself down enough to press the call button.

He didn’t really know what he was going to say. He didn’t even know where to start, all he knew that he needed to hear your voice. Now.

It kept ringing and ringing but you didn’t pick up. He tried multiple times but nothing. His calls went unanswered. With a heavy heart he decided to drive home, since he was still sitting in the parking lot at Pepsi center.

At home he tried again. And again just before letting his exhausted body fall asleep. But you didn’t pick up. Finally, the next morning just when he thought another call would go to voicemail you answered.

“Hey.” Honestly you didn’t know what else to say and you also didn’t know to expect.

“You wouldn’t do it, right? You wouldn’t… you know end it, right?” He sounded desperate, you could sense the urgency in his voice.

“Ryan…” “No, you wouldn’t do this to me, right? I love you, Y/N. I need you. I let you leave so you could get better, not to …”

His voice cut out, and his sentence went unfinished. You didn’t really know what to tell him. The voicemail was made impulsively. You had a bad day yesterday. Well, you had a lot of bad days recently.

“What do I have to do Y/N? Tell me what I can do? I thought that letting you go home, getting out for a while might help, apparently it didn’t. God, if you tell me that you want to come home, home to me, I’ll step on the next airplane and will get you myself.”

You laughed humourlessly.

“No, you were right. I have to fix myself. I had to get away from all of that. But I just can’t seem to get better. I don’t know that else to do, Ryan. I try to focus on myself, I go to a therapist, I try to get outside a lot. But… nothing.”

“You will get better, you have to. I couldn’t handle losing you, Y/N!”

Denver airport was buzzing this particular early February morning. You stood at the baggage claim, waiting for your suitcase to appear. The waiting time left you questioning yourself whether you made the right decision to come back here. You were only coming for a few days. To catch up with Mel and Linnea. Really Mel had been the one pushing you, saying that it would do you good to talk with someone you used to see almost everyday.

Finally you spotted your suitcase and made your way towards the exit. Finding Mel was easy enough, since she had spotted you way before you were near her and was now waving frantically. As soon as you got to her she gave you a big hug. Still, you were feeling at unease. You didn’t really know why. The team was on a roadtrip and wouldn’t be back for a few days, so there was no possibility to run into Ryan.

You weren’t actively avoiding him but you weren’t ready to face him either. YOU hadn’t spoken to him in weeks. You were supposed to be gone for a bit and come back once you felt better. Now over 2 months had passed and you weren’t better at all. You weren’t ready to come back, you were just visiting. You weren’t even sure anymore if you could ever come back. And that scared you. You used to love the city, loved living here, loved your job. Now, that was all gone. How would you be able to tell Ryan this? Tell him that you were failing at fixing yourself. Tell him to wait around for you, in hope that maybe one day, one day you would get better.

He had tried to call you occasionally but you usually weren’t picking up. Just sending him lame excuses for not answering the phone, knowing that he would see right through you. But you couldn’t stand to hear his voice. He cared so much, even though you weren’t giving him any reason to. You wouldn’t be able to lie to him, wouldn’t be able to give him false hope, that it would all work out. Cause truly, you’d given up hope.

Mel was right. Catching up did you good. You had missed her, in a way you had also missed Denver. The Denver you used to love, before everything turned grey and lifeless. You talked to her for hours. You played with Linnea, went out for lunch and even agreed to watch the Avs game in the evening.

Talking with Mel put a lot into perspective for you. You saw things from a different view. You realised that not everything always was gonna be perfect. That you didn’t need to have that dreamjob to feel happy. Quiet the opposite actually. Trying to be enough had torn you apart.

You didn’t just talk about you and your struggles but also about stupid everyday things. About that coffeeshop you went to, about funny stories on the team, about Linnea’s newest adventures. And you realised how much you wanted this back. This life you used to love so much, before you let it take control over you.

Those couple of days seemed to pass in a hurry and you would soon return home. This time with a goal to return rather sooner than later. That morning Gabe had left for the first practice since returning from their roadtrip. When he came back the three of you, Linnea was asleep upstairs, hung around in the kitchen making light conversation. You heard the door open and close, but you really didn’t think of much. Mel’s panicked look threw you off guard.

“You were supposed to tell Ryan that he can’t come over after practice today,- !” Mel’s harsh whispering towards Gabe was cut short as Ryan entered the kitchen. Suddenly everything went silent. It took Ryan a couple seconds to spot you, but his shocked look his face told you that Gabe at least hadn’t told the team that you were back in town.

Ryan was still wrangling for words, while Gabe and Mel quickly escaped the kitchen. You wished you could have too.

“You’re back. I didn’t know…” You knew he didn’t mean to sound so accusing and hurt, but it still stung. “Were you going to tell me?”

You were fighting for words. You didn’t think you would see him, you were hoping he wouldn’t find out. Your silence was enough of an answer for him, the disappointment written all over his face.

“I only came to visit, I’m not staying, Ryan.” You realised too late how wrong your words sounded. Ryan let out a sigh, frustration slowly building up.

“Obviously not to visit me.” He sounded sad and hurt. “I thought this was just some time away for you, not like… a breakup or something.”

“It’s not, Ryan. I- “ But you really didn’t know how to answer this honestly. Because it did feel like a breakup to you too.

He stepped closer to you before speaking up quietly. “ I love you, Y/N! I always will. And I’ll wait for you as long as you want me to. I won’t give up on you, ok? But if this is not what you want anymore, I need to know. Cause I can’t keep calling you, reaching out to you, keep holding on if you have already let go.”

You wanted to speak up, but you just didn’t know how. You just didn’t know how to let him down easy. And you could see in his eyes that he was waiting for you. But the longer you waited, the further he seemed to slip away.

He gave you a sad smile and a silently mouthed “I love you” before turning around and walking towards the door.

You knew he was long out of earshot when you finally spoke those words back to him.

“I love you too, Ryan.”

The rest of the day passed slowly. Everything seemed to drag on. You would fly back home the next day and you knew you had to tell Ryan to hold on just a bit longer. But you felt immobilized. Mel tried to talk to you about your confrontation, but to no use. You pushed her away, shut her out. So she let you be.

You were sitting in Mel’s car on your way to the airport. Mel was making light conversation and was actively avoiding the elephant in the room. And you were thankful for that. You wouldn’t know what to say.

For a minute you considered telling Mel to turn the car around and drive you to Ryan’s apartment. To your apartment. But you couldn’t do it. And a couple hours later you were sitting in the plane taking you towards your hometown.

You’d been sulking at home the entire rest of the day. You had to tell him. The sooner the better. But you hated confrontation so you waited til the next morning, when you were sure he was at practice. Your voicemail was short but hopefully enough to get the message across.

“Don’t… don’t give up on me, Ryan. I’m trying ok?” That was all you had said.

When he called you in the evening, it was the first time in a long time you answered to one of his calls. You talked for what felt like hours. Nothing deep or meaningful, just the little things. But when you hung up and you went to bed, it was the first time in months where you didn’t have trouble falling asleep.

Now you weren’t missing a single call of his. He asked you about your day, about your session with the therapist, whether you’d drank enough water and you would ask him about his day, about the team, about practice or about the game. Over the next months those calls started to become your favourite part of your day. It was one of the things you were looking forward to.

As you were sitting in your therapist’s office late in march, you kept replaying something she’d said earlier during the session. “You only know how to use the tools to fix your heart, but that doesn’t mean someone else can’t stand beside you and hand them to you.”

And you realised just how right she was. While nobody else could use those tools, it helped to know that there was someone standing beside you supporting you, helping you out, guiding you. And that someone was Ryan. And you knew then that that two of you would be fine. Even if it took a while til you got better. You’d already gotten better over the last few weeks.

So a couple of days before the regular season ended you flew back into Denver. This time not for a visit. You hadn’t told Ryan that you were coming. Since Mel or Gabe couldn’t come pick you up EJ came and drove you home. Talking with him on the drive home made you realise just how much you missed the team. They were like a second family to you. EJ was probably more excited for you to be back than you himself. He kept telling you how hard it had been for Ryan to be away from you and that he was glad that you were finally back so he wouldn’t have to hear Ryan pour his heart out to him on every team flight.

EJ helped you carry your bags up to your apartment door but told you that he would let the two of you reunite in peace. It took you a bit to calm your nerves before you were able to knock. Technically you still had the key and it was still your home as well, but you didn’t want to just barge in.

You could hear his footsteps walking towards the door and you were sure that you could feel your heart beating louder than ever before. You couldn’t hear any hesitation in his steps, indicating that he definitely hadn’t looked through the peephole before opening the door. This was only further proven by his shocked expression he wore when realising who was standing in front of him.

The surprised expression didn’t stay for long though and before you knew you were being scooped up into his arms. You could hear him exhale slowly. “You’re back…”

Your breath was caught in your throat. Shocked you looked down at the ice where your boyfriend had you moments before made heavy contact with the boards. It was midway through the third period and an opposing player thought the best was to avenge his teams 4 goal deficit by giving out a dirty boarding hit. It was the last regular season game and the clinching game for both teams, so emotions were running hot. He was still down, not moving. You watched in shock as the athletic trainers made their way onto the ice. Mel had wrapped an arms around your shoulder but you barely acknowledged her.

You could faintly hear her soft “He’s going to be fine Y/N, okay?” All you could do was give her a slow nod. In what seemed like slow motion, Ryan was helped onto his feet by the trainer and some of his teammates. His head hung low and he was basically dragged towards the tunnel but at least he was able to get up on his own.

You released the breath you were holding. You were still shaking but he seemed to be better than you first anticipated. The rest of the game passed by you in a blur. You were on autopilot. You barley registered Nate scoring on the powerplay that resulted from the hit. Neither did you acknowledge the empty netter from Mikko making it 6-0 for the avs in the end and subsequently clinching a playoff spot. As soon as the buzzer sounded you were out of your seat, trying to make your way down to the locker room.

Mel caught your arm and tugged you towards her. “Hey, he will be just fine, okay? He’s a though one. Let’s go down together, yeah?” You quickly nodded and gave her a hug. “Thank you, I don’t know what I would do without you sometimes.” You meant it, she was always such a good friend to you. She gave you a reassuring smile before wrapping an arm around you and making your way down to the locker room.

You were pacing holes into the carpet in the families room, impatiently waiting for someone to come out of the locker room and give you an update on Ryan. You nearly jumped EJ when he finally emerged as the first player.

“He’s fine Y/N. Just a little shaken up. He’ll be out soon.” He gave you a quick hug. And it really didn’t take long for Ryan to emerge. He looked tired and worn out, but he was walking on his own and you couldn’t detect any injury so you took this as a good sign.

He quickly closed the distance and pulled you in for hug. It was quiet but you could still hear him mutter “I’m fine, Y/N. I’m glad you’re back” into your hair. And in this moment you realised that the anxiety, the tight feeling in your chest and the worry about Ryan had lifted. One simple hug let all your worries wash away. It seemed to fix all your problems and worries. Just like it had used to do.

When Ryan pulled away you could see it in him as well. That realization. He gave you a kiss on your temple.

“You’re back, Y/N. You’re back. God, I missed you so much.”

And you knew he didn’t just mean your physical return to Denver. You were back.

*the end*

#ryan graves #ryan graves fic #ryan graves imagine #ryan graves x reader #nhl imagine #nhl fanfiction #colorado avalanche

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rydeszegras · 4 years

Text

hospitals make miracles - r.donovan

hi guys ! this is my first fic and its not good whatsoever but figured id give it a shot haha, hope you enjoy !

wc: 1,623

warnings: minor swearing, mentions of injuries

you were a senior at andover high school on a roadie up to your annual trip in duluth. youve been taking this trip since your freshman year as you were one of the first players to ever make varsity as a freshman. that being said, this was your year, this was the year you had to show out. being named captain this season not only did you have to step up and lead the team, but you also had to focus on your game as it was your year to get scouted. you’d been looked at by minnesota-duluth, boston college, and minnesota, but all you wanted was to go to wisconsin, and this was your year to make it happen.

“y/n/n, are you ready to see all the hot duluth boys this weekend? i heard their varsity team plays at the same time of us and they have the wisco hot shot ryder donovan.” lilly said bouncing up and down in the seat next to you. you and lilly had been best friends ever since you met eachother at little wild camp 12 years ago. “y/n are you even listening”, “oh yeah sorry lil, just thinking about this weekend, did you know wisconsin scouts are gonna be there, i dont know if i can do this lil, i cant mess up, my future relies on this weekend” you exclaimed, trying not to freak out. “y/n/n you’ll be great i promise, but we should get some rest, weve still got 1.5 hours left and we’ve got a big game against east tonight.” you nod your head in agreement, dozing off into a deep sleep.

after an hour and a half of driving you arrive at the rink, getting up you fix your hair and adjust your sweats and parka and get ready to go grab your bag. after grabbing your bag, you start to head into the rink when you hear lil and ken start screaming, turning your head you see what all the fuss is about. and there he is. standing right before your eyes. ryder donovan. you’ve seen him in pictures as you followed him and some of his friends on instagram, but wow he was even prettier in person.

stumbling into the rink you make your way into the locker room gearing up to take the ice for warmups at duluth heritage. stepping onto the ice you complete your typical warmup of one-timers, slaps, and some stretching before noticing two big things in the stands. wisconsins top scout, and wisconsins top recruit, ryder. you didnt like it, but you just couldnt take your eyes off him.

the game begins and you take the ice playing your heart out making a clean goal through the five hole and racking in two more assists. after taking the ice to begin the last 20 mins of play, you get ready to take the faceoff for the third period. you win the faceoff clean and go to prepare to set yourself up to take a one-timer on the net. thats when tragedy strikes, when bringing your stick back to recieve the one-timer, before you know it you’re slammed into the boards on a cross check. tumbling down you hear a snap, a snap so loud that you watch the scout and ryder jump to their feet. as the athletic trainer scrambles to try and get you off the ice, you’re taken off the ice on a stretcher as you cant seem to put any weight on your right leg.

on the way to the hospital all you can think is why me, why now, why today. knowing it was probably your acl, you knew you were done for the season, that was it, it was over. scrolling through your twitter you saw your team won 5-2, which put your team in an excellent spot to start the season.

you arrived at the hospital and settled into your bed when a quite familiar but unfamiliar face walked into your toom. left speechless you see the 6’3 brunette standing in your doorway. “hey im ryder, i know you probably dont know me but i know you, you’re all the wisconsin scout has talked about for the past year and as im committed there i knew i had to see what the girls team is gonna have to offer and let me tell you, you looked incredible out there” ryder says shakily, messing with his fingers. you thank ryder and invite him into your room to sit on the chair. “trust me ryder i know you, youre all the girls have talked about after finding out that we played east this season, and youre committed to my dream school so theres that too, but theres no way the wisconsin scout wants anything to do with me, especially now that i have a double torn acl” you said, pointing down at your stitched up and wrapped knee, trying not to cry.

the next day, lil picked you up to bring you back to your hotel. on the car ride there you told her about everything that happened last night but when telling her you felt you sounded crazy, theres no way that thee ryder donovan went to visit YOU at the hospital and there’s absolutely no way that the wisconsin scout actually liked you. that was until you saw the instagram notification pop up on your screen... rydesdono would like to send you a message. you were shocked, theres no way that actually happened, but you opened the dm anyways to see what there was to say.

ryder donovan:

hey cutie, i never got your number last night and i was hoping we could catch up a little bit sometime if you feel up to it, i know with your knee it might not be easy, but i figured i would ask:)

you sat speechless. theres no way last night absolutely happened and there was absolutely no way he just called you “cutie”, but of course youre gonna meet up with ryder, no matter how much work it is

you:

hey rydes! id love to meet up with you again ! heres my number 952-***-****

thinking he might not actually text you because thats what hockey boys do, but sure enough you were proved wrong

maybe: ryder

hey y/n its ryder, pick you up at 6?

you:

absolutely, cant promise it’ll be easy with my knee and all, but i’ll make it work:))

rydes:

how about i pick us up food and bring it back to your hotel room, that way you can still have dinner with me but you can rest your knee at the same time;)

you:

that sounds great, ill make sure to leave the door unlocked

speechless you instantly call lilly and tell her everything, who freaks out the second you mention his name. as much as she doesnt believe it, you dont either. how is it that getting injured led you to a hot shot hockey player that is committed to the same school you are (yep thats right, wisco gave you an offer!!), one who’s actually genuine and nice AND insanely attractive. its mind blowing, but knowing theres no way this goes anywhere, as youd have to take the 2 hour drive back to andover in two days and probably wouldnt see ryder again until next year when you were both at wisconsin.

about an hour and a half later you hear two quiet knocks at your door, yelling “come in” at the sound. from your bed you see the cute hockey player who walks in from the doorway carrying the bag of food he got from grandmas, which happened to be your favorite restaurant in duluth. ryder sets the food on the table getting your food prepared so you didnt have to get up. he brings your food over to you and you invite him to sit next to you on your bed. you turned on your tv to the umd vs minnesota game as you rest your head on ryder who had just put his arm around you after you both finished eating. after talking for hours, that really felt like 10 mins, ryder decided that he should probably get back home and even if you didnt want him to go, you agreed.

for weeks after that you and ryder talked and talked for hours on end nonstop whether it was through snapchat, messages, or facetime. even though you only lived two hours apart, your schedules clashed too much to ever be able to meet up with eachother again. eventually after a year later you had completed your physical therapy and were ready to start your first year as a badger, but most importantly you were eager for ryder to get into town so you could hug the gorgeous brunette again.

when arriving at labahn, you were preparing yourself for the first day of practice and your next meet up with ryder, as the boys were using labahn as well as kohl center was undergoing some remodeling. you pull your bag out of your grand cherokee when you saw the brunette, and just like the first time you saw him your heart stopped. dropping your bag you ran in a dead sprint to see him as he dropped his bag and ran towards you wrapping his arms around your shoulders as if its been decades since youve last seen him as he held you for what felt like forever, when ryder whispered into your ear, “so hospitals really do make miracles happen” as he picked you up to kiss you before making your way into practice, knowing that without your injury you may have never found eachother the way you did.

#ryder donovan #ryder donovan fluff #nhl #vegas golden knights #wisco hockey #nhl imagine #ryder donovan imagine #rydesdono #college hockey

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cynthiaandsamus · 4 years

Text

Attack on Titanland

Eren and his friends are on a class trip to Titanland! A theme park that for some reason has mascots in the shape of giant monsters.

(So the final season is depressing me and I had a dream about Eren going to an Attack on Titan theme park so here’s just a fluff fic for it)

“Eren, wake up we’re almost at the park.” Mikasa nudged the boy as their bus rolled into the parking lot.

“Huh? What…?” Eren rubbed the sleep out of his eyes as he looked around, disoriented as if coming out of another world.

“I swear you always fall asleep on car rides.” Armin chuckled, nudging him from the other side. “Did you forget where you are? The class trip to Titanland?”

“Titanland?” Eren repeated, his thoughs slowly returning to him. “Oh yeah.” He glanced out the window to the large billboard advertizing the front of the theme park and the long-haired green-eyed giant that appeared to be the mascot for the park. “Whose bright idea was it to make a theme park and base the rides off of a bunch of monsters?”

“I think they look kind of neat.” Mikasa gave a small smile, looking up at the Mascot Titan.

“Some people are scared of roller coasters, the Titans look scary and intimidating like that but they also look big and strong, like they know what they’re doing. I’d say using them for roller coasters is a fitting idea.” Armin laughed along as well.

“Alright class, settle down.” Hange called over the speaker from the front of the bus. “Now you have free reign when we get into the park but do try to stick together and use the buddy system, enjoy the rides! Personally I recommend the Thunder Spear, at almost one hundred fifty miles per hour it’s one of the top ten fastest roller coasters in the northern hemisphere!”

“You’re supposed to be the chaperone, not the tour guide.” Levi gave a grump groan that was half-caught over the loudspeaker before the other chaperone took the microphone for himself. “Alright listen up you brats. Don’t get lost, don’t wreck anything and stick together, now get outta here.” He tossed the transmitter back onto the hook right before a hoard of kids rushed out of the bus.

“So, what should we do first?” Eren looked to Armin, he’d designated himself the group’s planner so they could see as much of the park as they could during their short stay.

“Well, if you don’t mind there is one ride I’ve always wanted to see.” Armin held up the map and pointed to a spot of blue.

“’Paradise Sea’?” Eren quirked a brow. “Pretty relaxed for a monster-themed theme park isn’t it?”

“It’s the world’s largest tubing route, think of it as a good warmup.” The blonde boy grinned ear to ear, neither he nor Mikasa could object to a smile like that.

Soon the trio was in the water, Mikasa held the handles of her tube to one of the handles each of Eren and Armin’s tubes. “Eren you hold on too so you don’t float away and get lost.” She grumbled sternly.

Eren sighed “I won’t get lost.”

“You always get lost.” Mikasa objected.

“You do kind of always get lost.” Armin gave an amused chuckle.

“Ugh, enough about me. What are we going to do next Mr. Planner?” Eren looked at Armin, map still in the blonde’s hands.

“Well we could try the park’s signature coaster.” He pointed to a spot not too far away on the map with a brief description of the ride.

“The Behemoth, huh?” Eren read aloud, looking at the Mascot Titan from the entrance. “Man that dude need a haircut.” He mumbled, running a hand through his own hair.

“Among all the rides it’s got the best mix of height and speed, it’s a must-ride for a lot of roller coaster fanatics across the country. “ Armin wiggled excitedly in his tube.

“I don’t know, I don’t really like heights.” Eren sighed.

A snort from a few feet away caught his attention. “Why’d you even come then?” Jean shouted over, his group with Marco, Sasha, and Connie floating a few feet away with their own tubes lightly tied together in a square.

“Mind your own business!” Eren shouted, standing on his tube and glaring down at Jean.

“Why don’t you make me!?” The other boy also stood, nose inches from Eren’s.

“No standing in the tubes!” Levi gave a bored warning as he and Hange floated by, kicking both of their inner tubes and making them fall back down into them ass-first with a splash.

The shock of the kick forced Mikasa’s hand from off Eren’s handle, his tube floating away from the little triangle the trio had formed. “EREN!” Mikasa screamed as his tube drifted towards another path along the lazy river.

“It’ll be fine guys, we’ll meet up later!” Eren shouted over the sound of churning water before the foliage blocked him from view.

“He got lost again…” Armin gave a defeated sigh and shook his head.

A short bit later, Mikasa and Armin got changed back into their normal clothes, exiting the river ride with no sign of Eren at the entrance. “I can’t believe we lost Eren…” A pall was cast over Mikasa’s face.

“I had a meetup spot for us but I don’t think I got a chance to tell Eren, I’m sure we’ll find him when it comes time to meet up for dinner, let’s just walk around for now.” The blonde chuckled nervously.

Strolling down Titanstreet. LDA the main avenue that led off into the various hubs that held the rides and attractions, the duo passed by several of the park’s most popular stops along the way.

“Hey, hey, come on, no bumping.” Came the voice of a tired-sounding woman with long messy hair at a stall for electric cars. A sign above the ride read “The Go-Kart Titan” with a picture of a quadrupedal monster with a long face. The poor woman manning the ride looked like she hadn’t had a break in a long time and could barely stand up.

“Come on step right up, if you’ve got the courage to take on THE BEAST~” A blonde man with a beard and glasses called into the crowd, advertizing a salt and pepper shaker ride that that spun the riders around as if they were a baseball in a fast pitch, the sign on the front displaying a hair giant with long arms. “You look like you’ve got some courage little lady, care to give it a try?” The man reached out to Mikasa.

“No thanks.” She said with a surprising chill that sent a shiver down the older man’s spine, her face dark and miserable.

“S-Sorry about her, we’re looking for our friend.” Armin chuckled, rubbing the back of his head.

“Man, kids today sure are scary…” The man dusted off his glasses and shuddered.

“Hey Armin!” A voice called out to the two from the crowd. “Do you wanna try this ride with me?” Bertoldt asked, looking up at a huge tower ride that dropped a row of people from several stories up before propelling them back into the air and dropping them again. The sign read “The Colossus” and showed a humongous giant with no skin peeking over the park walls. “It looks exciting, but I’m kinda scared to go alone.” The tall man chuckled nervously.

“Sorry, we’re looking for Eren right now.” Armin smiled at Bertoldt and shrugged. “Why not ask Reiner to go with you?”

“He’s got his hands full with the kids there.” Bertoldt chuckled nervously, pointing to the burly blonde who had a younger child on each arm, tugging him in opposite directions.

“Come on, I wanna go on the Armored Cat ride!” Gabi tugged Reiner’s hand towards a a fast-moving ride featuring a giant covered in plate armor that made you feel like you were in an armored car busting through walls.

“Awww, but let’s go on the Jaw Snapper first!” Falco huffed, tugging Reiner in the other direction, pointing to a a ride advertized by a monster with a wild mane that spun the riders in a jaw-like centrifuge.

“I think I should probably go help him actually.” Bertoldt chuckled to himself, heading over to the trio.

“Chill Bert, I got this one.” A voice called over the tall man’s shoulder. “Besides, Annie’s got business with you, she wants to meet you over at the Tunnel of Love.” Ymir pointed her thumb back towards a sign depicting a female giant in a cave full of shining crystals.

“Oh, uhh right… thanks Ymir!” Bertoldt blushed, heading over to the ride.

“That’s really nice of you Ymir.” Armin grinned at the woman.

“Nice ain’t got nothing to do with it.” Ymir cracked her knuckles with a grin. “Reiner’s gonna owe me and I’m meeting Historia here for dinner later tonight so he’s gonna foot the bill.” She headed over to Reiner and the kids, ebdning down to take Falco’s hand. “Come on Falco I’ll take you on the Jaw Snapper, Reiner and Gabi can go on the other one.”

“Ehehe… she can be a bit scary sometimes herself…” Armin chuckled nervously watching Ymir’s machinations unfold.

Meanwhile back on Paradise Sea. Eren slowly woke up, finding himself trapped in a current that kept his tube going around in circles. “Huh… guess I fell asleep again…” He looked up at the clear sky, wincing as he felt his skin tingle when he blinked. “Ow that’s right, Armin had the sunscreen…” He grumbled, the sunburn giving the spots under his eyes a reddish hue, wrinkles forming around the burn that made the skin around his eyes look raw.

“Now… how do I get out of here…” The boy mumbled to himself, trying to gently shift his tube back and forth to work himself out of the current, bumping himself of the edge of the river and heading towards the end of the ride. Quickly enough he was changed again, looking at the sun to see quite some time had passed. “Man, Mikasa’s gonna be so pissed…”

“Eren!” A blonde girl came up behind the boy and bumped into him playfully. “Have you seen Ymir around? She said she had some big plans but then just wandered off, something about owing Reiner or something.” Historia blinked up at him.

“No I haven’t, I just got off my first ride and you’re the first person I’ve run into.” Eren rubbed the back of his head. “Sorry.”

“Ouch dude, you got some color…” Historia blinked, touching the red circles under Eren’s eyes.

“YEOWCH! Who goes and touches someone else’s sunburn!?” Eren shouted, backing up a step.

“Sorry, sorry! Well since we both got separated from our groups, maybe we can look for them together.” Historia gave a smile. “We can head to the center of the park and see if anyone’s there.”

“That’s a good an idea as any, Armin probably told me the meetup spot but I don’t think I was paying attention.” The two headed towards the center of the park, passing by the “Whack-A-Hammer Titan” stall that featured a crystalline giant holding a hammer with games and prizes on display for those willing to try.

“What do you mean I’m not tall enough to ride!? I’m the chaperone and I can’t exactly chaperone the kids on those rides if you won’t let me on!” Levi huffed, crossing his arms in front of a railroad ride as Sasha and Connie danced onto it with smug grins. “Fine, don’t blame me if those two idiots flash your cameras or something though.”

“Seems like everyone’s having fun?” Historia gave a chuckle, watching the scene as they approach the center of the park, a large statue of the park’s Founder, a tremendous female giant with glowing white eyes holding the hand of a young girl. “Her name’s Ymir too, huh? Small world…” A thin smile crossed Historia’s lips, as if fondly reminiscing.

“I can’t believe it’s already this late, the fireworks’ll be starting at sundown.” Eren looked around, not seeing anyone at first.

“Well isn’t this romantic? What are you two up to?” Mikasa said dryly, appearing behind Eren with a menacing glare.

“AH! NOTHING!” Eren and Historia shouted In unison and jumped away from each other.

“I was about to say the same thing, seems you’re a girl magnet Eren.” Annie called with a similarly wry tone, leading Bertoldt by the hand a small hat with angelic wings for ears atop the tall man’s head and two bundles of cotton candy in his hands.

“It’s nothing! We just got lost together! And who are you two to chew me out anyway!?”

“Oooh, ‘getting lost together’ with Historia, Ymir’s gonna break your jaw. Let me know when that happens because I don’t want to miss it.” Jean chuckled, leading Marco, Sasha and Connie away from the food stalls, a turkey leg in each of their hands.

“Did the petting zoo break down? Who let a wild horse just run around like that?” Eren gave a cock smirk. “Oh it’s just Jean.”

“Enough you two, the fireworks are about to start.” Marco got between the two before they could start brawling, chuckling nervously.

A low shaking echoed through the park as lights illuminated the recently darkened area. “What’s that Rumbling?” Eren blinked, looking around.

“It means the show’s about to start.” Armin grinned as and Mikasa flanked him from either side.

“Yeah, that Rumbling happens every night before the fireworks.” Historia grinned as the others started gathering around them at the center of the park as well.

Sure enough soon the show began, nine differently colored rockers shooting into the sky and exploding, lighting up the whole park like daytime. Eren watched as the fireworks illuminated his friends’ awed faces, the sky alight like a shining aurora dancing through it. Mikasa gripped his hand as his friends crowded in from every side, pointing and laughing and watching the show.

Yeah, this was nice.

-----------

Eren’s eyes shot open, staring up at the cold dark brick ceiling of his jail cell once again. Despite his crazy dreams he hadn’t left this place in quite some time. “More memories? From the past, or future, or somewhere else?” He muttered to himself with a sigh before closing his eyes, memories of reality slowly coming back to him as a defeated sigh ripped itself from deep in his lungs.

“Yeah… that would have been nice…”

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shookethbrooketh · 5 years

Text

seven days

day five

summary: dan is stuck in the wrong timeline. one day, he kisses phil goodnight. the next morning, he’s completely alone. he doesn’t even recognize where he wakes up, and little details in the world around him have changed. he has no clue what’s happening or where to go next in an effort to fix it; all he knows is that he has to find phil.

genre: sci-fi, a lil bit of angst, happy ending

warnings: just some swearing!

fic word count: 13.6k chapter word count: 3.3k

written for the @phandomreversebang ! inspired by the awesome moodboard/edits by @maybeformepersonally ! beta’d (beginning to end) by @i-might-just-leave-soon !

dan clambered to his feet and made his way to the door. he walked slowly and emotionlessly back to the flower shop and into its adjacent flat, where he flopped back down onto the same couch he woke up on. he hadn’t even anything to process; he knew exactly what he had to do. he had to wait - for another day, for another trope, for another phil.

read it on ao3

Dan woke up in his bunk and attempted to stretch his arms, but, as usual, there was no space. Why did he and Phil choose to sleep in stupid, tiny bunks instead of the master bed?��

The movement of the tour bus was soothing to Dan; he couldn’t quite remember what had happened, but he felt as if he’d had a long, terrible dream. He tore open the curtain to his bunk and carefully slid out so as to not hit his head, but as soon as his feet hit the floor he could tell he wasn’t in his tour bus at all.

Everything came flooding back to him; Interactive Introverts had ended nearly a year earlier, yet simultaneously it hadn’t happened at all, and in this universe it never would. Dan certainly was in a tour bus, but it wasn’t the II bus, and it certainly wasn’t 2018.

“Shit,” he heard from a bunk to the right of his. “I’ve really got to get used to that.” A body fell out of the bunk with absolutely no grace, and the man appearing before Dan barely managed to land feet first. He was rubbing the back of his blonde-haired head, and Dan could tell he was suffering a pain all too familiar: he’d hit his head on the bunk. “G’mornin’, Dan.”

Dan was taken aback for a moment by the fact that the man knew his name even though they’d never met, but within a few seconds he’d adjusted and shot back, “Morning.”

Dan sat down at the mini table in the bus’s “kitchen” and began mapping out his conversation. He’d learned to be quite careful conversing with people in odd timelines; if he arose too much suspicion, it could affect his ability to find Phil later in the day. He had to figure out what he needed to know to get by in this universe, and quick.

“So where are we going today again?” Dan asked nonchalantly. He was lucky in this particular timeline; he’d obviously had experience on tour, so he at least knew what that portion was like. He just needed the details.

“Detroit,” the man said, lighting a cigarette. Dan struggled not to cough. What kind of a tour bus was this? “Want one?” he asked, noticing Dan eyeing the stick of death.

“No thanks,” he answered, and the other man raised an eyebrow but let it go quickly.

“We’ll be rolling up in a few hours. You’re on opening act today,” he said, and Dan was immediately filled with fear and confusion.

“I’M opening?” Dan blurted out. He wasn’t a musician. Now that he thought about it, he didn’t even know that this was a musician’s tour. Who was he?

“I know it’s your first show on this rotation, but you’ll be fine. All you’ve gotta do is make sure the opening act gets in and set up alright. You’ll have help.” He paused to blow smoke directly in Dan’s face. “Roadie code.”

Dan wasn’t sure what ‘roadie code’ was, but all he could do in that moment was attempt to get out of the smoke cloud that was billowing in his direction. As soon as he could breathe, his focus turned quickly to trying to decipher what he was being told. He was a roadie, or at least that was what he had deduced. His duty for the day was to make sure everything ran smoothly for the opening act of this show, which worried him given that opening acts were about the only thing that he hadn’t experienced from his time on tour. However, he had other priorities.

“Who’s the opening act?” Dan asked.

“Some guy called Phil Lester. He’s another emo dude.”

Bingo.

Dan was completely mentally prepared when the bus arrived at the venue a few hours later. He’d been rehearsing in his head what he was going to say to Phil as much as he could from the moment he’d gotten there, and it was finally time to put it into action.

His head drifted off topic for a moment as he got off the bus and started unloading. He noticed that the venue was the same one he and Phil had been to when they went to Detroit for TATINOF, and he couldn’t help but take a moment to reminisce. Things had been so good then; their tour was beginning to look up from its original controversy, their relationship was as strong as ever, and, most importantly, they were together. The place held good memories for Dan, and he couldn’t help but hope it would hold good omens for him and the Phil of its universe.

“Here’s your crew,” the guy Dan had been talking to earlier said once they’d gotten inside. By then he’d learned that his name was Tommy, and he was the head roadie for the tour. Behind him were about five crew members from the venue. He recognized only one of them, which didn’t surprise him since it was ten years in the past, but it did remind him that he’d had an odd feeling of deja vu when he first saw her in 2016. Having his deja vu validated almost sent him into an existential crisis, but he repressed his thoughts; he had business to attend to.

“Awesome, thanks,” Dan finally replied. Tommy walked away and Dan turned to the crew. “Do you guys know where Phil is?”

“He’s in his dressing room. It’s down the hall, and it’s labeled ‘opener’,” responded someone with an emo haircut Dan had to remind himself was completely normal. He nodded, muttering something about setting up speakers as he disappeared in the direction the crew member was pointing.

His heart pounded as he came up to the door and knocked. Phil opened the door almost immediately, and Dan quickly discovered that Tommy was right about his emo act. He was dressed in almost complete black, and he seemed to have embraced his messy fringe to a point where Dan, with his 2019 brain, could barely handle looking at it.

“Are you the one in charge of getting me set up?” he asked immediately, radiating edgy, careless energy.

Dan was completely frozen out of shock; he’d had his plan all laid out, and Phil had immediately changed it. “Yeah, I-” he eventually stuttered out, but Phil cut him off before he could even begin to figure out what he was going to say next.

“Wonderful, let’s go.” Phil pushed right past him, and he was somehow rendered even more speechless than before. This Phil was not going to be easy to convince.

Dan followed as closely behind as he could, practically falling over himself as he trailed after Phil to the stage. The crew was already working efficiently to set everything up, and Phil stepped up to the microphone as if he owned the stage.

“We ready?” he asked, assuming a powerful stance; he truly practiced like he would perform.

Someone in a distant sound box gave him a thumbs up and started playing a track. “Where’s the backup?” he shouted.

From the gathering of the crew offstage, Dan heard a “they’ll be here a bit before the show!” Phil dramatically rolled his eyes and started singing to the recording. This clearly was a Phil completely unlike the one he knew.

The situation, however, was completely familiar to Dan. Having been on tour twice, he was more than used to a simple sound check. Phil seemed to prefer to jump straight into his songs while some of the crew was still setting up the main act’s equipment behind him, but Dan couldn’t help but appreciate the style just a bit. A quick rehearsal before a show was a refreshing, far from foreign concept in the foreign world he was living in.

After Phil had finished up, he took off back to his dressing room before Dan could even attempt to speak to him. He tried to prepare himself again before heading back down the hallway, but he was almost immediately interrupted. “Dan!”

He turned to see Tommy with the members of the band they’d been traveling with. Dan hadn’t heard of them, so he assumed it was a difference in the timelines, but they seemed to be a slightly different version of My Chemical Romance.

“Can you help me on security?”

“Security already?” asked, dumbfounded by the fact that warmups were just starting and they already needed security.

“A few fans are starting to get lined up; someone just needs to keep them in order. I’ll come get you off once we get through rehearsal, I promise. You’ll be back in time to cover opening rehearsal with the band.”

Dan sighed and responded, failing to hide his dejected tone. “Where do I need to go?”

By the time he’d been relieved from security duty, Dan had become completely aware of how much of a pain 2009 was. Despite his complete awareness that he was the exact same way, he couldn’t help but be dreadfully annoyed by the lines and lines of emo teenagers giving him flashbacks to times he didn’t particularly want to remember. Everything they said and did were completely reflective of what the culture used to be like, and it almost infuriated him to know that they had no idea how “cringe” they would consider their behavior to be in the future. That would be true of any point in a cultural timeline, but Dan could still barely handle living in the past with knowledge of the future.

Even worse, he had no way of telling time. Apparently a young roadie in 2009 didn’t carry a cell phone. Either that or Dan had left it on the bus. Regardless, he was driven nearly mad just by standing there waiting for someone to free him from this job and hoping and praying that he’d be able to talk to Phil before the show. If there was one thing Dan knew about performing, it was that once you perform, you leave. There was nothing better than a post-show tour bus sleep.

Finally, after what Dan could only assume by the movements of the sun was about an hour, Tommy came back with real venue security guards, and Dan was gone before they could even say a word. He had one thing on his mind, and that was getting to Phil’s dressing room.

This time, when he knocked on the door, Phil took slightly longer to answer. When he did open the door, he emerged with black eyeliner caked onto only one of his eyes. “You certainly seem to be interested in me this evening,” Phil said, continuing to apply eyeliner in front of him.

Dan had no idea what to say. All he could think was that he truly was in a fanfiction trope.

“I’m joking….obviously….” he trailed off, and Dan almost wanted to throw up in his mouth. Why did his journey through time have to be so cliche?

“Band’s here!” came a call from down the hall. Dan’s fists clenched up at his sides; he was quickly running out of time.

Dan walked awkwardly beside Phil to the stage, not daring to say anything at all after the ‘conversation’ they’d just had. It really wasn’t much of a conversation at all, but there wasn’t anything else he could call it.

Dan waited anxiously as the rehearsal went on, but he did enjoy watching; Phil seemed to be completely in his element performing with a band. Dan knew he had the whole science thing going, but he couldn’t help but hope this universe’s Phil would eventually make it big as a musician. In reality, his genre wouldn’t last long, but maybe he’d be like Brendon Urie and Fall Out Boy and evolve--or devolve, depending on the way you look at it.

Suddenly, rehearsal was over, and Dan didn’t even realize he’d drifted off into his own thoughts. It shocked him, given how focused he’d been earlier on his goal of trying to get information from Phil. Even he had become entranced by the appeal of the day’s trope. They do have a way of getting to you.

“Can I talk to you in your dressing room for a moment?” The words fell out of Dan’s mouth more than he spoke them. Nerves were beginning to creep back up; it was now or never.

“By all means,” Phil replied with a cool smirk. Dan couldn’t help but roll his eyes at himself for falling a bit for this Phil.

He followed Phil back to his dressing room like a terrified teenager who’d never kissed anyone before. When they reached the room, Phil held the door open for Dan, who went in and took a seat on the couch. The dressing room was nice, but it was nowhere near as nice as the one he and Phil had been in when they’d come to this venue. To be fair, seven years did tend to make a difference.

“So,” Phil said, running his hand through his hair and sitting down beside Dan, “what do you want to talk about?” He put a bit too much emphasis on the word talk for Dan’s taste.

Dan took a deep breath. Phil was sitting in such a manner that Dan knew he wanted to make out with him; Dan, however, had drastically different goals. Why was it that every time he needed information out of a Phil he had to ruin a perfectly good trope in doing it?

“I’m a time traveler.”

Phil took a moment to process this. Dan could recognize it as the same thoughts he went through when Phil first spoke to him; he’d had perfectly good plans in place, and what Dan said not only completely ruined them but probably also thoroughly confused him, at least at first.

“What year?”

“2019. I jumped around 2019 timelines for a few days and then got transported back to here. This is my second day in 2009.”

“Wow,” Phil said, clearly intrigued, “what’s it like?”

“It’s… good?” Dan said, a bit aggravated that they weren’t making better progress. “This entire thing goes out of style pretty soon, though,” he added, gesturing to Phil’s whole body. “But that doesn’t matter. You do this sort of science, don’t you? I know you’re nowhere near actual time travel, but you’re starting studies on the subject, are you not?”

Phil nodded. “You know about the Phils. You definitely are getting along well in your journey.” He stood up and walked over to a desk on the other side of the room and picked up a pad of paper and a pen; he seemed to have been drawing earlier. “What do you know?”

Dan’s entire story came spilling out almost uncontrollably. He truly hadn’t been able to vent to anyone the way he had to Phil, and it was just as relieving to him as it was helpful to Phil.

“That’s my story, I guess,” he ended, taking a deep breath and making eye contact with Phil, who had been taking some notes.

“I suppose it does make sense that this entire thing was a trope. That’s probably one of the simplest ways to explain how attracted I was to you having barely even spoken to you.” Dan wasn’t completely sure how to respond to that, so he just let Phil keep talking. “I have so many questions, mainly about the clear cultural differences that I can feel between us just from the way you spoke in your story and different things that you spoke of, but I doubt we have time to discuss anything like that. What matters is that we figure out how to get you home, back to your Phil.”

“As much as I’d love to explain fanfiction culture to you, I wholeheartedly agree.”

“Well, I can assume that your Phil is probably making efforts to look for you. He’s certainly realized something’s wrong with whatever Dan is in your universe right now.” Dan gulped; he hadn’t considered that there was another Dan currently with his Phil. It almost made him feel jealous. “The last Phil you met was right; there’s probably also another 2019 Phil in this universe somewhere. I’m not completely sure how you’d find him, but he’s probably the only one who knows enough to get you home.”

“But what do you know?” Dan asked, anxious to get to the point. Phil mentioning the lack of time for discussion suddenly made Dan quite aware that Phil had a show to open for any moment.

“Based off my research so far and what you’ve told me, I can make a couple calculations, but I definitely won’t be able to explain anything to you. I’ll just hand you a paper that you probably won’t be able to read, and you’ll have to show it to the next Phil. Keep it on you and hopefully it’ll come with you into the next timeline. I’ll work on all that after I perform--shit, the performance!”

Phil jumped up and ran to check a watch sitting on the desk. “I’m on in five!” he exclaimed, rushing for the door. “Let’s go!”

Dan and Phil rushed down the hall and backstage, where Phil got ready to go on. Dan tried to calm himself back into normal life, but it was difficult when normal life didn’t really seem to exist. All he could do for the time being was enjoy Phil’s music, and he was damned if he wasn’t going to enjoy Phil’s music.

He and Phil smiled at each other both as Phil went on and off the stage, and Phil disappeared quickly back into his dressing room to work on the calculations. Dan had nothing left to do but sit backstage and watch the rest of the concert.

When the band finally wrapped up, the entire crew immediately started moving, and Dan quickly joined in. “Dan, what are you doing?” he heard Tommy ask. “C’mon, you know we’re on band security getting out of here. Everyone else will get the stuff out just fine, even if we’re stuck here awhile. They’re slow, but they’re good.”

Dan bit his lip and walked out with Tommy and the band. He exhaled as he walked past Phil’s dressing room, trying to nonchalantly hit the door a bit in passing. He hoped Phil would notice; if he didn’t, Dan would be completely and utterly screwed.

They got out to the bus, and there was still no sign of Phil. The crew was beginning to get all the things outside and pack them underneath the bus; if Phil didn’t arrive soon, they’d have to leave without the paper.

“I’m going to go help them load,” Dan said, rushing off the bus before Tommy could comment on his obviously strange behavior. Dan quickly regretted his decision, as him helping sped up their process, and they were done loading within a few minutes.

“Let’s roll out,” someone said. The crew went back into the venue, and the rest of the roadies got on the bus. Dan furrowed his brow; he’d run out of time.

“Dan!” he heard, and his head turned faster than he could even register. A deep sigh of relief escaped his mouth as he saw Phil sprinting across the parking lot. Dan ran out to meet him, and when they finally met, Phil rested a hand on Dan’s shoulder to catch his breath.

He took Dan’s hand and placed the paper in it before taking a step back. “Good luck, Howell.”

#phan #phanfic #phanfiction #phic stuff #seven days #dong and ping

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gukyi · 7 years

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just a little bit of love (is all you really need) | pjm

⇒ summary: jimin’s something of a legend at gymnastics, but suddenly you walk in and turn his whole world upside down. quite literally, might i add.

⇒ gymnastics!au

⇒ pairing: jimin x female reader

⇒ word count: 4.5k

⇒ genre: fluff

⇒ warnings: none!

⇒ a/n: inspired by this post which, if you see my tags, is pretty much this entire fic laid out straight up. i power wrote this before a football game, so it’s unedited. also, flexible jimin?????

Jimin’s always kind of been flexible. He remembers playing in the park with his brother when he was three, jumping around and playing as three-year-olds do, when his brother taught him how to do somersaults in the grass. That summer, any time Jimin was presented with a flat surface in front of him longer than two meters, he’d do somersaults over and over and over, to the point where his neck would be sore and his head would be dizzy, and he loved it.

The following autumn was when his mother decided that enough was enough, and that if Jimin was going to be tumbling around the carpet in her house, she might as well get him into lessons where he can tumble elsewhere and get good at it. So she signed him up for toddler’s gymnastics at the local gymnastics center, and by the time he turned four that October, he was somersaulting like a pro.

Flexibility is just something that’s always come naturally to Jimin. He’s never not been able to bend backwards, to reach the tips of his toes with his palms when he stretched out over his legs. If you ask any of his family members, especially his mother, they’ll tell you how squeamish he was as a kid, how wriggly and wormy he was, always pulling these damn contortionist stunts as a casual toddler.

And flexibility is something you need when you’re in gymnastics, Jimin’s figured that much, and now he’s finally got this thing under his belt that he knows he’s good at, something he can be proud of. There are just so many benefits to being flexible when doing gymnastics, from when he was the first kid in his age group to master the splits—regular and straddle, to being the first one in his floor exercise class to not be afraid to bend backwards into bridge position, to being the kid all of the instructors praise during warmups, when he’s stretching his hands out nearly a foot past the end of his legs, pressing his chest right against his thighs as he stretches.

Jimin wins his first competition at age eight, holding that gold trophy that’s nearly as large as him as high as he can, in his small little arms that should have more muscle on them because he is a gymnast, after all, as he grins with all of his teeth to the camera flashes. He goes on to sort of amass quite the collection of trophies and medals and ribbons and plaques in his room over the next several years. They collect dust, now, his parents reserving a special shelf in their living room just for all of his achievements, a shelf Jimin hardly pays attention to unless he’s adding something to it. Just another thing to add to the transcript, Jimin thinks, but he doesn’t know what his life would be like without gymnastics to be there for him, without that one thing that Jimin loves more than love itself.

Jimin pours his heart and soul into gymnastics. Mind you, he pours his heart and soul into everything he does (except math, ugh), but gymnastics is all Jimin really cares about. It’s his favorite damn thing in the world to do, getting to the gym and changing into his gear in the locker rooms before tumbling onto the floor. It’s something that he feels confident about, and Jimin can’t necessarily say the same for his math skills.

The only downside to gymnastics? Jimin swears it’s stunted his growth.

It’s the summer before university, and Jimin picked a school near where he lives just so he wouldn’t have to leave the gymnastics center he loves so much, the faulty trampoline in the corner that breaks if you backflip on it too hard, the dusty beams in the center that make little kids scared to cartwheel off of, the aging locker rooms with doors that get stuck more often than not. Most of all, the coach Jimin’s worked with for the past ten years of his life is the best coach that he’s ever had, clearly, and Jimin would be nothing if not a fool if he gave him up.

“Park!” Hoseok shouts from inside the gym, where he’s working with a couple of the younger boys on their pommel horse moves. “You’re late! You said you’d be here at two!”

“I know!” Jimin shouts as he looks over the ledge separating the waiting area from the gymnastics center, meeting Hoseok’s eyes apologetically. “I got caught up in traffic!”

Jimin can practically hear Hoseok shaking his head to Jimin’s shitty excuse for why he was late. The truth is, Jimin saw a lost dog in the neighborhood he drives through every day to get to practice, and he wasn’t just going to leave a lost dog in the middle of the road like that. When he got out to check the poor thing’s collar, most of the engraving had eroded, but he could make out the road name, and went to every door on that street until he found the animal’s owners. Good waste of thirty minutes, if he’s being honest, and totally worth the thirty minutes lost of practice.

“Yeah, yeah, just get changed and get your butt in here! We have a floor routine for you to master!” Hoseok says mindlessly, focused on the younger kids in front of him as he guides them with the loving expertise of a more trained individual. Hoseok is only mean to Jimin, but that’s just because he cares, and it’s also because they’ve reached that level in their relationship where both of them can be playfully rude to each other without being personally offended.

Once Jimin’s got his Adidas duffel in a locker and his uniform on, he’s hopping over the ledge and meeting Hoseok on the floor as he finishes up with his pommel horse kids. Hoseok’s dusting off a significant amount of chalk on his hands, watching it fall to the floor like a drug littering the carpet.

“Did you warm up yet, Park?” Hoseok asks.

Jimin drops into a split for a quick second, twisting his back and cracking a good couple spots before switching legs. The whole process takes maybe fifteen seconds.

“Now I have.”

“Jimin, you’re really pushing it with this whole splits warm up thing. What if you tear something and can’t compete?”

“But I’m fine, Hoseok. See? No injuries,” Jimin whines petulantly, stomping his foot and curling into himself.

“Stretch, okay?” Hoseok orders, pointing to the floor. Jimin reluctantly sits down with his legs spread out, beginning to warm up like he inevitably does every time he comes, despite his protests. “There’s a new gymnast coming today, one around your age from a different city, and I have to go show her around. But I’m watching you.”

Hoseok points to his eyes with two fingers before pointing them back to Jimin as he leaves the floor, heading over to the waiting area to go talk with a girl and her mother. He does keep his eye on Jimin, though, so Jimin makes sure he’s stretching properly so he doesn’t tear some goddamn ligament during this practice and has to go to the ER and then can’t perform in his upcoming competitions and all of those awful things.

It’s not long before Jimin’s warming up on the floor with a couple flips and short routines, one-liners that take him fifteen seconds to complete, and Hoseok is finally walking into the gym again, albeit with you behind him.

Hoseok points to Jimin just as he finishes a run of some aerials and a backflip or two.

“That’s Jimin,” Jimin can hear Hoseok tell you. “He’s one of my best pupils. Killer at floor and rings, meh at everything else.”

Jimin scoffs at this, standing up quickly with his hands on his hips as he shouts. “Hey!”

“I’m kidding, though you do need to work on your bar routine a bit,” Hoseok promises, shrugging Jimin off because it’s practically second nature for him to just casually insult Jimin like it’s no big deal. No hard feelings.

You finally turn to him after nodding along to whatever Hoseok is telling you, and send Jimin a small wave. The miniscule action sends shivers down Jimin’s spine as he feels all the blood rushing to his head, pooling in his cheeks as he tries to wave back as non-awkwardly as he can, because holy shit, you are cute and he is nothing if not a sucker for cute people. If Hoseok loved Jimin enough, he would give him the rest of the day off and just let him show you around instead.

But he doesn’t, so Jimin is stuck standing in shock on the floor of the gymnastics center, watching you leave the area as Hoseok directs you to the smaller room with all of the bar equipment, both you and him vanishing from Jimin’s view.

Jimin somewhat (and by somewhat, he means a lot, very much so, a great amount) rushes through the floor routine Hoseok is making him learn, a dramatic thing that he is expected to master by the time competitions roll around in less than two months, just so he can cram in any time to go casually talk to you, gymnast to gymnast. Unfortunately, he’s been with Hoseok long enough for him to be able to pick up on any discrepancies in Jimin’s daily performance, and when Hoseok makes him slow down and practice despite Jimin’s clear insistence to just speed through the entire thing, he knows something’s up.

“Jimin, what the hell’s gotten into you?” Hoseok asks as Jimin bounces up and down on his toes, antsy. “You always slow down and practice your routines. Your body’s also too loose, what’s going on?”

“I just wanna get this routine down,” Jimin fibs.

“Not like this, you don’t,” Hoseok says, an eyebrow raised as he crosses his arms. “Run it from the top again, with the first big run of your stunts. Come on, we don’t have any time to waste.”

Jimin sighs aloud, letting his shoulders deflate as he moves back to the corner where he starts. The only good part about this starting point is the fact that if he cranes his neck just enough, he can get a glimpse of you covering your hands in chalk as you walk around on the mats under the unevens.

“Yoohoo!” A clap snaps Jimin out of his trance. “Jimin! Focus! I’m hitting play now, okay?”

Jimin manages to stay on track enough for him to complete the routine, but that doesn’t necessarily mean he completes it well, and Hoseok knows it. He gives him the rest of the day off to, in his words, “get his shit together”.

“Jimin,” Hoseok says before Jimin starts marching off towards the bars, placing a hand on his shoulder to stop him. “What’s gotten into you recently? You’ve been totally loopy today.”

“Nothing, nothing, really, I’m just out of it, I guess,” Jimin says quickly, shrugging off Hoseok’s hand as he makes eye contact with you. You smile amicably when you catch him looking at you, sending another small wave his way before moving on to whatever you were primarily focused on.

Hoseok might have dropped out of his law major in university, but he’s still smart enough to put two and two together. “Oh, I see what this is now.”

“What? What?” Jimin asks, as if he’s challenging his own coach to try and prove him wrong.

“You like that new girl, don’t you?” Hoseok asks suggestively, a smirk on his face. Jimin’s cheeks turn bright red once more, and as if that’s not already enough to give it away, he belatedly sends the most painfully awkward wave back to you.

“Don’t—”

“No, you should totally go for it, honestly. She’ll really help you out with bars.”

Hoseok leaves him with that statement and a supportive pat on the back, making Jimin cry out in objection as his coach leaves him behind.

Jimin stuffs his hands into the pockets of his sweatpants and moseys his way on over to you, trying to act as casual as he can despite the fact that his nerves are currently being doused in gasoline and lit aflame.

“Hey, you’re the new kid, right?” Jimin asks casually as you hop off the unevens, dusting your hands off. It’s a shame he missed your routine.

“Me? Yeah, that’s me,” you respond. “I just moved here from across the country. I’m Y/N.”

“I’m Jimin, but I’m pretty sure Hoseok was talking trash about me to you, so you probably know that already,” Jimin responds, and oh my God, he has to shut up and stop talking and just stop saying so damn much all of the time. He always does this, always says too much to people he has a crush on, he’s been doing this since he was seven. “Anyway, you do bars?”

“It’s my favorite,” you admit sheepishly. “But I’m pretty good at vault too, when I try my darnedest.”

“Floor and rings are my specialty,” Jimin says, and it totally sounds like he’s bragging about his best qualities, God, he should just never talk to other people except Hoseok ever again. “You know, if you ever need help with anything, I’m almost always here every afternoon.”

“Really?” You ask, smiling with your eyes wide. “I’d appreciate that a lot.”

“Yeah, um, if you ever need my number, wait—”

“Let me get my phone real quick,” you tell him as you scurry off, and, well, score!

You return hardly thirty seconds later with your phone in your chalky hand, white dust rubbing off all along the case, but you’re barely paying attention to it, quickly typing in his number as he rattles off each digit. Jimin doesn’t have his phone on him—it’s currently camping out in his duffel bag back in the locker room—so he just tells you to text him, and you send him a little hi! :-) so that he has your number. The conversation sort of tapers off there, the five minute interaction ending as you return back to the task at hand, the uneven bars in front of you. Jimin bids you goodbye and begins to walk off, getting just far enough out of view for you not to be able to feel his piercing gaze on you while you practice, but close enough for him to get a good view of what you’re doing.

And holy shit, Hoseok was not lying when he said you were good at bars. In the nicest way possible, your casual practice routine makes Jimin feel like he’s five all over again, staring in awe at all of the big boys and girls practicing on the bars like it’s muscle memory and only dreaming that one day, he would be that great.

Everything, from your routine to your stunts to your execution, is flawless in his eyes as he watches, stars circling his pupils. Jimin’s never been that good at bars, period, but your routine makes him look like an absolute rookie on them. You glide from each bar effortlessly, never hesitating in your movements, and the momentum that keeps you going is stronger than Jimin thinks he’s ever witnessed in his entire life. From beginning to end, your routine leaves him starstruck as you finally salto off of the bars, sticking the landing almost 100% perfectly if it weren’t for your slight wobble. But honestly, that little wobble can be completely overlooked in comparison to the rest of your practice routine, because holy shit that’s just a practice routine.

You dust off your hands once more and high-five one of the girls’ coaches, and Jimin presses his back against the wall of the gym and sinks to the floor.

He’s gonna need to up his bars game if he wants to come anywhere close to impressing you.

Unsurprisingly so, Jimin begins to stress workouts on the bars rather than his forte, the floor, when he’s with Hoseok, and especially whenever you’re there at the same time that he is. Any chance he can get he’ll spend going over and over different moves and routines and workouts just to step up his game.

But every damn time that Jimin thinks he’s come this much closer to impressing you, you arrive at the gym with your leotard on and totally blow all of his moves right out of the water without batting an eyelash, and all it does is leave Jimin breathless as Hoseok taps him on the shoulder and tells him to keep trying.

The only good part about constantly being in the bars room is that he keeps getting to see you, and you’ve reached this point in your relationship where you’ll just smile every time you meet eyes and crack silent jokes to each other when the coaches aren’t watching you, and it’s on this weird fence between acquaintances, friends, and romantic interests, and he can’t say he’s exactly sure where he falls. You haven’t alerted him of any need for gymnastics help since you arrived, but why would you, when you’re brilliant at everything you do. Even Jimin feels a little self-conscious.

“Jimin, come on, up you go,” Hoseok says again, throwing the chalk chunk Jimin’s way. “What’s with the sudden interest in bars? Last time I checked, you didn’t really try to perfect your bars routine when you always have so much going for you on floor and rings.”

“I just thought I might need to step up my game,” Jimin says, trying to avoid your eye contact even when he knows you’re trying to grab his attention to make a quick joke about something. “I wanna do better in the next competition.”

“But on bars?” Hoseok says skeptically. Jimin takes this as the perfect time to meet your eyes as you pretend to snort the dust of the chalk off of the ledge, making him snort to himself, catching Hoseok’s attention. It’s like he has a damn epiphany when he figures it out, mouth dropping open in realization as he nods ever so slowly. “Oh, it’s because of Y/N. Damn, I should have guessed that by now.”

“What are you even talking about?” Jimin asks, trying to play it off.

“Don’t try and fake it, Jimin. I told you you needed to work on your bars routine, but this isn’t necessarily the motivation I was going for. If you want to ask her out, just do it. You don’t need an Olympic-medal winning routine to knock her socks off,” Hoseok says.

“But don’t you want me to have motivation to get better at my routine, coach?” Jimin asks, confused. Isn’t this what Hoseok wanted? He’s always known his bar routines were lackluster, but Jimin isn’t a national floor champion for his bar workouts.

“I do, but if you’re just doing it to impress her, then I want you to know that you don’t need this whole big sha-bang to do it,” Hoseok says, and, well, that’s the end of that. “Anyway, get yourself back up there. You need to work on your giants between stunts. They’re not smooth enough.”

Jimin embarrassingly begins to spend more and more time later in the evening trying to perfect a bar routine high enough to meet your standards. His plan is for him to show up to the gym earlier than you and spend the entire time on the bars. As you walk in, he’ll perform his showstopping routine and blow you away, and once he sticks the landing, he’ll casually walk over to you and ask you out. Simple. Foolproof. Genius.

Hoseok thinks Jimin’s being ridiculous, and that a good bar routine won’t make you more or less likely to accept his offer, but it’s too late now, because he’s already doing it and it’s happening.

He hears through the grapevine (he texts you the day before asking how late you’ll come to the gym) that you’ll only be able to make it to the center after most of the classes and coaches are gone, which is perfect, because it allows for a more intimate moment between the two of you without screaming little kids running amuck around the place.

So Jimin gets ready, chalking his hands up more than he needs to, really, just to be extra safe. The chalk makes his hands dry and crackly and calloused, but every gymnast’s palms are like that anyway, so what’s a bit more chalk going to do?

If he messes this up, he’ll be damn pissed, because this is what he’s spent the last two weeks on and been totally disregarding his Expert Floor Routine for, and now it has to be perfect.

He begins to warm up on the bar when he hears the bell over the entrance to the gymnastics center ring and your soft voice greeting the lady at the check-in, doing a couple of giants to gain momentum, swinging around the bar several times as he listens to you place your duffel bag down on a chair in the waiting area, footsteps echoing throughout the room as you walk around on the hardwood.

Jimin’s going to get this right, goddamnit.

He’s been here all day for it anyway.

“Jimin?” You ask when you see him twirling around on the horizontal like it’s nobody’s business. “What are you doing here so late?”

Jimin stops, letting gravity pull him back down to Earth until he comes to a stop, letting go of the bar and dropping to the mat below. He shrugs casually. “Just getting in some late night practice.”

“Do you compete much on bars?” You ask, smiling as you enter the gym, adjusting your grips and heading over to the chalk.

“A little. I’m trying to get better at them, you see,” Jimin says, and he can feel himself leading up to his big moment.

“Really?” You ask, amused as you take a step back from your own uneven bars, turning to watch him on the mat with a tilt to your step.

“Yeah,” Jimin admits. “Wanna see?”

You nod excitedly, and Jimin takes it as his cue to take off, so he does. He jumps up and grabs onto the bar, pulling himself up and beginning to start his routine. He knows you’re the only one watching him, the only other person who cares enough to come so late, the only person watching him, but still his breath is getting quicker and his hands are getting clammier, even with all this damn chalk on him. It’s you, he swears, you’re the one that makes him so nervous. He begins to pick up steam, gaining momentum as he begins to turn once he reaches the top of the bar, shaky movements that have his body loosening ever so slightly, but it’s no big deal. He continues to push through, letting his body do all of the work and giving his mind a goddamn vacation because he’s thinking way too much right now, thinking about you and your smile and that laugh you do when you both make an inside joke during afternoon workouts.

Maybe Jimin should have taken into account the fact that you always seem to make him sweat without even trying, always get his nerves all tingly and jumpy, always make him hyper aware of every move he makes. Because, like he should have seen it all damn along, the clamminess of his hands melts down the chalk, and there’s not enough on the bars to keep him going, and suddenly he’s toppling to the floor.

“Jimin!”

Your voice is the only thing he hears as he hits the mat with such great force Jimin swears he’ll hear the sound in his nightmares.

After being a gymnast for so long, pain shouldn’t hit Jimin like it does this time, but maybe that’s just the massive bruise to his self-confidence after totally bombing his extravagant ask-you-out routine right in front of you. Damn, Hoseok’ll be pissed.

“Are you okay?” You ask, rushing over to him with concern lacing your syllables. “That was some fall.”

“I’m fine, really,” Jimin promises as you crouch over him, trying to press himself off of the mat but feeling his wrist give out from underneath him, crashing down.

“You don’t look fine, holy shit,” you say with furrowed brows. “Stay here, I’m gonna get the first aid kit.”

“It’s not like I was going to go anywhere,” Jimin jokes, and even in this time of gymnastics crisis you laugh, and for some reason, it feels like the only drug he needs to alleviate the pain.

Regardless, you come back hardly a minute or two later with the little plastic box of first aid nonsense in your hands, and here you are, crouched over him in the dim light of the gymnastics center as you tend to his poor wounds after he tried to impress you with his bar routine, and this is not where he thought this night would end up.

“I don’t think you’ve broken anything,” you say as you tenderly hold his wrist. He winces in pain and it makes your eyes dilate in worry. “But it might be a sprain.”

“I feel so dumb,” Jimin finally tells you.

“Why? You’re not dumb for falling,” you promise as you grab the gauze and begin to wrap it around his hand as a makeshift cast until he can get to an actual, qualified professional. “It happens to the best of us. I have so many battle scars.”

“I was just trying to do a cool bar routine…” Jimin says, voice trailing off as he mumbles, “to impress you.”

“What?”

“I just wanted to impress you,” Jimin breaths out quickly, the words leaving his mouth in a rapid fashion as you pause mid-wrap, letting his sentence sink in.

“What?” You repeat. “Impress me? Why would you want to impress me?” You ask in confusion.

Jimin feels his cheeks getting all red and his hands getting clammy again, and he’s worried that it might prevent the gauze from staying properly. “I just wanted to see if maybe you’d want to… uh, I don’t know. I don’t know what I’m saying anymore, don’t pay attention to me,” Jimin says, waving you off as you tape the gauze off so it stays wrapped around his hand and wrist.

“No, what were you going to tell me?” You ask, a hand on his upper back as you look him softly in the eyes.

“I was wondering if you wanted to go out sometime?” Jimin finally, finally musters out, and you giggle at how shy his confession is, how much effort it takes for him to just ask you out.

“Oh, Jimin, was that whole bar routine just for me?” You ask, touched.

“It might have been…”

“No one’s ever tried to perfect a horizontal routine just to ask me out before,” you tell him.

Jimin frowns. “But I totally screwed it up.”

“That makes it even sweeter,” you promise.

“So do you want to go out sometime? You know, after I get my wrist checked out,” Jimin says, holding up his temporarily bandaged wrist with a grin.

The answer comes to you like it’s the easiest thing in the world. “Of course.”

And maybe the whole routine thing didn’t go as planned, but the best proposals are always the unexpected ones, aren’t they?

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#sfwbangtan #bangtan bookclub #bangtanwriters-net #bts writing squad #jimin fluff #bts fluff #jimin imagine #bts imagine #jimin scenario #bts scenario #bts scenarios #bts au #jimin au #jimin athlete au #JIMIN IS SO FLEXIBLE ALWAYS #wow i really power wrote this in a day #ok gotta stop writing abt jimin i have TWO hogwarts aus on my wips list #w: just a little bit of love

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