#i was going for like. a sense of intimacy or closeness but also distance & guilt at the same time

[raiiny-bay]

but I can't wait until I see your face and my brain thinks that it's looking at a stranger

[aewrie]

notes on grimm and luuca

cw past sexual abuse, d/s dynamics involving consensual nonconsent, etc

grimm uses 'lover' as a blanket term for people he's had sex with, it doesn't hold much meaning beyond that. while luuca certainly falls under that, it's not the most important part to him. (currently unsure if i want them to use dominant and submissive specifically, i get finicky about terms in settings that are not based on present-day reality, but either those or some equivalent of would be the go-to. need to think of titles they might use. though grimm gets finicky on that front; doesn't want to be called master or anything similar. 'master' is for non-kink uses only.)

the cnc started out as roleplay contained within a scene. and over time they experimented with that sort of thing, just occasionally at first, but consistently enough that eventually grimm thought to ask if they would make it a more 'official' arrangement. something more permanent.

a bit of background on luuca: before the troupe, luuca was living in exile from the moth tribe. they were doing generally fine, until their assault. their abusers were another moth (cirrus) they considered a friend, not someone particularly close, but close enough, especially after what they'd been through together, and his partner (unnamed). the encounter started out consensual, but little things came up that bothered luuca, which were dismissed when they tried to voice their discomfort, and then everything escalated from there. (this is also when they got their wings torn at the edges and their other antenna broken. it was all around a shitty time.)

on a surface level their kinks are a 'revisiting/processing traumatic event in a safe, controlled way' situation, and there's some of that in there too, but more so it's about the shame and anxiety brought by them having initiated the interaction that ended with their assault. they could not enjoy sex for the longest time without feeling guilty about wanting anything at all. rape fantasies, and later cnc, were the loophole around that (can't be guilty if you didn't want/agree to it), though it also came with it's own complicated emotions and, initially, added distress. it was not a logical thought process that led to their fantasies, but their subconscious making a cocktail with the ingredients given. it took time to accept and longer to fully process. they had dreams: sometimes nightmares more distinctly reminiscent of their abuse, sometimes more vague, with someone unknown taking them; involuntary physical reactions were a hurdle to start with, but once they realized that was not all, that they were waking not from anxiety but arousal that went beyond simple physical responses, is when it got messier.

the first time playing with grimm was the first mostly guilt- and anxiety-free sexual experience since their assault. and if he hadn't happened to discover their fantasies, they were at the time content to take all of it to their grave and remain celibate, just to avoid the distress of being perceived as wanting. which would have come as a surprise to most who knew them, since they weren't shy around the topic of sex in a more broad, general sense. they can hide a fair bit of anxiety behind relaxed confidence, and early on, grimm wasn't as good at picking out the nuances of emotions he can sense from the troupe.

it took a long time of playing with grimm before luuca warmed up to anything else or anyone else. but when they did, they figured they like doing intimacy this way, just in general. and even if other things were on the table now, this affected the dynamics with grimm rather by making it more intense, as this was around when they reconfigured their relationship and dynamic.

and, expanding on the first time, it was. a success in some ways, not so much in others. grimm dealt with a drop immediately following the scene and then a continued low in the days after, which meant that, among others things, he kept some distance to luuca. luuca on their part almost had a drop, after getting back to reality from their high and not having been immediately able to spot grimm - but they noticed where he was before their anxiety got the better of them. had grimm been able to pay attention to how luuca was feeling before he could calm down, he would have felt very differently about the whole ordeal.

some days after that scene luuca decided to go talk to grimm because they noticed he wasn't doing so great. they didn't actually have sex. there was an attempt, but luuca got nervous to the point grimm called it off. after that there was cuddling and just being close, and that's the part that grimm cared about. that luuca willingly came to him, offering something devoid of all the power games. and, he was more comfortable getting in 'control', to decide that they would just be there and hold each other, in a more relaxed setting like that. which helped luuca calm down in turn.

it was a learning process for both of them, figuring out how to make things work beyond the one semi-fumbled go they lucked out with. they went pretty hard for first time and started with actual small steps after that, after having had a chance to reflect on how things worked out and how they could have gone both better and worse.

while luuca did say 'anything', when they worked out their long-term agreement, really it meant 'anything within grimm's limits', and that's the mutual understanding on that too. there's things luuca doesn't care for or that are soft limits that grimm is into, like biting, or scents, but the right amount of pushing those limits is something that adds to the experience for them. and sometimes it's a bargaining chip. i'll let you do x if you're willing to try y is something grimm heard more than once or twice, earlier on. soft limit ≠ hard limit.

and grimm's limits are what restrict their play the most. between the two of them luuca is more eager to go further, to the point that they sometimes worry about pushing grimm. it's not always easy to tell when he's nervous about something because he doesn't want to do it period, and when he's nervous because he does want it, he's just worried it would be too much. and here's a part of why they operate with a system of luuca suggesting things and grimm deciding if and when those things happen.

(he does have his own ideas too, but luuca can be prolific on that front.)

to luuca, kink is sexual first and foremost. to grimm these are two separate things that can also be enjoyed together, and particularly later on he does not hesitate to edge and even tease luuca without ever getting sexual at all when the mood strikes.

luuca will not beg, but might express their frustration with some colourful language, among other things. they are above being petty or making themself a nuisance when they know they are being toyed with.

often enough, the consent play is the only intense part of these two having sex. on surface level it might even appear gentle with playful teasing and resisting, but there is still the power exchange. and depending on luuca's headspace, gentle might be more intense emotionally than more overt play. gentle, and trying new things that push limits, are two situations where grimm is particularly careful.

a lot of the more intense stuff they get to is something that luuca initially brought up, grimm shot down without consideration, and then much later once he's really thought about it, they give it a go. or, grimm gives it a go and luuca is there for the ride.

even when there's someone else involved, for the occasional threesome or moresome, be it vanilla(ish) sex or a scene, luuca does not decide anything, though things get toned down a in many ways. the troupe is aware of the nature of the relationship, even if not all the details of it. more than a few would be surprised to learn just how rough (in multiple senses) grimm is with luuca at times.

(they are also aware that luuca can get away with certain things because what's grimm gonna do, threaten them with a good time?? which is why in the event anyone's hesitant to bring up an issue with grimm directly, they often go to luuca.)

(this is also why grimm has to get creative if he ever wants to 'punish' them.)

(and for real grimm would be more likely to stress himself into an anxiety attack about doing something luuca would genuinely, not at all in the fun way be distressed over, than actually do it.)

once they got properly established with their more permanent arrangement, the cnc aspect became more prominent, and also changed. it was not just about roleplay anymore, but a dynamic of their relationship in general. luuca has essentially consented to their consent not being considered. grimm decides what they do and when, and luuca's input is not pertinent. and, power exchange is part of their daily life to an extent. it's always there in the background. luuca's devotion to grimm and helping with whatever he needs assistance with is just that, but also acts of service as part of their submission.

there's a lot of little things luuca handles in his stead; grimm decides something should be done and luuca sees to it that it gets done. if he needs assistance with something, luuca handles it or sees that someone suitable does. and on a more personal level, luuca remembers things from grimm's past lives he doesn't. they tell him some of these things each reincarnation, and bring up some as needed. much of this they have discussed at some point, but at times it's luuca's judgement call.

there is also the element of things luuca chooses to tell others; things grimm doesn't like keeping a secret but also doesn't fancy talking about publicly or semi-publicly. this one is particularly heavy on the responsibilities department when grimm forgets something and doesn't want to be reminded without a good reason. at times luuca does worry, but it's a task given by grimm to handle these things, so handle it they do.

they do have a safeword/signal - typically takes the form of three consecutive taps or such, but could be just about anything, so long as it's repeated that three times and is recognizable as something deliberate - but it's not something luuca really uses, at least not to indicate that they want to stop.

to them, the whole point is that they don't get to have a say. it puts their anxieties around sex at rest. and even after they reach a point that they can relax, they like it; the anticipation of waiting and/or not knowing what might come, and the satisfaction of being claimed. grimm can act extra possessive during a scene and the emotional effect on luuca is on par with best aftercare; their abusers did essentially just abandon them after they were done, and even though luuca only vaguely remembers the fact, its effects are something they carry with them longer than anything else from that day, aside the physical scars.

they used to have an actual word, and technically that is still valid for use, but they switched to a more versatile signal after learning the hard way that grimm struggles with words when he gets anxious enough.

when luuca safewords, it's typically a case of there being an issue grimm was not aware of, something that he would not want to ignore if he had noticed it. maybe they've gotten sick and only just realized it a little before grimm showed up. maybe there's an injury/risk of injury that needs to be attended to right then and there that he didn't notice. and, often they'll just try to explain the situation without the use of the signal, if possible. it's more a backup in case they have trouble getting grimm's attention, or they're gagged and can't talk, or something along those lines. 

grimm, on his part, is more likely to safeword precisely because things got too emotionally intense. he's not the best at actually doing so, though. there's been a few times when luuca's noticed he's not really in it, and called things off just to give him a chance to reel back and ground himself.

just about every time luuca has safeworded, it's been because they knew grimm would have wanted to stop, or be made aware of something before deciding whether to continue, and if yes, how to continue.

and related to that, if luuca is actively resisting, they're fine. what grimm knows to look out for is them freezing or fawning (latter not to be confused for when they're exhausted and more cooperative for that reason. they will get grumpy about it).

the safeword signal has spread to some others, primarily through luuca as grimm doesn't play particularly hard with most others, and generally there's less chance of causing confusion as to whether a 'no' or such is part of the play or not. luuca on their part, once they get comfortable enough with others, tends to lean as far into the cnc as a given partner is comfortable going.

(the signal is also something that comes handy when either discreetly needs to alert the other of something serious in the company of strangers. a carefully placed repeated word or gesture in the middle of a friendly interaction isn't likely to raise suspicions.)

aftercare is interesting in that grimm, when he's domming, really just wants to be gentle and caring when he hits that point. luuca is generally more pragmatic, once they got more experienced and started working out the kinks (heh) of how all this works for them. for the most part, it's about the immediate physical needs. and it works out well, much of the time. making sure luuca is physically fine and attending to any problems gives grimm an 'excuse' to fuss over them and be gentle, even if more in the physical sense. the emotional gentleness tends to be reserved for scenarios outside of sex.

and like mentioned, luuca gets anxious about being abandoned, but it's less that they (emotionally) want to be cared for and more that they want to be wanted, be it sexually or in general. grimm just being there and acknowledging them does the trick generally, though he tends to do more than that even when there's nothing else that needs taking care of.

luuca generally prefers grimm stays 'in character' as much as possible with checking in and aftercare. particularly early on, at times grimm being too nice messed with them in a bad way. this was at the time one the bigger obstacles in figuring out something that works for them both, because while grimm enjoys the power and control, he also worries and does not want to push it if he is at all uncertain.

some things with aftercare that extends outside kinky scenarios: whenever grimm is responsible for an injury on luuca, no matter how mild, they let him address it. this goes for things like accidents or the child getting bitey. whatever it is, grimm checks luuca over and treats wounds as needed. they're his, and that means they're his to care for.

and, in a way that goes both ways. luuca is grimm's safe space to fall apart and be messy and emotional. this is in part just because they've been around for so long, but also largely because they've seen all the worst parts of him and still stick by without anything so much as resembling fear or contempt.

in case of grimm having a personal crisis or the like, luuca tends to be the primary line of communication between grimm and the rest of the troupe. there are others who will step up to handle grimm's duties, but anything else that is pressing luuca can relay so that grimm can take his time sorting himself out.

in case of interpersonal conflicts involving grimm that do not appear to be getting anywhere good, fetching luuca to diffuse the situation or to press for a resolution is a common occurrence. while many may be able to pinpoint the issue and offer solutions, luuca has less hesitation with regards to forcing grimm's hand if he does not seem to be getting anywhere near resolving an issue.

dreamsex/somnophilia deserves its own little section. for reasons.

initially luuca would have liked to jump right into grimm fucking with their dreams/nightmares, but he flat out refused. he had his hesitations because of teh inherent power imbalance, and his lack of confidence with manipulating dreams in a controlled way. and a good while later, when they were at the testing waters with various aspects phase, luuca brought up him having sex with their actual physical self while they're asleep. this grimm also initially refused. and after he got assaulted, luuca figured that best not bring that particular kink up again, just to play it safe. grimm had enough of a rough time reconciling with their role as a dom again after that.

to their surprise, grimm might have taken his time considering the dreamsex (as in, both of them are asleep, nothing is going on physically beside involuntary responses, but their minds are fast at work), but it did eventually happen. because he had ideas that carried more of a risk of serious injury, and by then he had grown more confident with his ability to control and manipulate dreams, and there he had a way to test things without risking real, lasting damage. and later, it was something done for its own sake. a little treat for special occasions.

the somno also happened later. after even further careful consideration. grimm didn't like the idea of luuca being unable to communicate at all, even if for them this was, for a good while, the #1 kink to hopefully try at some point. and when that did happen, it was a perfect example of how luuca should be careful what they wish for, because grimm can be creative about implementation and absolutely will scheme when he gets in the mood. they technically got what they wanted and were salty about it for days, much to grimm's delight.

closer to canon events luuca is old and is starting to feel it (au lore is troupe bugs age very very slowly but they do age) and their libido has gradually declined over time, though it's not completely gone. the biggest hurdle is that they need to be a more careful because they can't handle physically demanding things the same way they used to; they do grumble about grimm handling them like they're delicate, though. they may be a bit achy and have less stamina but they're not made of glass, they'll have you know.

fortunately, even when doing something in waking would be a potentially bad idea, grimm can still drop a visit to luuca in their dreams. even if the reason might have shifted from 'this would be a bad idea in general' to 'this would be a bad idea because of age related health concerns'.

tl;dr they have nasty disrespectful sex and also trust each other with their lives. ty for coming to my ted talk

[strideofpride]

what are ur thoughts on people saying serena only ever saw nate in a platonic way?

I mean I disagree lol. Like yeah I think it's fair to say that it's pretty much canon that Serena loved Dan more than Nate (not saying she should've, just saying that's where the writers choose to go with it) but that doesn't mean that she only saw Nate platonically??? I mean she was clearly attracted to him and had genuine romantic feelings as well. "I've waited a really long time for this. - Me too." "Even if I end up with Dan a part of me will always love Nate" etc. etc.

I think part of it is that the writers set up some really good stuff for them at the beginnings of both season 1 & season 2, only to keep them apart for the rest of the season. And like narratively I guess it makes sense? In season 1, Serena felt so much guilt about what she had done to Blair, that when she came back (for Eric) she felt she had to keep Nate at arm's length in order to not betray Blair again. And then she got involved with Dan and fell hard for him and she was able to bury any feelings she had for Nate deep down (also given the sequence of events in the pilot, you could kinda glean from it that she initially agrees to go out with Dan - a near stranger at that point - in order to stay away from Nate).

And then her and Dan broke up, and Serena figured Blair was over Nate, and they were both going to the Hamptons that summer, so it was okay to be close again. But they're still not there yet, Serena's not over Dan, Nate gets involved with Catherine (ugh), and though they do share a kiss, you can tell Serena immediately feels guilty about the way it clearly made Dan feel. Once again, she's hurt someone she loves by engaging in intimacies with Nate. That can't feel good.

So once again, Serena and Nate seem to be keeping distance from each other, and besides, they're both going through a ton of upheaval in their personal lives (Serena gets a new stepfather, only this time instead of leaving, he DIES, then her mother starts dating her boyfriend's father, oh also you have a half brother, oh wait he's dead too!) (Nate's family is broke, then he's homeless and moving around from place to place, then his dad gets taken in by the FBI, now grandfather is back in his life) so it makes sense that they would ultimately return to comforting old flames Dan and Vanessa (and later Blair) - oases of stability amongst all the other chaos of their lives.

It's only once Serena & Dan and Nate & Blair seem to have truly found closure that Serena and Nate can finally go down that path towards each other. But I think by then it was too late, the writers had made up their minds, they had set too much groundwork for Serena and Dan and to them, Serenate was just something to check off the bucket list rather than something they truly committed to doing. Which is a damn shame, cause serenate had so much potential, but the writers didn't want to see that.

So yeah, I think that's why people say that, cause the writers never fully committed to doing Serenate justice and kept them apart far longer than they probably should've if they wanted to build universal support for them.

[cynettic]

I just read Kitsune reader x yan Scaramouche's fic, may I have gotten hooked on it? and of course, it's just perfect and that's why I'm here to lose a part two with nsfw, thank you in advance and understand if you refuse:3

Link to Part 1

Summary - Taking you captive, Scaramouche continues to see you as a pillar of support. Coming back home to have you there, always. Even if it meant chaining you up.

Pairings - F!Kitsune!Reader x Yan!Scaramouche

Warnings - Smut, slight noncon ( I tried to make it as consensual as possible but its difficult with yandere themes ), fingering, electricity play

Rating - NSFW

Penpal - Ahhh I'm actually beginning to get attached to this series, might end up writing a couple more posts with different hc and stuff. I hope you liked the post though, have a great day <3

A/N - The literal definition of the ‘stoic cruel boy who’s mean to everyone but you.’ Oh well, Scaramouche is ooc af, but I did change a few things in his backstory so its supposed to make sense for this story ;) Also- since we dont know Scaramouche’s actual name, I have the reader still… yknow, call him Scaramouche. Which is kinda weird cause its his harbinger name but oh well. Also, credit to @cycletr4in for proofreading it ;3

Taglist - @cursedraiden

Stay with Me pt.2

Scaramouche was a gentle captor.

In contrast to piercing eyes and harsh stares when it came to others, he had a soft spot for you. Like the ice that encased him whole melted at your touch, craving for the warmth only you could give him. For your arms around him, to play pretend and imagine he were a child, free, fearless, unbound. A child in your arms, safe and protected.

But you were held hostage, which meant that the chains around your wrists and legs held you down and secured you. Like you were bound to one spot like you’d always been, except this time you didn't have a choice.

You weren't waiting for the Kitsune Saiguu.

Hell, you didn't even have your vision.

This brought on resentment for the dark haired boy. You hated him, you despised him for holding you down under his own judgment. But at the same time, all you saw in him was a child, a little kid who hadn't had the time to grow up. The one who refused to do so because it was his only way to survive in the type of world he lived in. Hide behind that same facade he developed as a kid, snide remarks and unrelenting cruelty.

Just to come back to your arms, sobbing because he was still that child. Sobbing because he was still hurt. Sobbing because you were still his beacon of light, of hope.

He depended on you.

And as much as you built up harsh words to use against him, they dissolved in your mouth when you saw him. His vulnerability that he saved for you and you only. A deep part of you cared for him, a little too much.

Gentle fingers brushed through the locks of Scaramouche’s hair, twirling it around and playing with the strands. It was smooth, a small detail no one would have the chance to notice from the distance he put around himself and others. A quiet hum left his lips as he leaned against your chest, eyes fluttering closed against the soothing feeling of you against him.

The lavish silk sheets were soft against your skin, pillow pushing your form to sit up. Just enough to have Scaramouche in your arms, knees on either side of his body as his head rested under your chin. His chest rose and descended, almost on beat with yours, if not just a tad slower.

You hoped he wouldn't hear the way your heart thrummed against your chest.

Warmth, his body flushed against yours, the luxury of a bed and the small candlelight on your bedside. Different from what you’d grown into just on the side of the trail, sitting for decades. Or with your time with the Kitsune Saiguu, it was never this warm, never this gentle.

But this warmth ended at your beating heart, furiously blazing. Sending an urge of adrenaline through your body, whispering ‘run’ through your veins. A primal urge that would've had your hands around Scaramouche’s neck, till he was wrangling and dead.

Till you could escape.

Hand slowly sliding down his jawline, you let your gentle fingers ghost along the soft skin of his neck. Claws outstretched and ready, sharp and pointed with a deadly intent to kill. You could end him so quickly, overturn his trust and make an escape. You deserved it, you deserved freedom. Not a delusional boy who thought himself protector against someone who’s lived decades more than him.

Jolting at the sensation of a soft grip on your wrist, you watched with idle fascination as he simply cupped your wrist in his hold. Not stopping you, not restraining you, he simply brought your hand to his face. To his lips where he pressed the softest of kisses into your palm. So heartfelt and genuine that all you could do was freeze, not even considering clawing his face.

“I love you.”

You both stayed in that position for a few moments more, silence cradling the tension that slowly dissipated from your body. Forlorn eyes watching as he shift the angle of your wrist to kiss your fingertips. He wasn't waiting for an answer, basking in these soft moments where he could hide in your hold. Like a child, forced to grow up too quickly, yearning back for his foolish naivety, yearning for the childhood he missed.

You were that childhood.

Which is why he clung to you so dearly, showed expressions he didnt know he could make, hold you captive under the impression that it was ‘right.’ What he was doing was okay.

Claws retracted, you pursued your lips, holding back the tears of frustration that burned at your eyes. You hated him, hated him for the chains on your wrists, for the disappearance of your vision that you’d given so much value to. Hated him for the warmth he still made you feel.

You hated him.

You felt like a housewife in some respects. Not with the cleaning and cooking part, and of course no children were part of the equation. But in terms of support, you stayed rooted to that room, loose chains too strong for you to break or tug holding you down. Window was too far, and you were stuck moving around the bed and the desk that sat just a little farther away.

Attempts at having your vision back or more freedom in movement had been discussed with Scaramouche, but as childlike and free as he acted with you, he was not an idiot.

“I don’t plan on underestimating you,” was his answer, head resting on the plush of your chest. “You’re strong, always were. But I have to take extremes to make sure you don’t get hurt, some people out there are stronger than you.”

You wanted to point out that there were a ton of people stronger than him as well, but you kept your mouth shut. “Can I at least see the house? I’ve been cooped up here for so long…”

And he cant say no to such an innocent request as that right?

So he unlocks the chains, the vision at his side reminding you that he was strong. You solely knew that he’d been tough as a kid, and under the intensive training he’d seemed to endure, he was much much stronger. You werent willing to give it a go and lose his trust just yet.

Not like he really trusted you anyways-

At the very least, you’d hoped to get some sort of blueprint of the house, and all you’d received was confusion and your mind making up that the house itself was a maze.

“Didnt we… just pass through here?”

Glancing at the obvious frustration on your face, Scaramouche chuckled, pulling your arm through the hallways you swear you’d seen three times prior. “Nope, most of the hallways look pretty similar. The house wasn't built for dumbasses.”

You flashed him a look and were about to make some snideish rebuttal before you saw the smirk. You knew what he was doing, trying to comfort you with casual arguments you both used to have. Consisting of you telling him to work on his people skills, and him calling you a lazy ass. Of course you missed it, but you also knew you couldn't go back to it.

And then there was the issue when you learned that he was a harbinger.

A scene you didnt want to replay in your head, when a maid burst into your room, Scaramouche acting a tad more intimate. He had an awful tendency to do that, hug your waist and press his face against the crook of your neck. Press gentle kisses down the length of your shoulder that had you shuddering. You weren't used to intimacy, and considering you’d watched him grow up, it was just weird.

Stuttering, the maid had demanded that he was requested by the Tsarista. You’d seen the fear in her eyes when Scaramouche slowly turned to her, seen the unshakable immobility of standing under his gaze.

“Do not enter.” He said, “It’s on the door.”

That was the first time you’d seen Scaramouche kill.

You hoped it’d be the last.

But you’d seen death before, so much death in the time of the Kitsune Saiguu. And for a few seconds, you found yourself fearless as you yanked against the chains, yelling at his figure at the doorway.

“Tsarista?” You snarled, standing just a few feet away from him. His hand on the girls neck, clenching around the pretty skin of hers. Disgusted, the chains that held you back from closing the gap and throwing the girl away from him were impossible to overcome. “Why the hell does she need you?!”

‘Let go,’ you wanted to say. ‘Let her go, she’s going to die.’

It worked, because the ironclad grip was gone, the maid tumbling to the ground lifelessly. You’d been too late, and now her blood was on his hands, your hands. This was your fault and you had half the self control not to thrash against the chains with sharp claws, hands on his neck.

The hard steel gaze vanished in an instant, and like he’d regained his senses, he took a few steps to you. Hands clenching to fists before loosening to fingertips brushing against his palms. Confusion, regret and guilt clouded his features like a child waiting to be reprimanded. You didn't back away, stood firm and fierce when standing and keeping a tough front.

You wanted to cry.

“Its… its a long story.” He finally stated to your question, and when you didnt budge, he took a deep breath. In control again, he closed the distance between the two of you, “I’m sorry.” And that same thrum of electricity jolted through your body, sending you into a spiral of the girls lifeless eyes and Scaramouche’s childlike eyes. Till everything went black.

You woke up with the body gone. Scaramouche was gone as well.

You learned that Scaramouche liked to have things his way. Which meant that he was always in control, always had control of every situation.

Even in those short stretches of vulnerability when he rested in your arms, he still held something over you. And you had to adapt, shift for his wishes, coddle him and stay as his beacon. Because he was stronger, and even if you’d find some way to escape, he would find you.

It was odd, and you slowly let go of the image of him as a child, you knew he was a lot older. He’d probably reached the age your body was stuck in, and with every sweet kiss he pressed to your lips, you knew he saw you as some sort of lover. But as someone who wasn't in control, you simply had to play along, just until you found some way to make your escape.

Without killing him.

_-_-_-_-_

“Strip.”

Laying on one side of the bed, your eyes jolted open at the commanding voice. Slowly, you sat up, eyeing the dim figure at the doorway. Without the help of a candle or the moonlight at the window, you could distinguish Scaramouche at the doorway, taking off the large headpiece as he flung it to the ground.

“Excuse me…?” Your voice was soft, rusty after an evening nap.

“I’ll make you feel good,” was his only answer. Slowly making his way to the bedside till he could properly face you. His eyes were soft, but there was an odd sort of determination that you hadnt seen before. You held back his stare, confusion lacing your features when he suddenly started pulling off loose decorations that hung on his clothes. Just till he unlaced the vest and slid off his shirt. “Don’t worry.” But you didnt know quite what he meant until he leaned further to you, catching you off guard.

So you yelped when his hands suddenly slammed down on your shoulders, shifting you to have access to the buttons of your top layer. He was quick when undoing them, simply swatting away at your hands when you protested and tried to pull him away. Throwing it to the edge of the room when he was done, you could only thrash in horror when he undid your trousers just as quickly, pulling them down before you could grab them back up.

“Scaramouche? Hey-”

And then he threw you down on the bed, exposing you in your undergarments in the cool air of the room. Shivers crept up your spine and bristled across your skin, and before you could curl up to at the very least hide away, you felt a tug at your chains. Fear finally settled in when you saw Scaramouche attach the chain to the bedpost, until your hand was lifted up and he began to do the same to the other.

“Wait wait wait, stop and explain what you’re-”

Only then did he pause from what he was doing, slowly looking down to properly face you. His eyes slid up and down your body, and he took a step towards you. “I’ll make you feel good,” were his only words, and you were forced to take them as all he was planning on giving you. Only when he sat on the bed next to you did you realize what he meant, hand settling on your shoulder, waiting.

“Alright,” you said slowly. Painfully, the words bit your tongue, but you were merciless against someone who had control against the situation. You could say no and you knew Scaramouche would stop, he was gentle to you and you only. And even if he’d been firm just before, you knew that he’d still stop if you asked him to.

A part of you felt thrilled to have that power over him.

Another part of you just wanted to escape.

But you didnt have any hope to do so unless you were willing too give him everything. Because he expected everything and would do anything in his power to obtain it. You’d let him fiddle around with this delusion, thinking that he had control. Until he didnt.

Which is why you didnt flinch when his hand gently slid up your stomach, cold against the warmth you’d had under the blankets. Rubbing gingerly against your skin and drawing smooth shapes over before he slowly slid over your body. His eyes seemed to glint under the darkness of the room, lust filled and wanting.

You didnt shift uncomfortably, you pretended to be that doll he expected you to be.

Just staring up at him as he slowly leaned down to kiss you. His lips felt like snowflakes on a winters day, idly swaying side to side to catch one in your mouth. Jolting like electricity when they melted into your touch, red and swollen when he pulled back. You now vividly felt every touch, as if a current flowed and static jittered in the places he briefly brushed his fingertips.

“You always take such good care of me,” he breathed, lips slowly drifting down your chin. Just past your jawline and right on your neck. The space between your head and shoulder, a soft vulnerable spot that had your lips humming at the affectionate pressure. “Its my turn to take care of you.”

And then his lips were everywhere, collarbone, shoulders, cleavage. Just until his teeth were tugging off your bra, face nuzzled in between both breasts. Both of his hands now resided on your hips, grabbing both thighs to hold them up and against him. You could feel him hard, pressing so close to your heated core.

You managed to keep your reactions in check.

Just until he slowly grinded against you, mouth on your breasts as he again pecked the soft mounds, molding his lips against them as if he could remember the texture, memorize the feel. It was just to that point that mindless sounds slipped past your lips, turning to gasps when his hands on your thighs suddenly buzzed, and static rushed in. Your legs felt weak, entire body thrumming in response to the electricity he sent jolting.

He was using his vision.

The realization was numb against his lips on your breasts, hands slowly stroking the skin of your sides, travelling up. He hovered over you for mere seconds before mashing his lips against you once more, different. He was no longer gentle, and it was with the contact on your tail that you lost all control. When he gently moved it out of the way, backing up.

You were a mess.

Not that you tried to be, you’d been doing your best not to enjoy his touch. But it was hard when your core heated up so fast, mashing both legs together in hopes he wouldn't notice. You knew he would, any action beyond that was just you trying to save your dignity.

He sat there like he was enjoying the sight, the first time you’d seen him actually portray any visual confirmation of satisfaction towards the chains. He’d drink dry any ounce of control you gave him, and it was impossible not to give him it all when you were visionless and vulnerable.

But the dignity you struggled so hard to keep shattered when his hands brushed against your inner thigh.

Fingers slowly made their way to the padded fabric of your undergarments, two digits rubbing the area slowly with expertise. You bit your lip, muffling any groan of anticipation, hiding the way your hips tried to rock back into the gesture. Desperate, oh so desperate. Hiding back the whimpers as he slowly quickened the pace of his fingers against your garments. “Archons Y/n,” he murmured. “I haven't even put anything in and you’re already a squirming mess.”

“Shut u-up,” was all you managed, trying to shift away from the pressure against your clit. But his other hand was on your hip, holding in place. You could only watch and press your thighs tightly together as he slowly slid down your panties, resuming hovering over you. Distracting you with kisses, his fingers gently stroked your core, two fingers slowly sliding into your cunt using your juices.

He was gentle when pumping both fingers in and out, too slow when you thrust your hips to meet his fingers, pleading for him to go faster. But he liked hearing your cries, slowing down when you begged, quickening when you whined and just lay there, taking it.

You shuddered the first time electricity jolted from his digits.

It was when he had three fingers that he sent the static up your body, back arching with such intensity that it even had him chuckling. “Oh? You like it that much?” And then it is like something buzzed against your body, fingers vibrating against your clit as your thighs tightened around his hand. So much that you thought you’d crush it, but it didn't matter, not with the electrifying feeling against your body. It felt so odd, so overwhelmingly good that it had your legs sliding up and down the bedside, toes curling as the static grew and you fell paralyzed to his touch.

It didn't take long with his fingers thrusting in and out of you to cum. Moaning mess when he gave you the time to breathe, teeth biting your bottom lip and then mashing against yours. Your eyes grew fuzzy and most happened in a haze, and all you knew the entire time was that you’d given yourself to him, and that it felt good. You couldn't see the childlike wonder in his eyes anymore, not the need of a beacon or of support. No, the look he shared was feral, the smile tinting his lips almost scary. But it felt too good to care, and you let yourself enjoy his ministrations.

He pulled out and suddenly his own shorts were undone, boxers thrown to the side of the room just like all your other clothing. You didn't see how big he was, just felt his hard shaft against your throbbing cunt, pussy dripping and legs open wide and tired after your first go at it.

You expected him to be gentle like he’d been with his fingers. But he pressed the tip against your core, and in one full motion he was in. Teeth grinding against each other, you held back a scream, shock coursing through your body, overwhelmed with pain and discomfort. It hurt. But it was quickly overshadowed by his movements as he slid in and out of you, slow when pulling his hips back, and rocking himself completely inside you each time. A pattern that let you catch your breath and lose it all the same. Like he was continuously having a go at hitting the deepest parts of you, pulling back before fully thrusting into you and sending waves of pleasure and pain alike.

It was expected, but you couldnt hear yourself.

Not with your mind trapped in a haze of how he felt, body still buzzing after how he’d pulsed his vision through you. And now you were at the mercy of his member, hips swaying along with his, no energy for you to rock with him and try to push him deeper.

Archons, you didn't even think he could go deeper.

But you were proven wrong again and again as he kept the steady pace, hands clawing at your ass and hips. Stabilizing himself and trying to press himself against you, as far as he could go. Slowly, his hands drifted up to your hair, playing with the soft sensation of your furry ears. Pinching and rubbing, fingers coaxing the back of them like a massage. So gentle, but it paled in comparison to the harsh treatment of his dick.

You came first, gripping the chain with your hands in an attempt to stay stable. Walls clenching around him one last time before you got your release, your moans turning into cries when he continued to thrust into you. Your body felt numb, all nerves centred on the way he pounded into you, chasing his own release.

When he did, he pressed his head into your chest, his own breaths heavy with pleasure. Not pulling out, you could only lay there helplessly as his seed filled you, warm in contrast to the electricity he’d shot up your body just earlier. He didnt pull out, and laying in your chest, your heavy breathing didnt stop until he was asleep, collapsing on you and using you as support yet again.

Taking only a minute later to regain control of your senses, you shifted uncontrollably at his member inside of you, sending waves of pleasure every time you moved. Your wrists were restrained and you were stuck in this position till morning.

Achingly, you looked down at the boy, wondering how you would ever manage to escape.

[360iris]

NSFW Alphabets: Sirius Black (Poly!Marauders Edition)

In which Sirius is in a polyamorous relationship with James, Remus, yourself and Lily.

A - Aftercare (What they’re like after sex)

He’s the type that almost immediately launches into your specific after-sex routine. He’ll leave the holding and kissing part to the others while he gets warm rags and a pitcher of water.

Makes sure you’re all cleaned up and having a clean set of sleeping clothes on; might even fix your hair so it’s not all over your head depending on how crazy the night was.

Very much the quietly caring type.

B - Body Part (Their favorite body part of theirs and also their partner’s)

His favorite aspect of himself is his hair, he devotes so much time, money and care into keeping it soft and long. He loves when you or the others play in it (despite how many times he might grumble, it’s an act). Not to mention when he’s giving oral and you pull at his roots? He’ll work even harder to please you.

His favorite aspect of you are your hands. He loves that you’re almost all hands, always subconsciously grabbing for him; it makes him feel wanted, needed even. Enjoys when your hands are in his hair, holding his own, or mischievously drifting over his thighs.

C - Cum (Anything to do with cum)

He loves seeing you swallow, there’s just something hot about it that gets him going? He also gets a kick out of coming on your chest, thighs or butt? It’s probably a marking territory type of thing.

D - Dirty Secret

Extreme throat fucking is probably his favorite way to get off. Forcing himself down your throat until your lips are touching his base and then holding you there by the hair at the base of your neck until you’re crying from the strain? Most definitely his thing.

When he has to pull out for a second to let you cough and try to catch your breath, he’d 100% spend the time degrading you.

“It wasn’t even that long, stop you sniveling and get back over here. Didn’t you say you wanted to be good for me?”

E - Experience (How experienced are they? Do they know what they’re doing?)

Very! Probably the most experienced out of all the Marauders.

The man is downright gorgeous, with the darkest onyx locks that fall past his shoulders; not to mention a tongue and wit that’s sharper than a sword. Interested partners flocked to him and he got plenty of physical use out of those encounters, but he never paid mind to them emotionally. His heart was set on particular group of dummies.

He knows what he’s doing and knows how to pinpoint what you like by watching your reactions. He’s very adaptable and changes his approach around your needs. A very sexually intelligent and intuitive partner.

F - Favorite Position

Doggy style for when you’re being punished, it’s a way to distance the intimacy and focus on the act. Also allows for easy spankings.

The Ballet Dancer and the Upstanding Citizen are his usual go-to positions bc they allow for face-to-face interaction.

He loves getting to see your reactions during sex, not only does it allow him to gauge how to best please you, but also gives him a sense of satisfaction to see you come undone up close.

G - Goofy (Are they more serious in the moment, or are they humorous, etc?)

His during sex humor is usually derived from him degrading you. He’ll laugh at you for how whiny and needy you’re being or for how quickly you came. He enjoys being a sarcastic asshole.

H - Hot Spots (A place that drives them crazy when touched)

Massaging his scalp really gets him going regardless of if he’d directly admit it or not. The second your fingers begin caressing gentle circles in his hair, he’s melting into a puddle. Very puppy of him to be honest.

Rubbing the back of his ears probably gets him too, I have a feeling they’re quite sensitive to touch.

I - Intimacy (How are they in the moment, romantically?)

His intimacy is very serious, all lingering steely stares, face-to-face closeness and caressing of your hips. His love is quietly passionate and searing.

Because of his childhood and being disowned at sixteen, he’s been very weary of caring about others. He had Remus and James and that was enough for him. He could love them freely and know it wouldn’t burn him.

With you however, he couldn’t begin to control his love. The way you seemed to understand who he was at his core. The way he could love you no matter the weather or the consequences. The way your opinion of him never swayed, even when he was hurting the most.

His love for you is the unsung and unspoken kind, no need for the words because you can feel his adoration through his actions. Through his unwavering stares and tender caresses.

J - Jack Off (Masturbation Headcanon)

He’s not obsessed with it, but if he’s feeling particularly overstimulated in the mornings or after a Quidditch match, he just might stroke himself in the showers. He could also be into the idea of mutual masturbation.

K - Kink (One or more of their kinks)

Impact play + sadism

He enjoys seeing the aftermath of sex. The bruises on your thighs, love-bites on your neck and the lingering redness on your butt.

Corruption kink

Remus was the first partner you’d had before he’d introduced you to his friends. Sirius loved seeing how they slowly trained you into becoming more confident and sexually aware.

Degradation

The process of getting you to point where all your inhibitions are abandoned and the only thing you can even think of wanting is him, thrills him like no other. All shame, embarrassment or guilt gone.

Voyeurism

Whether it’s in an abandoned classroom, the library or an empty hallway, he loves the anticipation; the paranoia and pleasure in your eyes.

L - Location (Favorite places to do the do)

Anywhere but his favorite has to be abandoned classrooms. Your button-up wrinkled, skirt hiked up and figure bent over a desk. What can be better than that?

M - Motivation (What turns them on, gets them going?)

His love for you motivates him like no other. The need to see you under him with watery eyes and puffy lips begging him to do something, anything.

N - No (Something they won’t do, turn offs)

Big no to bodily fluids that aren’t spit. Doesn’t do CNC, he wants his partners to be eager and willing so even the act of genuinely not wanting it turns him off.

O - Oral (Preference in giving or receiving, skill, etc)

He’s fine with either because they give him a different sense of pleasure. He’s very observant so once he’s assessed what pleases you the most, he leans into that hard until you’re shaking.

P - Pace (Are they fast and rough? Slow and sensual?)

Slow but impacting, allowing you both to savor the way he slides into you. The pain of the stretch but also the pleasure of the veins and ridges of his length.

Q - Quickie (Their opinions on quickies rather than proper sex, how often, etc)

He’s definitely not the type to say no to a quickie unless he’s intentionally playing a long game. Usually he has no problem pulling you away from to group to fuck in a random broom closet.

R - Risk (Are they game to experiment? Do they take risks, etc?)

He’s all for trying new positions or fucking in different locations. By no means is he vanilla.

S - Stamina (How many rounds can they go for? How long do they last?)

Three rounds at most on a good day! He could probably last an hour or two, with foreplay and all.

T - Toys (Do they own toys? Do they use them? On a partner or on themselves?)

He has dildo for himself when he wants to masturbate or for when he lets you peg him. The rest of the toys are for the sole purpose of overstimulation either you or himself.

U - Unfair (How much do they like to tease?)

A teaser one hundred percent! The power edging gives him over you is intoxicating. Denying you release until you’re sobbing makes him overly giddy. Definitely the time when he’s smiling the widest.

V - Volume (How loud are they? What sounds do they make?)

Grunts, curses and sighs are the most you can get from him regularly. Introducing vibrators can easily change that however.

W - Wild Card (Random headcanon for the character of your choice)

He’s secretly into pet play? Loves reminding you that bunnies don’t make noise. You can bet on pastel collars, lingerie and tail butt plugs (if you’re into of course.)

X - X-Ray (What’s going on under those clothes)

A very lean torso, he’s not insanely built but definitely has firm muscles. Very nice abs from all those years of obsessively playing Quidditch.

His penis is about 6-7 inches hard, a few veins along the length of it with a protruding, pink tip.

Y - Yearning (How high is their sex drive?)

Average, he’s not always thinking about sex but he’d never turn down an advance from you or the others. I’d say a healthy amount.

Z - ZZZ (How quickly do they fall asleep afterwards?)

Pretty quickly? He’s not one to stay up chatting so I’d drift off after making sure you’re all comfy and properly taken care of.

[slashbitch2]

Lying To Her Love

i noticed there were no fics for lorraine and felt i had to remedy that

also no hate to ed he's a dilf

Lorraine wasn't really sure what prompted her to stray from the group. Conjecture would be the only way to describe it: a sudden desire to distance herself from Ed, to explore the house alone. A new feeling had also arisen deep inside, in her chest if she had to place it, similar to a compass. Like there was an internal needle pointing in the direction she was supposed to go, and she chose to trust this instinct. Though thus far her inference skills had brought about nothing but terrifying situations.

And unfortunately, it seemed this time would be no different...

The needle slowly spun round to point out a set of stairs leading down toward the basement. A layer of dust had settled upon each step, indicating that no one had ventured down so far, which only served to intrigue her further. How, in a paranormal investigation, had no one thought to check the basement? As she drew closer, Lorraine realised there was a very faint set of footsteps. They were too imperceptible to have been made recently, yet the house had supposedly been uninhabited since the disturbances began over a week ago.

Had it not been for the very insistent compass directing her down, the footsteps would've been convincing enough. Careful not to unsettle the evidence, she began to descend down the staircase, one hand tracing along the brick wall as if to ground herself in reality. With each step she could feel a weight bearing down on her chest, a dizzy wave rushing over her. At one point the sensation grew so overwhelming that she had to pause and close her eyes. Whilst stood still, the strange pressure that had been building up in her ears reached its peak. Without opening her eyes, Lorraine knew she'd crossed over to one of her prescience visions.

However, when she eventually did open them, it was to find everything exactly as she'd left it. There were no indications that anything had changed, except for the familiar feeling that she was watching through someone else's eyes. Or rather, watching what someone else wanted her to. She'd been brought here for a reason, and by god she was going to get to the bottom of this. Reinvigorated by a new determination, she practically skipped past the last few steps and onto the cold basement floor.

Here Lorraine found the first confirmation that she was no longer in reality: natural light flooding in from no visible source. It was a welcomed change from the gloom of late evening she'd left behind, but only made her more weary of whatever she was about to encounter since it was clearly trying to lure her into a false sense of security. Nonetheless, she cautiously ambled further into the open space. In fact, it was eerie how empty the room was. Usually she'd be climbing over piles of abandoned objects, trying to give equal attention to each one which often invoked fabrications of the mind. However, here there was nothing for her brain to work with, save for the occasional movement out the corner of her eye that she knew was nothing more than fiction to fill the void and warrant her apprehension.

By the time she'd reached the opposite end of the room, nothing yet had occurred to explain why she'd been dragged into this particular vision. And then, an abrupt, horrifying possibility dawned on her. What if she was stuck here?  It had never happened before, but then again, in most cases 'the cause' would've revealed itself by now.

Although, with this realisation came another equally strange one. Lorraine could feel no fear, no panic, no negative emotions. All she was aware of was complete relaxation. Even her most horrific memories and upsetting images couldn't create any response. They were nothing but distant stories told by a different version of her. The positive aura filling the room started to shift into something else, into an almost crippling pleasure. It was both intense and insufficient. She found herself clutching at her stomach, as if she'd suddenly been made aware of an incapacitating emptiness. She longed for company, yet the idea of returning to reality appeared an incredibly unappealing one. Instead, Lorraine wanted to fall further into this dreamlike pleasure.

But that was what it wanted.

With great difficulty, and an exclamation of discomfort, Lorraine turned on her heels to begin her escape. Though she halted upon catching sight of a figure stood before her. She compelled herself to push past the profound ache lingering in her gut, standing up straight to face this mysterious being. Here she came across the second confirmation that this wasn't reality, not that she needed it anymore. You were indescribably beautiful, radiating a sort of divine light like an alluring beacon of possibility.

Most spectres or demons Lorraine met were the opposite. They enveloped the light around them, constructed a dark gap in which there was nothing but pain and regret. They represented everything that couldn't be. A screaming phantom that reminded her to appreciate life.

But you-

You represented all that could've been without any guilt or anguish. You emanated both warm nostalgia and burning desire, the effects of which were palpable for anyone who could tune into the energy, and Lorraine was being strongly subjected to it. Though first and foremost, she had a job to do.

She swallowed, refocused her attention to the task at hand. "Why-" Another wave of dizzying desire washed over her. She tried again. "Why are you-" The world around her was spinning. She blinked rapidly to try stave off vertigo, but stumbled anyway.

A cool reprieve from the searing pleasure caught hold of her. Using the embrace for support she stabilized herself only to come face to face with you.

Despite your overpowering influence on her, you appeared surprisingly human up close. Normal enough to blend in with reality, but sufficiently attractive to be memorable. Still there was something irresistible to your appearance that encouraged Lorraine to sink further into your hold, to move her hands to wrap around the back of your neck. She hadn't felt so loved since early on in her relationship with Ed...

Ed.

She shouldn't be doing this. Her marriage commitment ought to have her fighting against you- but that was practically inconceivable. Besides, how could something morally wrong feel so right? No, this wasn't infidelity. She wasn't exactly sure what it was, but not that. She would never cheat on Ed.

The temptation was intoxicating. Lorraine's hands started to trace patterns along any available skin, savouring the unfamiliar yet exhilarating sensation. You weren't a living breathing person so there was something different about the way you felt that she was eager to investigate. In response to her caress, you brought one hand up to cup her cheek, maintaining intimidating yet intimate eye contact. The touch emitted pure pleasure and Lorraine gasped as she leant into the contact. Time seemed to slow as neither moved, opting to stare at the other in silence instead.

She was vaguely aware that time moved differently in her visions. That the longer she spent in one, the more time had passed upon return. Though currently it was the least of her worries. All she could focus on right now was you and the close proximity that appeared to be narrowing still. Your gaze had dropped to the lower half of her face. Lorraine did the same, her eyes fixating on your lips. However, before you closed the gap she raised a hand, motivated by a new desire. She was shaking slightly, but ignored it to gently brush a finger along your lips. She wanted a taste of the upcoming kiss, and was pleasantly unsurprised. As expected, the touch only reasserted her conviction.

She'd never wanted anything- anyone- as much as she did now.

Suddenly your mouth was upon hers, bringing cooling bliss with it. Lorraine moaned. She felt again a rush of possibilities, the surging tide of everything that could be. The muted uncertainty at the back of her mind blurred into nothingness as she clung onto you. Your mouth was the only solid thing in a swaying world, and she planned on indulging herself in the addictiveness of it. She parted her lips, provoking insatiable tremors along her nerves and another rush of giddiness. She felt young, as if she were experiencing intimacy for the first time again.

Your hands were everywhere, carrying an influx pleasure. She'd never felt anything quite like it. Time became irrelevant, everything except you was meaningless. She was lost to an eternity of bliss, in a realm of endless fulfilment. It was incomprehensible, otherworldly.

And then it was over.

She hadn't noticed she was lightly crying, or trembling so much. Or that she was on the ground. You'd simply disappeared and she'd collapsed. But someone was holding her now, someone else.

"Lorraine!" Ed was crouching before her, gently shaking her out of the dreamlike state and back to consciousness. She'd never loathed him so much for saving her.

"What happened?" He asked, lowering to meet her eyes. "Are you okay?"

She scoffed, her mind trying to comprehend all that'd just happened. She was left reeling from the sudden weight of Ed's touch and separated from him. "I'm fine." Her voice barely breached a whisper.

"Did you see anything?"

Lorraine finally met his eyes, but she couldn't tell him.

"No." She answered. "There's nothing here." She lied.

[s0seo]

Attitude Adjustment

Pairing: Roommate!Jk x Reader x Roommate!Taehyung

WC:11.8K. Rating: M.

Description: After hearing an argument between your two roommates, you are a bit shocked to hear that they both have feelings for you. Add a bit of possessiveness and a dash of domination and you have one heck of a trio.

Genre: Smut. It’s literally just smut Bit of exposition, but it’s a filthy mess.

Warnings: little to no editing, swearing, dirty talk, hair pulling, slight choking, possessiveness, sexual frustration, thigh riding, unprotected sex (please be responsible), nipple appreciation, praise kink  (Taehyung is a good boy), soft dom vibes ,reader gets spit roasted, use of a sectional sofa, use of a wall, oral sex (f&m receiving), mentions of alcohol consumption (they leave a bar), slight mention of violence (someone gets pushed), bit of voyeurism, bit of exhibition, edging, scratching, mentions of jealousy, mention of a horror movie.

A/n: I hope you all enjoy! And as always I hope everyone stays happy and healthy. If you see a typo, no you didn’t, and if you don’t like fics like this, then don’t @ me I told you it was filthy.

A/n 2: I also want to give a BIG thank you to @ohhlalaniall​ for giving this a read and making sure it was good enough to post.

© s0seo please do not copy or edit as protested under this license :)

“Come on Y/N, I think we should get you home.”

It’s Saturday night, and your friend is dragging you out of yet another bar. 

You lean into his embrace as you let yourself stumble a bit.  A small part of you feels bad for making him take care of you like this, but if you plan on being bold enough to follow through with your plans tonight, you need the liquid courage to support you.

 Even though you’ve both had the same amount to drink, you are just a bit tipsier than he is, and you’re definitely going to use that to your advantage.

“But Tae…” you pout, “I just want to have some fun tonight.”  You say the last part into his neck as your head tilts to the side. As a result, you feel him produce a slight shiver as your words vibrate into his skin.

If everything goes according to plan tonight, his neck is only going to be the beginning of what your lips will do to him.

Your dark-haired friend puts his arm around your waist, trying to help you walk while he puts his arm in front of him and moves people out of your way.

You pull him closer to you and lean into him a bit more than necessary as you inhale his cologne. God, he smells good.

You think back to a week ago when you were sitting on the couch with your best friend and roommate Taehyung watching a movie. Everything was going great until the movie's climax hit, and you realized that the movie was too scary for him. 

You wrapped your arm around him, and you were going to let him lean on your shoulder until the movie was over when suddenly your other roommate came home from work early. 

While physical intimacy is pretty common between you and your roommates, it tends to get a bit awkward whenever you do it with both of them around. 

Still, Taehyung has always been pretty understanding and laid back about it though. The real problem has always been with your other friend and roommate Jungkook. 

Jungkook, while being one your best and oldest friends, has a bad habit of being a little possessive when it comes to you. For a while you weren’t sure if it was because he saw you as someone who needed his protection, or because he didn’t have a lot of friends. But everything changed that night. As soon as he walked through the door and saw you and Taehyung on the couch, he got angry. 

The worst part was, when you asked him, he wouldn’t even tell you why. The two of you argued for a solid thirty minutes about how he believed that you shouldn’t have been watching a scary movie without him because that was something for just the two of you. You countered with the fact that if he hadn’t flaked on your horror movie plans two weeks in a row then you wouldn’t have had to ask Taehyung to join you in the first place. 

He even went so far as to imply that Taehyung guilted you into watching the movie just so he couldn’t. 

Taehyung, who has never been one for any form of conflict, remained silent as you defended him.

Finally, you stormed upstairs, tired of the bullshit and the need to justify yourself to someone who was being angry and jealous for no reason. 

You paced back and forth in your room for a few minutes, until you decided that enough was enough and that he needed to be more understanding. 

You were just barely past the top of the stairs when suddenly you heard Jungkook whispering, or at least trying, to Taehyung. Your nosiness got the better of you, and as you tiptoed down the stairs you heard Taehyung trying to explain himself.

 He claimed that he knew Jungkook liked you but that he liked you too and that he didn’t want anyone to get hurt. He said that all he wanted to do was watch a movie with you because you were sad that Jungkook canceled on you again. That statement alone both shocked you and made your heart pound. Without making a sound, you peeked your head around the corner of your staircase, only to see Jungkook push Taehyung into the wall before quietly growling out the words “I met her first. She’s mine” and stalking off to the kitchen. 

You had no idea how they felt about you up until that point. You racked your brain for all of the signs that you must have missed. 

Jungkook’s jealousy finally made sense and so did their continuously increasing levels of intimacy with you. Taehyung’s decision to watch the movie with you even though he was afraid of almost everything made a lot more sense as well. Honestly how could you have been so dense?

If you were being honest you were more than a little attracted to them as well, especially Taehyung. You felt an attraction to Jungkook multiple times throughout your friendship, but you never thought he saw you in that sort of light, jealousy or not. 

However, even before you overheard their confessions, you’d definitely had your fair share of fantasies about them. Their lips, more importantly their mouths, and the things they could do to you as you ran your fingers through their hair had crossed your mind more than once. 

After that night, Taehyung began trying to distance himself from you so that Jungkook wouldn’t get upset again. It took you a few days to notice, but once you did you became angry. 

The more you thought about Jungkook's threat to Taehyung the angrier you became. After all, who the hell did he think he was claiming you like that?  As if you were some prize to be won or some trophy to have in his possession. 

As you laid in bed last night, fed up with the awkwardness that your roommate created between the three of you, you came to the conclusion that if things were going to get better for you three, Jungkook was going to need a definite attitude adjustment.

Once the two of you finally get back to your apartment, Taehyung helps you up the stairs and into your room where he leaves you to get changed and head to sleep.

You take a seat on your bed and watch him as he walks away, pausing for a moment to make sure that he doesn’t plan on coming back up.

‘Good’ you say to yourself as you walk over to your dresser and pull out a pair of lacy dark blue underwear and a matching bralette.

You quickly close your door and slip on your pajamas, making sure to move both quickly and quietly so as not to raise any suspicion.

You look over at your clock and nod to yourself as you throw on a baggy t-shirt that you stole from Taehyung a few weeks ago and a pair of short sleep shorts.

Jungkook should come home from work within the hour, and when he does everything needs to be in place.

You glance at your reflection in your mirror, retouch your makeup, and give your reflection a nod of approval before making your way back downstairs.

You take in the sight of him, leaning back on the couch with his phone in his hands as they rest between his legs. The black of his shirt and jeans only adds to his attractiveness. 

His head is resting on the back cushion and his eyes closed as they rest behind his dark curls. God his thighs look good. Actually, all of him looks good. 

You resist the urge to simply walk over to him and climb into his lap. No. If this is going to work you have to stick to the plan. You complete your descent, quietly walk over to him, and stop right behind him. 

After taking a moment to decide on the best way to do this, you lean forward, place your hands on his shoulders, and start to softly massage them.

You feel him tense up momentarily in surprise as he lifts his head and looks at you in confusion.

“Y/N” he says as he runs his hand through his hair, his tired eyes taking in your change of apparel, “I thought you were going to sleep.”

You give him a small smile, walk around the couch, and take a seat beside him. 

“I’m not tired anymore. Let’s watch a movie.” You suggest. 

He tries to subtly move away from your body. As if you wouldn’t notice, as if you didn’t already plan for it.

You place a seemingly innocent hand on his thigh and another on his shoulder before turning his body back towards you.

“Come on” you pout as your fingers trace small circles over the fabric of his clothing, knowing that it’s his weakness. “I’ll go to sleep after it’s over. I promise.”

He glances down at your hand for a moment and looks over your shoulder at the clock on the wall behind you before letting out a sigh and giving you a nod.

“Fine. But just one.” He says as he pulls up your Netflix account. 

You give him a nod and grab the blanket from the back of the couch before throwing it over the both of you and resting your head on his shoulder.

You feel him stiffen beside you for a moment before clearing his throat and looking down at you.

“What do you want to watch?”

You keep your eyes on him as you pretend to think about the question. You already have a movie in mind, it’s one of your favorites actually.

“How about The Passion Project?” You ask, knowing that he loves the movie just as much as you do.

He gives you a side glance and smiles as he pulls up the title and starts the movie.

“Excellent choice.”

You lean forward and wait for him to lay his arm on the back of the couch while you wait for the movie to start. He hesitates at first as if unsure whether he should or not, so you bring your eyes to his and tilt your head in question. He lets out a chuckle and shakes off his doubts as you curl your legs in front of you and lean into him. ‘Just like old times,’ you think to yourself as you breathe in a deep breath of his cologne. 

As the movie progresses you steal a few glances at him, and to your surprise he’s beginning to fall asleep.

‘Shit,’ you think to yourself. ‘If he falls asleep now then everything falls apart.’ 

You glance over at the clock on the wall once again. Twenty minutes. Jungkook will be home in twenty minutes. You give yourself a small nod and form a new plan. Things might have to start a bit sooner than you expected.

You lean forward out of your friend's embrace, and you hear him let out a yawn from beside you. Moving backwards on the couch you wrap your arm around his shoulders and pull his body close to yours until his head is resting on your shoulder. 

You raise your hand to his head and begin running your fingers through his hair, as he closes his eyes once again. He lets out a sigh of content, and you turn your head to look down at him, your breath tickling his skin, before asking, “are you awake?”

He takes a moment to respond, but he slowly opens his eyes and looks up at you, your faces just a few inches apart.

“Yeah.”

Your eyes travel to the TV, and you continue to run your fingers through his hair as you nod your head at the tv and whisper softly into his ear, “this is my favorite scene. You know why?”

He looks over at the tv as well and nods. “It’s because of the dancing, right?”

You look at the scene in front of you and watch as the two love interests stand in front of a mirror and begin moving their bodies to the rhythm of a slow and sensual cover of your favorite song. 

Not only is the scene very well shot, but it’s also the part of the movie where the main character decides to finally give in to her feelings for her teacher.

You softly shake your head and slowly bring your eyes back to his face. They travel from his lips, up to his nose, then to his dark eyes, lingering as they go. You feel the stillness of the silence that lies in the few inches between your faces as he waits for your answer.

“It’s because of the tension,” you whisper.

You see his eyes flicker down to your lips and you watch him slowly closing the space between you.

He sucks in a small breath as your nails graze his scalp, and you close your eyes and silence him with your lips. He lets out a sound of surprise but doesn’t pull away. His lips slowly respond to yours, as if following your guidance.

He pulls away after a moment and looks into your eyes. The earnestness in his gaze sends warmth to your core, and you watch him lightly lick his bottom lip before releasing a small laugh and bringing his lips back to yours.

You kiss him slowly at first, careful to give him plenty of opportunity to pull away again or tell you to stop. 

His lips taste like strawberries, no doubt because of his favorite strawberry soda he likely opened before making his way to the couch earlier. It’s intoxicating.

You can faintly hear the chorus of the song in the background as he deepens the kiss, and you let out a small moan as his hand finds its way to your jaw and slides into your hair. 

You crawl onto his lap in response and place your hands on both sides of his head as you slide your tongue across his lip. 

He moans against your mouth as he opens up to you, and you slide a hand down to the bottom of his black shirt and slip your fingers underneath it.

Your fingers trace over his abs, and you release a sigh as he brings his lips to your neck and wraps his arms around you, one of his hands now sliding down from your face to your ass.

 God you love his hands. His long fingers and his veiny yet muscular arms have been the subject of your less than decent imagination on multiple occasions.

You grind your core against his crotch and imagine how hot it would be to straddle his thigh while you jerk him off. Or even hotter, if Jungkook walked in and caught you doing it. 

The thought of his jealously turns you on more than you know it should, but you just can’t help but think about all the ways you and your roommate could torture him after the way he treated your friend.

Your thoughts are interrupted as Taehyung brings his lips back to yours, and now it’s your turn to let your lips roam. 

Your tongue trails along his jaw, and you begin kissing your way down his neck. God you love his neck. The thought of his collarbones, and the way his throat bobs as he swallows hard only gets you wetter and wetter. Maybe if you’re lucky he‘ll let you wrap your fingers around it.

You remove your hand from his abdomen and place your palm on his collarbone, slowly but surely making your way to his throat. 

His hands roam through your hair and across your back, and he lets out a quiet groan before placing a hand on your shoulder and whispering, “wait Y/N, hold on.”

You slowly pull away from him and look down at his face as you continue running your fingers through his hair, a hand now roaming up to his chest. 

‘Maybe it’s not over, maybe he just wants to pause the movie or something,’ you think.

“What happened? What’s wrong?” You ask, already preparing to guide the situation back to where it needs to be.

He looks up at you through half lidded eyes but keeps his voice confident as he says, “what are we doing? This isn’t right.” 

He puts his hands on your waist and tries to move you off of his lap. Following his wishes, you climb off of him and pull the blanket over your legs once again. 

“What do you mean?” You ask him, letting a small pout rise to your face. You’re guessing that he’s probably afraid of Jungkook finding out what happened. Part of you wishes that he weren’t so shy sometimes. That’s one thing that Jungkook continuously beats him at: confidence. 

He slowly shakes his head, and you cross your arms and give him a small, worried glance. Yes, let him believe you didn’t see this coming. You knew that he was bound to become anxious and stop you at some point during the night, you just weren’t sure when.

He looks around and opens his mouth to respond, but before he can you both turn your heads to the sound of keys and the turning of a lock. Jungkook is home. 

‘Good,’ you think to yourself, ‘now all I have to do is wait for the right moment.’

He opens the door and runs his hands through his slightly ruffled hair before glancing straight ahead at you and your roommate on the couch. The two of you are far enough away from each other to ward off any suspicion, but Jungkook’s gaze still hardens as it lands on your friend.

“What’s going on here?” He asks, trying to keep his tone light yet still managing to make Taehyung avert his gaze. ‘Such an obnoxious bastard,’ you think to yourself as you tilt your head at him and draw his attention back to you.

You give him a small half lidded smile, acting a bit less sober than you actually are, and you rest your elbow on the arm of the couch and point to the tv.

“Tae agreed to watch a movie with me before I go to sleep. We were about to call it a night when you walked in.”

You glance over at Taehyung and notice how stiff his body is next to yours. You can tell by the anger in Jungkook's eyes that he wants to say something to your roommate, and if left alone, you know he will.

His jealousy is as sexy as it is infuriating and you tilt your head to the side and bite your bottom lip as you call out to your roommate, “how about you take a shower, and we all finish watching it together?  It’ll be fun...” 

You make a point of slowly sliding your gaze over his figure as you say the word “fun” and bring a bit of anticipation to your eyes.

His eyes travel over to you and he glances down at your mouth as he thinks about it. 

“Fine. I’ll be quick. After all, I do still owe you a movie.” He gives Taehyung a threatening glance before making his way up the stairs and into the bathroom. You wait in silence until you hear the water of the shower running and turn back to your friend.

Placing a hand on his thigh, you turn your body and fully face him.

“Tae.” You say, “look at me.”

He glances up at you as you place a hand on his jaw and turn his face until he’s looking at you. 

“I want you,” you confess as you begin slowly closing the distance between your bodies. “God, I want you so bad. Don’t you want me?” 

He lets out a soft groan as you let your hand on his thigh accidentally travel a bit too far up, and he closes his eyes as he groans out the word “yes.”

You move your body even closer, practically on top of him at this point, and bring your lips to his ear as you ask him once more, this time letting you voice drop to a husky whisper “do you want me Tae?”

Your fingers lightly trace the outline of his hardening cock over his pants, and he unconsciously raises his hips up to follow your feather light touch.

“Yes.” He breathes out, before opening his eyes and looking over at you. Good. You have him exactly where you want him.

“Say it.” You tease as you let your nails lightly scrape along the fabric and watch your touch bring another groan to his lips.

“God...I want you…” he breathes out.

“Do you like me,” you ask, slowly guiding him to exactly where you want him.

He stares into your eyes and gives you a nod, and you crawl into his lap once more and bring your lips a breath away from his as you ask, “then why didn’t you tell me?”

You see his eyes flicker to the staircase, and he clears his throat before shyly admitting, “I... Jungkook likes you.”

You tilt your head at him and run your fingers through his hair once again, so he has no choice but to look into your eyes.

“That’s not what I asked…” you warn, bringing your lips back to his ear and nipping at his lobe.

He looks away from your penetrating gaze and lowers his voice. “I don’t want to make things awkward between the three of us.”

You reach out for one of his hands and slide it underneath your shirt until his long fingers graze your bra.

“Does this feel awkward to you,” You ask.

He swallows hard and shakes his head in response as his thumb teases the lace.

You give him a look of satisfaction and place your lips on his once again. This time your kiss is a bit slower and definitely more aggressive. You tease his lips with your tongue then pull it back as his tongue chases it. Like your very own game of cat and mouse held within a kiss.

Suddenly, he pulls away from your kiss and places a hand on your shoulder.

“Hold on Y/N…I don’t know if this is such a good idea. What about Jungkook?”

You grind your hips into him, and tug his curls out of his face, smiling as you hear a moan escape his lips in response to the sudden show of aggression.

“Why not,” you ask before bringing your lips next to his ear, your nails now scraping along his scalp and chest. “You like me, right?” 

He gives you a small nod in response as you run your fingers through his hair and grab onto his curls a bit tighter this time and feel his hips rise up to meet your body. 

You are vaguely aware of the fact that the sound of the shower has stopped, and you bring your lips to his ear and say, “I know you’re afraid of him…”

He tenses up underneath you, but you slowly grind yourself against him and place a finger underneath his chin before lowering your face back to his and asking him, “do you trust me?”

His eyes are filled with uncertainty, but he gives you a small nod, so you continue.

“Will you be good for me,” your question is barely audible now, but he looks up at you and earnestly nods, nonetheless.

“Good,” you whisper as you brush your lips against his and begin kissing him again. Now he doesn’t hold back, all of his worries and fears seeming to vanish as he moans into your mouth and pulls your body against his.

His hand makes its way to the bottom of your shirt, and you break the kiss just long enough for him to remove it from your body. His gaze roams over your chest and back up to your face, his hands reaching forward slightly before patiently dropping back down to your waist, and you give him a look of approval as you softly grab his face and whisper, “you’re such a good boy aren’t you, always doing what you’re told...”

His hips rise to meet your core and he gives you a nod, his long warm fingers digging into your ass as he does. God, you could watch him look at you like this for hours. How the hell did you get lucky enough to have someone as hot as he is as a best friend and roommate?

“What the fuck” you hear Jungkook demand from your right. He’s only a few feet away from you, but still far enough behind you that you need to turn your head to look at him. 

A shadow of a smile makes its way to your features as you note to yourself in satisfaction, ‘Jungkook has officially entered the game.’

Taehyung tenses underneath you and moves you from his lap as he tries to explain himself.

“Jungkook, it- “

“It’s exactly what it looks like.” You interrupt, making a point to place your hand on his thigh and slide your fingers closer and closer to his hardness. 

Jungkook’s eyes shoot to yours, full of irritation and jealousy. 

“Even now,” you think to yourself smugly, “he isn’t upset at what’s happening. He’s upset that he’s not a part of it.”  Well, lucky for him, he will be.

You tilt your head at him and bite your lip as you admire him from your place on the couch.

His wavy black hair drips water on the towel around his neck as well as his chest, and his pajama pants hang low on his waist. 

God the things you wanted to do to those curls, and his chest, god his chest.

You admire the water dripping down his torso and you feel yourself getting wetter and wetter as you see the way his body glistens under the light. 

Part of you wonders if he decided to leave his shirt off because he heard the two of you, or if he was planning on using his body to intimidate your friend. The thought doesn’t sit well with you and you are once again reminded of how petty your friend can be.

You’ve often imagined yourself walking up to him after he gets out of the shower and simply running your hands over his chest and muscles. Seeing him here in front of you with jealousy in his eyes and his hand in his hair makes you realize that your imagination has absolutely nothing on the real thing. 

If he wants to be petty and an asshole to your friend, fine. Two can play at that game.

You look over at Taehyung and give him a wink before standing up and walking over to Jungkook.

“What the hell are you doing?” He demands quietly as you get closer to him.

“What’s wrong Kookie,” you ask, lowering your head and looking up at him. You keep your tone innocent and your steps slow as your eyes continue to roam over his body. “Tae and I were just hanging out while we waited for you.”

“Is that what that was supposed to be,” he asks with an edge in his voice as he takes a step towards your roommate. Of course, he thinks Taehyung is behind this.

You put your hand on his chest and walk him backwards until his back rests against the wall, his hands hanging limply by his sides as he lets out a groan.

His eyes stare into yours as your hand lingers on his chest, and you slide your other hand up his body and turn his face towards you.

“Why do you keep looking at him? I’m right here in front of you.” You whisper as you lean your body into his, the fabric of your bra now absorbing the moisture from his chest. 

His eyes search yours for an explanation, and upon finding none he flashes Taehyung a threatening glare and looks down at your half-clothed body as he whispers, “I don’t understand…”

You give him a small smirk and run your fingers through his damp hair before bringing your lips to his ear.

“How about I give you a hint?” You tease as your lips hover around his face, one hand continuing to run softly through his hair while the other lightly traces the over his chest, your fingers just barley grazing the skin of his nipples..

“I know what you said to Tae last week.” You whisper as you trail your lips across his jaw and bring them to his other ear. 

His body stiffens underneath you as you confess, but you continue anyways. “You have no idea how angry I was to hear you talk about me like that.”

He pulls his face back and opens his mouth to explain, but before he can you silence him with your lips. You feel him stiffen in surprise, and you pull your lips away and look into his eyes.

“This is what you wanted right,” you ask, “to have me all to yourself….” 

He closes his eyes and lets out a shaky breath as you tease him. 

‘He’s so close,’ you think to yourself, ‘now, just a little bit further…’

“My lips…,” you whisper against his skin as you prong your mouth to his neck. Your lips hover over his throat as you continue, and you slowly mark his skin with your teeth as you go.

“My hands…” you whisper, letting your hands roam over his chest. You slide an arm around his waist and pull his body towards you as you whisper one final thought, “my body, wrapped around you, begging for your touch…”

He releases a frustrated groan before bringing his hands to your face and guiding your lips back to his. You lightly tug at his bottom lip with your teeth, and he flicks his tongue across your bottom lip before massaging your tongue with his own. 

He spins your bodies around and you feel your back press into the wall. You release a moan as the kiss becomes more possessive and he pins your wrists above your body. The thought of his strength sends a jolt of satisfaction to your core, and you pull your hands from his grip and return them to his hair.

His hands roam your body, and you feel him slide his thigh between your legs while one of your hands roams from his hair to his throat. 

The kiss is as infectious as it is aggressive, and you guide his lips to your neck. Stealing another glance over at your friend, you see that he’s begun to run his hands over his thighs in anticipation. He’s probably getting more and more turned on just watching you tease your roommate. 

You have no doubt that if you pushed him hard enough, he’d show you a possessive side of his own, but that’s a challenge for another day.

The thought of him becoming turned on as he watches you makes you wet with satisfaction, and if the hardness against your thigh is any indication, it’s turning Jungkook on as well.

Though Jungkook’s arousal probably has less to do with the idea of being watched and more to do with showing off to the one that’s watching.

He places one hand above your head against the wall and slides the other against your waist, rubbing his thumb across your skin as he holds your body in place.

You bring your hand from his throat to his chin and make him look at you. There is a hint of panic in his eyes, as if he thinks you’ll push him away, but you run your fingers through his hair and smirk at him instead.

“You like me,” you whisper against his lips, not bothering to present it as a question.

His eyes shoot down to your lips, and you watch as the panic in his gaze turns into something else.

“Of course, I do. I wouldn’t hang out with you if I didn’t.” 

You tilt your head and narrow your eyes at him, pulling a bit of his hair as you correct him.

“No,” you say as you slide your hand up his chest.

“I’ve seen the way you look at me,” you tease as you nod your head at Taehyung and whisper against his lips, “just like he does...”

You watch as jealousy makes its way back into his eyes at the reminder of his competition, and he opens his mouth to say something to Taehyung, but you lift a finger to his lips and stop him before he can. 

“You’re jealous right? Is that why you always get angry with me if I bring someone home with me? Is it because you wish it was you instead?”

He breaks your gaze and looks at the ground before giving you a small nod. 

“When you heard me, did you imagine that it was you in my room... making me moan…. making me scream?”

His hips unconsciously grind themselves into you, and his grip on your body tightens. 

‘Honestly, it’s just too easy,’ you think to yourself.

You give him a smirk and place a hand on the side of his face as you continue to comb your fingers through his hair and carry on.

“It must drive you crazy...hearing me moan for someone else when you know it should be you making me feel good.”

He closes his eyes, and you watch him release a quiet whine as you drop your hand down to his pants and trace his hard outline over the fabric. 

He grits his teeth and closes his eyes as he leans his head forward into your neck and groans out the word, “Yes…”

You lean in closer to him and whisper into his ear while looking at Taehyung.

“You want to hear me moan for you, and only you. Is that it?”

He stiffens against you and lets out a small whimper as your fingers stop their tracing and suddenly grab him in your hand, the thickness and thought of what’s to come making your walls clench.

When he still doesn't respond you bite his ear and let out a small growl.

 “Say it …”

“God...Yes. I want you. I want you to moan for me and only me.” He looks into your eyes as he confesses. “You belong with me.”

You smirk at his confession, and suddenly spin your bodies before pulling away from him. 

“That’s too bad…” you tease.

His eyes widen and follow you as you walk back over to Taehyung. Looking down at him you use a finger to lift his chin up and sweetly ask, “be a good boy and take off my shorts.”

He glances behind you at Jungkook who is likely giving him a glare that could kill, but after a moment he smiles at you and curls his fingers into your waistband.

You place your hand on his shoulder, step out of your shorts, and lean him back as you straddle his thigh and remove your bra.

He closes his eyes and leans into you as you run your fingers through his hair, and finally bring his lips to your neck.

“You’re so good to me aren’t you,” you ask as you let your hand roam up his chest and lean your body into him.

“Y/n… what are you doing,” you hear Jungkook ask from behind you.

You glance back at your friend and see the jealousy and possessiveness return to his eyes, as you run your hand underneath Taehyung’s shirt once more. 

You look down at him and smile before releasing a sigh as his lips find their way to one of your nipples, and his fingers begin working on the other.

“So good,” you moan out, “such a good boy for me…”

You hear Jungkook release a sound of frustration and look back at him one final time as you move Taehyung’s mouth to your other breast.

“I don’t belong to anyone Kookie. You want me? Then you’re going to have to share.”

“Y/N…” he whispers in what is probably meant to be a warning but comes out as a whine instead.

“I’m going to show you” you say to him over your shoulder while admiring Taehyung, “exactly how it feels to have your feelings not matter…”

You look down at your roommate and pull his head back by his curls until he is once again looking into your eyes. Leaning down, you begin to grind your clothed clit against his thigh, rolling your hips in agonizingly slow circles, and trace his lips with your tongue. 

He lets out a whine at your teasing, and finally, giving in to his pleas, as he releases a second moan you silence him with your lips. 

He kisses you slowly. You can tell that he’s making it a point to show off how good he makes you feel while Jungkook has to stand back and watch. Good. Jungkook needs to learn that bullying your friend will get him nowhere.

You let out a moan at the friction caused by his thigh and your soaked underwear and take pleasure in the realization that you’re leaving a giant wet spot on his leg. Good, let him feel how wet he makes you.

His hands travel to your ass and your hair as your teeth dig into his bottom lip, and he moans as he pulls your body against his just a little bit harder. 

You help him remove his shirt and trail light kisses from his chest plate, to his nipples, and then to his neck. Your hands busy themselves with unzipping his pants before wrapping your fingers around him and bringing your lips back to his, taking your time with both your hands and your mouth.

“You’re so thick,” you praise, “and already so hard, just for me…”

You feel Jungkook's eyes burning into you, watching you, as you show him just how good you could make him feel. How good you should, be making him feel.

You bring your eyes to Jungkook as you ask Taehyung, “does that feel good?” 

You hear him moan into your neck, and you squeeze him tighter as you instruct him.

 “Say it. Tell me how good I make you feel.” 

He lets out a gasp, and your fingers make their way to his throat and squeeze lightly.

“So fucking good...” he whimpers.

Your lips travel to his neck, slowly marking him as you continue to grind your body against him. 

“Good boy,” you whisper at his response. His thigh flexes between your legs and you let out a whimper as the friction causes you to see stars. Your teeth continue to mark his neck and throat, your tongue softly sliding over the bruises as they form.

He lifts his leg up higher and you slow the movement of your hips as you feel yourself getting close.

“You’ve thought about this before haven’t you,” you whisper in between bites, “having me on top of you, touching you and teasing you until you cum for me…”

He lets out another grunt before closing his eyes and confessing.

“Yes.”

“How would I do it? When you imagined me? How did you use me?”

“God. Your mouth...your mouth....”

“Do you want my mouth?”

“Please…”

You look over at Jungkook and smile. The bulge in his pants betrays the scowl on his face, and you slow your hand as you bring Taehyung’s attention to your other roommate.

“Look at him…” you whisper into his ear before giving it a nibble then letting your teeth drag against his lobe.

He looks over your shoulder at Jungkook's frown and you feel him twitch in your palm. He’s enjoying this, making Jungkook jealous. Who would have guessed that they'd be into a little exhibitionism? 

Your hips return to their original pace as you feel his orgasm building and you increase the speed of your hand as you prepare to send him over the edge.

‘He looks so angry, doesn’t he?” You ask, not bothering to spare a glance at your friend a few feet behind you as you feel yourself reaching the edge.

Taehyung lets out a loud moan, looks up at you, and nods. His hands wrap around your waist and pull your body down onto his leg as you jerk him off.

“Good” you whisper breathlessly, and as his lips travel back to your breasts, you feel yourself stiffen on top of him and bury your teeth in his shoulder as your orgasm barrels through you. 

His thigh shoots up in response to your teeth, and you feel yourself getting close to another. Looking down at his fucked out gaze, you tighten your hand around him slightly and return your lips to his neck and command him, “Be a good boy and cum for me...let him see how good I make you feel.”

He releases a cry into your neck and moans your name as his orgasm barrels through him. You watch him as his body tenses, and he unloads himself into your hand and onto his stomach. 

Slowly, you lick his cum off of your hand and slide two fingers across his stomach before bringing them to his lips to taste. He looks into your eyes as he slowly opens his mouth and flicks his tongue against your fingers, sucking them as he goes. 

You bring your fingers to his hair once again and softly comb it away from his eyes. Noting the beads of sweat that have appeared on his chest, you drag woke tongue across his skin as you ask him, “did you enjoy it? Making him watch as I jerked you off...as you made me cum for you?” 

He glances behind you at Jungkook and gives you a small nod. You wrap your lips around one of his nipples and smile inwardly as he releases a moan. His hand flies to your hair as your lips travel to the other one and lightly drag your teeth against it.

“You like that,” you ask. He gives you an earnest nod and you smile at him and say, “maybe if you’re good I’ll give you some more. Would you like that?”

He gives you another nod and you glance back at Jungkook and smile as you look at Taehyung and say, “I need you to wait your turn then, we can’t have Kookie feeling left out now can we?”

You trail your tongue up from Taehyung’s chest and back to his mouth. You place a slow kiss on his lips before bringing your attention back to your friend and smile as your eyes travel over his tense shoulders. 

He looks at you with discontent and irritation as you rise from your friend’s thigh and stalk over to him.

‘Oh, he’s angry,’ you think to yourself. ‘Good, now he knows how it feels.’

As you get closer, you slide your hands up his body and tilt your head at him, slowly pinning him to the wall again as you do. Letting your hands slowly roam across his chest and up through his hair, you feel his hardness pressing against you.

“God you look so fucking hot right now,” you whisper as you close your eyes and breathe in the smell of him.

You watch as confusion makes its way to his eyes, and you smile as you drag your nails across his scalp and trail your lips from his collarbone to his ear, while oh so slowly marking him with your teeth.

He lets out a moan, and his hands travel to your ass and pull your body against his as he uses his long fingers to grab you.

“You don’t know how much it turns me in to see you like this.”

He lets out a gasp, and you slowly drag your tongue from the base of his neck to his jaw before marking him once more, this time letting your teeth sink into his skin a bit deeper. He thrusts his hips into your body, and you smile up at him as you notice how much he likes the pain. 

“Does it turn you on,” you ask as you grab a fistful of his hair and bring your lips to his ear, “knowing that you have me all to yourself while he watches?”

He sucks in a breath as your fingers finally reach the bulge in his pants, and his lips make their way to your neck and begin sucking on your skin without warning.

You moan at the thought of the bruises that his teeth will bring, and he begins slowly thrusting his hips into your hand.

He lets out a growl, and one of his hands travels to your hair and grabs it, suddenly causing you to release a cry of your own. 

He slowly pulls your head back until you’re looking up at him and he reaches down with his other hand, grabs your wrist, and slides it inside of his pants as he smirks down at you.

You wrap your fingers around his hardness and try to hide your surprise as you realize just how long he is. While Taehyung may be a bit thicker than he is, Jungkook’s length is in a league of its own. You feel an all too familiar ache in your core as you picture him ramming himself into you.

He spins your bodies and pins you against the wall, his thigh trapping you while slowly rising against your still sensitive lips. His mouth travels down to your nipple and begins teasing you while one of his hands slides down to your underwear and begins rubbing you over them, his free hand pulling your hips against him as he does.

“What about you,” he whispers. “You love the thought of making me jealous, don’t you?”

His thumb slowly rubs your clit, and you release a gasp as you grind yourself against him.

“Of course, I do…it’s just so easy...” you confess.

Your thumb slides over his tip, and you use your fingers to cover his length with his warm precum, your mouth watering as you imagine the taste of it on your tongue.

His nails dig into your thighs and you release a gasp as he pins you even harder against the wall, his hips thrusting forward into your hand as he lets out a moan.

His lips return to your neck, marking you, claiming you as his leg between your thighs rises higher and his hips continue to thrust into your hand and body.

You pull your body even closer against him as you increase the pace of your hips, begging for more friction as your nails dig into his shoulders. You feel yourself getting closer and closer to release. 

Suddenly, Jungkook begins to lower his thigh, pulling you from your blissful state. You try to lower your body with him, but the harder you try to rub yourself against him the lower you feel his thigh move and the slower his thumb moves against your clit.

“Kookie...” you groan out, as your grip around his cock tightens and you begin pumping him faster. He sucks in a breath, and in one fluid motion, grabs your wrists and pins them above your head with his hands.

“What’s wrong baby?” He teases, his insufferable cockiness returning to his voice. If it weren’t for his thigh between your legs, you swear that you would drop down to your knees and make him beg. 

His hands travel to your breasts and he smiles down at you as he confesses, “ I can’t tell you how many times I’ve imagined you like this… your body against mine...begging for release...”

“Sometimes it would be my mouth…” His head drops down to your chest, and you let out a whimper as you feel him take one of your nipples into his mouth. His tongue swirls around it and he grazes it with his teeth before switching to the other one.

His lips travel to your ear as he continues to tease you.

“Sometimes I would use my hands…” he says as you feel two fingers travel down into your underwear and tease your sensitive lips. You release a moan, and he brings his mouth to your ear and nips at it as he grinds his hips into you and asks, “you know what I always used though?”

You release a moan as you feel his hard length pressing into you. You know exactly what he used, but you decide against giving him the satisfaction of a response.

“Doesn’t feel so good does it, being teased...” he asks, as he slowly begins moving his thigh between your legs again, his pace excruciatingly slow. “Do you want me to let you cum?”

“Yes,” you moan out and you hear him release a chuckle before removing his body from yours completely.

He holds your gaze as he slowly drops down to his knees, making sure to leave small bite marks on your thighs that have you groaning as he goes. His tongue teases the lace of your underwear, and he looks up at you and slides his hands along your legs.

“You knew, didn't you,” he asks, looking up into your knowing and ever so tantalizing gaze.

“Bringing other guys home when you knew I was here, fucking them a few feet away from me, knowing all I would thinking about was your moans…”

You let out a sigh as his fingers tease at the fabric of your underwear and slide them to the side, softly teasing your folds.

“Of course,” you breathe out, your confession surprising you. Maybe he was right, maybe you did know how he felt about you before you heard him say it.

You lean back against the cold surface of the wall and let out a moan as you feel him bring his face to your wetness while placing his hands on your ass, his tongue tasting you through the fabric.

“I’ve been thinking about you for so long,” he says as he brings mouth to your underwear and teases you over the lace, his tongue and teeth merciless as they mark your thighs.

He teases your lips with his fingers, coming closer and closer to your inviting core as you moan.

“Look at you…” he remarks, satisfaction and smugness lacing his tone at your whines, “moaning for me…begging for my touch...” 

You look down at his face and spot the familiar look of pettiness and irritation in his eyes that betrays the confident and cocky smile on his face. 

He’s not just angry, you realize, he’s bitter because you made him wait. The idea that he feels entitled to you, that he somehow gets to claim you first sends a jolt of anger through your body, and you already feel yourself getting ready to punish him for it. ‘Later,’ you note to yourself, ‘let him have his fun for now.’

He brings his fingers to the waistband of your underwear and slowly peels it from your body, his nails lightly scratching your legs as he goes.

You know exactly what your teasing has done to him, and you inwardly smile to yourself as you prepare yourself for his retribution. After all, he’s never been one to forgive very easily.

His eyes are calculating as he takes in your full figure from his position below you. You watch him carefully, your fingers slowly running through his hair as he gives you a mischievous smile that doesn’t quite reach his eyes and suddenly begins his assault on your body.

The first flick of his tongue almost causes your legs to give out, your sensitive bud crying out in pleasure. The second has you seeing stars. His hands continue to pull your wetness against his mouth while you release a moan and grab a fistful of his hair. His tongue is slow in its endeavor, as if savoring the taste of you as he explores your folds with his mouth.

You close your eyes and lean your head back against the wall behind you as you drape one of your legs over his shoulder and thrust yourself into his mouth. 

You feel one of his hands leave your ass and he pulls his mouth away from your core and looks into your eyes as he places one of his long fingers in his mouth, swirls his tongue around it, and slowly slides it into you. 

You release a gasp as you feel his finger curl into you and brush against your sweet spot. 

“God you’re so tight, just for me...” he whispers, “do you want more?”

You open your eyes and glance at Taehyung as he watches you with his mouth open, pure lust filling his gaze on your body. You notice that he managed to remove his pants at some point while you were occupied. You narrow your eyes at him, and he stiffens underneath your gaze as he understands his mistake: didn’t give him permission to do that.

Looking down at Jungkook, you bring one of your hands to your nipple and tease yourself as you watch him.

“I want you,” you confess, “I want you inside of me.” 

He smiles up at you, and without warning he slides a second finger inside of you and returns his mouth to your clit, sucking it between his lips and flicking it with his tongue.

With every pump of his hand you feel yourself getting closer and closer to another orgasm. He increases the pace of his fingers, and you look down and take in the sight of him. His curly dark hair is messy from your hands, and his eyes stare into you as he watches you falling apart against his mouth. 

God, he looks so hot like this, on his knees in front of you watching how good he makes you feel. A small part of you wonders why you didn’t come on to one of them sooner.

He slides a third finger inside of you and you cry out as you feel his lips suck hard on your clit. Your body begins to tense up and you whimper out, “Kookie, I’m gonna cum…”  

You feel a sense of relief at the thought of release, and you smile down at him as he continues to pleasure you. He makes a noise against you in confirmation and continues his assault. 

You feel your body beginning to tense up, when suddenly you feel his hands and his mouth leave your body.

Your body cries out at the sudden loss of stimulation, and you release a sound of frustration as you look down at your roommate.

“What the fuck…” you gasp at him harshly as you pull him by his hair and force him to look up at you. This is the second orgasm he’s taken from you, and you’re not going to let him steal a third. You let him have his fun, but you’ll be damned if he thinks you’ll let him push you like this.

He rises to his feet, and your fingers release their hold on his curls and drop down to his neck as he wraps one of your legs around his waist and smirks down at you. He places a finger underneath your chin and peers down at you through his dark hair.

“Did you really think it was going to be that easy,” he whispers before planting his lips on your neck and making you. “Baby if you’re gonna cum, it’s gonna be on my cock…”

He spins your body around and you brace yourself against the wall as his hands drop down to your thighs.

You feel your irritation subside, and you let out a moan as you feel him grab his cock and begin teasing your lips. You wait for him to place himself inside of you, but he simply continues to tease you as mouth returns to your neck and breasts.

“Now that I think about it though,” he whispers into your ear, “I don’t know if you really deserve it just yet.”

“Kookie,” you warn, desperate to feel his hard length inside of you, “stop being such a tease.”

He removes his mouth from your nipple and tilts his head as he narrows his eyes at you. 

“Look at you,” he says, smiling down at you, “so desperate for my cock…” 

You lower one of your hands to his pants ready to take what you want, but he grabs your wrist and pins it above your body.

“You’re so impatient aren’t you,” he whispers, “so greedy…”

As he lines up his cock with your entrance, he smirks at you and teases, “baby if you wanted me, all you had to do was ask,” before finally sliding into you.

Your nails scratch at the wall, and you feel his grip on your thighs tighten as he settles into you. A quiet whimper leaves your mouth as he slowly thrusts himself into you, your body adjusting to his length. ‘God, he’s so big,’ you think to yourself as you feel him bottom out, his tip pressing firmly against your sweet spot. You close your eyes and release a moan as you feel him pull out all but the tip before ramming himself inside of you in one quick motion. 

He continues his slow unrelenting pace, teasing you as your body clenches around him and begs him to stay.

“Fuck me harder...faster Kookie...” you beg

He slows his pace even more and growls into your ear, “you think you deserve that? After the fucking show you just put on?”  

“Oh baby,” he whispers as you let out a whimper, “I’m just getting started.”

He reaches in front of you and squeezes your clit between his fingers, and your legs give out on you as you let out a cry of pleasure. He holds your body up and trails kisses from your neck to your shoulder as he begins moving his hips faster and harder.

“You gonna cum for me baby.” He asks.

You give him a moan and he quickly pulls out of you and spins you back around before lifting your body up and sliding back into you.

You feel your mind go blank at the force of his thrusts and you wrap your legs around his waist and use your feet to pull him in deeper.

“Fuck,” he groans as he burrows his head in your neck and continues pounding into you.

Your back slams into the wall with every one of his thrusts and you glance over his shoulder at your other roommate who is looking at you with a question in his eyes. 

You give him a small nod of approval and watch as he slowly begins stroking himself to the sight of the two of you in front of him.

You feel yourself approaching the edge once more and one of your hands grabs Jungkook’s hair and guides his mouth down to yours, nails dragging across his back as you continue to moan.

Your legs tighten their grip around his waist, and you clench your walls around him as you suck in a breath and feel your orgasm crash through you. He continues ramming himself into as you ride your high and you feel him tense up as he reaches his peak as well.

“I want to cum inside of you,” he groans out as he tries to hold himself back.

You release a whimper as you feel his cock press into your spot once more and feel another orgasm approaching.

“Fucking do it then, I’m on the pill.”

Your confirmation is all he needs, and he increases his pace and pace and thrusts into you a few more times before tensing up and unloading himself inside of you. You feel a tiny spark of disappointment that you couldn’t cum a second time, but one look at Jungkook's still semi hard cock eases your worries.

He sets you down and your legs feel like jelly, but you walk over to Taehyung who has stopped touching himself and is now watching you with anticipation.

“You said you wanted my mouth, right,” you ask as you climb up onto the empty cushion in front of him and begin slowly rubbing his thighs.

He lets out a small gasp as he watches your fingers curl into the waistband of his underwear and slowly peel them from his legs. He raises his hips, and you pause for a moment and just take in the sight of him laid out in front of you.

You hear Jungkook behind you, and as you wrap your fingers around Taehyung’s thickness, you spread your knees and lift up your ass in invitation.

“You’ve been good for me, haven’t you?” You ask your roommate in front of you.

He bites down on his lip and holds back a groan as he nods down at you.

As you crawl just a bit closer, you look into his eyes and place your tongue at the base of his cock, slowly dragging it up the length of his shaft.

He releases a sharp hiss through his teeth, and you feel his fingers lightly grab your hair and pull it as you finally take him into your mouth.

Jungkook’s hands travel along the skin of your ass and thighs, and he places light kisses along your spine before spreading your legs wider and teasing your lips with his hardness. You lower your body as you brace yourself on your elbows and arch your back in anticipation at the pleasure behind you. 

A moan vibrates around Taehyung’s cock as Jungkook slowly slides himself inside of you and lets out a groan of his own. He slides in deeper and deeper, and you can't hold back the whine that escapes your lips as he finally bottoms out. 

While the wall felt good, this is on a whole new level of deep. Once he’s settled inside of you, you feel him slowly pull out and begin teasing your lips again.

You remove Tae from your mouth and let out a gasp as Jungkook places his hip inside of you and suddenly jewels your hips back into his. 

The pace he sets for your bodies is merciless, and every thrust brings you closer and closer to cumming again. 

A small part of you is honestly amazed that you’ve all lasted this long, but the fact that you have makes you happier than you know it should. You don’t know if something like this will ever happen between the three of you again, but the fact that it has sends waves of satisfaction through you.

You rotate one hand around Taehyung’s cock as you continue to taste him. Your other hand drops down to his balls and softly caresses them as you suck. 

His hips jerk upwards in response and you admire the look of utter pleasure painted across his features as you take him deeper into your mouth. 

“God, you feel so good” He moans as he runs his fingers through your hair. “Fuck, you feel good.”

You feel Jungkook’s grip on your thighs and you begin pushing yourself backwards and meeting him thrust for thrust. 

He reaches a hand down to the front of your body and begins teasing your clit. You release a choked back sob at the stimulation and begin sucking on Taehyung a bit harder.

Taehyung looks down at you as his breathing quickens, and he whispers out “I’m...l need to cum.”

Slowing your hands and your mouth, you look him and the eyes and say, “not yet.”

“Please,” he begs, “I don’t know how much longer I can last.”

You give him a nod of understanding and remove your hands and mouth completely. 

He lets out a small whine at tour denial as well as the loss of stimulation, but as you narrow your eyes at him he gives you a small nod and runs his hands on thighs while he waits, careful not to touch himself as he does.

Looking back at Jungkook you swear you could cum just from the sight of him alone. The sweat that glistens off of his body, the way that his arms look while they pull your hips back, and the way that his sweaty curls stick to his face as he looks down at you cause your walls to tighten around him.

“Kookie,” you say as you feel him slow his pace once more, “I want to taste you.”

You feel him twitch inside of you, and he pulls himself from your body and walks up beside you. 

He looks down at you as he continues to run his cock, and you tilt your head as you crawl onto Taehyung’s lap and say, “stand behind the couch.”

Taehyung takes the closeness of your bodies as the perspective opportunity to return his mouth to your nipples, and you let out a groan as you feel his hands on your back lightly pull your body closer. You begin grinding your hips on top of Taehyung and reach down and tease him with your lips.

He looks up at you as you lean down and place a slow kiss on his lips before lowering yourself onto him. You let out a gasp at his thickness, and you let yourself stretch around him as you begin working your way around him.

Your head falls forward and your nails lightly dig into his shoulder at the way he’s stretching you out, and you his lips on your neck as you let out a whimper.

Your mouth opens up for Jungkook’s cock and you moan as Taehyung sharply thrusts himself into you and completely bottoms out.

Jungkook’s hands make their way to your head and one finds a place along the back while the other moves your hair out of your face so that you can see him properly. 

You realize how much you like seeing him like this, looking down at you with lust and adoration in his eyes. It turns you on almost as much as seeing him on his knees for you.

You take him deeper into your mouth and slide your hand from his base to your mouth as you suck.

He leans his head back and groans before sucking in a breath and confessing, “fuck, I’m gonna cum.”

Taehyung’s lips pepper your neck with kisses, and you can tell from his strained breathing that he’s going to cum soon as well. 

Removing your hand from his shaft, you take him into your mouth just a little bit deeper and reach down and caress his balls. His body tenses up, and you hear him suck in a breath before shooting his load down your throat while continuing to thrust his way through his orgasm. 

You increase the pace of your hips and drag your tongue along Jungkook’s cock as you clean him up.

Taehyung’s hands grab onto your hips and he begins thrusting himself into you harder and faster. 

“You gonna be a good boy and cum for me,” you ask him as your hand makes its way to his throat.

He looks up into your eyes and groans, his eyes full of desperation.

You bring a hand down to your clit and tease it while tightening your grip around his throat and whispering, “then cum for me Tae.”

You feel him twitch inside of you before raising his hips one last time and stiffening beneath you.

He releases a cry, and you ride him through his orgasm and chase it with your own. 

Breathing heavily, you rest your head on his chest and collapse on top of him. 

Slowly, you lift up your head and begin kissing him once more, the taste of Jungkook still fresh on your tongue as he caresses it with his own. 

Jungkook walks around behind you, and you look up at him as he leans down and kisses you. Taehyung's hands slide along your breasts, lightly tracing the outline of your nipples and the marks that now surround them. 

You let out a sigh as Jungkook raises your body from Taehyung’s and lifts you up into his arms. You wrap your legs around his torso and trail kisses up his neck as he brings you up the stairs. 

Glancing over at Taehyung who you can tell is already feeling abandoned, you curl a finger at him and gesture for him to follow.

Once in your bedroom, Jungkook lays you down on your bed and begins kissing you as you both move further up on the mattress.

“Can I ask you something,” Jungkook whispers as he takes your hand and places your bodies under the covers, his body staying close to yours as he leans his head on his fist.

You look into his eyes as Taehyung enters the room and crawls on the bed as well.

“Anything,” you assure him as you feel your eyelids getting heavier and heavier.

You feel Taehyung climb into the bed beside you and rest head on your pillow as he places his chin on your shoulder. He entwines his legs with one of yours and wraps one of his arms around your waist as he looks up at you.

Jungkook traces a finger from your chest to your collarbones as he looks down at you and says, “do you actually have feelings for me, or were you just trying to prove a point?”

You slowly reach a hand up to his face and guide his lips down to yours. The kiss you give him is tender and slow.

“I would never do anything to hurt you Kookie. I would never do anything to hurt either of you. You mean so much to me.”

Taehyung snuggles in closer to you and rests his head on your chest as Jungkook gives you a small nod and slides his arm under your head. 

As you look up at your ceiling you think about the pleasant soreness you’re going to wake up to tomorrow, and just how lucky you are to have friends like Jungkook and Taehyung in your life.

You hear Taehyung ‘s breathing slow because you and as you fall asleep, you hear Jungkook release a small chuckle and say into your neck, “I know that if it came down to it, you’d be all mine.”

As you drift off, you find yourself smiling at him as you realize that even after everything that’s happened, he’s still just as cocky as he was before, and if there’s one thing you love, it’s a challenge.

*********************************************

Tag list:

@ephemeralkookie

@ohhlalaniall

@bangtanology

@tangledsparkles

[zevexsii]

eli clark x reader sfw + nsfw hcs (gn s/o)

obligatory mention of how much i LOVE this man

cut for length and nsfw content

sfw

mom friend energy. eli probably has some of the healthiest behavior, at least comparatively, considering the rest of the manor is an absolute trash fire(loving). 

not saying that eli hasn’t witnessed his fair share of trouble! there’s a lot that he has to deal with- mainly guilt, considering he has a fiance and… feelings for someone else. any sort of relationship would happen very slowly, and you would have to be very open and honest- communication is absolutely key. 

eli lowkey worries that his feelings for you are temporary, seeing as he has no communication with gertrude, the next thought he has is that he’s using you in place of her. it’s terrifying for both of you. 

he isn’t, though! it’s definitely hard to stop thinking about; eli can tell when you’re upset or worried (part of his abilities is being able to perceive the emotions of those around him, to an extent), so please sit down with him and talk it out. eli’s anxiety rises with yours, and it pains him when he can’t comfort you :((

eli would like to continue wearing his engagement ring if you're alright with that. the entire arrangement is complicated and needless to say, eli has a lot of feelings about the subject.

moving on! eli's favourite forms of intimacy involve physical intimacy and words of affirmation <3 i hc that seeing through brooke rose saps a lot of energy out of both eli and brooke, so eli likes to keep his arm linked in yours, even if it isn’t all about having a guide. so pda… but not really? he isn’t opposed to sweet kisses on the forehead or cheek in public, just nothing big. 

eli kind of zones out a lot?? you’ll be in the mess hall, and eli will abruptly lean his head on your shoulder, no matter what you’re doing, humming contentedly under his breath. he’s not trying to stop you from eating, no, not at all! eli just has airhead tendencies and you love him for it. 

if you tend to overwork yourself, or just have trouble taking care of yourself in general, eli won’t be having any of that. since you can’t prioritize yourself, he’ll have to do it for you. 

when eli goes to bed or notices that you haven’t eaten yet, he’s right at your side, gently tapping your shoulder and handing you a glass of water or offering to bring you something up from mess hall. eli understands if you’re working on a deadline, but it’s still concerning enough for him to drag you off for a short nap or two. 

eli is the best cuddler around. lay down with him once, he’ll be pretzeled around you in no time- you’ll never want to get up and that’s the point. he’s not really picky about positions, but his favourites involve ones where he can gently run his fingers along the outline of your facial features (if you’re alright with that, of course). his smooth fingers ghost the outline of your lips, and eli’s smile outshines the sun.

he isn’t the best cook, but he’s more than willing to help out or learn! it’ll be a little more difficult, but eli isn’t opposed to trying things that make you happy or help out.

it may not be too noticeable under eli’s thick robes, but he’s got a really soft tummy and is pretty chubby! his cheeks are real round too- hold them and he’ll lean into your palms, nuzzling gently into your touch. 

pull him onto your lap or hold him!! please don’t let him pull the “i’ll crush you,”. if he does, simply shush him and rest your arm around his waist, pressing a soft kiss to the crown of his head every now and then. he’ll be asleep in no time. eli goes soft if you want to hold him on your lap or vice versa. when he’s got you in his arms, your head nestled in the crook of his neck, there are no words for the warm, protective feeling he gets in his chest.

he prefers holding you most of the time, but if eli’s craving reassurance and comfort, your arms are his hideaway. 

eli is an oblivious petname enthusiast (going both ways), his favourites being dear, darling, and love. hearing the soft tone of your warm words alone makes his heart melt- regardless of what you’re saying. 

another thing that makes eli indescribably soft is seeing you interact with brooke rose. if eli’s companion isn’t with him, it’s common for miss rose to be found perched near you, either being fed or keeping a careful watch over your shoulder. 

brooke also keeps a close eye on you during matches! she knows eli holds you in high priority. if you’ve perfectly timed a calibration or kited the hunter for an impressive run, you’ll hear a faint hoot of support off in the distance as brooke flies back to eli. 

eli is normally very confident in his qualities as a partner, but every now and then, something completely throws him off and into a puddle of self-doubt and crippling fear of inadequacy. during these times, eli needs a lot of one-on-one attention and verbal reassurance. 

he’s also sort of obtained the role of “therapist friend” among the manor inhabitants and sometimes finds himself bending over backward to help others. this trait is exposed in the way that eli will try to brush over the severity of his emotions and problems when he vents to you. 

make sure to interrupt him there and encourage him to discuss things thoroughly. he’ll be truly grateful that you noticed. 

eli really enjoys couple baths :) he’s a little insecure about his body at first, but reassure him, or give him privacy to join you in the sea of bubbles and sweet-smelling oils chosen specifically for their relaxing aromas. 

nsfw

eli is a very soft lover. rather vanilla, but isn’t opposed to indulging you in any of your lighter kinks. he’d rather not touch anything that requires a safeword. sex with eli is about love and pleasure, going both ways. 

big switch energy and will take whatever role his partner needs for the time being. eli’s a little hesitant about initiating, but he’s stellar when it comes to picking up on seemingly minuscule hints- the lingering touches and hazy look in your eyes when you look his way. it drives him insane, but eli waits for the safety of a  private space to nestle himself close to you, his hands slipping lower and lower before one of you finally plants your lips on the others.

as far as libidos go, eli’s sort of casually horny all the time. he’s not going to pressure you into doing anything prematurely though, don’t worry- it takes a while for him to even consider having sex with you, and even longer for the worst of the guilt to subside. 

loves it when you ride him. especially after a difficult match; eli is sore and tired, all he wants is your warmth and a reminder that you adore him. 

seeing as his sight definitely isn’t the best, and there’s no way in hell he’s going to bring brooke rose into this, eli would prefer a more vocal partner. whimper about how good he feels as you bounce up and down on his cock. eli lives to have you go to town on him, using him completely for your own pleasure, milking him for all he’s worth, while your mindless whimpers give away how close you are to cumming. 

eli has an obvious praise kink. worship his body or murmur out your need for him, and his round face flushes completely, precum drizzling from the tip of his dick. he’s decently sized too, roughly fifteen cm in length and twelve cm in girth.

not too fond of oral- receiving, that is. it feels too harried and impersonal for eli to be satisfied with it completely. the only time he’ll ask you to suck him off is when he’s completely exhausted or he’s jealous. on the other hand, one of eli’s favourite places to be is between your legs, caged in by your shaking thighs and driven on by your gasps and moans of pleasure. eli is completely enamoured by all parts of your body, but your thighs are one of his greatest weaknesses. 

when eli tops, he prefers missionary. that way, he’s got the sight of your beautiful face pinned down beneath him burned into his brain, your mutual devotion to each other immortalized in indescribable ecstasy. he has to be as close to you as he can get, too. 

without realizing it, eli begs for you quite often. neither of you really see it as begging, but either way, eli’s breathless pleas of “y/n, please, i need you,” send you reeling. 

eli’s pace is slow and sweet, gaining momentum as he reaches climax and/or you signal him to speed up.

can go for a max of three rounds. eli’s massive creampie kink is activated when he pulls out; the sight of his seed leaking from your soaked hole leaves him seeing stars. most times this leads to an impromptu second, or even third round if you’re up for it.

if you’re feeling a fair bit more dominant, eli is completely fine with penetration. he’ll be extra vocal if you tease him lightly while you prep him. every curl of your fingers inside of him coaxes breathy whines and desperate groans from eli’s heaving chest, and he wouldn’t have it any other way <3

interlock your fingers with his while you milk eli’s prostate, his chest heaving with heavy pants and moans in perfect tandem to the rocking of your hips. remind him how beautiful he is, totally full of you and lost in every slight shift of your cock or strap-on. 

eli won’t bring it up, but it becomes pretty obvious early on that he’s super into overstimulation. you’ve corrupted his thoughts entirely, every sense has been washed over by mindless requests of “more, more, more, please, and oh god i can’t take it anymore, y/n, please-,”

yeah, you’ve completely destroyed him. 

aftercare is tender and sweet, just like eli. depending on who’s subbed, eli will softly work shampoo into your hair, letting you lean back against him, or you’ll gently run a washcloth over eli’s back, applying pressure to any residual tightness in his shoulders. afterward, offer to grab some snacks or water from the kitchens and crawl into bed with your exhausted lover, snoozing off to whispered praises and lovely nothings.

[shoyouth]

Hello again! So i have this idea, could i request a hc when mc is being particularly clingy with them? Like, ask to cuddle a lot or backhugs on the living room or when they go about their day, etc? She just feels very needy that day 😂 thank you! And i love your writings so much, it made me smile a lot :)

Hello, my friend! This is such a cute request tbh, ty for sending it in! And aww thank you so much, that makes me so happy to hear 😁💞

napoleon ; he loves it. If you’re not normally clingy, the first time you give him a hug he watches you amusedly, inquiring as to why. But in the morning especially, when you aren’t pulling away from his embrace so adamantly, when you aren’t scolding him to get up but instead linger and return his kiss sweetly—he’s reminded why he loves sleeping in so much, and why he loves you. He could definitely get used to this.

arthur ; will tease you. Instantly. He has that little grin on his face and he catches your hand before you can snatch your hug and leave, and he pulls you right back in to his hold. Though he really is all bark and no bite; the second he has his hands on you, his touch is feather-light, his warm arms circled around your waist delicately. He actually basks in your open affection-days, and he becomes so so soft and he hums in your ear and sways back and forth. He needs it just as much as you. On certain days he may be more playful and return your affection twicefold; one kiss to his cheek leads to him pressing his lips to both of yours.

mozart ; you’ll be hard pressed to get him away from the piano, peeking your head through the door or lingering around behind him. He may feign exasperation at your ‘insistent silent cues’ that you want affection, but he readily turns around on the bench to let you sit with him, his lips pressed against your temple. Once you’ve had your fill, he’s softened up as well, and he’s nonchalant as he says he would not mind if you just stayed and wrapped your arms around his shoulder while he played “if you’d like.”

leonardo ; when you throw him pouts across the library, he can’t help the chuckle that rises in his throat. He’ll close his book and make his way over to you, nuzzling his nose against yours softly as he jokes that you can hardly be away from him. Again, leonardo sleep often just like napoleon, so he really doesn’t mind when you want to cuddle. He’ll sleep with you anywhere but if you have qualms about napping on the hallway floor, he’ll make the effort to clear his bed (only his bed, the rest of the room is still a godforsaken mess) for the both of you to cuddle comfortably, faces towards each other and playing with each others’ fingers.

vincent ; all you have to do is give the word and his paint brush is set down and his arms are open. You either cramp yourselves up super close on his couch or you go to his favorite spot on the hill and lay in the grass. Vincent gives super warm, comforting hugs (theo can vouch for him), and he smiles so sweetly as he holds you against him. He fixes your hair and asks about your day absently, and you may hold hands as you talk or—on more mellow days—you interlock your pinkies as you watch the clouds.

theo ; he’ll be in the parlor reading poetry or talking to arthur when you come in and sit so close beside him you’re practically on his lap. He pauses to protect himself from the stutter lodged in his throat, and his eyes cast to you. At your innocent smile, he simply sighs; he knows what you want. He places his hands on either side of your waist and hoists you into his lap, his arms caging you against his chest. If arthur makes any comment he grumbles and glares, but it’s just to protect his dignity when a pink flush crosses his cheeks (all the while you just smile). Affection in front of the others always flusters him a bit, but he always plays it off and acts suave—he secretly loves it.

issac ; if you ever were to surprise him with a back hug out of the blue, oh boy. He will sputter and choke, whirling around with big eyes. He may huff defensively that you shouldn’t surprise him like that, but the feverish flush of his cheeks shows you that he’s not mad at all. Though it may take some time, he grows to love your surprise affection on your clingy days, especially when he gets too stressed or focused about teaching or tinkering. Also a major sucker for the intimacy of close embraces like dazai and arthur, where he caresses your cheek and kisses your forehead—it relaxes and reassures him a lot.

dazai ; this sly dog can instantly read when you’re clingy, but he won’t do anything until you tell him. Everytime you’re glued to his side or brush against his arm, send him needy looks—he just smiles and asks if you’ve eaten or read the book he recommended. When you finally cave and tell him, for an odd moment he will remain quiet and not do anything, maybe have you just follow him. But once you’re sat down somewhere more comfortable, he’ll turn to you and gently take you in his arms, similar to arthur, and just hold you. His fingers will card through your hair, and it’s only when you silently beg for affection that you are able to draw out this soft kind of intimacy from him.

jean ; like issac, he isn’t much of a fan of the surprises. I don’t think he’d ever come to love it though because he’s afraid of how he’d react—would he feel threatened and pull his sword on you? What if he hadn’t drank enough that day, would he turn on you? For this man’s guilt-ridden heart, please initiate affection slowly. He’d love the soft handholding while you walked and talked, or the hand on his guiding arm. As he grows more comfortable, you could initiate gentle but firm hugs or sitting in his lap, and like arthur, he would end up needing it more; he will melt in your hands with his face pressed against your shoulder, your fingers running through his hair. It helps him forget and feel loved in time.

comte ; quirks a brow at first, a soft smile crossing his lips at your inquiry. He’ll cup your chin in his hand and kiss you gently, assuring you that he is all yours and he is only there to fulfill your every desire (“Be Our Guest” from Beauty and the Beast begins playing in the distance). He’d gladly let you latch yourself to his arm while he traveled the mansion, but he throws his tasks out the window quickly to instead sit in the gardens with you, admiring the landscape with his arm securely around your waist. At times like this, he feels very happy in a mellow sense; your affection helps him forget that he’s immortal, and that he can share moments so intimate like this with you.

sebastian ; quite honestly you’re both cooking in the kitchen when you slowly intertwine your fingers with his empty one on the counter. He pauses in reading the recipe to look to you for an explanation, but you’re nonchantly getting the ingredients together. Sebastian is observant, and so I think he would quickly understand that this is your silent confession of being needy, so he’ll just smile and press a kiss to your cheek before continuing with his work. He will try his best to leave your hands connected while you work, or return to your hold as quickly as possible if the task requires both hands.

shakespeare ; your shows of needing affection may have to be more subdued if you ever want a desirable reaction. If you come on too strong or lively, he will only use poetic words to answer your actions, his eyes flashing as he’s on guard, for you couldn’t be that happy to see him, could you? But if you’re more mellow, perhaps kissing the inside of his wrist or ghosting your touch along his neck, he may shiver and crumble. Such intimacy! Mayhaps you do hold such love for him in your heart of hearts, and he’ll gloss his lips down your forearm to kiss your inner elbow to show his own desire.

[cherrynojutsu]

Title: Like Gold

Summary: Sasuke grapples with love and intimacy regarding his developing relationship with Sakura after returning to the village from his journey of redemption. Kind of a character study on Sasuke handling an intimate relationship after dealing with PTSD and survivor’s guilt in solitude for so long. Blank period, canon-compliant, Sasuke-centric, lots of fluff and pining, slowly becomes a smut fest with feelings.

Disclaimer: I did not write Naruto. This is a fan-made piece solely created for entertainment purposes.

Rating: M (eventual nsfw-ness)

AO3 Link - FF.net Link - includes beginning/ending author's notes

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Chapter 4/?: Soothe

Sasuke arrives outside her building shortly before seven in the morning, an ubiquitous aubade sung by birds, polished and practiced for many years, lilting into his ears along the way. The village for the most part is still slowly awakening from its slumber; no merchants in the streets yet, and he only passes a few people here and there as light slowly seeps higher into the sky.

He carefully pushes open the glass door of the exterior portion of her complex, making sure to keep it quiet in case her neighbors are still asleep. As he goes up the stairs, he notices that all of the downstairs tenants’ lights are on, emanating from beneath the trio of entryways. Once he reaches the upper landing, he sees that Sakura’s light is on, too, though her other two neighbors' are not.

The doors of each unit are all painted different colors. Hers is sage green; he hadn’t been able to discern that previously, with the desaturation that night brings.

He's wondering if maybe he should knock to let her know he’s here, but then she emerges a few minutes early, beautiful and bright-eyed and full of life, pale yellow sunshine coating her from the large window with diamond patterning behind him.

She seems pretty awake already; she must be an early riser. She's carrying her tote bag again, and today she wears a dark skirt with a red top, along with a familiar pair of knee-high sandals. She's also wearing a smile, directed upwards at him.

"Good morning, Sasuke-kun," she acknowledges him softly, looking very happy to see him.

"...Morning." He keeps his voice low, because it is still a little hoarse. He tries to memorize her eyes again in the span of seconds before she turns to lock her door behind her.

It's 6:58 by the time they're out the glass door, her leading the way. They take the main road west a few blocks before turning to go north, this time. There are several more buildings that appear residential on her street. One of them has vines creeping up the sides, starting to bud after the warmer spring weather. He notes there is also a bakery on the corner, not open yet, but one that seems like the kind to also sell confections. He wonders if that factored into her apartment selection at all; he remembers she has a sweet tooth.

It is an easy silence they share on the walk there, bird calls lulling in as background noise again. There are more of them now, a more layered song than earlier, with a wider variety of voices filtering in and out.

Sakura leads them to a very small tea shop within five minutes of the hospital; it is quaint and simple, definitely not modern. It is also quite small, with only four or so small tables situated by windows, looking out towards the street. The entire establishment utilizes a spread of cinnamon-colored wood for its surfaces; floors, counters, and the shelving in the back, laden with neatly-labeled teas of several varieties in glass jars. He assumes the larger jars are store stock, with the smaller ones higher up on the shelves being available for purchase for use at home, if one decides they like a particular flavor enough.

He finds he likes the atmosphere. He figured he would. It's not a formal place, but rather one where you retrieve what you've ordered from the counter and can choose whether to stay or go. He supposes that makes sense; it’s closer to the busier part of the village. There appears to be a small area to the left of the counter where one can add cream, sugar, lemon, or honey, though he knows he won't. He vaguely remembers that she used to take lemon and sugar in her tea, and possibly cream, depending on the brew. Honey seems like something Sakura would like, too, now that he’s thinking about it.

He scans the menu briefly upon entering before deciding something hot with caffeine would probably be best. Sencha green tea is usually what he gravitates toward. He also enjoys black tea during cooler weather, and jasmine occasionally, though not often; it had been his mother’s favorite.

Once he orders, he says, "Hers, too," and glances back towards Sakura expectantly. She looks at him with a blush that rivals the color of her hair when she realizes he's offering to pay for hers.

"Oh! Um, lavender matcha. Hot, please."

His lips quirk upwards a little, because that is possibly the most Sakura thing she could have ordered.

It doesn’t take very long until it’s ready, as they’re not busy; they are the only ones there, thus far. He takes a sip while idling by the end of the counter as he watches her add honey and cream into hers, stirring carefully. It is one of the better blends of sencha he’s had, aside from a particular place nestled on the edge of the Land of Mountains, where he’s pretty sure the elderly woman who ran the place harvested the tea straight from her private garden. He had pilgrimaged there a total of five times on his journey, months scattered like the seasons in between.

It was an odd teahouse, more formal than this one and off the beaten path, not near any major landmarks, nor plotted on any map he’d seen before or after. The lady, who had wizened eyes of a crystal clear blue, slightly lighter in hue than Naruto’s, had served the brews in eclectic and sometimes chipped mugs and teacups, from which he had assumed after multiple visits must be a fairly vast collection. The china was different every time, but he had liked the tea itself so much he kept coming back, if he was anywhere near the area. Twice he had been the only customer there, the first two visits occurring during early morning hours, and there was something extremely cathartic about sitting at the table in the far corner, looking out the window as the sun rose higher in the sky until it no longer skimmed the horizon and the mountains in the distance.

The other three visits had occurred during the afternoon, so there had been at least one or two other people present, at those times. He had noticed that third time that other patrons were served out of much different teacups than he was; he had secretly suspected, after that, that the woman tried to match the stoneware from her collection to whatever she saw in her patrons.

There had been a father sitting with his daughter, who had looked to be around six or seven, on his third visit. The father’s teacup had been robust, solid with carved detail that appeared to have been created with something like a miniature chisel, and an earthenware glaze mix of green and russet, strangely looking similar to the color of seaweed. The daughter’s had been a smaller cup, dainty finery of opalescent sky blue, with a similar mother of pearl finish coating the inside. The girl had quickly drained her glass once she realized the inside was pretty, too; she had spent the rest of the time there in awe of its beauty, turning it in the light as her father watched with soft eyes, enjoying his own cup more slowly. Sasuke had thought it must have been an expensive teacup, not necessarily what you’d typically give a child that young, but the girl hadn’t chipped or broken it. Instead, she had been enamored by its beautiful finish, even more enthralled with the inside than she had been with the outside, and had handled it with great care.

He never saw the same cup twice, for him or any other customer there. He had hoped by the third and fourth time that this was a good sign, that it meant progress. Once he figured it out, he wished he’d examined the first two cups, near five months apart, with greater care; he had thought there might have been a lesson there he had missed. His first teacup, from what he remembered, had been rather plain: rounded, no handle, slightly hard to grip, a shiny black glaze with a burnt orange rim. The second time, he’d been served the sencha in another black piece of china, though this one must have been fired differently; there was no glaze at the very bottom of the outer portion of the vessel, bare toasted clay in an oatmeal color. Carved designs on the outer portion of the piece had nearly melted glaze off it, allowing for the viewer to see the true color of the clay body beneath, creating an effect of brushstrokes in the third dimension, rippling out of the darkness. That one had had a chip at the top, but it hadn’t compromised the structural integrity of the piece, and was easily avoided simply by sipping from the undamaged side.

The third cup had taken him off guard in its uniqueness, and is what had caused him to look to the girl and her father. He had analyzed theirs, and then his own cup closely for a long time that day, thinking. Still no handle, but it had been a bit more narrow, as well as taller, easier to grip. The glaze design was fascinating, a thick glossy black base coat overlaid with a strange dissolving mixture of sapphire and indigo. It had reminded him of a night sky in the middle of nowhere, tiny amounts of galaxy blues and violets barely visible to the naked eye in their sheer scope and complexity. The glaze itself also only covered around two thirds of the vessel, at an asymmetrical angle, with the remaining half left unglazed, as if it hadn’t dripped down to be fully covered yet because the artist had liked the way it looked as is.

When he went back for a fourth cup several months later, the lady had given him an entirely too knowing look, and served his tea in a somewhat misshapen mug, this time with a handle. The handle was awkward, too small, and slightly malformed; the mug’s overall shape seemed as though it may have been an artist’s first attempt, shoddily trimmed and uneven in many places. The glaze design itself was mesmerizing, though, something like a gradient this time, shifting from splattering black to sepia to a lighter color, akin to the inside of a water chestnut. It was almost as if the cup had been constructed by a beginner and then drenched in magisterial color by a master. The sencha had tasted just as good from that cup as it had from any of the others, despite the challenge of grasping it with any semblance of comfort.

The last cup had been only a few months ago: well-designed, with a near perfect handle, easy to hold. The foot and interior of the mug was a smoky gray, well-trimmed, but the exterior body of it was a white raku crackle, twisting patterns of scale-like ivory and black outlines, small dots sprinkled in between where the unevenness of the heat must have interfered in the firing process.

When he reached the very bottom of the vessel, having finished his tea, it had been gilded gold, metallic and astonishingly bright, catching the light of the sun coming through the farthest window, where he sat in the corner alone.

He had sat there staring at it for the better portion of an afternoon. It was a peculiar artistic choice.

This sencha is good, too, he thinks as he takes another sip, here with Sakura, also at a table in the farthest corner, looking out another window. Herbaceous, earthy, and light, and in a cup that matches hers. It feels cleansing on his sore throat, corrosion, not too hot but not lukewarm, either; a rather perfect medium between mellow and astringent. It is a nice way to greet the break of day.

“Thank you, Sasuke-kun," she murmurs, after they’ve been seated for a few seconds.

He nods; she’s still flushed as she says it. He can see it better now, in the bright light of the window. He takes another sip, and continues to enjoy looking at her.

“How is yours?” She asks.

“...I like it.” He considers his next words. “You didn’t add lemon.”

Her lips quirk upward, dimple appearing. “It doesn’t go the best with the lavender. They only have this kind on hand for the springtime.” She pauses, then adds, “I still put lemon in pretty much all my tea, otherwise.”

Sasuke inclines his head again, and she takes another sip.

They sit there for a while in a comfortable silence, watching more of the village wake up and people pass by from the window, on their way to work and other responsibilities. There are two small birds across the street, perched on the awning over an apartment building’s entrance. Finches, he deduces by their plumage and size. Perhaps they are looking for a mixture of materials with which to build a nest.

“It’s a good place to just sit and watch, in the morning,” Sakura mentions after a while, still looking out the window contentedly.

“...Is that your favorite thing about it?”

She meets his eyes, then, and smiles. “One of them.”

He looks at her expectantly, so she continues. “The tea itself is good. It’s close to the hospital, and I like... “ Her voice trails off, and she glances over at the station where she added cream and honey, lips still turned upwards. “I like that they don’t overfill the cup; it makes it easier to add what it needs.”

A ghost of a smile overtakes him. Practical, as always.

Sasuke finds himself contemplating what kind of teacup the elderly lady would give Sakura, if he took her there.

XXX

"You're a little on the skinny side for your height, now," Sakura notes as she writes down his information on the form he's given her, stepping off the scale; 163 pounds. "Not unhealthy, necessarily, but you should try to put on some weight."

They are at the hospital, in an exam room this time instead of her office. Her voice has shifted to something more professional, and Sasuke knows he is now with Sakura the clinician, though her affection is still an undercurrent in the way she's looking at him carefully with warm eyes. She’s already measured his height, and has his paperwork from his last physical to compare it to; apparently he’s grown another two inches since then.

He hopes he’s done growing, in that regard. It doesn’t seem likely that she’ll grow any taller; she’s twenty now, and they already have a considerable height difference. He doesn’t know how tall she is, exactly. He must hover over her by at least six or seven inches.

"Okay," He responds, because he trusts her judgment. Being away and mulling on his failures never gave him much of an appetite. Being back in Konoha hasn't much either, so far, but he can try. “How much?”

She looks somewhat surprised that he asked. “160 to 196 pounds is considered a normal range for six feet; I’d start with ten, and then evaluate from there.”

He nods. Her eyes linger on him, as if she’s contemplating saying something more. When she turns to set down her clipboard and grab the cuff typically used to measure blood pressure, he thinks she must have decided against it, whatever it was. He goes to sit in the patient’s chair, familiar with the routine at this point. He's gotten a physical near every year of his life that he’s spent in Konoha.

She sits on the wheeled chair that’s next to the desk, rolling it closer to him. He extends his right arm, and as she carefully adjusts the cuff, she tells him, tone casual, “You’ve got an inch on Naruto, now.”

There is a very stupid and juvenile part of him that takes immense satisfaction in this news, but she doesn’t look like she’s finished speaking yet. He waits for the rest.

She smiles apologetically. “He’s got about fifteen pounds on you, though. There’s some motivation for you.”

He pins her with a pointed stare, unimpressed but also a little amused. Motivation, indeed.

Her expression turns somewhat guilty, now. “Sorry. Couldn’t resist. I did his about a month ago; he came back from a mission with a cracked rib, and it needed to be updated.”

She starts increasing the pressure, and he suddenly becomes aware that she is closer to him than before, by the nature of the operation of the equipment. He had become aware of her physical proximity at roughly this point in the exam the last time, too.

He’s thankful it doesn’t seem to affect his blood pressure. “105 over 70; good,” she concludes, before reaching to remove the cuff from his arm. Her fingertips make brief contact with his skin, this time, and he has to fight an urge to shiver, even though they’re warm.

She picks up her pen to input this information in the appropriate slot, then sets it aside and puts away the cuff. When she turns back to him, she says, “Heart rate is next. Hold out your wrist, please.”

He holds out his right arm again, letting his elbow rest on the surface of the desk this time. Both of her hands come to grip his single one, lightly and carefully feeling for his pulse. He tries to hold very still, and to not think about how soft her hands are. He distracts himself by preoccupying his gaze with the clock on the wall behind her. It feels like a very long thirty seconds, though he knows by watching the hand tick that it’s actually not.

She doesn’t vocalize what the number is, just removes her hands finally and reaches for the pen to fill it in on the paper. He wonders if it was elevated.

“Heart and lungs next.” She reaches for the stethoscope, positioning it in her ears before leaning in to listen to his heart first, over his shirt. He looks to the ceiling.

It doesn’t take very long. “Sounds good. Lungs, next.” She gets up and comes around the chair slightly behind him. He shifts to pull the back portion of his shirt up to his shoulder; he remembers this from the last exam, too.

“It’ll be cold; I’m sorry,” she warns gently, before pressing the instrument to his back. She is nothing but professional as she asks him to take a few deep breaths. Routine, and very careful not to touch his skin with anything but the diaphragm of the stethoscope, cool metal.

It feels… different than the last exam. He had been a little on edge during this part, then, too, even though she was nothing but professional then, as well.

He is just… very aware that she is behind him, and that his shirt is pulled up, and she’s listening to him breathe and can see the skin of his back. And that he's kissed her.

The coolness slips away after a short amount of time. “Lung function sounds good.” He pulls his shirt back into place, feeling a faint sense of relief as he does so. She goes back to document her findings on the paperwork.

She then lays the stethoscope back in its appropriate place. Scanning the page, she asks, “Any issues with your hearing?”

“Not that I’m aware,” Sasuke responds. She dips her head in acknowledgement, filling in that box with what he assumes is non-applicable.

“Sense of smell?”

He recalls raspberries and antiseptic. “No.” She fills another box.

“Sinus or lymph node issues?”

He shakes his head.

“I’m assuming you’ve used the Sharingan and Rinnegan since last time, so I’ll look at your eyes towards the end.”

He nods, and she reaches for a light instrument to use to look at his throat, as well as one of the wooden sticks from a glass jar in the corner. “Throat next,” she says, flicking the light on.

He tries not to furrow his brow. He wasn't looking forward to this part.

He opens his mouth for the wood, reedlike and firm against his tongue, and then she’s shining the light in and frowning.

“Say ah, please.”

He complies, feeling quite undignified, though he knows it’s necessary and just part of her job. She removes the stick after a second, setting the flashlight instrument aside, and he closes his mouth.

"Teeth and gums look good, and your tonsils look fine, but your throat looks a little raw. Have you been sick recently?"

"Yes." It is technically the truth, though not in a viral sense.

She looks thoughtful as she’s making a note on her clipboard. “Within the past week?”

He nods. She must see him from the corner of her eye, because then she asks, while still writing, “Any other symptoms? Cough? Does it feel sore?”

“No.” He pauses, then clarifies. “No cough. A little sore. Not bad.”

Verdant eyes flick up to him for a long moment. He feels somewhat guilty; even if he knows the truth, she might be thinking right now that he’s been irresponsible, that he may have given her an illness via kissing.

She breaks eye contact eventually, and sets the pen down, standing to open the uppermost cupboard door in the exam room. His brow furrows, until she’s pulling down a small box that he sees has cough drops in them.

“We only have mixed berry; they’ll be kind of sweet, but it should help. Take a few for later, and put one in now, please.”

Sasuke blinks, and then takes a handful. He puts all but one in his pocket, and then unwraps the one left in his hand, putting it in his mouth, as she asked.

She arches to put the box back in the cupboard, and he forces himself to look elsewhere.

It does feel good on his throat, soothing. “...Thank you,” he says after a few more seconds, as she makes another note on his form.

“You’re welcome,” she replies. Then, back to clinical Sakura. “Any other issues? Abdominal, neurological?”

“No.”

She flips the page. “Infectious disease screening questions are next. Obviously you’ve traveled outside the village in the past 21 days, but have you been outside of Fire Country in that time?”

He thinks. “Rain, about thirteen days ago. Wind, 19 days ago.”

Sakura inclines her head, and writes in the information. He notices she keeps her eyes trained on the questionnaire now. “Have you, to your knowledge, had close contact with a person with measles, mumps, or chickenpox in that time period?”

“No.” She checks the 'no' box.

“Have you, to your knowledge, had close contact with a person or source in that time period for any of the following: botulism, diphtheria, E. coli, encephalitis, hemorrhagic fever, hepatitis, influenza, listeriosis, malaria, meningitis, pneumonia, rabies, severe acute respiratory syndrome, smallpox, or yellow fever?”

“No.” He watches her check several 'no' boxes.

“Have you, to your knowledge, had close contact with a person in that time period who may have exposed you to any sexually transmitted infections?”

He’s glad she’s looking at the paper still, even if that answer is obvious. “No.” She checks several more 'no' boxes.

“And you didn’t have a fever earlier.” She checks another 'no' box. “And sore throat, but no shortness of breath at any point?”

“No.”

“Vomiting or diarrhea?”

“...Vomiting, yes,” he answers honestly. “No to the second.”

She nods, as if she knew that already from looking at his throat. She probably did. She’s good at what she does.

“Any kind of rash?”

“No.”

That’s the last question on the page, so she turns to the next one.

“Next is bloodwork. We’ll do a cholesterol screening, in regards to heart health, and then we’ll also do a general workup and run it for any infectious diseases. I don’t think we’ll find anything if it’s just the vomiting and resulting sore throat, but better safe than sorry.”

She then starts getting out the necessary supplies with which to get a blood sample. It doesn’t take very long; he holds out his right arm again, and Sakura finds the vein easily. “You’ll feel a pinch.” Within sixty seconds it’s over, and she’s pressing and holding the cotton to the dot of red before taping over it, a small pressure dressing.

“Leave that on for a few hours, please,” she advises, and he nods to indicate that he will. She makes quick work of labeling the blood sample, and sets it aside with the clipboard, he assumes for the end of the appointment.

She scribbles in a few more comments on the sheet, he assumes for whoever is running the tests. “Okay, just eyes and arm left. We’ll do eyes first. Any deterioration in vision that you’ve noticed?”

“No.”

“Good. I’ll shine the light to check your pupils quick before I use chakra to look at them.” She grabs a different light tool, a penlight, and turns it on, before looking at him expectantly.

He blinks, curious what she’s waiting for, and then she asks softly, “Could you move your hair out of the way, please?”

Oh. He complies, and she shines the light in one eye, moving it slightly and monitoring the progress. She then does the same to his Rinnegan.

“Reactivity is good; no signs of defect.” She sets the penlight back where it belongs, then makes a note in his paperwork indicating that. Then she’s shifting her chair a tiny bit closer, so she can reach his eyes with her hands.

“Do you have a preference, which one I start with?” She asks. He shakes his head. “Okay; I’ll check the right eye first.” She reaches out with her left hand, pressing her thumb above his eye over his eyebrow, and her other four fingers lightly to his temple, just next to his eye socket.

Sasuke tries not to dwell on how close she is again as green chakra drizzles into his ocular system; he keeps his vision trained forward, as he knows he’s supposed to as she examines. There is a freckle on her right ear that he remembers focusing on, the last time; he does this time, too.

Around thirty seconds passes, before she informs him, “I’m going to funnel some chakra into the retina and optic nerve here; there’s some damage.”

He had suspected there might be, though his vision has not suffered; mostly there was just a bit of pain, sometimes. He hasn’t overworked it by any means, but he hasn’t completely abstained from using it since he’d last been healed by her, either. “Okay.”

The flow of her chakra works its way deeper, more of it now. This part has always relaxed him; her chakra really is quite calming, careful and gentle, threading its way behind his eye and wrapping around the nerve.

She works for about five minutes before the chakra starts to let up.

“...There. That should be a little better,” she says before lifting her hand from his right. “Look up, down, please.”

He complies.

“Left to right, now.” He does. “Good. Does it feel okay?”

He nods, meeting her eyes again finally. It feels stronger, no pain. He decides to verbalize that, even though he’s already nodded. “It’s better. Thank you.”

She smiles at him. “Good.” Then she’s detailing whatever she’s supposed to detail in the paperwork, before setting the pen down again.

“Left eye now.”

She repeats the process, frowning again. “There’s some damage here, too. I’ll fix it.”

This time, it takes longer; not quite ten minutes, but fairly close. He tries to focus on the wall behind her.

He had asked her once, when she was healing him following the war, if it used a lot of chakra. She had said not necessarily, but it depended on the level of damage. She also told him that it was moreso a delicate process, requiring careful manipulation, so he has tried not to talk during any healing sessions since.

When her hand finally pulls away, he’s gotten so used to the contact that it feels like a loss.

“Look up, down, please,” she requests again. Then left to right.

“Function looks good. How does it feel?”

“Better. Thank you.”

She smiles at him gently, just Sakura again for a second, before turning back to the form to finish the optical section.

Then, she turns the page. “Arm is last. Could you please roll up your sleeve to your shoulder?” He grabs his empty left sleeve with his right arm and starts shifting it upwards, rolling it so that it stays put once it’s to the top.

She touches the end of what’s left of the limb with careful fingers, soft but steady on marred skin and scar tissue. “I’ll look with chakra in a second, but any redness that you’ve noticed?”

“No.” He shifts his gaze forward, because her fingertips really are softer than he remembers.

“Any areas that occasionally feel warmer than is typical?”

He shakes his head.

“Swelling of any kind?”

“No.”

“Have you been stretching it as instructed?”

He meets her eyes, then. “Yes.” He wants her to know he listens to her recommendations.

Soft jade, and she’s smiling again. She moves her hands away momentarily, and grabs the clipboard with the papers, checking several boxes as he has indicated. He looks back forward.

“Any phantom limb pain?”

“Sometimes.”

“Residual limb pain?”

“...Sometimes.”

Her gaze flicks upward. “If you had to rate it on a scale, one being hardly anything and ten being the worst?”

“...Usually two or three.” He pauses, and she waits. “...Sometimes four or five.”

“How often, for the worst of it?”

He thinks. “Maybe twice or three times a month.” It’s a bit more often than that, but not by a lot.

She notes it on the paper; that must be a normal range. “Alright. I’ll check with chakra, now.” Her fingers come back to his stump, touching more firmly now. Green chakra starts to thread its way in.

Sakura frowns, after a second. “Nerve endings are a little inflamed. I’ll fix it.” The flow of her chakra increases, and he feels almost instant relief; he supposes it still hurt, faintly. Maybe he just got used to it. “Has it hurt in the last day or so?”

“...Late last night.”

She nods, as if that makes sense. “It won’t take too long. Maybe five minutes.”

He inclines his head just barely, not wanting to move while she’s working.

“You should let me know if it hurts again,” she suggests quietly, after a moment. “It doesn’t take much to fix.”

“...Okay.”

There is a comfortable silence for a few minutes as she works. He feels the chakra start to dilute a little towards the end of it.

“I’m going to stop my chakra and manually massage the tissue, now. It should help prolong the effect.”

He feels her chakra dissipate. She has done this to him before, throughout the rehabilitation process following the war; it was more important then, she’d said, to develop tolerance to touch and pressure of the residual limb. It had hurt, the first few times, but later in the healing process, he had secretly enjoyed it; it made it hurt much less, and the process itself felt… nice.

He had privately wondered what it would feel like on his back.

It elicits the same response now, too, kneading fingertips gradually increasing pressure to access deeper tissue, helping to work away pain that has lived there for a while.

"You wear your hair differently now," she comments after an incredibly nice period of time, still pressing tenderly in little circles, though the pressure is starting to taper off now, since they’re getting towards the end of five minutes; that was roughly the time she would do back then. Since there’s no chakra anymore, it must require less of her concentration.

He realizes he hasn’t shifted his hair back into place yet, then. He takes a moment, then responds quietly, furtively, "Most people dislike looking at the Rinnegan."

She doesn’t respond right away; just finishes massaging the end of his stump, then removes her hands to pick up her pen.

"Not me," she murmurs softly as she makes her final notations.

His heart flips in his chest, and he feels his face grow warm. He's glad she's focusing on the forms, so she can't see the effect her words have had.

The lozenge has dissolved fully, and his throat isn't as sore.

XXX

Sasuke goes to the Hokage’s office, after, to see if the dobe is there. He has some time to kill before lunch, and he wants to take him up on his offer to spar at some point, given that his eyes are freshly healed. Now that he knows Sakura’s schedule for the next few days, he can fill the rest of his time with whatever else. He’ll see her tomorrow at four, at the hospital, and then at Ichiraku’s on Saturday, and then for a bit after, too; they still need to confirm an actual time for that with Naruto and Kakashi. He assumes Sunday and Monday must be her days off. If they’re not, she works too much. He’s going to ask her tomorrow, he thinks.

Oddly, he finds only Kakashi in his office.

“Ah, Sasuke. Good morning,” he greets as he walks through the doors.

“...Morning.”

The copy ninja sizes him up with a single eye for a long moment, as if considering what to ask him. Sasuke braces himself.

"You got your physical done."

Sakura had said after the bloodwork was complete, she’d drop off the paperwork for him. "...I did."

"It went well, I assume."

"...It did."

"Wonderful," he says quietly, sounding pensive.

There is a very long pause.

“And the date, with Sakura this morning, before that? That went well, also?”

Sasuke deliberates. There is no teasing lilt to his old sensei's voice this time, just genuine curiosity, so he answers honestly, even though his neck warms and he doesn’t quite appreciate being spied on. “...It did.”

Kakashi gives him one of the widest and most genuine smiles he has ever seen him wear, beneath the mask.

“Wonderful,” the copy ninja says again, this time teeming clearly with pride and meaning.

“...Yeah.” Sasuke agrees, looking anywhere but at him.

Kakashi shuffles a few papers around his desk, and starts talking again, as if Sasuke has not just admitted to something he’s sure their sensei had suspicions about for the better portion of eight years. “Well, Naruto’s not here; I’m assuming that’s who you were looking for. Hinata’s leaving for a mission later today, around one, so I gave him the day off. I kind of assumed he’d use the opportunity to seek you out for a spar in the afternoon, after she leaves. He was going on about it yesterday, along with a Team Seven dinner on Saturday night; sounds like that will be at six.”

Sasuke just blinks, gears turning still; the scroll from yesterday is still on the desk, so he's not sure why he'd grant Naruto another day off so easily.

Kakashi further clarifies, smile shifting into something more sly. “I wouldn’t go over there before a little after one, if I were you.”

His first thought is oh, and he feels rather stupid. His next thought is gross. His old sensei is grinning, as if his reaction amuses him; he must have made some kind of face that belayed his internal thought process.

“Ah, love requited and besotten newlyweds. What a time." Sasuke's neck burns again, because he realizes after a second that the ‘love requited' portion of that is referring to Sakura and himself. Kakashi's moving on, though. "Anyway, now that I’ve given you too much information…” His voice trails off, and he looks at the intricate scroll tucked away at the table beside his desk, where Naruto usually sits. “If you’re not busy and want something to do until lunch, you could take a look at this scroll for me, since Naruto won’t be getting to it today.” He appears to be thinking, then adds. “For all his progress, he can still be less than perceptive, in certain instances. Your assistance could be invaluable, since I’m occupied with other tasks at the moment.”

Sasuke ponders for a bit; he has already read a good portion of the way through his books, and it’ll be a few hours before he needs to eat. It's not lost on him that this involves a level of trust in him on Kakashi's part, as whatever is in the scroll is likely not public knowledge.

He decides it can’t hurt, though he hopes he doesn’t get asked any more questions about Sakura. He makes his way to take Naruto’s seat, opening up the scroll.

He stares at it long and hard, rolling it out on the table to examine it more closely. Kakashi wordlessly grabs the stapler on his desk and sets it on the top end of the parchment, to hold it in place as he further unravels it. It appears to be a cipher, and quite a complicated one.

“...You think Naruto’s going to be able to crack this?” Sasuke questions incredulously, glancing towards his old sensei with his brows furrowed in doubt. His eyes catch as he does so on the framed photograph sitting on his desk; from this angle, the side instead of the front, he can now see that it’s their original Team Seven photo. He hasn't seen it in a long time.

Kakashi chuckles, not looking up from his paperwork. “Not at all, which is why I was helping him with it yesterday. It’s good practice for him, though, and at the very least, it does keep him busy when I don't have anything else for him to do.”

XXX

Sasuke ambles back to his apartment around noon. He made some progress on the cipher, enough that Kakashi said Naruto might actually be able to take it from there. It feels good to be of use.

It also feels good to have something to give the idiot shit over, when he goes to visit him later.

He empties the cough drops from his pocket into one of the cups he bought yesterday, and pops another one into his mouth before he starts getting out ingredients to cook. It feels good on his throat, menthol pleasantly numbing despite the slightly sweet taste. He pours a hefty amount of rice into a pot to start boiling, and then begins slicing carrots and scallions and mushrooms for takikomi gohan. It takes a while to slice with one arm, as holding the vegetables in place with one hand is a challenge, but he manages by summoning a clone. Once he’s done, he slips them in a pan with some salt and dashi stock. He also adds frozen peas before covering it with the lid to simmer.

Once that’s going, he washes his hand, then folds the comforter he had washed and left out to dry this morning, ultimately storing it in the closet. He stirs the vegetable mixture occasionally, after, reading more of his book while he waits for the rice to finish. The one about kenjutsu is more interesting than he thought it would be. He might finish it by the time he sees Sakura tomorrow.

He really hopes he can walk her home again; he hadn’t gotten a chance to kiss her today. She might not want him to, if she thinks he's sick, but somehow he suspects she likely understood it wasn't actual illness. She's good at what she does, and smart.

It’s a simple but savory lunch, a larger portion than he’s accustomed to. He eats all of it, albeit slowly, as he reads.

Uncannily, an abrupt and earsplitting knocking erupts on his door as he puts the last bite in his mouth to chew.

“TEME! Open up!” More incessant knocking. “I’m fucking bored, and Kakashi-sensei gave me the day off! Let’s spar!”

Sasuke rolls his eyes and closes his book before standing to rinse his dish, setting it in the sink to wash later, along with the pot and pan already rinsed and stacked there.

“Alright, dobe. You don’t need to bust down my door.”

He grabs another cough drop and removes the tape and cotton from his arm before he goes. It’s a little tender, but the blood has clotted by now.

[hatboyproject]

This is very long, but it might be of interest to someone, somewhere. I was asked recently about the direction I'm taking this romance in and whether or not I'll be addressing certain disability specific subjects within it. The answer, of course, is yes - I have always planned to do this in one form or another. Whilst no single piece of media can address everything I'd like to say on the subject, and I am working within the bounds of a larger story with its own pacing and focus to consider, there's still room to touch on some of these things.

I'm aware that my interpretations won't always be the same as others'. They are my interpretations, coloured by my experiences and feelings, and ultimately, this is my mod - I'm writing it for everybody who 'wears the ballcap,' so to speak! But, it's my interpretation of this character that I'm trying to share with everyone. Different people "took the helm" (laugh, I'm hilarious!) on writing Jeff across the trilogy, and as time has gone on I've been trying to convince myself that it's okay to have my turn at doing that, too - albeit in a non-professional capacity. So... Let's get into my interpretation of Jeff, where his stuff comes from on my view, and how things went to get him to where we are at the beginning of ME3, where the romance can occur.

A lot of how I interpret him comes from experiences in my own life with my own issues, and with those of my loved ones, some of whom are physically disabled in similar (but not identical) ways to Jeff. Some of this carries an element of catharsis for me.

Mechanically and narratively speaking, what draws me to writing this romance is the contrast between how these two characters are strong. It's this core idea that strength doesn't have only one manifestation in a person. That loving somebody doesn't have to be done only one way, that it can be beautiful and passionate and fulfilling - even if, when it gets physical, the headboard can't exactly be made to shatter with the force of it all. For me, it's also an exercise in insecurity and dealing with feelings of frustrated inadequacy - something that has plagued me my whole life.

Yes, yes, he's fictional - but the only way for me to really get into a character is to think about them as if they're a real being. When I look at Jeff as a person, I see many things... Some very positive, some pretty negative... I try to see him as a complete person with strengths and flaws.

On the surface he is often defensive, dismissive, sarcastic, and emotionally avoidant. But why is that? He is highly skilled, dedicated and capable, and knows it, but at the same time is a person who is constantly overlooked, underestimated, and asked to work thrice as hard to get the same considerations. Even then, his validity is questioned often by almost everyone around him. Over time, combined with the realities of living with his physical condition, this has given him some deep-seated insecurities. He feels the need to brag about his skills because they are, ultimately, the one thing about himself that he is absolutely certain has real worth. He overcompensates for this by abusing rules and technicalities wherever he can, because I think he knows that if he played life by the rules, he'd never have gotten anywhere. It's a stacked deck, so why not hide some aces up his sleeve? When you don't fit in the box provided, you question the value of every box you see.

When a person lives with this long enough, it can get hard to swim against the tide of society's expectations and still remain chipper about it, let alone not internalise some of it. It can cause a person to create a shell constructed out of distrust and untruth.

Living with a disability can really suck sometimes, and the suck is compounded when having to deal with your own frustrations plus those of others. In my personal experience, that happens a lot.

There is a certain sense of alienation that it can create, and it can become a kind of Sword of Damocles. It can be easier to anticipate rejection and others' assumptions, inabilities to understand or relate than to keep reaching out, only to have the same tired conversations about being different. I see a lot of this in him. I understand the chip he has on his shoulder.

I also see an extremely sensitive, empathetic, devoted and boundlessly loving person under all that. In fact, it's because of these things that I think he actively tries to distance himself. At the core of his being, I see Jeff as somebody who loves quickly and completely. I think he sees that as a vulnerability, incompatible with what he's learned he has to do to survive... and also with the machismo thing that comes with being a pilot. I think on some level he's terrified of that about himself, but he also can't help it. Jeff is ride or die. So, he tells himself he doesn't care and never lets anyone in. Any time anyone showed interest, he'd shut them down, alienate them, distance himself, and get in the seat of something that flies.

I think up until now, (ME3) he's seen intimacy both as a thing he longs for, but is also afraid of because of his fundamental knowledge that he is different. He thinks he can't "measure up" to what he sees all around him. He sees romance as something that will lead to his inevitable rejection and being crushed, emotionally - and if he's not careful, physically, too. I think he's embarrassed about that as well. He's very interested where it comes to all that, but the things he likes to watch, he knows he can't do like that. His only experience is second-hand as a voyeur, so some of his perceptions about that are unhealthy for him. I think any kind of attempt by the medical professionals in his life to broach the topic and offer support on, he's angrily changed the subject, or stopped listening to, because of the entire mess above. I think Jeff is kind of a lonely person, and some of it is self-imposed, though the reasons for him thinking it's the right thing to do aren't all within his control.

All this is difficult for him to reconcile with, because he has been desperately in love with his commanding officer since almost the moment s/he met him, but entirely unprepared to face it.

I think at first it was easy for him to dismiss it as a stupid crush. Everyone gets them when cramped up in close quarters in stressful situations and the Commander's magnetism was hard to ignore. But then it became clear that Shepard really hadn't read his file and really hadn't made any assumptions at all about him. S/he just wanted to know him, and as time progressed and that actually bore out, it got hard not to really feel something powerful, even though s/he was the Commander and it wasn't strictly appropriate to think that way. But, then there was that thing about not fitting in the box provided...

I think he agonised over coming to Shepard with it, but ultimately decided it would be selfish with everything they were going through. I think there was a part of him that decided s/he'd never be interested anyway, not when there were other, healthier people to choose from... People who didn't have these hangups or need special accommodations made for them. I think he decided to keep it to himself, for what he felt was both their sakes.

If/When the Commander quietly hooked up with someone else, I think he had a lot of feelings all at once. On the one hand, the person he cared for most was finding some peace in all the craziness. On the other, he wished that particular brand of peace was shared with him. Most of the time there were more important things to worry about, but during downtime, I think it was on his mind a lot.

I think he feels very sheepish about it, but occasionally his jealousy got the better of him and he interrupted Shepard at moments that got too hard to watch on the security cams. He watched the cams around the ship lot, and listened in on all the others a fair bit. I think because he saw himself as being at a remove from most people in a lot of ways, it was easy to justify that to himself. I think he saw it kind of like listening to a podcast or a soap opera or... Nature documentary, almost, or something. He got to know all of them in this way... Parasocially at first, but gradually, socially too. He felt better about trying, because he had this secret edge. Not the greatest stuff he's ever done, but... Complete person. Strengths and flaws.

And then, the unthinkable happened. He couldn't accept that the ship was dying. He was sure he could save it... But when Shepard's hand touched his shoulder, when s/he'd come back for him, he knew it was over. And then, it really was over. Shepard paid the price for his arrogance. The person he wanted to protect the most spun off out into space. The communicator between his mask and that helmet was still in range for long enough that he could hear the choking. For a long time afterward, even hearing people cough made the hairs on the back of his neck stand on end.

The Alliance grounded him. I don't think he even had the capacity to be mad about it. I think that was a hard time for Jeff. I think between being burdened with the knowledge of the Reapers, the loss of Shepard, and the weight of his guilt, he was pretty close to the very, very edge when Cerberus knocked on his door and made him a bunch of promises. Pretty sure those promises had nothing to do with leather seats and everything to do with Project Lazarus. I'm very sure that the promise of Shepard coming back is the reason he even let Cerberus pay for the surgeries he agreed to undergo, because I don't think he valued himself much at all at that point. I'm pretty sure it was being ready to help Shepard that he was thinking about when he was learning to walk on his painful legs without crutches for the very first time. When Cerberus offered him a big shiny reset button I think he took it without hesitation because there wasn't anything else to hope for. I think seeing Shepard in the docking bay galvanised him and without ever telling them so, he pledged his life to them even harder than before. I think he told himself that he would support Shepard in every way he could. He would go wherever, do whatever, and when dealing with him, try to give them what he knew they needed; a goddamn break.

So, fast forward again, and now we are here. With all of this in mind... Shepard might have had a dalliance with someone else, or might've been too damaged by their previous love interest on Horizon, or whatever. Either way, I think Jeff saw it as not his business to even dream about that. I think the guilt tore him up every time he looked at Shepard. I think he felt like on some level, he deserved the pain of unrequited feelings which only ever got more intense. If he didn't think himself worthy of it back then, doubly so now. I think during the six months of house arrest, he tried to visit, but the Alliance denied his every attempt. Then the attack on Earth happened.

And so now we have Jeff, who, just like other humans is confused and groping about for a sense of what's up and what's down. Fortunately for him, Shepard is part of that sense of stability. He's just better at hiding it, because avoiding it and telling himself to focus elsewhere is second nature to him by this point. But things are a little different, now. Shepard seems looking around for a connection too. Future days seem short in number and the rulebook less and less important by the minute. Denying it to himself becomes impossible, and even EDI prods him about it. Shepard won't stop being so goddamn nice to him and even responds with things that if he didn't know better, he could interpret as... But then all the old insecurities come rushing back and he's walking on his own damn eggshells again. Fuck it. It's time to admit it. To come clean. S/he has to know.

So he asks. And s/he accepts. He's equal parts thrilled, stunned and terrified. He's even on some level, suspicious. Is s/he setting him up for a fall? Are they angry about his responsibility? What do they want out of this, actually? He hasn't explained what it'd be like. That what they're doubtlessly expecting of him is unrealistic. That he's completely inexperienced. I think at this point, he's a bit pissed off with himself and feeling a lot of dread because he's pretty sure how this is going to go. He realises he's got so caught up in it that he's done things in the wrong order. Damage control. He has to talk with Shepard and explain what s/he should expect from him, because it will be different. Manage expectations because he's had to manage his own. He goes in steeled.

But s/he knows it will be different, it turns out. As ever, Shepard has made no assumptions whatsoever. S/he only wants to get to know him. Wants him for everything he is, and accepts what he is not. It was never an issue for them beyond understanding how to work with it, because he is worthy just as he is, and has worked hard enough. He has to teach them about his limitations, about underestimating and overestimating... But where there's a will, there's a way. Time for a few shared moments of peace before the end of days, and through all the craziness, something feels right at last. He feels safe enough to let Shepard in properly. Thus begins his reassessment of himself and reckoning with letting go of the insecurities he has that aren't actually his own, but come from outside.

Also he totally gets to sext the Commander now when s/he's on missions. Nice.

So. There's a lot more I could say and expound upon but it's been hours and I have stuff to do. That's my direction. It's not going to suit everyone, and I doubt I can get everything across... But I'll try. I'm just one person, with just one perspective, with just one version of this story. But I hope people like what I come up with surrounding this framework, because I have lived a lot of it myself. Just a few less Reapers in my version. Not everyone's experiences and responses will be the same.

[writeswheneverpossible]

"I want to be with you, it is as simple, and as complicated as that." - Charles Bukowski

Whenever you look at Kai from a certain distance-on stage, performing with his heart out, on the red carpet, posing for the cameras, or in his little studio, working on his own music-you cannot help but feel small. Most of the time, you feel like a hindrance, a stumbling block. Is it right for you to even be near him? To even enter his life?

For someone like Kai, it becomes easy for you to see the invisible bubble that surrounds him, and you're afraid of popping it. As such, you've learnt how to keep a special distance from him as the two of you get to know each other. Innocent friendship soon turns to young love and you are still very naive about it. Your mind is filled with never-ending questions, but your heart burns with strong feelings for him. It is like a war determined only by time. Will it stop as days go by? Or will it last until the end of this affection?

Alas, you are easy to read according to Kai, but he could not understand what the words mean. Just as you've been very careful around him, he's been very attentive to your every move. He could tell from the start that something is slightly off, like a clock with the second hand not moving, obvious only if you look closer. That is why he has you trapped in his studio, determined to not let you leave the room until he finds out why you've been acting this way. You never visit him at the company. You barely go on dates with him. The only thing you two do is call and text each other, which he is still grateful for, but there's a nagging feeling that there is something more to it, that your actions are justifiable.

You look down at the floor, unable to bear his questioning gaze. All you want to do is disintegrate into mid-air and reappear inside your bedroom so you can fall back onto your comfy bed, which you regret leaving in the first place. Why must Soobin call you after dinner and claim that Kai has hurt himself during their practice earlier, only to discover that it is, in fact, a lie? You steal a quick glance at your boyfriend and find that he has his poker face on, the one you can never decipher. The mood is serious and it is suffocating you, yet you wonder if this would lead to your first real argument with him.

"Y/N," he begins, erasing all thoughts from your head. "Can you please be honest with me about one thing?" You cannot help but stutter a low hum in response.

Kai wants to smile at how cute you sound, but the one theory he could come up with takes over instead. "Do you hate me...or something?" he croaks.

The whole room seems to darken at his question. A sharp pain pierces your heart and your body feels heavy with guilt, as if someone has just placed a huge boulder onto your hands for you to carry. Of all the things you are expecting, the word "hate" has never come close. You shake a little as you look up at him, but this time, his eyes are lowered, lips pulled into a sad smile. "What makes you say that?" you manage to whisper.

"I don't know..." he begins, fidgeting with his fingers now. "Maybe the fact that I have never seen you come near me when I'm working? Or that I have never liked someone as much as I like music before, yet I have to think of the two separately and not in this one picture?" he confesses, chest heaving with emotions. It is his first time admitting out loud that he likes you this much, despite having dated you for six months only.

Reality hit you hard, like rain on an unlucky night. The raindrops pattering on your skin are annoyingly strong and cold and you wish you could brush them away, but could you even? Powerless is what you feel upon hearing Kai's words.

You gather all the strength you have left inside you and walk towards him. He may be much taller than you, but as you gaze up at him, at his face, you could sense how little he feels at the moment, from the way his shoulders hunch out of his own will and the way his head hangs low, eyes avoiding yours. You reach up a hand to brush at his cheek, making him look at you, before you cup his face and smile gently. All the things you want to say, all the words you could have said, remain unspoken as you look into his beautiful eyes. They look kind, loving, but also alarmed. Is this your first time being this close to him? Is this the first time your skins touch and graze upon each other's? Is this what intimacy feels like? You realise that's all you could think of. Again, what you feel for this boy pulses within you, reminding you of its blatant existence.

Your worry about sabotaging his career is something you can never let go of and it's true that it has made you distant yourself from Kai, avoiding anything and everything related to his work, believing it's best that you don't appear within the frame. Your brain says 'just stay with him' but your heart aches and reasons that 'it won't be easy for him.' All of this makes him feel unreachable sometimes and maybe he should have stayed unreachable, but looking back at things now, you feel you wouldn't change a single thing.

Slowly, you lean forward on your feet and get on your tippy-toes, placing a lingering kiss on his lips. Kai's eyes widen as you do and he blushes at your action, but he doesn't want it to end. When it does, that one quote of Bukowski's you find come close to describing the internal turmoil you feel when it comes to your relationship with him slips out of your mouth and it is, indeed, as simple and as complicated as that.

"I want to be with you, Kai, it is as simple, and as complicated as that."

[msmarvelouswinchester]

The One Where Love Hurts

Summary - The reader used to date Dean but then he broke her heart and Sam was there to help her get her back on her feet and along the way they fell in love and at your best friend's wedding, Sam finally takes a step forward.

Pairing - Past!Dean x Reader, Dean x Lisa, Sam x Reader (eventual)

Characters - Lisa Braeden, Sam Winchester

Warning - Implied smut, angst, a happy-ish ending, Dean being a douche, allusions to cheating, heartbreak, kissing

Word Count - 1535

Square Filled - Free ( @anyfandomgoesbingo )

A/N - This is based on the song "August" by Taylor Swift (hope I did it justice).

Written for @herstarburststories' 1541 followers celebration, hope you like it! This is also a submission to @smol-and-grumpy's Superfriends title challenge.

This is an AU where the Winchesters are not hunters and monsters don't exist.

Spn dividers by @firefly-graphics

Unbeta'd. All mistakes are mine.

Salt air

And the rust on your door

I never needed anything more

Whispers

Of "Are you sure?"

"Never have I ever before"

Your eyes scanned the crowd in the room waiting for the bride and groom to take the stage. With a drink in hand, you tried to distance yourself from the awfully jolly group of people.

“You don't need to stay. The wedding’s over.” You looked and saw Sam Winchester standing beside you. You didn't know how glad you were for him to be there with you that day or all those days before that you had spent in your bed crying over Dean. Sam had been your rock on those days.

“She's my best friend. It's a big day for her. I have to be here.” You replied.

“You're hurting.” He said and wrapped an arm around your shoulder. You leaned into his warm body, placing your head on his shoulder. Your cheeks flushed a bright pink at the intimacy. You had always thought of Sam as just a friend but maybe you felt something for him only your vision was clouded by the feelings you had for his brother but now that chapter is closed you could finally see clearly.

“I thought I meant somethin’ to him. I was there for him when he needed me the most. Maybe I was really just a rebound girl for him.” You sniffled, as soft music started playing. The stage got illuminated as the newly wed took the stage, hand in hand. You suppressed a sob when the man you used to love entangled his fingers with your best friend. He whispered into his bride’s ear, making her laugh. Maybe you weren't in love with him anymore but it still hurt.

“Come on. Let's go home. He is my brother but what he did is unforgivable. You deserve better than him.” Sam tugged at your hands.

“No. I'll stay and you have to stay too. You're the best man in the wedding.”

“Okay but I won't leave your side.” He said.

But I can see us

Lost in the memory

August slipped away into a moment in time

'Cause it was never mine

And I can see us twisted in bedsheets

August sipped away

Like a bottle of wine

'Cause you were never mine

Lying in your bed, your bodies slick with sweat, you lingered in the afterglow, lost in the heat and silk of his skin. Your chest heaved as you panted, trying to come down from the high. Face turned towards the man you loved, you let out a sigh of content with a small smile tugging at the corners of the lips. He pulled you closer to him. Goosebumps erupted on your body as he drew imperfect, little circles on the bare skin of your back.

“Are you okay?” Dean softly asked.

“I'm more than okay.” You said and traced his jawline with your fingertips. He leaned into your touch as his emerald eyes looked into yours.

“De-” your mouth fell open in an inaudible moan, when his hands slid down your back, his touch igniting a million fire on your body. “You're insatiable.”

“I can't help it, not with you lying naked next to me.” Dean said before leaning in to claim your lips with his. Your hands move up to his neck, your fingers entangling in his hair. He let go of your lips and stared at you with a look of adoration.

“Stay.” The word slipped out before you could have stopped yourself. You closed your eyes to brace yourself for the impact and also to hide the tears that were starting to pool in your eyes, as you felt his hand go limp.

“You know I can't do that.” The guilt in Dean’s voice surprised you. You had expected a much more harsh answer but instead you heard those words dripping with guilt.

“You can't be with both of us. You have to choose.” You said.

“I-”

“Lisa is my best friend. I can't do that to her. Please.” You pleaded.

Back when we were still changing for the better

Wanting was enough

For me, it was enough

To live for the hope of it all

Cancel plans just in case you'd call

And say "Meet me behind the mall"

So much for summer love, and saying "Us"

'Cause you weren't mine to lose

“I told him to choose between us and he did.” You told the younger Winchester.

“My brother was miserable when he was with her. I thought he had finally come to his senses when you told me about you two but then two months later I got a call from him saying that he is marrying Lisa. I'm so sorry, Y/N.” You could hear the sorrow in his voice but you didn't feel anything. You were numb. Sam wanted nothing more than to beat his brother into a pulp for his wrong doing. He was always in love with you but he never uttered a single word because of his brother.

You still remembered that day - the day when you had received a call from Lisa saying that she was engaged after for a whole month all your phone calls to Dean had gone straight to voicemail because he had left you abruptly one morning. You had barely ended the phone call before breaking down in tears on the floor. If it wasn't for Sam, you wouldn't have been back on your feet. He had been a tremendous support.

“Loving him was painful. I never thought love hurts so bad.” You sniffled when you saw the first dance come to a heartbreakingly beautiful end.

“Then it isn't true love. Being in love shouldn't hurt. Let him go.” Sam said.

“I have but the memories of those days still keep haunting me. Why does it hurt so bad to let him go when he wasn't even mine in the first place?” You sniffled. Sam took the drink from your hand placing it on the counter top before hugging you tight.

“Come on, let's get out of here.” Sam coaxed you, making you nod. You needed to get away from him even if it meant ending things with Lisa because you wouldn't be able to see Dean play house with your best friend. Sam gently guided you out of the room. Once outside when the cool air hit your face, you broke down like never before.

Remember when I pulled up

And said "Get in the car"

And then canceled my plans

Just in case you'd call

Back when I was living for the hope of it all

“Let it out.” He whispered, his heart breaking for you. You turned around in his arms and clung onto his biceps tightly, burying your face into his chest, your tears and smeared makeup messing up his white shirt underneath his tux.

“Maybe I wasn't enough for him.” You hiccuped through your tears.

“No.” Sam’s stern voice made you look up. “Don't blame yourself.”

“He didn't think about us for once if there was even an us to begin with. He just left, chose her. I should have known. I should've never hoped.” You said.

“You deserve a better man who would have you as his first priority. Someone who would put your name at the top of their list.” Sam said.

“Those men are only in Hallmark movies and Jane Austen books-” before you could even complete your sentence, you felt Sam’s lips on yours. Even though you were taken aback at first but then you melted into his touch.

“Tell me to stop and I will. Just say the word.” He spoke against your lips, his hot breath still fanning your face.

“Don't stop.” And that's all it took before he captured your lips for the second time. There wasn't any urgency or lust in his kiss instead it was filled with love and adoration. Your hands travelled up to the nape of his neck, pulling him closer. His hands grasp your waist.

“I know it's a little awkward and weird-” you didn't know who ended the kiss first but you heard Sam speak first, “I always liked you from the very beginning when you came into the barbecue party with a crate of beer in that purple floral dress.” You laughed at his description. “But you were my brother's girlfriend-”

“Hardly his girlfriend, more like an easy lay for him.” You spit out.

“I'm sorry you feel that way but if you'll allow me I would gladly show you how a proper Winchester man treats his girl,” Sam smirked.

“What about Dean?”

“What about him? He let go of you. He is now married and you're not his property. I love my brother but I will deal with him if he has any problem with us being together.” Sam assured you.

“Okay. Then let's give us a chance but I need some time before I am ready to date another man.”

“Take all the time you need. I'll be waiting for you patiently.” He smiled. “Loving me won't hurt you because I will always be there to catch you when you fall.”

[oh-styles]

Something About a Beginning: Part II

First off, I want to thank each and every one of you for your immense patience. (More so than others, but I digress.) Writing on such topics when you yourself aren’t in the most healthiest mentality is a struggle alone, but we got here. 

Second off, if you haven’t read the first part, you can so here. These chapters implicate bouts of depression and talks of miscarriage, so read at your own will. 

I do want to note that I mention Robin in this story, and I was hesitant to include him because I felt it wasn’t appropriate, because he shouldn’t be used as entertainment purposes (i.e. in stories) but I mention him only with love and respect.

Again, thank you for your patience, and happy reading.

July 3, 2019 London, England

Harry lost his girl.

She vanished in the night – gone with the wind – and all that remained was a ghost of a woman, transparent and bleak. He hasn’t seen her smile since that night, coming close to a week now, and his gut retches at the thought he might never get his girl back.

She’s buried herself in the sheets; the window is opened a crack, and he spots an empty bottle of melatonin laying overturned on her bedside table. He stares intently at her body, watching as the sheets rise and fall to the pattern of her placid breathing, and he thinks for a moment that she’s finally found herself a better place. Not dead—not by any means. Whatever dream world she has found herself delved in, he knows she might have found a sliver of peace there, hopefully smiling.

“She’s sleeping, mum.” Harry says into his phone, taking a step back to gently close the bedroom door. “Rande and Cindy invited us to Muskoka but…” His words hung in the air, like the elephant in the room, but his mother knew all too well what was lingering on the precipice of her sons’ tongue.

But she’s too depressed.

But she can’t go a day without crying.

But I don’t think she has the energy to leave the house.

It’s been four days since the attack, and Harry hasn’t seen her take a step outside of their bedroom.

“Love, she’s wasting away in there. It might help her a little to get out, get some sun…”

“Mum, I can’t even get her to sit in the fucking garden.” He can hear his mother’s nettled sigh on the other end of the line, but how can anyone expect him to put her on a mother fucking airplane if she can’t even bother to walk the 30 meters to the fucking garden? “The sodding paps were outside the house last night.”

“They can’t—”

“I’m aware.” He begins to descend his way down the stairs, stopping to peer out from the front window – an old, worn out habit. “I think it’s best we get away for a bit. The story hasn’t died down… I think it’ll help—getting away. They won’t bother us there.”

Harry knew your answer before he even had the chance to ask; he knew he was wasting his time in even suggesting such a thing, but the guilt would eat away at him if he didn’t even try.

“Muskoka…Canada, remember? We went there last year.” He sat at the edge of the bed, running a hand over the sheets where a peek of your shoulder laid exposed. “It’ll be quiet. Nobody there to bug us. If you want to just hang out in the hotel room the whole time, I’d be fine with that. It’s just…”

I can’t stand to see you burrowed away another day.

“I’m really worried about you… I’m just trying to help.” He was powerless, and he knew it. He couldn’t take her by the arm and force her on a plane, but god forbid he try his damned hardest. “No paps, nobody. I promise. I wouldn’t take you there if it wasn’t safe.”

He feels a stir beneath him, and from underneath the covers, a small hand inches outward and lays upward, a silent plea for intimacy—a piece of familiarity he hasn’t touched in days. He reaches out and clasps her hand in his, and readjusts himself to lay beside her.

“You can think about it. I don’t need an answer this second, but give it a day or two, okay?”

He sees her nod, and her eyes blink open to meet his, only for a second, before they are closed once again for the remainder of the night.

*

July 6, 2019 Ontario, Canada

Muskoka came and went. Nothing advantageous to really capture your attention, though you kept your head nestled low in a book for most of your stay. You tossed a couple Stephen King novels into your bags without much thought, and by the time your trip was coming to an end, you had already completed one and started another.

A photo made its rounds online of you at dinner with Harry, Rande and Cindy, and even thinking back to that night, you couldn’t recount a time where you felt a pair of eyes boring at your table. You think it might be because you paid more attention to the drink menu than your friends, but you digressed. They only saw the back of your head, and not even the photographer mentioned you. You were also mistaken for Kaia on a couple occasions.

After Muskoka, you were back in London, and not much later Harry would be jetting off to Italy for Google Camp, and a few days after that, he was set to fly to Mexico for a video shoot. He was redundant to go, and even called Jeff to see if they could reschedule, but that would cause a delay for the next video they’d film only a week later. He asked if you wanted to join him, and you kindly declined. You were much aware of his past video sets, and how common it was to see photos and videos leaked online, and you were far from interested to be included.

You were much happier to find yourself under the watchful eyes of Anne Twist.

“I can meet you in Scotland if I’m feeling up to it.” You knew it was a scorching lie crawling right off your tongue, but if it meant he carried some hope with him, then you would feed him whatever white lies you could muster. Even Anne knew better than to believe you.

“I think Canada was good for you, love, but you need some rest, too. Can’t be travelling all over the bloody world, now, can you?”

It was a nice feeling to know she had your back.

In another life would a little green monster be envious of missing such a trip to Cancun, but the only desires you had were sitting in Anne’s garden being force fed a steady cup a tea and a plate of biscuits.

Anne didn’t pry; she knew well what you needed, but she would be keeping her sons promise on keeping you safe, and she knew there was no safer place for you to be.

It was August now, and the heat felt suffocating. You and Anne spent your mornings walking to the bakery her son once worked in, grabbing a quick breakfast before heading to the park. You would pick off pieces of your croissant and toss it at the squirrels, but you almost always scared them off. Anne told stories of when Harry was a child, and how he once tried to tell her Gemma was a drug dealer.

“She was only a child,” she hummed, laughing into her coffee. “But he was always a character to have around.”

“I feel like…between you and me, right?” You could hear in the distance the sound of a goose honking and a group of children wailing, running away. “I just…don’t want to upset him.”

Anne reached over and took your hand in hers. “Anything you say is always safe with me, love.”

“I’m mad he left me here.” There was a short beat, but you could feel your throat close, and that anger begin to well up in your chest. “This…this is also…”

“I know, love.” She scooted closer, squeezing your hand. “Everyone has their own ways of dealing with grief. Harry isn’t good at sitting around… Even when Robin passed, he didn’t like to sit. He needed to go do something.”

You remember, and yet you still recall him lying on his mother’s couch in tears. You don’t think he’s cried since the two of you left the hospital a couple weeks ago.

“He loves you, darling. He calls me every day to check in on you. Don’t think for a second he doesn’t care.”

Even with her words, you felt something was missing.

*

Harry was only in Scotland for a couple days before he was finally home, but it wouldn’t be long before he would be venturing off to Italy – again – for another work-related conquest. You weren’t sure why he was so content with country hopping every couple of weeks instead of resting at home with you, but you didn’t bother bludgeoning him with questions.

“After I’m through with Italy—I won’t even be there a day—I’ll be back home, but a couple weeks later, I have to go to LA for some meetings… I’d like you to come, if that’s okay.”

Again. There’s always something. It must be so fucking difficult to stay in one place for more than a couple weeks with your grieving girlfriend.

“Also…I was meaning to ask you. Ariana is in town in a few days… Wanted to know if you wanted to come with me and the guys… I think it’ll be fun.”

“Your child died a month ago and you want to go to a fucking Ariana Grande concert.” The words fell helplessly from you, but it was weeks of anguish and neglect that hit its final tier, and you were quite tired of hanging on. “Tell me….how does that make sense to you?”

“Excuse me?” For the first time that night, he looked at you. All before, he found excuses to shift his glances to anything but you, maybe in fear of reality finally hitting him in the face with what he’s been running from for weeks, but for the first time that night, he bared his eyes down at you, and his mouth fell open.

“I’m sorry—have I been hallucinating you just picking your shit up and leaving every chance you get?”

“I’ve had work—” He took to his feet, swiftly flinging his hand out to close the lid of his luggage.

“Any normal person—I swear, any normal person would stay home, and fucking grieve, except you, who wants to fucking fly everywhere and work, because that would require facing his fucking prob—”

“I have a job—I know it’s hard for you to relate to that, but I have commitments—”

“And what am I then? If not a commitment, then what, Harry?”

“You are a commitment—”

“Then where have you been? Why have I been staying with your mother? I know you invited me to go with you, but I shouldn’t have to. I’m fucking hurting, Harry! I don’t want to go to Cancun and Italy—I want to be here with you. Do you know how fucking hard it’s been dealing with this without you here?”

For once, he was silent, but he shifted on his feet.

“You haven’t cried. Not since the hospital. I can’t count how many times I’ve cried, and you sit around texting your band or going to video shoots… If you feel nothing—no grief or anything…if you didn’t even want the baby, just tell me. Make this easier on me, please.”

“How the fuck can you say that I didn’t want the baby? My heart is fucking hurt!”

“Then act like it!”

“You really think I can sit around every day and watch you fall apart? I have to be the strong one… If it can’t be you, then it has to be me, and I don’t like watching you hurt.”

“You know…you sometimes have a really shitty way showing people you care about them.”

You stood there, arms folded in resistance, and he couldn’t take his eyes from off the floor. He felt cornered, and he was defenseless with nothing else left to give. His bags still laid on the bed, clothes scattered over the sheets ready to be put up, and you knew this room was no place for you. Your purse was downstairs, and your phone in your pocket.

“I’m going to stay with Gemma tonight. I’ll have her pick me up. Please don’t follow me out.” 

*

She’s always been the quiet one.

The first time she met you, at a family gathering you were reluctant to attend despite the persistent reassurance from your other half, she knew from the moment she saw you that you were different from all the others. You held yourself different, much shorter, like you knew you could never become the center of attention.

You studied the room, holding onto Harry’s hand as he introduced you to his mother, and that’s when Gemma appeared from over her mother’s shoulder.

“About time I meet you,” she chuckled, reaching her hand out. “I’m Gemma.”

She watches you now from the edge of the driveway, sitting on the steps of the porch with only the light above you illuminating your surroundings. From behind you, she spotted the silhouette of her brother peeking through the curtains, keeping a close eye for just in case.

Your track record wasn’t a good one.

As she approaches, you perk your head up with a sigh of relief. For the first time, she was the Styles you nothing but needed.

“Come on, Magoo,” she chirps as she finally reaches you, lifting her hand out for you to take. “We can hit the McDonald’s drive-thru.”

Laura Nyro played over her car stereo, a melodious tune you recall hearing once before on a long drive in Cheshire. You shut your eyes, and the memory floods you like a storm, like a stampede parading across your chest, and you lean over to rest your head on the window.

Gemma reached her hand over to find yours, giving it three squeezes of solace.

I. Love. You.

The cut that was tucked away in your hairline was in its last stages of healing, and a scar would most certainly take its place. You always felt the erratic throbbing, like a little reminder that no matter how far you run, your problems will always be chasing you like the devil.

“Did I make a mistake?”

Gemma turned her attention from the road, lifting your hand up with hers, and planting a soft kiss to your knuckles.

“No, Magoo. I’m sorry to tell you, but you’re dating a dumbass.” She heard a muted hum in response. “Nobody is perfect… Not even that shithead. I can see where he thought what he was doing was okay, because he was sacrificing his feelings for you, but… that’s just not how you do it.”

You could drink to that.

Gemma spotted the golden arches and took a left at the light. “I’m glad you texted me… Haven’t had a bloody girl’s night in ages. It sucks under the circumstances but…” She turned back to you with a wink. “I’ll take what I can get.”

On the journey back to her flat, you pleasantly sipped at your chocolate milkshake and tapped your feet to the music, and even sporadically hummed along to the few chords you knew. It really didn’t take much to please you.

Gemma was never gifted a sister as a child. Though, she did want one, and was thoroughly distraught when her mother brought home a brother all those years ago, she did grow accustomed and grew to love the curly haired boy who she would then share with the world. But the girl beside her, who slurped her drink and choked behind a laugh of a joke about a time traveler who walks into a bar, had burrowed herself deep within her heart, much like she does with any counterpart she meets.

It’s incredibly difficult not to meet this girl and not hold some sort of placement in her life. Her heart is massive, but the love she radiates is gracious and touches anyone who dares get too close.

And the love Gemma has for her is just as the same.

Michal was asleep when the two of you arrived; you knew your way around, and confidently walked to the spare room down the hall, last door on the right. Gemma trailed behind you, holding your milkshake as you flipped on the light, and kicked off your shoes.

Olivia was already sprawled out over the comforter.

“Could you stay with me, tonight?”

“You don’t have to ask me twice, babe.” Gemma smirked, setting your drink down on the bedside table. “Have you ate?”

You shook your head, even trying to recall if you had mustered an appetite to have some breakfast, but even then you think you took a couple bites out of an apple and forgot about it.

“I’ll make you something—actually, Michal and I have spinach ravioli left over… Want me to heat some of that up for you?”

You graciously nodded. “You’re too good for me.”

“I just love you is all.”

The next morning, the spot beside you was visibly vacant, and from down the hall you could vaguely hear a low, sullen voice talking over the sound of the television. Gemma fired back in response, and from your feet, Olivia peeked her head from the covers, turning towards the disrupting noise.

“Let her sleep—she’s exhausted—”

“Just give me five bloody minutes!”

You knew any chance of sleep you wish you had was far gone.

“I’m up—just fucking talk!” You hollered into your pillow, your eyes still adjusting to the sunlight cascading into the room. You could guess it wasn’t any later than nine that morning, and before you had a moment to check, his unquestionable footsteps neared your door, and you heard a light tap. “I’m obviously awake.”

After you walked out the night before, he ignored your wishes and followed you downstairs where the shortest reaction he got from you was the front door slamming in his face.

“Can I talk?”

I don’t know, can you?

“You literally came here and woke me up from some incredible sleep, mind you, and you’re asking me if you can talk.” He was in a blind panic and darted his eyes around the room. “Well, talk.”

“I’m a fucking twat, I know this. It’s inexcusable what I did—what I put you through—it was selfish—I’m so fucking selfish—I can’t fucking deal with this kind of stuff, and I’m a bloody twat for leaving you because I can’t handle it. It’s cowar—I’m a coward! I can’t face shit—and I love you so much, and I left you… I’m so sorry, please believe me. I’m such a twat—"

“Shut up, please—you’re giving me a migraine.” You held up a single finger as you adjusted yourself in bed. “Look, I don’t even know how early it is, and you know how much I hate mornings.”

“I know, but…I didn’t want to wait until the afternoon to talk to you.”

“That’s fair.”

“It’s 10:30 by the way.”

“Did you practice that speech in your car, or did you just wing it?”

While you were in bed with Gemma, watching King of the Hill on her iPad, Harry resided to his office where he spent much of the evening hunched over his journal, scrawling out endless messages to you about how much of a wanker he is, and by the time the sun began to rise, he had his eyes in his hand and began waiting for an appropriate time to come and see you.

“I…thought a little bit about it, yeah.”

“You really hurt me, alright? It’s not something I can just forget because you said you were sorry. When I needed you the most, you weren’t there. What kind of partner is that?” He stood silent in his spot; his hands dug deep into his trousers. Suddenly, he was a little boy again getting scolded by his mother. “I had your mom, I had Gemma, but not you. The only person I needed. I get this wasn’t part of the plan, and we got our hearts broken, but that doesn’t give you the right to run off because you can’t handle seeing me upset.”

Olivia stretched her limbs out over the covers, purring against the sheets.

“I appreciate you coming, I really do. This isn’t something I can just forget and move on from. I want to work on this, but it’s going to take time… I still love you though.”

*

September 19, 2019 Los Angeles, California

“Your shirt looks like amebae under a microscope.”

He stifled a grunt, looking down at his shirt with concentration, and every so subtly did you see him glance swiftly at the bathroom mirror. “I’m surprised you even know what ameba are.”

“Or it looks like those eye floaties you get, but…colorful, you know?”

“Will you stop bullying me?”

“Only when you tell me how much you paid for that shirt.”

For a second, and you saw it flash through his eyes, he considered telling you, but figured that was a fight for a different afternoon. His silence was all the answer you needed. You nodded and left the room.

He found himself eminently lucky that you even agreed to accompany him to Los Angeles, but it was under the one condition that he takes you to In-N-Out whenever you oh so politely asked. Though, after you harassed him over his attire that morning, he was undecided to change his mind.

He didn’t.

You did, however, apologize and say he looked like a sexy ameba, and he then locked you out of the car for five minutes.

To be fair, you only accepted his offer to travel with him because you missed your friends, and they were the one thing that remained untouched from the summer. You felt the emptiness being carried with you with every passing day, and all the books and websites said that was normal, but finding distractions and hobbies to pass the time was coming close to becoming a sport – way too laborious for you.

You even found yourself searching “Losing interest in things I used to like” and you were considerably shocked to discover the rabbit hole Google led you down.

You didn’t consider yourself depressed, not by any means. Sure, you were sad most of the day, you never really gained your appetite back, you stopped painting and watching King of the Hill and Breaking Bad, and if you didn’t spend the entire day sleeping, you would lay in bed with your eyes closed, praying you would eventually grow tired enough to slip away for a little while.

Harry even signed you both up for couple’s therapy.

“This is for people who cheated on each other and refuse to break up!”

But regardless of your inherent fussing, he refused to back down. Where the two of you stood mentally, this was your last chance at redemption, and he wasn’t letting you back out. The way he saw it, if you didn’t make an effort to try and fix what was broken, there was no hope for the relationship moving forward.

That was when you realized the outcome was more than just losing your baby.

After the first session, you made an appointment with your physician, who later prescribed not only you with anti-depressants, but Harry as well. Your world was spinning madly, in every which direction, but at least you had your boy holding on madly with you.

The first time you encountered a fan since the summer happened on that very first outing in Los Angeles when you and Harry were arriving for your lunch plans. (Not In-N-Out, but you let it go.) If it had been solely one girl, you trust that you could easily fight her off if given the opportunity. I mean, sure, you didn’t fight off that other girl, but she had the upper hand, or so you tell yourself.  

But, no, she was with a group, and you felt the urge to vomit.

“I’m going to throw up—” You propel yourself in the other direction, ready to sprint back to the parking lot, and thinking back on it now, you can’t even remember the last time you even sprinted. “Let me sit in the car—let’s get the food to go—I don’t care—”

This is why we should have fucking gone to In-N-Out.

“Pet—you can’t run forever, okay? I know it’s fucking scary, but you have to face this one day.” You remember the exact quote Harry was reciting from the therapist, just with less profanity. “I won’t let them do shit, alright?”

They did stop him, of course, and you took a few steps away so they could have their moment, but you made sure he was still an arm grab away incase—

“Hey,” You had disregarded the voice, opening a game on your phone – Numberzilla – before you registered someone had spoken to you. “I’m sorry to bother you…”

At first glance, you could easily discern she was unsure of herself. She likely had a rush of confidence, and now standing blankly in front of you, she has lost all certainty. From behind, you peered up to find Harry staring at the back of her head, already inching into his pocket for his keys.

“Oh,” you gulp, clutching your phone in your hands. “Hi…”

“I just…was just hoping that you were doing okay.”

Doing okay, because of—

Your heart thudded to a stop.

“You alright?” Harry was at your side, and the young girl took a step back.

“Sorry—I’m sorry.” She gave a weak smile. “I just wish the best for you two.”

She was already walking off when you mustered up the words to thank her, but you were doubtful she heard you. Harry’s arm was in a tight grip around your backside, with his keys hung in his hand, ready to run.

The two of you cancelled your lunch plans and hit In-N-Out instead.

*

September 24, 2019 Los Angeles, California

“Is it okay?”

It was a Tuesday; you had a clear agenda for the day, and it was a little after lunch that you found yourself aimlessly clicking through channels, with your boyfriend sitting down by your feet, flipping through the pages of your current read.

You had felt the undeniable ache since the night before, and you thought maybe if you just ignore it, it’ll go away, but it only lingered, taunting you with its insatiable lust.

The itch you don’t want to scratch.

Your heart was racing, your palms were sweaty, and it didn’t matter how tightly you squeezed your legs together, nothing could rid you of this.

“H,” You poked his leg with your toe. “Bear with me on this, okay?” He didn’t respond, but he carefully set your book back down on the coffee table. “Will you have sex with me real quick?”

“I…you want to?”

“Do you have condoms? Because if not, I can take care of this myself—”

“Yes, yes, I have them. I have—they’re upstairs.”

And there you were, minutes later, his cock was inside of you, and he slowly rolled his hips carefully into you, dipping his toes into the water. He physically cannot express how much this meant to him, and how long he hid this desire deep in his gut, because God forbid he be the one to bring it up. If he had to wank off in the bathroom in between commercial breaks until you decided you were ready to have sex again, he’d find a way to tolerate it.

“Is it okay?” He choked out in between breaths; only minutes in, and he was cradling dangerously on the edge.

“Yeah—yeah, it’s okay. It feels good.” You readjusted your hips, stretching your leg out to wrap around his. “Maybe a little faster?”

“I’ll cum in a second—” He shook his head, halting his movements when that tiny, little knot inched closer to unravelling. “Just give me a sec.”

“Babe—”

“Hold—” He reached his arm under the bend of your knee, lifting it up as he thrusted back into you. “Fuck—”

He was relentless; you stretched your hand down between your thighs, rubbing and kneading that small bundle of nerves as his cock hit deep within you with no sign of letting up.

It had been way too long.

“Harry—fuck—” It was deep, pulsating, and you lifted your hips up as your orgasm radiated throughout your every limb, tightening around his cock as he thrusted hard, giving you one last nudge of pleasure as his grip tightened around the sheets, fucking into you with a lasting, animalistic moan, cumming thick ropes into you.

You made him access the condom, triple checking there wasn’t a hole unbeknownst to either of you, and after a fourth overview, he politely asked you if he could throw away his used condom now.

You would be okay this time.

He ran a bath a little later, and you submerged your body deep within the bubbles, letting them rest at your jawline. You felt like you lost your virginity all over again.

“H?” You asked, rubbing the bubbles up your arm.

“Yes, pet?”

“Do you want to get married?”

The question caught him, and he cracked his eyes open with curiosity. “I want to, yeah. You know I do.”

The conversation had only been passed around once, when you were terribly drunk and crying over some sob film where the boyfriend dies before they have a chance to elope despite their parent’s protests. The film stuck with you for weeks, and you always wondered, if you knew you were with the one, why wait? Why wait for tragedy to strike?

“Let’s get married.”

He chuckled, wiggling his toes against yours. “You’re mental.”

“No, I’m serious. Why wait? Seriously? I love you, you love me, and we aren’t getting any younger.”

“Pet, you’re 24.”

“And only getting older!”

“So, you want to find some Little White Chapel in Vegas and get hitched?” He leaned up a little, a smirk stretching out on his face.

“I want a real wedding, of course, someday, but right now…let’s do it. Let’s go to Vegas or Miami or somewhere, and just do it.”

It took an hour, but he eventually agreed, and was on the phone with Jeff to arrange a flight and hotel. The next day, the two of you ran around downtown to every consignment shop in the city, looking for a white dress – not as hard as you thought it would be – a diamond ring – a little tough, but you found one for cheap – and a nice pair of heels in your size – a lot harder; you bought a size too big by accident.

And in 24 hours, you would be marrying your best friend.

*

Miami, FL September 26, 2019

“Shit…fuck, we’re actually doing this?” You stuffed a wad of tissue paper into the toe box of your heels – one size too big – and stood up to test them for a final time. “No going back?”

“Cold feet, pet?”

“No, I’m fucking—it’s humid in here.” You swing around to face him, fanning yourself off with a loose People magazine, and its then you see him standing smugly in his slacks, a proper grin etching itself across his face.

“Cold feet—the expression, pet…”

“Harry—fuck, I’m nervous. My shoes are too big, I feel a pimple forming on my chin, and I’m pretty sure the wire in my bra broke ten minutes ago because something is stabbing my tit.”

“Well, I think your tits look great.”

“You can thank that bombshell bra I bought years ago for that.” You stroll back over to the sofa and toss the magazine carelessly onto the coffee table. “Did you have them sign an MDMA?”

“NDA, and Jeff got that covered.” Harry combs back a piece of his hair, that one strand that always gives him trouble. “Hold onto this for me?” You watch as he removes his H ring, and strolls over to the sofa. “Put it in your bra—can’t lose much in there.”

“You’re hilarious.”

“And you’re my wife.” His fucking smug grin falls over him like a tidal wave, and you wish you could just slap it right off his face.

“No, I’m not.”  

“Give it a couple minutes.”

Your heart hurled itself up into your esophagus, the tremorous pounding radiating all throughout your head to your toes. Harry appeared quite relaxed as he staggered to the full-length mirror to adjust his collar, and from the reflection, he caught your watchful stare.

“Your mom is going to be pissed.” You think back to Anne, and all the good she’s done for you, and you are now repaying her by having her miss her son’s wedding. “We’ll need to plan the real thing soon.”

“We’ll tell her when we want to tell her, but for now,” he swung around on his heel to face you, “This is about you and me…and the rest of our lives.”

You make a mental note to thank Niall later.

You think back to those years ago, and how you almost bailed on Niall that night to stay home and watch The Young and the Restless with your roommate. You weren’t thrilled to get that phone call, but as long as Niall agreed to pay for a couple drinks, you found it in yourself to put on a pair of pants and enjoy a night out. 

And maybe if you had inclined to stay home, your entire life would be a completely different world right now. Maybe you’d be in somebody else’s kitchen helping them prepare dinner, or on some lavish vacation with a guy you only met a month ago, or maybe you’d be alone in your apartment, binging a new show to pass the time you only let flutter by.

But you were here now, standing at an alter that smelled roughly of cigarettes and mildew, wearing shoes that were too big on you, in a dress that probably saw more weddings than you ever will, holding the hands of the man you were prepared to love for the rest of your life.

Nothing seemed to matter anymore, not the harassing, not the attack, not the stalking. It didn’t matter what anybody threw at you anymore; you were hard as fucking stone, and not a single person was going to damage what the two of you were building.

“You may now kiss your bride.”

[silkylious]

Of Cold Soba and Rose-gold Vows (Todoroki Shoto x Fem!Reader)

Pairing: Todoroki Shoto x reader Warnings: ANGST, mature themes, suggestive content, fluff A/N: ughhh its finally here, honestly this took way too long to finish because im a lazy cunt but here it is finally! Hope you enjoy!

Also feel free to request stuff!

Click. Clack. Click. Clack.

The footfalls of heeled shoes propagated throughout his office, each echoing step flooding his chest with dread and accelerating the previously calm rhythm of his heartbeat. Three consecutive knocks sounded before her sickly-sweet voice followed suit. “I have more paperwork for you, sir,”

Despite the lump accumulating in his throat, he managed to croak out a response, ushering his secretary into his office. The door clicked open, closing shut after she stepped in. He didn’t dare lift his eyes from the sheets of paper lining his desk, grasping on what little self-control was left in his morale. A hefty stack of paper was slammed right in his field of vision, causing him to snap his head up, ready to berate his assistant on her lack of professionalism. The lecture he was prepared to give her was shoved to the back burner in his mind once he made eye contact with her figure. Shit. A dress shirt way too tight around her bust, the first couple buttons left open and a body-hugging pencil skirt, accentuating her already exaggerated curves. Fuck. He winced at the audible gulp he couldn’t help but take, hoping she didn’t notice his frazzled reaction. His fleeting attention was brought back to her face, mentally cursing himself when he caught sight of her smug visage. She definitely noticed.

She took his silence as compliance, deciding it was finally time after so many failed trials to raise the stakes a bit more. Her self-satisfied attitude only augmented as she made her way around her boss’s workbench, stalking the way his shoulders tensed and the formation of sweat beads on his temples. With the pen now long forgotten, his hands clenched into fists atop his desk, two contradicting thoughts wreaking havoc through his conscious. He felt her feminine stature press into his back, her dainty fingers hugging his broad shoulders, compressing the taut muscle. All hell broke loose in the corners of his mind, his vision blurring at the peripherals. He could almost hear his subconscious screaming at him to push her away, to do something! But right now, he could only focus on the soft touch encasing his shoulders, the short breaths enchanting his ears.

“You seem a little tense, sir,”

Todoroki was well aware of the flirtatious lilt in her words, well aware of how wrong this was, but he couldn’t help but silently indulge in the prohibited intimacy. His resolve was rapidly cracking, her heinous antics doing a number on him. He’d resisted so many times before (her little game of cat and mouse lasting way longer than he should’ve allowed) but something about this moment propelled him to the edge of caving in. Just as he was about to pluck the thinning thread holding his restraint together and finally fall victim to her adulterated wishes, his phone rang, snapping him out of his indecent trance, giving him an exit out of this situation and he damn near bolted out of it. He wasn’t a religious guy, yet he still internally thanked whatever higher being was looking down at him right now.

He took the cue handed to him by the heavens gladly, his scarred hand darting out to clutch his cellular device. Urging his frisky secretary out with the excuse of taking this phone call, he watched as a sour expression overtook her features. She clearly wasn’t pleased about this, making it a point to stomp her way out, slamming the door behind her retreating figure. With her presence far away from his personal space, he let out a breath he’d been holding for way too long, taking a moment to steady his pulse. Mismatched eyes tiredly descending onto the device that had saved him, sliding his finger across the screen to accept the incoming call.

“Pro-hero: Shoto, we need your backup right now,”

The villain he was called in to capture had caused a ruckus in the city’s mall, one thing lead to another and devastating damage had been dealt to the city square. The villain was arrested with the help of the many Pro-heroes on sight, Shoto doing most of the dirty work with little to no harm inflicted to the surrounding area. Not many civilians were injured and there were no fatalities, the rest was smooth sailing from there (aside from a little squabble with a certain explosive hero claiming he had stolen the last blow, which Shoto honestly couldn’t give less of a fuck about). He couldn’t wait to take a shower, clock in and call it a day. 

The hero carved his way through his agency, muscle memory dragging him to his office while taking off various support items during the short walk. He paused in his steps when a dire thought crossed his mind. Would she still be here? It wouldn’t be the first time she’d tried to get some alone time with him by staying well past her work hours. And if she was here, what would he do? He wouldn’t know how to respond after what happened earlier that afternoon. Whatever fucked up odds were in his favor for the second time that day as he didn’t hear a single noise in the agency, save for a lone janitor mopping the floor. Relief brought him back down to earth and away from his anxious thoughts. He briskly made his way into a stall, thoroughly enjoying the cold water enveloping his skin.

While under the showerhead, his thoughts ran amuck. That afternoon had been a close call, he despised himself because he knew that had his phone stayed silent, he would have indulged in the disgusting fantasies she’d created. A concoction of guilt and self-deprecation settled deep in his gut, he knew he had to stop these risky incidents, it wasn’t right. But every time he found himself ready to pull the plug and repent, she lured him back in like a sailor to a siren’s song. These sordid happenings had to come to an end, he knew that like the back of his hand, he just didn’t know how to stop luxuriating in the bittersweet taste of this forbidden fruit. He briefly contemplated firing her, frankly her skills weren’t even all that awe inducing, he could easily find a less problematic, more efficient replacement for her. But the wicked part of his being quickly squashed that option, even though he was fully aware that it was the correct option, the right thing to do.

The half and half Pro shut off the faucet, cutting his train of thought short in the process, and stepped out of the stall into the locker room. What was supposed to be a nice quelling of his worries had only spiked his self-hatred up a couple notches. Diligently drying off his candy cane hued strands, he could only hope that his mind would ease up with time.

By the time he’d made it to his surprisingly humble apartment, he’d relaxed enough to not look like he had a stick shoved up his rectum. All his tranquility was defenestrated the second he heard the voice that had been causing him so much inner turmoil the past few weeks.

“Welcome home, Shoto.”

The words that would typically soothe him, now caused him immeasurable pain. The guilt he’d been able to muffle, now ringing louder than any alarm ever could in his brain. Oh, how badly he wanted to tug you by the waist, desperately hold you against his larger frame. Yet Shoto couldn’t bring himself to do that, hell he couldn’t even meet your eyes, too afraid that he’ll taint your being with his grimy hands. The shame welling up was eating him alive, that vile scene playing on repeat before his heterochromatic irises as he tried to match your stare, a singular thought plaguing him. You don’t deserve this; he doesn’t deserve you.

He hadn’t been expecting you to be at home as you usually be snoring peacefully in bed right now. The uneven timing between both your careers had made it near impossible to spend time together, but you’ve coped with it throughout your relationship.  

“Sho, you okay?” He was pummeled back to reality when he heard your concerned voice, lord knows he didn’t deserve your sympathy. He managed a small smile and a kiss to your forehead.

“‘M’ fine, just tired. Long day at work.” Was his simple response, leaving out all the details that would surely bar him from sleep that night. You hummed lightly, enjoying the sensation of his puckered lips on your forehead, which had become quite scarce lately.

“I made dinner, your favorite. You want some?” The hopeful glint in your stare amplified the hurt in his chest. How could he do this to you? Shoto didn’t take long to decline, ignominy brutally killing his appetite. He resigned to bed with you in tow, he could practically sense the disappointment radiating off you, but he wouldn’t be able to bear looking at your face a moment longer.

This has been the formulaic dynamic of your relationship recently; he’d leave early, hurl himself at work in hopes of avoiding any interaction with the two causes of conflict in his life then arrive late into the night, either to find you cocooned with all the blankets in bed or on the rare occasion that you were awake, he’d forgo dinner and b-line it for the bed. The distance between you made you perturbed. Sure, you saw the amazing work he does daily on the news (and you were the proudest and loudest of his fans, supporting him from day one unconditionally), but that didn’t mean he had to marginalize your existence for the sake of his hero career. Besides, this only became a problem recently, you tried to brainstorm any shifts or events that could have birthed this unreasonable drift between the two of you, but you came up with nothing, unaware that what had caused the drift wasn’t an event, rather a person.

All sleep eluded him that night, sleepless and cloaked in despair. His mind going back to its chaotic state. He didn’t know why he was enabling his secretary’s inappropriate behavior, maybe due to the lack of intimacy between you two? No, he couldn’t lie to himself, he was painfully aware that he was the one to cause the shortage of affection in your relationship. Todoroki didn’t understand why he wouldn’t just stop her like any good-natured, faithful boyfriend would. No matter how hard he berated himself, he could never find the will to stop wallowing in her passion, the passion of a woman that wasn’t you. God, how pathetic he was. He, at the very least, prided himself in being able to reject her advances up until now, but he knew that was the bare minimum of what he should do, but what he didn’t know was much scarier in contrast. He didn’t know how long he’d be able to turn her down. He watched the rhythmic rise and fall of your chest, which eventually lulled his mind into a turbulent slumber.

Todoroki woke up at the ass crack of dawn the next morning, as per usual, yawning while he went through the motions of his morning routine. Now fully dressed and presentable, he paused beside your side of the bed. His cold knuckles brushed over your face, smoothing some of your follicles away to get a better look at your expression. Even in your sleep, you leaned into his touch, longingly seeking out his comforting, cool caresses with a soft, dopey smile. His heart stuttered violently, both with mirthful adoration and overwhelming penitence. With that, he abruptly halted the loving contact and headed towards his agency.

His day had been going pleasantly for the most part, a fairly easy patrol with some small-fry villains here and there, and barely any run ins with his dreaded secretary. All was looking well, he could finish paperwork and surprise you with an early visit, you’d absolutely love that! At least, that was the plan until she came barging into his office. His eyes expanding as he took in her disheveled figure. Her top buttons all undone, giving him an ample view of her cleavage, she had ditched the thigh-high stockings deciding to go bare-legged, her pencil skirt skin-tight around her curves and he could have sworn it was hitched up a bit. She wasn’t messing around this time. He prayed, begged for a way out like what had happened last time, yet he could somehow tell that wasn’t going to happen. Fate had already dealt its cards, giving him chance after chance, and now he was all out of chances, all out of luck. He gulped in preparation of what would come, for better or worse.

Meanwhile, you were sat at home, with a laptop in your clutches. After typing out a few overly formal and redundant emails, you stretched your arms above your head, hearing a satisfying pop. Unlocking your phone, your eyes scanned the number displayed on the lock screen. 5:32 PM. Shoto had informed you that he would be arriving early, the mere thought bringing a smile to your face. Your attention diverted from the numbers on your device to the background picture, a picture of you and Shoto on the beach, your lips caressing his cheek as he held onto the phone, a serene smile lighting up his expression. You missed those days, you knew you had to have a talk with him about the direction of your relationship, you just didn’t know when. You’d rarely see him throughout the day. And when you did, he was either too exhausted to function or already knocked out in bed. Your faith was firmly planted in him, it really was, yet you couldn’t help but speculate why his absence was more frequent these days. Shaking those thoughts away, you head to the kitchen to start preparing dinner.

Shoto eyed her with a mixture of anticipation and fear, the way her hips swayed purposefully, her petite fingers curling around the lock and clicking it shut. She stalked her way over to his desk, leaning over it and bringing herself face-to-face with the object of her desires. Her pride was wounded way too many times to count, each rejection only increasing her sense of entitlement. She knew that her boss wasn’t single, he had a goddamn picture of you on his desk, yet that didn’t hinder her in the slightest. In fact, she took it as a challenge, at first it was fun to get a reaction out of him but his consistent refusal to her advances was getting tiring. She was treading on thin ice, one small slip up and she’d be engulfed in icy waters, but she confided in the fact that he hadn’t fired her yet (for whatever goddamn reason). Her stern expression met his own stoic one, a façade he wasn’t sure he’d be able to keep holding up much longer.

“You left me hanging last time, sir. Let’s continue where we left off, shall we?”

She slid behind him, noiseless as a cat, taking the position she had been in the day before, this time with no interruptions. And there were no objections coming from him, which surprised both of them. She’d been expecting even a little bit of resistance on his part, yet there was none. Her abhorrent hands snaked their way down his built pectorals, relishing in his lack of defiance, whispering to him all the foul fantasies she’d dreamed of, and he didn’t say no.

“See, sir, once you let go, it’ll feel a lot better,”

As her fingers danced across his abdomen marveling at his muscles, she shifted a bit so she can stand beside him, watch all the resilience drain from his face as he gave in to her sick pleasures. God, he wanted to stop her, to shove her away, to do something, anything! But despite his subconscious crying out for him to take action, his body didn’t budge an inch. He felt sick to his stomach, he was enjoying this. He reviled himself over and over again in his head, yet he couldn’t deny her sensuous touches. He was already planning to penance for his sinful consent, never in his life did he think he’d ever be a perpetrator of infidelity, yet here he was letting a woman who wasn’t his lover touch him in ways he’d pledged were for only for your hands to execute.

His muteness was getting her drunk on the control she had over him -over the number three Pro-hero, she couldn’t help but test the waters and push her luck. Her digits scraped a path from his rock-hard abs to his inner thigh, kneading the muscle in her hands, inching closer and closer to the point of no return, the point where he’d officially be classified as an undignified cheater. His head snapped up, the haggard shouts of his subconscious finally proving fruitful in their effort to make him move. His eyes searched her grinning face, shit-eating and riddled with malice, and in a flash his mind compared her power-drunk smirk to your soft smile that he had the pleasure of witnessing that morning. All of a sudden, the frayed old thread holding his restraint together was restored to its original state, resewing and stitching itself back together to form a robust lasso that would hold his heart and spirit tightly, only yielding to your will and wind. She wasn’t you; she’d never be you or even come close. That small revelation prompted him to grip her wrist, which had been itching towards his semi-hard member. With newfound resolve, his voice as stern as he could muster, he made a demand- no, an order.

“Get out.”

“Wha- But-”

“Out. Now.”

His austere words left no room for discussion or complaints, her previously smug smile vanishing, replaced with pure fear at his staunch appearance. The tables were completely flipped, he had finally regained control over his traitorous body. She quickly heaved up, trying to fix her debauched state frantically before she booked it out of the room. With her villainous aura gone, the IcyHot Pro-hero dramatically sighed out, slumping in his office chair as he recounted the events of the past thirty minutes. He loathed himself for letting that continue on longer than it should have.

Before Todoroki can drown in his sea of self-loathing, his cell phone buzzed, indicating a notification. Opening the device, his breath hitched once he saw who had texted him.

Babe ❤️❤️: Sho r u still coming home early tonight? ps love ya Sent 6:13

Given the events that had just transpired in his office, his heart was racing. Mostly out of left-over adrenaline, but a part of him was happy he could still call himself loyal to you by minimum measures. Todoroki’d been so close to tipping over, he promised himself that he wouldn’t repeat his past mistakes. with the ache to see you blooming in him, he shot you a short text confirming that he’d be home in a bit and took a brisk shower to scrub off any lingering sensations from his sleazy assistant, both figuratively and literally.

When Todoroki arrived home only to be greeted by your patient smile, he couldn’t help the exasperated look overtaking his features. He truly didn’t deserve you, but he’d be a fool to let you go. Before you found the chance to even address him, he pulled you into a bone-crushing hug, savoring the aroma of your shampoo. He abruptly let you go to get a hold of your cheeks, gingerly patting them with his thumbs as he reminded himself over and over again that your were his and most importantly, that he was yours and only yours. Mental exhaustion crept up on him, the aftermath of his ongoing misdeeds finally catching up to him. Shoto could barely handle the fact that he had been so close to giving you up for some office skank, rubbing at his temples to ease the oncoming headache. You didn’t comment on his odd demeanor, opting to give him a serving of his favorite dish instead. With his head down, eyes focused on the coffee table in front of him, Shoto didn’t notice you leaving and returning with a tray in hand. His grey-blue hue flickered between the bowl of cold soba and the small glass of sake that were pushed into his line of vision then up to your playful grin. So pure, so loving. Nothing like the one he saw mere minutes prior in his agency.

“Eat up, I won’t be taking no for an answer this time!” Were your endearingly light-hearted words, that cheeky smile never fading. Shoto cemented this moment in his mind forever, ridiculing his past self for the umptieth time that day. How could he even bestow his stare on another creature when you were right by his side? Regret, repentance and unhinged love inundated him. He uttered out three simple words.

“I love you.”

You’d heard those same words come from his mouth dozens of times before, yet somehow this time felt special. You could tell the words carried more weight than they typically did, though you couldn’t pinpoint what kind of baggage they were upholding. Without even realizing it, tears had begun to trickle down your face, all your doubts and worries extinguished in an instant. Oh, how you longed to hear those words in recent days, they shook your entire world to its very core. He loves you; he still loves you.

Honestly, he hadn’t been expecting that reaction from you, but he understood the implications behind it, and it only added to the overbearing guilt weighing on him. Had you been so starved for his affection that those simple words made you cry? Shoto shot up from his seat, he made up his mind.

The cold soba was abandoned that night, he’d grabbed you by the waist and pulled you with him to the bedroom where he indulged in the throes of passion with you, worshipping you and locking every sound, every expression and every word you made forever in his heart which you mercilessly tugged at using the lasso holding it hostage. Despite the less than pure nature of your acts, Shoto considered this his confessional, where you were the priest, ridding him from all his past sins and engulfing him in your warm light.

When you were both tuckered out, he pulled you into his bare chest, petting over your head and silently planned the coming day. Promising that he’d be better for you.

The next morning you were dejected to wake up in an empty bed, but you wouldn’t let that shake you up. Shoto was clearly trying to reignite the spark between you two, and you were going to put in the effort too. While making your morning beverage before heading to work, a neon sticky-note caught your eye. You plucked it from its place on the fridge. In neat handwriting, it read:

Hey love, Sorry for leaving early again, was called in for an emergency I’ll try to clear the rest of my schedule to come home early today Love you

~S

The sweet words served to strengthen your faith in him. He was trying, and you would be sure to show that you appreciated his determination.

After dealing with the emergency, Shoto patrolled around the city, helping out here and there when needed. When he returned to his agency, his steps carried a steadfast feel to them, he knew what he was going to do next, and he was going to make it quick.

“Sir, you called?”

The duel haired hero didn’t even spare a glance at his secretary, finding the monotonous emails on his screen far more interesting. He encouraged her to sit down in the chair parallel to his bureau. She wordlessly took his offer and sat down, her heart beating a mile a minute. They both knew where this is going.

“You’re fired. Pack up your supplies and leave as soon as possible. And please leave your desk at pristine condition.”

She shouldn’t have been surprised really, if anything this was an expected outcome from her unprofessionalism, she didn’t dare voice her disapproval though, even she wasn’t dumb enough to poke the grizzly bear. Just as silently as she had entered, she left without making a fuss. Irrepressible relief calmed the Pro-hero’s senses, he’d done the right thing. And he would continue to walk the right path for you. He was able to clear the rest of his schedule, noting mirthfully that he still had time before he’d head back home. He settled for making a couple detours before coming home to your adoring gaze.

“I’m back.” Shoto called out blissfully, he missed the feeling of having an embrace to call his home. When he didn’t receive an answer he got a wee bit skittish, though his worries were subdued when he noticed your sleeping figure huddled up on the couch, a bowl of half-eaten popcorn on the table and a shitty romcom playing on the TV.

He crouched so he could properly take in your pacific visage. He vowed to himself that from then on out, he’d better himself in every aspect to truly be worthy of being yours. And he was going to forevermore eternalize that vow with the rose-gold band residing in his pocket.

[valeriehervo]

Valérie Hervo runs Les Chandelles, the legendary Paris sex club where members of French high society, politicians, barristers and rock stars (and an increasing number of Brits) come to indulge their erotic fantasies. Can it survive the twin threats of the pandemic and a moral backlash?

Adam Sage

Saturday March 20 2021, 

Valérie Hervo is outraged. She has just been listening to a radio station where two male presenters, chatting about her forthcoming appearance on their show, kept referring to her as the owner of a “group sex club”.

“That really is low-class vocabulary,” she tells me. “It’s very macho as well. Only a man would say something like that.

“And it is not what this place is about. To me, it is a journey through the mystery of the senses to a land of sensuality and encounters.”

Hervo is particularly aggrieved at what she took to be the implication that she organised sexual games for the benefit of men.

Nothing could be further from the truth, she insists. “Here, everything revolves around women’s pleasure. This is a place where a woman can do what she wants, when she wants and with whom she wants – and if she wants to do nothing, she does nothing.”

Hervo opened Les Chandelles, her recreational club – as she would prefer it described – in 1993, and it has since become a part of French high-society folklore.

Any Parisian will tell you that this is the place where the country’s political, economic and cultural elites live out their sexual fantasies beyond the sight of ordinary mortals, where government ministers, television presenters, rock stars and chief executives engage in the ancient practice of libertinage.

But what exactly goes on behind the plain façade in a narrow street near the Louvre in central Paris? And what might this tell us about French values? Or indeed about British values, given the steady flow of clients rumoured to have crossed the channel in recent years in the hope of fulfilling their “erotic potential” under Hervo’s stewardship?

With telephones barred from the club (they have to be left at the entrance) and hardly anyone willing to talk openly about their evenings there – “It’s a matter of intimacy,” says Hervo. “You don’t start telling everyone about your sex life at dinner parties” – such questions have given rise to few answers and much speculation.

Now, with the club closed because of the pandemic, Hervo, 53, has written a book that explains what happens when the dancefloor empties, usually around 1.30am, and the salons around it fill with writhing, sighing bodies.

Les dessous des Chandelles, which could be translated either figuratively as The Secrets of the Chandelles or literally as Underneath the Candelabras, is the portrait of a quintessentially French establishment.

Where else would the lost property include designer thongs or customers eat Ladurée macarons off the back of a naked woman, a famous male barrister end up in an alcove with his female rival days after their clash in a criminal court, or Mick Jagger reportedly be turned away for wearing a pair of jeans?

Hervo explains that her club is a bastion of French “savoir vivre”, where a select group of beautiful, intelligent and well-educated people conduct themselves in a way befitting a nation that has given the world some of its greatest suggestive literature, from Molière’s Dom Juan to Laclos’ Les liaisons dangereuses.

Consider, for example, her account of one of the Eyes Wide Shut theme parties she holds from time to time. “A naked woman, her gaze hidden by a Venetian mask, lies on a table,” she writes. “A nymph in a transparent toga joins her. She kneels down and delicately pulls her legs apart.”

She has torrid encounters herself, for instance with a woman whose perfume she found bewitching and whose body she discovered behind a veil in an alcove.

Much of her time, however, is spent looking after her patrons, like the couple of regulars who realised to their horror that their adult son and his partner had also begun going to Les Chandelles. Hervo tells how they begged her to help them avoid what they said would be a “regrettable” meeting.

On another occasion, a male customer arrived with his mistress, explaining to Hervo that his wife was stuck at home because she was ill. An hour later, the wife arrived with a younger man, she writes. “Don’t say anything to my husband,” she told Hervo. “He thinks I’ve got the flu.”

Hervo promptly rushed downstairs where she found the husband, “naked and frolicking with his partner and a few other accomplices”. She advised him to leave through the emergency exit.

I am discussing these and more adventures with Hervo at a table in her club’s pink and white restaurant, which is to be found at the bottom of stairs that wind down from an ordinary-looking blue door on the street.

Opposite us is another staircase that leads to what could easily be mistaken for an 18th- century Parisian literary salon – were it not for the mattress in the alcove at the end of it.

A third staircase, encased in walls painted in gold leaf, descends to a dancefloor, a bar and more salons with their alcoves, benches and mattresses.

It is difficult to find an English word to describe Les Chandelles. Some have called it a swingers’ club, although that conveys none of the cerebral sophistication and cultural aspirations that go with elite sex in France.

Others have used the term wife-swapping (or échangisme, as the French call it), but Hervo is no more happier with that than with group sex.

“For me, échangisme is very reductive and sad,” Hervo explains. “It involves some kind of contract between four people and they all need to agree, which can’t happen very often.”

What prevails at her club, she says, is libertinage, a concept dating back to a 12th-century rebellion against the church by disaffected clerics who were determined to place physical love above the courtly version promoted by troubadours and their ilk.

The contemporary version of this philosophy involves making “everything possible and nothing obligatory”, Hervo says.

One couple might go for sex, either with each other or with someone else, she says. A second might go along to watch. A third could be happy with a turn on the dancefloor.

“For some, it is enough to have an imaginary journey. For others, they will want a little bit more. But what happens in the salons is the icing on the cake and it doesn’t matter if nothing happens, because we’ve had such fun with the preliminaries.

“Everyone goes at their own rhythm. You may be happy with a look, a caress or with voyeurism. But that is all very different to échangisme.”

Libertinage, which has come and gone in France over the centuries – the early 17th and the mid-18th being among the high points – enjoyed a return to fashion from the late Nineties with the emergence of hundreds of clubs amid a spirit of unrestrained freedom.

The number has since fallen, with adepts taking to organising their own house parties. At the last count there were 269 such clubs left, according to French state radio.

The health crisis looks likely to drive many more out of business, their activities scarcely being compatible with social distancing.

Les Chandelles, however, has a status apart, and this should offer it protection against the vicissitudes of fortune.

Hervo says her customers include “politicians from both the left and the right” and “celebrities from across the whole world” (she refuses to divulge their names).

Hervo says that as her club’s fame has grown, so has its allure to visitors from Europe, the US, Asia and “a lot from Britain”.

It is not enough just to cross the channel and knock on the door, though. In order to get in, you need erotic knowhow, Hervo says, along with familiarity with Parisian savoir-vivre.

“It is an alchemy. A way of being,” she says.

In his Histoire du libertinage, Didier Foucault, a history lecturer at Toulouse University who is a specialist on the subject, writes of how the practice became fashionable after 1600 among aristocrats driven “by a haughty refusal to bow either to common law or to any authority whatsoever, be it temporal or divine”.

There may be something similar about the French elite that frequents Les Chandelles. The entrance fee is €96 for two, or €310 with dinner and a bottle of Deutz champagne thrown in. If Deutz is too downmarket, there is Cristal Roederer for €490 or Dom Pérignon Rosé for €470.

But the selection policy is not based on money, Hervo insists. More important to her are “elegance, refinement, education and taste.

“I have a very tough door policy. I turn away a lot of people.”

The badly dressed, the ugly, the vulgar, have no hope of getting past her, she says, while the overweight may struggle as well, at least if they are male.

“I know I shouldn’t be saying this, but I am going to say it anyway. I think I would be more concerned by a fat man than a round woman. Round women can be very beautiful but, in general, men who are fat are… Well, someone who lets himself go physically is someone who does… not respect himself. And if he doesn’t respect himself, he is less likely to respect other people.”

Les dessous des Chandelles is a strange, almost dual work. On the one hand, it is a window onto this secretive world of privilege and exclusion created by Hervo beneath Rue Thérèse in the French capital.

On the other, it is a tale of the author’s personal voyage through libertinage and her claim that the sexual liberation she found along the way, first in other clubs and then in her own, helped to unshackle her from a traumatic childhood marked by incest, guilt and depression.

Our conversation reflects the same duality.

For much of the interview, Hervo comes across as the archetypal Parisian businesswoman, complete with carefully applied make-up, an elegant hairdo, an articulate discourse, a headstrong Yorkshire terrier and a well-trained fiancé – Tom, the maker of an excellent Sancerre white wine, who rushes off shortly after I arrive and returns later with an armful of her outfits for the photoshoot, including an all-white suit and a glittering jacket.

One minute she is talking with off-putting clarity about the female orgasm, telling me in a tone that brooks no argument that “a woman’s sexuality is so much richer than that of a man”. The next she is explaining, with equal equanimity, how she resisted underworld attempts to take over her club following her divorce in 2005.

Like all self-respecting Parisiennes, she knows how to throw a strategic fit of pique as well, announcing that the photographer is driving her mad and that Tom had better summon a friend for help, and be quick about it. The friend duly arrives with a bottle of sancerre to enable Hervo to get through the afternoon session.

Yet, from time to time, there are signs of the scars left by childhood, as when she concedes that she took refuge in libertinage in part because “at night-time, you can’t see the suffering so much… the glitter masks the pain”.

At one point, her eyes fill with tears as she discloses that her relatives have refused to speak to her since the publication of her book, which recounts her rape by her grandfather as a young girl, her parents’ refusal to believe her, her teenage struggles with depression, her toxic marriage to a man 20-odd years her senior, and her salvation in swingers’ clubs.

It was her former husband who introduced her to libertinage. She writes of her first experience in a club where “in a salon plunged into darkness… some couples are making love while others are observing them”.

She did not want to join in – at least not the first time – but says, “My emotion [was]great and my excitement real.”

“I was 24 and I instinctively knew it was right for me,” Hervo tells me. “What I liked in those places was a feeling of freedom and especially a feeling that I was meeting couples who seemed to get on well together.

“That was not the image of the couple I had received as a child because my parents argued all the time. It was like Disneyland as far as I was concerned.”

When her former husband suggested opening their own swingers’ club in Paris, she jumped at the chance. He put up some of the money, they borrowed the rest and she became the manager.

“It was a success straight away, because I think it was the first club to give so much importance to women,” she says. “At that time, in 1993, in other clubs, the women were just treated as objects and it was the men who took charge of the games and who brought along their wives.

“I think that they were probably men of little courage who were not able to cheat on their wives and who went to this sort of place instead. But that was not at all in the spirit of libertinage.”

Les Chandelles would be different, she decided. “Women who are objects are women without humanity. Here, I made sure that the women were subjects.

“In fact, I created here what I never had myself. I tried to encourage women to take their time, to dare to set the tempo, to ask men to be attentive and unhurried and to be gallant, because women adore gallantry.”

She says her door policy has always involved refusing entrance to couples if she suspects that the woman is being dragged along against her will or kept in the dark about the true nature of Les Chandelles. “Even now in 2021, there are boors who don’t tell their partners where they are taking them,” she says. “It’s increasingly rare but it still happens. But if I have the slightest doubt, I question them. You get a feeling for these things.”

Inside the club, no means no, she says, explaining that men can be expelled for repeating a request to a female customer if they are turned down the first time.

“I think women are much safer in this sort of place than in traditional nightclubs where they get hassled all the time,” she tells me.

She says that she herself came to see Les Chandelles – of which she has been the sole owner since extracting herself from her disastrous marriage 16 years ago and buying her former husband’s share – as a refuge from the wounds left by her troubled childhood.

“This has been my bunker and my incubator,” she says. “It was where I revitalised myself, and where I discovered myself too.”

Can her club really be as idyllic as she pretends?

For years, Les Chandelles has been described in the French press as a favourite haunt of Dominique Strauss-Kahn, the former head of the International Monetary Fund, who resigned following his arrest on suspicion of rape. Although the charge was ultimately dropped, reports of his attendance at Les Chandelles have done nothing for its image.

Recently, it has also been linked with Gérald Darminin, President Macron’s interior minister, who, it has emerged, went to Les Chandelles in 2009 with a woman who had asked him for help in overturning her criminal conviction – he was legal affairs adviser for an opposition political party at the time – and who has accused him of raping her later that evening.

He denies her claim, but the publicity has scarcely been an advertisement for Hervo’s establishment.

She says the coverage has been misleading and unfair. DSK, for instance, barely ever visited Les Chandelles, she insists.

“There are many other politicians who came more often than him and who were much more important than him,” she says.

As for Darmanin, she says that when he dropped into the club a little over a decade ago, he was a young bachelor, and that young bachelors sometimes visit “for an evening with – what’s that word they use now? – oh yes, les sex friends, that’s it.

“And there’s nothing wrong with that. If you find yourself on your own for a year or so, you might want a regular one of those. Why not?”

Until now, the interview has gone smoothly enough, interrupted only by the barking of Cerise, Hervo’s Yorkshire terrier, at the emergence of the photographer from below.

But then I make a big mistake. Noting the entrance policy favours single women – who are allowed in on evenings otherwise reserved for couples, when single men are banned – I ask Hervo whether she uses them as an enticement for male patrons seeking a threesome with their wives and another partner.

She looks daggers across the table. “That is really a stupid, male, Cro-Magnon thing to say,” she tells me. “It’s very maladroit of you.

“Single women come because they want to have fun, because they could meet a man who pleases them, or a woman, or perhaps neither. Sometimes, it’s just two women friends who come for a drink because they know that here they won’t be bothered and because they will be appreciated because they are pretty.

“When I began here, I didn’t receive single women in the evening, because society considered that a woman who came alone to an establishment like mine was either a whore or a bitch. I fought to make people understand that life does not work like that, and I am proud to say that today I have single women among my customers.”

I ask Hervo if she is a feminist. “I certainly am not a neo-feminist,” she says, explaining that she laughs off wolf whistles in the street, likes being complimented on her looks and wants to “seduce or to be seduced, freely. But I am feminist for some things. I am in favour of women being able to experience pleasure alone at first, to discover their bodies and to enjoy their bodies, and only afterwards to share all that with a partner if they so wish.

“That sort of thing has not always been possible in the past.”

Pointing out that Foucault’s history of libertinage shows how sexual freedoms have come and gone over the centuries in France, I wonder out loud whether the country is shifting back towards greater restraint.

“You’re right, it is,” she says. “The difference is that today, it is not religion that is trying to cover everything up, it’s our moralising society. There is a very prudish scent around these days.”

In a thinly veiled attack on #MeToo, she complains in her book that the social networks have been transformed into “popular tribunals”, that the law has come to treat women “as weak beings which have to be protected” and that the ancestral French game of seduction is being subjected to new codes and new rules.

It is difficult to determine whether the pandemic will brake or accelerate this trend. Some predict that when the crisis ends, we will see a repeat of les années folles (the mad years), as the Twenties were known in France, with a yearning for freedom, parties and libertinage.

Others forecast the continued spread of the Anglo-Saxon-style feminism that Hervo abhors and the curtailment of French love-making and seduction. She is not overly worried, though. On a personal level, she has emerged from years of therapy able to confront her past and look forward to the future, she says. She has become a part-time therapist herself, has a house in the country, where she has spent much of the past year, and is planning to “marry the man I love” this summer.

Even if the moral backlash gathers strength, she thinks that Les Chandelles will continue to triumph.

“There have always been currents and countercurrents, but if society goes one way, people will need a place of liberty where they can do what they want, where they will have the freedom to talk, to exchange.”

Indeed, she believes that her club may even come to play a role similar to that of literary salons in the 18th century, when they nurtured the ideas that helped to topple the ancien régime.

Only in France could there be dreams of Enlightenment amid the shadows of a basement sex club. Les dessous des Chandelles by Valérie Hervo is published by Cherche Midi