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commander-rahrah · 11 months

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Talking to the Moon: Part II

Pairing: Astarion x GN!Reader Word Count: ~6900 (haha.. whoops again) Warnings: suggestive, swearing, PTSD, trauma, past/implied abuse, fluff, angst, emotional hurt/comfort, death, blood drinking, combat

archiveofourown: here

masterlist: here

part I: here

Summary: Set in Act II (pre-Moonrise Towers), Astarion and Tav/Reader wake up in the Last Light Inn after he makes amends. Astarion begins to realize what he is feeling for Tav/Reader is different then anything he has every felt before, and it is a continuous internal battle for him in more ways than one.

Notes: This is still a GN!Reader/Tav in second perspective with no names or y/n. The backstory established in chapter 1 still continues — Reader/Tav is Selûne blessed; noble with only a few specific appearance descriptors used (silver hair/star like freckles). This update is a combination of like 3 little daily headcannon dreams I had while playing the game the first time, and I felt like they all flowed so well together to create what would be a series of moments for Astarion to realize he was indeed falling for Tav before his confession scene that happens after Moonrise towers!

I hope to write more for this specific pairing, as I want to add even more to the confession scene from Astarion. And also the resolution for Reader and Shadowheart. I know how it all ends in my head, but I am loving writing it out and sharing with you all! ♡♡♡

P.S.: I keep slipping little Shadowheart x Karlach moments in... because I love the idea of them being together. But you can take it however you want to LOL.

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Astarion blinked awake, slowly, peacefully. He couldn’t remember the last time that happened. He usually bolted awake on instinct after finishing his trance.

But this morning he was greeted by a comfortable silence. Stretching his neck, he smiled as he took in your still sleeping form — hair tousled with sleep. One hand clutching your pillow while the other rested near his own, outstretched. Had you held his hand as you were sleeping? He couldn’t recall once he had fallen into his trance.

As if sensing him looking at you, your eyes fluttered open before your lips curved softly at the sight of him.

It made his half-dead heart flutter.

“You talk in your sleep.” You mumbled with a voice still hoarse and drowsy.

“I do? What did I say?” A knot formed in his stomach as he thought of the possibilities — the damning things he could have said.

“It was mostly muttering. You weren’t very coherent… but you sounded afraid. So I…” You flexed your fingers next to his own hand before trailing off.

You had reached out to comfort him whilst he slept. He swallowed as he looked at both of your hands still stretched out to the middle. Before he pulled it back, intertwining it with his other one laying on chest. “Apologies. I’ve never had a bed partner before… You must have slept terribly.”

“No, not at all. I haven’t sleep this well in months actually.” You said as you stretched your arms over your head, starting to sit up on the soft mattress.

Astarion agreed silently in his head. Not that he would admit it so freely out loud.

The pair of you sat in silence for a moment, your bodies still slightly laid across the mattress as you tried to will yourselves to start the day. Occasionally, he could feel you glance over to him. After mustering up some courage, he looked over at you with his red eyes round and vulnerable.

You studied the features of his face for a moment, before your eyebrows crinkled. “You must be starving. You haven’t fed.”

“No… but I’ll be fine. I’m sure some evil cultist will pull a sword on us and I will get to shred their throat.” He let out his nervous laugh, but the burning in his throat was uncomfortable.

“Astarion. You need but ask—“

“I can’t — I couldn’t.” Not after how he had acted last night. The shame that had ripped through him still lingered, his skin turning hot again as he remembered.

Then you were closing the empty space between, shuffling on your knees across the mattress as you got closer to him. “You need it to survive, you can’t help it that you’re—“

“A monster?” His lips curled, before he flashed his face away from you.

Your voice was quiet, laced with an ache he couldn’t understand. “I don’t think you’re a monster. Have I made you feel like one?”

He thought of your face that fateful night when you learned what he truly was. Surprise had flickered across your face, but never fear or hatred. You had quickly turned the tables as you were then calming him down. As if you hadn’t just woken up to him looming over you, fangs bared like a wild animal.

You hadn’t treated him any differently at all. Perhaps you asked a few curious questions and graced him with some teasing with that sharp tongue of yours. But you had believed him and accepted him as he was. Trusted him.

He wanted to hate you for it. For not seeing him as a wild, dangerous creature. For not just treating him like every other person did when they realized what he truly was.

It would be easier — to hate you.

But he couldn’t. He would never.

“No. You haven’t.”

“Astarion,” You grabbed onto his wrist delicately, your touch featherlight and a bit hesitant. “Feed.”

“Alright, if you insist.”

“I do.” You laid back out onto the bed, stretching out your neck for him. He swallowed, already eyeing your pulse point that was beckoning him closer.

His throat bobbed up and down as he pushed his blankets aside and eliminated the lingering space left between you. His fingertips brushed over the puncture wounds that lingered on your neck now — he had committed to always feeding from the same spot, so to avoid further marking your perfect form. His fingers trailed up your jawline, your cheekbones and into your hairline. “You’re too good to me,” He murmured into your skin, pressing a soft kiss on your neck. Surprised by his own intimacy, he pulled back to look you in the eye. “Are you ready?”

You nodded, fisting the sheet you laid on in preparation.

Astarion moved his body half over yours and sunk his teeth in, piercing through the soft flesh until your hot blood rushed into his mouth. He couldn’t help the moan that escaped him as the sweet taste flooded all of his senses.

But he had become better at it — not as frantic as his first time. Not as desperate. One of his hands lingered in your hair, the other wrapping around your waist carefully as he pulled himself closer into you. The thin fabric of your nightclothes let him feel your warm, soft skin beneath.

The thundering of your heart was echoing in his ears and down into his own chest. But your shallow breaths were acting as a timer. He needed to stay aware of you, to not push you or your body too far. He became increasingly aware of your hands tightening in the sheets and toes curling as you let out a whimper. Both pain and pleasure intermixed.

He realized that so often while he had fed from you, the lines got blurred. Lately, you both had been buried deep in each other whilst he was sucking and lapping at your neck — bringing you both into bliss for very different reasons. And though those moments with you did bring him into euphoria, something no one else’s touch or body had done in a century, it still brought that familiar tremble. A single thought that spoiled the high and made him wish he could peel off his skin.

He didn’t want to cross that line today, not if he didn’t have to.

With a gasp, he pulled away from your neck. He lingered close to it for a moment, breathing in your scent once more before licking at the punctures to stop any lingering blood from pooling out. Sitting back up, his tongue went over his lips and teeth cleaning up the red stains. “Are you alright?”

Your voice was a gentle whisper, purposefully calm to reassure him. “Yes. Are you?”

“Feeling better already.” He wiped at the corners of his mouth carefully, before asking, “Do you need — would you like me to make you feel better?”

“It’s nothing that my amulet and a strong cup of tea won’t fix.” You gripped the edge of the bed as you sat up, fingers already clasping at the golden amulet glittering off of your neck — it glowed slightly at your touch. The colour slowly returned to your cheeks, and the open puncture marks closed — leaving behind the purple-red bruises from his mouth and small scars from his fangs.

“Right. But I got mine… do you want yours too?” His pale fingers swirled nervously on his own knee.

“Astarion, this isn’t transactional.” You said with a shake of your head.

No, that couldn’t be. Everything had a cost, everything was an exchange. He knew that, he lived by that.

“What?” A bewildering look crossed his face, his head cocked to the side. He was sure he hadn’t heard you right.

But you said firmly, “I don’t expect anything in return. Not ever.”

“Then why in the heavens do you let me do this!?” He asked exasperatedly, his voice a little louder than he intended.

You took a large breath before staring back into his eyes, your stare and voice unwavering. “Because I care about you. And you told me heartbreaking stories of how you spent years eating rats and bugs. Being tortured and cut into. I may not ever truly know what you went through Astarion… but I understand. So every moment that I spend with you, I want to show you the opposite.”

“Someone will take advantage of that you know. Take advantage of you —that goodness you insist on.” Your blood in his stomach turned sour, as he knew that someone was him.

“I know. They have and they will. But I will not change my mind on this. And despite what you think or expect, I will not treat you like a monster or a thing. You are a person, albeit a complicated one, but aren’t we all.”

He blinked at your sudden outburst, mouth open slightly as his mind scrambled for some witty response, some quick line. But he failed too as you continued your admission.

“I wish you could see yourself how I see you. Not just the drawings I gave to you when you told me you wished to see your reflection…,” Those charcoal drawings of his face were carefully tucked into the pages of a leather book in his pack. His most prized possession. “One day, when you are ready to hear it I will tell you.”

Astarion remained silent. He was gobsmacked, his eyes wide. He felt like he was still processing, his mind sputtering and his heart thundering from your confessions. You cared for him? You understood him? And there was more to hear? Whenever he was ready… whatever that meant.

The only attachment he had planned for was your bodies intertwining in a false passion. Not that it had been very fake as of late… But everything else.

Astarion was suddenly very out of his element.

“Have a left you speechless, my dear? Maybe I should make unprompted speeches more often.” You smirked, though your face flushed a brilliant shade. He had been silent for too long, so you had tried to make things light and airy.

He slipped back into his usual cadence as his face broke into a grin, a dark chuckle escaping him. “So vicious, darling. Maybe I’m rubbing off on you.”

He prayed he wasn’t.

• • •

It was a hard few days in the Shadowlands, searching for a way to break the curse and edging ever closer to Moonrise Towers.

It was brutal here, punishing. Each turn more dangerous than the next.

There were no animals for him to feed on, so Astarion sheepishly continued to accept your offers. And there was no exchange as you promised, except quiet gratitude from him and an even more quiet understanding from you.

It was bewildering and mystifying. He still couldn’t wrap his head around it. Why you would choose to do that for him.

He could understand you jumping to the aid and rescue of the Tiefling children, helpless animals, the young couples desperately in love. They were good, they were pure.

But he was none of those things. He was wretched and broken. He craved violence and vengeance. His touch was a curse for you both. And he had used you, manipulated you. And maybe you knew it.

Yet you were still there.

And the cursed lands kept reminding him of that.

Everywhere they looked he seemed to find pairs. Engraved wedding rings enchanted to protect the other. Skeleton couples laid next to each other in their final moments. Like the pair that died on the rooftop, their boney fingers still intertwined. The handwritten poems cataloging the love they held for each other sat next to them, like they had whispered it to each other before their last breaths.

You had found the poems first, a soft look on your face as you read it to the group — your tender voice breaking as you neared the end of the last poem, their final declaration of love even in death. Astarion had to look away as you finished it, his half-dead heart thumping in his chest as he heard you speak the proclamation. He wouldn't allow his mind to even start to imagine you saying such things to him.

Lae’zel’s huffs broke the moment, demanding they get a move on and head back to camp already. The group blinked back to reality, before turning on their heels to go.

You walked ahead of him as the group began to backtrack to camp, tucking the book of poems into your pack with a gentle touch.

Astarion’s thoughts had been consumed by you for sometime now. For longer then he had realized. Perhaps from the moment he met you. He sometimes wondered what about you had kept him so captivated. Why he picked you to feed on, or to be the unsuspecting member of his plan.

He could have picked Wyll — he was noble and honorable, prone to jump into the thick of things to save an innocent or a friend. Loyal to a fault. And he was quite handsome too. Like the princes he dreamed to marry when he was a boy.

But no, it was you he was drawn to. His little moon.

He had realized that he ached for something he had never known, and had never before believed truly existed — that it was only invented to be seen in plays or read in prose and poetry. But now he longed for it with you.

When he was cursed to this life of a bloodsucking monster, of a vampire, he quickly realized that he would always feel hungry. That he could have his fill of blood and still be starving. He could drain this merry party dry and still feel that prick in his throat and pang in his belly.

What he didn’t realize was that the curse Cazador bestowed to him was so much more. Not just an endless bloodlust, not just waking nightmares and endless torment. But that he could long and ache for companionship, attachment, love. But that he would never take it for himself. That he would always be both starving and empty.

Because he knew he didn’t deserve it. Not after the things he’d done, in this life and his old one. Not after what he had become. He didn’t deserve you — someone so good that a literal goddess had blessed you with their power. Someone whose voice turned gentle as their fingers trailed lines of poetry. Someone who would offer themselves up to a monster, just to make them feel whole again.

You deserved someone bright and unbroken. Who could give and receive touch as freely as breathing air. Who knew that true companionship wasn't some fantasy invented for the arts, that love was more then sex and flattery. Who could one day also lay beside you, willing to accept what fate becomes them and turn to bone. Not a half-dead creature like him.

He knew he would cease his foolish plan. He couldn’t use you as bait nor a shield, not anymore. You deserved better than that. What that meant for him… he wasn’t sure.

Perhaps he should confess to his plan too. As a final way to make you understand what a manipulative bastard he truly was. To push you away. It would hurt less than to confess what his heart wished for, but his mind knew he could never have.

The path the group was walking along was overgrown with thorns and vines. A specific darkness plagued the route, and it was barely dulled from the magical glow of the party’s several spells and enchantments. He felt the hairs on the back of his neck rise, his red eyes darting around them — searching.

It happened in an instant — the shadows silent and invisible until it was too late. The creatures appeared with a sudden flash, long curling claws slashing into your side — catching you unawares. Your shout of pain alerted the rest of the party, everyone drawing their weapons quickly.

Astarion went to the enchanted daggers at his side, hurling them through the air with easy precision as they found their target. They boomeranged back to him, sliding into his waiting palms. He had gotten rid of one, but there were way more than usual. Wherever they had stumbled into, it was not good.

“Shit!” Karlach swore loudly as more shadows appeared after the ones they downed. Continuing to converge around you, drawn to your huffs of pain and blood. Your blood, the scent that was usually so sweet in his nose but now had dropped an anchor in his stomach. There was too much of it, much too fast.

“Watch out!” Wyll shouted in warning to the vampire, before sending several of his powerful red blasts soaring out of his hands.

With a glance to his side, the rogue twirled around Lae’zel’s strong, cleaving swing with ease before releasing his daggers once again at the creatures advancing on you. But he threw them a moment too late — their clawed strikes sinking deep into you before the magical daggers ripped through them and back into his hands.

The sound of your knees crashing into paved stones made Astarion's teeth chatter. His heart lurched into his throat, your name choking out of him as he screamed. He had never moved so fast — it almost seemed like he had blinked across the battlefield like Gale so often did.

“RAHHHHH!” The booming roar of Karlach echoed in his ears as she raged from seeing you fall. The rest of the party converging on the remaining shadow creatures attempting to surround your unconscious body, moving in sync with each other with a deadly precision.

Knowing that those creatures were being taken care off, Astarion fell to his knees next to you — his pale hands grabbing onto your shoulders. “Sweetheart, wake up.”

You didn’t stir, your head and limbs shaking loosely as he moved you. He dragged your head onto his lap, before unbuckling the holster on his belt. He tipped the the precious red liquid from the healing potion between your lips. He said your name, running his thumb across your face.

You didn’t stir.

“Darling?”

His red eyes studied you, your face looking lack luster and eyes remaining closed. Your hands laying limply at your side, unmoving. He couldn’t hear the familiar thrum of your heart.

No, no, no, no.

“Astarion?!” Gale shouted, his voice exhausted and strained as he split his concentration just enough to check on you two.

The world tilted as the wizard instead shouted for you. But you couldn’t respond... because you were —

“You can’t die, dammit!”

Suddenly, you were all bathed in a golden light for a moment as Shadowheart brought down a thunderous strike of radiant energy, defeating the remaining shadow creatures as they shrieked in pain. Then the sound of thudding metal and footsteps as the party surged forward to you, panting for breath.

Wyll’s eyes went wide with worry as he saw you unmoving, his hand covering his mouth,“ Are they—?”

Astarion looked up at his party with bleary eyes, his hands trembling as he held your face on his lap. “They won’t wake up. I tried, I gave them a potion and they—“

“Oh gods.” The Blade choked out, his face immediately crumpling.

Gale shook his head, immediately dumping the contents of his side satchel onto the dirt. Scrambling through them, “No, no, we can do more! I’ll have a scroll or, or — Shadowheart!!”

The cleric had remained in the back, her face half covered in shadow. Her nostrils flared as she looked down at you. But she made no move forward.

Astarion’s red eyes pierced through her, before narrowing, “Bring them back.”

She didn’t move, her face blank. “My goddess will not allow it.”

“Princess! What are you talking about?” Karlach tried to grab her hand, but Shadowheart pulled away. “It’s Giggles!

Her black braid swayed back and forth as she shook her head, taking one step back. “She is Shar’s enemy. She is my enemy.”

“I don’t give a fuck about your goddess.” The vampire spat, his lips curling, “Bring. Them. Back.”

“I—" A moment of hesitation as her voice shook and her eyebrows furrowed.

Gale let out a shaky breath, his fingers pushing back his long hair. His brown eyes were shining with fear. “I have no scroll, I—“

“We are running out of time!” Lae’zel finally spoke out, glaring at Shadowheart. “Do something now, istik.”

Astarion voice was deadly, his fangs baring as he shout out. “If you don’t do this. If you let them die— I will hunt you down and become your worst nightmare. I will fucking haunt you! BRING. THEM. BACK.”

“Shadowheart, please.” Karlach whispered, finally getting ahold of the half-elf’s hand.

Conflict flickered across her face, before she stepped forward. She crouched next to you, bowing her head as her hands began to glow with golden light. Her small hands rested on your unmoving chest, before the light disappeared into you.

A loud gasp escaped you as come back to life. Your hands finding purchase in the dirt as your eyes snapped open wide with fear and uncertainty.

Astarion let out a loud breath, tipping his head back with a silent thank you to anything that was listening.

The sigh of relief echoed throughout the entire party. Minus the dark haired cleric, who stood up quietly. Her throat bobbed as a hard to read look crossed her face and she backed away.

“I— what, what happened?” You asked groggily, your eyebrows meeting in the middle from confusion.

“You scared us Giggles.” Karlach sniffed, “Thought we’d lost you for a second there…”

“I… I was gone?” You craned your neck, looking up at Astarion, alarm etching every feature of your face.

He opened his mouth, but no words could come out. Fear and panic still held a tight grasp around his throat.

“For but a moment.” Gale stepped forward, his voice practiced but reassuring. “Shadowheart brought you back.”

Your bottom lip wobbled as you fought instant tears, before you croaked out, “Thank you.”

A quiet grunt is all you got in reply from her.

You sat up gingerly, Astarion grabbing your elbow to steady you. Your blood and the strange ichor from the shadowy creatures was clingy to your clothes. You were shivering — a combination of the cold and from the knowledge that just mere moments ago you had been dead. The vampire had undone the clasp of his cloak and was wrapping it around you before you could say no.

“I think it’s best we head to camp. We will take the paths we know.” Gale spoke up first, gathering the contents of his satchel that he had spilled across the ground.

Karlach took your pack from you, slinging it across her back with ease. “Fangs, help me get them up.”

He rushed to his feet, gently pulling you up with him. You swayed for a moment, but your fingers tightly found his forearm to keep you steady. “Thank you,” You breathed.

Him and Karlach slowed their pace to match your weak steps as you walked between their sides, both of their arms wrapped around your waist. Gale was leading the way with Wyll at his side, his staff a shining beacon as the two kept their heads on a constant swivel. Lae’zel brought up the rear, her sword remained out as her eyes narrowed on the huddled form of Shadowheart. The cleric’s arms were hugging herself as she kept her eyes on her boots.

Astarion couldn’t help but count your heartbeats, the rhythm now steady and thumping like normal. He needed to recommit the sound to memory. If only to drown out the reoccurring one of hearing it stop.

• • •

You were much quieter than usual, the lute you would strum by the campfire abandoned. Your eyes were blank as you stared into the flames, licking and dancing across the logs. You were miles away, your half-full dinner plate forgotten at your feet and now licked clean by the camp dog and owlbear.

Shadowheart and Karlach had almost immediately retired to the latter’s tent — still in there now, speaking in hushed whispers that even Astarion’s elven ears could not pick up. Lae’zel was sitting on her perpetual watch, her sword balanced across her knee as she polished it. Wyll sat closest to the fire, using the warm light to inspect a map of Moonrise Towers you had found today — making marks and notes, strategizing the best way to rescue the lost Tieflings and his father. Gale was dutifully at your side, sharing the log bench and reading quietly — his mage hand holding the book up for him and turning the pages.

Astarion watched from a far, sitting at his own tent. He was not interested in feigning conversation. But he wasn’t interested in his own activities either — the book he had open on his lap had been on the same page since he first sat down. Instead, he was watching you carefully.

The scene from earlier in the day was repeating in his mind, he couldn’t shut it out. Not just the sound of your heart stopping, or the scent of your life blood draining out of you. But how you had clutched to him as you journeyed back to camp. That the trembling in your lip would stop when he looked over to give you reassurance.

You had slipped into a deep shock when you arrived in the familiar comforts of camp, almost instantly dissociating once you breached your group’s makeshift home. Gale had swooped in then, his mother-hen behavior taking over as he ordered you to change while he cooked.

So, the vampire had slipped away. Disappointed to no longer be needed. Wishing he too could dissociate or play healer or anything, something to just stop his racing thoughts and pained heart.

His pointed ears perked as you spoke.

“I’m going to go for a walk along the river.” You said suddenly, breaking the quiet that had been settled around the camp for hours. You braced your hands on your knees as you stood up from the bench.

“Do you need company?” Gale asked from your side, already starting to stand up to join you.

“I’m okay, just going to the dock… to collect my thoughts.” You didn’t notice the hurt in the wizard’s eyes as you rejected him. No, your eyes were searching around the camp, looking for something. Someone.

They settled on Astarion.

He raised a single white eyebrow, your eyes never straying from his. A silent invitation, maybe? To join you on the dock.

You gave the smallest indication, a tilt of your head that anyone else would have missed. Then you were off, heading across the camp before turning toward the tree line closest to the river.

He waited for a moment, as to not make it obvious. Perhaps to spare Gale’s feelings, that you had silently asked him to go, and not the wizard.

“Off to get lucky?” Wyll asked as the vampire marched by.

“Wh—what?” He stuttered, steps faltering as he turned to look at his companion still sat on the dirt by the fire.

“Gonna try your luck with a hunt?” The warlock rephrased, looking up from his stacks of maps and parchment.

“Oh. Yes. That’s it, ‘hunting’.” He waved his hands and did a funny little bow, before turning on his heel. When had he become such a terrible liar?

With a practiced lazy grin, he bid the rest of his companions a quick farewell before following the trail into the tree line as you did.

The docks weren’t far from camp. A few minutes journey down a well-walked dirt path through the sparse woods led him to the quiet river.

You were already sat on the wooden dock, your boots half hazardously tossed behind you and your feet hanging in the water. Your head was tipped back, arms stretched behind you as you seemingly basked in the silence. Astarion made purposeful loud steps, causing the wood planks to creak. To announce himself, to avoid startling you.

You didn’t move, didn’t flinch. Instead you merely opened your mouth to speak, “Hello, Astarion.”

Oh, how he loved it when you said his name like that. Like you had been waiting for only him.

“Darling.” He drawled from behind, standing carefully next to you.

You turned your face so you were now looking up at him instead of the dark sky, “Thank you for knowing I wanted you here. I didn’t want to announce it.“

A smirk quirked his lips, “Good, I can still read you then.”

You looked at him quizzically, “Have you been having difficulty doing that lately?”

“You…, He cleared his throat, “You have been keeping me on my toes, yes.”

A cheeky smile spread across your face, your eyes sparkling with delight. “Oh, you must hate that.”

Yes, he did. He rolled his red eyes at you, “I certainly haven’t been bored since I met you.”

You both let out chuckles, before you patted the spot next to you on the dock. “Sit with me?”

He joined you, removing his own boots and rolling up his pants to sink his legs in the water. But then he paused, his pale feet hovering above the blue water. “What creatures lurk in this river, do we know?”

“Oh, don’t be a scaredy-cat.”

Astarion huffed before placing his feet in. He hissed from the cold temperature, but after a moment it felt refreshing on his tired and sore feet. A relaxed sigh escaped him, and his shoulders lowered slightly.

You both sat in a comfortable silence for a moment. Then he kept glancing at you from the corner of his eye, but was careful to not get caught. “How are you feeling?”

You blinked at the question. “I— I’m not sure how to answer that. Okay, I think. Are you?”

“You scared me today.” He admitted without thinking, his eyebrows furrowed.

“I’m sorry.” You mumbled, your fingers kneading the flesh of your thighs.

“I don’t need you to apologize. I need you to… Just never do that again, ok? I know you did nothing wrong and you were just standing there but don’t ever put yourself in a situation like that again.”

Your brows met in the middle, your mouth turning into a frown. “The path we are on is a dangerous one, Astarion… I can’t—“

“No. Nothing can happen to you. I won’t allow it.” His voice cracked, so he swallowed some of the emotion down. “So stay at the back, behind me, I don’t know. But I will not witness what I did today again, you understand me?”

“Okay,” You submitted with a nod, “It’s all still very hazy for me…”

“It was terrifying. It’s been a long time since I’ve felt like that.” He chewed his inner lip, surprised at the confession that had just hurled out him.

A haggard breath left you, before you abruptly stood up. You started to fumble with the buckle of your pants, staring out into the river as you took it off and tossed it behind you.

He watched you with confusion, “What in the hells are you doing?”

“I want to, I don’t know, feel alive. I need to reset. I can’t get the feeling I had when I came back out of my chest.” Astarion knew that feeling, had felt that feeling. And it still resurfaced sometimes.

You peeled off your shirt next, then your trousers, the clothes falling in a small pile at your feet — until you were suddenly stark naked standing on the edge of the dock.

Astarion did his best to hide his awe at you, standing confidently above him — completely nude and bathed in the dim evening light. You stood there for a moment, your chest rising and falling as you took quick breaths. “Well?”

With a sudden leap you jumped into the water, a joyful yelp escaping you as you splashed into it.

“Have you gone mad?!” He asked after you, holding his hands up in defense of the cold water that splashed from your movements.

“Yes! Join me in my madness.” You said with a loud laugh, the musical sound ringing in his ears. You threw your head back, your bare chest exposed as you flopped backwards and began to float in the water.

He looked at you like you were demented. “Oh, I don’t think so.”

“Astarion, come in. There are no ghouls or creatures. It’s nice.”

He set his jaw, his words coming through his gritted teeth. “I can’t — I haven’t swam in two hundred years.”

“Oh.” You realized, before standing in the water to show him, “It’s like the baths we took near the grove. You can touch the bottom, I’ll help you.”

His red eyes couldn’t resist roaming your wet figure, backlit in the evening light in front of him. Then he snapped his eyes away, turning his nose up, “You’re intolerable.”

“You love it. Now get that stubborn, pale ass in here.”

The vampire huffed as he stood up, “Hmmph, it’s a good thing you’re pretty, you know. Or everyone would reconsider why they condone your behavior.”

You flashed him a smile, before turning around and dunking your head into the water — giving him privacy to undress.

The vampire slid off his clothes, carefully piling them next to yours before staring down into the dark blue water.

Fun. That’s what you were searching for. Just a moment, a thrill. It wasn’t a distraction like what he had tried to do in the Last Light Inn. It was.. an escape. He could do that for you. It was probably one of the few things he could afford you.

“Oh hells,” He hissed through his teeth before jumping in after you.

Even as a cold-blooded creature, the water was a shock to his whole system. He felt goosebumps cover all of his flesh, his muscles drawing taught from shock. But as he surfaced and saw the delight flickering in your eyes, he instantly warmed. “Are you happy now, you wretched little thing?”

You didn’t reply, instead grinning and nodding childishly.

“Good.” He smiled back, “Now, what?” His feet could indeed reach the bottom, he stood in it, the water gently moving over his shoulders and collarbones in the lazy current. It was nice, but foreign — a sensation he was still trying to grow used to after all this time.

You bit your lip and shrugged, beginning to swim in a slow circle around him. Before sending a large splash of water over him.

“My hair!” He cried out, before his eyes narrowed and settled on you. “You minx, you’ll pay for that.”

Another laugh escaped you as you tried to outmaneuver him, your wet arm slipping through his hand as he tried to grab you. So he instead launched a counter wave back at you, splashing water across the back of your head.

“Muahaha!” The vampire let out, his grin spreading across all of his features.

Your smile was contagious, addicting. He could feel strain on his face from his own smile as he laughed with you, the longest a genuine one had been plastered on his face for centuries. The two you played in the shallow river, splashing and shrieking like children. It was liberating, he had never felt more free. Not even the day when he had realized he hadn’t perished from the sun’s attention. This was somehow better.

His wet, pale hand caught your wrist as you went to slide past him in your game of chase. You swallowed slowly, your plump mouth hanging open slightly as he tugged your closer to him — drawing you nearer until you were face to face.

Your eyes were hooded, staring at his mouth. But not possessively, not with the hunger and objectification he was used to. But with longing? How long had you been looking at him like this?

He tilted his head forward, meeting you halfway as yours lips pressed into his carefully. A soft groan escaped you as you felt him kiss you back.

His pale fingers grabbed your naked waist, pulling you into him so your bodies were flush — your chest cold and hard from the water pressed into his own. His fingertips dug into your fleshy side as you deepened the kiss, opening your mouth to him. Your hands trailed up chest, your fingers tips playing with the sensitive skin on the nape of his neck and moving into his hair. Your touch gentle yet firm — it was maddening.

It had been sometime since you’d touched each other like this, but there was something different tonight. Arousal was flooding through him, his lower belly tightening and warming as he hardened against your thigh. Gods, did he want you right now. And not to perform, not his almost ritualistic routine for Cazador’s prey. He just wanted you, needed you for only himself.

As he felt you push into him more, a low moan escaped him.

But then he felt a familiar shiver travel up his spine, disgust — not at you, or him. But at the tainted act. Haunting memories of back alleys and side rooms flooded through him.

Gods dammit.

He had wanted this — to kiss you, to be with you. To indulge for just a moment in you, even though he knew he could never truly have you. A temporary bliss to sate his thoughts of you, his need for you.

Loathing burned through him for ruining the moment. So, instead he tensed his jaw, furrowing his eyebrows as he continued. He could persist, he insisted to himself as his hold on your waist tightened.

You two had barely kissed twice more before you pulled away, completely breathless. You caught your breath, before looking up into his eyes, “I don’t want to go any further tonight, I’m sorry.”

He froze, before his fingers immediately left your waist. “Did I do something wrong?”

“No, no! You’re wonderful. Just… a lot happened today, and I’m still overwhelmed I think. I hope you understand.”

He understood more than he could bare to say. “Of course.”

He’d never thought to just ask to stop. He never had the choice, the free will to. If he stopped he would have no prey for his master. Then he would be punished. And the punishment that Cazador would doll out for him was a much worse abuse then enduring the practiced torture he did with his victims. So he had just done it…

But you had asked. You had listened to yourself, and your wants and had stopped. You were vulnerable and honest in a moment of passion. You trusted him to listen.

You trusted him.

“And don’t apologize. Not for that.”

You pecked him on the cheek — your lips incredibly soft, it was only a puff of air across his skin. “We should probably head back — the others might be worried.”

He blinked back to reality, nodding along as different thoughts and memories flooded him. “The others, right.”

You both got dressed quietly, your clothes sticking to your damp skin and hair. You began to walk back towards the forest line, the dirt path leading back to camp looming in front of you.

Astarion glanced over at you, but blinked as he had realized he caught you staring at him. Your cheeks flushed brightly, before you ducked your head.

“Gale told me about what you did for me today.” You said quietly as you walked, your eyes fixed on the trail and hands twirling nervously at your side.

His steps slowed behind you, “Oh.”

You turned to face him, your eyes soft yet wide, “Shadowheart may have cast the spell. But you… you’re the reason why I’m here. Thank you for fighting for me.”

His heart thudded, as he felt an overwhelming urge to go to you. To hold you like he had in the river. His fingers twitched at his side as he instead swallowed and spoke, “Of course. You would have done the same.”

The sounds of the camp began to trickle down the trail, soft chatter by the fire could be heard from here. Surely meaning that any thing said between you now could also be overheard. You seemed to realize this as well as you turned back to him one last time.

“Astarion,” You called back. Every time you said his name, it was like a piece of him that he had long forgotten about came back to life. “I’m very glad I met you.”

He thought of all the moments that led to this one. Dying in that dirty, dark alley. Clawing his way out of his own grave. Two hundred years of misery, and begging, and torture. To the nautiloid and the god damn worm slithering in his head. And then to you — under him with his knife to your throat on the cliffside, flushed and dancing at the Tiefling party, sleeping soundly next to him in the inn. And to now, staring at him with your soft eyes and smile, your sweet laughs and touch still echoing in his ears and across his skin.

Maybe the gods had answered his calls after all — if he had been fated to meet you along.

“So am I,” He smiled back.

Continue to part III here!

#bg3 astarion #astarion #astarion ancunin #astarion fanfic #astarion x reader #astarion x gn reader #astarion x tav #astarion bg3 #baldur's gate 3 astarion #bg3 fanfic #astarion/reader #astarion/tav

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jinkieswouldyoulookatthis · 1 year

Text

Make a Wish

This fic was inspired by The Time Dean was Sam’s Girlfriend by fleshflutter on LiveJournal

This is it! The thing I've been working on writing all year. It's finally done!

Dean and Jessica share a birthday, so what would happen if they both made birthday wishes at the same time that caused them to swap bodies? The inspiration story was fluffy and silly and adorable, but what if things were more explicit? Like, way more explicit?

This is a gender-bending body swap fic were the characters' sexual partners do not know who is actually inhabiting the body they are having sex with, so it's non-con. It's a bit of a dead dove, so if you don't think you'd be okay with the tags, please don't read. If you do read, I hope you enjoy it!

Relationships: Dean/Sam, Sam/Jessica, Jessica/omc

Warnings: Non-Con resulting from body swap situation and characters not making good choices

Read on AO3

Words: 14,476

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

January 24th, 2004

If anyone had ever tried to tell Dean that he would be spending his 25th birthday alone in some dive bar off the highway somewhere between Bumfuck and Podunk, middle America, he would have said that sounded about right. Especially after the last few years. Being alone had become, more and more, par for the course.

His dad, increasingly absent, which was fucking saying something when you considered John Winchester’s stellar trackrecord in that particular department, had been off on a solo hunt for a week now. Before heading out, he’d tasked Dean with a simple salt ‘n’ burn, a milk run that had taken all of a day and a half to complete. So now Dean was expected to just sit here, in this rest stop that was pretending to be a town, and fucking wait.

Dean hated waiting. Waiting gave you too much time to think, even though he had nothing good to think about, and thinking like that got you into trouble.

It was a Saturday night and, other than Dean, there were only four other people in the bar, three other patrons who all looked to be well into their fifties and the bartender, who was a decently handsome guy, probably did well enough with the ladies, but he had a beard and skinny jeans that gave off hipster vibes that made Dean decide right off the bat that he didn’t particularly like the guy.

He pulled his cellphone out of his pocket and flipped it open with his thumb. The screen lit up, his thumb hovered over the button that would pull up his contacts. Once again, Sam hadn’t bothered to call him on his birthday and the urge to give his brother shit about it was strong.

Eight months.

He flipped the phone shut and sat it on the surface of the bar to the right of his beer, and tapped his ring against it twice, the silver making a satisfying clink against the hard plastic. It’d been eight months since they’d spoken.

Dean had called on Sam’s birthday, no answer, so he’d left a message, “Happy Birthday, Bitch. Call sometime, let me know you’re still alive.”

It’d taken almost another month before he’d worked up the nerve, which was almost entirely worry-fueled anger at that point, to call again. It only rang twice.

“Dean?”

Fear that had been slowly choking him from the inside let go all at once, replaced just as suddenly by irritation. “So you are alive.”

“Yeah, sorry I haven’t called you back. I’ve been drowning in finals.”

“Yeah right, you know you aced ‘em.” He could hear Sam smile, without him saying anything, and that should have made things better but it really didn’t. But they’d shot the shit for a bit, conversation light and barely surface deep, a shallow script whose only consolation was the reassurance that Sam was okay, better even, he sounded like he was thriving. A weird lump suddenly formed in Dean’s throat. “Hey, I gotta go, but happy belated.”

“Oh? Okay, thanks.”

“Later. Hey? Pick up the damn phone sometime.”

“Yeah, yeah. Bye, Jerk.”

“Bitch.”

That had been in June. Neither of them had reached out since. He gave the phone a spin on the heavily varnished wood, set it twirling in place like a top before reaching for his beer. One long pull and it was drained.

“‘Nother one?” The bartender asked as Dean sat the empty bottle down.

“You know what? Fuck it, it’s my birthday, let’s step it up to bourbon.”

“Birthday, huh? And you’re lucky enough to be drinking here?” There was a barely restrained chuckle at the end.

“Yep.” Dean said with a little extra pop at the end of the word.

“Damn.” The bartender said as he turned and selected a bottle, grabbed a glass, and was back pouring two fingers of amber liquid with practiced ease. “This one’s on the house, birthday boy.”

Dean’s face lit up in a genuine, if somewhat rueful smile, “Thanks.”

The bartender nodded and busied himself further down the bar.

Dean slowly swirled the glass a few times. “Yeah.” he said, quietly, “Happy birthday.” Looking down at his phone again, he raised the glass to his lips and took a drink. He closed his eyes as the smokey, thick burn chased a wish for something out of reach down his throat.

A wave of vertigo crashed over him, so sudden and hard that he was glad he’d been sitting down. Even though he’d watched him pour the drink, the idea that maybe the bartender had drugged him suddenly seemed like a very real possibility.

Wait, why did he smell candle smoke? Shit, was he having a stroke or something?

He opened his eyes and had to grab onto the edge of the table to steady himself as his legs threatened to give out. Bar and barstool were gone, replaced with a house and a small dining table. The room he was now in was full of people looking at him with bright smiles, who all started clapping and cheering as soon as he opened his eyes. Smoke curled up from a forest of little, thin candles sticking out of a flowery cake on the table right in front of him that had, “Happy Birthday, Jessica!” written on it in fancy, blue, cursive icing.

There was a flurry of movement to his left and a pair of pretty brunettes started cutting into the cake and passing slices around. Everyone was smiling and laughing and acting incredibly… normal, like nothing weird had just happened.

Something moved way too close to Dean’s face and he flinched and tried to swat it away. As he touched it, he froze, eyes fixed on his fingers and the lock of long, wavy, blonde hair that tugged on his scalp as he tried to get it away from him. Long blonde hair that was being held not by his own fingers but by delicate, slender, fingers with nails painted pale pink, all glossy and graceful and… soft.

To say it was disconcerting would have been the understatement of all time. He was looking at a hand that was very obviously not his own, but that moved and felt as if it were. He gave another tug to the lock of hair, harder this time, and although it didn’t exactly hurt, it was definitely attached to his head, not a wig or anything like that. He brushed it back and confirmed he now had a full head of hair that came down way past his shoulders.

Chick hands, chick hair… his eyes went wide and he looked down his chest and stared right into cleavage.

He had tits!?

“Oh fuck.” he said in a chick’s voice.

“Hey?” A warm touch to his upper arm caused Dean to turn and look right into the throat of a massive guy standing behind him. Tilting his head back to look up he was met with bright eyes and a dimpled smile that he knew better than his own reflection.

“Sam?”

“Happy Birthday, Jess.” That smile, still sweet but with a gleam, a glint that Dean hadn’t seen since they were both teenagers. One of Sam’s hands came up, jesus he had big hands, and gently brushed along Dean’s jawline, thumb sweeping his cheek as long fingers slipped into his hair behind his ear. Sam’s gaze held Dean’s focus as he leaned down.

Had Sam gotten even taller?

Everything was moving in slow motion, Dean couldn’t feel his heart beating, wasn’t breathing, but his mind was spinning, scrambling to sort through way too much information, too much change, just too much, way too fast. So perhaps it was understandable that he didn’t react in time to pull back.

Just a fleeting, Oh fuck, before their lips met and Dean’s heart leapt into action like he’d been shocked awake. Sam was warm and familiar, but the way he pressed and pulled at Dean’s bottom lip, just a promising hint of more, made a small noise escape Dean’s throat that didn’t sound at all like disgust, like it should have.

Someone wolf whistled loudly nearby, eliciting another round of clapping and cheers from the crowd and Sam pulled back, twin spots of red blazing on his cheeks. He laughed in a way that Dean hadn’t seen in ages, playful and easy and open, as he glanced around at these people who were obviously his friends. A spark of something anxious twisted up in his chest. Dean blinked a few times, licked his lips, and swallowed, winded like he’d just sprinted up a hill too fast.

“Get it, Winchester!” a guy hooted from somewhere behind Dean.

“That’s real mature, Brady.” Sam said, his hand sliding down Dean’s shoulder and the back of his arm, coming to rest low on his back, fingertips brushing against the strip of bare skin between his top and skirt. The skirt thing was weird… drafty, but the warm press of Sam’s fingers sent little static sparks through him and a blush heated his cheeks, spread down his chest, and he was once again very aware of the fact that he currently had boobs… and a pussy instead of a dick.

This was bad, his mind raced like a cartoon character running in place before his thoughts finally caught traction with the ground and lunged forward. He wasn’t him, wasn’t in his own body. He was somehow in the body of Sam’s girlfriend?

Of all the bodies in all the world, I had to end up in this one?

But Sam hadn’t kissed him, he’d kissed his girlfriend, who’s birthday just happened to be the same as Dean’s? Which was… okay, yeah, that was weird as fuck. But she’d obviously just blown out the candles on her cake, which would have been the same time that he’d had swallowed down his own wishful thoughts.

Shit. He swallowed again. Shit, shit, shit.

“I, uh,” he cleared his throat, “I’ll be right back.” He said, trying not to show how unsettled he was at sounding like a chick, reminding himself that he looked like a chick, sort of was one right now. He took a breath, and told himself to play it calm and poker face the situation.

“You okay?” Sam asked, his eyes squinting slightly the way they did when he was concerned, or getting suspicious, his thumb rubbing against Dean’s skin, sending those sparks flying all through him again.

Oh, so not good. This is bad.

“Yeah, good, I just need to go to the bathroom.” Dean smiled as he felt for pockets in the clothes he was wearing, but found none. Where would she keep her cellphone? “Did you see where I put my purse?”

“Yeah, it’s right over there.” Sam looked at an end table by the sofa in the adjoining room.

“Thanks!” Dean said as he broke away from Sam and grabbed the purse.

Taking stock of his surroundings, it looked like they were in a two-story house. It was a little worn and run down, but decorated in a way that practically screamed college kids lived here. Probably a rental near campus, it had that vibe. It was also older, which meant that the bathroom was likely upstairs. He unzipped the purse as he went up the stairs, and thanked whatever luck he had that there was a little flip phone tucked inside. He found the bathroom and was punching in his number as he closed the door.

~~~

“Happy Birthday, tooooooo, yooooouuuuuuuuu!!!!”

Jessica thought of a wish and blew out the candles on her cake, then blinked and started coughing at a sudden burning in her throat. She must have inhaled the candle smoke. While her eyes were closed the room gave a lurch and she was suddenly sitting down.

A loud solid thunk made her flinch as she opened her eyes. Dark amber liquid sloshed in a thick bottomed glass that had just dropped onto a heavily varnished wood bartop a few inches below an outstretched man’s hand in front of her. Whiskey and the lingering, stale ashtray smell of old cigarette smoke hit her all at once. Looking quickly to her right, to see who had dropped the glass, she found that the man's arm that was connected to the hand that’d dropped the glass, was attached to her?

“What the…?” The voice that came out was not hers. It wasn’t even close. It was a man’s voice, with a timbre that resonated deep in her chest. She covered her mouth with her hand but then immediately jerked her hand away at the feel of a man’s fingers touching her lips and the feel of scratchy stubble against her fingertips. Her mouth tasted like whiskey, that’s what was burning in her throat, like she’d just taken a drink from the glass in front of her.

She looked down at herself and saw a broad, flat chest filling out an oversized leather jacket with a thermal shirt underneath, and long, muscular, denim-clad legs. Her hands were thicker, wider, than they should be, with short-trimmed nails, and a few scrapes and scabbed cuts across the knuckles.

Over the sound of Guns ’n’ Roses’ Welcome to the Jungle she could hear a couple of voices talking not too far away. She looked around. She was in some ratty, hole-in-the-wall bar that smelled like a lifetime of regret and spilled beer. There were only a few other people. An older couple that looked like they’d probably gotten here on a Harley, were sitting down the bar to her left, they were the ones talking, but they weren’t close enough for Jess to hear what they were saying. And there was a middle-aged guy who looked like he might be a trucker way down off to her right. He was drinking a Budwiser and staring into space, lost in his own thoughts. There was also a bartender busying himself with restocking the bar. He was probably in his mid-20’s, with a neatly trimmed beard, blue plaid flannel shirt that was buttoned up but not tucked into his well-fitting, black jeans that were rolled into wide cuffs above hiking boots. She watched him move some bottles around on the shelf along the wall and realized that there was a mirror there that ran the entire length of the bar.

Slowly standing and looking ahead into the mirror, she watched as a guy stood up and stared back at her. He had short, sandy brown hair, spiked a little in the front, and big light colored eyes. The dim lighting and collection of various neon in the room made it hard to tell if they were blue, gray, or green, but they were wide. He looked like he was also in his 20’s, handsome, really handsome, but no one she’d ever seen before. She raised her hand and watched as the guy in the reflection did too. She touched her face… his face? He mirrored the movement.

“What the hell?” She said, in a voice that seemed to fit the reflection.

“Everything okay, man?”

It took a few seconds to realize that the bartender was looking at her, that he’d been speaking to her.

“Uh?” What in the hell was happening? Was she dreaming? Was this some weird hallucination? A byproduct of having a stroke? Had she somehow fallen and hit her head? “I don’t know…”

The bartender’s brow furrowed. “Something wrong with the drink?”

She looked down at the glass again. Should she say anything? Say something to get some help? What would she say? Her heart was racing. Maybe she should slow down, take a minute before letting the looming panic take over. “No, it’s uh, it’s fine, it’s good. I’m good. Um, how long have I been here?”

“I don’t know, maybe about an hour.” He poured water in a glass and sat it down in front of her, next to the whiskey. “I know the bourbon here isn’t that great,” he shrugged and gestured around as if that explained it, “maybe take it easy?”

“Yeah. Sorry. I’m okay. Just had a weird… um sort of deja vu thing for a minute there.”

He nodded at her and moved away down the bar again.

Okay, something is going on, but it’ll be okay, I can figure this out, she thought as she sat back down on the stool. That’s when she noticed the hard press of a wallet in one of her pockets. Pulling it out and flipping it open revealed a driver’s license with her reflection’s photo on it.

“James Page, huh?” She said quietly to herself as she looked through the rest of the wallet. There were a few credit cards, about a hundred and fifty dollars in cash, and a condom… classy. She looked at the ID again, it listed his birthday as 01-24-1979, “What?”

Okay, so today was also his birthday. That felt too coincidental to be a coincidence.

Absently, she took a drink of water. If this was a dream, it was the most mundanely detailed dream she’d ever had, the water tasted like chlorinated tap water. She started to pull one of the credit cards out when a cell phone sitting on the bar in front of her, had that been sitting there this whole time, started to ring with an obnoxious metal guitar riff. She grabbed it up and looked at the caller ID. It was her own cell number!

Quickly answering she said, “Hello?”

“Please tell me your name is Jessica.” a woman’s voice said.

“Um…”

“My name is De… uh… James Page, that’s my phone you’re talking on, please tell me that you’re Jessica Moore?”

It sounded weird when heard from the wrong end of a phone call, but she recognized her own voice speaking back to her.

“Yeah, yes, that’s me… what’s happening?”

The woman on the other end of the phone gave a loud sigh before continuing. “Thank god, it’s just a straight swap. Okay, so, this would normally sound really unbelievable, but you already seem kinda freaked so I’m guessing you’ve noticed that we seem to have switched bodies.”

“But, I mean how is that, how is this even possible?” Her heart was pounding in her ears. This is crazy, it’s crazy…

“Did you make a wish when you blew out your birthday candles, Jessica?”

“What? Why is that important?”

“Well, you see, today is my birthday too. Happy Birthday by the way. And I uh, I made a wish right before I opened my eyes in your body. So I’m wondering, since I know you’d just blown out the candles on your cake, did you make a wish too?”

“I… I did, yeah.”

“Okay, good. What did you wish for, exactly?”

She looked around to make sure no one was paying attention to her conversation before replying. “I wished I knew more about my boyfriend’s family.”

“Huh. Okay. Who’s, uh, who’s your boyfriend? What’s his name?”

“Sam… Winchester. Do you know him?”

There was a slight pause. “No. But I’m guessing he’s the really tall guy, soulful eyes, needs a haircut?”

“He doesn’t… I like his hair, but, yeah I guess that sounds like him.”

“Hmm. Okay.”

“Wait, what did you wish for?”

There was a longer pause before James continued, “To find someone I haven’t seen in a while. I dunno maybe they’re around here somewhere? Where am I?”

“Palo Alto. Uh, that’s in California. Sorry, maybe you already knew that. Where am I?”

“Missouri, kinda middle of nowhere honestly. Sorry about that. Look this may not have anything to do with our specific wishes, right? Maybe things just got mixed up because we both made wishes at the exact same time? I don’t really know how all this Freaky Friday stuff works. But with any luck it’s temporary and everything will be back to normal tomorrow.”

She closed her eyes and rubbed her hand over her face, pinching the bridge of her nose. “How is this even real?”

“I don’t know. Look, there’s a set of car keys in my right front pocket, they’re to a black ‘67 Chevy Impala parked out front. It’s an automatic, can you drive?”

“Yeah, of course.”

“Okay, good. If you turn right out of the parking lot, go about a mile down the road to the Sleep EZ Motel, I’m checked into room 12. The room key is in my other pocket. My stuff is already inside and the room is paid up until the end of the week, so you shouldn’t have anything to worry about. Just don’t hurt my car and don’t get me killed, okay?”

“Wait, that’s it? I’m just supposed to wait?”

“Unless you’ve got any other bright ideas?”

“What about Sam? My friends? What are you going to do?”

“Hopefully? Nothing. I’ll pretend to be you, promise not to get you hurt or screw up your life, okay? And like I said, with any luck this’ll all sort itself out in the morning.”

“And if it doesn’t?”

“Well, I guess we’ll deal with that tomorrow.”

“Shit.”

“Yeah. Hey, Jessica?”

“Yeah?”

“Tell me a little about yourself.”

~~~

Dean hung up the call and deleted it from the phone’s call history. When this was all over, the last thing he wanted was for there to be any way for this to get traced back to him. He tucked the phone back in Jessica’s purse and looked in the mirror.

She was a hottie, Sammy had good taste. Long blonde hair, big blue eyes, full pouty lips, and with a body… Dean gave a quiet whistle. Then he looked around furtively, as if anyone else could see him in the bathroom and somehow suspect him of doing something pervy, but then he thought, fuck it, possession is 9/10ths of the law, right?

Biting his bottom lip and pulling his shirt up, exposing a lacy bra and a really nice set of tits. Cupping them with his hands, feeling their weight, massaging them a bit and feeling his nipples get hard in response was hot enough but looking in the mirror was almost too much, like watching porn that you could actually feel. Until he caught his own stare, the face of some girl that he’d just spoken to on the phone looking back at him, and it hit home that this was someone else’s body that he was a guest in.

“Ah, shit.” he said to the reflection and pulled the shirt back down, smoothed it into place. He looked down, thinking about how weird it felt to not have a dick. He looked at the toilet reflected behind him. Maybe he should at least try to pee while he was in here.

“Sorry, Jessica, but somehow I don’t think either of us is going to be able to avoid peeing all night.” It took him longer than he'd anticipated, what’s so hard about peeing after all, but there was the confusing clothing and then the wiping, and new sensations that came with that, which he definitely tried to not pay too much attention to, and then the readjustment of the clothing.

When he was done and verified in the mirror that he looked normal, you know, for being someone completely different, he took a step towards the door and froze with his hand on the doorknob.

Okay, you can do this. Just go downstairs and pretend to be a girl. How hard can that be? Just go pretend to be Sam’s girlfriend. He’s only, like, the smartest guy you’ve ever known, who’s been trained since he was a kid to notice when a situation isn’t right, when someone isn’t themselves, when they’re actually a monster… Fuck.

He took a deep breath and opened the bathroom door. No, it’s cool. You’re cool. You can do this. You’ve bluffed your way through more dangerous situations with less information to go off of. And Jessica told you enough to fake it for one night. It’s just one night…

“Jess,” Sam was looking at him when he came down the stairs, his face lit up despite a shadow of concern. “You sure you’re okay?”

“Yeah. Yeah, I’m good.” Dean smiled and walked towards him.

As he got within reach, Sam wrapped one arm around Dean and pulled him in snug against his side. Then Sam leaned in and kissed the top of his head, just like Dean used to do before Sam had the audacity to get taller than him. Dean didn’t need to fake his smile but then a wave of guilt threatened to well up, he thinks you’re her, and he had to look down, swallowing thickly. Sam gently squeezed him in a one armed hug.

When they were kids, Sam had been very touchy-feely, clingy, always in close contact with Dean, casual, almost unconscious, but now, unlike then, it seemed a lot less casual. Heat, of a sort that wasn’t just physical, flared up with every touch. And Dean could have convinced himself that it was just Jessica’s body responding in a sort of pavlovian way to a still newish lover. But the problem was, Dean knew better.

Sam’s hands were huge and gentle and warm, so fucking warm, against his side, Jessica’s side, his arm, her arm, his back, not his, his hip… It was maddening but he just needed to play along, like it wasn’t destroying him. Over the years Dean had fine tuned his resolve to push all of this away and shut it up behind a door marked “Stuff You Don’t Get to Have", and now, with a series of simple touches, Sam had unknowingly jimmied the lock and opened the door. Sam was always so good at opening doors.

The summer between Sam’s junior and senior years of high school, before the Stanford bomb had been dropped on their lives, John had been chasing down yet another lead on what had killed mom. Dean had no idea what it was, where he went, because he’d given him practically no information, which was beyond frustrating, but kinda par for the course. But John had left them with Bobby because it had been on his way, apparently.

While they were there, Dean helped Bobby fix cars, and what they couldn’t fix, they’d strip down for parts. Sam had gotten a job at a restaurant washing dishes. It was grueling in the heat and he’d be reeking of garbage from taking out the trash at the end of the night. But Dean would always be there, waiting to drive him back to Bobby’s. He’d have a cold beer open and waiting for Sam when he was showered and in clean clothes. More often than not, they’d watch a movie on the tv, choosing from Bobby’s collection of vhs tapes. They’d take over Bobby’s couch, sprawling and slowly gravitating towards each other, leaning together and laughing over what they were watching. They kept their voices quiet so as to not wake Bobby, who inevitably fell asleep in his armchair or was already up in bed. Sam had been more relaxed and at ease than he had been in a couple of years.

Life was simple and Dean felt just about as free as he could ever remember feeling, without the weight of expectations, there in that safe place and time.

When John came back he was short-tempered and easily bristled. Things between John and Sam, always rough, had gotten steadily worse. John was harder on them both, trying to establish his authority, which only made Sam withdraw when dad was around.

Sam started talking about leaving together, just going somewhere and getting real jobs, the kind that paid in cash instead of scars. But Dean wouldn’t think about it, well, he wouldn’t let Sam think that he was thinking about it. Kept putting it off, until it was too late and Sam was leaving for real, full ride to fucking Stanford, and one last attempt to get Dean to come with him. He’d pulled Dean aside while he was packing, held onto his hand like they were still little kids, “Come with me.”

“What?”

“You don’t have to stay here, you can come to California…”

“I can’t just leave.”

“Why not?”

“Because Dad…”

“Dad is going to self-destruct, Dean, this life is going to kill him and if you stay… if you stay,” Sam’s eyes were swimming in unshed tears that he swallowed back before continuing, “You don’t have to stay. You can do anything, Dean, anything.”

And Dean almost believed that, for one long torturous moment, looking at his brother, the only person that stood any chance of convincing him to break away from his dad, from this life, Dean could almost see it. Sam pulled him closer, slid his hands behind Dean’s neck and rested their foreheads together, silently begging. And that door in Dean’s mind cracked a bit and threatened to break open. Sam didn’t want all that, didn’t want… no. Dean slammed the door closed and locked it.

“You don’t know what you’re asking.” Dean took a deep breath and placing his hands on Sam’s shoulders did the hardest thing he’d ever done, he pushed Sam back enough so he could clearly see his face and said, “I’m not going.”

Shock, grief, embarrassment, hurt and anger all seemed to flash across Sam’s face at once, but it was the anger that stayed long after the others had been packed away. The anger was what Dean had seen when he closed his eyes that night, thinking about Sam on a Greyhound to California.

But here, now, he leaned in and closed his eyes, drinking in the feel of being next to his brother for the first time in years. He breathed in and could smell Sam,even though his mind was having trouble processing the scent. It was Sam, he smelled just like he always did, but it was like this body, which didn’t have the same sensory memory of a childhood spent together in the Impala and rundown motels, processed the scent through different filters, all of which were good, all of which lit up like fireworks with each breath, and shot that giddy, new love/lust feeling through him mixing with his memories.

Sam’s hand was curled loosely around Dean’s, Jessica’s, hip, his thumb resting on the waistband of his skirt again, long fingers flexing in and gently pressing into the hollow of his hip bone, and it was doing things that were steadily eroding what tenuous self-respect Dean had.

Sam would kill him if he found out that this was him and not Jessica. Shit, maybe he should have said something right away.

“Wait, so if the wish is what switched you then that means that when I kissed… Dean, you kissed me back!”

Yeah, no, too late for that now, he just needs to make sure that Sam never finds out.

They made small talk and drank. Jessica was a lightweight, which Dean found out as he was finishing off his third beer. He couldn’t remember the last time he had a room lurch that hard on three beers. He stumbled slightly as he stood up to get another. Sam reached out a steadying hand.

“Whoa. Easy there.”

Dean laughed it off, “I got it, I’m good.. Anyone ever tell you that you worry too much?” Dean said, softening it with a smile that may have been a bit more shmoopy than he’d intended, but it seemed to do the trick as Sam held up his hand in an “I give up” sort of gesture and let Dean duck into the kitchen.

There were photos stuck all over the fridge, and Dean recognized several of the people from tonight, including Sam. He studied them all while he drank a glass of water before grabbing a couple more beers from the fridge. There was a bottle opener on the coffee table and, sitting back down next to Sam on the sofa, Dean popped the top off one beer and sat it in front of Sam before popping the top of the other for himself.

Sam huffed an amused breath through his nose. Dean looked at him, took in the bemused look and asked, “What?”

“It’s nothing, just,” Sam laughed and shook his head, “you just reminded me of someone.”

Shit. “Oh? Who?”

Before Sam could answer, the conversation in the room reached shrill levels when Bria announced that her boyfriend Brad had proposed to her.

“Jess, I’m sorry, I wasn’t going to say anything because tonight’s your night, but…” the bottle blonde held out her left hand to show off a glittering diamond.

Everyone spent the next half an hour or so congratulating Bria and Dean tried his best to play at being interested. He was worried that that somehow he’d given himself away but Sam was smiling at him again, all dimples and teeth and just pure fucking sunshine, and Dean inwardly breathed a sigh of relief and smiled back. He was simultaneously too drunk and way too sober for this situation.

~~~

Jess should have left and found the motel, but what was she going to do in some guy’s random motel room until morning? Pace around and worry? Staying put seemed like an easier option, doing nothing usually was, at least for now. Absentmindedly she picked up the glass of bourbon and took a sip. It burned a bit but tasted surprisingly okay. She thought that James obviously drank the stuff and his taste buds must be used to it. She kept sipping at it.

This couldn’t be happening, it had to be a dream.

She realized that she had to pee. She’d had to for a little while now but had been unconsciously putting off dealing with it. Unfortunately, it wasn’t the sort of thing that could be ignored forever. Looking around, she spotted the restrooms. She turned around on the stool and stood up, ready to be wobbly after drinking and being in someone else’s skin. But she felt solid, and strong. Glancing at her reflection in the mirror behind the bar again it occurred to her that she was going to have to use the men’s room.

This was most likely just a dream, she could do this.

Luckily, since the bar was practically empty, the bathroom was too. Stall or urinal, that was the question. She opted for a stall, just in case someone came in, it felt less weird that way. Closing the door behind her, she stared down at the toilet before looking at the front of the jeans she was wearing. For the first time she thought about the fact that some guy was in her body and would probably have to pee at some point too. Ugh.

Well, she could do this, it was just peeing, everyone does it, right? She unbuckled, unbuttoned and unzipped, then pulled the waistband of the boxer briefs away and down with her left hand while reaching in with her right.

Okay, yeah, weird.

A couple moments later, she was washing her hands at the sink. That was definitely an experience, odd but kinda fun in a rather intrusive feeling way.

She looked at her reflection, really studied it since she wasn’t being watched. She smiled, frowned, and tried a whole range of emotions. Damn, this guy was attractive. Big green eyes with lashes she would have killed for, freckles, perfect lips, and he was tall too, although not as tall as Sam. And he was in great condition, not like one of those guys that works out in a gym all the time, but strong and lean, solid. His hands were callused, knuckles scarred, like he worked with his hands.

“Who are you?” She asked as she looked in the mirror again before leaving the bathroom.

Sitting back down on the barstool, she caught the bartender’s attention. “I’m sorry, what’s your name?”

“Jeremy.”

She nodded. “Can I get another, Jeremy?” and she tapped the empty bourbon glass with the silver ring on her right hand before sliding it forward.

He nodded, grabbed a bottle and poured a generous amount in the glass. “You feeling better?” he asked as he slid the glass back towards her.

She nodded, “Eh. It’s been a weird night.”

“Not the best birthday?”

“No. I was supposed to spend it with my boyf…” she stopped herself suddenly and tried to switch gears, “I had plans, that, no offense, didn’t include this fine establishment.” Shit, she’d almost outed this guy that she didn’t even know. Maybe he was into guys, but maybe not, how would she know, and it was always better to be safe than sorry when literally walking in someone else’s shoes.

Jeremy, if he noticed the slip, didn’t give any indication of being bothered by it. He leaned on one elbow against his side of the bar. “Are you traveling for work or something?”

She looked at him, honestly not sure how to answer that question. She knew she had a room at a motel nearby, but why?

Before she could answer, Jeremy continued, “I mean, there’s not a whole lot of here here, you know? This is not really a destination. And,“ he leaned a little closer and spoke in a more conspiratorial tone, “you’re like an eleven compared to the locals.” He nodded at the few other patrons and cracked a smile.

Okay, so maybe he had picked up on her little slip, but she didn’t think he was a threat, so she just laughed it off and took a sip of her drink.

~~~

Later, standing in the kitchen trying to follow some random friend group drama that could have almost been a telenovela storyline, Sam had come up behind Dean and wrapped him in a hug, hands crossed over his waist, his face nuzzled into his hair behind his ear. Dean’s eyes closed as a delightful shiver ran through him and settled between his legs.

“Ugh, get a room, you two!” Sam’s friend Brady said, teasingly.

Without looking, Sam grabbed a handful of chips out of the open bag on the counter and threw them right at the guy’s face, who actually managed to catch one in his mouth to raucous applause.

“Come on.” Sam breathed, low and quiet in Dean’s ear, and threading their fingers together, steered him out of the room.

“What? Where?”

“It’s getting late and I promised, didn’t I?”

Dean didn’t know how to respond because he had no idea what Sam was talking about.

~~~

Jessica sipped at the bourbon, not sure if she enjoyed the taste or not but the smooth burn was sort of growing on her. She sipped and she thought about what she should, or even could, do. Trapped in a stranger’s body, in an unknown town, states away from anyone she knows, what were her options? She could go find the motel room that matched the key in her pocket, and what? Watch crappy motel tv until she falls asleep in some stranger’s bed, hoping that she wakes up in her own body in the morning? That honestly sounded depressing as fuck. So she stalled, and sipped, and sat, and tried not to completely freak out.

~~~

His little brother was all hands, huge, long, spidery, gentle hands. Hands that covered so much, especially on Jessica’s smaller body. He smoothed over his… her long hair, down his… dammit, her arms, down her back. Eyes shining and bright, open as if to not miss anything, to catch every reaction as he walked backwards into a room to the right of the bathroom, Sam finally stepped back out of Dean’s space enough to let the warm flickering glow light up his face. The room was lit by half a dozen candles, on the dresser, the nightstand, on top of the bookshelf. Dean’s eyes went wide. Oh.

Oh no. This was, shit, this was… he looked at Sam. This was bad, he told himself. He couldn’t, it was too much, too far.

Sam, still smiling, was now a little unsure, a little embarrassed, “Too much?” His hand was rubbing gently up and down on Dean’s back, Jessica’s back, fuck, like he just couldn’t stop touching her.

Dean tried to say something, screaming internally at himself to find a way out of this, screwing things up between Jessica and Sam would be better than… He swallowed and opened his mouth, piecing together some sort of excuse, but all thought evaporated as Sam bit his bottom lip, all dimples and glinting eyes, and leaned in. Dean didn’t mean to smile, it was a reflex, a reaction to the extreme absurdity of the situation, that’s all, it wasn’t because his heart fucking swelled at seeing Sam all lit up and happy, looking at him like that.

Oh, I’m a bad, bad person.

He couldn’t look away from Sam’s mouth. And then Sam was too close to see and he nosed into his hair, speaking right into his ear, warm breath sending shivers through him, “I promised you, tonight is all about you. I want to make you feel so good, see how many times I can make you come.”

And Dean felt hellfire flare up through him, burning his cheeks, making his thighs and inner muscles clench around a deep needful longing. A gasp escaped, unbidden, from his open mouth.

You do this and you really are the scumbag you’ve always felt like. This is the line, right here, right now.

But this was something that he would never get to have normally, only this freaky occurrence giving him an impossible chance to have everything he’d ever wanted, even if just for one night, even if under duplicitous circumstances, in someone else’s body, even if it meant burning in Hell eternally for it.

One of Sam’s thumbs brushed lightly over Dean’s lips, as his fingers curled into his hair, turning his head and mouthing at his ear, nipping at and rolling his earlobe between his teeth before tracing kisses along the underside of his jaw. Dean breathed out a shiver that went all the way down to his knees. Sam kissed right up to the corner of his open mouth.

Dean didn’t believe Hell was real, not really, not an actual place like the bible thumpers would have you believe, but this, even ignoring every other horrible thing he’d ever done, this would surely damn him… but maybe it would be worth it. He could have this, and Sam never needed to know.

He turned his head just a little and caught Sam’s lips with his own.

~~~

With the bar being as quiet as it was, Jeremy took to making small talk as the evening wore on, nothing heavy, nothing too personal, just talking about sports teams (luckily a topic she knew a fair amount about) and cars (which she didn’t but luckily most guys didn’t take much encouragement to go on about that sort of thing without much more than a few interested prompts), but he was nice and kind of funny. It was better than stewing alone in her thoughts.

By the time Jess had had another bourbon, man did this James guy have a higher tolerance than she did, she had loosened up a lot.

So what if she’d probably experienced a psychotic break or something and was now trapped in this weird-ass dream, or maybe worse that she was really stuck in some dude’s body on her birthday and was now drinking alone in some shitty bar. She blinked, god was this what James’ life was like? Hopefully this was just a bad day or something. She at least had a party with all her college friends and Sam… Sam. Shit, James better be playing it cool, like he’d said he would, and not be doing anything to fuck things up between her and Sam.

~~~

For a moment, when he kissed Sam, SammySam oh fuck SAM, he’d forgotten all about his hands, like they didn’t even exist, like nothing existed outside of the bursts of confused chaos in his mind and how kissing Sam seemed to short circuit everything.

Good! No, no! I can’t. Stop. Ohhh god, right, this is right. Can’t. Fuck, finally!

Every part of his borrowed body felt like it was blushing, like he should be legit glowing, and there was this warm, aching, wetness that he was suddenly very aware of between his legs. It was a lot like how he normally felt when turned on, just not as focused, deeper inside and suffused throughout his body. He also found that he was very, very aware of his tits, every move, each breath as they lifted and fell, the way the fabric of the bra and shirt moved, every touch against Sam, he could feel all of it, and was aware of it all at once, and yet craved more. Sam’s hands were in his hair, cradling his head as they kissed. His lips tasted like home.

You can touch him!

And just like that, a lifetime of suppressed impulses and denied wants let loose as he placed his hands on Sam’s sides. Lightning-like desire, in all its terrifying glory, zapped through him, along his fingers and up his arms at the contact. Sam was solid, still lean and lanky with youth, but no longer a kid, not his little brother. Big.

It wasn’t like Dean never touched him, hell, he’d probably touched him more than anyone else. But that was different, it was checking on him, cleaning him up, bandaging and mending, little kid snuggles and hugs, holding his hand as they crossed the street, shoulders leaning together as they sat and joked quietly, just the two of them. This, though, this, was the edge of the map. Here, there be monsters, and his pulse pounded like he was on a hunt.

He ran his hands up over Sam’s chest, feeling the lines of the muscles beneath his shirt as Sam slid one of his hands down Dean’s back, pulling him closer, pressing them together. He didn’t stop at his waist this time, his hand continuing down over Dean’s ass to cup and squeeze. Dean moaned, just a little and in a way that he hadn’t expected, and his hands moved up across Sam’s shoulders and neck and into his hair, fingers tangling in his nape and pulling Sam down, or himself up, it didn’t matter which as long as they somehow got closer. Dean instinctively wrapped his legs around Sam’s hips when he lifted him up, one hand under Dean’s ass, across the back of his thighs, the other still cradling the back of his head. Sam shifted, holding Jessica’s weight easily and Dean wondered if Sam had gotten strong enough to lift his own actual body the same way. That thought made his breath hitch.

Sam pushed the door shut with one foot and then took three strides to cross the room before he dropped them both down onto the bed. Sam caught himself with his elbows, so his weight didn’t come down on Dean all at once as he bounced, a laugh bubbling out of Dean, met with a smile from Sam.

Sam looked at him for a moment, brushing hair from Dean’s face, Jessica’s face, Dean reminded himself. Sam was looking at Jessica like that, like she was the most beautiful thing he’d ever seen, and like he wanted to eat her up. Jealousy at the realization sparked in Dean, but it was quickly quelled because Sam looking at Jessica like that meant that Dean could look back through her in a way he never could through his own eyes.

He took in Sam’s bright, clever, magic-colored eyes, and his pointed nose that made him look fox-like and clever. That mole beside his nose, that Dean always wanted poke or to kiss, depending on the day. His hair that, from this angle, spread around his face like a dark halo and reminded Dean of that photo of Jim Morrison, the one where his arms were spread and his chest was bare. He looked like the hero of some Greek myth and he was painfully beautiful.

Then Sam was kissing him again, little nibbling kisses that wandered along his jaw, sending delicious shivers through him. Sam’s hand found the bare skin at his waist, fingers spread out across his stomach, up under his shirt to his ribs as he kissed his way down Dean’s throat.

Dean leaned his head to the side, stretching his neck as he arched up into Sam’s touch. Sam’s fingertips traced along the bottom of his bra, brushed the underside of his breast. Holy shit.

He’d gotten so caught up in the fact that this was Sam, SamSammy, that he’d almost completely glossed over the fact that he was in a woman’s body and was going to experience sex, with Sam, in a body with girl parts! What was, possibly, most disturbing was how onboard he was for this ride. Like, if he was completely honest with himself, the Sam thing had always been there, usually it was forcibly shoved into the furthest, deepest, darkest corner of his brain, and locked down tight, but sometimes it escaped and made it almost to the surface before he’s wrestle it back down again and did his best to ignore it. But beyond an occasional fleeting thought about what the woman he was with was feeling as he went down on her, thrust into her, well, he’d never actually fantasized about actually feeling whatever they felt. The prospect was surprisingly thrilling.

And this isn’t gay (or incest) if it’s Jessica’s body. That thought sent a cold shiver through him, followed very closely by a rancid tendril of self-disgust. What the hell was the matter with him?

But then Sam was cupping his breast, warm hand giving a massaging little squeeze, the nipple genty pinched in the V between his thumb and index finger, sending sparks of pleasure through him and distracting him from his thoughts. Dean had always liked having his nipples played with during sex, well, he really liked having everything played with during sex, but now, though? It was just so much more.

Sam pushed his shirt up, kissed him through the fabric of the bra, before giving a little, demanding “Off.” and worked both the shirt and bra off, undoing the back clasp one handed, that’s my boy. And then his mouth was on him again. Dean’s hands were on Sam’s shoulders, then in his hair as he lavished attention on his tits. And, yeah, definitely an area deserving of all the attention Dean was prone to give because it felt fucking awesome. Before the sensations could become too much, Sam would shift his focus to the other side, kissing and sucking, biting (which felt amazing) and pulling little gasps out of Dean.

Dean squirmed a bit, suddenly desperate for some sort of friction between his legs. Like he’d sensed it, Sam ran one hand down, using little more than the weight of his hand, over the fabric of his skirt, and rubbed, pushing a bit more with his middle and ring fingers, curving with his body, right down between Dean’s legs. It wasn’t quite like having his dick rubbed, the feeling a little more muted, more spread out. But the warmth that spread through him felt familiar as did the desire it inflamed. And he pushed his hips against Sam’s hand seeking more pressure.

The biggest difference Dean felt was where he normally would have wanted to push into his partner, to thrust into them, all he wanted now, the desire that consumed his mind, was that he needed something inside him, stretching him, filling him. This hollow, wanting, ache was new but made him unbearably warm and desperate. And he wondered, not for the first time, about how much of it was coming from Jessica’s muscle memory, because while it was new to him, it felt so perfectly right and natural in this body.

With a final playful pull on one of his nipples, sucking hard before letting it drop and the weight of the breast bounce back against Dean’s chest, Sam kissed his way down across his stomach. Jessica was a bit ticklish, it would seem, because the light scrape of Sam’s stubble sent delightful tremors through Dean. Not enough to make him laugh or pull away, but enough to make him smile.

This is crazy. This is crazy. This can’t be real. I must be dreaming. This is some weirdass fever dream. What the fuck is wrong with me?

Sam reached the waistband of Jessica’s skirt, kissing and tonguing over Dean’s belly button as he worked loose the zipper and slid the fabric down, chasing it with his mouth. Dean lifted his hips so Sam could slide it the rest of the way down and off his legs, leaving him in just delicate, barely there, panties. They were silky and pink and Dean flashed back hard to six years ago, to Rhonda Hurley looking at him wearing her panties like she wanted to eat him alive, a look that was mirrored now in Sam’s eyes as he slowly looked up his… Jessica’s body. Dammit.

That look wasn’t Dean’s, it wasn’t for him. Sam was looking at Jessica like that. Fuck he shouldn’t do this. He needed to say something, stop this somehow.

“Sam…” He pleaded, but it came out too breathless and wanting, needing, and Sam smiled and leaned down, placed a kiss right on the silky pink stretched over the center of all the warmth Dean was feeling and hummed against him.

“Hmm?” and then he kissed a little lower and looked up from under his bangs as he gently stroked one hand up Dean’s thigh, fingers spreading so wide, hot and thrilling. He placed another kiss, this time below the curve of where Dean could see, so he couldn’t see Sam’s mouth as it pressed the fabric right into the wetness between his legs. Sam nosed in then and breathed deep. “All this for me?”

Dean bit down on his bottom lip, part of his mind still desperately trying to get control of this situation, to somehow, miraculously pull back before it was too late, when Sam looked up and locked eyes with him as he slowly, gently, bit the fabric covered mound, worrying it so slowly with his teeth before saying, in a voice deeper than Dean had ever heard him use, “God I want to eat you up. Will you let me? Let me just,” he licked, his tongue spread wide, right up over the now sodden crotch of those pink panties, “devour you?”

And the last vestiges of Dean’s attempts to be a better person crumbled. If he was going to hell, and he was definitely going, then he was going to make damn sure that he got the maximum value out of the trip.

“Yeah.” he said as he reached out and ran his fingers down Sam’s hair, his thumb brushing Sam’s cheek as Sam, SamMySammyMine, smiled his sharp, clever, mischievous smile and pulled the panties off and settled back between Dean’s legs, bending Dean’s knees up and over Sam’s shoulders. One hand going up Dean’s side, his long arm easily allowing him to cup around one breast, while the other spread, fingers splayed, across the tight skin below Dean’s navel, pressing down with gentle pressure to still the squirming Dean hadn’t even realized he was doing.

~~~

The last of the other customers paid up his tab and left. Jessica threw back the rest of her drink.

“What do I owe you?” she asked as she stood up to pull James’ wallet out of his pocket. The gravity in the room lurched violently to the left and she had to catch herself by clutching the edge of the bar. She barked out a laugh and sat back down on the stool. “Whoa.”

“Easy there.” Jeremy said. “No rush.”

He slid another glass of water over to her with a smile. She nodded and gratefully took a drink. It was cold and even though it still tasted a little too much like chlorine to be called good, she knew it would help.

“It’s cool, take your time, I’ve got a bunch of things to do to close up so you don’t have to leave just yet.” He said with a smile.

~~~

Sam’s attention focused between Dean’s spread legs, nosing into the trimmed little bush before licking along the folds of his pussy. His tongue, a wide and warm pressure, different from anything Dean had experienced before. It wasn’t like having his dick licked, which felt good right from the start. But the act was insanely intimate and definitely felt good, and the fact that it was Sam, samsamsam, made him shiver. And then the tip of Sam’s tongue dipped in and flicked across Dean’s clit and there it was! A burst of pleasure followed immediately by a desire for more.

A keening slipped from Dean’s throat, so much higher pitched than felt right to him. Looking down, all he could see was Sam’s shaggy brown hair and his fox-like eyes, pupils wide in the darkened room, looking back at him. Sam slid his hand down, long fingers spreading Dean open. Dean felt the air stir between his legs, cooling around the edges, and he realized just how wet he was. Sam licked again, taking his time, dipping in and flicking across before gently kissing that swollen bud of nerves and then doing it again, and again. Dean gasped when he used his teeth, normally something, as a guy, that would be a complete no-go, but the nipping and nibbling here felt good, really good, primal and hungry, and Dean wanted more.

Sam pushed his tongue in, deeper each time, as he rubbed Dean’s clit, pressing and circling, circling and pressing, sucking, biting, again and again until Dean’s hands had to move because Sam was holding his hips still, so he reached down and brushed Sam’s hair back, so he could see him better, then stayed in his hair, just holding, trying not pull. And his other hand went to his breast, kneading and then pinching the sensitive nipple. Everything combined and built up like a wave swelling, growing more and more, frantic, urgent, faster, and then he was pulling on Sam’s hair, which made him groan into Dean, the vibrations sending Dean crashing over. Sam continued to gently massage Dean’s clit, while fucking into him with his tongue, as wave after wave rolled through Dean.

Just as Dean was able to breathe again, Sam shifted around a bit so that he had both hands working, the one still spreading Dean open and working his clit in slow circles, while he pressed first one finger then two into him.

There was a punk rock girl out near Salt Lake, what was her name? Brenda something, shit he couldn’t think, but she’d had a thing for sticking her finger in her partner’s ass when they fucked her, and while she’d been enthusiastically into it, and it hadn’t been bad, it was weird, kinda good weird, but weird. It was nothing like this.

Sam leaned back in as he worked up a steady rhythm, and started tonguing and sucking his clit again. Dean was so sensitive it didn’t take long for him to feel everything building again. Sam had worked another finger in and curled them forward. It was a tried and true move that Dean had used on many, many occasions, and now he knew why it always worked so well, as he gasped and came hard, muscles fluttering hard around Sam’s hand.

“Samm… Sam,” remembering just in time, “please, oh fuck, mmm, I…”

“Hmm?”

“I need,” but he hesitated before voicing the rest, bit his bottom lip, was he really going to ask for it? From Sam?

“What? What do you need, baby?” Sam asked, his voice lower than Dean had ever heard it, deep but tender and pressed right between his legs, and damn if that didn’t light something up on the switchboard in Dean’s head.

No one but Dean would ever know if he just asked for what he wanted.

“Fuck me?” he said, quiet and unsure.

“Hmm, thought I’d stay here for a little longer, make you scream my name.” Sam slowly nosed in again and licked. “You taste so good.”

“Sam.”

Bright eyes staring up at him. “Mmm?”

“Are you really going to make me beg… on my birthday?”

Sam nodded as he nipped at the inner crease of Dean’s hip.

Dean let out a frustrated groan, “Please? Get up here and fuck me, Sam.”

Sam smiled, “Well, since you asked so nicely.” He sat back, pulled his shirt off and used it to wipe his hand and face before tossing it onto the floor. Shit, Sammy had filled out since the last time Dean had seen him and, reminding himself that he could look, he let his eyes linger on his brother’s torso. He realized he was mentally inventorying the scars he could see, there were no new ones, which was good. Sam’s belt buckle jangled a little as it came undone and he unbuttoned his jeans. Sam stood and pushed them down along with his underwear, black boxer briefs, and then was kicking them off to the side and slowly crawling back onto the bed.

Holy shit! HIs baby brother was built like a Greek god! How often was he working out? He was all slick, cut muscle, long limbs, and… In what universe was it even remotely fair that his little (no longer the operative word) brother had gotten bigger than him, apparently in every way? Dean was not a small guy, over six feet and packing a generously sized dick that he’d never, not once, gotten any complaints about. In fact, he’d received more than enough compliments to give him a, possibly, over-inflated sense of pride. Dean had an amazing cock, that he knew how to use. It was a source of great joy for him. And, he soothed his ego, it was hard to get a proper sense of scale, not having access to his own hands. But then Sam was grinning at him with his wickedly clever eyes and bright, dimpled smile again and Dean felt himself smiling back, his cheeks flushing as Jessica’s body responded to a new wave of want.

Sam crawled up over Dean, stretching his long body and skimming, not quite touching, over him, supporting his weight on his knees and hands. Just as Sam zeroed in on his lips and when Dean anticipated he would kiss him, Sam kept stretching past, reaching over and easily sliding open then closing the nightstand drawer. When he pulled back, a condom packet held by a corner in his mouth, he dragged it lightly across Dean’s skin, tickling slightly and forcing a giggle out of him that Dean would cringe over later when he replayed the moment. Sam sat back on his heels and tore open the packet. A wild thought, a desire, flashed through Dean, causing his cheeks to burn.

“Wait,” he said breathlessly.

Sam stopped and looked at him, concern overriding some of the confidence he’d shown just seconds before. But Dean was sitting up and reaching out, running his hand down Sam’s thigh as he smiled Jessica’s wide smile.

“Just, let me…” and he slid his hand up, his gaze meeting his grasp as he stroked Sam’s length. Hot, velvety soft skin twitched in the circle of Jessica’s manicured fingers. Dean blinked slowly, his eyes threatening to close, to block out such a transgression, but he made himself look, burning the image into his memory. He licked his lips as he shifted so he could lean forward. He just needed to know… if he was here, if he was doing this, then he needed it all, there’d never be another chance. He rubbed his thumb through the drop of precum beaded up on the head of Sam’s cock, spreading it slick across the head, and then kissed there. He looked up to find Sam staring down, eyes dark, mouth open, a blush high on his cheeks like he was drunk, and Dean licked slowly, tasting as he stared up at him.

Dean had never gone down on a guy before, although he’d received plenty of propositions over the years. But he’d eaten out more than his fair share of women and every one had tasted different, each one unique and special and divine, and this really wasn’t much different from that. Salty, a little bitter, not bad, just intimate. And he’d be lying if he said there wasn’t a deep satisfaction to sucking the head of Sam’s cock into his mouth. Sam’s fingers slipped into Jessica’s hair, fingers spanning the width of her head and gently holding there, not pressing, not pulling, as he let out a slow breath.

Dean reached up with his free hand and took the opened condom packet from Sam as he swirled his tongue against the vein on the underside of his cock. And then he pulled back and slid the condom down and gave it a couple slow pumps with his fist to make sure it was rolled all the way down.

He sat up and crawled forward, capturing Sam’s bottom lip as he pressed against him. Sam’s hand let go of his hair and like earlier, he pulled Dean in like he weighed nothing, hands engulfing his hips as he settled Dean on his lap. Dean wrapped his arms around Sam’s neck, reveling in the feel of his tits crushed up against Sam’s chest and Sam’s erection hot and hard between them. His hips rubbed forward, like they were seeking friction on autopilot.

“Sam,” he keened.

Sam lifted him again and lined himself up and lowered Dean onto him. Dean’s eyes rolled closed as he stretched and was filled in a way he’d never even dreamed. He’d never be able to claim that again, he was sure he’d never get the perfect feeling of them fitting together like this out of his mind. And as his hips once again seemed more in control of things than he was, he gave some experimental grinds, and looked at Sam whose eyes were closed, his brow furrowed a little in concentration, and he looked… beautiful.

“Sam?”

Sam opened his eyes, his pupils blown wide in the candlelight and a look of pure want on his face, and he was the most gorgeous thing that Dean had ever seen. He circled his hips, trying to find the leverage to do more when Sam lifted him again, easily taking Jessica’s weight in his arms and began to thrust up. As he repeated the movement, again and again, Dean let his head fall back, his eyes closing, Sam’s mouth kissing hungrily along his jaw and down his neck, teeth nipping, stubble on his chin rough, but never hurting, never bruising, no it was just enough to feel all the way down through to where they were connected.

With his eyes closed and head tipped back, the weight of Jessica’s hair hanging down, bouncing with every forceful thrust, Dean could only hold on, losing himself in the sensations. Sam ran a hand up Dean’s back, his hand tangling in and gently but insistently pulling, causing Dean to arch further back. Sam kissed down, captured one of his nipples, his other hand sliding low across Dean hips, thumb finding and pressing into his clit and the combination of all those sensations pushed him up and over that cliff again. Being so full, having something… his brother’s cock, a thought that he really shouldn’t be so completely good with… inside him, for his muscles to squeeze, and with so much skin-on-skin contact for him to clutch onto, pushed everything up, and up, and over.

When Dean could focus again, he lifted his head, eyes meeting Sam’s, Sam who was still fucking him, and holy hell if his (not so) little brother wasn’t a goddamn freight train. The thought brought a ridiculous swelling of pride with it, some misguided feeling that he’d had a hand in raising this absolute god of a man. Dean smiled, his mouth open with every breath that Sam pushed out of him, and he traced his fingers across Sam’s face, thumb dragging across his bottom lip before Dean leaned in and kissed him.

“Come on, Baby. Come for me? I want to feel you, come on.” he said in between kisses. Sam’s arms tightened around him, his pace speeding up. “ Come on, Sammy.” Dean breathed and he felt Sam’s body tense. He leaned back enough to see Sam’s face as he climaxed. Little aftershocks from Dean’s last orgasm were still pulsing through him as Sam twitched inside him.

When their heavy breaths slowed down to contented sighs, Sam pulled out, removed the condom and tossed it in a small trash can by the nightstand and twisted the two of them so they could fall onto their sides on the bed, his arms still around Dean, facing each other.

Sam brushed a thick lock of hair out of Dean’s face, his eyes alight with reflected, flickering candlelight. He was sweaty and his cheeks were still flushed and he looked contentedly fucked out and Dean couldn’t stop staring at him.

A bemused smile flashed across Sam’s face after a moment. “What?”

Dean didn’t have the words, so he just smiled with his borrowed face, hoping it conveyed the best part of the crazed tangle of things he was feeling. When Sam returned the smile, Dean leaned in and kissed him one last time before snuggling into his brother’s broad chest, his eyelids growing heavy.

Sam placed a kiss on the top of his head. “Happy birthday, Jess.”

Dean was glad that Sam couldn’t see his face because he knew the smile wasn’t reaching his eyes anymore.

Dean lay there until Sam’s breathing evened out into sleep. And then he steadfastly refused to give into the looming tidal wave of guilt that was threatening to drown him, closing his eyes, he breathed in the smell of Sam, letting all the memories it triggered carry him, finally, to sleep.

~~~

“So, I’m curious,” she asked, “you don’t seem too enthused about… wait, where are we again?”

Jeremy laughed, “Eastfield.”

“Right, right. You don’t seem too enthused about Eastfield. And you’re young, seem intelligent, so why…” she gestured around the bar. “You from here? Got family or something?”

“Nah, I mean, not exactly. I grew up near here. Went to college. While I was there, my dad got sick, cancer, so I came home to take care of him. And, I don’t know, after he passed I just didn’t go right back and now,” he shrugged as he moved glasses around, “I don’t know. I’m just sort of here because here feels as good as anywhere to be.”

Jessica nodded and took a sip of water.

“What about you? You’ve been here all night and haven’t mentioned what you do for a living once.” Jeremy carried a crate of glasses into the back, Jessica could hear it being set down, and then he was back again, leaning up against the bar across from her. “Most people don’t shut up about their jobs when they get talking here. It’s just a safe topic, you know? Not too personal but something that eats up most of their lives. But you?”

Jessica shrugged and smiled, taking another drink of water. Jeremy squinted his eyes a bit, pursed his lips.

“What if I guess?” He looked her up and down, clucking his tongue quietly. “A hit man for the Mafia? Is the Mafia still a thing?” He smiled.

She laughed, “I don’t know. But no, I’m not in the Mafia.” I think, she added internally.

Jeremy looked at her, watched her mouth as she smiled. “Are you a model or something… which as I’m saying it, sounds super cheesy.” he said with a bit of a blush rising high on his cheeks above his beard. He was flirting and she suddenly remembered that she wasn’t herself. He was flirting with the gorgeous guy who’d been drinking alone at his bar all evening.

“I don’t really want to talk about what I do, it’s just not…” she shrugged and took another drink of water, licking her lips. The room was still spinning a bit and she felt all warm and fuzzy, like this was all a weird but pleasant dream.

Jeremy leaned forward onto his elbows, only a foot or so of distance between them now. “SInce I’m already kinda making a fool of myself… you are, you know… really hot and it seems like a crime against humanity for you to be alone on your birthday.”

He had nice brown eyes, wide and clear and kind, and what should have been an overdone line came across as genuine. The only other guy she knew that could have pulled that off was Sam. Thinking of him caused a heavy lump of guilt to form in her stomach.

“And yet, here I am.”

He slid one hand closer, fingertips just brushing the backs of her knuckles where her hand was still curled around the glass.

She stared at his hand and thought about Sam, who was the best man she’d ever known, smart, sweet, funny, weirdly mysterious, how did he even know half the shit he knew? And she knew so little about his life, his childhood, just enough to know that it had been nomadic and traumatic. His mom had died when he was a baby, his dad hadn’t handled that well, and he had a brother, but he never wanted to talk about them. He was home, thinking he was with her (hopefully) if James wasn’t screwing everything up. But at the same time, the idea that Sam might not be able to tell that it wasn’t her… well, it rankled.

She looked over Jeremy’s shoulder and saw James’ reflection looking back. Maybe it was the drinks, she thought as she shifted her gaze back to Jeremy, or the dream-like unrealness of the entire evening, but she slowly licked her lips thinking about what it would feel like to kiss a guy using someone else’s mouth, a man’s mouth? Would it feel different?

There was only one way to find out.

She pushed up and forward slightly as Jeremy leaned further across the bar. They both hesitated when there were only a couple of inches of space between them, giving the other a chance to back out. Shyness was never something that Jessica suffered from. Quite the opposite. Throughout her life she’d been accused of being too forward, too bold and daring, too aggressive when she wanted something. She knew she was impulsive, but YOLO, right? She slid her hand around the back of Jeremy’s neck and pulled him into a kiss.

The beard was something new to her. It was scratchy-soft and tickly in a way that was not entirely unpleasant. His lips were soft though and he knew what to do with them. After a moment, they broke apart.

“Hey, come around. I, uh, I want to give you something.”

When she stood up this time she was steady. Walking around the bar, she felt a flush of excitement, like a spreading fire flowing from her cheeks, down her chest, and into her gut. She followed him through the doorway and into the back room where Jeremy turned and pushed her up against a wall with a big, laminated, OSHA poster taped to it.

He was a couple inches shorter, so she had to tip her head down to meet his lips, a feeling so opposite of what she was used to that it added to the overall surrealness of the situation. And then he stepped even closer, one leg wedging between hers, pressing against her, his hands cupping her head, fingers rubbing into her scalp, such a different experience with James’ short hair, but pulling a pleased noise from somewhere deep in her chest. When his hips ground against hers, she was startled at the sensation. All that pooling warmth in her gut was suddenly rushing to her groin, focusing with growing insistence. She could feel Jeremy, already so hard, pressing back and the sensation left her breathless.

“Can I?” He tipped his head down as his hand skated over the front of her jeans, lightly tracing the bulge of her cock. Shit, she had a cock and this guy wanted to…

Okay, so she didn’t know if James was gay, or into guys at all, and she was seriously dating Sam, she was, but when would she ever be given the chance to experience this from this side of the equation again?

“Yeah.” she said.

Jeremy kissed her again as he undid her belt and jeans, sliding his hand down to feel her through her briefs. Her hips pressed forward, chasing the warmth and touch of his hand. And then his mouth was gone. He sank to his knees as he pulled the waistband of her briefs down and freed her straining cock. And it was like watching porn that she could feel, looking down the long stretch of her borrowed body, flat stomach and hard on, flushed dark pink with short, dark curls around the base. And then Jeremy’s tongue licked slowly up along the bottom of her shaft before flicking across the tip. Oh! That felt… good! One hand gently held the base, angling the length for better access, while his other hand cupped warm around her balls, lifting and squeezing in a way that made a small gasp escape her lips. Jeremy stared up at her as his tongue darted out again and swirled around the head of her cock, like he was trying to burn the image into his memory. But when he sucked her into his mouth and she groaned and placed a hand gently in his hair, her mouth falling open, his eyes sank closed and he got to work.

Jessica had given head, she knew her way around a blowjob and took pride in the responses she got, but to feel it, oh it added an entire other level. She couldn’t help but note what worked vs. what didn’t work vs. what really worked. She had also been on the receiving end of oral in her own body many times, something that Sam was particularly fond of (and extremely good at), but while this was similar, it was also so completely different, everything sort of flipped around in a delightful way. Her head tipped back against the wall as she let the feelings take over. Despite having no direct experience on this side of a blowjob, she felt confident that Jeremy seemed to know what he was doing. She didn’t hold back her responses and he picked them up and ran with them.

She was still tipsy enough and this was all still so new and weird, she had no idea how long it lasted before she felt herself tensing up, everything building as he worked at an increasingly frantic pace. As if he could sense how close she was, and he probably knew better than she did, he pulled back just enough to look up and say, “Come on” before swallowing as much of her as he could. A couple more pumps and the pressure in her burst, flooding out of her in deliciously violent spurts, all of which Jeremy greedily took.

When she could focus again, and looked down, he had his own dick out and was coming in his hand, his forehead resting against her thigh, still on his knees. She ran her hand through his hair, unconsciously petting him as they both came down.

When he sat back and fixed himself back into his pants, she did the same. She offered him a hand and pulled him back up to his feet. Awkwardness threatening to set in, she just smiled at him, “Thanks seems like a bit of an understatement.”

“What can I say, I’m a sucker for hot birthday boys.” He laughed, cheeks glowing with a deep flush. “No pun intended.”

Her smile spread wider.

Walking out of the bar a few minutes later, Jeremy’s number written on the receipt in her pocket, only feeling a little awkward at how quickly the whole interaction wrapped up because he seemed honestly content, Jessica looked around the parking lot. James had said it was a classic car, but she wasn’t sure what she’d been expecting. The long, shiny, sleek lines of the absolute beast of a vehicle that was waiting for her was a surprise though.

She fished the keys out of her pocket and opened the door with a creaking squeak that spoke of old joints formed from heavy, solid, metal. She slid in behind the wheel and pulled the door shut.

“Okay. Just an easy drive over to the motel. You can do this.” Turning the key in the ignition, the engine roared to life. Nothing quiet or subtle about this car, but it felt right on a weird, deep level that she wasn’t sure was coming from her. She eased out of the bar’s parking lot and onto the blessedly deserted street, keeping it a bit below the speed limit, even though she could feel the car practically begging to go faster.

Then there was the motel, and she parked outside room 12, locked the car and went inside. The place was… well it wasn’t going to ever earn even three stars on any travel guide ever again, but it was sorta clean and had the basics covered, a bed, nightstand, little desk with a chair next to a dresser with a tv on it, open closet, and a dingy bathroom. She dropped the keys onto the nightstand, along with James’s wallet and phone, as she sat heavily on the side of the bed.

Exhaustion settled heavily on her and she felt like she was made of lead, but still managed to pull off her boots and started to lay down before stopping herself and grabbing the cheap pen with the motel name on it. She scribbled a quick note on the receipt, under Jeremy’s name and number. And then was asleep almost as soon as her head hit the pillow.

~~~

The distinctive smell of stale, decades old, cigarette smoke and bleach hit him as Dean woke with a start. Sitting up and taking immediate stock of himself and his surroundings. Sunlight streamed in around the curtains, lighting up copious dust motes. The distant sound of a door banging shut reverberated through the walls.

He was still wearing what he’d been wearing when he’d left his body last night and had been sleeping stretched out on top of the covers on the bed in his motel room. His duffle bag lay seemingly untouched on the floor at the foot of the bed.

He rubbed his hands over his face and scrubbed at his hair a few times.

His wallet, keys, and phone were on the nightstand next to a note, which he picked up and read. The handwriting wasn’t his. And as he looked he realized it was likely written by two different people.

Jeremy 555-823-3467 was written in one hand, while the rest was another, messy and unsure.

You may not want to go back to that bar.

“Huh.” he tossed the note onto the bed, got up and walked to the window. A quick check outside verified that his car was there and seemed in one piece.

~~~

Jessica woke up slowly, warm and comfortable. She stretched and felt the familiar feel of her own body and smiled. The smile dropped entirely as she realized that she was naked and not alone. Sam, also naked, stirred next to her as she moved.

The night before settling like a brick in her stomach. She knew what she’d done, and would carry the guilt of cheating on Sam, but if she was honest with herself, which she tried hard to be, she believed that the extraordinary circumstances were something that she would have regretted not taking advantage of. Right or wrong, she’d made her choice and she’d live with that. But the idea that some random guy had used her body the same way, with her boyfriend, and that it turned out that Sam hadn’t noticed anything wrong, which either said a lot about how poorly he knew her, or about how good James was at pretending to be someone he didn’t really know, well, that weighed on her in a much more unpleasant way.

It wouldn’t be for another year and a half before that strange, surreal night would come sneaking back into her life in a fittingly bizarre and unexpected way.

Looking at that too handsome face again standing so close to Sam as she flipped on the light in their living room, made the floor feel like it was going to drop out from under her.

“Sam?”

“Jess. Hey. Dean, this is my girlfriend, Jessica.” Sam said, still slightly out of breath.

She blinked in surprise, “Wait, your brother Dean?”

Sam had never shown her any pictures of his brother, had only spoken about him a few times, and had made it sound like they were distant, estranged. She hadn’t ever questioned… why would she have questioned? This, what the hell was this? But before she could form any of her swirling thoughts into words, Dean stepped forward, an over-the-top leering grin on his face.

“Oh, I love the Smurfs. You know, I gotta tell you. You are completely out of my brother's league.”

There wasn’t even a hint of recognition in his eyes, but she still felt the hairs on her arms rise with a sense of danger at the aggressive eye contact he’d fixed on her.

Later, as she watched Sam pack and assure her that he would be back in time for his interview on Monday, she couldn’t shake the feeling that something bad was looming nearby. But she’d never told Sam about that night, it was insane, how could she have even begun to explain it? So she didn’t know now how to articulate why she didn’t want Sam to go. The idea that James was actually Sam’s brother, that he’d… that they’d…

Sam kissed her goodbye with promises of seeing her soon and then was out the door. A familiar rumble of an engine starting up outside, and then they were gone.

#wincest #wincest fanfiction #non con #extremely dubious consent #body swap #gender swap #sam/jessica #dean/sam #long post

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thecw-unicorn · 2 years

Text

Holiday Dreams. Yandere! Giorno x reader

Also bigggg shoutout to the lovely @mrsgiovanna for helping a bit with this story!!!!

Giorno is aged up by the way!

TW: toxic, unhealthy relationship, nightmares, implications of abuse, depression implications

Every day was the same.

You’d awaken in your lavish prison, pick out an outfit from your designer filled wardrobe, and skulk around the manor for the day.

On the days you could find the energy to get out of bed.

Those days didn’t happen as much as they did when you first arrived. Those days also were filled with tears and fear. Although now, the tears remained, albeit happening occasionally and quietly. Nowadays, the sadness and fear is giving way to dull emptiness and despair.

You had been in Giorno’s home for several months. To be exact, 167 days. The late summer had turned to fall and now, to winter. The holiday season had arrived, which further upset you to have to spend it with your captor, the man who took and took until he was satisfied, the man who frightens you to your core instead of your friends and family.

Giorno had been an enigma from the day you met him. Even now, after spending as much time with him as you had, he was still difficult to understand and decipher. It didn’t help you were the complete opposite to him. One look and he instantly read your thoughts and feelings. It made you feel gross and unsafe, always having that deep never ending pit of anxiety resting firmly in your chest.

To his credit, he has kept his word. He’s never so much as raised his voice, let alone his hand to you. He always was kind and aware, keeping his distance and only initiated any form of affection when you were comfortable. He even gave you your own bedroom, albeit connected to his. He even got your things from your cheap apartment brought over, including your comfort items. All of your hobbies provided for—especially books. You had been an avid reader before but now the interest to partake has fizzled out.

Despite his best efforts to maintain some civility between you two, it didn’t stop you from getting on your knees, pleading, begging to be sent home and swearing up and down to never tell a soul. You could still sometimes see the discomfort in his eyes and voice when he dismissed you.

Which brings you to today. Day 168. Christmas. You had half a mind to stay in bed all day again, purely out of spite but today was different. You wanted to try to find some kind of solace today, even if it meant having to talk to him. Not for you, but for your loved ones. You had no idea if they were looking for you, but you liked to think they were. And even if they didn’t know where you are, wouldn’t they just want you to be happy?

You lazily make your way through your routine, your eyes noticeably red and puffy from last night. You make your way down the stairs, already regretting the decision to leave your room. Then, you see it.

Breakfast was nearly displayed on the grand table. You quickly recognize all of your favorites. Pancakes, waffles, fruit, eggs, bacon, and sausage. And there he is at the head of the table. His golden hair perfectly styled and outfit immaculately tailored to his body. His suit was a deep emerald green, complimenting and accented his eyes. There was swirls of a floral pattern in a silver thread. He turns to look at you, his eyes immediately light up by your mere appearance.

“There you are,” he says in his soft and warm voice. “I’ve been waiting for you. Buon natale.” He walks towards you, extending his arms out for a hug. You stand there, frozen in your tracks, not knowing what to do or think. His arms close snugly around your waist, and you catch a whiff of his elegant cologne. You figure it best to let him do what he wants. Things often were easier that way, as much as you hated to admit. Let him hug you, kiss you. Anything else you would probably panic, although luckily, he hasn’t attempted. He backs away after a moment, smiling softly at you, taking the moment to smooth your hair behind your ears.

“Did you sleep well?” He asks. You shrug your shoulders. The truth is, sleeping has been difficult for you, especially since your “arrival”. At first, you had nightmares, all regarding Giorno and what he could do to you, knowing nobody could stop him. While those were few and far between, your dreams as of late had been…strange. You had been doing your best to hide your sleep troubles from Giorno. Soon, you thought, he’ll know. He’ll see the dark circles and other signs. He always knows. Mostly fragments of a scene, and yet they were so distantly vivid it was as if it was real life. Another interesting aspect was that many of the “scenes” you had seen in your dreams often happened the next day or so. You had considered it to be simply deja vu at first, but the more and more it persisted. You quickly shook yourself free of the reflection.

Placed neatly in front of the large windows in the living room, setting the stage against the foggy Christmas morning of Southern Italy. It was a large and tall thing, flocked on every branch, with beautiful green, white, gold, rose gold, and purple ornaments delicately hanging on, with colorful lights carefully hung all around the tree. The final touch was the star on the very top, golden with stained glass. It was beautiful, even you could admit. Giorno always had wonderful taste.

Then, the presents. Dozens of them it seemed, all wrapped or bagged and placed all around the tree. Surely, they couldn’t ALL be for you. Some for the the staff, perhaps? Or for him? Maybe some were for decoration…Giorno catches you staring.

“Would you like to open some?” He asks. In truth, you wanted this to be over as soon as possible, despite loving the holidays. Celebrating with him seemed wrong. That it was cruel to be happy, or at least pretend to, with him. Besides, you didn’t think you could stomach the breakfast right now in his presence.

“Okay.” You say quietly. He leads you over, and motions to a plush seat. “Ah. I almost forgot.” He says suddenly. He pulls out a pen from his pocket, and right before your eyes it turns into a beautiful pink ranunculus flower. He gently places it behind you ear, adjusting your hair to keep the flower in place. His proximity to you makes your heart race. You blush, still not used to these intimate displays of affection. Giorno has used his ability in front of you plenty of times, and even then, it still amazes you. You could almost feel his smugness at never failing to make you blush. This time, however, something was different.

You noticed a hazy golden glow around him. Had it always been there? You couldn’t say for sure. Yet now, it’s more obvious to you. While still somewhat blurry, you could see it. That golden glow radiating from around him.

Giorno catches you staring. You quickly take your eyes back to the Christmas tree. Giorno’s mind was racing. Were you staring at his stand? Have you always seen it? Or are you just now seeing it? Are you a stand user? If so, what’s your ability? He couldn’t stop the overwhelming questions bouncing around his brain. He could feel unease creeping into his chest, spreading throughout his body.

Desperate to change the situation, he directs your attention back to the presents. “Why don’t you pick one out and get started?” He encourages. “They’re all mine?” You said, stunned. He smiles and nods. You hesitantly begin to pick out a gift while Giorno sits and watches. He should be happy, and excited the mere prospect of you opening your gifts from him. He’s always given you gifts ever since you came to his home, but it was different today. He knew how much you deeply loved and appreciated the holiday season.

While it should be a happy and joyous occasion, Giorno couldn’t shake that steady, unrelenting feeling of unease. He always kept a close eye on you, mainly to ensure your safety, but now he would have to watch closely for any…anomalies that may present themselves when regarding your theorized abilities. As he watched you open your presents, (with the occasional offer to put on any jewelry you had gotten), he thought about you. You were everything he could hope for. Beautiful, kind, his ray of sunshine lighting up his dark days of dealing with some of the most corrupt individuals that Italy had to offer. While quiet, and shy, it couldn’t be mistaken for being passive. You were also curious and had your own version of fearless when it came to seeking your interests. He loved it about you. He loved the days before listening to you talk and talk about your hobbies and interests. God, he loved listening to you talk. Now, you barely speak until spoken too. In the very early days of bringing you home, you cowered at his every move. He couldn’t blame you, taken from the life you knew but the most powerful man in Italy. Of course you were afraid, although it didn’t stop his heartbreak and the longing to comfort you when he found you crying or staring at him with petrified, doe eyes.

You had your own version of strength. A different sort. Not the kind that relied on brute physical force or a keen, intellectual mind. It’s not unlikely or impossible to think that you could have a stand, unique to your own personality. But the possibility brings a whole new set of troubles for Giorno. How strong would it be? If you could figure out how to control it, would you use it on him? Would you try to escape? To leave him behind in search of a new life far, far, away? He couldn’t process it. It was just too much.

You absentmindedly opened Giorno’s presents, one after another. More games for the consoles he had gotten you (making sure they were offline of course), a jewelry music box, more books to add to your ever growing to be read pile, clothes, shoes, jewelry, hair and skincare products, makeup, and much more. You didn’t think you had gotten this many presents in your whole life until now.

You had finally, somehow made your way to the last and final present. Jewelry you were guessing by the size and shape of the small box. You take the top off and notice it. A sterling silver chain, with a small flower charm on it. A rose, made of beautiful stained glass with 2 small opal stones on both sides of the charm. Beautiful, no question, but something was off about it. You had seen it before. Not in the sense that you had seen and Giorno had noted the object and bought it before, but you had seen it elsewhere.

In your dreams.

The realization makes you uneasy, and you could barely breathe, your heartbeat ringing in your ears.

“Do you like it?” You barely make out Giorno asking. “Is it to your tastes? Would you like me to put it on?” You couldn’t focus properly. You had seen it before, you knew you had in your dreams. How did Giorno know about it? He’s been in your dreams before, but this was different. Such a seemingly small detail, yet it was so clear you remember. And it went from your imagination to now being in your hands.

“No.” You mutter a reply.

Giorno noticed your change. He still couldn’t stomach the idea of you being a stand user. He was unable to pinpoint the exact reason for your behavior switch. The necklace was beautiful, and reminded him so much of you.

Whether or not you were a stand user, he would get to the bottom of it. The idea of you keeping something from him was bothersome, to say the least.

He would figure it out sooner or later.

#jojo pt 5 #jojos bizzare adventure fanart #yandere jojo x reader #jojo no kimyou na bouken #jojo giorno #jojos bizarre adventure #jojo golden wind #vento aureo #yandere jjba x reader #jjba x reader #yandere jjba #don giorno #yandere giorno x reader #yandere giorno #yandere giorno giovanna #my writing #writing

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escapingrealtiylovinginsanity · 15 hours

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Rewind, Remix, & Replay Jay & Kim 6x8

You can read the rest of the series here

This chapter pretty much wrote itself. Oh, it was so much fun. Hope you guys enjoy it as much as I did! Love ya’ll <3

It had been a long exhausting day. Jay had got shot at and wasn’t in the best mood when he finally made it home. He had just popped the top off his beer and hadn’t even taken a sip yet when there was a knock on his door. He thought about ignoring it. An older lady down the hall sometimes came knocking when she needed something hanged. Jay had the sneaking suspicion that it had more to do with her loneliness than anything. Jay usually didn’t mind but tonight he was not in the mood.

Jay took a long pull of his beer when the knocking started again. This time, it was louder and more deliberate. Definitely, not his neighbor. Jay headed towards the door grumbling to himself as he nearly tripped over a half-unpacked box. He took another long pull of his beer throwing open the door. He paused beer still up to his lips in surprise.

Zoey Silver.

Her dark curly hair was frizzy around her face, her eyes red and puffy, her lips pressed together, her jaw clenched, and her head held high. “You and Aunt Kim can’t break up.” Jay scrubbed his hand down his face as his blue eyes met hers.

“Does Kim know you are here?” Zoey ignores the question but Jay sees the flash of guilt before she crosses her arms over her chest defensively. Jay’s hand immediately dives into his pocket to find his phone.

“I’ve never seen her as happy as she is with you- you can’t just end it! It’s not fair. This isn’t even her fault! It’s not like she wanted this to happen.” A couple who were leaving their apartment turned to look at the two of them. Jay grabs Zoey’s arm and tugs her into his apartment and away from the prying eyes. “This is my fault, isn’t it? I’m the reason you called it quits.” Jay’s brows furrow as Zoey’s eyes fill with tears and her lower lip trembles.

“Zoey, I don’t know what you think happened- But me and Kim are fine. We aren’t breaking up. We love each other. We are just… postponing her moving in. That’s all.” Zoey’s angry eyes fall on the few boxes that had made it to his apartment before things had changed.

When he had asked her to move in, Kim had agreed easily a tired smile on her lips. Kim had decided that breaking her lease would be cheaper in the long run than waiting for it to end. A lot of Kim’s essentials had already made it to his apartment but she still had a lot of things to box up. She didn’t want to rush the process of moving and wanted to go through all her things before just bringing them over. It made sense they probably had two of a lot of things.

It had been smooth sailing with only minimal bickering about some decorating ideas. Most of it was just to rile Kim up, Jay didn’t really care what the apartment looked like. The only thing he genuinely fought for was the living room wall for a bigger TV and surround sound. Kim had given in pretty easily to that when she realized he didn’t mind her change around most of the space.

Then Nicole had a crisis and attempted to kill herself.

She had gotten drunk and gone to the roof of her apartment building standing on the ledge. The brunette had been crying hysterically and trembling from head to toe. Someone had ended up calling 911. A member of the crisis squad had talked her off the ledge. However, it was clear that Nicole needed more extensive in-patient treatment. The program she ended up signing into was a minimum of 90 days with the potential of being 180.

Six months.

Zoey had broken down when she had been told. She didn’t want to live with her dad who was never home. His new girlfriend was young and always made Zoey feel like she was overstaying her welcome. In the end, it hadn’t been a hard decision. Of course, Kim was going to take Zoey in.

Jay had understood when she sat him down and told him. It wasn’t an excuse to get out of it. It was reasonable and the only real choice to be made. It didn’t help the disappointment and anxiety that clawed at his chest. His relationship with Erin had ended shortly after they decided to move in together too. He knew this had nothing to do with him. Still, it had his head spinning and his emotions whirling.

Maybe Kim hadn’t wanted to move with him at all. Maybe he wasn’t the type of guy that got to live with the woman he loved. Maybe too much time with him could ruin any relationship.

“That’s how it always starts.” Jay is dragged back into the moment by Zoey’s tone going high-pitched. “No, no-I refuse to be the reason you guys end things. I- I will just- just-” She rakes a hand through her curls shaking her head as her tone drops low. “I will just move in with my dad. Then everything can go back to normal. I- I should have known it would be asking too much to live with the two of you.”

Jay stands there dumbly for a moment. His brain trying to catch up to the words that had come out of her mouth. “Zoey, it’s not like that- at all.” Her brown eyes roll up to the ceiling as she continues to shake her head and scoffs.

“Yeah, right.”

“Hey, it’s not. I- I let go of Kim moving in here because I wanted you to be able to stay with her. I thought that was what you wanted. Had I known- Kiddo I don’t care if you moved in with us too. You have been through so much- your life keeps getting upheaved by all these big changes. I didn’t want to make it harder on you.” Zoey’s brown eyes finally meet his again. Her jaw is still tense and her eyes are searching his intently.

“You wouldn’t mind if I move in too.” Her voice is quiet, unsure.

“Well, honestly this place is a little small. We would have to look for a two bed-” Jay’s breath is pushed out of his chest as Zoey connects abruptly with him, her arms hugging him tightly. Jay chuckled hugging her back. “Guess we will have to start looking then.” He offered easily before correcting, “As long as it’s okay with Kim.”

“She will be,” Zoey states confidently. Her fingertips swipe under her eyes trying to minimize the smeared mascara. Jay smiles at her and hopes that she is right. Another guilty smile tugged at her lips, “I thought that was the plan in the first place. For us all to move in together. I knew Aunt Kim was planning on moving in. I figured I would just be on the couch. She didn’t say it but, I know she felt like she didn’t have the right to ask you to take me in too.”

“She does- and so do you. We are a family. I keep telling you that I got your back.” Zoey nodded a few more stray tears trickling down her flushed face as she looked up trying to force them to stop.

“I know,” Her hands swipe her cheeks again, “I think I even believe you. I love you, Uncle Jay.”

Jay isn’t sure what the exact emotion is that tightens around his chest and clogs up his throat when he hears her call him Uncle for the first time. He just pulls her into another tight hug. “I love you too, kiddo.”

#chicago pd #jay halstead #kim burgess #jay halstead and kim burgess #kim burgess x jay halstead #jay halstead x kim burgess #jaykim #jake and kate #jake x kate #burgstead

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thethistlegirlwrites · 8 months

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You Only Live Twice

Emma tries not to look too closely at the deep gash in her forearm as she unwinds the bandage around it.

It’s nothing. She’s had worse.

She’s had worse enough times, as a hunter, to know when it’s getting infected.

It’s not bad enough for blood.

She washes it out, smears on the expired but probably still viable antiseptic cream, wraps a fresh bandage around it, then rifles through the clothes hanging from the exposed pipe that doubles as a sort of makeshift closet for a long-sleeved dress that isn’t one of the ones she’s worn the past three days.

She’s not going to give anyone anything to talk about. She can’t afford to.

She’s only had this club eight months. Any sign of weakness, any misstep, could land her in the same position as its former owner.

So could the hunter who shows up less than half an hour after opening.

He stands out in the crowd, between the silver-laced bullwhip coiled on his hip, the massive knife sheath hanging from his belt, and the vivid crimson scars on his neck. She descends the stairs from the balcony where she’s been keeping an eye on the club business (she usually mingles more, but last night someone brushed against her arm, and she hissed, and despite being able to pass it off as being insulted at the lack of apology given on her own turf, she doesn’t want to make it a habit).

By the time she reaches the main floor, the hunter in question is sitting at the bar. He’s got a glass in front of him, but he’s not actually drinking it. A trick she’s seen him use a hundred times. Makes him a customer, so the owner can’t ask him to actually order something or leave, but he won’t get in trouble for drinking on the job.

“Stoker.”

“Heard you were moving up in the world. The industrial grunge vibe is kind of cutting-edge fashion for an upscale place. Missing that warehouse you used to party in already? Myself, I’d get some steer horns on the wall, a little space in the middle of the floor for some line dancing, and a couple vintage Eastwood western posters on the walls, but that’s just me.”

“I didn’t ask for an interior decoration consultation.”

“You sure? I think “A Fistful of Dollars” would look perfect over that corner table.”

Coven rivalry heating up due to outside agitation. And at least one of the vamps at that table is an instigator. She has to admit, she wasn’t a fan of his classic western team bonding movie nights, but it did offer them a whole coded language to use in the field.

Apparently, he still thinks they’re some sort of team.

But she’s on a coven borderline, and if someone ties the vamps stirring up trouble to her bar, she’ll have a lot more to worry about than a wound that won’t heal and being seen talking to a hunter.

“I never was much of a fan of that movie. Out of town gunslingers shouldn’t be poking their noses in a town’s affairs.”

She’ll take care of the problem. Which she’s pretty sure Stoker knew would happen. He’s not appealing to a sense of justice the human Emma used to have. He’s appealing to her new nature’s self preservation instincts.

He’s always been smarter than he looks.

She moves to get up, but he catches her wrist, just below the bandage on her arm.

She bares her teeth.

“I’d like to see the upstairs too. Might have some pointers for that.”

There’s plenty up there for a hunter to object to. Private soundproofed rooms for parties. Emma’s put her foot down hard on any hosting happening here, and all her employees are people she trusts to do the same, but the simple fact that she left those rooms in this building could be cause for a conscientious hunter to run her in to the agency.

“I can ask, or I can come back with justifiable cause. We’ve raided this place back when it was Corbin’s. He had host parties going on on the balcony level. Looks to me like you’ve still got doors closed up there.”

“I’ve got nothing to hide.”

“I think you do.”

He’s not looking at the doors.

He’s looking at her cheek.

Damn that tic. She chews the inside of her cheek when she’s in pain, and it makes a dimple-like divot. He’d learned a long time ago to recognize that for what it was, around the same time he benched her for a busted ankle she was insisting was a sprain.

Apparently, some of her human habits carried over into this version.

“Fine. I’ll let you put your mind at ease so my customers don’t need to be subjected to a raid team over nothing.” She makes him go first up the stairs. No matter how much they used to trust each other, no one with a stake is getting behind her in her blind spot.

“I’m going to need to inspect each of these rooms for any residual blood,” John says, pulling a spectrum light from his pocket. Emma steps back from the glow. UV is unpleasant to be around at the best of times. It’s making her genuinely nauseous right now.

Checking the smaller rooms, which she’s now using mostly as storage space, takes very little time. But the big room, the one she still actually does rent out to vamps who want a little more exclusivity than mingling on the first floor, is going to take a little longer.

John steps inside, then motions to her to join him and close the door.

She does, and the thumping bass from downstairs dies off. It’s nothing more than a heartbeat in here, a faint echo of the one she can hear from her former partner’s chest.

“Show me.”

“I don’t answer to you anymore.”

“I know that.”

She shakes her head but rolls up her sleeve. The bandage is starting to turn brown and yellow.

“Some scumbag objected to being thrown out for harassing my bartender. I’ve had worse.”

“You’ve had worse as a human. Have you been hurt as a vampire before?”

“How do you think I got this place? That Corbin just walked away?”

“Heard about a raid on a blood bank two days before you took over. Whoever pulled it off got away clean. Took only one bag of the most common types, left anything rare and the universal donor.” He frowns. “Almost like they were minimizing the damage they did. Even left just enough evidence to point out the flaw in security where they got in, but not enough to be IDed.”

“I’ve heard you talk confessions out of people too many times, Stoker.”

“Not my point. My point is, you had blood. That’s why you healed. Your body isn’t going to put itself back together on its own anymore. You’re a dead woman walking, Em.” He looks at her arm. “Dead bodies don’t have an immune system. They decay.”

“So what is this? Tricking me into doing something you can run me in for? If you can prove I’m drinking human blood, it’s at best six months in your holding cells detoxing. No way I keep the club if I’m away from it that long.”

“No way you keep it if you go into a coma while some bacteria eats away at your corpse either.”

He’s got a point, as much as she hates it.

“I told you. I don’t drink human blood anymore.”

“And I don’t smoke anymore. But if an undercover calls for it, I’m gonna light up a cigarette.”

“That’s different.”

“Maintaining a cover keeps me alive. Drinking a little genuine blood is going to do the same for you. If you don’t, I guarantee you, within a day or two you won’t be able to get out of your coffin. Infections spread a lot faster in a body that can’t fight them.”

She’d seen the burgundy streaks running up and down her arm away from the wound, as much as she’d tried to ignore them.

“Thanks for the advice. You’ve given it. Now get the hell out of my club.”

“You’re stubborn enough not to take it.” Stoker reaches for his knife. She tenses, until he shrugs the shoulder of his leather jacket down his other arm and then makes a neat slice along the inside of his forearm.

Blood wells up, bright, tangy, tempting. Overpowering.

“Well, you better do something, or this is going to get all over the floor and my spectrum light is gonna turn it into a Christmas tree.”

“Blackmailer.”

“Mule-headed idiot.”

She missed that insult.

She dives forward and catches the first falling drop of blood in her palm a fraction of a second before it hits the ground.

She keeps her hands cupped below his arm as she cleans up the overflow of blood, but in moments it’s a manageable trickle. She can feel her arm putting itself back together, an agonizing ache somewhere between being burned and having glass shards pulled out of her skin one at a time, but she can also feel her body forcing out the infection.

She hadn’t realized how awful she was feeling until she isn’t anymore.

A hand holding a white sterile compress slips between her tongue and his skin, and she almost snarls and bites down on it, but she forces herself back with all her re-acquired strength.

She’s left enough indelible marks on Stoker’s skin.

“That should hold you. You’ll get a delivery tomorrow night. A little congratulations on the new place gift from an old friend. Make sure to chill it well, it’s best served that way.”

When they leave the room together, it looks like the whole club is holding the collective breath most of them no longer actually need to take. And when Stoker opens the door, then turns to yell back, “You got away with it this time, Cole, but someday, we’re going to nail you, mark my word,” before vanishing into the night, there’s a moment’s silence and then a collective cheer.

Emma descends the stairs with her accustomed grace, simply nodding at the congratulations on surviving her first surprise inspection by hunters.

“I have nothing to hide,” she says to those who ask what cleaning service she’s getting in.

It’s true until the next night, five minutes before opening, when an unmarked van parks at the back door and rings the delivery bell.

Carlos has to call Emma back personally to sign for the damn thing. Someone sent it certified delivery.

She waits until the club opens and her staff are busy filling orders and watching the crowd before she opens it in the privacy of her personal office.

Inside is a cold-storage pack, and inside that are two bags of shelf-stabilized blood, stamped with the O- type marker and a string of ID numbers.

SJ 79110806007.

Only John Stoker would have been issued a double-oh-seven ID number by sheer luck of the draw.

Next time he shows up, she’s going to have a poster of “You Only Live Twice” hanging over the end of the bar.

It’ll clash with the aesthetic a little, but the sentiment fits just fine.

(You can read this story and others from this universe on my WorldAnvil here!)

@catwingsathena @nade2308 @the-one-and-only-valkyrie @telltaleclerk @ettawritesnstudies @writeouswriter

#febuwhump #febuwhump2024 #febuwhumpday7 #suffering in silence #infected wound #lady whump #vampire whump #emma cole #john stoker

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aarcanechaoss · 1 year

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Silver & Gold

Masterlist | Gold & Silver (P2)

Licht x OC (and hinted Licht x OC x William x Patri)

Aka Selene Morte in a different font (and I didn’t want to use Yvaine) - she can shape shift & is Half Fae

Warnings: none - this is just an idea I have had for ages and wanted to see your thoughts because I very much want to write about Fae / Vanir in the BC world

Selene was worried, it was like every good thing that had happened these past few months since the Elf Invasion had come to a stand still as the former Elven King strode into her room, his eyes gleaming.

She watched him lock the door quietly, quickly before striding again towards her, sat on her bed reading a book.

“Lady Morte.” He greeted finally as he stood beside her, jaw tensed.

“Licht.” She responded in kind, having placed her book on the side table. “Can I help you? It’s not often a male strides into my room without my permission.”

“There it is again.” Licht said, leaning down, eyes searching her face like he’d finally figured it out.

“What is?”

“Male. You call myself, Patri, Rhya and Vetto males- on occasion William too.” Licht stated. “In which I assume you call yourself a female then?”

“I am a f-woman after all Licht.” Selene turned, dual coloured hair shifting as she did, falling in waves over her shoulder.

“I think I’ve finally figured you out Selene.” Gods the way he said her name.

She tried to force a smirk onto her face, tried to mentally saunter herself out of the conversation.

“Is that so?” She cocked a brow as he moved closer, now sitting on the bed, left hand pressing into the bed right beside her hip.

“You are a Demi-Fae.” He said, and she realised now it wasn’t anger in his golden eyes but joy… joy because she can tell him if his people survived.

And at that she couldn’t stop herself from nodding, the glamour she had on melting away like silvery flames.

She was not Elven in the slightest. Not with how small her ears were, or the delicate point of them. Not with the sharpness of features she tried to soften in her human form. That was all she had hidden, never bother to hide anything else, it wasn’t like the others like her didn’t do the same.

Licht’s right hand reached her face, traced the shape of her ear, the shape of her jaw, the curve of her neck. A tear in his eyes gave away that he had figured out the other truth. One she learnt months ago, when she first laid eyes on him.

“It seems my attraction to you was not simply physical.” He says slowly.

Selene pulled back as far as she could, the silver strands of hair tangling in Licht’s fingers, the rest of her black hair falling down her back.

“There is no obligation to-”

“It’s fine.”

“But Princess Te-”

“I have a feeling you know some things that I should be told concerning her- but contrary to what the others believe when they revived me they forced the memory of her death forward again… even though I had been wandering for the last five centuries.” He states. “So I do not mind knowing that I could find someone in this life too… mate.”

A tear slipped down her face.

“It’s not just you.” She whispered, fearful.

The former king cocks his head, “William and Patri I assume.” She nods.

“Granted I’m not entirely sure if it’s just one of them or not… having multiple mates isn’t as rare for…”

“For Fae Royals.” He supplied.

Her head snapped towards him.

“How-”

“You look an awful lot like your mother from memory… and you have your brother’s eyes.”

Her mother.. Queen Titania of Elfhame and her eldest brother Brannon… they had known Licht?

“I only met Titania once, when I was ten and my father still king. Brannon and I were friends.”

“Ah.” She said, unknowingly leaning back into the elf’s touch. “Could we… take whatever this will be slow?”

He blinked, urging her to continue.

“To figure out the mating bonds between us I mean and so that I can tell you about.. the others.”

“I agree… but Selene… is it terrible that I want to kiss you?” Licht’s golden eyes dropped from her brown to her lips.

Her heart thundered in her chest.

No, no it wasn’t bad. She wanted to kiss him the moment she saw him, wanted to pull him to her chambers and show him just what a Demi-Fae could do to an Elven man.

“I want to as well.” She whispered, leaning into his hand as his other’s thumb traced a circle on her hip.

Licht surged forward, lips claiming hers in a near possessive and carnal way. She melted, hands reaching to explore his chest, his shoulders, to tangle in his long hair. He leant forwards, pushing her into her pillow, pulling her beneath him as he shifted to hold himself above her, one thigh between her legs.

Her eyes gleamed silver as the kiss deepened and she-they both felt the mating bond snap into place like a string pulled taught. He pulled away, hair framing him like a halo. Golden eyes searching now silver before he kissed her again, tongue and teeth taking control, desire taking the lead.

A kiss, that was all they had intended, all the Princess and former king had been trying to give. They couldn’t help it.

They wanted more.

#black clover #black clover smut #black clover licht #Selene Morte #black clover OC #black clover fluff

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voidendron · 1 year

Text

lie to my face

Whumptober 2023 Day 9: “Learning everything ain’t what it seems, that’s the thing about these days.” Polaroid | Mistaken Identity | "You're a liar." Star Wars: The Old Republic Warnings: None Characters: Rediaex'aere'zortiea "Xaerez" (Cipher Nine, he/they (he/him still at this point), Chiss), Ikaruv'eir'ansc "Veira" (Sith Apprentice, they/them, Chiss)

Most Sith didn’t give Cipher Nine a second glance—most didn’t even realize who he was. He was good, that way. At keeping under the radar, being unnoticed even by the Sith he was meant to work under, from time-to-time. Even Darth Arkous, all those months ago, had struggled to track him down; even Lana, and Marr, had had a hard time keeping track of him as everything started to happen with the Revanites.

He sneaked right past the noses of those meant to watch. Spoke with a silver tongue that made others none the wiser. Was oft waved off as an insignificant sniper, when not making it obvious that he was actually Intelligence.

…Usually.

Xaerez found the yes of a young apprentice—Veira was their name—on him, that day. As he stood, going over patrol routes sent to his personal datapad; the apprentice watched from afar as their master lingered near the conference table away from the camp’s center, receiving a debrief from Darth Marr and Satele Shan alongside a few other Sith and Jedi. It was something about spirits, his hearing implants picked up. Doors, switches—whatever it was, from what he caught, they’d need the Force to activate it to get into one of the temples. Hence why Xaerez, the Champion, and Havoc Squad weren’t part of the conversation.

It was during that debrief that he caught the apprentice eyeing him.

It wasn’t the first time the same one had glared at him. But it…well, it wasn’t an angry glare. It was a thoughtful one, like the kid recognized him from somewhere but couldn’t place where from.

And it was when that meeting ended, and the Barsen’thor and Wrath ended up the ones chosen to get into the temple while another group watched their backs, that the apprentice approached him—as he’d expected they might.

Lord Xandosc’s apprentice, he knew. A part of Lord Azan’s power base that she would often call on when her status as Wrath (and tendency to brute force a situation) wasn’t quite enough to get a job done. He also knew the kid was a spitfire, prone to lashing out—and was Chiss. From what Xaerez had read in their files while getting an understanding of Azan and her allies, the kid had been sent away from Csilla as an infant when their Force-sensitivity was discovered, and ended up raised by a rather prestigious Sith couple.

They’d certainly found a place for themself.

“Uh, hello?” the apprentice asked. Their voice was slightly muffled behind a cloth mask that covered the lower half of their face.

Xaerez stood at a straighter parade rest. “My lord.”

They didn’t say anything, for a while. Instead, giving the agent a once-over; Xaerez did the same. He had to wonder why the kid’s hair was gray, only a few locks of what must have been their original black remaining; they were just a teenager. Curious.

“Lord Wrath calls you Cipher Nine. Is that really your name?” They sounded credulous; he didn’t blame them.

“Yes.” What more could he say? Veira was one of Azan’s trusted allies; there was little he could do to hide that part of his identity from the kid if she’d already told them.

“Don’t you have a name name?”

To his quirked brow, the apprentice snorted and waved him off. “Right, right. Top secret spy stuff, got it.”

Maybe once upon a time, that would have pulled a laugh from the agent. Maybe in his younger days, when he was but Veira’s own age, hanging with delinquents on Csilla and slicing into systems he shouldn’t have.

Veira was quiet for another few moments, and Xaerez took that as a chance to glance back down at his datapad.

That is, until the apprentice opened their mouth again.

“I’ve seen you in a dream before.”

His hand hovered over the screen as his eyes flicked back up at them. Had he heard that right?

“...Pardon?”

And then they were laughing as they brushed a manicured hand through their grayed hair.

It was with that laugh that Xaerez’s breath caught in his throat. They sounded exactly like—

“Why did you…” They hummed, as if they were…trying to find their words. “You’re the one who killed my uh… My birth parents.” They didn’t look angry, merely curious; it didn’t put Xaerez any more at ease. “…Why?”

“I’m afraid I don’t know who you’re talking about,” he answered oh, so carefully. “I’ve had a very long career.” Surely it was just a coincidence. A coincidence, that they had Xaanehz’s laugh. A coincidence, that he finally noticed the look in their eyes—and that they looked just like Ullem’s did, just with the addition of artful wings and shadow.

“You’re a liar.” The apprentice had stepped close, their curiosity falling away to irritation. If it wasn’t for the mask they wore, Xaerez was certain he would have felt their breath on his face. “I can sense it. You know exactly who I’m talking about. Don’t you, Agent?”

It took everything he had not to step back. “...What did you see, in your dream?” he asked instead. He had to know, if his suspicion was right.

And as they described it, Xaerez had to swallow the anxiety rising in his throat. A type of anxiety, that he hadn’t felt in a very, very long time—he couldn’t let them sense it.

An assassin, they said. Their parents, and who they assumed were their grandparents, sniped from afar before they even knew what hit them. A beautiful manor on Alderaan. The sound of waterfalls, and Thranta, the anxious breathing of their killer as boots crunched over snow.

“I saw your face,” they ended with. “So...why?”

Lies came so easily to him, even as nausea bubbled in the pit of his stomach. “It was an order,” he said. His voice was too even for the way he felt. “I don’t remember the details—” an eidetic memory made that a blatant lie, but the kid didn’t know that, “—only that they forged various sensitive files to hide your existence. In doing so, they put an entire system at risk.” How much of that was actually the lie he fabricated, he wondered, and how much was far closer to the truth than he’d ever realized?

“They…” Their gaze cut to the side, as if they were warring with themself over how to go about the information. “They died protecting me from stupid Ascendancy laws?” Everyone knew how most Chiss viewed the Force. That made Xaerez’s job easier, if the kid figured that part out for themself. It was less time for him to have to linger on the realization that his sister’s baby—that little Unarhem—was very much alive and standing mere inches in front of him, that she’d lied so convincingly about him dying from the sickness he’d been born with. It was less time for him to have to linger on the memory of seeing her face for the last time through the scope of a rifle.

“I’m afraid so.”

Then their hand was on his jacket, shoving him into the stones behind him with enough force that he couldn’t hide his grimace, nor the way his datapad slipped from his hands to fall into the grass at their feet.

“And you just…agreed to do it?”

If he hadn’t, someone else would have. He couldn’t let another handle it, couldn’t run the risk of Xaanehz, or her husband, or their parents, suffering at the hands of another. The way he’d done it was quick, painless. He couldn’t have stomached it had it been handled any differently.

But instead, he only nodded—and was grateful for the mask that he wore. For the way it shrouded his eyes behind tinted transparisteel; shrouded, the way he bit his lip behind the sturdy metal. “I was doing my job.”

Their fist tightened against his lapel, the leather against manicured nails making an unpleasant noise for his hearing implants. If it weren’t for the fact that they both wore masks, their noses would have practically been touching.

“You’re hiding something.”

“With all due respect, my lord. You didn’t know them—”

“No, but maybe I could have figured some more shit out.” They shoved him again; Xaerez hissed between his teeth when the back of his head cracked against the stone. “I’ve had this dream over and over—why?! What are you lying to me about?!”

Resisting the urge to reach a hand up to feel for any blood on the back of his head, he instead brought his hands up non-threateningly. He knew—maybe even better than the apprentice did—that if Veira decided to attack him, he wouldn’t stand a chance in defending himself. Melee combat wasn’t exactly something he was good at, especially not with his damned foot being as bad as it was.

He racked his brain for something to smooth Veira anger, something he could offer that wouldn’t put his own hide at risk.

“I know what your name was. Before your parents took you in.”

The pause they gave was all the answer he needed; that should suffice nicely.

“Nearu’narhe’maal—Unarhem. From the Nearu and Rediaex families.” No one knew his full name, he knew. Offering his family’s name didn’t matter, not anymore, not now that anyone who might have known them knew they were all dead.

He could hear Veira take a breath—

Then they grumbled under their breath when their master called to them from across the camp.

One last shove—Xaerez barely held his head forward enough that it wouldn’t hit the stone again—and the apprentice stormed off with one last, “We’re not done,” thrown over their shoulder.

He took a breath he hadn’t realized he’d been holding, tipping his head back against the cool rock behind him as he squeezed his eyes shut, just for a moment.

So…Unarhem was alive.

Unarhem, who he’d attended a funeral for. Who he’d known was so incredibly ill after being born. Who he’d known (or, thought he’d known) couldn’t have survived with how weak h—they, were.

And he thought he was good at keeping his identity buried.

What a damned discovery…

#whumptober2023 #no.9 #swtor #imperial agent #sith warrior #chiss #tales from the void #voids ocs #oc: rediaex'aere'zortiea #oc: veira

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badnikbreaker · 2 years

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thoughts on thorn and my forces arc for ames i promise these are related —

i joke a lot about amy’s forces arc that exists solely in my head, and it DOES exist solely in my head because in canon forces amy doesn’t do a damn thing, much like the rest of the cast that isn’t the rookie, sonic, or sonic. but my amy did have an arc in forces, and it’s arguably a lot of negative character development!

once sonic was gone, amy, knuckles and silver end up running a resistance without the hero, and it’s impossible and it’s frightening and a lot of people are dying. knuckles steps up to be the commander, and amy’s voted vice - commander and becomes the tactician in turn. at first, amy tries to protect everyone, but that just leads to more deaths. it’s not long before she has to start making genuinely horrific, terrifying choices — pull forces from this town of 1000 to save this city of 5000 and lose half the town. send soldiers on a suicide mission knowing that’s the only way to stop something worse. amy took on this role as another expression of her love; she made the impossible calls so that she’d bear the guilt and hatred so nobody else had to, so that nobody she loved had ot. it’s another way to protect knuckles, silver, vector — all of them.

but part of what happened, for that sacrifice to be survivable, is that amy became much more utilitarian, much less outwardly emotional, much more steady and restrained. it’s not that their old personality was gone, just that there wasn’t an opportunity to indulge it here; what was left was a much colder, quieter hedgehog capable of making really difficult, sometimes horrible calls without so much as flinching. most of the others, knuckles and maybe silver aside, don’t notice the change; it takes months for it to solidify. frogs in water. but amy, at least outwardly, seems to grow so much colder. to do anything else makes her less effective, costs lives, forces the others to suffer. to do anything else is selfish.

it’s all an expression of amy’s desire to protect, of amy’s love for the world and the people in it, even if it makes her outwardly less visibly loving. but there’s a lot of guilt that goes unmentioned and un-coped with because she just doesn’t have time. and she grieves in a real, if deeply repressed way, the person she was before she’d had to do all those horrible things and cost all those lives, and grieves that she doesn’t know that she can ever go back to being who she was then.

amy can’t be guilty or selfish or weak, because as long as she isn’t, the others can be.

anyway i think i’m a genius, but i’ve had folks accuse me of writing them like an OC before. which also, true. but the POINT is that during thorn’s arc in prime, it reminded me a lot of my amy’s arc in forces. obviously there’s not a 1:1 comparison here, but there is something to the idea that amy is willing to do horrible, miserable things — draw away from friends, hurt people she loves, turn her personality into something, someone, wildly different — if she thinks that’s ‘necessary’ to protect the greater good. and once thorn realizes what she’s done, she outright says “i couldn’t sit back and let it happen, but [after what i did]...i could never get back to who i used to be” which i think is such a neat parallel to my forces stuff and amy’s guilt and grief about ‘losing’ who she was before she had to do those horrible things. amy is someone who can be driven to do terrible things in the name of love / protection.

like i said, it’s not a 1:1 comparison. forces amy doesn’t lose the plot quite as much, among other things. but it does emphasize that amy’s endless love and care and desire to protect can, in the right situations, cause her to become something very different than the amy we know — either a cold commander or a monster.

much like thorn, with some help and time, my amy returns more to her natural self post - game — she’s always going to be able to drop into ‘soldier’ mode at the drop of a hat, and her bubbliness gets toned down a bit in some contexts. she’s always going to be better at making those hard choices. but she’s still a deeply loving, kind person, and the parts of her that are excitable and emotional and headstrong get to show through more regularly again and, eventually, take center stage.

#amy : headcanon.#WOOOOO #amy rose i love u #prime spoilers /#its not rly abt prime but i do talk abt it a lot in conjunction here

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liminalpsych · 10 months

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After two weeks of no adhd meds for the first time since I got on them in 2017, I finally wrangled a way with my pharmacy to get them filled (turns out they’re not backordered on the brand name, just the generic, which I hadn’t thought to check until a client mentioned success with this approach).

They still don’t have enough of my dose in stock so I’m not getting them until Monday, but I’m getting them soon instead of indefinite waiting, and now I have a route to take when the generic is backordered in the future so that I still get my meds on time.

(It’s a little more expensive, but still cheaper than the adhd taxes I’ve been paying with dopamine seeking behaviors for the past two weeks.)

The silver lining has been that I now have a very, very clear understanding of exactly how adhd stimulants help me, and how much they help. (I used to live like this. Only it was worse because I was on an SSRI instead of an NDRI as my antidepressant; my current antidepressant at least takes the edge off some of my adhd symptoms.)

(Did you know serotonin can inhibit dopamine production? That’s possibly why some ADHDers have paradoxical reactions to SSRIs. We don’t have enough dopamine to begin with and then it makes us produce even less? Terrible times.)

Anyway. Might make a separate post about adhd meds on Monday. But for now, here are the things I’ve noticed:

oh right I used to be tired all. the. time. 9 hrs of sleep + a nap = still tired all the time, pre medication. Properly medicated, I’m good on 7.5 hrs. Half medicated (no stimulants, but NDRI), I’ve been doing okay on 8 hours but still pretty fatigued. I have not been getting deep/delta sleep (which stimulants help with in ADHD, adhd brains tend to spend a lot of time in REM sleep and not enough in deep delta sleep, and stimulants increase deep sleep in many adhd cases for some reason). There’s been a couple nights of 0 hours of deep sleep despite 8 hours of sleep. It’s been great. Fabulous. /s (help i’m so so so tired)

Focus/motivation, obviously. Oh right, this is probably why I haven’t written much fiction since college. For the past several months I’ve just been able to choose to write, make myself write and it works. For the past two weeks that has been much, much harder and even impossible. I am able to make myself spend time with my WIP each day to maintain momentum (still using all my adhd coping skills) but writing prose has not really been happening.

Social anxiety. I knew stimulants helped with the rejection sensitivity, social anxiety, overthinking social situations, because I went off of them for 2 days in a row once and had a terrible RSD flare up. But two weeks off of them has been… not great. Also generally just feeling insecure, having self esteem issues flare up, anxiety in general, harder to self-soothe and talk myself through catastrophic thinking, etc etc. (and trust me, I have skills. So many skills. So many well practiced skills. I teach them to others and use them personally. I’m functioning, it’s just extra hard.)

Dopamine seeking. Siiiigh. Back to snacking on sugary things that make my digestive system angry at me, in a desperate subconscious bid for tiny insufficient hits of dopamine. That had mostly stopped.

Task switching has been extra hard, unsurprisingly. Also lots of zoning out.

My driving skill/safety. D: yeeeeah. there are a number of studies out there showing that unmedicated adhd (especially in younger drivers, it improves somewhat with age/experience) shows up as similar levels of impairment as being at/over the blood alcohol limit. I was horrified the first time I drove while medicated. “oh. Oh no. I have not been particularly safe to drive all these years.” Been extra cautious as a result, and haven’t driven the wrong way down one way streets or anything like that the past two weeks, thankfully. (Yes, that was a thing that happened pre-medication.)

In before anyone tries to suggest this is indicative of a dependency or is because I was on meds for a long time: no. This is how I lived 32 years of my life. Until the tiredness got so bad that I got desperate enough for a med change that might work a little better than just “not having intrusive suicidal thoughts,” which is all the SSRI managed to do for me. For the past six years of adhd medication, I haven’t been tired all the time, things haven’t been so mind-numbing hard, it’s been a complete game changer and opened up so much more capacity for living that I didn’t have before.

It sucks to have to go back to my old exhausting norm where I had to drag myself through tasks with sheer force of will and could barely get anything done. I am so relieved the end is in sight and I’ll be back to my modern norm on Monday.

#adhd #medication #psychopharmacology #personal #come back to this later

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caramelcal · 2 years

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sharing your treasures

word count: 2.1k

summary: theo wants what he can't have until he can have it.

ship(s): draco x reader, theo x reader, draco x reader x theo

warnings: fem!reader. mentions of sub!reader. a bit of swearing. mentions of smut.

also, hi guys! ik i've been gone for ages but i'm backkk

the great hall was bustling with noise as you sat at the slytherin table, your boyfriend, draco, beside you, his arm draped lazily over your shoulders. you laughed at something blaise said, taking a bite of your breakfast.

you looked over at draco just as he was casting his eyes over to you, both sending each other warm smiles with fondness glimmering in your eyes, before returning to the conversation, draco replying to what blaise had said. you and draco had been dating for a few months and had been friends for a few months before that.

every second with draco was amazing, and you wouldn't have given it up for anything.

you were so wrapped up in the conversation, that you didn't notice the eyes that were on you. not the silver eyes of your boyfriend, but the blue of his best friend, theodore nott. his eyes had barely left your face all morning, too wrapped up in the open affection that draco was showing to be able to even touch his breakfast.

he couldn't help but feel guilty at the thoughts that entered his head. that should be me. that was his best friend, but he couldn't help it. if only he had been faster, if only he had told you sooner, if only he hadn't been such a pussy. he'd never forgive himself.

draco was happy, you were happy, and he couldn't complain. he wanted the best for you both, even if it meant each other, but he still couldn't help but feel a little bit regretful.

he never normally had trouble with girls, he approached them without hesitance but you were different. he already cared for you, being friends for a long time beforehand, so he couldn't approach the situation with the same ease as he did with other girls. draco didn't seem to have the same problem as him.

"theo?" he doesn't even hear someone calling his name, too deep in his thoughts to even acknowledge that someone could have possibly noticed his lack of interaction. someone nudges him on the arm, then again, but a little harder, "theo, you alright there, mate?"

he blinked, almost as if being snapped out of a trance. his eyes met draco's puzzled features. draco, after realising he isn't getting an answer, reiterates the question, "you alright, mate?"

"yeah, i'm fine," theo denies, but he can still tell that there's uncertainty in draco's gaze. draco doesn't fully believe him, he knows that, but he also knows that draco won't push it, and that's good enough for him. theo's eyes very briefly cast over to you, to see that you're looking at him too. you don't have the same suspicion in your eyes, and he can't help but let out a mental sigh of relief.

nothing very interesting happened at breakfast after that, and theo is quick to get up and out of his seat, and set out for class. you don't let him get away that easy though, half running to catch up with him.

"teddy," you said, catching his attention. you're the only one that ever calls him that, and he'd punch anyone else if they called him it too. yet, when it's you, it's like honey coming off your lips.

he doesn't reply as such, he only hums in response to let you know that you can continue. his eyes look over at you, only to find that you're staring at him too. you don't break the eye contact as you ask, "you sure you're okay?"

he let out a breath, looking straight forward again, "yeah, just tired."

it's not long before you reach class, and are sitting down beside each other. you guys chose your seats at the start of the year, which is why you are sitting next to theo instead of draco. you and theo had been very close friends at the start of the year, and there was no point getting everyone to shuffle around just so you could sit with your boyfriend.

the class went ahead like normal, and theo found himself at peace, not tormented by his thoughts of you and draco and him. worksheets are put down at his side of the table, which he barely even notices, not until you go to reach over, your hand resting on his to maintain your balance. something erupts in his chest when he looks up to see you bending over him.

his eyes filtered to your boobs before he can stop himself, encased in your loosened shirt, with your tie barely even pulled up. he let out a shaky breath but he can't seem to pry his eyes away. his mind is instantly filled with dirty thoughts about how pretty you'd look with his cum painted over your chest, about how they'd bounce as he trusted into you relentlessly.

he cursed in his head as he felt his dick harden, but he knew he couldn't do anything about it. he hated how much you affected him, you drove him crazy and you had no fucking idea.

classes zoomed by after that, and eventually, you guys find yourselves sitting in the slytherin common room. everyone else appears to have retired to their rooms, it's only your group left, who slowly also seem to be disappearing off to their rooms.

when pansy and mattheo finally head off, leaving you, draco, and theo alone, draco turned to you. your eyes met his silver ones as he spoke, "head off to the room, i'll be in soon."

you give him a quizzical look, but all you're met with is an arched eyebrow as to why you haven't moved her, and soon enough, you're getting up, with a small pat from draco sending you off. as you walked away, you turned to theo, "g'night, teddy."

"night y/n/n," he nodded, sending you a small smile. not a word is spoken between the two best friends until the door closed behind you, theo letting out a sigh.

"i think i'm gonna head off too," theo went to get up, but draco is quick to stop him from doing so.

"stay with me, theo. i have something i want to talk to you about," something about those words set off alarm bells in theo's head, but when he made eye contact with draco's silver eyes, he knew that he couldn't just run away. draco was his best friend after all, of course they would talk to one another. it was nothing for concern.

with his hand around a glass, rings clanking against it, legs spread and white shirt half unbuttoned, draco almost looked intimidating, but not to theo. draco cleared his throat before he continued, "i know you like, y/n."

theo had no words. there was nothing he could say to make up for what he had done, crushing on his best friend's girl. he knew he couldn't lie to draco, he knew him too well. draco would see right through his deceit.

"draco, i-" theo was quickly cut off when draco put his hand up, signaling for theo to stop talking.

"i've seen the way you look at her, nott. you would be stupid to believe that i didn't notice," draco shook his head, not at theo, but just in general. his eyes cast away into the distance as a silence filled the room.

theo's eyes never strayed from draco's figure, his heart beating wildly in his chest. he couldn't stand up for himself, there was nothing he could possibly say that would be of any use to him here. he just has to wait for draco to unleash on him.

"y'know, maybe i should punish her for being such a slut, thinking about other men. i would, if i didn't believe that it'd be good for us," draco met theo's eyes once more, seeing the shock grow on his face. y/n wanted him. you wanted him. it felt surreal, "she wants you, and honestly, i want you to join us too,"

draco's normally never this open with anyone, and while he does tell theo stuff, he still can't find himself believing the words coming out the blond's mouth.

"i dunno man..." theo trailed off, casting his eyes down to the floor as he shrugs. of course he wants to, he'd jump at the chance to be with you, but something feels amiss to him, and he doesn't want to seem too eager in front of your boyfriend about fucking you.

"what? you trying to tell me you don't like her? I've been watching you the last few weeks, i see how you look at her."

theo just shrugged at draco's words, "she's still your girl."

a smirk comes onto draco's face, and theo knows that any slither of doubt that draco had about theo not liking you is out the window. he should have denied it, but he couldn't find it in himself to deny his thoughts, his feelings, or his dreams about what he'd do to you.

"she could be ours. i'm not one for sharing normally, but you're my best mate, and it isn't like we haven't done it before."

when draco finally came into the room, you pouted at him, "what took you so long?"

you had been waiting for what felt like forever at this point, thinking that he would literally be following behind you after saying goodnight to theo. yet, it seemed that he must have got caught up doing something. you, however, had been doing what you always did when draco sent you away, kneeling on the bed, waiting for him.

draco walked over to the bed, hooking his fingers under your chin and lifting up your face so you have no choice but to meet his eyes, "i was getting you a surprise. looks like we need to work on our patience, hm?"

"surprise?" you asked quizzically. that's when draco's eyes go towards the door, and he moved your face so you also face the door.

you're confused, but you don't say anything, just waiting impatiently as you see a shadow at the door, then, a figure walking in. tall, fluffy hair, leaning against the doorframe. theo.

his blue eyes immediately met yours, making your eyes widen and your mouth drop a little in shock. theo, noticing your confusion, turned to draco, "i thought she knew."

"she did, she just didn't believe you'd want to do it. she thought you didn't like her," draco replied, not even looking at theo, just studying you, kneeling on his bed. your eyes don't move off of theo, and you don't even notice that draco has beckoned him over, giving him permission to act on all those fantasies that had been plaguing his mind for months.

your eyes followed him as he got closer, going far too slow for your taste. you had been waiting too long for him to go this slow. theo replaced draco's frame right in front of you on the bed and you're forced to crank your neck up to look at him, his fingers, like draco's had been, hooked under your chin.

"i heard that someone's been wanting me to make them feel good?" you don't use words, you simply nod your head. theo, however, isn't very pleased with your lack of verbal affirmation, tightening his grip o your face a little, his voice turning more stern, "words, baby."

"yes, teddy. i want you so bad," you let out in a hurry, your heart beating so fast.

"aw," he mockingly pouted, "is malfoy not making you feel good enough, princess?"

"watch it, nott," draco warned, yet there isn't much malice in his warning. he knew that theo was only joking, and he knew from the way he had you screaming and fucked dumb that you knew theo was joking too.

theo, turning his attention towards the blond, sent him a cheeky smile, before his full attention returned to you. draco watched on, his white shirt unbuttoned, and sleeves rolled up past his elbows, arms crossed over his chest.

"didn't think i'd come, did you, love?"

"no, teddy," you affirmed what draco had told theo.

theo stroked your cheek with one hand, his other hand reaching down tauntingly slow to grab your boob, squeezing it before he spoke, "dumb bunny, don't worry, i'll show you exactly how much i want you."

your eyes briefly cast over to draco, just to make sure that you were allowed to go ahead with this. when your eyes meet the silver of your boyfriend's, he nodded, "go on, my love, show theo how much of a good girl you can be."

#draco malfoy x reader #theodore nott x reader #theo nott x reader #draco x reader #draco x reader x theo #draco x reader x theodore #draco malfoy x reader x theodore nott #draco malfoy x reader x theo nott #theo x reader x draco #theodore nott x reader x draco malfoy #theo nott x reader x draco malfoy

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darkscorpiox · 2 years

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TWST — Diasomnia’s arc predictions (small spoilers from Ignyhide’s arc)

For months, even before the conclusion of Ignyhide’s arc, I have pondered on how Diasomnia’s will be unravelled. In a previous post, I’ve pointed out the similarities he shares with Aurora and theorized that her narrative will be seen in Malleus’ journey before he overblots and become the Maleficient who makes the princess a prisoner of her own dreams. Some fans might say that since he’s so magically strong, there’s no way he would overblot easily, but it can be said the same about Leona who overblot despite not having overused his magic. But if not an overblot form, then what if it’s instead his true fay form? Will we see him as a dragon? That would be cool either way.

I also wonder about the other Diasomnia members, especially Silver and Sebek.

I’ve been curious about the silver/white-haired teen since the introduction of the game’s characters and I heard his line.

“It’s strange. I feel like I’ve met you somewhere before.”

Where have I heard that before? Wait…

“But don't you remember? We've met before. […] Once upon a dream.”

There might be a connection between him and Yuu. Silver is symbolized by a sword and told Yuu was skilled with said weapon. Either Silver will be the Philip to Yuu’s Aurora or the “sword” which will help them in their fight to save Malleus.

Then we have Sebek. He’s a child of mixed ancestry (half-fairy, half-human). Despite his human father’s unconditional love for him, the latter only has contempt for his parent. Knowing the negative opinion of the fay population about humans, it’s no wonder Sebek hates the other half of his heritage. That might be why he idolizes Malleus. Adding the fact that his symbol is a lightning bolt, a certain image comes to mind.

When we’ll go against Malleus, I think Sebek will be one of the obstacles, believing it is his duty to follow his Lord in all of his endeavors, overblot or not. And Silver will be his opponent. Sebek would see Silver’s opposition as an act of betrayal toward Malleus, fortifying his hatred for humans, while Silver would argue that Sebek’s blind loyalty to Malleus is not helping the latter, maybe comparing it to a wall of thorns keeping him from getting the help he needs (for the sake of reference). Maybe Lilia, as the leader like the red fairy, Flora, will convince Sebek to switch side which will lead to this scene below.

Maybe Silver will land the final blow or it might be Yuu.

Speaking of Yuu, at first, I thought they would be in Aurora’s position, but what if it was Lilia instead? I mean, while I love the relationship between Yuu and Malleus, I don’t think they are close enough yet to push Malleus over the edge if anything happen to his first friend. Plus, in Ignyhide’s arc, Lilia had mentioned the probability of not living for long soon. And if anything happens to him, Idia, as his internet friend, would have a more personal reason to join into the battle.

I’m kinda worried that if Yuu could FINALLY get back to their world and it’s one of those one in a thousand years kind of magical circumstance, Malleus would sabotage the process and ruin Yuu’s only chance in their LIFETIME to go home, and that would totally destroy their friendship (possibly beyond repair) and breaking Malleus’ heart, leading to his overblot (does it have yandere vibes?). Maybe Yuu would for the first time fear him.

Oh wow. Whether the cause of Malleus’ overblot will be Lilia or Yuu, we know the feels will be strong.

#disney #twisted wonderland #twst #disney twisted wonderland #disney twst #twst yuu #twst silver #sebek zigvolt #lilia vanrouge #sleeping beauty #malleus draconia #twisted wonderland theory #twst theory #twisted wonderland theories #twst theories #mine

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ushidoux · 3 years

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Power Struggle - Ushijima x Reader

Summary: You’re set up on a blind date with a man who might just be your match. (~5.1k words)

Warnings: fem pronouns, fem!reader, blind date, exhibitionism, public sex

A/N: Part of @cherrytenko’s CEO collab! Surprisingly this is possibly the longest fic I’ve written as a oneshot and it’s a little softer than I expected it to be but please enjoy!

---

It’s about half past 6pm when you add the final touch to your makeup, a smear of matte lipstick (Rouge Hermes #48, to be exact), to your lips.

It’s not often that you’re able to leave work early but your mother and father had called you from overseas in the late afternoon, interrupting their own third honeymoon, to remind you of your final meeting for the day -

A date.

“I know you hate these things, but just go! You might like what you see,” your mother insisted over video chat, her voice muffled by the sound of wind whipping past her as she and your father cruised along on a shaky speedboat they’d purchased just for the day. You weren’t completely sure where they were, only vaguely aware that they were somewhere around Jeju Island, and not exactly sure why they still had phone service, but you weren’t going to ask too many questions.

“No obligation!” Your father adds, just out of view and yelling slightly.

Sure, never any obligations.

As you smack your lips in the mirror to smooth out the lip color, giving yourself a brief once-over to decide whether or not you feel the need to adjust your hair or if you will wear falsies or not, you frown ever so slightly, then let out a sigh.

You hate this.

This is the third “meeting” they’ve arranged for you this month, and they’d been at this for almost six months overall by now. This search for a ‘suitable husband’ was getting stale - not to mention, time-consuming - and you weren’t sure you would be willing to appease your parents any longer.

In fact, you weren’t exactly sure you were interested in a partner anymore. The clock would hit thirty any moment now, and the math of falling in love, getting married, having kids, and still heading a successful company no longer seemed to be adding up. You didn’t know how exactly to tell your sweet parents who were the picture of domestic bliss that they’d probably have to give up on the idea of grandchildren, and consider raising puppies instead.

Regardless, for the time being, you could still bother to meet this stranger for dinner.

There’s a clasp seal envelope atop your dresser - a portfolio that had been left on your desk by your father’s assistant at the beginning of the week - that still seems entirely too formal for the process. This is matchmaking, not a job application, was the first thought that came to mind once you realized the envelope held a set of photos, a resume and an admittedly curt but formally written statement reminiscent of a cover letter.

Ushijima Wakatoshi, the signature at the bottom of the letter read in an extremely neat script. He must be particularly organized and detail-oriented.

There were two pictures, one that looked almost like a passport photo and the other much more relaxed, where he was dressed casually in a t-shirt and pressed jeans, standing with his arms crossed beside a redheaded man whose smile was wide and infectious, his arm around his neck. You wondered if he picked those photos himself.

You’d perused the first photo much more carefully because you could see more of his face. He’s quite handsome, you’d admitted, the faintest warmth in your cheeks, but he seemed awfully uptight. For one, the look on his face was very neutral, not bothering to smile. He was clean shaven and his hair was close cropped at the edges, a woody brown that paired well with serious olive eyes. You wondered if he ever laughed out loud, and what he looked like when he did.

The taxi driver is prompt and waiting outside of the high-rise in which you live by the time you make your way down the elevator. The click of your heels is loud on the tile as you make your way past the revolving doors. As you slip into the back of the car, you wonder if you’re dressed too professionally. You may have forgone the women’s pantsuit, but you’re still wearing a feminine pantsuit-esque ensemble in a creamy beige - pink would have seemed too ditzy, white would have seemed a bit too innocent (not to mention risky) and yellow too juvenile.

You’re not sure why you’re thinking so hard about this, but really years of paying attention to your appearance in public, not being taken seriously because you’re pretty and young and your personality is more bubbly than bossy puts you on your guard, especially when it comes to first impressions.

The location appears to be an upscale sushi restaurant, the type that you have to call ahead for months to get a reservation unless you have some kind of special arrangement with the owner. A staff member checks you in and brings you to the back to a private room, and as you pass through the dimly lit hallway, clutching your purse a little too securely, a scene from a yakuza movie comes to mind.

“Your room, madam,” the young man nods and motions you to enter a room that is brightly lit enough that it is almost blinding, large and round as though you were in a fishbowl yourself. You look up and notice that even the ceiling is curved. Elaborate paintings hang off the wall.

He’s not here.

You glance at the attendant and he raises his eyebrows as though he is expecting you to say something. You must look surprised, and continue to look so as you remove your shoes to sit at one of the thin mattresses set before the low table.

You wish you’d worn stockings perhaps, tucking your bare feet beneath you in a casual seiza position. You can’t recall the last time you’ve been this traditional/formal, and the thought of a man you barely know already knowing what your feet look like bare bothers you just a bit.

The attendant pours water and then tea for two wordlessly and slips out of the room.

Your heart pounds once you’re finally alone. Why is this so intense?

You fidget nervously with the thin silver necklace you are wearing, looking for a menu. There is none so far. Just square plates, both chopsticks and forks (odd for sushi, you think), and a steaming cup of tea set right next to a sweltering crystal glass of ice cold water. Opposites.

For a fleeting moment, you actually wonder for once if this man will like you.

“My apologies, Ms. ___.”

You’re startled by a rich voice, a tiny gasp revealing that you’re more spooked than you realize, and your eyes shift towards the direction of the sound to see what looks like your date finally arriving in a hurry.

You instinctively readjust yourself onto your knees to look formal, then realize you should probably stand instead, but before you can get up he waves you to sit back down, now settling down himself across from you.

“I had intended to arrive early but quite a few things happened at the company to make that unfeasible.”

He said this while removing a suit jacket in a way that was in no way intended to be sexy, not at all, then let out what sounded like a single, semi-nervous chuckle.

Wordlessly, you replied with a nod, transfixed as you compared photography to reality. The photos didn’t do him justice, not at all. The suit jacket was picked up quickly by a waiter who you had forgotten was still in the room.

Ushijima extended an arm to you across the table, intending to shake your hand.

“Did you wait long?” He asks as you shakily take his hand for a handshake that consumes your hand almost entirely in his large one.

You shake your head, then embarrassed when you realize you aren’t using your voice, and add, “No, I didn’t wait long...”

“Are you hungry?” He replies, quickly. Your instinct is to say no, no you didn’t need anything, especially not from him, but you are pretty sure your stomach would growl loudly any minute now, and you’d only look like a fool.

Ushijima glances at the waiter, who finally hands the two of you menus.

“Please order anything you like.”

You look down, swallowing hard again, and for a moment it is difficult to focus on the unnecessarily elaborate handwriting on the menu.

Something about him already grates on your nerves and you couldn’t exactly pinpoint what. You could forgive people for being late, and you were used to people being a little forward, but something about the way he was both familiar and unfamiliar in the way he spoke to you seemed to veer into patronizing behavior.

Why wasn’t he nervous? Every man you’d sat across from in the past half a year had just a little waver in their voice when they spoke to you at some point, even those who had started off boasting their fancy degrees and their villas and their large bank accounts.

But he sits perfectly still, all broad shoulders, gently wafting cologne, and a gaze that is both disconcerting and impartial, so you don’t know what to think.

When you look up from the menu to him, his eyes are still heavily focused on you, and you can’t really fault him. There’s nothing else to look at in this room, after all.

You take this opportunity to tease him. No man has ever intimidated you before and this one is no different.

“Are you going to order anything? I barely saw you look at the menu.” Your voice is light and coquettish and it implies, all you’re doing is staring at me.

“I already know my order. I’ve been here enough times,” he replies, immune to the playfulness in your voice. You watch him roll up his sleeves as he answers, and take note of the shape of his hands as he takes a sip of tea.

Maybe you’re the one staring.

“Would you like a recommendation?” He offers as he sets the cup down.

You shake your head no, and wonder again why you’re making gestures instead of talking. He smiles as though he can read your mind.

Once the waiter takes your orders and leaves the room, you’re left in silence, facing your would-be partner. It’s a stalemate of sorts and you lose, asking the first personal question.

But you ask it semi-clinically, refusing to lose the upper hand. You’re not sure why there’s an upper hand, but there is, and it will be yours.

“I read a little about your company before arriving. You gave me quite a few details, which I appreciated,” you state, turning your head to the side politely to take a sip of tea yourself. “You’ve done very well for yourself as CEO,” you add.

His eyes don’t crinkle from the flattery. “My employees do great work at all levels so it’s only natural that there would be positive growth,” he replies matter-of-factly.

You smile politely, but this answer doesn’t give you very much information about him. He’s shifting the success away from him, you remark, however he accepts the compliment as though expected. Is this genuine humility or arrogance?

You lean very slightly forward, just enough to see if he’ll take the opportunity to glance down your blouse, as other suitors have invariably done. He doesn’t, and you proceed to ask the next question.

“What do you do outside of work?”

His eyebrows raise, and you wonder if it’s because he realizes you are pretending you didn’t read that section on his application, but he answers anyway.

“I don’t have very much free time, as you are probably aware, but I garden and paint. And of course, I like to keep fit through team sports.”

A quick look at him makes that last part quite clear. You clear your throat slightly and then it is silent again. It’s not exactly an uncomfortable silence, but it’s not comfortable either.

Just as you wonder why he isn’t asking you any questions, he suddenly speaks up.

“Pardon me if this sounds inappropriate, but you’re beautiful. Why would you need a matchmaking service?”

You’re taken aback, and while your brain is scrambling for understanding of what his intentions are, he adjusts his sitting position so that he’s cross-legged with both hands on his knees and lets out a sigh before continuing.

“You’re also accomplished and clearly articulate. I don’t imagine you’d have trouble finding a partner through more organic means.”

It seems like there are a million butterflies that suddenly inhabit the small space in the pit of your stomach. Again, you’re at a loss for words, something that is rare for someone as opinionated and cordially fierce as you.

Should you be offended? It’s almost as though he’s asking what’s wrong with you?

He asks frankly, “Why a blind date?”

You want to ask him the same question, but you hear the waiter return and you fall silent, letting the butterflies in your stomach die down.

---

“I-is this the first time - ah - you’ve done this?”

You’re no longer laid out on the tatami like you were just an hour earlier, Ushijima nibbling on your lower lip and your collarbones instead of the overpriced, high-quality fish that sat atop your table, but now laid under him, spread eagle save for the hands you use to hold on to his shoulders as he slowly and deliberately thrusts inside you.

Your voice is breathy and catches in your throat every time he moves, but you have to know. How often has he ended up like this?

The heat that fills your whole body now isn’t just from the shame of letting a stranger fondle your body in an upscale restaurant, it’s because Ushijima somehow knows exactly where and how to touch you, as though he’s always known. His fingers have traveled your body like a hiker on a well-beaten path, from the softness behind your earlobes to your squishy center and back, and now have settled into a hold that is firm yet gentle on your hips.

When he replies “no” with immense honesty, his mouth sinks into the crook of your neck and he goes just deep enough that you don’t have time to factor this new information into your impression of him.

So instead you savor the thickness that fills you and the strength that holds you close, the soft grunts that fill your ears before they get drowned out by your equally loud whimpers and moans.

---

You don’t spend the night, partially out of shame that Ushijima bedded you so quickly and partially because you have a full schedule for the next morning. The parting of ways is brief and awkward and you seem to feel it more acutely than he does.

“I enjoyed our time, Miss ___,” he offers. You’ve dressed up faster than he has so you find yourself unwittingly ogling at the expanse of his sculpted chest and the flex of his muscles as he redresses. You’re almost sad to see him cover up.

You nod and walk out of the room, trying your best to hide the fact that your legs feel far too wobbly to be walking on these heels.

---

“Miss ____?”

Your eyes widen as you realize you’ve been daydreaming through a meeting with the board of trustees and now the wrinkled old men who hated the fact that your father thrust you into leadership you “didn’t deserve” are staring at you with disgruntled expressions.

“Oh, um,” you think quickly, recalling where the presentation left off and glancing quickly at the notes you’d jotted down on a notepad before wondering why Ushijima hadn’t called or texted since you met two weeks ago.

“Um?” The most senior of the group repeats, and your stomach turns for a moment before you steel yourself. He bares his teeth every time he’s displeased with you and you get the impression of an ancient and disgruntled wolf.

You clear your throat loudly, and settle back in your chair, crossing your legs and your arms over your chest.

“I have some disagreements with the current approach, but I’ll start with the pertinent positives,” you start.

---

“Was the sex at least good?”

Your best friend from high school glances at you briefly, as you face forward on the Peloton you are riding side by side with her. She’s much less out of shape than you are given that she also is your personal trainer and thus rides hers effortlessly, taking some time to wait for you to respond.

You begrudgingly say yes.

“Wow, for once someone dropped you before you could drop them!” She teases in a sing-song voice. You would slap her on the shoulder if she was close enough and if you weren’t out of breath. It stings just a little bit that you’ve heard nothing from him nor the matchmaking company and don’t have a good response to tell your parents aside from I guess we didn’t click.

“He’s missing out, though.”

“Yeah, no shit,” you huff, and cycle faster. No hard feelings.

---

Scratch that, there were absolutely going to be hard feelings now that he was not just fucking with you but also with your livelihood.

Admittedly, it was strange that despite the fact that your companies had never crossed paths until now despite working in the same consumer domain but this was unacceptable.

You’d opened an email that had just slipped into your peripheral vision as you worked on reviewing a couple of interns’ executive summaries, only to find that Ushijima might have just royally fucked you over.

A curt email from a crucial business partner read,

We apologize but we’ve decided to move forward with Ushijima Industries instead. I understand that this is last minute, but we believe that it will be mutually beneficial to discontinue our relationship at this point in time.

Your blood boiled. What the fuck was this?

Your phone rang, one of your team leaders calling immediately and likely looking at the email at the same time you were. He apologized profusely.

“What happened?”

“It seems like they just showed up and offered twice as much as we offered them last minute.”

This bastard. Then in a moment of horror, you wondered if this was your fault, if you had blabbed a little while slightly tipsy off of sake, and revealed that you had this acquisition in the works.

Voice smaller now, you asked, “So we can’t do anything to woo them back?”

“No, I don’t think so. I just have to make sure our other deal doesn’t fall through,” the slightly frantic man answered, the sounds of keyboard keys clicking rapidly heard in the background of the call.

“Okay, thank you for your hard work,” you stated. “I’ll see what I can do,” you replied with a click.

Maybe calling someone who’d ghosted you as you drove home, fuming and irritated, wasn’t the best idea, but you needed to confront him somehow. The idea of being bested in more ways than one was too much to bear.

The phone rang once, twice, then three times, and you were getting angrier with every tone through the car speaker. You hung up in frustration.

How embarrassing.

You made it home still irritated, indulging yourself in a relaxing bath to quell your anger. By the time you had soaked for close to an hour, you were mad at yourself for reacting impulsively and now having your number in his phone as a missed call… if he recognized it anyway.

It turns out he did.

“Ms. ___, did you call me earlier? I wasn’t able to make it to the phone in time.”

His voice was even lower on the phone, a slightly gravelly quality making you wonder if he’d actually been napping or just had a smoke. You couldn’t imagine him doing either of these things.

“What kind of game are you playing, Mr. Ushijima?”

There was a bit of hesitation on the phone, and you let out a sardonic laugh once he replied, as expected, “What?”

“How did you know about that deal other than what I told you?”

He paused again, and you too, stood still, a towel wrapped around your still dripping body.

“I assure you, I have no idea what you’re talking about,” he then said, carefully. “I, uh… assume you were calling about something else.”

You grit your teeth. What the fuck else? The fact that he sounded genuinely confused only served to aggravate you further.

“Did you or did you not use the information I gave you to intercept my deal with MNY?”

Finally the lightbulb went on.

“Oh, that was you. Hm.”

If you’d been talking in person, you probably would have slapped him at this point. Or at least considered it.

“I didn’t know you were our competitor in that aspect. I… probably would have reconsidered if I had known.”

“Excuse me?”

That tone of over-familiarity, patronizing… the care when you’re not supposed to care was back and you realized you regretted this phone call.

“How would it be any different? Are you implying that you’d let me win?”

“No, of course not, I…” He trailed off. “Would you like to come over to my apartment and talk? I can give you my address, I would rather talk in person.”

Why? So I can get over there and end up fucking you again?

“I respectfully decline,” you answered curtly, and hung up, tossing your phone onto your bed and letting out an aggravated sigh.

---

The next morning, you leave an early executive meeting only to find that your office had been overrun with flowers between the hours of 7 to 8 am.

There are yellow roses, stating admiration, spilling out of an oversized bouquet on your desk and a separate bouquet of light red carnations and white camellias that imply that he finds you ‘adorable’. A white card is placed in the yellow bouquet, and on it is written Ushijima’s neat script - you realize it’s from him before you even finish reading the note.

I would like to see you again. Please accept my call around 6 pm.

Respectfully,

Ushijima Wakatoshi

Your hands hover over the wastebasket in your room with the flowers in your arms, but instead you sigh, and stuff them behind you on your shelf. At least you won’t have to see them while you work, but they’re pretty. They’re clearly bought from a floral shop, but you recall that he had said he gardened in his free time.

Ushijima calls promptly at 6 pm and you let it ring twice before deciding to block his number just as he’s calling. Something about the action is satisfying.

You can’t be won over with a couple of flowers and kind words. Women aren’t as easily swayed as he may think.

---

It’s another Friday, and surprisingly you haven’t been contacted for a blind date, whether it’s by your parents or the matchmaking service they’ve subscribed you to.

Maybe they’d gotten the message after you’d been ghosted that you were tired of this game. Maybe they were giving you a break. Maybe they’d run out of potential suitors. You were surprised, but not upset.

Ushijima had truly gotten under your skin.

After blocking his call, there were no more attempts at contact for the rest of the week. The only thing left to consider was that if you ever crossed paths in your careers, you would pay him back for snatching your investor.

And snatching your dignity in the process.

It was about 4 pm and most of the employees were wrapping up their tasks for the day. You usually aimed to have everyone out by 5, especially on Friday so this was boding well.

“Hey, Madam President, are you okay with an add-on?” You hear your secretary call from outside your door.

“Oh, I mean, I guess but-”

She’s already letting Ushijima through the door.

You smile sweetly, maintaining professional behavior as best you can, while your secretary leads him to an armchair across from you, up until she exits, your expression souring the moment she closes the door.

“Mr. Ushijima, what are you doing in my office?”

He’s settled into the chair so comfortably that it feels as though you’re in his office, not your own. He’s dressed more casually than he was at the restaurant, no suit jacket, just a brown V-neck sweater over a dress shirt that almost seems too tight and a pair of chinos. He’s also wearing a pair of glasses, which is new.

You hate that he looks good.

“Apologizing and requesting your company.”

He looks at you sincerely, his hands clasped together in his lap. You narrow your eyes.

“Please leave.”

He actually frowns, and the small action actually surprises you.

“Do you actually want me to leave or are you still upset about the investor? Because if it’s that, we can make an arrangement-”

“No, I’m upset because you did that after not following up after our one night stand!” You finally blurt out, then bite your lip realizing you might have said too much.

“I… got busy.”

“Busy screwing me over?” You quip.

He runs a hand through his hair, a nervous gesture.

“I didn’t call because I thought you didn’t like me.”

You’re a little stunned by this reply, then decide you don’t believe him. What was there not to like? At least at that point he hadn’t done anything wrong.

“Why would you think that?”

His hands leave his hair again and rest on his knees. You notice it seems like a default position for him.

“I’ve been referred to as ‘stiff’. It’s great at work but not great for relationships.”

Ushijima’s brutal honesty is again sending you for a loop. You raise an eyebrow, bidding him to continue. Your arms uncross and you rest your elbows on the table.

“So…?”

“So usually by the time I’ve had sex with someone, it’s all they’re after. And since you didn’t call, I assumed even the sex wasn’t good.”

You unwittingly burst into laughter. Here was this successful, attractive man with a perfect pedigree who was insecure about how good he was in bed?

His eyebrows furrow, and you recollect yourself, realizing that this is a bit cruel.

“You could have sent a text,” you murmur.

“I’m bad at starting conversations.”

You stifle another laugh. “So you just don’t?” You tease. It’s gently mocking but mostly incredulous. It seems that he’s the opposite of the confident man he appears to be.

“That’s why I got excited when you called but then you were upset.”

You purse your lips.

“I promise I didn’t intend to put you in a bad situation,” Ushijima insists.

You sigh, then offer him a small smile. “Are you normally this persistent?”

He glances at the flowers that are only partially hidden from view, which makes your face warm up bashfully, and then looks right back at you.

“No. I just like you.”

Again with the directness, a confidence that is effortless, even when he’s not confident at all.

You don’t want to melt but you do. So instead you rise and clear your desk, stuffing a few items into your handbag as you prepare to leave. He watches, unsure of what you’re up to, sitting still as you walk around towards him and place your hand lightly on his shoulder.

Your body faces the door, but you turn to the side to look at him and grin.

“I’m done with work for today. Take me out.”

---

A couple months later...

“Fuck, you’re - ah - they’re gonna know, I-” Your voice morphs into a mewl instead once his ring finger reaches just the right spot; you’re squirming as much as possible under his touch but he has you laid back on your work desk with both ankles rested on his shoulders and his weight leaning onto you to essentially keep you in place.

“Move your hands,” Ushijima whispers in a hushed tone, leaning in to kiss between your breasts as he readjusts your legs atop him. His pants are down and his cock is already up and ready, the base and swollen balls rubbing against your wet cunt that you are desperately trying to protect from his intrusion. You know there’s absolutely no way you’ll stay quiet when he’s pounding the shit out of you, he likes it entirely too rough, and the walls are thin. You don’t listen, continuing to reach for his hands to swat them away from you.

There’s a part of you that is almost certain that at the very least your secretary knows that every time Ushijima comes for a ‘meeting’, it really is just to fuck the shit out of you before you leave together for the evening, or to relax you right before you once again have to defend your dad’s establishment of you as Company President.

This isn’t a good look.

“I-I can’t…” you whine.

“You can,” he assures you.

He gently kisses your face before prying your hands out of the way and keeping them pinned up against you with one hand and guiding his trajectory with the other before sinking inside of you. You moan at the breach of your privates and he quickly presses his lips to yours to swallow the sound.

Once he’s bottomed out, he rolls his hips, and soon you start to see white once you climax, clenching and cumming around him.

“T-Toshi!” You moan his name, and he clasps a large hand around your mouth before continuing, picking up the pace as he fucks you through your orgasm. He can’t deny that he likes the fact that you’re noisy, that the fact that the heavy desk he’s fucking you against is making a squeaky noise that suggests he’s really putting some force behind these strokes, and that if anyone could see the two of you now, it could be an issue for both of your corporations. Misconduct, they would call it.

He doesn’t care and while you act like you do, you don’t really care either.

When he lets go of your wrists to use the edge of the desk as leverage and tilts backwards, you scream in pleasure, a terribly obvious sound, and it’s enough to have him tip over and spill into you with a groan. He collapses onto you and the two of you almost slip onto the floor, but don’t; you wrap your arms around him.

Your hair is disheveled and so is his, and your legs are sticky with sweat and cum. You sigh, letting him soften inside you and stroke his hair.

“You’re getting me in trouble,” you murmur, and he lets out a breathy laugh.

“We don’t really have to answer to anyone, do we?” He replies with a smirk, and pecks you one more time on the lips.

He’s right - only you two are a match for each other.

#ushijima x reader #ushijima wakatoshi x reader #ceo!ushijima x reader #ceo collab #ushijima wakatoshi smut #ushijima smut #haikyuu smut #not sfw #fic: power struggle #mae.writing #hqintheclub

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spices-and-cherries · 3 years

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valentine’s day blues

BENOIT BLANC X READER

I’ve been wanting to do a hanahaki disease fic for a while, so I’ve been working on this off and on as I try to muster up the energy to write out a few requests. This is also a bit short, so I apologize for that!

I did not reference race, gender, sexuality, or physical appearance. If I missed something, please let me know so I can change it!

Warnings: hanahaki disease, mentions of murder, angst

Masterlist:

One man was known to have had it for seven years before dying, the object of his affections leading him on for over half of that time. Another had realized his love a little too late, minutes before she had taken her last breath. They were buried next to each other. There was even a woman who had killed her lover after finding out he had been with others and then killed herself. Dried up, yellow carnations had been found in her lungs during the autopsy report.

None of this is to say that the hanahaki disease only ends in heartbreak and death, but those fairytale endings are rare. Even most doctors won't even see patients if they have it because the survival rate is so low.

It happened on Valentine’s Day and the irony was far from lost on you. In fact, if it wasn’t so damn painful, it might’ve actually been a little funny in a sick and twisted way.

You had been harboring a little spark of... attraction towards a man at work for some time now. For months, you had protected it and held it close to your heart, refusing to let anything snuff it out. But shielding a tiny flame from wind and rain for almost a year is tiring. In retrospect, it’s not surprising that you let desperation and wishful thinking and hope get the better of you as you walked by a little men’s boutique you had previously never looked twice at.

In the window you had spotted a gift that you were sure he would like. It was a set of simple, gold cufflinks with the letter B pressed in the center. The box that they came in was just as nice, a wine color with the boutique’s name written in a delicate silver cursive.

That night, you stared at that little box for hours, running every possible scenario through your mind - the bad outnumbering the good - until you felt sick to the stomach. The feeling stayed with you all night and through your commute to work, all the way up to the very moment you set the little box in his hand later that afternoon.

He had looked at you with a mix of confusion and something you couldn’t quite place, but had accepted it graciously. Later that night, you had gotten a text.

Thank you for the kind gift. - B

You don’t know what you were expecting the next day, but Cupid’s lesser known brother, Heartbreak, shot a deadly arrow right through your heart. It was all the more painful after receiving what you considered to be a rather cryptic message.

He didn’t wear the cufflinks.

Was it because he didn’t like it? Was the gesture too forward? Maybe you should’ve written more than just a simple, ‘thank you for your hard work’?

Maybe he just didn’t like you back.

It started with a feeling of sadness that seeped up from your toes, quickly followed by despair that froze your fingers, and then rejection gripped your throat and dug its long nails in.

You wait until you get home to start crying. Seconds after closing your front door, you found yourself breaking down. It as though your body had given up just as much as you had because before you knew it, you were gasping for breath on the floor. Even in the moment, you couldn’t figure out why it had affected you so much, but your brain was already in overdrive. All of your insecurities were pouring through and you became acutely aware of how Pandora’s box must have felt. The relief that came with the opportunity to finally let all your emotions out was dampened with knowing the damage was done.

And that is how you got to where you are now, gagging over the toilet bowl in a desperate attempt to get the last bits of flower from your throat. Even an idiot would know what was going on, but as an officer of the law you are intimately aware of what havoc the hanahaki disease could bring.

The moment the red carnation - even redder with your blood staining it - hit the palm of your hand, you knew what it meant and your tears had never tasted so bitter.

-----

Happy Valentine’s Day!

- Violet

#benoit blanc x reader #benoitblanc #benoit blanc #x reader #daniel craig #angst #fluff #romance #unrequited love #thats actually not #mutual pining #idiots in love #hanahaki disease #au #happy valentine's day

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rae-gar-targaryen · 3 years

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loved you once, part two [angel reyes x fem!reader]

A/N: Muahahahaha. IT’S HERE!I know, it’s been over a month. And I’m really sorry for that. But HOLY SHIT, the traction “loved you once’ got was way more than anything I could ever have imagined or expected. I am just so grateful to everyone for reading. For the people I’ve met and gotten to know since engaging in the Mayans fandom and posting fic. Honestly, this wouldn’t exist without you.

For this part, as before I invented a tattoo and an ex-girlfriend for Angel, and I fudged the timeline a bit and added some elements from season three in here. You’ll know them when you see them. Also, if you can tell me where Frida’s date comes from, you win a cookie, and maybe a hug from me.

Part one was based on "Loved You Once" by Clara Mae, this part was definitely moreso based on "You Broke Me First" by Tate McRae. And "After Hours" by the Weeknd. Honestly, the playlist for this fic is a sad, horny mess. You wanna cry, but feel confusedly turned on by it? I may drop the link.

As always, if you want a tag in anything I write for Angel, EZ, the Mayans fandom (or anything else), please feel free to send me a message or an ask, or add yourself to the taglist (link in profile).

Pairing: Angel Reyes x fem!tattoo artist!reader (aka Frida -- as always, the appearance is ambiguous, but the reader is described as having female pronouns/parts. I do imagine a latinx reader, but I hope I’ve written this so you can imagine yourself with no restriction.); also slight Frida x other, and slight Coco x Frida.

Word Count: 23.4K (I KNOW, OKAY?) of ANGST! Half-baked simile and overbaked metaphor. Heartbreak swathed in honey-sweetness, and biting frustration. But maybe, ultimately, the balm of peace?

Warnings: ANGST, non-explicit references to infidelity, sexual references and sexual content, descriptions of sex, fingering, oral (female receiving) so 18+ ONLY, please! Canon-typical douchebaggery, references to a past relationship, song references and poetry. (It is me, so yeah, poetry). This honestly feels just like a compendium of heartbreak.

Summary: You and Angel have been broken up for a while. After the ill-fated run-in at the patch party, will you continue on as you have? Or is it the push you both needed to reconnect? Angel loved you once; will you love him again?

Read part one here.

---

It doesn't snow in Santo Padre.

It's not that you enjoyed being cold, or particularly wanted snow. But a part of you had always romanticized the concept of a “classic” winter -- the feeling of crystalline fluff tumbling from the heavens to dust your cheeks and lashes, bathing your surroundings in an ocean of chilly silver-white. Of retreating from the exterior world's glacial crispness and into the warmth of your home, bathed in an orange-golden glow, the cinnamon-y scent of something baking.

Of falling into the arms of your beloved, someone who would seep the chill from your bones with his warm embrace, kissing the tip of your cold nose. Who would admire the snowflakes caught in your lashes before they melted away as he presses his lips to yours. Cherishing you and cradling your cheeks as he does so, like you're the snowflake he's afraid will melt away.

But it doesn't snow in Santo Padre. Your idyllic winter fantasy is not to be. No snowflakes, no cinnamon; even the man of your reality is, in truth, much harsher than that of any winter chill you could’ve dreamt up on your own.

In the real world, your romance with Angel bloomed, despite the dying light of mid-January. And nearly a year later, it felt like the true harshness of winter had come to your doorstep when you were, quite literally, left out in the cold. Not exactly the stuff of dreams. You know what they say, be careful what you wish for. This frigid winter was inhospitable, and worse than you could have ever imagined.

The stinging numbness of Angel’s harsh treatment of you and subsequent departure left you with frostbitten limbs and an icy heart.

The chill had subsided, had melted away from your bones some in the passing months...

Until a few weeks ago. At that damned patch party that you were foolish enough to attend, despite knowing full well who would be in attendance.

That had gone famously.

Aneesa had come by the next day to drop off your gear, your books, and a wad of cash you’d tried to push off, but that she’d insisted was from Bishop for the night’s work.

“So you are alive,” she’d snipped, her annoyed expression melting into one of sympathy when she’d taken in the shadowed look in your eyes, the sunken nature of your shoulders. How you’d shed your party clothes for one of Angel’s old t-shirts he’d left at your place and never come by to reclaim, something you hadn’t done in a while. And if you were honest with yourself (something you were a little afraid to be in this moment of weakness), you knew it was wildly unhealthy to still have it-- let alone to take comfort in wearing it. To want to take comfort in anything to do with Angel.

Though Aneesa hadn’t been in the room when it had all gone down, otherwise occupied with Gilly, she’d heard more than enough from Coco and EZ, Gaby standing to the side with an empathetic expression as EZ recounted how Angel had basically run you off the property in his insistence to speak to you. How you’d looked ready to burst.

You’d apologized, of course, for not responding to her texts and calls. For worrying her. She’d waved the apologies away, opting to scoop you into her signature warm embrace. But it wasn’t just Aneesa.

The texts from that night went unanswered, despite the near-constant buzzing of your phone.

It had nothing on the buzzing of the thoughts in your own head, replaying just what-the-fuck had happened at that party.

“I care, Frida.”

“... and if I wanted you back?”

“Please, querida.”

Frida, this. Querida, that. Honestly, it was too much.

You were smart to get out of there. You were right to get out of there. You’d said what you’d needed to say in that moment, even if it didn’t scratch the surface of everything you’d wanted to say to Angel since he tossed your shit in a box all those months ago.

You’d almost thought you were back in mid-winter, with the chill that had resided in your bones after you’d gone home, hands shaking and clammy with the nerves from confronting Angel. Your skin felt like it was vibrating on a different frequency. Nauseous. And as you’d slid into bed that night, all you could feel was the cavernously empty side of your bed, threatening to swallow you whole. And not for the first time did you wish it would snow. It would be warmer than the perpetual bleak chill you felt everywhere since Angel had left you.

Now, in the sweltering heat of late summer, the season’s defiant final push before it shunts away into cooler autumn, you find yourself back in your shop. Ever-grateful for central air as you watch the waxy sunshine and passersby through the glass door.

You were leaned over the counter, idly sketching, when the telltale ding signalled the shop’s door opening.

As you looked up and saw just who was making his way in, ever-present gentle thunk and squeak of his boots meeting the linoleum, you were struck with visions of your life a year and a half ago, when this very sight had been what started it all.

A sight that should have been a welcome one -- your man walking into your workplace to greet you on a break with a kiss on the cheek; or, at the very least, what should have been a cherished memory -- the ineluctable meeting with the person you’d thought you’d spend the rest of your life with … all of it was tainted now by the actual sight of him walking to the counter for the first time in a long time (but not nearly long enough, given everything), hands stuffed in his pockets. His eyes were fixed on his feet as he put them one in front of the other on his way to where you stood.

There was no easy lean on the counter. No self-confident rapping of his ringed knuckles against the hardwood. No smirking grin.

The Angel before you was a sulking shell of the man who had blown into your life a year and a half ago with his practiced flirtation and his warm, ochre eyes. Maybe 'Clara Forever' should have been more of a red flag than you'd originally lent it. But you weren't reading between the lines then, content with perusing the beauty of the surface poetry that was the man you'd met.

The man now? Between the lines was all you were reading. How could you trust the surface? After everything. This man was mussed hair and tired eyes, overgrown scruff and rumpled jeans you were sure he’d rolled out of bed in. Despite his disheveled appearance, your guard was still up. You knew how easily Angel slipped beneath your skin, like pin-pricking bolts of easy silk gliding seamlessly into your bloodstream, taking you over before you even knew he was wrapping you up, away, and into himself.

To say you were grateful for the buffer the counter provided between the two of you would be a massive understatement. It may as well be Everest, because there was no damned way you were going to let him scale it and press his way even further into your day, let alone back into your life.

You were silent as you watched Angel unstuff his large hands from the pockets of his kutte and shift a little from foot to foot. You crossed your arms over your chest, flexing in your impatience, and waited for him to speak.

He looked up at you, sullen eyes meeting your shrewd ones for the first time since that night on the clubhouse porch.

Oh. And Angel’s eyes had always held so much emotion. You knew you’d said it before, thought it before -- Angel’s feelings were his worst-kept secret, ever bubbling beneath the surface but inevitably bursting through like greenery through the cracks of stone. Spilling molten lava.

Bleeding hearts on a very crisp sleeve.

Today, they were glistening; but not with rage or definitive humor. You saw shame. You saw remorse. You had half a mind to tell Angel just where he could shove those feelings, and then he spoke, cracking the brittle, tense silence between the two of you with the gravelly timbre of his voice

“You, uhhhh, got any space for me today?” You had to hand it to him, Angel’s question was unexpected; his eyes left yours to take in the empty chairs at the back of the shop.

You shuddered a little with your exhaling sigh, internally bemoaning the fact that you were alone to face this as you chewed over just how you could answer. Olí had gone to the bakery a few blocks down to procure some late-morning cafecito. You immediately thought of texting him, begging him to come back and save you from the inherent awkwardness of this situation. But you knew he was likely caught in the line of the belated rush. And eager to flirt with the barista.

On your own again, then. Left to battle with your own emotions, and to face the minefield that were Angel’s. To face the consequences your admittedly-childish and flippant exit the night of the party had wrought. And if you were honest with yourself, you were not ready for this. Not quite ready to face the music (music that, to you, sounded like every clichéd, sad song you’d played ad nauseum since Angel had pushed you aside, causing you to unintentionally meet the quotient of every breakup truism).

What was it they said? Clichés are clichés for a reason?

You pulled yourself from the mire of your own thoughts with the sluggish carefulness of a child unsticking their boots from thick mud, hating the way Angel’s eyes shone now with hopefulness as he awaited your answer.

Was he fucking serious?

You uncrossed your arms, sighing loudly now before you answered him.

"My books are full," you said simply, shrugging. “Sorry.” Though you clearly weren’t, your clipped words plinking through the tense air like chips of ice.

Angel looked around the empty shop, eyebrows lifting as he took in the underlying meaning to your statement.

“You got no one in here,” he responded, trying to keep his instant and rushing frustration at the situation at bay. He’d come here to try to talk to you. To hopefully appease your mood by coming to your turf to do so. Make something easy for you. Couldn’t you see that?

You stood unmoving, studying him keenly, almost like you were wagering with yourself on just how long it would take his frustrations to boil over.

You weren’t about to cave so easily.

“Dunno what to tell you, Angel,” he’d quirked up at the way you said his name, almost like a little puppy, and you tried not to let yet another icy shard wedge its way into your heart at his behest, slightly disgusted with yourself for how you defaulted to the desire to smooth the wrinkle from his brow, to cup his cheeks and kiss away the worry you saw behind his eyes. Even after everything, your first instinct -- your first desire -- was to nurture him. But you told yourself since the patch party that you would be resolute.

Even if on the inside your heart was frozen, but your resolve was melting.

“My books are full,” you repeated, holding up the datebook where you kept your schedule and making a show of flipping through the obviously-sparsely scheduled pages. “No room for you here.”

The line across Angel’s quizzical brow deepend, ochre eyes hardening into a slate frown. His upper lip curled slightly in annoyance, and as he caught his breath on the inhale, you could see him physically resist the urge to snap at you.

“A lotta white on those pages, querida,” he bit out, starting to lean forward in the direction of the counter, weight on the balls of his feet.

You closed the pages to your datebook primly, placing it on the counter and folding your hands over where the book rested.

“No sé a qué te refieres.” I don’t know what you mean. You gestured at the empty chair behind you. “Business is booming. Now, if you want something done, Olí has openings next week. Or I can have him call you if he has a cancellation. Other than that, I surely can’t help you,” you shrugged, refusing to meet his eyes.

You may have sounded tough -- cold and distant to your own ears, even. Angel may have been convinced. But you knew that if you looked him in the eye now, he would see the cracks in the already thin veneer that was your display of disinterest. Better to keep your head down, so to speak. Lest he see just how false your sense of bravado truly was.

“Frida …” Angel slowly reached across the counter, holding out an arm to touch yours.

You took a deliberate step back, just out of his arm’s reach, your eyes blazing now as he curled his fingers back and dropped his hand once more to his side. You shook your head.

“Am I speaking something you don’t? I already said I can’t help you." You pointed to the door, “That’s your cue to go. I have a client waiting.”

You'd had to hand it to yourself. Despite the depression-gymnastics your insides were doing, you were putting up a good front.

With that, you jabbed the finger pointing at the door, now over your shoulder at your empty chair.

You were nothing if not adamant. Angel supposed he’d deserved that. At the very least, he’d deserved that.

Angel exhaled, rolling his eyes a little at your unwillingness to engage with him, before holding his hands up in surrender, retreating.

Your heart was pounding in time with his steps to the exit. Were you really going to let him walk away -- keep walking away -- from you? Was he really going to say nothing else?

Angel gave you one last look before turning on his heel and making his way toward the exit of the shop.

You don’t know what possessed you to say it. Maybe your inner masochist wasn’t done playing “Operation” with your feelings -- perhaps it was the gnarling, twisting fear you felt at seeing him walk away again, and maybe this time for good. But, as Angel reached the door, you called out,

“If you want an appointment, you’d better call first. You know what they say about walk-ins. Always risky.”

Fuck. And you were doing so well.

Angel glanced over his shoulder at you, full brows raised in mild surprise at your flimsy olive branch, wrapped in reference to your first meeting. He nodded mildly to acknowledge he’d heard what you’d said, his shoulders shifting beneath his kutte as he pushed the door open and walked back out into the hazy heat.

Huh. Guess you had more to say to him, after all.

----

"¿Flores, Angelito? ¿Para mi?" You asked in mild surprise, a little giggle bubbling from your lips as you took in the man before you with his short-sleeved flannel beneath the kutte, his thick, ringed fingers clutched around the bunched stems of an impressive-looking bouquet.

The few dates you had been on with Angel at this point were all sweet. You’d never had much of a sweet tooth, but … there was a first time for everything. And Angel Reyes made you want to indulge.

He had texted you the night before, asking if you'd like to meet him at the park the next day for some coffee, and maybe a walk.

"A walk?" You'd teased. "So old-fashioned, Angelito. Will we be supervised on this walk?" You drummed your nails against your thigh while you awaited his response, the bubbles in the corner of your screen popping up to indicate Angel was answering.

"Not the first time I've been told I needed adult supervision. But I think you're up to the task," he'd answered. Followed by a "winking" emoji.

Before you could type a similarly-cheeky response, he was typing again. A double-text.

"No need to involve anyone else in our business."

You chuckled at that. You'd give Angel Reyes that one. He certainly was charming.

He'd met you as planned the next morning, proffering you the cluster of blooms. An unexpected gift.

"¡Que bonita!" You accepted the bouquet, admiring the starshine sprigs of queen Anne's lace that were nestled between the soft pink pastel peonies and crisp swaths of greenery. You stood, rocking up to your tiptoes to press a kiss to Angel's cheek. "Gracias, guapo."

As you dropped back onto your feet, you took in the mildly flustered expression on Angel's face, rewarding him with another light giggle.

"Yeah, well…" Angel scrubbed his hand along the back of his neck. He had a habit of that, you noted. Was he nervous? "Seemed right, right? Since I've got flowers from you, and all.." he trailed.

"I love them, Angel," you assured. "You didn't have to get me anything. I was just happy to have coffee with you."

On that note, you turned to the bench you had been waiting on, two cups of still-piping coffee in the little corrugated to-go carrier. You plucked one from its nest and handed it to Angel, popping the little plastic flip-top on the lip of the cup, blowing on it a tad to cool it, before handing it to Angel.

You’d done it so seamlessly, he wondered if you truly realized what you had done, a cute little gesture of caring that -- the more he thought about in hindsight, the more he realized -- were the kind of gestures that exemplified and embodied you. He couldn’t help but stare down from his height in admiration of you.

“I assume you take it black?” you chirped. “If not, I grabbed packets,” you gestured at the little four-cup carrier, packets of cream and sweetener stuffed into one of the empty holders.

He chuckled a bit at that, taking a small moment to admire you the moment you turned back toward the bench, your beauty in the late-morning sun as it streaked solar beams making your hair shine like a resplendent halo, the aura of it soft and reflective against the apples of your cheeks, ethereal.

He appreciatively noted your own tattoos, streaks of ink awash against your skin and flashing beneath the ridden-up sleeves of your hoodie as you reached forward to grab your own cup from the carrier.

You deposited the empty holder and packets into the trash, bringing your own cup to your lips and turning back toward Angel,

“Shall we?” You tilted your head toward the path encircling the park.

Angel took deep sips of his coffee, seemingly immune to the heat, and savoring the rich flavor as you walked by his side.

Asbestos mouth, you thought, amused with yourself and your thought at Angel’s ability to slug the piping hot liquid without even flinching.

For his part, Angel appreciated that you didn’t feel the need to compulsively fill the silence-- content to sip your respective “wake-up” cups, walking side-by-side and enjoying the sun’s tender, teasing warmth while basking in the other’s company.

Angel didn’t know what made him say it, but in this moment, with you looking so perfect as you did, it felt like the moment to share a little piece of himself,

“My mom used to bring me here when I was a kid, ya know?”

You looked up at him from beneath your lashes, not breaking your stride, “That’s sweet,” you acknowledged. “I can just imagine you and Ezekiel running her ragged while you play. Do you and she ever come back here together?"

Angel balked at your question. It struck him in moments like these, just how truly new you were to the self-contained corner of the universe that was Santo Padre, a vacuous and arid black hole that the rest of space and time forgot. It didn’t occur to him that there was anyone in town who didn’t know what had happened to Marisol Reyes.

He stopped walking, unsure how to answer your question. You caught on to the change in pace, turning to meet him where he stood.

“She, uh… she’s dead,” he said, softly and simply. He couldn’t deny the truth, and certainly didn’t see the point in being dishonest about it.

“Oh,” you breathed. “Shit, Angel, I-- I’m so sorry,” you quickly wrapped your arms around him, mindful not to spill your coffee on him as you brought your hands around his waist. “I didn’t -- I didn’t mean to ask … I didn’t know.”

At first, Angel’s body had stiffened when you made contact with his torso. But he quickly relaxed into the hug, tilting his chin down to rest atop your head, bringing one arm around to gently pat your back, to reassure you that your innocent question hadn’t done any harm.

“S'okay, querida, it happened a while ago. Like you said, you didn’t know.”

The two of you gently parted from your embrace, you leaning forward to run a reassuring hand over his bicep, genuine empathy emanating in the gesture.

“Well, this isn’t heavy at all,” as you withdrew from Angel, you hunched your shoulders at the mild discomfort you felt having brought up something painful for him. “Nothing like some light conversation on a casual coffee date,” you chuckled nervously.

Angel had the good grace to smile at that, his easy expression a gesture of mercy on your flip-flopping conscience.

“I mean,” you carried on, “I know you don’t know me all that well, but… if you ever want to talk, ever need anything, I’m here. I didn’t mean to dig at any old wounds,” you murmured, sincerely, but sheepishly.

“Really, querida, it’s OK,” he reassured. “I didn’t bring it up to be … depressing, or nothing... I have nothing but good memories with her here,” Angel took a long sip of his coffee, nodding at you slightly and resuming his previous pace.

He pointed over to the swings on the other side of the large lawn, “She used to push me and EZ. Would cheer for us when we got higher. And ... if Pop was working late, and we wanted to play, she’d grab his glove and bring it to play catch with us, even if the damn thing was too big for her hands,” Angel smiled as he looked over at the lawn. “She woulda liked you, you know?”

He nodded to himself in assurance at his own words, confident in his assessment of your character through the lens of his mother’s memory.

Your breath caught at that, taken with the compliment. You smiled gently when Angel turned to face you again.

“It would have been an honor to know her,” you said, sincerely. “Sounds like she was a wonderful woman.”

“She was,” Angel agreed, easily slipping his hand into yours as the two of you continued to walk, his thumb tracing the back of your hand. “I just hope I never lose that. Never forget her.”

Angel’s words gave you pause, struck with your default instinct to nurture. You were no stranger to loss. Who was, really? Not wishing that pain upon anybody, you imparted wisdom that had, in turn, been impressed upon you in your own similarly-sad moments:

“You won’t,” you assured, taking your hand from his, trailing your fingers up his wrist and to his forearm, tracing your thumb over the sprig of rosemary you had etched into his skin a few weeks prior. “¿Por recuerdo, sí? For remembrance? You remember her in moments like these, where you share her with others. That’s not something you’ll lose, Angelito. Because she lives on in you. And your brother.”

Angel was silent for a moment.

Worried you had somehow overstepped -- when weren’t you feeling that way with Angel? Could you ever just mind your own business without spilling clichés like some kind of poetic dimestore vending machine, or a stale-ass fortune cookie? He hadn’t asked for you to --

But Angel hadn’t said anything to put you down. As a matter of fact, he was just standing there… looking at you with that face again. What did that face mean?

Angel regarded you with a peachy-hued gaze of adoration, your words stirring something in him. But when weren’t they? Would everything you said always make him feel this way? He had learned from the day you’d met, and your first date, that you were thoughtful. Generous with your thoughts and your empathy. Willing to give to others, but reserved with your own heart.

And as he held your gaze, he was lightning-struck with the desire to make you feel safe enough to share your everything with him; wanted to kiss your pretty mouth and share every story from his life with you. Wanted to leech any pain from your pretty bones and replace it with the security of his affection.

The thought might have scared him, if he had given them a second longer in that moment. Never before had he truly desired to share these things with another.

You were dangerous that way, Angel decided. A real sleeper hit.

He tilted his head down, bringing his free hand to gently graze the high part of your waist with his fingertips, pressing his lips softly to yours.

Every kiss with Angel was a novel experience, a lesson buried in a newly-cracked book you couldn't wait to turn every page of. He kissed fully, sweetly. At times, he kissed like the languid, steady pour of warm, thick syrup over waffles, overwhelming your every pore. Other times, he kissed like a bonfire -- passionate, smoky, hazy and stuttering in its fervor to reach the height of its burn.

Now, he kissed you like honey, spliced with a crisp zing of orange zest, all sweetness and light. His hand on your waist a grounding reminder of your place on this earth beside him. But the longer you tasted it -- the heavier it became, filling you with a rush of sugary affectations, awash with your desire.

You break the kiss to cut the cloying taste, just as much as you'd needed air.

Angel’s gaze upon you as you broke apart was heavy-lidded and weighted with some emotion you couldn’t (or wouldn’t dare, just yet) to name… his full lips dragged into a low, lazy smirk, watching as you giggled lightly, nervously.

“So …” you trailed, making a vague gesture toward your stomach. “The butterflies. Not just a first date thing with you. Good to know,” you nodded, more to yourself than to him.

A genuine little barking laugh escaped Angel’s lips at that, his amusement and rush of adoration for you compelling him to bend down once more and press a soft kiss to the side of your head.

“You are something, Frida.”

The two of you resumed your walk, you teasingly bumped your hips into Angel’s as you spoke again,

“Since we’re sharing about when we were kids -- I always wanted to be a dancer, you know? My dad used to take me to classes. But I was… fucking awful,” you giggled. “I was better with my hands than on my feet.”

"I'm sure you are," Angel snickered, quicker than you were...

Your eyes widened when you realized what you’d said,

“I -- not like that. You know damn well what I mean,” you made a vague gesture in the air like you were holding a pen and sketching. "You know I'm good with my hands. I freehanded that, didn't I?"

You nodded toward Angel’s arm once more.

“Sí, sí, you’re Frida, after all,” Angel decided not to make a joke at your accidental double-entendre. “It's your hand, but it's also your eye. Your spirit.”

And if Angel was more honest with himself -- and with you -- in that moment, he could have gone on -- “And in your heart, something inscrutable.” Not that he was one for too much, too soon with any woman.

"--But I'm sure you can dance Frida," Angel continued, gently knocking your shoulder with his own as the two of you continued to walk.

"And how would you know that?" You teased. "I'm only left feet." As if to demonstrate your own self-deprecating point, you swung one foot behind yourself in a reverse-kick as you walked, an attempt to softly, jokingly kick Angel’s behind. But you’d woefully miscalculated the height differential between the two of you, your leg not extending high enough to reach its target, causing you to stumble and pitch off-balance.

Angel scooped you in one arm before you could even begin to fall.

“Already tryna kick my ass? Damn, mama, I try to compliment you and this is what I get?”

Angel’s arm was warm around your waist, the result of his successful rescue to keep you from falling. Maybe you were glad with the stunt you’d pulled, if it resulted in him scooping you into his arms like something out of an old movie.

“Yeah, well I may not be able to kick your ass now. But give me time,” your voice had taken on a breathy quality, overwhelmed by Angel’s proximity to you. “But I did tell you I couldn't dance.”

“Whatever that was aside,” Angel shrugged before replying, as simply and matter-of-factly as though he was telling you the sky was blue, “I know you’d be a hell of a dancer.” He gazed down at where you were held against him before continuing,

"How could something about you not be beautiful?"

---

Now, you were squirming in your seat as you sat in one of your favorite restaurants in town, the familiar ambience not enough to assuage your nerves. Not only were you unused to the feeling of the summer dress and heeled wedges you had donned for the first time in your post-Angel months, you were similarly unused to the company.

Even if the man across from you had been the perfect gentleman thus far.

Christopher was suave, sleek in his black button-up and expensive-looking dress pants, tattoo peeking from the buttoned collar of his shirt, adorning his throat in a way you found regal. He was far too overdressed for this mid-level, casual dining. But you figured that on the first few dates, you should keep it light. A cup of coffee here, a quick lunch at a food truck there.

The two of you had met when you were perusing your options, mulling over your selection of the perfect avocado at the supermarket. You didn’t see the man on the other side of the display, reaching for the same fruit as you, and you brushed hands. The two of you chuckled and made light conversation, and then went on your merry errand-running ways. Perhaps it would have ended there if you didn’t see him two days later at the bookstore.

At that point, you had to say something. You took note of the novel in his hands, and by the end of the encounter, he had smoothly asked you to coffee on your next day off. You had liked his firm handshake when he had introduced himself, and the warmth behind his eyes. His smooth voice that sounded like a crime, too suave and beautiful to be legal.

Had the whole thing been a little rom-com for your taste? Sure.

Were you a little afraid to get out there again after the absolute shitshow the last few months had been? No shit, Sherlock.

Were you keenly aware of the way Christopher’s dark eyes danced with mischief the same way Angel’s did? That he had the same keeled, low-pitch to his voice?

Fuck that. You weren’t going to shoot yourself (and someone else) in the foot because you were too busy lugging around heavy, distinctly Angel-shaped baggage. You resolved to give Chistopher an actual chance.

And this was the first time you had sat down indoors together for a prolonged period. The first date-date.

To say Aneesa was ecstatic when you told her about your plans with Christopher would be an understatement.

“Girl, you know he’s gonna treat you. That man is smooth as hell, darling,” she called from the depths of your closet, mocking Christopher’s deep voice that you had relayed to her in your recap of the encounter, while she tossed out dress after dress in her mission to dress you in what she dubbed “the date ‘fit to end all date ‘fits.”

She had outdone herself. You felt gorgeous.

And while there were no homemade sandwiches, and your favorite worn jeans were tucked away at home, you had to admit that Christopher was doing one hell of a job at making you feel wooed. And maybe Aneesa was right when she said that maybe “new” was a good thing.

You and Christopher had laughed your way through dinner. He didn’t talk much about his work, but was very interested in hearing about your job, and seeing photos of finished pieces from your ‘gram.

“Damn, mama, you drew that?” He asked appreciatively. “You got an eye for the beautiful things.”

You felt heat rush through your cheeks and down across your collarbones at his words, preening beneath his smoky praises.

"Well, I'm out with you, aren't I?" You flirted back gently, smiling into your glass of wine.

The easy smirk Christopher rewarded you with was swoon-worthy to say the least.

Who was she? You were impressed with yourself. Gone was the fumbling girl rife with awkward, unintentional double entendre that you were with Angel. This Frida was a smooth motherfucker, making a man like Chris smile.

He, in turn, showed you photos of his son, beaming with pride while he talked about his son’s winning science fair project.

He had confided in you that, normally, talk of a kid on the first date could be a deal-breaker.

“But you seem like the kinda woman who ain’t afraid of an up-front man,” he had said.

If he only knew.

As the date was winding down, Christopher gave you a kiss on the cheek as he departed the table to use the restroom while awaiting the check.

You smiled to yourself, using the moment alone to glance down at your phone, basking in the champagne-warm, fizzy feeling of a date gone well. Of mutual attraction and reciprocal attention. When you looked up and out of the glass doors of the restaurant you saw him. The champagne feeling gone, dousing you like ice-water; as quickly and sharply as it had come, it was gone.

And he saw you, too.

Oh fuck.

Through the glass, Angel appraised your sundress, your makeup, your styled hair. You saw the decision on his face the moment it was made.

He fucking wouldn’t.

Oh, but he fucking would. Ever one to place his heart before his own head, Angel reached for the handle, entering the restaurant and making a beeline for you, past the hostess stand. Until his biker boots carried him to your table, where he noted the napkin tossed on Christopher’s side of the table, the companion chair slightly pulled back.

He glanced at the empty plates on the table before raking his eyes up your crossed legs beneath the table, and up to yours, taking in the blaze resonant in your gaze.

Fuck, you were hot when you were mad.

Not giving him a chance to speak, you piped up first, voice hard and laced with boxcutter edges and vinegar,

“You need to leave, Angel,” you seethed.

It was apparent to Angel, even in his slightly-tipsy haze (you hadn’t caught onto his mild impairment, thank God) just what you were trying to get him away from. You were on a date. And it wasn’t beneath Angel, he would admit, to make you sweat a little. Especially after you had brushed him off a few days ago in the tattoo parlour. Petty as fuck, and he knew it. Coco would certainly have told him so.

He pulled Christopher’s chair back even further from the table, lowering himself and spreading his legs out comfortably, leaning back in his chair, head tilted back obnoxiously to appraise you further.

“You look good, dulce. What’s got you so dressed up and out and about on a Friday night?” He lilted his voice in a crudely teasing way, like he was mocking you for making yourself feel pretty.

You would not let him have this one, too. Not after the shitshow of a patch party. Isn’t it funny how you could barely bring yourselves to look the other in the eyes then? Too afraid to broach feelings, content to instead skate around them with all the grace of Bambi on ice. But this town was too small for you to hide from him for the rest of your life. And you were well-past sheepish aches and pains and trying to spare Angel's feelings; no, you were on the road to well and truly pissed.

The pulse and magnetism between you and Angel was always strong, a source of perpetual warmth for you. But it was you he had left behind, in the whispering grip of a ghost. And you? You refused to be that girl on the clubhouse porch forever.

Now, your blazing eyes met his slightly-glazed, blasé ones.

Was he … drunk?

Fuck this.

“I’m not gonna tell you again, Angel,” you warned. “That isn’t your chair. You can go.”

“‘You can go,'" Angel mimicked your words, echoing what you had said to him just now, and of when he dropped by your shop. He giggled. “Bit of a broken record, Frida. Maybe I’m just here to get dinner?”

You crossed your arms over your chest, tired of Angel’s games, and thinking that Christopher was likely due to return at any moment.

“Then get your food. If that’s what you're here for, it has nothing to do with me. No reason for you to sit here.”

Your usually patient nature was fading fast, the ice Angel had bestowed you with in his departure hardening your demeanor into someone he barely recognized. If he had been more himself, maybe that would have been cause for distress. But he was in petty, childish, drunk-Angel mode. The Angel his brother had often chastised him for being. The Angel his brother had laid into him for being after his behavior at the patch party, leaving you to the proverbial wolves while Andres had insulted you. The Angel who was hurt. Who tended to lash out.

That Angel ever-so-delicately chose to ignore your just-left-of-polite plea for him to leave.

“So, you dressin’ up for dinner with Aneesa? Or … wait… is this a date, amor? You dating? Maybe I’m just tryna to talk to you?”

A cool hand met your shoulder, a protective arm sweeping over you from behind where you sat. Christopher had reappeared, standing protectively over the back of your chair.

“And if it is?” Christopher’s voice was smooth, even and deadly-cool in a way that made you shudder a little.

This was all getting a little “West Side Story” for you. And you had to break it up before something worse could happen. You would not let Angel ruin the first date you had been on since him. Let alone the first decent date.

“It’s OK, Christopher. Angel was just leaving,” you nodded at him in what you’d hoped was a reassuring manner. For his part, Christopher didn’t flinch at Angel’s antics, and didn’t remove his arm from the back of your chair.

“C’mon, Frida. I told you, I just wanted to talk. You can’t give me a few minutes?” Angel’s voice had lost its teasing demeanor, bald and glaring.

You glanced between Angel and Christopher, now thoroughly uncomfortable with the trajectory this night had taken. If Aneesa ever asked, this would be one of the top reasons you’d choose not to date in a small town. Who's dick didn't you step on when you left your house?

You opened your mouth to answer, to politely brush Angel off and resume your date with Christopher, when Christopher surprised you by speaking first.

“Do you want to talk to him, mama?” Christopher’s arm was still resting reassuringly on your shoulder. You glanced between the two again, unsure of what to say.

Your pause seemed to be enough for Christopher, taking in the raw emotion behind your eyes as you looked at the slick, kutte-wearing man that was in his seat. Your hesitation and apparent emotion filling in the gaps about just who this person must be to you.

“Tell you what, darling,” Christopher said, sharp eyes never leaving Angel’s as he spoke to you, “I gotta take a quick call,” Christopher gestured to the sidewalk beyond the glass doors. “I’ll be right out there, give you a few minutes. But if he doesn't leave when you want him to,” he looked directly in Angel’s eyes now, “I’ll be back. I owe you dessert, anyway.”

You swallowed heavily at Christopher’s words, a kind of sick relief washing over you as you nodded. Was he just that understanding? The demeanour around him had an air of what you would describe as … deadly. While his words were a balm to you, they were clearly a threat to Angel. But maybe that was just you being too dramatic. He was a smooth-talker, is all.

Christopher took your nod as acquiescence to his compromise, pecking a quick, light kiss to your cheek and striding casually toward the door. The absence of his warm arm now rendering you unpleasantly naked beneath Angel’s gaze.

“Weeeeeell,” Angel drawled, turning to look over his shoulder, eyes following Christopher as he strode just to the other side of the glass. “That’s who you’re going out with? He. Seems. Nice. Cheerful, too. You sure know how to pick ‘em, querida.”

“Is that really a joke you wanna be making, Angelito?” You sneered. “What the fuck do you want?”

“I told you,” Angel said lightly. “To talk.”

You sighed, rubbing your temples, carelessly dropping the napkin that had been resting on your lap on the table, a not-so-subtle white flag. You looked pointedly at Angel, urging him to continue.

“I meant what I said at the party,” Angel started.

Strike one, Angelito. Mentioning the party was not the way to go.

“Which part did you mean?” You asked, voice taking on a tinge of faux-sweetness. “The part where your hand practically up some girl’s ass the entire night? Or the part where you let that guy shit-talk my work? Or maybe it was the part where after all that, you cornered me with nobody around to tell me you loved me?”

Angel flinched.

“I deserve that,” he said.

Strike two. Too little, too late.

“You deserve more than that, Angel,” you chastised. “And now you’re still trying to take from me. Date-crashing? You tryna fuck this up for me, too? Haven’t you done enough fucking? So, what is it about me that says you can walk all over me? Why can't you just leave me the fuck alone?”

Shit. You’d said it at the party, and you were telling yourself again now -- you would not cry in front of Angel. So, why were there hot little slivers poking the corners of your eyes? Your heart felt heavy, sick. It was getting to be a familiar sensation -- like a friend who showed up to crash at the worst possible time.

The appearance of your tears was sobering to Angel. He reached toward your side of the table in an attempt to brush your hand, to offer you some kind of comfort, even though he was the one you wanted to be comforted from.

“No, Angel,” you wiped your cheeks and placed your hands in your lap, out of his reach. “Why aren’t you listening to me? You tell me. How much more could you possibly take from me? There's nothing left,” you shuddered, sucking uneven air between your teeth before gesturing at his state. “I don’t care if you’re drunk, I don’t care if you’re broken. You can’t just walk in here like nothing, trying to tell me the same shit that didn’t land the first time. To what? To give you my heart back when y-you broke it -- broke me -- first? Is that what you wanted to talk about?”

Angel was stunned. But, as is the default, Angel deflected. His genuine remorse at your words buried beneath his childish need to lash out, like a child buries toys in a sandbox to spite the friend he won’t share with.

“That's why you're out with that … What was his name? Chad? Tim? Awfully shiny duds that dude had on,” Angel continued, “He's so… not me."

Strike. Fucking. Three.

"Possibly one of his best qualities," you snipped, venomously. “But this isn’t about him, and don’t act like it is. You keep trying this thing where you just want me to hear your broken record bullshit about how you want me back, how you wanna talk. But then you don’t say any shit of substance And you certainly don’t hear a goddamn word I say back to you. That tells me you aren’t really ready to talk. And you don’t give a shit if I’m ready, either,” you bit. “I tried, Angel. To tell you a little bit of what I’m feeling? You don’t wanna hear it. You just want me to hear you -- even if you say nothing.”

A little flurry of movement caught the corner of your eye, turning your head to see the waiter hovering awkwardly, clearly confused that the man sitting across from you was not the man he had seen you with all evening.

You pushed back from your seat, standing and beckoning for the waiter to come over.

"He's got the check," you gestured at Angel.

You patted Angel’s leather-clad shoulder as you walked past him, toward the door. “Thanks, amor. Real classy of you, paying for a girl’s date, and all.”

Ice cold.

You walked out of the restaurant as Christopher hung up his phone, turning to see the door swinging shut behind you, and you walking toward him. His sharp brow arched questioningly at your sudden appearance, opening his mouth to ask about the bill.

“It’s taken care of,” you breezed before he could ask, “Let’s go. You said something about ice cream?” You looped your arm through his as the two of you made your way down the block.

Inside the restaurant, Angel’s phone buzzed with a text from Coco asking him where the fuck he was, and what the fuck he was doing.

But his mind was swimming. The verbal truths you’d laid into him wriggling beneath his skin to take residence in the part of his brain that kept him up at night.

He looked down at his texts again. He honestly didn’t know how to answer.

---

Then, after a bad night, there was nothing more you wanted than to see Angel, his presence always a balm to your frazzled nerves. His easy, (at times) childlike demeanor was refreshing, and brought a light into your day that you now realized had been long missing before you had moved down here.

You were sitting on the couch in your living room, feet up on your coffee table, wearing your favorite joggers and oversized tee, the epitome of comfort.

You had a crappy reality TV show on in the background while you tilted your head back, sheetmask on, the cooling gel seeping into your pores. Cleansing your face and your soul.

You had texted Angel to come over. After this shit-show of a day, you could use the company. You understood it was late. You understood he may not be able to come over right away -- club shit. And wasn’t there always?

“Hasta pronto, Frida,” his last text had read. See you soon.

That was over 45 minutes ago. You were antsy. You’d had a long day. Some dude at a consultation had rubbed you the wrong way -- the two of you not communicating your respective ideas together well. The idea that your artist’s brain couldn’t match his vision to deliver something itched at you, wrinkled your brain. You’d had no choice but to refer him to Oli. On top of that, he’d been leery with you.

Your hands were tired, the fine bones in your fingers aching. And you sure as shit didn’t want to answer any more emails or DMs. You just wanted to lie here, sheetmask on. Unbothered. Your boyfriend’s presence would be a bonus, but he was late.

Somewhere between your next episode of “90 Day Fiancee” and your umpteenth sigh, you heard it -- the telltale rumble of Angel’s bike making its way down your otherwise quiet street.

At the gentle rap on your door, you solidified your puddle of comfortable bones long enough to slip off of your couch and make your way down the hall, unlatching it and opening the door, only to be greeted with the rapidly-horrified face of your boyfriend.

“Jesus fuck!” Angel yelped.

Your body jolted at the shock of his shout, hand coming to your chest.

“Sorry, Frida, didn’t mean to scare you, but…” he gestured at your face. “What the fuck is that?”

Oh.

You brought your hand up to where the silvery-grey sheetmask was still resting atop your skin. You sighed, peeling the mask from your face slowly, revealing your dewy skin beneath.

“Sorry about that,” you chuckled, your heartbeat returning to normal.

You turned and made your way back down the hall, beckoning for Angel to follow, which he did, shutting the door of your place behind him.

“Sorry about that,” you called over your shoulder as you tossed the mask in the trash beneath your sink. “I kinda forgot it was there.”

“Not for nothing, Frida, but that’s a hell of a home defense system.”

At the question in your eyes, Angel continued, kicking his boots off and shuffling his way into your living room.

“If any serial killer ever shows up to fuck with you? All you gotta do is answer the door like that. He’ll think another murderer is already here,” at that he sucked air thorugh his teeth like Hannibal Lecter. “Hellooooo, Clarice,” he mimicked, laughing at his own joke and popping the button on his jeans to make himself comfortable as he slouched on the couch.

“Bien,” you agreed, between a flurry of giggles. “Too many cooks in the kitchen, and all that. Brilliant, Angelito.”

You popped open your freezer to grab your jade roller, subsequently grabbing Angel a beer from the fridge.

“Sorry I’m late,” Angel called from the other room. “Club shit ran long. Plus, you sounded kinda down when you messaged me. So I had to make a stop.”

You peeked into the living room in time to see Angel pull a crinkling plastic bag of mini peanut butter cups from the deep pocket of his kutte, plopping the bag onto the coffee table. “I come bearing gifts.”

You smiled to yourself in the kitchen, pleased as punch with Angel’s thoughtful gesture. You popped the cap on Angel’s beer, turning to bring the drink to him, simultaneously rolling the jade over your face in your other hand.

“Gracias, amor,” he accepted the beer from you. “What’s this now?” He beckoned at the roller in your hands.

“It’s to help rub the product from the mask into my skin, plus it’s nice and cold -- keeps my face from getting puffy,” you explained.

“I don’t understand why you females think you need alla that shit,” he said, taking a sip of your beer, turning his attention to your TV. Not that he would ever admit it, but he was following along the trainwreck of season six of “90 Day Fiancee” with you. Had his own couples he loved to hate.

“We females,” you emphasized, “just aren’t afraid to prioritize self care, unlike you big, bad bikers. Seriously, Angelito, when was the last time you washed your face with something other than hand soap, or --” you gave an exaggerated shudder to drive home your point, “that shitty 16-in-one body wash/engine oil I know you keep in your shower.”

Angel gave your shoulder a teasing little shove, ”Man, shut up. I bring you chocolate, and this is how you treat me?”

Flirtation and sexual chemistry come easy to Angel. He was always blessed with an easy social grace, and women seemed to eat up the flirtatious attention. But anything more serious, and he becomes a blushing little boy, all shuffling feet, nervous smiles and awkward stuttering. There was some of that with you, he wouldn’t lie. But with you? Everything had a way of feeling so natural.

“Oh, gracias, beautiful, generous, benevolent Angelito, god among men,” your voice was dramatic, teasing, you mocked bowing to him.

“Okay, that’s enough outta you,” you grabbed your wrist, tugging you into his lap, tracing tickling fingers up your sides, causing you to writhe, shrieking through chiming laughter.

Angel’s beer long-abandoned on the coffee table, your jade roller now dropped somewhere on the floor, you gazed into Angel’s face from your place reclining across his lap, chest heaving with the exertion of being tickled and laughing too much.

For his part, Angel was looking down at you, brow softened in fondness for the woman before him, lightly trailing his hand along your cheeks.

No one was laughing now, and the noise of the TV became an unimportant, staticky hum somewhere in the background to the moment you and Angel found yourselves in.

You don’t know how you ended up beneath Angel on your couch. You were even less certain just when the two of you had absconded with your clothes.

All you knew was that the heavy drag of him inside of you was resplendent, beyond words. Was it always like this with him?

And you? You were a brazen little thing, all gasping moans and dragging fingernails, urging Angel on with pleas and fluttering lashes. Your dedication to marking Angel’s back was admirable, and it’s not like he could honestly say he minded. He’d bear the battlescars of a night with you for eternity, if he could.

As Angel thrust into you, all you could think about -- beyond the heated urgency of the way he was making you feel, was that he was perfect.

The two of you basked in the after, awash in the blue-white glow of the TV screen still playing before you, skin now slightly sweaty and glistening in its own right, catching your breath together. The synchronicity of it all … music to you.

You were both unfocused in your respective gaze’s on the television, just content to lie next to one another. Angel was stretched out on the couch behind you, unwrapping peanut butter cups, handing them to you piece by piece. This last one, he had pressed directly to your lips, which you had wrapped around the tips of his fingers, tongue following, as you accepted the candy.

“Don’t start, Frida. I don’t know that I have the strength,” Angel said, pressing a kiss to the side of your head.

“Just once more, Angelito? You know I’ve had a hard day,” you hmm’d.

“Evil woman,” he chuckled, reaching for you again.

“You love it,” you gasped at the feeling of his fingers making their way once more to your center.

“Yeah,” he rasped, eyes trained on your face as he played your body. “I fuckin’ do.”

Somewhere between rounds two and three, you had managed to talk Angel into wearing a face mask of his own, promising that he would “feel so much better for it.”

He had acquiesced, of course, never able to tell you no. But made you promise under pain of death that you would never reveal that he had done something so girly to any one of his brothers.

You had agreed, but taken out your phone to snap a quick pic. Angel shirtless, tattoos illuminated against his skin in the ambient lighting of your living room, with a sheet mask on his face was too good not to capture.

“I swear, Frida,” he began, mock-threateningly, “If that ends up on the ‘gram…”

You shook your head.

“Don’t worry, Angelito. This one’s just for me. And… maybe for Coco, if I’ve had enough tequila.”

So, the butterflies… Always gonna be there with you, huh?

---

A few days after your date, Coco had texted you.

“Leti needs a ride to work on Tuesday, and I have a yard shift. I hate to ask, but can you take her?”

“Sure,” you’d agreed. Following up with another message, “Do I pick her up from your place?”

“She’s coming with me to the yard. She likes to hang in the office with Chucky,” he’d responded.

Well, shit.

If you’d known that this favor had come with the condition that you return to the yard -- to anywhere within the vicinity of that god-forsaken clubhouse, you probably would have refused. But you knew Coco was struggling to balance his club life with his relationship with his daughter. And you liked Leti.

“You got it,” you responded. Cringing to yourself at just how you were going to pull this off and get out of there without anyone else talking to you. But texting Coco back to ask who else was on the yard shift with him would be too obvious. And kinda rude. He knew who you were hoping to avoid.

Not much got past Johnny “Coco” Cruz.

So, Tuesday afternoon found you rolling over to the yard, hoping to swoop Leti and make a quick getaway.

Luck, like time, was a bitch of a woman. And never seemed to be on your side in the keen moments you’d hoped she would be. Because as you pulled your car into the dusty lot abutting the scrapyard, who do you see?

Coco, in his snapback and yard uniform, was laboring with a large piece of metal. Ezekiel appeared to be fluttering in and out of the clubhouse, the clinking of glasses from inside reaching your ears when the door opened.

Angel and … of fucking course … Andres were across the yard from Coco, standing over a junker and exchanging words.

You sighed, rolling your shoulders and steeling yourself for whatever this was about to be as you got out of your car.

The sound of your door opening and shutting was enough to draw nearly every eye in the yard to you, Angel freezing in his spot from the other side of the lot

As you began to stride over to where Coco was standing, EZ bound down from the clubhouse steps, intercepting you and greeting you with a warm hug. You smiled easily at the younger Reyes brother, holding your hand up to your eyes to shade your face as you looked up at his smiling face, him already talking to you a mile-a-minute.

From across the yard, Angel observed the interaction. After you’d met the club initially, and met EZ, Angel was content to say that he could appreciate how well you got along with everyone. How well-liked you were by each of the men, especially his brother.

You two discussed literature, art, and liked to talk shit to each other, friendship in its purest form. Somewhere between Faust and the floodgates, Angel had watched on as you spilled over in your excitement speaking to EZ. Faust and Proust. Did Angel know what -- or was it who?? -- the fuck a "Faust" was? No. But he'd drown himself in literary references that already made him feel over his head if it meant he got to sit back and just take in how well you'd gelled with his family, with Ezekiel. In another life he supposed he'd be jealous that you had so much in common with his brother. But you didn't look at Ezekiel the way you looked at him.

Even Angel could see it. And if he couldn’t, Coco was quick to remind him.

“She only got eyes for you, mano,” Coco had told him, quietly, resolutely.

EZ had left you now, gone back to the clubhouse for something. As you made your way to Coco, hugging him in spite of his obvious hesitance.

Angel heard him protest against your attentions -- “I’m covered in grease, ma.”

You’d hugged him anyway. He’d melted into your embrace, smiling softly. Angel had confided to Coco that he had seen you a few days ago on a date. Coco’s eyes had clouded over with something as Angel spoke, but passed through his features quickly, like a summer storm, before clearing. Resuming listening to Angel. The conversation… hadn’t gone well.

“Back again, huh?” Andres had said from Angel’s side, gesturing lightly to where you stood with Coco. He nudged Angel’s side. “You taking another crack at that?”

Angel ignored his question.

“I think she’s here to pick up Coco’s kid,” he said simply, turning his attention back to the junker. Choosing to stay out of the situation, as Andres had left the car and was now striding across the lot to you.

“No hug for me, jaina?”

You’d frozen in place at the voice behind you, Coco’s quicksilver eyes darting to over your shoulder, where Andres now stood, narrowing at the man’s question.

You recovered quickly.

“Sorry,” you breezed, turning to face Andres. Noting the way his panther tattoo peeked out from the tank the man was wearing. You would never say you hated any piece you did, per se. But you weren’t about to post this one, wanting no association with it, or the man who bore it. Even if it was perfectly fine work. “Coco really was covered in grease. It’s pretty gross. I think I’m good,” you diverted, nudging Coco’s ribs and smiling to ease the tension.

Andres shrugged, the blow to his pride obvious in the way his face twisted and his eyes narrowed at how closely you stood to the lithe ex-military man next to you.

Coco eased through the conversation, patting your arm comfortingly, his eyes finding yours as he spoke, “I’mma go get Leti, OK? I’ll be right back.”

You were a little distraught at the idea that Coco would leave you with this man, knowing how he had spoken to you before. But you supposed if he could hurry this interaction along and go get his daughter, it might not be so bad.

“So,” you turned, schooling your facial features into a mask of cool indifference as you faced Andres, who was now addressing you. “We didn’t get to finish what we started the other night,” was all he said.

“Didn’t we?” You asked, tilting your head, nodding toward Andres’s tattoo. “I think we finished. It healed nicely.”

Andres rolled his eyes a little at you, as though you were slow.

“That’s not what I mean, and you know it.” He took a step toward you.

Was this guy for real? Was he not getting it, or did he just not care?

You took a step in kind back from Andres, your anger flaring. “So what did you mean?” you asked. “You mean the bit before I gave you free ink, where you insulted my work? Or the bit after I gave you free ink, where you just insulted me?”

You could see the faint twitch in Andres’s face as you called him out. His patience clearly wearing thin. A man not used to hearing no when it was told to him.

“That’s what I always liked about you,” he gritted out, smiling fakely, “you got that reaaaal fiery attitude. Not just any guy would put up with it,” he said, as though he was trying to give you advice.

“I dunno what you mean by ‘always,’” you said, politely, your own fake smile screwed into place. “If you excuse me, I’m gonna go find Leti.”

As you made to leave, Andres lunged forward, gripping your wrist.

"You really don't remember me?" Andres pressed, "C'mon, chiquita, don't be like that."

"I really don't," you snipped, whipping your wrist out of his grip. You were a little shorter with him than you usually were with people, even in your more frustrated moments. But he really was pissing you off. "Sorry if that's a blow to the ego, or whatever, but I didn't really make it a habit of looking at other guys when I was with someone else."

Andres snorted, tone no longer teasing, eyes dark and flat. You turned to face him again at the undignified sound he had made, noting his cool, angry features.

"If only that 'someone else' had shown you the same courtesy," he snarled, swatting at your wrist now instead of reaching for it.

"Hey, man, leave her the fuck alone." You turned to see EZ and Coco striding across the yard with Leti in tow, making their way toward you. Out of the corner of your eye, Angel was also making his way over, shoulders tense.

EZ turned to you, taking in your crestfallen expression and the way you were suddenly very interested in your shoes.

"You okay, hermanita?" EZ asked, large hand gentle on your shoulder.

You nodded, sheepishly. Hating the way you seemed so small in that moment. This man was nothing, to you, or otherwise. And he’d managed to make you feel like you were nothing, too.

You tried to find your voice again as you spoke, quiet at first, “Andres was just apologizing to me for the way he was rude at the patch party,” you turned to look at him, your eyes blazing now, “weren’t you?”

Coco snorted.

Andres narrowed his eyes, glaring at Coco, who held up his hands as if to say, “what can ya do?”

“Best apologize,” Coco rasped, now pulling on a cigarette that seemed to have materialized from nowhere. “One does not fuck with Frida,” Coco exhaled. “Unwise, mano.” He gestured to you, “She’s got that scary tia energy.”

EZ’s hand was still resting protectively on your shoulder as you crossed your arms over your chest, waiting for Andres’s apology, now that you’d put him on the spot in front of his brother. Angel watched the entire exchange like a snake coiled to strike.

He knew he had fucked up by not saying shit as Andres dug at you at the patch party. It had been roiling beneath his skin, his blood bubbling and waiting to burst forth. Waiting for a chance to put the fucker in his place.

“Yeah,” Andres gritted through his teeth, fake smile ready to crack at any moment. “Sorry about that. Too much to drink, and all.” His voice was flat. Devoid of any real remorse, as you knew it would be.

“It’s alright,” you shrugged. “I hope you enjoy the ink. It’s the last you’ll be getting from me.”

Andres’s eye twitched before the dam broke on his childish rage, “Why you gotta be such a fuckin’ bitch? No wonder Angel fucked around on you -- that smart-ass mouth is gonna get you slapped.”

He made to step toward you again, EZ and Coco stood before you, protectively, blocking you from Andres’s approach.

But Andres could reach you, Angel had gripped his shoulder, turning him around and landing a punch square to his jaw.

“Man, what the fuck,” Andres swore, spitting a wad of blood at the toe of Angel’s boot. “What the fuck did you hit me for?”

Angel cracked his knuckles, shaking his wrist and his hand out from the impact of his hit to Andres’s face, readying himself to strike again if he needed to.

“You don’t fuckin’ talk about her like that,” he squared up, shoving Andres in the shoulder. “Listen to me, new patch. I’ll explain the rules -- you don’t look at her. You don’t talk about her. You don’t even think about her.”

Angel’s shoulders were heaving as he worked himself up more, stalking toward Andres, like a jungle cat, coiled muscle beneath his skin ready to unleash.

“Nod so I know you understand,” he bellowed in Andres’s direction, pointing a thick finger accusingly into his face, rewarded with Andres's curt nod.

EZ gently removed himself from your side, coming to grab Angel and whisper into his ear, calming him.

“Hey, man,” EZ reasoned, “Now’s not the time. You guys can settle this later. Cage.”

Angel nodded, breathing heavily through his nostrils and willing himself to calm down as he turned to you, locking eyes with you again, only to be met with an imperceptible look on your face. Had he fucked this up even further now? You had never looked at him like that.

You shook your head, breaking the moment and stepping from behind Coco to go meet Leti where she was standing a comfortable distance away from the whole scene.

“We gotta go,” you said, hurriedly grabbing Leti’s hand and marching off toward your car with the girl in tow.

You buckled yourselves in and drove away from the lot in a cloud of dust. Hoping you could just leave it all behind. The further you got from the gates, the easier you could breathe. You drove in silence, as Leti watched you, assessing. Before she broke the silence.

"We all miss you, you know," Leti said, softly, from her place in the passenger seat. "Just because Angel let you go doesn't mean we wanted to lose you, too. And fuck Andres. He’s a fuckin’ clown."

Leti's words were a wave of molten-hot guilt washing over you, burning your synapses and hardening over any residual anger and sadness you'd felt over the confrontation that had just happened. You knew some of what Leti had been through. How she, so like yourself, was reticent to form bonds with new people. How she'd routinely felt abandoned by those she let herself care about -- and you felt you'd now done the same.

"I'm so sorry, Leti," you implored, looking into the girl’s doe eyes, flecked with amber-gold and layered with wisdom and emotion. Her gaze heavy and so like her father’s. Nothing slipped past them. "I never meant to hurt you, to leave you."

"I-it's just … I miss you, is all," she murmured, twisting her long hair around her finger. "I know EZ misses you. He talks about you all the time. And … and my dad, too. Coco doesn't talk about it alot, but I think that says more than if he tried to put it in words. I know for a fact he misses you. Was pretty pissy with Angel for a while after everything went down."

You smiled gently, leaning forward across the console to give Leti a soft hug.

“I really am sorry, Leti. I promise I’ll be around more,” you broke the hug, rubbing her arm as you pulled away. “You and Coco are welcome to come over for dinner anytime. I’ll cook for you. Just tell Coco no smoking in the house, cierto? And don’t tell Coco I said so, but you can come hang with me in the shop, if you want. Been slow lately. You can come do homework someplace quiet..”

She chuckled lightly, nodding and promising to text you about coffee plans as she got out of the car.

You mulled over Leti’s words as you drove away. Maybe cutting everyone other than Aneesa out flatly wasn't the way to go. It's possible you had made a mistake there, though it's not like Leti hadn't confirmed that she understood why you did what you did. And it's not like other people wouldn't have done the same in your shoes. Even still, perhaps re-cracking open the "Angel" chapter of your life had its benefits, if only to once more let in the friends you had made along the way.

Your departing words to Leti ringing in your ears long after you’d parked at home,

"I'll reach out to the guys more, too," you confirmed. "I didn't mean to leave everyone hanging."

I know you, you're like this. When shit don't go your way, you needed me to fix it.

And like me, I did, but I ran out of every reason.

---

The cracks of the next morning’s light streaming through the slats on his window were barely perceptible to Angel in his haze. The kind of stupor that comes when you’ve effectively straddled the line between two worlds -- Angel reluctantly bids farewell to the gentle caress of sleep, even if it was imperfect and restless; and begrudgingly greets the world of the waking, frowning beneath a heavily-furrowed brow at the grey-orange sun.

Through the warming beams of light that streamed in isolated splashes across his skin and the bedspread, he could still imagine, half in dreams, that the warmth was you curled beside him, all soft curves, your thigh slotted between his, your sleep-mussed hair, his shirt riding up your form just so as you snoozed, and oh, your sweet, half-awake smiles. But the alternating cool spots of shade from the slats were the chilly reminder of your absence, of the ghost of your touch long gone cold. And as Angel shook himself more evermore awake and into the latter world, he wished he could return to the amorphous and hazy, staticky embrace of his dreams.

Where life was a little more kind. Where there was a little more you. You were haunting him. Did memories, both experienced in your past together and the hypothetical potential “memories” of an unmet future, plague you, as well? Never to be? Did you dream of him? Or was he your nightmare? He supposed he’d never know, and knew had given up the right to ask.

Put myself to sleep, just so I can get closer to you inside my dreams ...

It was a truth that was bitter, acrid, and hard to swallow. Or was that just his morning breath? Angel licked his lips, tasting the post-sleep stale dryness on his tongue, pushing himself out his side of the bed and toward the door -- for coffee or his toothbrush, he hadn’t decided. But the need to make a decision was cut short with an unexpected event--

A pounding at his door. Three raps from a heavy fist on the other side of his shitty apartment’s excuse for a door.

“Angel!” The shout through the wooden barrier that followed the persistent banging was unmistakably his obnoxious younger brother, come to pester him about what had gone down yesterday. Likely with a peace offering of some sort, as was EZ’s way.

Angel sighed, rolling his neck to both sides until he was satisfied with the resulting crack, not bothering to tug on a shirt or socks as he padded his way through the cool, empty apartment.

He fixed his signature scowling look of annoyance that EZ was so accustomed to to his face before swinging open the door.

One of EZ’s bearpaw-like fists was still raised, fixed to rap against the door again if necessary. The other clutched a carrier with two to-go cups of coffee from EZ’s favorite shop. The one down the street from yours. The one with the cute barista.

EZ, for his part, looked a little sheepish at the exaggeratedly grumpy look on his older brother’s face, his gilded, mossy eyes widening in a show of good-natured surprise. He recovered quickly, shouldering his way into Angel’s apartment, placing the to-go carrier with Angel’s coffee on his coffee table and flopping on one end of Angel’s couch, the leather giving a groan beneath his weight.

“By all means, bro, make yourself at fuckin’ home,” Angel groused, smacking his lips and turning to swipe the cup of coffee off of the table.

“You’re welcome,” EZ smarted, eyebrows raised at Angel guzzling the fresh coffee like the heat was nothing. What was it you had called it?

Ah, asbestos mouth. EZ had heard the moniker pass through your lips on more than one occasion and found it to be apt as applied to his taciturn older brother.

“So,” Angel said between sips of nuclear caffeine. “What? Any particular reason you’re banging on my door at ...” Angel trailed off, clearly unsure what time it actually was.

“At 11:00 a.m.?” EZ supplied, sarcastically, “You’re right, Angel. It’s practically dawn.”

“Man, shut up,” Angel groused, “What do you want?”

“Who says I want anything,” EZ asked?

“This coffee’s got a string attached to it,” Angel shrugged, shuffling over to the couch and sitting a respectable distance from his annoying younger brother.

“We gotta talk about yesterday,” EZ supplied, finishing his sentence over Angel’s exaggerated groan and eye-rolling.

“Wasn’t the point of yesterday that it’s done, little brother?”

“Between you and Andres, maybe,” EZ said. “But not between you and me. After that shit you pulled at brunch with Gaby a few days ago, and now this, with Frida...”

Angel took another sip of his coffee, his annoyance doubling at the increasingly lighter weight of the cup in his hands and at his brother’s pestering.

“So, what? You wanna try and beat the shit outta me, too?” Angel asked. “Didn’t work out so well for Andres, did it?”

“Look, Angel, I’m not trying to say I understand why you did what you did, fucking with Frida and Adelita. Because I don’t. And I gotta be honest -- after how yesterday went down, I understand it even less. And Coco agrees with me --”

“Oh, great,” Angel rolled his eyes, cutting his brother off. “You gotta stop going to the Church of Coco, man. What’d he tell you this time?”

“That you’re fucking your way through your pain,” EZ parroted, mimicking Coco’s signature throaty breeze, “and you won’t stop until you feel something,” he shrugged, resuming his normal voice as he continued. “I don’t know about alla that, but --”

"It was too … domestic," Angel cut EZ off, shaking his head, more at himself than his brother. "Can you really see me with all that shit? Drinking coffee in bed together on a Sunday morning until we're old? Nah, bro … that ain't me. Adelita, the chaos. That's me."

"It could be you, Angel," EZ protested. "The only person saying you can't have the Sunday coffee life is you."

“I'd just… I'd just fuck it up,” Angel sighed, dropping his forehead into his palm, his elbow on his knee.

EZ continued drinking his coffee, pausing before delivering the blow.

“I got news for you, bro,” he said between his prim little sips. “You did fuck it up.”

Angel tch’d in annoyance at his brother, carding his hands through his hair and smoothing the thick strand that seemed to always threaten to fall over his eyes. For good measure, he tossed EZ that wicked side-eye only that only Angel and his mother had ever been able to truly perfect.

“You think I don’t know that? You’re supposed to be the smart one.”

Angel takes another pull of his coffee, now just the overly-concentrated dregs at the bottom of the cup, lightly grimacing at the beverage’s bitterness. EZ knew Angel took his coffee black, of course it would be the kind of thing his little brother would remember. But, in truth, given the way this conversation was turning, the literal sensation of bitterness on his tongue was almost too much for Angel to bear. He’d almost preferred it if EZ had forgotten his order -- watered the drink down with cream and (dare he say it?) sugar, and called it a day. Because at least it would be easier to swallow than the harsh truths and bile that were currently stewing inside of Angel, waiting to be given a voice. And it didn’t seem that EZ was in any kind of charitable mood when it came to pulling punches, either.

Angel took in his brother’s profile from his perched place at the end of the couch: EZ’s legs were spread in a show of comfort, but shoulders tensed, like he was waiting to fight Angel every step of the way, no matter where this conversation was headed. Angel supposed he’d deserved that.

For as fiercely protective as little Ezekiel was of his big brother, he was -- annoyingly so -- protective of the woman he’d dubbed his hermanita. A soft spot for you, the artsy girl with ink-stained fingers who would press lent books into his baby brother’s hands insistently, all the books you could bear to part with. Always there for Ezekiel with a patient ear and arms that would do their best to wrap around his broad shoulders.

Angel was struck again with the heavy weight-- the sinking stone in his gut that -- in theory-- should pull him to the bottom of the river he found himself awash in. Drowning is a sort of grounding, yes? But no… he just drifted further and further down the bank, carried in the foaming rapids by the pressing weight of his choices. In addition to that weight, his guilt prickled. Once again with the realization that his decisions had affected not only his love with you, but your relationship with Ezekiel, as well. How incredibly short-sighted he'd been with it all, playing fast and loose with the lives of everyone he'd loved.

Angel sighed before he spoke again,

“No one ever tells you, do they?” EZ perked up at that, looking at his brother with his brows furrowed in puppylike-confusion.

“No one ever tells you just how insecure it all makes you feel,” Angel supplied. “Love. They write a million songs about how perfect it all is -- how it’s supposed to be some kind of divine answer. Birds singing, an’ shit. Or they talk about how it rips your fuckin’ heart out, but they…” Angel pauses to chuckle, “They never tell you how when you’ve got it, you feel both so… happy it’s yours. But terrified at the same time that it never. Really. Belongs to you.”

He shook his head, meeting his brother’s eyes again, his own swimming with the glimmer of emotion long-kept down. EZ leaned across the couch, placing a warm hand on his brother’s shoulder, nodding at him in acquiescence, encouragement to keep going.

“I-I know what I did, and I know everyone wants an answer… Why did I do it? Why-why did I let it all go down like that? But what answer would ever be good enough? I hurt her, and that’s the end of it. I was fuckin’ stupid, all because I was scared. I had her, and I knew I shouldn’t have had her at all. And I’m just so fuckin’ … sorry.”

He sighed, breath shuddering. Opting to fill the now-still air in his apartment with another bitter slug of shitty coffee while EZ pondered what to say in response.

EZ shifted on the couch, leather creaking beneath him as he weighed what to tell his brother.

“I- I don’t know what the answer here is, Angel,” EZ finally admitted. “I get that it’s scary. Fuck yeah, it is. But that’s no excuse --”

“I know that,” Angel snapped.

EZ held his hands up in surrender, placating the red dragon-heat that was his brother’s quick temper before it could rise.

“I know you do,” EZ spoke softly, “I know, man. But it’s not that simple. You should probably tell her, ya know? What you just told me. But even if you did, she’d be within her right not to hear it. Or not to want to fix shit with you, or take your apology. And you? Gotta accept it.”

EZ brushed imaginary dirt from the thigh of his jeans before speaking again,

“Sucks,” he sighed through his nose. “I dunno if I’d be madder at her for taking you back or for not taking you back. But, uh, even if she doesn’t, that doesn’t mean you won’t find it again, Angel. You just gotta decide whether you wanna try here -- and accept the outcome no matter what she decides. You owe her that. But one thing’s for sure … you should actually try talkin’ to her.”

Angel had the faraway look in his eye of a man either deep in thought, or someone not listening entirely, staring through the far wall as EZ had spoken to him. Maybe he didn’t look it, but he’d heard every word, turning them over again in his mind before swallowing them somewhere deep in his gut, internalizing wisdom from someone who was younger than him, but who’d undoubtedly lived through more than most people. EZ was good for that kind of bereft wisdom -- disconnected in its logic coming from someone like EZ, but completely sensical when you understood the depth of the boy’s character and empathy. Not for the first time in his life, Angel was grateful for Ezekiel.

He smiled weakly at his little brother, acceptance cracking through the little cracked crescent grin, “Mom would’ve liked her, huh?”

EZ smiled at his brother in return, facile and genuine, as only Ezekiel’s grins could be.

---

I swear, for a while I would stare at my phone just to see your name, but now that it's there, I don't really know what to say…

Across town, EZ had left Angel’s, and the latter, now alone in his apartment and buzzing with EZ's words, was typing a text to you. And here you are … looking down at your phone between gathering your laundry and stacking clean dishes. You saw Angel’s name pop up next to the little text bubble on your homescreen, causing you to pause in your chores.

Huh. Unexpected Should you open it?

After everything that had gone down yesterday at the scrapyard, and the shitty attempt a few days prior to fuck up your date-- were you ready now to have the conversation you knew you and Angel were dancing around for the better part of several months? Ready to breach the seemingly impenetrable wall of silence? Feelings like the ones you held for Angel had a way of not being able to stay buried for too long. And you knew you could never truly move on, never would be able to give the icy shards wedged between your ribs and into your heart a chance to heal. Not unless you and Angel got it all out into the open.

And with the circumstances the way they were, with everything that had gone down -- how many women in your position could say they'd had the same opportunity?

How did the old saying go? What three things cannot long be hidden? The sun. The moon. And the truth.

The truth was, to you, the sun and moon rose and set on Angel.

The truth was, you had bitten off a few barbs and spat them at Angel in the few moments you’d shared with him since he tossed you from his apartment all those months ago. You weren't a perfect person. But it’s damn well what he deserved, after what he did. You weren’t wrong about that. The fact that everyone, and Angel’s father, were angry at him for the way things had gone down told you that you were not the one in the wrong.

The truth was, Angel had fucked up. Not only with his infidelity and the way he had tipped you from his life, with blunt hands tearing haphazardly at the roots… but he had insulted you, your work, and stood idly by and allowed others to do the same.

He knew it, and you knew it. And you had both been petty.

But now that the wound was open, and the skin around it raw and heated, pulsing with its own heartbeat -- how could you ever give it a chance to heal if you didn't try to close it?

There was nothing saying that if you read Angel’s message, if you heard him out, and you got the chance to say your own piece, that you had to forgive him. And if it meant moving on? Maybe it was the step you needed to take.

Like burning a candle to the end. Or, yes, wrapping a wound. Or perhaps like covering an old tattoo. Clara Forever?

You unlocked your phone, sliding open your texts, taking a deep breath as you did so.

“I just wanted you to know I heard what you said,” Angel’s text read. “I do wanna talk to you, Frida. But only when you’re ready to talk to me. If you ever are. I just want to hear you out. Even if I know you never have to accept my apology.”

Well.

You looked down at your phone. You read Angel's text. Re-read it.

You'd be lying to yourself if you didn't acknowledge that everything that had gone down hadn't been building to this.

You brought your thumbs to the glass, beginning to type,

"I'm off tomorrow at six. You can come by after."

There. Short, sweet, and to the point.

Your phone pinged in your hand. Glancing down at it, you saw two words in response,

"Gracias, Frida."

"Don't thank me yet."

You put your phone down flat on the counter.

The truth was, you still loved Angel Reyes. And you weren't sure whether your rage outweighed your ardor. And this scared the shit out of you.

When Angel rolled up the next day at ten after six, you were slightly annoyed. In the beginning of your relationship, he had been incredibly punctual, likely borne out of eagerness to see you. As time wore on, Angel's timeliness waned. At the time, you had assumed it had everything to do with his commitments to the club, and had remained understanding. With the benefit of hindsight, however, you now knew that it likely wasn't always the club.

You didn't know anything about Adelita, save for her relationship to Angel. And you intended to keep it that way. But a nastier part of your brain was intensely curious.

Did she make Angel laugh? Was she smarter than you? Prettier than you? She had to be beautiful, just like Angel was beautiful. The thought made your heart ache.

When she kissed Angel, did she taste your lips on his? Did she know about you now? Did she hold more of Angel's heart than you had?

If you were more like her, would Angel have chosen you?

You knew you wouldn't ask Angel any of these questions -- what did they always say? Don't ask something you don't really want the answers to?

You slept easier at night keeping the idea of Adelita just that -- an amorphous, question mark-shaped idea. Knowing Angel's part in it all was more than enough.

Easier. You said you slept easier. Not well. You dreamt of Angel far too often to say you slept well. You dreamt of the feel of his hair between your fingers, both in a gentle and comforting pass, and in the harsh tugging borne of passion. You dreamt of the feel of his warm skin against yours. You dreamt of days spent swimming in the ocean, him lifting you up to twirl you through the water, like a sea sprite, a deity meant to be worshipped. Perhaps most cruelly, you sometimes dreamt of a future. Your memories blended with your dreams at the cruel, twisting hands of hazy sleep. Never to be.

And when Angel arrived at your place shortly after you had returned home from closing the shop, your gut, your brain, and your heart were all writhing in their own respective dances, never in sync with one another, and rendering your nerves completely fried.

You opened the door, beckoning Angel in. You stopped yourself from moving to help remove the kutte from his shoulders and hanging it by the door, freezing your hands in the middle of raising to do just that, dropping them awkwardly by your sides again.

If Angel noticed, he hadn't said anything.

He shuffled into your place, likely surveying what had changed since he had last been there. To his surprise? Not much. You still had candles everywhere, casting everything in a warm glow. Your overstuffed chairs were still draped in cozy blankets and piled with brightly-patterned throw pillows. The bookcase in the corner of your living room was still packed to the edges, stacks of additional books on the floor at the foot. Your potted green plants made the room look simultaneously larger and smaller. Your dedication to maximalism was admirable.

You loved what you loved, even if you didn't have the space. In your heart, or otherwise.

Angel breathed in the familiar cinnamon-orange scent that was your place, its permanent residence in his mind sending a zip through his heart.

You shuffled past Angel, into your living room and making your way toward the kitchen, offering Angel a drink, which he declined.

You shrugged. "Suit yourself."

You made your way into the kitchen, opening a cabinet that Angel knew contained a precarious tower of stacked coffee mugs. Like a personal game of Jenga only you could win, you plucked your desired mug, and closed the cabinet before the dangerous clinking of the remaining mugs could turn disastrous.

You prepared a cup of tea while Angel stood at the carpeted edge of your living room, unsure of just how comfortable he was allowed to make himself in this space that -- while just as chaotically orderly and distinctly you as he remembered it -- seemed to be purged of any remembrance of him.

Stirring honey into your mug of tea and blowing on it, you watched Angel over the rim of your mug. Watched him observe your space, and waited for him to speak.

You tilted your head toward the open door of your bedroom, breaking the silence first,

“I, uhhh, I’ve been working all day. I’m just gonna change real fast.” You shuffled your feet into the carpet, padding softly into your room and pushing the door softly shut.

You slipped out of your jeans and into soft sweats and an oversized tee. Maybe if you felt more comfortable, you could stave off some of the awkwardness. Maybe letting Angel back into your space wasn’t the best idea.

After changing, you took a moment -- sat on your bed, elbows balanced on your knees and head in your hands … you took a few deep breaths, lit a candle. Your palms felt clammier by the second, knowing that Angel was out there waiting for your re-emergence.

You don’t know how long you were sitting on the edge of your bed, just breathing. Preparing yourself.

A soft knock on your bedroom door broke your dazed thoughts. You looked up, seeing Angel through the widening crack in the door, fist raised, his knuckle rapping softly on your bedroom door.

You locked eyes for moment before Angel chuckled sheepishly to himself, shuffling his feet in your doorway,

“I, uh, thought you might’ve jumped out the window,” he chuckled lightly.

Leave it to Angel to find a way to lighten the heavy mood that had descended upon your space. You managed to crack a small smile, corner of your mouth tilting up just-so in that way he had always found endearing.

“The thought had crossed my mind,” you shrugged, patting the space next to you, acquiescing to allow Angel to sit.

He crossed your room, exhaling heavily as he took a seat next to you on the bed.

Now that you were seated so closely to Angel in the low light of your bedroom, you looked at his face, taking him in. Really looking at him for the first time in months. Trying to ignore the pricking feelings of trauma that were doing their best to bubble beneath the surface and consume you --- had Angel not broken your heart in a manner so like this? Seated next to one another on the end of his bed while he told you, in no uncertain terms, that he was done with you? The thought made a sick wave of nausea wash through you. You wiped your perpetually-sweaty hands along the thighs of your sweats.

You had survived the last encounter like this, hadn't you? Honestly, what more could he do to you?

For his part, Angel was silent next to you, surveying the space of your room as he had in your living room. The familiar clutter greeted him -- a stack of books and a coffee mug on your bedside. A sketchbook never too far from reach. The comforter beneath him as pillowy as he remembered. He shuddered a sigh.

You decided to take conversational mercy on him,

"Go ahead,” you beckoned. “Say what you have to. But just know I meant what I said at the party. I don't need shit from you. You telling me what you want to say is for you. And when it's done, you're going to give me what I deserve and listen to me. We need to put this behind us. I’m not going to be looking over my shoulder for you for the rest of my life, Angel.” What had started as a murmur grew fiercer with each word.

"That's fair, querida," was all he offered. Your words to him each time you had spoken since the party were evermore forceful. He was used to gentle Frida. It wasn't often that the turn of your tide was leveled against him. Not often he was forced to bear the brunt of your storm when you were upset.

He could see what Coco meant. It was unwise to make you angry

He turned his body slightly to face yours, looking down at your hands as though he was contemplating attempting to hold one. His fingers twitched where his hands rested along his thighs. Better just to crack the ice, become submerged in frozen water. Take the shock out of it now, even if he wasn't sure where to begin, now that he faced you.

“I”m not really sure what I can tell you that’ll make it better,” he admitted.

You sighed.

“I’m not looking for you to make it better, Angel. There is no more better. Whatever you want to say, you say it,” you pressed. “We’re past better. We’re not together. you were clear about that. You don’t have to spare my feelings, I’m not your girl.”

Angel flinched, almost imperceptibly, at your last statement. He knew you weren’t together, knew you weren’t his. Hell, he’d been busy in the months since you’d been broken up. Busy chasing Adelita. Busy with other women when it didn’t work out with Adelita. Busy acting like a jackass with Andres. Busy with club nonsense. But hearing you say that you weren’t his girl?

It made Angel’s heart ache in a way he wasn’t expecting.

“I thought I was doing the right thing,” he said. At your scoff, he shook his head. “Really. After Adelita told me she was pregnant … I thought it was easier just to let you go. I needed to be there for her, for the kid. Even if it meant -- even if it meant losing you.”

“Easier for who? For you?” Your voice was soft. You hated that, once again, you felt like the crystalline girl Angel’s heartbreak had rendered you. Worried that the slightest thing would shatter you once more.

Angel chucked again, but there was no humor behind it. His eyes looked flat, as though he wasn’t really focusing on anything.

“For both of us, I guess. It’s stupid. I thought if I just -- cut you out … we would both be better. But … that ain’t what happened. I just made us both miserable. I made you hate me. And now ... She's gone. And so are you,” Angel’s voice was low, cracked.

The weight of his words, coupled with the gravelly pitch of his voice was making you feel restless, itchy. Grit like pebbly grains of sand you would roll between your fingers on days at the beach, palpable and pronounced.

“A-and,” you interjected, “how did you meet her? When did you meet her?”

Angel’s eyes darted to meet yours again, finding a swimming emotion he was getting better at putting his finger on. You only looked like that when you were getting lost in negative thoughts, awash in a sad song. Or when he was breaking your heart. He hated that look on your face. Hate that it marred your beautiful features into baleful melancholy.

“Club shit,” was all he’d said. “We were mixed up in some shit with the rebels. We were helping each other. W-we connected. It just … happened.”

You whipped your head at that last bit, eyes hardening. Angel’s hands came up, defensively.

“I know. Everyone says that, don’t they? It’s true… and I -- I really didn’t mean to hurt you. When I found out she was pregnant, I thought I was doing the right thing. By her. And by you,” he sucked air in through his teeth before releasing the breath in a huff of air. “I was wrong, Frida. I made every wrong choice, and I’m sorry.”

Angel carded his hands through his hair, tugging the ends lightly in his frustration. “I-- I just been going through some shit lately. And then ... Ezekiel tried to serve us brunch, and I was an asshole.”

He looked at you, only to meet your puzzled gaze.

“Brunch?” You queried, wrinkling your nose lightly. “Since when are you a brunch kinda guy, Angelito?”

“I really ain’t,” he said. “And you?”

“I like brunch just fine,” you deadpanned, rolling your eyes.

“That’s not what I mean, Frida, and you know it,” he said. “But we can get back to that later.” He took in your loose sweats, the way you had been picking your nails, the bags beneath your eyes. You had looked so beautiful, so perfect and untouchable, at the patch party the other night. And now -- in your room, all pretense stripped away, Angel could see the real you … behind the professional and put-together front. The tired girl with a broken heart. And he felt the residual ache in his chest that had taken residence left of his heart ever since the day he had put your stuff in a box and left it outside of his door.

“I know you have something you want to say to me, too, Frida. Your turn. How are you feeling?”

You laughed hollowly, your eyes fixed on the doorway to your room, half expecting Angel to get up and go.

“I’ve been better, Angel,” you deadpanned, swiveling to look at him, and finding him still seated next to you. “Ya know? It’s been a tough couple of days? Between that disaster of a party and whatever the hell went down the other day… but this town is too small for us to just try to ignore each other, and I do like it here.” You rubbed your eyes, the air between the two of you filling with silence that never used to be so awkward.

“That can’t be all you gotta say,” Angel pressed. “C’mon, Frida. Tell me how you’re feeling. I was… I was awful to you.”

The candle in the corner of the room sputtered, causing momentary, flickering shadows to dance along the walls of your room. Your safe, homey space felt full of shadows and ghosts, words unspoken between the two of you threatening to burst forth, your closet brimming with proverbial skeletons.

And you were just so tired. And now Angel was pressing you? You weren’t sure if the heat was from your sweats, the proximity of the man next to you, that you had turned up the thermostat too high. Or the fact that you were still so fucking angry.

“You want to know how I��m feeling, Angel?” You tugged on the ends of your hair, running your hands down the thighs of your sweats once more. Were you always so sweaty? “I appreciate you telling me the truth. Finally. And for apologizing, I guess.”

Tears were pricking at your eyes, the heat blazing in your cheeks matching the heat in the room.

"But you made me look stupid. Like someone in need of pity," you sucked air in through your teeth. "I fucking hate pity, Angel. It's just misplaced empathy. A useless emotion. And you’d think I’d just wear that mess? For everyone to see? At the party. At the yard. Everyone just feeling sorry for me. For months. Because of you.”

The ache in Angel’s chest intensified. Awash in a wave of hot shame. Was it always so hot in this room? You were right. And weren’t you always? You never were that girl, and he had sent you down the river like you meant nothing, your artist’s hands crushed beneath the washed stones of his choices. He opened his mouth to respond, but you weren’t done, apparently --

“And after everything? The way it went down? You made me feel like … I don’t know … Like you were punishing me,” your voice cracked, sobs and tears imminent through the dam you had erected. “Like I loved you more than you loved me, and you knew it… like you wanted to make me pay for that.”

“Frida …” Angel turned his body toward yours fully now, closing the space between the two fo you and cupped your cheeks, thumbs brushing away the silvery hot tears that were slipping down your face, sick that he had caused them. Sick that he had even made you think that what you were saying was true. “It wasn’t like that,” he assured.

“And the shittiest part is,” you hiccuped around your words, “you can’t even tell me give me the comfort of a cliche -- you can’t honestly tell me ‘it meant nothing,’ or that it was a ‘one-time thing,’ because none of that is true, is it? You care about her -- you had a child with her. You love her. And here I thought I could take what you did, take you, fold you up and tuck you away, like a note you pass in school. And I can’t. I just can’t.”

You tilted your face downward now as your tears fell, allowing your face to be fully cupped by Angel’s warm, calloused hands. Even now, you were still amazed at how tender his touch was, despite his rough exterior. All he wanted now was to comfort you, to touch you and bring your eyes to his again. To remind you of his love for you. Once. Now. Always?

“Frida, it wasn’t like that. They were my selfish, stupid choices. Mine. And I was scared. Scared of how much I wanted … everything with you. And it wasn’t right. I told you -- I … been going through some shit.”

“Scared,” you murmured. Turning your face in Angel’s hands, causing your lips to brush over his fingers. You leaned back, effectively releasing your face from the trace of his touch.

“Isn’t it remarkable how secure and insecure you can simultaneously feel when you’ve found someone worth loving? I felt it, too. With you it's now I knew you were the one,” You said. Angel straightened in shock, at how, though you weren’t present for his conversation yesterday with Ezekiel, you parroted his feelings he had confided in his brother back to him. Always on the same page. His full lips pursed as you continued.

“We can’t keep using what happened to hurt each other. I’m done with that,” you said, shaking your head. “I’m sorry you felt the way you did. I’m sorry you felt like you needed to look elsewhere. And I hope you find what you're looking for,” you hated how soft your voice sounded to your own ears. Hadn't you meant to be forceful, angry? You sniffled. “Because, despite everything that’s happened... You are someone worth loving, Angelito.”

"No, Frida," he shook his head softly before looking at you again, eyes glittering. "You are. Someone deserving of more.”

Your breath caught in your chest at his words, taking this moment to look into his ochre eyes once more. You wanted to commit to your memory just how they swirl like melting chocolate and promises in low candlelight.

And, oh. Angel was made to be seen like this, you’d thought. The dim candlelight giving everything in your room a pleasant glow and slightly-blurry edges. He looked like his namesake. And how ironic was that, really? Considering the context of your conversation.

It's easy these days, you thought, for you to get carried away by your own feelings... While you searched desperately in the emotional rubble for your muse, Angel, the truth of it tore you to shreds with blunt fingernails -- knowing he was out in the world -- running freely and carelessly. Running away with your imagination. With your hope. With the pieces of your heart that had survived the blitzing storm he had put you through. With the pieces of your heart that had belonged to him. That you feared may always belong to him.

Looking at Angel now, in the low-lit steadfast luminescence of your room, shadows flickering agreeably across his angular cheekbones. He was sculpted. Made to be admired in perpetuity. Artist that you were, it ached. It stung. The knowledge that your hands were not the ones that had molded him into the man sat beside you. A man molded, instead, by his own choices.

All you could do was watch as those wrong decisions drifted lazily down the river, only to become a torrent, Angel caught in the current. The waves lapped loudly, sloppily against riverbanks of better judgment, but Angel is never quite washed ashore. No, as you watched, he slipped down the river, out of your fingertips and toward something you're too fearful to quantify. Away from you.

You want the river to carry him back to you. To home. But you know it never will.

Angel has two choices now: To drown under the weight of his path this river has wrought; or to swim.

As you sit beside him in the growing heat of your room, you hope he chooses to swim. Even if it’s not to where you stand.

"So, is that what’s next?” You asked, wiping your eyes.

At Angel’s puzzled look, you carried on,

"You're asking for it back," you whispered. “Or you’re going to. My heart? You may not have said it like that, exactly, but it's what you want. Like you don't know how bad it all hurt me, even if you say you know, I don't think you ever will. And even if I wanted to give it to you, I don't know if there's enough of it left."

You wrung your hands together, awaiting Angel’s response. You looked up at him through your lashes, clumped together with the tears that had escaped during your confessional.

His molten eyes were soft on your form, swallowing before he spoke again.

“I was such an asshole… to you. And at that stupid brunch … to Gaby. But it was all just … too much. I mean, she was wearing mom’s apron…” Angel shook his head. “And all I could think of … Even with Adelita out there, with her and my boy gone, outta my life… all I could think of was how it should be you wearing the stupid apron. It should be me giving you my mother’s ring. And I was so angry at Ezekiel for having all of that. For having what I wanted … wanted with you.”

If there was any air left in the room, it was certainly all gone now. All that was left was heat, no air or space between the two of you. Just stagnant air and the weight of words, both said and unsaid. And if Angel had said these words to you more than a year ago? Maybe they would sound different to your ears. Melodious, even.

Now, all you could think to do was comfort. Ever the nurturer. What else could you do, really, after he'd said that? You shook your head gently, lacing your fingers through Angel’s and squeezing.

“It’s not that he has something you don’t, or that you can’t have, Angel… What EZ and Gabriela have is what they have. It’s theirs. You’ll have yours. Someday.”

Silence descended upon the room once more. The warm scent of orange-cinnamon from your candle permeated the room, the ever-present heat between you and Angel banishing all thoughts of romantic winter from your mind.

“I just wanna say, again, Frida… how sorry I am for what happened at the party. For what happened with Andres. It was fucked up of me,” Angel’s tongue passed over his lips. “Did I answer all of your burning questions?”

You reached over, trailing your fingers over the tattoo you had given Angel what felt like a lifetime ago. His eyes followed the trajectory of your fingers, his nerves alight at the feeling of your starlit, feathery touch on his skin once more.

"Just one left.” Your eyes locked with his, unwavering. “Who am I to you, really?" You ask, the edge your silken voice had taken on slides beneath Angel's skin clumsily, like crumbling shards of glass. "What did I mean?"

Angel tries not to look at you now. Tries, but fails. His dark eyes meet your downcast ones once more, hates that they are once more glimmering with unshed tears waiting to fall. Hating that once again, he's the cause of the dreary blue tinge shading what should have been your sunny, hopeful worldview. Awash with the sunsets he would take you to see.

And if there was any time for blossoming truth, for a sprig of rosemary remembrance of sacred feeling, it was now.

"You're the love of my life," he finally admits, exhaling heavily. "That's just it, ain't it? Always you. And not that I have any right to ask you now -- But I need to know, Frida. Am I yours?"

Any air left was sucked from the room in one fell swoop, leaving you with the stuffy and sticky discomfort of Angel's question and the weight of his heated gaze on you, waiting for something, anything to fall from your pretty lips.

And what a question it was.

You knew the answer, of course. You reach up to brush your thumb tenderly across Angel’s sculpted cheek, as though you could be the one molding it, nodding before verbalizing your answer,

"You've always been the love of my life. Had my heart. I'm yours, But, I think I know now… that you were never truly mine. Even if you say it now. You have a heart that's not so easily won, Angelito. That's something I wish I'd learned sooner, wish I could've taken from you… from all of this."

All Angel could do was shake his head, the crease in his brow deepening at your words.

"Ever the poet, Frida."

"I thought I was a 'shit' poet?" You teased gently, recalling his words to you when he’d texted you to ask you out for the first time.

Angel chuckled, the grit and honey in his voice washing over you, a wave of silken heat, his eyes are fixed upon yours intently, leaning forward and bringing his hands to trace along your neck, your jaw, dragging his thumb over the full, pillowy part of your bottom lip.

“You did win it, Frida,” was all he said.

The rush of warm, fluttery feeling swam through your body, prickling you like sparkling, popping champagne. Angel’s eyes tracked yours, down to where his thumb was dragging across your lip. Your eyes slipped shut, lashes fluttering.

You could feel it rushing back. Everything Angel had ever made you feel -- the ardor, the frustration, the crushing weight of the river wild. Heat bloomed across your cheeks and down your chest, between your thighs and through the fingertips that you had brought to grip Angel’s biceps.

His declaration of love, of melted marshmallow and warm cocoa -- made you crave him in a way you had long thought gone.

You pressed your lips to kiss the tip of Angel’s thumb. You were rewarded with a reciprocal, sucking in of air on Angel’s part.

He held his breath momentarily before surging forward and capturing your lips with his full ones.

You were awash in the memory of every kiss shared with Angel. Of how he’d made you feel in your full-hearted moments together. Rich and full, like morning coffee. Hazy and sweet, like cherry smoke.

Angel’s kiss makes you feel dizzy, fizzing and dissolving simultaneously, like a Mento in a glass of Coke. Volatile and thrumming, both erupting and disappearing so fast, you were afraid you’d never have the chance to process exactly what it made you feel.

It might be okay, you reasoned to yourself -- if you could hold Angel just for one more night, feel his body pressed against yours. It felt like a good idea in this moment, just to hold him for one night only.

Your lips pressed against one another, his hand cupping your jaw trailing back to tangle in the hair at the nape of your neck, tugging it -- causing your kiss to break. Angel trailed his lips from yours, down and along your jaw.

Angel’s grip firmed, turning your head further as he continued his attention down your neck, giving you a view of the chair next to your closet where you had haphazardly thrown Angel’s t-shirt when you had worn it last, a symbol of comfort now worn-out.

You laid back, Angel following, surging over you and pressing you into your cloudlike comforter. His hips rolled into yours, his teeth now scraping gently along the slope of your neck.

At the gasp you emitted, Angel felt himself harden in his jeans. He'd thought he'd never hear that sound from you again. And replaying the memory of it in his head? Not enough. He rolled his hips into yours again, again, as you dragged your thighs up Angel’s sides, locking your legs around his hips. He trailed warm hand down to caress your breast through your soft t-shirt, leaving a heated trail in its wake.

“Oh, Angel,” you gasped, rolling your hips to meet his.

“Can I kiss you like this, amor?” Angel rasped, “I’ll make you feel good.”

He took in the heat behind your eyes, the kiss-swollen state of your lips when he broke from them. The creeping heat he felt from beneath your collar in his position atop you, and the way your breasts heaved beneath your shirt.

The thread of resolve you were hanging by seemed to dissolve, leaving you unraveled and threadbare, naked before the man you swore would be your forever. The ache you felt between your legs burned crimson, cloudy and acrid. You tasted Angel’s kiss, tasted him, on your tongue.

You were never more aware of the dimensions of your body than when Angel had his hands on you, tracing and gripping every curve, the touch of places you don't think to touch yourself, strange but pleasurable as you relished in the trace of his rough fingertips against your smooth skin. He slid his hands down your waist, hips and into the loose waistband of your sweats, sliding them down your legs as he went.

Angel played your body with temerity, a confidence, and before you knew it, your lower half was bare before him. He pushed the soft, loose fabric of your t-shirt up and over your chest, trailing his lips over your now-exposed skin, bringing his other hand to cup your breast, circling the pad of his thumb over your nipple.

You gasped and groaned beneath Angel’s attention. Gripping at the hem of his shirt, you tugged it up and over his head, trailing your hands down his firm, thick torso.

Angel was reticent to deprive himself of your touch after not having had it for so long. The touch of your nimble, artist’s fingers trailing over the lines of his body made Angel feel like an instrument being plucked to a tune that made both his and your body sing. He thought he would never feel it again.

But this moment? This was about you.

Angel gripped your wrists, firmly planting your hands next to your head, following the trajectory and leaning over you with his full body. Releasing your wrists, Angel firmly pressed his lips to yours again, his tongue swiping past your lips and invading your mouth. Hot, needy, dirty.

Ange tore his mouth from yours, his lips trailing lower and lower down your body, kissing your hips, nipping at your hipbone, causing you to yelp and buck your hips.

The action drew Angel’s attention, lifting his lips from your body, his eyes meeting yours.

“I missed you, baby. Did you miss me? Sweet girl...” His voice was lower than you think you’d ever heard it, dangerously so.

Bringing his hand down to cup your mound, he traced his fingers through your slick folds.

“Ah-Angel,” you gasped, tilting your head back at the blissful feel of Angel’s touch. As quickly as his touch had come, he withdrew it, causing your eyes to snap open, fixed on him and full of fire.

“You know how this works, querida. I won’t touch you unless you answer me,” he taunted, the tips of his fingers trailing lightly over where you’d wanted him most, staunch in his refusal to commit to the touch.

“God, Angel, yes,” You gasped. “P-please.”

Angel rewarded you, prising apart your legs and sliding down your body, tracing a teasing lick of his tongue through your folds, increasing in pace and intensity at the noises passing through your lips.

"I d-do miss you,” you sighed, starting to roll your hips against Angel’s tongue. “I miss the way you touch me… the way you fuck me.”

God. It was hot, the way you talked, the way you gave yourself over to him.

Stars and firecrackers popped behind your eyes at Angel’s attention, cinnamon heat seeping through your bones, writhing and twisting at the way Angel strung his way through your body. Unable to justify the concept of being left alone, you tugged up at Angel’s jaw, forcing him to look up at you. Met with your wanton gaze, Angel licks his lips at the sight of you and slides back up your body with a grace that defies his size.

Now level with you once more, he gripped your jaw, turning your head to the side and attacked your neck, your breasts with renewed vigor, grinding his denim-clad hardness against your naked core, the painful drag of the fabric turning pleasurable.

With your gaze turned toward the wall, you were once again greeted with the sight of Angel’s rumpled t-shirt on the chair by your closet. An object of comfort, threads and strings tying you to a past life.

What were you doing? Taking comfort in something that you couldn’t, in good conscience, call your own?

The rumpled shirt seemed to be mocking you, taunting you. Reminding you that, once again, you were seeking clinging to something you shouldn't. Seeking solace in things -- people -- that you shouldn't.

Apart from Christopher's warm, sly, sensational goodnight kiss the other day, Angel's was the first touch you'd experienced like this since, well, Angel… How easy it was to slip back into your feelings for him, get caught up in him.

I'd give it all just to hold you close, sorry that I broke your heart... You shouldn’t be doing this.

“Angel,” you prised his lips from your body. “St-stop.”

Angel’s eyes were wild, hair mussed and lips swollen.

“What, querida?”

“Angel,” you sighed again, sliding your shirt down and coming to sit up. “We can’t be doing this.”

Angel slouched next to you with a huff, trailing his fingers down your arm.

“Why not?”

You sighed. After all this time, the feeling of Angel so close to you was everything you thought you wanted. But everything that had been said? The water beneath your respective bridges? Angel was still awash, had not come to rest on any bank. And you were still waiting on the shore -- now certain that all you would mold from the riverbank clay were memories and half-baked dreams.

“We’re not together,” you breathed, leaning over the bed to pick up your sweats and tug them back on. “And that’s not what this is. We're too old for platitudes, and happy endings are for children's stories. Whether you want to acknowledge it or not, you know this is wrong.”

“Querida -- I want…" Angel started, before turning away, leaning over his thighs and tugging his hands through his hair… his distress with how he had let himself get so out of control with you was mounting. He sighed heavily, shaking his head.

“What? Angel,” you touched your hand to his still-bare shoulder. “What do you want?”

"A second chance…?" Angel's normally smooth voice trailed at the end, transforming his desire into a question, fading into the silence of the room. He shifted his shoulders, turning his body to once more face yours, but not quite meeting your eyes.

You let his words hang in silence for a moment, weighing how you wanted to respond.

“Say something, Frida.”

"I knew you'd say that," you chuckled drily. "I know you, you're like this. But second chances become third, fourth, fifth. I can't trust you. What did you expect me to say?"

Angel opened his mouth to answer before catching sight of the expression on your face, twisted into proverbial knots. Even now, you were being far more gracious than he had any right to expect. He closed his mouth again, sighing.

"I don't know, dulce."

"I do,” you shook your head. “You expected me to say 'yes,' " you reached across the bed to one more lace your fingers through his. "I know you. But what does it say about me that I want to? It would be so like me, wouldn't it?"

You squeezed Angel's fingers tenderly in your grip, awarding him a flickering, wan smile.

Angel's voice cracked when he spoke again, "Then say yes, Frida. Let me prove it to you. Prove that we’re meant to be together."

"And would you? Would you take me back if I did that to you? If I had someone else's child? While we were together?"

Angel was silent at that, not having considered the reversal of roles. In truth, though you knew him, he knew you, too. It would be so wildly out of character, how would he have been expected to consider it?

"You think you might, because you love me. But, see, Angelito, I don't think you would. So how can you sit there and say we're two people who are meant to be when we don't even love each other the same? Love doesn't come in pieces, amor. You held my heart in your hands. And you crushed it. Let it crumble into nothing, like sand. Like I meant nothing."

“But this--” Angel gestured between the two of you, eyes lingering on the skin of your neck where his mouth had been, tracing his fingers over your kiss-swollen lips.

“--Can’t happen.” Tears were rising to your eyes again.

Goddamnit. Couldn’t you get through one conversation with him without crying?

“Maybe we are meant to be. And maybe we'll find our way back to one another. But right now? I -- I don't think I can. But more importantly, I don't think we should. And please hear me when I tell you how much it breaks my heart to say that."

Your heart was burning, but your skin was ice. Dream, they call desire. And he could hear the heartbreak in your voice. Always stupidly genuine.

Angel was stock-still, and as you took in his prone form, eyes tracing to his face -- you saw a lone tear slip down his cheek, shaking his head.

"I miss you, you know?" He chuckled, no humor in his soft, velvet voice.

"I know."

You were in a fugue state, the rumble of Angel’s bike retreating down the street barely registering as you were processing as you retreated to your bed, the room and your sheets noticeably cooler in Angel’s absence. The room feeling too large without him in it.

As you settled into bed, you noticed it -- Angel’s old shirt, still on your chair.

You hadn’t thought to return it.

---

The following week found you back in the shop, preparing for your mid-afternoon appointment. You had wiped down the table, changed the wrapping, and were now idly jotting as you waited. Thoughts on one person in particular.

The bell above the shop door dinged, causing you to look up from the poem you were penning on the lime-green sticky you kept a stack of near your work station.

Your one o'clock was right on time.

And you were greeted with the sight of Angel striding in with two cups of caffeine, offering one two you as he rested his ringed hand on the counter.

“If you want an appointment, you’d better call first. You know what they say about walk-ins. Always risky.”

Since Angel had departed your place in the middle of the night a week ago, the words between the two of you having had time to simmer and settle, allowing you to process the weight of it all.

For his part, Angel had given you space. Hadn’t said anything past texting you to tell you he had made it home safely.

In the days that had followed, you had cautiously cracked the ice between the two of you, hoping to assuage any awkwardness and rebuild some kind of friendly connection removed from the physical. It was probably better that way. Messaging him idly to ask about his day. Not that you had shared with Angel, but you were also texting Christopher.

Angel had called the shop, asking if you were available to help him with something he’d wanted to do. Something special, he’d said.

“Something for Ezekiel,” Angel told you. “He’s been through alot lately, with Gaby and the club and everything … been through alot with me lately. Now feels like the right time”

You had, of course, readily agreed. Eager and honored to help Angel with a tribute to his brother. The texts between the two of you changed to exchanges of ideas, you sending him screenshots of your sketches before the two of you had decided on a design that fit.

You accepted the cup of coffee from Angel gratefully and with a gentle smile, beckoning him behind the counter. Coffee truly was a love language.

“You can sit in the chair and lean forward, or you can lie on the table. Both are clean. Dealer’s choice,” you said between sips.

Angel nodded, slugging the last of his coffee and placing the cup down before slipping his shirt over his torso, baring his back to you as he sat in the chair, leaning forward and twisting his abdomen to bare his shoulder blade to you.

The tawny patch of skin on his shoulder, above the large Mayans tribute that covered the expanse of his back, seemed like the perfect place for something for EZ, the angel (ha ha) on his shoulder and guiding influence in one another’s lives.

You cleaned and bic’d the area, stenciling your design into the space and getting your kit ready to begin.

Angel watched what he could of you from the corner of his eye, a resonant ache blooming through his chest at the familiarity of this scene. Of you, all business, touching his skin, preparing to impart a piece of yourself that he would wear on his body for the rest of his days.

You queued up your playlist, the sounds of motown flowing through the shop as you hummed along idly.

In this moment, Angel knew … he was still in love with you. Likely always would be. You had been far too gracious with him, as you always were -- in the way you had treated him the other night. No mention of your “almost” encounter, for which he was grateful. And he knew he was correct in his assessment of you when you had first started dating -- it was in your nature.

“You mind?” Angel broke the comfortable silence between the two of you, gesturing at the journal-like sketchbook you had left near your station.

You shook your head in acquiescence, “No. But it’s kind of a mess in there lately,” you acknowledged. “Shit poet, and all.”

“You’re never gonna let that go, are you?” Angel barked a laugh. “I didn’t insult your poetry, Frida, you did.”

“Ever the self-deprecating, starving artist,” you sighed dramatically.

Angel took that as his cue, flipping through the pages of your book. One page felt particularly heavy beneath his fingers. He flipped to it, to be met with dried, pressed flowers that had been delicately glued to the pages, the page covered in a plastic slipsheet -- the dried, dusky pink of peony petals were affixed to the page next to a swath of a white, lacy-looking bloom.

Around the flowers were sketches of hands that looked suspiciously like Angel’s own, down to the tattoos, and idle lines of poetry.

Angel furrowed his brows as he glanced at the flowers again.

“You got those flowers for me,” you acknowledged, looking over his shoulder to see the page of your book he had settled on. “One of our first dates, when we went to the park. I’m not sure if you remember.”

Angel’s throat caught in a way that both annoyed and unsettled him. How were you always doing this to him?

“Recuerdo, Frida,” he breathed. “Lo recuerdo todo.”

You patted his arm gently, resuming your work.

“I like pressing flowers. It takes a while, but the end result is worth it.”

You pinched your brows in concentration as you drew along the stenciled lines you’d previously etched into Angel’s shoulder blade, gun buzzing. You began to fill in the minimalist rising sun that was now filling the shoulder blade, stippling the interior as you went, the effect giving the sun an almost stucco-like finish that looked breathtaking against Angel’s golden skin.

Angel allowed you to continue you work in silence, the weight of the past few days with you settling into his bones. He had pleaded with you, endeared himself to you so much that he had lost his voice. His bones filling with the words he wished he could verbalize.

He was slowly arriving at that place of acceptance -- Santo Padre was a small town. He would see you. And it appeared that you could now stomach his presence, but he wouldn’t push his luck. Seeing you alone. Hell, even seeing you with someone else, was better than not seeing you at all.

But once thing was clear -- you were someone who would always be in his life, his memories, his heart.

Angel was lost in his thoughts; you were focused on your work. The only thing that gave any indication as to the passage of time in the room where you two found yourselves was the evolution of your playlist passing through tracks.

Isn’t that how it always was with Angel? Time stood still.

As you finished his tattoo, you snapped a quick pic for your work Insta -- and maybe, selfishly, for yourself, to admire, too. It’s true, what you had felt all those months ago, and again a week ago -- Angel Reyes was your muse.

Made to be admired in perpetuity.

You cleaned and wrapped it, pushing back wordlessly from your seat and making your way to the front as Angel gingerly tugged his shirt back over his head. Quoting the rate over your shoulder, you put Angel's aftercare bag together. But not before slipping the lime sticky in.

“Is that it?” Angel asked, arriving at the front counter, kutte once again in place..

“C’mon, Angelito, you know you get the friends-and-family rate,” you shrugged.

"And is that what we are, querida? Friends?” Angel's voice had none of the bravado it held when he had first spoken these words to you the day you'd met. Now it was cotton soft and carefully tinged with hope. He leaned over the counter.

You shrugged again.

"I guess we'll see, won't we?" You tilted the corner of your lips in a gentle, wan half-smile.

"One day with you, and already friends again?” Angel breezed. You shrugged lightly in response, as he continued, “Or maybe the day after that? A man can hope, Frida."

“You know what they say, Angelito,” your voice was soft, but he’d recognize the teasing lilt anywhere. He’d heard it so often at the breaking dawn of your relationship. Kindness, with a hint of subtle flirtation. It was just how you were. “Hope springs eternal.”

Angel nodded, tossing a few bills on the counter and gently rapping his ringed-knuckles against the counter, a he was wont to do. He smiled gently at you, all glimmering white teeth and high cheeks.

As Angel walked away, head down and focused on his phone now as he headed out the door and toward his bike, you watched him leave. Your elbow on the counter and head propped in your hand.

You wondered when Angel would discover the sticky, recalling the words you had written on it.

my stark moments of clarity between hazy and woebegone memory (thanks to spilled red wine) -- are still marked by the firm hand of your bruising ardor.

Your phone buzzed, breaking you from your reverie as you looked down at the name flashing on the screen, an easy grin blooming across your features.

“Well, hey,” you greeted. Unable to keep the happy chirp from your voice at hearing from him again so soon.

“Hey, mama,” he greeted in that smooth, throaty rasp of his you adored. “You busy later?”

---

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