#impossible to salvage and just runs dry constantly

[retirementhomecollab]

☾ the witching hour

☾ decision: balcony

☾ warnings: f!reader, swearing, sfw shirtlessness

☾ word count: 1.6k

You push the glass door to the side, into the almost winter night. The chilly air that nips at your cheeks seems closer to the frigidity of December than the tailends of fall. Behind you, the buzz of the party burns, like a smattering of fireflies in an autumnal glass globe, protected from the frost. Leaving October behind you, you choose the night.

You’re not alone in wanting a little cold from the chitter chatter. His figure is dimly lit, but you’d recognize the jersey-clad back and soft black hair anywhere. You’d spent many classes last semester daydreaming of this view from behind, his broad back a total eclipse of any other light in your universe.

You begin to call to him, but he turns around first. And you choke.

What the fuck is he wearing.

“What the fuck are you wearing?”

“Oh, hey.” He holds up a hand, unsure of whether to put down the red solo cup he’s holding in the other.

“Why…” You struggle to find the words. “Why are you like that?”

“Like what?” He looks at you blankly.

You gape at him. Does he not know what he’s wearing? Sometimes, he’s a bit absent in class but he’s never this much of an airhead.

“Kageyama,” you enunciate every syllable, “you are shirtless.”

This most blatantly conspicuous statement hangs between the two of you. You stand there, not entirely sure of what else you could say.

Red blooms across Kageyama’s face like the midnight frost. At the same time, almost impossibly, he pales. If you weren’t in such a situation, you would tease him. But you are in such a situation, so you use the social skills in your arsenal — which always bleeds dry in front of this man — and try to salvage the situation.

“I mean, you’re wearing a jersey.” That’s definitely the wrong way to go about this. Neither of you need a double-spaced, Times New Roman twelve-point font, MLA formatted report on his current state of undress. But then again, in the battle between brain and tongue in these situations, your mouth usually runs you straight into trouble. “But, like, you know — I mean I’m sure you know — it’s quite unzipped, you’re rather naked— sorry, I meant undressed — underneath it, and I can see your very successful abs.”

Very successful abs. What the fuck.

Your brain smothers your mouth at that.

To your partial credit, a switch finally flicks on inside Kageyama’s head after your ending thesis statement. He slams the cup down onto the balcony ledge and scrambles to pull the zipper up.

As your mind’s eye watches your audacity in horror, your eyes are enjoying their newfound independence from your rational. They follow the zipper in disappointed fascination as it hooks into the lowest teeth, clicking in slow motion until it hits the highest, tippiest-toppest teeth. Your eyes damn your mind for even mentioning anything about his state of undress, and your mind damns your eyes for being correct.

Meanwhile, in Kageyama’s own head, he runs through the two-and-a-half excuses he can come up with to explain how he could even forget that his jersey was unzipped in this weather. But the most blatant truth is that his one brain cell had been too focused on how good you look in your costume. And right now, that brain cell is so absorbed in thinking up ways to salvage the situation in his own manner that he doesn’t notice your expression changing from an unabashedly appreciative stare to an embarrassed effort to meet his eyes.

“Sorry,” is what he settles for, gaze truly apologetic. “The senpai thought it would be great for us to match.”

“‘Us’? As...what…?” You frown.

“The Karasuno first years.” Oh, right, his high school buddies. “As some stupid characters from some stupid swimming show.”

You look at him, eyes widening by the second, mouth hitting the ground for the umpteenth time in the past five minutes.

“So you mean you’re…?”

Kageyama nods reluctantly.

“And Hinata is…?”

He hangs his head low.

“And Tsukishima…?”

He smirks a little at this.

“That makes Yamaguchi the cute, friendly softie.”

Kageyama’s eyes narrow a little but he nods.

You stare at him, needing a long moment to process this.

Kageyama looks like he wants to throttle someone. Namely his former vice-captain for suggesting it.

And then the stupider two of this party’s hosts for supporting it.

And then his second former vice-captain for hyping it up.

And then his third captain (aka the ‘cute, friendly softie’ you seem pretty friendly with) and his third captain’s girlfriend slash former second manager for accepting this stupid proposal on all of their behalves.

But when you burst into belated laughter at the absurdity of it all, Kageyama’s face hesitantly moves on from the pinched, murderous look he had on and compromises for a nice bewildered confusion.

“Kageyama,” you catch your breath as you lean a hand on his arm for support, “you have to help me find them later.” He nods questioningly but it’s not like he can say no, not when you have a warm hand pressed against his chilled arms, eyes crinkling in the exact way that had Hinata constantly making fun of him for staring at during group projects.

You grin at him as you explain, “I want pictures next to my new favourite cosplayers. Especially Yamaguchi.”

Man, this really is the devil’s hour.

“Do you like Yamaguchi’s type?” He blurts out before he can stop it.

“Huh?”

Leaning against the railing, he looks back at the apartment filled with friends conversing and couples generating warmth. By the couch, Yamaguchi has his arm around Yachi, laughing at something an upperclassmen friend of Bokuto said.

“The cute, friendly softies.”

You laugh casually, looking out at the expanse of the city before you, not quite understanding the weight of his question.

“Sure, why not? Warm personality, cute face. Nothing to not like about them.”

Or maybe you do understand, since for you, the qualities that make a “cute, friendly softie” most definitely applies to your love interest, who is standing out here in the freezing cold with you, dressed in nothing but swim trunks and a sports jersey.

But Kageyama stays silent.

Feeling that you might have said something wrong, you look at him haltingly. Kageyama continues to look into the apartment for a while, and you think that maybe, with the faraway night sky blue of his irises, he’s not really looking at the apartment. And then you catch your own reflections and his sharp blues staring straight at you through the reflections, and your maybe is now a certainty.

It’s so warm.

“Yeah.” He finally turns to you, the real you. On this cold, frigid night, Kageyama takes your honest, heartfelt words positively, a spark of hope on this Hallows Eve. “I like them, too.”

You wait for the magic to finish casting.

“They’re easy to be around. They’re comfy,” he elaborates, face softening. “They’re really warm.”

With a small, beaming smile, you cling onto that magic. Kageyama returns your smile with an equally bright one of his own. You turn to face the city lights again as he shifts his gaze back to the glow of the apartment. He might’ve moved closer — or was that you? — but you two stay in silence, simply there.

You could get used to this, his warmth besides yours in the chilly night. The fireflies fade straight into the background with the heat and comfort that Kageyama generates. For you, this is enough magic for now.

A delicious buzz runs through you, comfortable against the cold night.

You grin to yourself when you feel him flinch beside you as well.

But when he shivers again, practicality hits you.

“Oh shit, Kageyama!” You whip around to look at him. “Aren’t you freezing in that?”

He looks at you, eyes wide and blue in the night.

You make a move to untie your cloak.

His face starts to glow red once again.

“I’m fine!” He protests as you hold the cloak out to him. “I’m really warm!”

A chuckle erupts from you as you roll your eyes.

“Yeah, you are,” you grin, a teasing glint in your tone. “I was a bit chilly coming out here, but you’re pretty warm, Kageyama.”

The blush that engulfs him has Kageyama believing that you truly are a witch — and not just on this devil’s night.

He knows next to nothing about this stupid swimming show, but he, as Kageyama Tobio, cannot be outdone by a mere witch.

“I guess I am a bit cold,” Kageyama admits with a lopsided smile.

You huff out a satisfactory grin, passing him your cloak, victory in hand. Kageyama throws it around his shoulders, and you watch with barely-concealed admiration as his form dwarfs the cloak.

As you stand there, beaming up at him as if you could successfully ignore the cold, he barks out a short laugh.

Grinning at you slightly, Kageyama opens up his borrowed cloak.

“You look a bit cold.” His eyes hold all the impish blue magic of the hour. “I have a borrowed cloak from a cute friendly softie that we can share.”

You almost choke on the chilly air as it’s now your turn to flush red. He laughs, quite embarrassed at his spurt of gusto, and pulls you close, enveloping you in both the cloak and his body heat. As your city and friends come together for the last of October, you’re here to take on the wintery night, embraced in the magic of December’s warmth.

Pick a different room: > Go to the closed bedroom. > Go to the open bedroom. > Go to the kitchen. > Go to the hallway. > Go to the bathroom. > Go to the living room.

[kristie-rp]

Responsibly Questionable

Original by @cassandra-rp / @coloredinsanity

PREVIOUS

Giselle can hear an argument, or at least two people talking. She can’t really tell what it’s about, and she doesn’t care – wouldn’t care without the downers she’s taken, and definitely doesn’t care with them, letting them ease her back to sleep. 

It takes some time for the pills to wear off, but as soon as they do, her eyes fly open and she shoots upright, taking a startled breath of impossibly warm air. She’s never seen the place she’s in before, and the disorientation of just waking up is amplified in her confusion. Her glasses are dirty and cracked, and they’ve been undependable for a long time; she can sort of read through one particularly large uncracked section, but that’s about it. Her instincts and common sense allow her to make sense of the fragmented words she can read in context, but out of context, it’s anyones game; the place around her is blocks of color and, for some reason, a pile of soft blankets that have fallen into her lap. She’s staring around as though the hazy walls will provide an explanation when she makes the mistake of meeting the gaze of a woman who is peeking around a wooden doorframe. The woman offers a warm smile before approaching Giselle, and Giselle’s immediate response is to recoil into the couch, away from the danger of a stranger.

“W – who are you?” The stress in her voice spikes to the sound of two male voices, voices that must be coming from another room. She’s been abused and used countless times, and this wouldn’t even be the first time a woman lulls her into a feeling of safety before tricking her, and her heart rate picks up as her anxiety grows.

The woman lowers herself as Giselle watches, bringing herself to a similar height to the girl on the couch. She’s trying to seem less threatening, and with the motherly aura, the one Giselle has only ever seen from the sidelines, it’s almost working. “My name is Melina,” she says, her voice deliberately low and soothing. “Please don’t be afraid. You’re safe here; it’s just my husband and my son upstairs talking. They’re harmless.” Melina sighs internally, not surprised to see confirmation that the girl in front of her has been through a lot. Scars are visible beneath the dirt and mud set on her skin, telling a story of being hurt so many different ways. Melina slowly gets to her feet when she feels Giselle isn’t going to have an anxiety attack at her doing so. “How are you feeling?”

Giselle might not want to shriek anymore, but she still hesitates, curling her fingers – being able to move them without any stiffness is such a novelty for her, she could marvel at it if she wasn’t inclined to suspect something bad about to happen – into the filthy scraps of her trousers. She swallows down nothing, mumbles out the words “What does it matter?”. She’s trying o be defensive, but she’s not in any shape to keep it up; her voice cracks on the words. Tears sting at her eyes and she ducks her head, hunching her shoulders and wishing she could hide.

Melina hesitates herself, her heart going out to this scared little girl. She sits on the couch slowly, out of reach of the girl. “Your name is Giselle, right?”

Giselle should change her middle name, if she has one, to hesitation, because she does it again, before nodding stiffly. “How do you know that?”

“I’ve been looking for you,” Melina says, knowing full well how it sounds. “Well, my husband and I have been. How much do you remember of your childhood?”

“Enough to know you’re not my mother, if you’re trying to play that card.”

“Of course not. I meant – do you remember your brother?”

Giselle’s body language shifted instantly, startled by the question. The tears are still burning in her eyes, but she’s a little less on edge with distrust for this woman as she reluctantly looks up. “Sorta,” she mumbles, swallowing hard enough to make her dry throat ache. She slips her hand into her pocket to run her fingers over something Melina cannot see, squeezing it tightly for reassurance.

“Well,” Melina says, “That’d be my son. We adopted him.”

The first thing Giselle experiences is disbelief, blinking uncomprehendingly at the woman. Melina smiles slightly, and Giselle has no idea when the woman moved closer, but she brushes against her back with a light touch and she’s still got that soft smile. “I drew you a bath. You’re freezing cold; it should warm you up. I can help you with your hair, if you want, and then we can all talk and have dinner. I don’t know what you like, so I made Cethin’s favorite.”

Giselle choked on nothing, the name warranting a physical response of some kind – it was familiar, of course it was, she knew her own brothers name. She nods slowly, though, her defences falling. She wants to see her brother almost more than anything she’s wanted before, it’s all she’s wanted for years, but a warm bath sounds fantastic, and she agrees to it quietly.

It takes a while. The water had to be drained and refilled several times, with Giselle too shaky to manage a shower instead, and even with Melina’s help it takes what feels like an eternity to work the snarls out of her hair. She doesn’t know what the stuff Melina pours into her hair is, but it smells like fruit perfume, and it makes it soft and shiny for the first time in Giselle’s memory. In warmer months, her hygiene isn’t as bad as it is right now – there are fresh bodies of water in the woods on the edge of the city that are easy and fairly safe to get to, and there are showers at the beach if she needs something quicker. In winter, though, it’s too cold to chance the fever the cold will give her.

“Isaac,” Melina calls suddenly, startling Giselle, “can you get Cethin’s old glasses? He should still have them in his desk.” She’s been examining Giselle’s belongings to check whether anything obvious needs salvaging, and the glasses are marked as cheap reading glasses that can be bought at a gas station. Cethin’s will be stronger, though there is no way for Melina to know if they’re anywhere close to the right prescription. She has brought clothing with her and lets Giselle dress herself. Her own old clothing proved much too large, something she realized once she’d seen Giselle’s incredibly underweight frame in the bath; even sweatpants that hadn’t fit in years with the drawstring tightened as much as possible would probably slide right off.

Luckily, the McKinley’s are hoarders, and she is able to dig some clothes from Cethin’s past out of storage in the basement. Her son has been small all his life, constantly built as though his body is still preparing for them to be unable to feed him, the way his biological parents couldn’t. She is able to provide Giselle with long gym shorts that stay up on narrow hips, and a sweatshirt decorated with Pokemon graphics, a relic from when Cethin was obsessed with anime (he still is, to some degree, but is less likely to wear such obvious references now). She asks Giselle to sit on the edge of the tub once she is dressed and proceeds to sort through the medical kit kept in the bathroom cupboard.

Giselle recognizes some of it, but others are completely unfamiliar to her, either never used or never heard of. She listens to Melina murmuring to herself, frowning; she hasn’t realized before how badly infected some of the cuts to her feet and legs have become, with constant numbness brought on by Port Lyndon winter blocking out the pain. The bandages itch as Melina applies them, but she sort of trusts the woman to know better than her what she is doing. She swallows as she watches some strands of hair fall to the floor, nervous to have any sort of potential weapon so close to her. She can’t see what’s going on, not with Melina flitting in and out of positions that block the mirror and no glasses either, but she’s resigned herself to playing a doll as the woman who raised her brother attempts to fix the mess of her hair. It’s a lot of work: she hasn’t cut it in years and she has never allocated money for a real brush, settling for running fingers through it to yank terrible knots out after soaking in a river. Melina isn’t a hairdresser by any stretch of the imagination, but she has raised a son for years; she manages to create something that passes for an unstylish home job of a haircut instead of a mess of evidence of a hard life.

Giselle flinches as someone taps on the door. “She’s dressed. It’s alright.” An older man moves theatrically slowly, clearly trying to help put Giselle at ease. He crouches beside her, and it takes so long that she wonders how big the bathroom she can barely see actually is. He slides something made of cool plastic onto her face, and as she blinks an uncertain smile comes into focus. Her eyes widen as she looks down, staring at her fingers before looking around. She cannot remember the last time she saw anything this clearly. It’s a little off, not quite strong enough, but it’s so slight and such an improvement from what she is used to that she cannot complain, even if she wanted to.

She insists on helping Melina clean the bathroom, despite the woman claiming that it isn’t necessary. “I – I know how to do this. I did it for a man for a while before,” she explains reluctantly, trailing off as she scrubs at the dirt on the edge of the tub.

Melina collects her clothes in a plastic bag, trying very hard not to seem as though she is offended by the intense odour. “Anything you want to keep, dear?”

Giselle’s eyes widen and she takes the trousers, things more like rags than anything else. She reaches into the pockets, sending a small array of pills scattering across the floor. Melina frowns, assuming that’s what the girl is after, until Giselle instead produces a small duck plushie. It looks like the kind of toy a newborn would be given, and Melina already knows that at some point it was yellow. It’s been ages since then, apparently, stained black and brown from exposure to filth. One of the legs is hanging on for two threads – one, in fact. A slight smile pulls at Melina’s lips, something sad to it. “Cethin’s still got his,” she says, voice soft. “I believe it lives on his desk.”

Cethin, meanwhile, has been lingering in the living room. He’s cleaned up the couch, taking not-so-bafflingly dirty blankets to the laundry in the basement, and cleaning what he can off the cushions. It’s the dirt has come off her clothing, what little hasn’t been trapped by the picnic blanket. With as much as he can get at out of the way now, he has been staring at the DVD and game collection he’s examined countless times in the past, listening to what he can through the wall. His mothers voice is soft, though, and apparently Giselle’s is quieter still; he can barely make any of the conversation out.

The bathroom door opens, and that’s about all he’s been prepared for tonight. He hesitates near the shelf, swallowing at the sight of his mom with a bag of clothing to trash, and then, more pressingly – the girl who tucks herself into the space behind Melina, like she’s hiding. She had been in the tiny bundle he’s accused his father of abducting, apparently, though he didn’t see her before. Judging by what he has cleaned off the couch, she must look entirely different now. He hears Isaac react to exactly that somewhere behind him, in the doorway to the kitchen, and though Cethin doesn’t know it yet, she looks like an entirely new person. What draws his eye, though, is the spot of dirt in her hands, a filthy toy he first thinks of as a rag, which confuses him, because Melina would only let that remain if it was a source of comfort. He stills as he notices the face, something he describes now as derpy, and his eyes widen as a memory comes, unbidden, to the forefront of his mind.

(“Quack.”

Giselle smiles, the blonde hair on her head a mess that their mother couldn’t manage and their new – temporary – guardians cannot, either, not without risking her wailing. She places her tiny duck toy on top of the one her brother has, the identical twin, the second part of the set. Cethin grabs his out from under, sits it on top of her head as gently as he knows how and grins. “Quack!” he says back. The two, toddlers at the time, don’t understand what the point of this game is, but it brings a smile to their lips nonetheless, a spot of fun to the string of uncertainty that is their lives.)

Cethin has always known that the almost impossibility of seeing his little sister again would make him emotional, but he doesn’t expect the tears that immediately spring to his eyes. He will not remember moving, but the next thing he is aware of is his arms surrounding her, rubbing her back and holding her close. Giselle begins to cry in earnest, too, sobs and laughter mixing together as she tangles her fingers in his jumper.

Melina and Isaac share a look over the teenagers heads, swallowing down guilt. It’s a heartwarming reunion, but it’s one they know they are majorly responsible for creating a need for. If they hadn’t split them up, choosing Cethin instead of a sibling set, then this wouldn’t have had to happen. Would it really have been so bad to have had a daughter to raise alongside their son?

It turns out that Cethin’s favorite food is something called paella, something devoid of the meat Giselle expects. Melina dishes it up with an array of pills she calls supplements, giving them to the guest, too, much to her confusion.

“Mom’s paranoid we’re all going to end up deficient and die of malnutrition,” Cethin explains. He is sitting beside Giselle at the round table, probably closer than necessary, and keeps bumping his knee against her leg as gently as he is able. He’s checking to make sure she’s still there. She’d be doing the same thing, if he hadn’t already started before she worked up the nerve to try.

Giselle is immediately worried, squinting at the pills dubiously. “Die of... what?”

“Isaac is the only one of us who eats meat. Iron deficiency – lack of it – is a very real problem. It can cause – ” Isaac cuts her off with a fake snore, and Melina swats at him with a laugh. “Oh, fine. Just take your vitamins.”

Giselle watches closely as Cethin swallows the pills with a glass of water, and hesitantly copies him. The water is cool and feels odd in her mouth; it’s been a while since she started taking the downers dry, and this is – something else. The water isn’t cold enough to burn, and her hands aren’t shaking. It’s bizarre. She’s waiting for the other shoe to drop.

“Come on, try the food,” Cethin is urging. Giselle doesn’t need to be told more than once; it does smell delicious, even if it is entirely vegetables and rice. She makes a face when she accidentally claims a forkful of mushroom, the utensils awkward and unfamiliar in her hands – but she brightens as she swallows and starts shovelling it in.

“Slow down,” Isaac advises, but he’s laughing, too, probably relieved that the repercussions of what Cethin insists is abduction haven’t started up yet. “You’ll make yourself sick.”

It wouldn’t be the first time, Giselle thinks, and she’s seriously concerned they’re going to take the food away, change their minds and just not feed her. It wouldn’t be the first time. But they’re all giving her such earnest looks, and Cethin lets his knee bump hers again. She glances at him, as if asking for confirmation.

“C’mon, you’ll like it more if you can actually taste it,” he says, laughter in his voice.

She blinks at him, before sighing and obligingly slowing down. It’s probably the nicest thing she’s eaten in ages, possibly ever, if she’s honest. It’s such a surreal experience, like something out of a dream.

She wonders how it’s going to end.

[mtsainthelens]

i have no idea what to do w this blog tbh like i have a lot of weird baggage attached to it and it feels like a slight parasitic influence on my life and identity and a source of paranoia but it’s literally just a blog.