#in hindsight that sentence does not sound the way i wanted it to but still. cryinggggg they're saying they expect even more couples

[theinfinitedivides]

My Dearest living up to its Korean title and creating at least eight couples among the production staff????? during the year plus of filming????? i'm yelling this is insane

[writingquestionsanswered]

Hi! I’ve noticed these days that my writing is struggling between sounding very formal and proper versus sounding casual. On one hand, I’ll have a sentence that looks like it came straight out of a 1940s British series, but two lines later there’s some casual dialogue that’s closer to an American teen novel. I grew up with both types of books tbh, so maybe that’s why? How do I stabilize my writing style and make it a little more consistent? Thank you!

Stabilizing Voice in Writing

There are three types of "voice" that play a role in how your writing sounds... authorial voice, narrative voice, and character voice.

Authorial voice is your writing style as an author. In many ways, it's your "writer personality." It's what makes your writing distinctive from another writer's. While authorial voice tends to be consistent across all stories, it will evolve with time and may even change slightly for particular projects--especially when crossing genres. Authorial voice includes things like how much/little description you use, how simple or ornate that description is, how you use word play, and the types of words you use. Narrative voice is the "voice/voices" with which the story is told. This is made up of point-of-view (the perspective from which the story is told, for example, first-person or third-person limited), as well as your writing style and use of language. Anything the narrator says falls under narrative voice.

Character voice is the way a character's personality comes through in the things they think and say. It includes things like whether they're concise or wordy when they speak, slang and catchphrases, quirks of speech like saying "um" or "uh" a lot, how their attitude is reflected in what they think and say, accent, and the kinds of words they use.

When you have a first-person narrator, narrative voice and character voice are combined, because the character's voice IS the narrative voice.

So, there are several quick exercises you can do if you want to stabilize the voice in your writing:

1 - Do a little analysis of your own writing style (so far). Remember: writing style is something that evolves over time, so you might not have a fully established writing style yet, but you should be able to look at what you write and start to see some patterns. In your case in particular, do you gravitate more toward formal speech than casual speech? Can you think of any writers whose style matches what you'd like your writing style to be? Try reading more of their books, or read a chapter an analyze the writing style to see what you can mimic.

2 - Think about the narrator of your story... Even if it's a third-person omniscient, faceless narrator, it can still help to assign a sort of mental picture for who this person might be and who they're telling the story to. Is this someone who experienced it telling the story in third-person long after the fact, with 20/20 hindsight, to someone who might be interested? Is this a god who watched it all unfold and is retelling the tale to an audience of other gods? Is it an old grizzled storyteller telling the story to a rapt audience around a campfire? Try to choose something that makes sense as far as who might be telling this story, who they're telling it to, and why. It's not that you're including this as part of the story, but rather as a sort of placeholder for your brain any time you're in narrator mode. If you can slip into this narrator's shoes as you write the narrator parts, it sometimes helps you "get into character" and stick with a consistent, relevant narrative voice.

3 - Establish character voice... Character voice does have an impact on narrative voice, even if the story isn't told in first-person. In third-person stories, who the characters are can tell you a lot about who your narrator might be (so it might help to do this step before #2 above...) For example, if your characters do happen to be a bunch of 1940s Brits, you can start to think about who they are and what they experience to figure out who the narrator might be. In this case, it probably wouldn't make sense for the narrator to be a god telling the story to other gods (as that feels too mystical for this narrator), but a grizzled storyteller recounting the tale around a campfire might make sense.

If your story's being told in second-person (You walked to the window... Like a Choose Your Own Adventure) or first-person (I walked to the window...) character voice relates even more to narrative voice, because in second-person, even though the narrator is not the POV character, the narration is still being filtered through the POV character's personality, knowledge, and experiences. And in first-person, the narrator IS the POV character, so the narrative voice and character voice are one and the same.

By doing these exercises, you can start to hone each of these voices to find some stability. Happy writing!

•••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••

I’ve been writing seriously for over 30 years and love to share what I’ve learned. Have a writing question? My inbox is always open!

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[clusterbuck]

Ooh for the sentence starters:

I’m hindsight, Eddie really should have hid the ring better.

in hindsight, eddie really should have hidden the ring better. but he’d been in a hurry—abuela had dropped by the house one day, unexpected, to give him his abuelo’s ring, and he’d only had fifteen minutes before buck was due home with christopher.

she’d pressed the ring into his hand and folded his fingers over it, then lifted her hand to his cheek. “your abuelo would be proud,” she’d said. “he’s a good man, your buck.”

“yeah,” eddie had agreed. “yeah, he is, but he’s also going to be home soon, so i need to—”

it had seemed relatively safe at the time. buck rarely goes into the hallway cupboard, neither of them do—unless it’s a holiday. like christmas, which is coming up.

now buck’s standing in the hallway, reindeer headband on his head and a ridiculous amount of tinsel wrapped around his neck. he’s holding the ring in one hand, careful, wondrous, and when he looks up at eddie there’s a slight question in his eyes for all of half a second before his face splits into a grin.

eddie figures his own face must make it pretty clear what the ring is for.

buck takes a step towards him, then another, still grinning. he takes a piece of tinsel around his neck and wraps it around eddie’s instead, using it to pull him closer.

“you love me,” buck says, sing-song, teasing, and eddie laughs and kisses the tip of his nose.

“this isn’t news,” eddie says.

“yeah, but you want to marry me,” buck says.

eddie raises his eyebrows. “you know i haven’t actually proposed to you yet.”

buck leans in to kiss him, the taste of the gingerbread they’d baked earlier on his tongue and tinsel itchy under eddie’s jaw, buck’s forearms resting on eddie’s shoulders and the heat of his body tucked in close. eddie gets lost in it, just for a second, just enough that when buck speaks it takes him a moment to remember what’s going on.

“yeah, but you’re gonna,” buck says. “and i’m gonna say yes.”

eddie smiles, swiping the antlers off buck’s head and settling the headband on himself. “yeah?” he asks. “you’re gonna marry me?”

“eddie,” buck says, laughter curling around the word the way it curls around every corner of their house. soft and bright, a sound eddie’s come to associate with home.

buck kisses him again, and eddie lets his hands slide down to buck’s waist, slip under the hem of his t-shirt and rest against the warm skin of his back. his fingertips tap out morse code, idle, a habit he’d picked up in the military, but instead of classified information and redacted coordinates now he taps out the same thing every time. eight letters, over and over. i-l-o-v-e-y-o-u.

“eddie,” buck says again, grinning at him the way he does sometimes, when his whole face crinkles up and eddie can see hints of the wrinkles he’s going to grow into, one day, when they grow old together. “of course i am.”

send me a sentence and i’ll write some more

[sidekick-hero]

I’m tired of asking to settle the debt

5 times Eddie warmed Steve's hands and the one time Steve returns the favor.

(note: this is part one of six, I will publish the rest over the holidays because I'm bad at time management and will not finish it in time for @thefreakandthehair Winter Fic Challenge.)

December 1972

The first time it happened, Steve didn't pay attention. Later, when all was said and done, he wishes that he did. But that's the thing with hindsight, isn't it?

The first time it happens, Steve is busy being sorry for himself.

It's the first week of December, and Steve wakes up to a world covered in white. He is six years old and all he wants to do is get out there and enjoy the magic.

And that's why he forgets. Even if only for a second, he does. Forgets that he is a Harrington. Forgets that his parents do not care about snow. About magic. About him.

He runs to the kitchen as fast as his little legs carry him without falling head-first down the stairs. His sock-clad feet skid to a halt on the hardwood floors as he rounds the corner. There, at the table, sits his father, face hidden behind the morning papers. His mom stands at the stove with a coffee mug in her hands and a faraway expression on her face. They don’t look up as he enters the room.

He walks over to his mother and his hand closes around the stiff material of her sensible slacks. She finally looks down at him. "What is it, honey?” her soft voice asks. Her brown eyes, so much like his, look at him.

He beams up at her. “It snows!” he exclaims. "Can we go outside? Maybe build a snowman or have a snowball fight?" his voice brims with excitement at the thought of all the adventures waiting outside in the snow. "Or I could go get my sled and we can..."

"Honey, slow down. We can't go out in the snow. You will get all dirty and sweaty when you play outside in this weather. And you know that your father and I expect guests later. And we want to make the best impression, don't we?"

"But, mom, I won't be long. And I will be careful, really. I promise," he pleads with her, his eyes big, round, and glassy. He may be only six, but he knows about the power of his sad puppy dog eyes. Their babysitter tells him that all the time, with a soft giggle and her hand ruffling his hair. He will marry her someday, he decides. She is always so nice to him.

His mom looks like she wants to give in. "I don't know, Stevie. Maybe...," but before she can finish her sentence, his father interrupts her. "Your mother said no, Steven, so you listen to her. Stop begging like a spoiled brat. You listen to us when we tell you something, are we understood?" his gray eyes bear into him, and they look like the sky outside. Steve feels pinned underneath their weight. He wills his mouth to move, but no sound makes it out. "I said," his father repeats, voice low "are we understood? Answer me when I ask you a question. Or are you too stupid even for that?"

"Yes, sir. I mean, no, sir," he stutters, and his father laughs at him. Steve feels the skin of his face burn with shame and humiliation. Before his parents can say anything else he runs out of the kitchen and up the stairs to his room. He doesn't stop, doesn't think, just grabs a jacket and his sneakers and runs off into the woods behind their property.

Shame and anger still cursing through his veins, he marches on for almost an hour before coming to a halt. When he finally stops to look around, he has no idea where he is. The neighborhood he is in is unfamiliar, the houses small and in differing states of unrepair. There aren't any people on the sidewalk or on the tiny lawns in front of the houses. In fact, there is no one around, the air eerily silent and still. Just as he decides to turn back and try to find his way home by tracing his steps backward, he hears laughter. He turns towards the sound and sees three figures approaching.

It's three boys, all older than him. Steve thinks they might be 14, maybe even 16. They walk straight toward him, and he doesn't think they want to build a snowman with him or have a snowball fight. But before he can make up his mind to just run away (like a coward, his father's voice whispers) they reach him.

"Awww, look at that, Troy! A baby!" croons one of them with false cheerfulness. His pimpled face does not look cheerful. It looks hungry; like a stray dog would look smelling food. "I wonder what the little baby does here all alone. Don't you have a mommy and a daddy, little baby? They already sick of you, huh?" the tallest of three adds as he smirks down at Steve. The words hit a little bit too close to home. His face burns again. They both laugh at the expression on his face, and he shrinks back.

The third boy doesn't laugh. He doesn't smirk or insult Steve, either. He just looks at him. At his clean clothes, so new they're still a bit stiff. His thick down jacket with the brand logo bold on his chest. His eyes are serious, calculating. "I don't think his parents are around. I think he is all alone. Aren't you, little baby?"

Before Steve can say anything to that - what, he has no idea - the third boy pounces on him. He grabs Steve's jacket and yanks on it. The zipper strains but holds, so the boy grabs for it and manages to pull it all the way down. Steve doesn’t wait to see what will happen next, he just turns around and starts running. The boy still holds onto his jacket, but it slips off his arms, and Steve is free.

He runs as fast as he can. The blood rushes in his ears, and he swears he hears footsteps, so Steve doesn't stop until he absolutely must. There is a small park in front of him, and he thinks that maybe he can hide between the trees and the bushes. He runs towards it and cowers behind the thick bushes, catching his breath.

That's where Eddie crashes into him a few minutes later.

Eddie is a Dragon. Eddie breathes hot puffs of smoke into the air. Dragons don’t think about what their feet are doing. And so, he walks straight into Steve, who still crouches behind the bushes. They both tumble to the ground.

They both yelp, startled and, in Steve's case, still scared from his earlier encounter. His hands form fists, and he is on his legs before he can think about it. His whole body is shaking from adrenaline. And from the exhaustion and the cold, but he doesn't think about that. Just knows that he can't let another stranger hurt him. "Whoa, hey. Sorry, dude. Didn't see you there," Eddie has his hands up, placating. He looks at Steve curiously. "What are you doing behind those bushes?"

And Steve feels silly now. Hiding behind bushes like a coward. The boy probably thinks he's a baby, too. "Nothing," he huffs. "Go away." And he turns his back to Eddie, dismissing him. Hopes the boy gets the hint and goes away so Steve can figure out what to do next. How to explain that he ran away, that he lost his jacket, and that he is, in fact, dirty and wet from his recent tumble. Steve thinks about his father and how this would have never happened if they had let him go outside to play for a bit. Steve is thinking about how he would sit in front of the fireplace by now, warm and cozy. Maybe with hot cocoa. Instead, he is God knows where. Lost and alone. And so cold, shivers ran through his tiny body, making it tremble.

"I'm really sorry, okay? I didn't see you there, I swear. I was being a dragon, you know? Look!" and with that, Eddie puffs again, his breath turning to smoke once more. And despite himself, Steve snorts at that. He can't help the answering grin either when the other boy beams at him proudly. There are deep dimples in his cheeks.

The boy with the unruly curls sticks his hand out towards Steve with so much enthusiasm that his whole body sways forward. His face is mostly eyes. Big, brown eyes, darker than Steve's own, and really pretty, with long lashes. Like a girl. "I'm Eddie, nice to meet ya." Steve looks at the offered hand for a second before grasping it with his own. "Steve", he answers, "it is very nice to meet you, too." And he sounds so formal, and so stiff, that he wants to hide away in humiliation. But before he can do any such thing, Eddie pulls him in. "Wow, dude, your hands are freezing! Why don't you have a jacket on?"

Steve huffs in annoyance. "Because they stole it."

"Who stole it?" Eddie asks incredulously.

Steve hesitates before he says "Three boys, a few blocks back. They just grabbed it. I ran away before they could do anything else." The admission brings a new wave of shame. Steve does not even know what else they could have done, but he trembles at the thought of those few minutes he spent in the company of the bad boys.

His trembling must have been stronger than he thought because Eddie says "You must be, like, super cold then! My uncle made me wear, like, three t-shirts and a jumper under my jacket. I can barely move." He sounds almost offended, like the thought of his uncle wanting him warm was somehow insulting to him. Steve thinks of his own parents and how they only care about how clean and nice he looks.

He's so lost in thought that he doesn't even notice that Eddie is still holding his hand in his until he reaches for Steve's other hand as well. Eddie's hands are nice, warm, and dry despite the cold. Soft. Steve looks at his hands in Eddie's in wonder. Notices that Eddie bites his nails and that there is dirt on his palms and under his bitten-short nails. It should bother him - his mother would throw a fit if his hands ever looked like that. But all he can think about is how he doesn't want Eddie to let go.

Eddie, meanwhile, pushes Steve's palms together between his own and starts to rub his hands over them like he wants to make a fire with Steve's hands. He starts chattering about his uncle Wayne, who lives not far away in the trailer park, and how he is going to spend the holidays there because "my ma's been kinda sick a lot and my da is really busy, y'know? So, I'm with Wayne for a bit. That's cool, Wayne's really cool." Steve can only nod along. A bit overwhelmed by the onstream of cheerful chatter. Thinks that he would also really like a cool uncle Wayne to spend his holidays with because his parents have no time for him. But something about the way Eddie talks about it tells him that he shouldn't voice this thought.

Suddenly, the movement along with the chatter stops and Steve notices that he hasn't said a single thing for several minutes. Big eyes search his for a second before turning downwards to their shoes. Eddie lets their hands drop, and Steve feels cold again. They're standing really close, otherwise, Steve would have probably missed the quiet "Sorry". The sudden shift in mood baffles Steve. "What are you sorry for?" he asks, curious.

"I know, I talk a lot. My da always says so, my ma, too. Not uncle Wayne, though. So, I'm sorry I'm so much." Steve has no idea what to say to that. Eddie does talk a lot. He is a lot. But Steve likes that. Likes that a whole lot. Only, he doesn't know how to tell Eddie that. So instead, he says "I need to go home.".

At that Eddie let’s his head hang even more. He looks like a kicked puppy, all the boisterous energy gone as it had never been there. Steve misses it already.

Just as Steve has gathered enough courage to reach out to Eddie (to do what he has no idea, maybe to take his hands again because that had felt nice), Eddie looks back up again and smiles. There are no dimples this time. "There is a bus not far from here. I can take you there. I bet it gets you home in no time. Wayne and I often take the bus because it gets you everywhere you want to go." And with that, Eddie grabs his hands again and marches him out of the bushes and towards the street. Steve has no choice but to follow.

They find the bus station just as a bus pulls in. Eddie goes up to the driver, bows in a silly, over-the-top way, and says "Dear good sir. My friend needs to get home. Can you take him?" The driver chuckles at that, clearly charmed by Eddie's antics. "If his home is on my route, sure. Where do you live?" that one goes to Steve, who has no idea how to answer that. But before he can make a fool of himself, the bus driver recognizes him. "You're Harrington's boy, aren't you? Oh boy, you're lucky I found you. This is no place for you, here. Come on in, I get you home."

And with that, Steve takes a step further into the bus. As he turns around to say something to Eddie, say anything but goodbye, maybe even ask him to come along, to come to his house and have some hot cocoa, the door of the bus closes between them.

The last thing he sees before they drive away is Eddie's hand, pressed against the dirty window of the door. Steve places his own above it, against the glass. It's cold.

[purplehairedwonder]

Chapter 1057: In the End (It Doesn’t Even Matter)

No regrets for the Linkin Park lyric in the title. (RIP Chester.)

Well, it’s happened. Wano is officially over. I have some mixed feelings on how this final chapter plays out.

So, let’s start with the elephant (or wolf? considering his DF) in the room: Yamato decides not to leave Wano with the Straw Hats.

I’ve made no secret of the fact I’m not a Yamato fan, so on a personal level, I’m relieved he’s not joining the crew. Plus, the fact his DF is of the guardian deity of Wano was a flashing neon sign that he would probably stay as well as the way he was with Momo for basically the entire raid connects him to Wano. 

But on a storytelling note, this is such a strange choice for a few reasons. 

First, it seems like every third sentence Yamato has said is about wanting to go to sea and wanting to join Luffy. What was the point of all that build up if Yamato decides to stay -- and the conversation he has with Luffy about it is off-screened!

Second, in hindsight, what is the point of the character at all? One of the reasons I wasn’t a big Yamato fan was his late entrance to the story and sudden screen time despite... not really doing all that much. But if he joins the Straw Hats, there’s at least some kind of payoff to that. 

With Yamato staying behind, well, you can remove him from the story and very little actually changes. The functions he does perform, like help hide Momo or delay Kaido, could have been performed by myriad other characters. That’s panel space that could have been given to a lot of other interesting plotlines that were going.

I don’t doubt we’ll be seeing Yamato again before the end -- maybe with Pluton? -- but for now, everything surrounding this character’s portrayal has been... odd.

Then we get Momo’s farewell to Luffy. The Straw Hats head to the port in the last chapter without saying anything to Momo or Kin’emon, and they’re both upset about this.

(Side note: I think too much space was spent on flashbacks to other moments in the manga; this would be a great place for the anime to flesh out but to save page space in the chapter.)

Something that makes zero sense to me is that everyone left without saying anything to Momo or Kin’emon but then Luffy says they’ve been waiting so they could give Momo their flag? 

Why would they be waiting if there was no way to know if Momo would realize they’d left before they actually set off?

Luffy’s response is just “we’re meeting now, aren’t we?”

Zero sense.

Still, this is a great panel. Luffy is truly an Emperor. He’s come so far from that barrel in the East Blue.

And Momo’s tearful farewell. Despite his adult body, he’s still a boy and is going to miss his hero. I’m glad we got such a lovely farewell for a character who has been with us for so long.

Sticking with the Kozuki, we see the story of the raid being told to the people of Wano with some dramatic flourishes. Hiyori gets a lot of focus (ironic considering how she was sidelined).

This panel is absolutely gorgeous...

But that is a weird message. I get the parallel to the “I am Oden, and I was born to boil” catchphrase but switching from Oden’s first name to the Kurozumi clan name and saying they were born to burn when the Kurozumi had been persecuted for the actions of a few, leading to festering hatred in people like Orochi and Kanjuro, and making it a motto for people to cheer along to...

Feels like lessons were not learned.

ANYWAY. Poor Raizo didn’t get the same glow-up that Shinobu did from Greenbull’s attack, and that makes makes the latter turning tall and thin even worse. Oda, c’mon.

AND. Saving the best for last: the departure of the crews. 

The Straw-Heart alliance is over (I cry), and Law continues to be tsundere AF.

Law:

Everyone else:

Side note: I love Nami’s outfit here.

But we can’t end Wano without one final round of Captain Trio shenanigans. I never get tired of the way these three bring out the chaos demons in each other.

This gave me a flashback to the Sabaody auction house. Even the sound effect is the same for Luffy and Law.

Some things never change XD

The ships going over the waterfall is a great panel.

Dumbasses, all three of them.

Get you a man who can do both?

I love this trio so much. I miss them already.

So, that’s it for Wano. Gotta say, somehow it was both rushed and slow, stretched and overfull. I feel like Oda may have bitten off more than he could chew with the scope here, and the rushed ending was the result. Lots of good stuff but also a lot of questionable things as well.

And now... hopefully we’ll see more about what’s happening around the world. 

[voyageofthenautilus]

Mod Blue’s Thoughts: March 13/14

The Sargasso Sea, Part 2

”Once this voyage was over, might not Captain Nemo consent to set us free in return for our promise never to reveal his existence? Our word of honor, which we sincerely would have kept.” My dude, you are literally in the middle of writing a tell-all memoir, but suuuure, let’s believe you would have kept your word… (More on this in a hot second.)

“He had thumbed through my work on the great ocean depths, and the margins were covered with his notes, which sometimes contradicted my theories and formulations. But the captain remained content with this method of refining my work, and he rarely discussed it with me.” What a passive-aggressive king.

I love how a good portion of the fish lists in this chapter is Aronnax going “sounds fake, but okay.”

I also love that Nemo is asking Aronnax to explain stuff to him, when I feel like it’s usually been the other way around in their relationship. Maybe he’s pretending not to know so that Aronnax will keep talking. (I’m now picturing him gazing into Aronnax’s eyes and twirling his hair and going “ummm I don’t think I understand, can you explain it again? *giggle*” And… now I am not sure what to do with that mental image.)

Oh my god I forgot about the photo-taking scene! How delightful!

okay, so here’s my thought from the beginning that I wanted to go back to. “I attach a print of the positive.” This makes it sound like Aronnax definitely has an audience in mind for his diary. Is he meant to be writing this diary while he’s on board the Nautilus? Is he meant to be writing this after the events of the story? I know there’s a chapter where he mentions that he has started writing the diary… but some chapters definitely sound like he’s writing in hindsight. And then there’s the details that The Mysterious Island brings… and now that I’m thinking about that, I’m having a lot of Feelings, but I’ll expound upon those elsewhere once I do my Mysterious Island re-read, I suppose.

Finally, as epic a closing scene as the Nautilus leaping out of the water is… that would NOT end well in real life…

Sperm Whales and Baleen Whales

I feel SO bad for Ned, being trapped on the Nautilus away from his friends and family on land and unable to partake in his favorite pastimes… even if his favorite pastimes are killing sea life, but hey, nobody’s perfect.

“Do these animals live a long time?” Conseil asked.

“A thousand years,” the Canadian replied without hesitation.

“And how, Ned,” I asked, “do you know that’s so?”

“Because people say so.”

“And why do people say so?”

“Because people know so.”

LMAO. Also, Ned’s theory about whales and how they used to swim faster is just… what in the Ishmael?!

“But Ned my friend,” Conseil said, “why not ask Captain Nemo for permission to hunt—”

Before Conseil could finish his sentence, Ned Land scooted down the hatch and ran to look for the captain.

A common refrain, but: someone needs to draw this.

Wow, Nemo really hates those sperm whales. What’d they do to him, kill his family or someth—

okay, but that ending is horrible. What the hell, Nemo. I forgot how much earlier in the narrative this side of his character starts to rear its head (we’ve already seen a bit of it, but this act in particular does not bode well and sets up for some major shit later on). And to think he killed them all in the name of protecting the baleen whales, but the very end reveals that at least one of the baleen whales was still killed by the sperm whales, so what was the point of all that? Let nature do its thing and don’t try to meddle with it in some show of superiority. Anyway, this isn’t usually the kind of thing that makes me emotional but I am genuinely upset over that baby baleen whale…

…and then Nemo and the crew go and collect milk from it without another thought, and Aronnax is somehow able to shove all the nasty business out of his head and enjoy the experience of trying the milk. Wow. I have… Thoughts about this.

The Ice Bank, Part 1

*reads chapter title* OH, YES! YESSSSSSSS this means my second-favorite chapter is coming up in a bit! So hyped…

Iceberg classification! Is there anything Conseil can’t classify?

[occult-roommates]

Lügner, Lügnerin

Back at Audrey’s place, Dawud brushed his teeth, as he was getting ready to go to bed. However, upon hearing his best friend cry in her bedroom, he had to make sure everything’s ok in there.

Audrey: I’m so scared, what if aliens literally don’t like me...Oh my god, what if aliens are racist? Dawud: Hey, don’t worry. One of my roommates is an alien and they’re very much in love with black Earthling women. Audrey: ...Dav...What are you even talking about?  Dawud: Look, Audrey, in theory I’m supposed to keep it a secret, but that’s the truth, and I’ve been wanting to tell you for months. One of my roommates is an alien, I am not joking. Their name is Kino Gurafee and- Audrey: Kino? Dawud, you’re making this up. It’s literally the German word for movie theater. Like, I remember back in high school we did a project for German class where had to talk about, and I still remember this sentence verbatim years later from how hard we memorized this project; der letzte Film den wir im Kino gesehen haben. In fact, Kino Gurafee sounds like a play on cinematography. Dawud: Why would I make a play on cinematography out of all the words on the planet? Audrey, if I was messing with you, I would have name the alien something like Diese Nawtz or Uar Mome. Audrey: I also remember while we were doing that project back that you got fixated on the word Kinematographie and would repeat it on loop for months on end.

Dawud had no memory of this category 5 echolalia event, but now that she mentions it, yeah, it did happen. Damn, that girl memory might actually be way too efficient for her own good. Anyway, he started arguing with her that no, he’s not lying, he does indeed live with an alien and then...she slapped him, out of nowhere.

Dawud: What the fuck Audrey! Audrey: Look, I might be an autistic girly girly girl, I might love pink and have an actual unicorn decal on my wall and be obsessed with aliens, but I’m still a grown ass woman. Don’t start telling me very obvious lie in order to make me feel better like you’d do to a child! Dawud: Alright! Yes, I’m lying! You’re happy now!

Well, he did not sound convincing at all. But instead of pissing off Audrey even more, it just made her regret slapping him, it was obvious enough he was hurt, not just physically but emotionally. 

Audrey: D-Dav I’m so sorry. Dawud: I’m so tired of lies. Like, earlier this month, I freaked out at Daniele and my pilot friend from work cause Dan told me he made out with him. And in hindsight I feel so stupid for not realizing it right away. It was so obviously fake. I hate lying actually, make me feel bad. Audrey: Wow, go tell that to your mother, who you pretended you were still in school for more than a year when in actuality for most of that time you were a depressed NEET sleeping on my couch. Dawud: Ok, yes that was messed up, but you thought I was happy and comfortable living a lie? In fact, while she knows the truth now, I’m pretty sure it strained our relationship by a lot, which really fucking hurt. She might never trust me ever again after that. Ever since, I try to be as honest as possible. Audrey: Thank god cause that whole alien roommate thing shows you’re a pretty bad liar actually when you’re in front of the person. At least you got away with lying to your mom by avoiding her for a whole 18 months. Dawud: I’m not even good in telling when people are lying. Like that whole body language thing sounds like bullshit honestly...That or I might be autistic too, I don’t know. I feel like I don’t have enough traits to qualify, but I wonder pretty often. Audrey: I mean, I’ve been suspecting it too...And so does my mom...Your mom knows but she doesn’t believe it. Dawud: What?? Audrey: Yeah, back in 5th grade when I got diagnosed, my mom noticed you also fit a lot of the criteria, so she told your mom and she kinda denied it cause admitting it would “put your future in jeopardy”. Also it was around the time your father’s died so you were under a lot of stress already, and you were being bullied a lot to begin with. That would just have put even more weight on your shoulders. Dawud: I don’t even understand why I was being bullied so much back in elementary school! I mean, I don’t think it was that obvious I would grow up to be queer and I only got fat during puberty. Audrey: Well, you are from an Iraqi family and it was the 2000s...

Oh, ok that was a lot to take in on a Saturday morning at 4 am. Well, assuming he indeed is, that would...explain a lot. Yeah, getting diagnosed in 5th grade would have put a lot of weight on his shoulders, but so is being an undiagnosed adult who is trying to make it into this world as if nothing is wrong. Also, funny his mom didn’t want to get him diagnosed cause it would put his future in jeopardy, but in the end Audrey ended up a fine mostly functional adult and he’s just been all over the place in recent years...Sometime he wasn’t even all over the place, he was just straight up in a dark place.

Audrey: Though, let’s say, considering we’ve been the best of friends since kindergarten, I know it’s because we were next door neighbours and our parents were friends, but like...Ok, it’s ironic cause I’m about to use an idiom, but you know, birds of a feather fuck together. Dawud: ...Don’t you mean flock together??? Audrey: I mean...they can fuck too...If you know what I mean. Dawud: No, in fact I don’t.

Whelp, Audrey don’t know what she expected.

It all started because Audrey wanted to see a flying saucer, and now he’s finding out something new about himself. I mean, it’s not 100% confirmed, but it seems pretty likely. Much to process and think about as he’s trying to fall asleep at 4:30 in the morning.

Prev - Next

[enbyonmandalore]

Tear Me Apart

Din Djarin x afab!reader

Rating: NSFW 18+

Word count: ~2630

Warnings: penetrative sex, unprotected sex (don't be a fool, wrap that tool!!), choking, gagging, picture of the position they're in at the very bottom, gender neutral language but female body parts are explicitly mentioned, the helmet stays on!

Summary: P*rn without plot. Pure filth. Basically Din Djarin destroying his machanic's pussy.

A/N: Have some filth for Valentine's Day, folks... There is a separate version for all the amab!readers out there! Check the tags to find it easily!

___________________________________________________________

Tear Me Apart

"So you're telling me how to fly my ship?", the Mandalorian asks in a tone that sends an ice cold shiver down your spine. You roll your eyes.

"I'm telling you what is good for your ship.", you retaliate, crossing your arms in front of your chest. "This thing is bound to fall apart if you don't at least try to fly more carefully!"

In hindsight, you probably should have tried to control your temper, but this man was driving you nuts. No wonder he'd been looking for a mechanic to take on missions with him... His ship is a shit show of second-hand parts and in a constant state of disrepair.

The Mandalorian in his silver armor steps closer, lifting a finger to your face.

"I didn't hire you for advice, I hired you to fix things."

"Get your finger out of my face", you hiss, "Or I-"

Or I just might quit, is what you want to say - an empty threat. Of course you don't want to quit. He pays well, usually honors your skills and to be honest with yourself, you had begun to find his strong-and-silent type of character very pleasing lately. There is just something about this guy, but you can't quite put your finger on it.

"Or you what?", he interrupts you. His stupid finger is still on one level with your face...

"I think you know.", you say with a glare and move his hand away from yourself as gently as you can.

"That's not a kriffing answer.", the Mandalorian replies and steps even closer.

Without thinking any further, you shove him out of the way and shoot him another glare. You just want to get back to work and forget about this silly interaction with this stupid Mandalorian.

But he doesn't let you get far. You're able to take two steps, before he grabs your shoulder and spins you back around, taking you by surprise. Your self-preservation instinct kicks in and you duck, slamming your open palms into his torso to keep a distance.

What he says next, though, completely knocks the wind out of you.

"You wouldn't quit. I notice the way you look at me."

He what-

Oh no.

And it gets worse. "You really think all your staring has gone unnoticed? I'm not blind, you know?"

You gulp. Suddenly it feels like there is no oxygen left in the Razor Crest's hull. Your body doesn't respond to your urge to leave this part of the ship and retreat to your tiny bunk. He sighs.

"And I'm not deaf either."

You're still frozen in shock. You should have known, you should have kriffing known.

The Razor Crest isn't exactly sound proof, but night after night you had done your best to keep quiet. Yes, you touched yourself at night or when he was gone and thought of him and the things you wished he'd do to you. Being in a small space with only one other person for a long time does things to your mind... You had sworn to yourself to never admit to him how much you like him, but it seems like saying it out loud is no longer necessary.

What happens next doesn't exactly compute in your brain - Mando is way too close. So close you imagine you can feel his breath on you. What is going on?

"And don't think that these feelings haven't been getting to me, too. I'm a lonely man. But I need you to shut up and get back to fixing the ship."

"Make me, then." You can't stop the absolute no-brainer of a sentence from leaving your mouth. Regret immediately starts flooding your chest. Fuck.

But once again, the Mandalorian's response takes you by surprise.

"Fine. I guess you'll get what you want."

With ease, he picks you up by the shoulders and sets you down on a storage crate. The next moments pass in a blur as your boots are yanked off, your pants following soon after, thrown into a corner of the ship. Din Djarin helps you remove your shirt and it too is tossed aside. The anticipation and arousal swirling in your stomach drown out the cold of the metal crate you sit on as you carefully watch the Mandalorian remove part after part of his beskar armor. Not once does he take his eyes off of you, you can feel it.

He steps closer and this time you neither flinch nor move away. He is standing between your legs and you nearly swallow him whole with your gaze. Even without most of the armor he looks imposing. He is so broad.

With a shaky hand you reach out to him and touch his arm, squeezing it lightly. Din mirrors your gesture and brings his hands to your sides and your breath hitches as they sweep up and down your sides in a surprisingly tender way. That's when you notice something else pressing against your bare body. Din Djarin's bulge pulses ever so slightly as he presses it between your legs and you can feel the heat he is emitting through his flight suit.

"What do you want me to do?", Din asks in a low gravelly voice.

"Take me the way you want." The words slip out of your mouth before you can form a logical thought. The Mandalorian's helmet tilts to the side, then he nods. Okay.

He closes in even further and you spread your legs just a little more, pushing your hips forward to press against him. As Din's hands slide down to your ass, you reach for the outline of his cock bulging against the fabric. He feels huge. The moment you start palming him, Din's fingers dig into the flesh of your ass. The imagery of him in your head makes your mouth water. You need him and you need him more than you thought.

Without warning, Din Djarin lifts you up one more time and presses your back against the freezing hull of the ship. A whine escapes your mouth and your eyes widen. But his body heat and the fact that he is now actively rubbing his erect cock against your core make up for the cold.

You can hear him breathe heavily through the vocoder.

The Mandalorian sets you down, put doesn't stop groping at your body. His hands explore every inch of your skin, prodding at your entrance until you're soaking wet. He groans lewdly and takes a step back, you follow. You manage to find the zipper to his flight suit and open it; Din's hand steadily guiding yours as the lower part of his suit drops to his knees. His hard cock feels hot in your hand as you pull it out of his undershorts. The gravelly moan that comes through the vocoder as you stroke him does nothing but fuel the arousal that's already threatening to drip down your thighs.

He lays down on his back and grips his cock at the base, giving himself a slow stroke before beckoning you closer. The tip glistens with precum. Instinctively you lick your lips.

"Come on, you can do it", the Mandalorian encourages you as you lower yourself onto him; your back facing him. The flushed tip pushes inside of you at a whole new angle. Suddenly you're scared that he won't fit - but those concerns are washed away quickly.

"Good", he murmurs along with more hushed words of praise as your pussy swallows inch by inch of his length until there is no more left. Just as you are about to look over your shoulder and ask what you should do now, the Mandalorian's gloved hands land on your shoulders, pulling you backwards into an awkward lying position*.

Your legs are spread, but bent at the knees, effectively pushing your heels into the sides of your thighs. Your back is arched over his chest and your head finds a place on his shoulder, his helmet a mere inch from your face.

The beskar is cold to the touch despite you both panting and sweating. It's nice at first, a cool sensation against your cheek and neck, but after a moment it makes the rest of your skin feel even hotter and like it's melting.

Everything is hot and wet.

The sweat on your back soaks through Mando's scrunched up shirt, effectively sticking your exposed bodies together and making an audible squelching noise whenever you move too much.

You can feel little droplets building up on your forehead and running down your temples. You wonder what he feels like under that helmet.

He's got to be suffocating... You could hear his heavy breathing he was trying so hard to control.

But any more thoughts about that are wiped from your brain the moment Din Djarin thrusts his hips up. A startled sound escapes your throat and you quickly press your lips together as he begins moving at a steadier pace, his massive hands holding your hips in place. This is a whole new experience. Every single sensation feels different. Why haven't you done this before?

As Din's hands move over your body it becomes harder and harder to contain the moans building up in your throat. Full of desperation you reach up to grasp at his helmet to ground yourself somehow - only intending to touch it, nothing more. But Din is faster. One of his hands that had just been roaming your body darts forward and intercepts your movement. You find your arms pinned to your torso, with Din's arm locking them in place.

You give it an experimental wiggle, but he doesn't budge.

You swear you can hear him chuckle triumphantly between some grunts.

The complete helplessness makes your body shake in anticipation. You'd never admit it, but you like how much control he has over you right now. His strong arms hold you in place and the feeling of his cock sliding in and out of you make you feel like you're on cloud nine. The edge of sweet release is quickly coming closer.

A tingling sensation brings you back onto this plane of reality and you notice Din has let go of your waist and is instead focusing his attention on your tits. The tips of his fingers ghost over your nipples again, sending shock waves of heat down your spine. At first his touch is feather light, teasing. You wince as he then rolls the hardened buds between his fingers, pinching them in the process.

One of his hands moves down between your legs while the other stays on your chest and fingers begin circling your clit. He slowly drags his gloved fingers along your folds, coating them in your arousal, before returning to your clit. You whine as you feel the arousal building up in your core, like a bomb ready to explode. Your body jerks almost violently as he hits the spot.

"You like that, huh?", he asks teasingly and does it again, getting the same reaction from you, but accompanied by a high-pitched mewl this time.

"I'm s-so close!", you try to warn him.

"Even better", Din says as you feel yourself drift over the edge... The double sensation on your clit and nipples make your core clench tight around him, drawing a deep moan from him. You have no time to prepare for your high, it just happens.

Your body trembles and colorful stars dance in front of your eyes. For a moment it feels like an out-of-body experience and you aren't sure if you're screaming or-

Through the aftershocks of your orgasm you realize that Din is still fucking going, though slower now.

The Mandalorian's hand roams higher, up your chest and across your throat before coming to a halt on your face. He gently caresses your cheek with his thumb, before clamping his hand over your mouth.

"As lovely as you sound, I've been wanting to shut you up like this for some time now. Don't even think I didn't hear-", his sentence is interrupted by a rough grunt, "Hear you moan my name whenever you thought I was away."

A feisty grin sneaks onto your lips, which he couldn't possibly see, but very well feel.

"Oh", he states and stops moving entirely, earning a muffled complaint from you. The tone of his voice meant exactly what you thought it did. He knew.

Lifting the pressure on your lips, you feel Din Djarin turn his head ever so slightly. Hovering his hand over your face he orders: "Take it off."

He slaps your hands away as you lift them to take off his glove. "No hands."

Ah

Another smile spreads on your lips as you open your mouth and tug at the tips of his glove with your teeth. The part covering his index finger budges first, then the middle finger and soon you manage to pull off the whole glove. Din tosses it to the side. You wiggle your hips in a silent plea for him to keep moving, but Din only shakes his head while removing the other glove for you.

"Say it.", he orders and you know what he means.

"Fuck me", you cry.

"Manners"

"Wh- Please fuck me. I need it", you beg and the moment the words leave your mouth, his bare hand covers your mouth once more and he thrusts up into you - hard. White dots dance across the inside of your eyelids.

Your cries and moans now muffled by his calloused palm, the Mandalorian's own moans sound crystal clear.

"You sound even better like this", Din mumbles in between breaths.

And then his other hand lands on your throat, just holding it at first, while you grab his wrists to ground yourself. He lets you, without complaining.

"How's this?", he asks and gives your throat a gentle squeeze. As he does, your core also tightens around him.

Maker-

You inhale sharply -you would have gasped if you could- and signalize an OK with a thumbs up, accompanied by a muffled Yes.

Without further warning, Din Djarin sets a new pace - harsh and desperate. You can hear the way his length thrusts into your pussy getting shamelessly wetter. Din's moans are getting deeper with each move. They start in his chest where you can feel a low rumbling against your back and then become lighter and airier. You imagine him with furrowed brows and gritted teeth...

He slams his cock into you and all you can do is helplessly moan into his palm. It feels so good.

The pressure around your throat disappears and instead Din is toying with your clit.

"I'm- I'm so close", he gasps and you squeeze his wrist in response. You are, too. You're a whining, shaking mess and completely at his mercy, the aftermath of your last orgasm amplifying the sensation even more. Without warning your walls tighten around him and your back arches as you desperately cry out his name.

Din's breath hitches as he cums. You feel him pulsating inside you as his fingers dig into your hips to keep you still. His seed covers every inch of your insides - hot and sticky. You can't help but imagine him cumming elsewhere on your body.

Your legs are shaking and you tremble as Din pulls out. You wince as you notice how empty you feel suddenly. Din lowers you to the floor next to him and if you were able to formulate a sentence right now, you'd probably thank him. But neither of you speak a word for a while.

The Mandalorian turns his head to face you, just as you were about to close your eyes. His gaze lingers.

"Don't-", he interrupts himself, "Just ask next time. Don't get on my nerves like that."

___________________________________________________________

*Okay, so for clarification, this is the position we're talking about:

This fanfiction is property of @enbyonmandalore (Tumblr). I do not own any of the characters associated with the Star Wars franchise. Do not repost/crosspost on other accounts or websites, edit, translate or otherwise change this piece of writing. Rebloging is fine, reposting is not.

[stardustprompts]

renegades  -  marissa meyer  sentence starters change tenses/pronouns as needed !!  some lines have been edited for clarity / length / ease of roleplaying tw :   death ,  violence ,  murder

‘i’m not going to report this because I believe you are going to make better choices after this.’

‘we’re doing this for (name), aren’t we? use that anger. use it to avenge him.’

‘your days of villainy are over, (name).’

‘you sound like you’ve read too many comics.’

‘oh, i’m sorry. I was busy daydreaming about your funeral.’

‘you know what they say … one cannot be brave who has no fear.’

‘(name) wasn’t a part of this operation. he wants to act on his own, he can die on his own.’

‘sacrifices must be made sometimes.’

‘in case anyone’s wondering, I currently feel like someone’s filled my head with concrete.’

‘that’s their thing though, isn’t it? even when they’re supposed to be working together, they still believe in trampling the weak to make way for the strong.’

‘makes no sense to me, but then, they are villains. who knows how they think?’

‘what, no ‘hello’? no ‘glad to see you weren’t killed by a psychotic villain today’?’

‘if we don’t mind the rules, then we’ll be just like them.’

‘if he’s an enemy, I want to know who he’s working with. if he’s an ally … I want to know why he’s not working with us.’

‘time to build a bridge and get over it, (name).’

‘you knew the risks of this mission, you knew there’d be no rescue attempts if things went haywire. but look … you’re fine, I’m fine — we’re all fine.’

‘I swear, there are days where I wonder what I’m still doing here with you has - beens.

‘I probably could have saved us both, if I’d really tried.’

‘we both know that the world would be better without heroes. without villains. without any of us, getting in the way of normal, happy people and their normal, happy lives.’

‘you would make a promising spy.’

‘if I decide you don’t deserve such charity, then I can take it away.’

‘sometimes showing off can have negative effects.’

‘you expect me to believe that imbecile was working alone?’

‘who’s going to believe your word over mine?’

‘you’re an impostor. and that makes you an enemy.’

‘can we say with absolute certainty that we even know ourselves?’

‘I don’t much care for the ocean. seeing it always fills me with regret.’

‘no one knows who you are. you could go anywhere.’

‘you did not chose this life, (name). you could still chose differently.’

‘I won’t be free until you are.’

‘I won’t rest until (name / organization) is / are punished.’

‘and if revenge does not bring you joy?’

‘do not touch my smoothie or I won’t hesitate to kill you and everyone you’ve ever loved.’

‘I can’t tell if that was arrogant or just … you know, honest.’

‘oooookay, you go ahead with that. not like we should discuss it as a team or anything.’

‘I think we’ll get along just fine.’

‘it’s important to listen to those feelings when you have them.’

‘strong intuition can save lives, especially in our line of work.’

‘how can we expect people to change if we don’t give them a chance to?’

‘you mean people don’t like to see hypocrisy in their leadership? shocking.’

‘so this is the life of a superhero. no wonder everyone wants to be one of you.’

‘it sounds brave in hindsight but all I remember is how terrified I was.’

‘we’re supposed to be on a very important mission, you know. i’d hate to be a distraction.’

‘I can handle this. if you don’t get some sleep, you’re going to be useless.’

‘this is why we can never win.’

‘the best part of all this is that I’m going to kill you and no one will know it was me, because no one will be alive to tell them.’

‘I have the distinct impression I’ve been set up!’

‘you set this all up. you set me up.’

‘right now I have to go do damage control, because someone completely ignored my plan.’

‘why is it that some villains get so obnoxiously chatty?’

‘why should I do all the heavy lifting when it comes to protecting your identity?’

‘i’m not a villain, and I’m not your enemy.’

‘you don’t pull your punches, do you?’

‘you never follow through! you never pull the trigger when it counts!’

‘you are not one of us!’

‘we’ll never know what different outcomes might have occurred had you acted differently.’

‘you were reckless, and I have to assume that is in part because of how … personal this assignment is becoming for you.’

‘my science trumps your magic.’

‘it gets people to underestimate you and that’s an automatic advantage.’

‘if you want to go on thinking you did some heroic act, by all means, stroke that ego.’

‘all you really did was risk your own abilities and make yourself look like an idiot.’

‘if I die, I’ll let you know. until then, I have things to be dealing with.’

‘what we do — what any of us do — it’s just a series of choices, right?’

‘have you completely turned your back on us yet, or are you still holding on to the charade that you’re on our side?’

‘perhaps you’ll recall that you were the one who betrayed me, not the other way around.’

‘tell me this isn’t your roundabout way of threatening to kill me in my sleep.’

‘despite all your talk, you’re afraid to make the tough decisions when they need to be made.’

‘I trust you’ve noticed how he looks at you, observant as you are.’

‘the world would be falling apart if it wasn’t for us.’

‘for the record, while it’s very charming that you keep trying to protect me, I would like to remind you that I actually know how to defend myself.’

‘you might have had potential once, but now? you’re nothing but a disappointment.’

‘if I’m going to die, it’s not going to be alone.’

‘it’s horrible to go through all this plotting and have no one around to appreciate it.’

‘if I asked you on a real date, would you say yes?’

‘you have always feared failure, but it is an especially strong fear tonight.’

‘not really interested in the psychoanalysis.’

‘(name) is dead. you fear you will come to regret this.’

[bloody-bee-tea]

Wedding Days

Inspired by this prompt from @mingcheng-prompts

Jiang Cheng groans when he hears Wei Wuxian’s excited laughter and then he mentally curses himself for it, because it’s Wei Wuxian’s wedding day. He’s allowed to be excited and happy. Required even.

It doesn’t change the fact that Jiang Cheng got dumped a day before the wedding happened and he had to show up alone to this, but it is what it is. Jiang Cheng wouldn’t even change it in hindsight and he’s kind of glad that relationship ended, but still.

He deserves to get another drink, right?

Jiang Cheng is just about to knock back another shot when a hand settles on his arm.

“What the hell?” he snaps out, ready to tear a new one into whoever dares to interrupt his drinking, but the words die on his tongue when he locks eyes with the most gorgeous man he has ever seen.

“Drinking alone is no fun,” the guy says and lifts his own shot to Jiang Cheng. “Want some company?”

“Depends on why you are drinking?” Jiang Cheng gives back, because he could never simply take anything that was offered and the guy huffs out a laugh.

“I was dumped. Like, ten minutes ago. It feels like a good reason to drink,” he says with a shrug. “You?”

“Dumped yesterday,” Jiang Cheng mutters and clinks his shot against the other. “It’s a perfect reason to drink,” he says and then downs the shot, watching the man do the same.

Jiang Cheng is absolutely not itching to get his teeth into his throat.

“Nie Mingjue,” the guy introduces himself once he swallowed and it takes Jiang Cheng an embarrassing long moment to tears his eyes away from his throat.

“Jiang Wanyin,” he replies and he wonders if he can pretend that his voice sounds rough like this because of the alcohol.

“Wei Wuxian’s brother, right?”

“And you’re Huaisang’s brother,” Jiang Cheng gives back, distantly wondering how they went all these years without meeting even once, but he shrugs it off. “Nice to meet you.”

“Likewise,” Nie Mingjue says and then waves the barkeeper down for another round of shots.

~*~**~

Jiang Cheng feels pleasantly warm, a tingling spreading out from his stomach to all his limbs and he likes to pretend that it’s the alcohol finally putting in some work. It has nothing at all to do with the way Nie Mingjue kisses a scorching hot trail down his throat.

“No, stop,” Jiang Cheng breathes out, because this is monumentally unfair. He wanted to kiss Nie Mingjue’s throat, not the other way around.

“What?” Nie Mingjue asks, pulling away immediately and Jiang Cheng takes that opportunity to get his own lips on Nie Mingjue’s skin.

“Wanted to do that since the first shot,” he says between kisses and Nie Mingjue makes a noise in his throat that Jiang Cheng can almost taste.

“Gods, you’re so unbelievable hot,” Nie Mingjue says and reaches around Jiang Cheng to grab his ass in his huge hands.

“You’re one to talk,” Jiang Cheng groans out when Nie Mingjue simply lifts him up the ground and Jiang Cheng is quick to sling his legs around his waist. “Fuck, you’re one to talk,” he repeats as he grinds into Nie Mingjue.

He doesn’t get to say much more when Nie Mingjue claims his lips into a searing hot kiss and Jiang Cheng doesn’t quite remember how they end up in his bed, but he surely won’t complain about that.

Not that Nie Mingjue gives him a chance to even form a coherent sentence now that a mattress is below them.

~*~*~

Jiang Cheng wakes up alone. There’s no note to find anywhere and Nie Mingjue doesn’t contact him, even though it would be easy for him to get Jiang Cheng’s number from Nie Huaisang.

Jiang Cheng tries to not let that get to him and he goes on with his life as usual.

~*~*~

It keeps happening. They keep meeting at weddings of their families or friends, always alone, sometimes recently dumped and sometimes not, but they somehow always drift to the open bar, where the other is usually waiting.

Drinks lead to kisses, which lead to making out, which lead to them leaving the reception early to put their booked rooms to good use.

Jiang Cheng normally wakes up alone. Nie Mingjue still hasn’t contacted him.

~*~*~

It’s the ninth wedding in the last year and a half and Jiang Cheng finds himself in the same arms that he always finds himself in during these things.

“Why didn’t you drink tonight?” Nie Mingjue asks between kisses, because of course he had picked up on that and Jiang Cheng tries his best to shrug, while also not to dislodge Nie Mingjue’s lips from his skin.

“No reason,” Jiang Cheng breathes out and hopes that Nie Mingjue will just drop the issue.

It’s the ninth wedding in one and a half years and Jiang Cheng is scared that it will be the last for a while yet. Their families and assorted friend circles are big, but not that big and the next wedding will be a while off yet.

So Jiang Cheng decided to do something stupid and he can’t afford to be drunk for that. Well, drunk on alcohol. He’s perfectly drunk on the hot feeling in his gut, on the kisses Nie Mingjue presses into his skin, on the feeling of his arms around him.

Jiang Cheng doesn’t think there will ever be a way to not get drunk on this, but then his head hits the pillow on his bed and like always Nie Mingjue makes thinking impossible for him.

Jiang Cheng leans fully into it. No matter how his plan works out, it will be the last time for a while, after all.

~*~*~

When Jiang Cheng wakes up, he is not alone. He takes a moment to let out a relieved breath and then he spends long, long minutes simply staring at Nie Mingjue.

It’s the sole reason he didn’t drink even a drop of alcohol yesterday; he tends to oversleep when he is intoxicated and for once he wanted to wake up before Nie Mingjue.

He has a plan, and no matter how stupid that plan might be, he has to try. Jiang Cheng doesn’t want to wait an undetermined amount of time before he sees Nie Mingjue again, and simply reaching out for him seems strange, especially with all the time that has already passed.

But for now, Jiang Cheng enjoys waking up to Nie Mingjue still in his bed. He’s breathing softly and evenly, his face turned towards Jiang Cheng and he has to fight the urge to reach out and trail his fingers over the slope of his nose or his cheekbones.

He doesn’t want to wake Nie Mingjue yet.

Jiang Cheng is pretty sure that he will never get to watch his fill of Nie Mingjue, but he tries his best now anyway. If this goes wrong, it might be the last time he gets to do this, after all.

He is aware that he could be labelled a freak for staring at Nie Mingjue like this, but Jiang Cheng doesn’t care much about that right now. He settles back into bed, head propped up on one hand, so he gets a clearer look of Nie Mingjue and then he stays that way until Nie Mingjue shows the first signs of waking up.

Jiang Cheng is never going to admit to it out loud, but the way Nie Mingjue scrunches his face right before he wakes up is the cutest thing he has ever seen.

“Morning, sleepy-head,” Jiang Cheng whispers as Nie Mingjue blinks his eyes open, and then he decides to fuck it all and he leans in and brushes a kiss over Nie Mingjue’s cheek.

“Wanyin, you’re—awake,” Nie Mingjue says, his voice still sleep rough and while that sends a shiver of heat down Jiang Cheng’s spine, his words make a pit open up in Jiang Cheng’s gut.

“I feel well rested,” he lightly says, untangling himself from the blanket to get up. “Maybe you didn’t put enough work in yesterday,” he tries to joke, but he knows it falls flat, especially when Nie Mingjue sits up and immediately covers himself with the blanket.

Jiang Cheng already knows that he made a monumentally big mistake here, but he’s in too deep now to simply call it quits.

He would rather Nie Mingjue tells him to his face to not be stupid than to live with this uncertainty for longer.

“Stay for breakfast,” Jiang Cheng says, his back turned to Nie Mingjue as he puts on his pants. “There’s no rush to leave, right?”

Jiang Cheng tries his best not to think about the last eight times when Nie Mingjue clearly couldn’t get away from him fast enough, but he soldiers through it.

“Your stomach grumbled in your sleep, you surely must be hungry.”

He turns around, once he buttoned his pants and Nie Mingjue’s face is answer enough for him. Bitterness sweeps through Jiang Cheng, and he can do nothing to stop it.

“I don’t think that’s a good idea,” Nie Mingjue says, much like Jiang Cheng expected, and turns away from Jiang Cheng to get dressed.

It looks like he’s in a real rush to get away from Jiang Cheng and he didn’t expect that to hurt so much.

“Of course,” Jiang Cheng bitterly says. “I’m good enough for a drunk fuck but not for breakfast. Got it.”

He feels bad for his words afterwards—it was always clear that this was no-strings attached sex and nothing more—but he can’t take them back and he’s not going to apologize either. Nie Mingjue can deal with that, while Jiang Cheng deals with his stupidly broken heart.

“Wanyin,” Nie Mingjue starts, but Jiang Cheng doesn’t want to hear his excuses or his explanations.

“No, that’s—” he can’t bring himself to say ‘alright’ because it’s not and he doesn’t want to lie to Nie Mingjue but he can’t find any other words, so he simply trails off.

He’s glad he booked a bigger room for this wedding than he normally does, because it lets him step away from Nie Mingjue and the bed, even though the distance is barely anything.

Jiang Cheng busies himself with his phone, but in all honesty he is listening for Nie Mingjue gathering his things, wondering if he’ll even say goodbye to him or if this is just going to be it.

He wouldn’t be surprised if Nie Mingjue simply walks out on him after Jiang Cheng’s stupid and clearly unwanted attempt.

What he didn’t expect was for Nie Mingjue to step up behind him and pull him into his chest, his arms tightly around his middle.

“It won’t just be breakfast, if I stay,” Nie Mingjue whispers into the space at Jiang Cheng’s throat. “If I stay for breakfast, I will want to stay for lunch and dinner and movies and dates and sleeping together and every second of every day that comes after. If you ask me to stay for breakfast, I’ll never leave you alone again.”

It sounds like a confession and Jiang Cheng’s eyes immediately feel hot with tears.

He turns around in Nie Mingjue’s embrace to sling his arms around Nie Mingjue’s neck and he hides his face much like Nie Mingjue just did.

“Stay for breakfast,” Jiang Cheng croaks out, hating how his voice breaks with hope and happiness and a shiver runs down his spine when Nie Mingjue presses kiss after kiss into his skin.

“I’ll stay forever,” Nie Mingjue gives back and Jiang Cheng nods his head.

“Please,” he says, beyond caring that he’s basically begging Nie Mingjue and even that thought leaves his head when Nie Mingjue pulls away just far enough to be able to kiss Jiang Cheng.

“You never said,” Jiang Cheng breathes out when they part and Nie Mingjue shrugs.

“Well, you didn’t either, and I thought—you could have reached out. And then every other time I met you you just came out of a relationship so I didn’t know what to think to be honest.”

“You didn’t reach out, either,” Jiang Cheng gives back, just a tiny bit angry over that. “And I didn’t—I haven’t been in a relationship since that very first time. I made them all up, because I thought I needed that excuse for you,” he admits, hiding his face in Nie Mingjue’s shoulder when he can feel himself blush. “But you always recently broke up before a wedding, too.”

“Ah,” Nie Mingjue breathes out and then he laughs. “Same lie here, to be honest,” he explains before Jiang Cheng can get really angry at him and Nie Mingjue takes his face into his hands.

“Let’s exchange numbers now, so that this misunderstanding can never happen again,” he says and Jiang Cheng leans up for a soft kiss before he nods.

Breakfast is much more comfortable than Jiang Cheng dared to hope for, but that’s probably because Nie Mingjue keeps him tucked into his side and Jiang Cheng can hold his hand all morning.

He’s not inclined to ever let go of Nie Mingjue again, so the fact that he wants to stay, too, fits perfectly well.

(Jiang Cheng was right; there were no more weddings for a terrible long two years. He would have died if he hadn’t gotten to see Nie Mingjue at all during that time, but when they are told that they can kiss now, Jiang Cheng figures it’s better to attend a wedding with his husband now, anyway. Especially his own.)

Link to my ko-fi on the sidebar!

[professorspork]

If you're accepting non-superhell prompts, I'd love to see a conversation between Nora and Emerald! I've been REALLY loving these microfics, I've subscribed to you on Ao3, I'll read whatever else you write

[Gahhh that’s so nice you’re so nice!! thanks for being patient on this one, finding my Nora took some doing]

It’s occurring to Emerald that she’s never had a close female friend before.

You say that like you’ve ever had any friends before, the voice in her head that sounds suspiciously like Mercury needles her, but she brushes it aside. Like—okay, yeah, she’ll concede the point when it comes to Cinder. In hindsight, whatever they’d had going on between them may have been... super intense... but it probably had never been friendship, in the usual definition. But she and Mercury were friends, no matter what the judgy little shitstain version of him who lives in her head has to say about it. They’d always gotten along. Told each other stuff. It’s not like there’s more to it than that, right?

It had always been like that. Been—instinctive somehow, with guys. Before Cinder, on the street, it was always the men who’d been easiest to manipulate; who would empty their pockets for a smile and a sob story. And then she and Merc had been two sides of the same coin for so long, and then... well, Hazel’d liked her enough to die for her, apparently. (Which—that’s a door that she keeps closed, thanks. She shuts it firmly again, now.) Oscar seems fond of her, in a sweet, uncomplicated sort of way that she really doesn’t know what to do with, seeing as he shares headspace with like a trillion year old man and the idea that anything to do with that kid could be “uncomplicated” is batshit. Ren vouched for her once, and then again, and now he keeps doing it, like it’s habit, like she should just be used to the fact that people are going to have her back, to ask her if she’s eaten, to turn to her with a raised eyebrow in conversation like her opinion would be constructive.

Anyway.

Now that she’s noticed the pattern, it seems like the kind of thing she should probably… work on, or whatever. And Nora seems like an obvious place for Emerald to start. They’ve been thrown in together a lot, lately, Emerald and Oscar expected to fill in the gaps of what’s left of the old JNPR by default. Not that they’ve ever really had a conversation about it—Emerald can’t think of the last time Nora said two words to her that weren’t combat warnings like “more Grimm coming” or “on your left,” but. That’s probably just because things have been tense. She remembers Nora being friendly, on the whole of it. Off-puttingly friendly, even, back at Beacon.

How hard could it be?

The answer, it turns out, is absurdly hard. Nora’s barely ever in the temporary barracks they’re all living out of, instead always checking on the refugees, going on supply runs over esoteric requests, volunteering for extra patrols. Emerald used to find that kind of dogged do-goodery gag-inducing, but now that she’s been the helping hand herself a few times, she’s starting to see the appeal. The way people look at you when you’ve been of service, it’s—nice. Really nice. But Nora works utterly thankless jobs, the kind most people don’t even notice, let alone appreciate. And when they have their insufferably long leadership meetings and they’re talking about distribution of resources or whatever, Nora’s a fierce debater—jumping in to advocate for the people from Mantle sometimes even before May can. As far as Emerald can tell, she does this stuff just because... she believes in it. Because it’s the right thing to do, and someone has to.

She can’t imagine what it would feel like, to have the attention of someone like that turned on her. She’s craved it from the wrong people for so long, but now that she has her pick of options... she’s letting herself actually want the right kind, for once. She thinks.

Which is all to say that largely through no fault of her own, Emerald unexpectedly finds herself sitting with a profound, fervent desire for Nora Valkyrie to think she’s cool.

She hates that.

-

Fighting with Nora is easy.

(—er. Alongside. Fighting alongside Nora is easy. Emerald’s done fighting with these people. Very done.)

It’s weird, because Emerald’s finding working with a full team to be a real adjustment. When battles get big enough to merit it, she’s used to keeping to the sidelines to use her Semblance for nefarious purposes, or, in a jam, used to having Mercury’s six—literally, because all the forward momentum from his feet-first style always left his back wide open. Figuring out where to put herself so that Oscar can use her shoulder as a fulcrum as he dodges, or trying to aim for the Grimm Ren isn’t already shooting (ugh)—it’s taking work.

But somehow, it’s not work for Nora. Nora seems to anticipate with perfect ease how Emerald will move or what she’ll be doing; Nora bobs and weaves around their ragtag little band with her war hammer like it’s breathing.

It doesn’t bother Emerald until it does, and she means to bring it up casually but there’s never a good time. So it just… stews, and stews, until she can’t keep it bottled up anymore.

Which means that instead of the earnest question she intends it to be, it comes out like this:

“Okay, seriously? It’s creepy how you do that.”

It’s just the two of them, plus the handful of dweeby Atlesian tech-types they’re escorting back from their foray installing some fancy hydro-filtration modules on the outskirts of the camp. And it’s not like Emerald had felt outmatched by the half-dozen Ravagers that had decided they looked like lunch—she can shoot Ravagers in her sleep, at this point—but still. The way Nora had moved around her, it was like they’d been fighting side by side for years.

Nora just cocks her head to the side. “Do what?” she asks, like she hadn’t just basically read Emerald’s mind in front of the water nerds.

Emerald does a complicated gesture with her hands, wrist over wrist, and then flicking two fingers—trying to evoke the way Nora had flipped over Emerald’s back and then kicked off, just trusting Emerald would reel her back in with a chain in midair before a Grimm could fly away with her sorry ass. “That.”

“Oh!” Nora laughs and rubs at the back of her neck, looking sheepish. “It’s nothing. I guess it’s just not a big deal for me? Like—I was there when Ren built StormFlower. The cables are newish, but we practiced so much back in Atlas… I dunno. It’s just reflex, when your weapons are so similar. Fighting with you, it’s almost like fighting with him. I don’t even have to think about it.”

Nora swallows, then, and makes a face Emerald can’t interpret—disappointed, maybe, or ashamed. Which: good. She probably should be, taking things for granted like that.

“Well—just—” Emerald’s not even sure what she wants to say. Ask, next time? Don’t? “You shouldn’t make assumptions. I’m not your boyfriend, okay?”

The venom she puts behind the word is directed more at herself than Nora—frustrated, again, that she’s put herself in the position of wanting so desperately to be liked.

Pathetic.

Nora just nods, looking glum.

“Yeah,” she murmurs, cheeks pulling in a bitter smile. “You’d think I’d be able to keep that one straight, huh?”

She says it with such pointed irony that for a second Emerald wonders if she’d gotten it wrong somehow, but like—Nora and Ren are a thing, right? That’s—everyone knows that.

“Hey, what—?”

“Let’s just go,” Nora says, and Emerald automatically falls into line behind her.

They make the rest of the walk back in silence.

-

Sometimes at night, when she can’t sleep, Emerald likes to climb up to the roof of the barracks and look out over the refugee camp.

It’s—peaceful, is all. A good reminder of where she is; how far she’s come. The night sky in Vacuo has more stars than she’s ever seen, and being able to watch over all these people who have somehow become her responsibility… well.

A part of her will always be standing on the rooftop at Beacon, looking down on pure chaos as a queasy, frightened sensation twists in her gut and its noxious voice whispers you did this, you did this, you did this. What did you think was going to happen, you stupid little girl? You don’t get to feel sorry for it now.

But she does.

Weird how the only thing that’s helped is actually doing something about it.

She hears a scuffling noise over her shoulder, and she’s got Thief’s Respite drawn and ready before she can even really register what she’s heard. She relaxes when she sees it’s Nora at the other end of the barrels, unarmed and hands raised—a funny little smile on her face, like yeah, fair enough, I should have known better than to try and sneak up.

“Just me,” she says, unnecessarily.

Emerald holsters her guns. “Can I help you?” she asks, and—what is it about her voice, that makes sentences that would be nice if any other human said them come out straight-up hostile?

Nora shrugs, hands dropping to her sides. “I was hoping we could talk; I figured you’d come up here if I waited long enough.”

Well, see—what kind of lesson is she supposed to take from that? She’s been hoping for Nora to talk to her for weeks, and acting like a bitch is the thing that gets her what she wants? Good guys are supposed to know better.

And there’s the way she said it, too. Like everyone knows Emerald comes up here to brood; like it’s a big open secret. The knowledge sits uncomfortably in her stomach, makes her feel watched. Even now, even here, she can’t get a moment alone. Not really.

“What, so you’re spying on me now?”

Nora’s eyes narrow. “I have a pretty bad track record when it comes to losing people. Makes a girl want to put in a little hustle when it comes to keeping tabs on her friends.”

And Emerald would snark at that, or maybe apologize, or something, only—

Nora thinks they’re friends?

“Well, take a seat, I guess,” she mumbles, scooching to the side as though she needs to make room on the massive, empty roof.

Nora walks over and joins Emerald on the asphalt, letting her legs dangle over the edge. Seemingly unsure of where to start, she stares at her hands. Emerald stares too, but her eyes can’t help but wander—tracing the way scars, silvery in the moonlight, spiderweb up Nora’s bare wrists and forearms to fetter her shoulders, clavicle, neck. Like cracks in a pane of glass, right before it shatters.

(Only that’s not it at all, is it? It’s not a sign of weakness, but a warning of strength. I care this much, her scars announce to the word. You wanna try me?

Hazel’s arms always looked like that.)

Emerald doesn’t want to be the one to break the silence, sure that whatever she’d say would be incredibly stupid.

Luckily, Nora has no such qualms, and opens with: “I really admire you, you know?”

Emerald stares, jaw slack, certain she’s heard wrong. “I—what?” She’d say something defensive, like yeah right or you don’t have to make fun of me, only Nora’s eyes are so wide and so guileless they don’t leave any room for argument.

“I mean it,” Nora adds. “I know we don’t know all that much about each other, but… here’s what I do know: I can’t remember a time I saw you without Mercury right behind. Just like me’n Ren. And the way you fought for Cinder…” Nora smiles a sad, private little smile. “You don’t fight like that unless it’s personal; unless someone means something to you. Just like me’n Ren. And now you’re here. All on your own. And you didn’t have to be. That’s—don’t you think that’s crazy brave? I sure do.”

Of course she fucking doesn’t. Crazy brave would have been walking away the first, tenth, hundredth time she had a flash of panic about what she was doing. Or, better yet, doing something about it. Crazy brave is taking thirty thousand volts to get to your friends; it’s flooding your veins with pure crystalline power and saying Go, I’m doing what Gretchen would have done, it’s—

She closes that door.

“It’s not like I really had a choice,” she sighs, dodging the question.

“Oh, you know that’s not true,” Nora scoffs dismissively, tilting sideways to nudge Emerald with her shoulder.

And Emerald jolts, because—look, it’s not like no one touches her. They have to manhandle each other all the time in battle, and… and Oscar gives her high fives sometimes, which makes her embarrassingly pleased. But what Nora’s offering now, that kind of buddy-buddy casual contact…

… it’s been a while, is all.

“So, why did you want to talk to me?” Emerald asks, overwhelmed and suddenly desperate to find a way to get this conversation over with. She feels like she’s sprinted five miles; like she’s had the crap kicked out of her and she has to go somewhere to lick her wounds. Too much, too fast.

Nora laughs—a chuffing, cynical noise that doesn’t sound at all like her. “Looking for pointers? See, I’m trying this thing where I do things on my own, but I just—I suck at it. Like today; you saw. Even when I’m not with Ren, all I do is… is act exactly the same way I do when I’m with Ren. Like I literally don’t know how to exist without him, whether he’s actually there or not. And I know that’s not fair to anyone; I didn’t mean to treat you like—” She shakes her head, biting her lip. “You’re not just some stand-in. It’s not you at all. I’m just—broken, or something. One trick pony.”

“No, hey—”

“But you figured it out,” she barrels on, which is good, because Emerald doesn’t actually have a clue what she would have said there. “You don’t have anyone and somehow you’re just, like—good to go!” Nora says it cheerily, like it’s a compliment, but has the grace to balk a little when she hears how it sounds. “…sorry. That’s—sorry.”

Emerald shrugs, drawing her knees to her chest and resting her chin there. She feels like an idiot; building it up for weeks like spending time with Nora would solve all her problems when, surprise surprise, Nora’s just as fucked up as she is.

“Hate to disappoint you, but I don’t have any hot tips,” she mutters into the crooks of her elbows. “I don’t have a clue what I’m doing. Like—you want to know the really sad part? I was just following your lead.”

“My…?” Nora can’t even finish repeating it, which: Emerald can’t blame her. It’s so dumb. “Huh?”

“Come on. You know.”

“I don’t,” Nora says, voice thick with exhaustion. Like she’s sick of herself. “Ask anyone—I’m not the brains of the operation.”

Hearing Nora talk about herself that way makes Emerald’s chest feel tight; like her ribs have locked in place so her lungs can’t expand. She doesn’t know how to explain it; not without sounding like a starry-eyed fangirl or a moron with a crush and that’s not what this—it’s only that—

She chooses to start a different way.

“You wanna know why I switched sides? Like, really why?”

Nora softens, and reaches out to touch the back of Emerald’s left hand, where it dangles over her knee. “Sure,” she says, but Emerald barely hears it; it’s taking all of her concentration not to clench her fist or pull away in response.

“I overheard Oscar—or, Ozpin, I guess, I don’t know—talking to Hazel about Salem, about her goals. And… listen. No one joins under Salem because they’re trying to kill the world, okay? I mean, no one but Tyrian, anyway. We were all just trying to… find ways to get by. And when Cinder found me, she—” Emerald swallows, hard. This cuts too deep, too close. It’s not something she can just say. “I wasn’t trying to be some big villain, or something. I was just—looking out for the people who were looking out for me. And why wouldn’t I? No one else ever seemed to think I was worth it.”

“Of course you are,” Nora cuts in, quiet but vehement. “Everyone is.”

“See, the worst part is that you mean that when you say it,” Emerald grumbles, scrubbing at her face until smears of color kaleidoscope behind her closed eyes. “I figured people like you didn’t exist, and then Cinder and Merc were glad to prove me right, and—I let them. You know? And maybe if I’d just held out a little longer…”

“You’re not the only one here who’s ashamed of her past. Harriet tried to blow up Mantle, like, a month ago.”

“That’s not—forget that. I’m talking about you. Nora.” It’s the first time she’s ever said her name like that—addressing her, in conversation. It feels… astonishingly intimate, for so small a thing. Emerald powers past it. “Every day, I see you do something ridiculous, like double back on a patrol because you forgot you promised some kid a candy bar, or something, and that—matters. To me. It’s so stupid, but it’s not, because… argh! I want—it’s—” She tries to get her mouth to form the words, that’s the kind of person I want to be, but they stop in her throat.

Still, Nora seems to get the message. Her eyes seem suspiciously shiny for a moment—but when she blinks, it’s gone. “I… thank you.”

“Don’t mention it,” Emerald grumbles. Saying it like she means it: seriously. Don’t mention it.

“I understand what you mean, though. For years, the only person who looked out for me was Ren. And if he’d said…” Nora trails off, then, cocking her head to the side as she works through something. “Huh.”

“What?”

“Nothing, just. I remembered something. I was about to say that if Ren told me the only way for us to get by was a life of crime, or something, I would’ve taken his word for it, but—the opposite happened. We decided to enroll at Beacon. And that wasn’t his idea; it was mine. I always wanted to be a Huntress. To… to be the one strong enough to help people, instead of always needing the help. He wasn’t sure if we would make it, but I was. We were together, right? How could we lose?” She chuckles, a little, shaking her head at herself. “Get a load of that. He followed me.”

They smile at each other, then. Like they’ve figured out something profound. Maybe Nora has; Emerald hopes so.

“I’m glad you’re here, Emerald,” Nora says, and—there it is again. The frisson of electricity that comes with being referred to by name.

Of course, then Emerald ruins it by blurting out:

“Of course you are, all your other friends are dead.”

Which—“Fuck!” she sputters, because she didn’t mean to say that. What is wrong with her? “Sorry! Sorry.”

Nora only grins at her, feral and incisive. “Yeah, well. Yours are evil, so. Pick your poison. At least I’m proud of mine.”

Touché.

“Still glad I’m here?” Emerald jeers, because her first instinct is still to press on the bruise to see how much it hurts.

Nora laughs, and gets to her feet. “Believe it or not, yes. If putting your foot in your mouth was all it took to get booted from Hero Club, I’d have been kicked out a long time ago.” She reaches down to offer Emerald a hand; Emerald takes it, letting Nora pull her to standing. “Now go and get some rest, huh? None of us can ever sleep when you’re up here thinking so loud.”

“That an order?”

“Advice. Friends give it, from time to time.”

And—yeah. Maybe they do. 

[sevenmikento]

uhmm i know it’s super broad but a gojo satoru fluff? nothing like domestic AU but more like close childhood best friends where they both clearly like eachother but reader is a really big tsundere

A/N: imma try making this a oneshot! :D also there MIGHT be some spoilers for the manga but i’ll try to keep them as vague as possible

genres: fluffy!! slight angst; 1.4k words

the three times he says “i love you” [Gojo Satoru X Reader]

The first time Gojo Satoru tells you he loves you was during a simpler era in which nothing was expected of the two of you in spite of your powerful heritage as jujutsu sorcerers. It was a time when you could still laugh at the mistakes you made during training sessions, the adults slightly more forgiving than they would have been if you were a few years older.

You’d been left to your own devices after dinner, having chosen to stay in your room throughout the evening and night. The sound of your door sliding open doesn’t alarm you as it could only ever be one person: the boy whom your parents are taking care of… your closest and only actual friend.

You fail to spare him a glance, eyes glued to the old book that weighs heavy in your tiny hands—in both physical weight and spiritual significance. A smaller, more petty reason for your lack of acknowledgement is the person himself who’d now taken it upon himself to simply stand right in front of you, blocking the light from reaching the yellowed pages of the book written by your ancestors.

“Why’re you still studying?” he asks, leaning forward a bit more, obscuring your vision further. Whether it’s unintentional of on purpose, you cannot tell. “It’s so easy,” Gojo continues, referring to the technique he so easily picked up during the day, “I can show you—”

When he grabs your wrists, your head shoots up, lips parted as you ready yourself to reject him, to tell him to go away and let you study by yourself. However, the words escape you when you notice the blood gushing down his forehead, his right eye shining in the midst of the dark, red liquid.

“What happened?” All frustration is drained out of your very soul as you grab his shoulders, guiding him to sit down on your bed. Your positions now swapped, Gojo stares up at you, silent. “Does it hurt?” you ask, holding your hands to either side of his head, his temples covered by the warm palms of your hands.

He hums in response—neither a yes or a no—and appreciates the fact that you don’t push for an answer. His eyelids flutter closed as the sensation of your reverse cursed technique flows effortlessly into him. The feeling is comforting beyond all words, warm and cooling at the same time, it all originates from your soft hands and tender touch.

The broken skin heals and the words slip off his tongue:

“I love you, (Y/N).”

Your technique abruptly stops as your hands fly off his face as though his skin were boiling hot. Gojo opens his eyes to look at you again but by then you’re gone, leaving him alone in your room with the book you’d abandoned and his racing heart.

The second time those words spill out of his lips, they’re spoken in a tone so casual and careless that you find yourself more irked than flustered—even if he was, then, already someone you’d developed feelings for.

Gojo had stared at you from over the round frames of his sunglasses, brilliant blue eyes twinkling with the usual playfulness they always seemed to carry no matter where he was or what was happening. His gaze was also expectant—as were the looks of your fellow jujutsu classmates—in a way that you just couldn’t decipher.

What did he want you to say? What were you expected to do?

Gojo Satoru had, of course, spoken those words out loud in front of all your mutual friends. It was perhaps, in hindsight, not the best idea, seeing as your response was a simple punch to his shoulder followed by a brisk walk out of the classroom.

The white-haired teen merely sighed, as though not realising that he’d, in no way, shown any form of seriousness during his confession; acting as if the blatant rejection was no fault of his own demeanour. But he’s not an idiot, of course. Reckless with his feelings, yes, but no idiot.

“You’re a dumbass,” Geto chuckles, slipping into the chair of the desk that was beside Gojo’s, his arm casually slung over the backrest of the seat with his cheek resting against his hand. He looks at his white-haired friend with amusement but also slight pity, knowing fully well how much he meant what he’d said, even if it definitely didn’t sound that way.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” he replies with a pout, crossing his arms behind his head while he sticks his long legs out from under the table and gives them a little stretch. “That was most certainly just a prank that played out perfectly well.”

“Perfectly, you say?” Ieiri Shouko comments from her seat at the back of the room. “All you did was piss (Y/N) off.”

“Exactly!”

It’s only a few hours later when Gojo realises he may have annoyed you a little bit too much.

Having not seen you at all ever since the very successful prank, he decides to look for you at your room and, much like his prank, succeeds in finally finding you. He lets himself in and shuts the door behind him before sauntering over to your bed where you sit at the end, legs crossed and eyebrows furrowed as you type furiously on your flip phone. Gojo feels an odd sense of deja vu when you ignore him but he shrugs it off easily.

The mattress sinks under his weight before his head lands on your lap. In the midst of making himself comfortable, he slips off his glasses and tosses them aside, hands rubbing at his eyes lazily. When he opens them once more, he stares right up at your face, peeking at you from underneath your phone. Your own eyes flicker towards him briefly but return to their original focus, eliciting a whiny huff from the young man.

He grabs your free hand and smushes the palm to it into his cheek, smiling like a fool when you let it rest there, your fingers tickling the edge his hairline. Your skin is calloused and scarred, the results of years of perfecting your inherited cursed technique, but it soothes him all the same. His heart stutters when you begin to caress his skin with the pad of your thumb, rubbing his face with tender affection.

“I meant what I said…” he whispers as he lets his eyes flicker closed, fully immersing himself in the feeling of your touch, just missing the way you look at him. Your phone lowered, you stare at him silently as you continue to keep his face nuzzled in the palm of your hand. He falls asleep a short while after and so do you.

The third time he says those words, Gojo fully prepares himself to watch you run away yet again. He tells himself that if you do what he expects you to do, he’ll never say those words again—not to you, not to anyone else. He’s convinced that if you, the person who knows him more than he knows himself, are unable to love him then he won’t even try to love anyone else.

The third time he says those words, he says them as you eat dinner together in your room at the school, the sentence tearing through the sound of clinking cutlery and the YouTube video playing on your phone that you were watching together. He says them out of the blue, after quietly staring at you eat and laugh instead of the screen for the past twenty minutes.

He says them after thinking to himself, ‘I really do love you.’

And you… you stare at him with an expression he’s never seen before. Your eyes are wide, lips parted but there’s no shock on your face, there’s only… relief and—

“I love you, too,” you reply before letting out a shaky breath as though the words themselves took immense effort to say. You smile widely, the scars littering your face bending to the shape of your joyful expression. A source of great insecurity over the years, Gojo can’t help but find every single one beautiful.

He resists the urge to say something stupid, to make this all-too-serious atmosphere become slightly less serious—a terrible habit of his and one that you immediately pick up on after years of dealing with his foolishness. You grab his hand and intertwine your fingers with his—a gesture that sends his heart flying off to god-knows-where.

“You can say whatever it is you want to say.”

Ah, he always knew you were the one for him.

“… does this mean I can touch your butt? :D”

[morganaspendragonss]

holly's august extravaganza day 26: slowly becoming lovers

for sonia (@pragmaticoptimist34)! i have to confess something - i got so caught up in writing this that i actually forgot to include either of the other two prompts you sent me 🙈 i hope you like it anyway!

second confession - it was supposed to be longer and then it kind of got away from me so i had to draw a line somewhere oops

thanks to @ravens-words, @cosmiicmalex, @halsteadmarchs and liz (sorry, i don't know your tumblr!) for enabling me and to @noxsoulmate for beta'ing!

ao3 | 2.9k | falling in love, fluff, tiny, tiny hint of hurt/comfort, soft tarlos, set between s1 and s2

Things don’t get fixed overnight. They agree to give them a shot, but that doesn’t change the fact that TK is still reeling from his break-up and overdose, nor that Carlos is still hesitant and afraid of pushing too hard at once.

But, slowly, they get to know each other. And, slowly, they start to fall in love.

i. food preferences

“You have to be joking.”

“It tastes like soap, Carlos!”

Carlos groans and drops his head into his hands, shaking his head at this latest revelation from his boyfriend. His boyfriend, who has just made his life—or at least his cooking—a hell of a lot more complicated. “My mamá would have a fit if she could hear you now.”

He almost regrets the words as TK’s eyes alight with interest; he’s been dancing around the topic of his parents for a while now, but it’s not like he can deny what he said. His mom would be having a fit, or possibly attempting to kill TK with a wooden spoon, if she found out that Carlos’s boyfriend was not only a gringo, but one who hates coriander.

“I swear, you won’t even taste it when it’s mixed into the food,” he tries, because coriander is a staple of his cooking, and he can’t even fathom not using it.

But TK just levels him with a firm look. “Yes, I will, Carlos. I’ll always taste it.”

Carlos rolls his eyes at his boyfriend’s theatrics, but sighs, relenting. “Fine. I suppose I can—” He doesn’t get a chance to finish his sentence, as TK throws his arms around him and plants a noisy kiss on his cheek.

“Thanks, babe,” he says, grinning cheekily.

“Yeah, yeah,” Carlos grumbles, but he can’t help but smile.

There’s very little, he’s finding, that he wouldn’t do for TK.

ii. nicknames

It slips out by accident one day.

“TK,” Carlos groans, followed by a gasp as TK moves just right, sending sparks of pleasure down his spine. “TK, Ty—”

TK instantly freezes on top of him and Carlos’s eyes open, concern rising in him as he takes in the pensive look on his boyfriend’s face.

“What’s wrong?”

“I…” TK shakes his head and forces a smile. “It’s nothing. I’m good, I promise.” He ducks down to kiss Carlos again, but the mood is all wrong, and Carlos gently pushes him back, raising an eyebrow. TK holds out a moment longer, then sighs and rolls away, staring up at the ceiling. “It’s stupid.”

Carlos tuts, reaching over to brush a hand through TK’s hair. “Bet you $20 it’s not.”

“Hope you have $20 then, Reyes,” TK says wryly. He looks over at Carlos and sighs again, biting his lip. “It’s just… You called me Ty.”

“Oh.” Carlos’s eyes widen and he props himself up on an elbow. “I’m so sorry, I wasn’t thinking; it won’t happen again—”

TK presses a finger against his lips, cutting him off abruptly. He smiles softly, then removes his finger and caresses Carlos’s cheek. “It’s okay,” he says. “More than okay, actually. I… I’ve always hated my name, but, I don’t know, I guess it sounded right? Like, when you said it? I think I’d kill anyone else who tried, but I really liked it coming from you.”

“Are you sure? You’re not just saying that because—”

Carlos is again cut off, this time by TK’s lips on his. TK moves so that he’s straddling Carlos again, hands pressed against his chest. “I’m sure,” he whispers, a grin playing at his mouth. “Now, weren’t we in the middle of something?”

iii. religion

Christmas sneaks up on him that year. Between helping the city recovering from the solar storm, work in general, the pandemic, and building his relationship with TK, Carlos has completely lost track of the months, until it’s a week before the date and he has nothing planned.

Really, it’s never been a big deal for him; he and his family used to attend mass and make an event out of it when he was a kid, but now he’s an adult, he’s often working, and he hasn’t been to church regularly since he was a teenager. But this year is different. This year, he’ll be spending it with TK, their first Christmas together, and he wants to make it special.

But he’s left it too late—nothing he orders online will arrive in time, the shops are becoming a nightmare, and he honestly has no clue where to even start. So Carlos resigns himself to another quiet Christmas, frustration and disappointment welling in him at the thought of telling his boyfriend.

“I’m sorry,” he blurts out one night over dinner, the thought having been gnawing at him for days.

TK raises a brow. “For?”

“Christmas,” Carlos sighs, looking down into his stew. “It’s our first one together and I had all these plans, and then I just sort of… I didn’t forget! But things have been so crazy, and—”

He’s cut off when TK lays a hand on his. When Carlos looks up at him, TK seems to be fighting back laughter, which is confusing at best and potentially mildly insulting at worst.

“Babe,” TK says, grinning, “it’s okay. You might not believe me, but I forgot too. Christmas wasn’t really a thing growing up—my mom’s Jewish, so I used to celebrate Hanukkah on the years I stayed with her, and Dad was working more often than not. I don’t care, I promise.”

Carlos blinks. “You’re Jewish?” Surely he would know if… But they’ve never discussed religion before, and Carlos had kind of assumed TK had the same ideals as him about the church. In hindsight that was stupid and presumptuous, and Carlos can’t quite believe he’d do something like that. An apology is on the tip of his tongue, but TK just shrugs, going back to his stew.

“Half,” he says. “I don’t really practice anymore but I still keep the beliefs with me, if that makes sense?”

“Yeah. Yeah, it does.”

TK smiles at him, and Carlos suddenly realises that this holiday season will be special after all, even if they don’t celebrate anything. Because he’s with TK, which is the most special thing in the world.

iv. how they sleep

Carlos has been sleeping alone for a long time. He’s had a couple of short-term boyfriends and the odd hook-up here and there, but he’s never had someone else in his bed regularly—certainly not regularly enough to get used to it.

TK was hesitant at first to stay over, but once he started to be more comfortable, it was almost a given that they’d be sleeping together whenever their shifts allowed.

And it had been an adjustment.

TK had warned him he tended to move around and be clingy in his sleep, but Carlos hadn’t quite understood what that meant, until now. He is, essentially, trapped under TK, his arms pinned to his sides and one leg thrown over his hip. TK’s head is pillowed on Carlos’s shoulder and his breath is fanning in soft puffs over his skin.

The only way he can move is if he wakes TK up, and there’s no way Carlos is going to do that. His boyfriend looks so peaceful, and Carlos is more than happy to be clung onto like a koala to a branch if it keeps that expression on his face.

In fact, he thinks he can get used to this very easily.

v. pda

In private, their days are filled with gentle touches and stolen kisses. Carlos will be cooking breakfast and TK will slip his arms around him, kissing the back of his neck. TK will be doing one chore or another and Carlos will brush a hand over his back or gently nudge him as he walks past.

But in public, it’s a whole other story.

It’s almost reflexive, the way TK reaches for Carlos’s hand as they’re walking down the street. It’s something they do all the time at home, and even with their friends, but this time, Carlos immediately tenses, seemingly automatically pulling his hand away.

“You okay?” he asks, frowning.

Carlos takes a deep breath, then obviously plasters on a smile, retaking TK’s hand—and TK can feel the tension in the gesture. “I’m fine.”

“You’re not.” TK gently lets go of Carlos and smiles reassuringly up at him. “It’s okay if you’re not comfortable with touching in public.”

“I’m sorry, I just—”

“You have nothing to be sorry for. This is all on me; I should have asked.”

“But—”

“But, nothing.” He carefully bumps their soldiers together. “You’re entitled to your boundaries, I’m just sorry for overstepping. Tell me next time, please?”

Carlos hesitates, but nods, a gentle press of their arms a silent acknowledgment of agreement and understanding.

vi. scars

Carlos, TK has noticed, likes to pay extra attention to his bullet scar. Whether it’s pressing a gentle kiss over it when they’re in bed, or brushing it with his fingers when wrapping an arm around him, it happens too often for TK to believe it’s anything but intentional.

He doesn’t understand it at first.

Then he discovers Carlos’s own scars.

“What’s this?” he asks, tracing over the thick raised scarring on Carlos’s side. It stretches along the curve of his waist and round his back, and TK has no idea how he hasn’t noticed it before.

Carlos cranes his neck, letting out a hum when he sees what TK’s looking at. His head flops back down on the pillow and he closes his eyes, absently stroking up and down TK’s sides.

“It was...three years ago, maybe?” he says. “I got stabbed on a call. They told me it was pretty touch-and-go for a while, but they fixed me up and I was back at work in a month.”

His eyes are still closed, body completely relaxed, but TK can’t take his eyes off the scar. He reaches up to his own scar, and he gets it.

Carlos’s eyes crack open. “TK?”

“I’m good,” TK murmurs. He breaks his gaze from Carlos’s abdomen and smiles at him. “We both are.”

And if, after that day, Carlos notices him paying more attention to that scar, he doesn’t say anything.

vii. penguin or panda

“You’re out of your mind!”

In Carlos’s defence, a zoo date had seemed like a good idea. He knows TK loves animals, and he himself grew up around them, so in theory, a trip to Austin Zoo should have been the perfect time to get to know each other better while enjoying the day.

Turns out, TK has some very strong opinions on animals, and is willing to budge for absolutely no-one.

“I can’t believe you think penguins are cuter than pandas! I mean, look at them, Carlos!” He gestures emphatically to the panda enclosure, where one is napping on a log. It’s pretty cute, Carlos has to admit, but���

He shrugs. “But remember when the penguins were all huddling together?”

TK makes a noise of outrage, and Carlos has to laugh, then some more at the wounded pout he gets for it. “Is this really a thing for you?” he asks. “Like, is this going to be the dealbreaker for us?”

TK folds his arms and levels him with a stern look. “That depends,” he says. “Meerkats or koalas?”

And, just because he knows it will rile TK up more, Carlos grins and answers, “Meerkats.”

(They don’t break-up over it, but Carlos isn’t so sure that TK will be forgiving him any time soon.)

viii. special interests

“Say you could go back to a moment in history, but only once,” TK says, out of the blue, breaking the comfortable silence of the front room. Carlos stops carding his fingers through TK’s hair and looks down at him, curious. “Where would you go?”

Carlos opens his mouth, but TK doesn’t give him a second to answer. “Is it cliché if I said I’d go to Stonewall? I mean, I’d really like to see dinosaurs in the flesh, or—oh! I was, like, obsessed with pirates as a kid; I thought they were the coolest things ever, and I pretty much idolised Anne Bonny. But I’m pretty sure I’d die immediately if I went to either of those places, so…”

He trails off, a blush rising on his cheeks. “Sorry, I’m boring you.”

“No!” Carlos rushes to say. “No, you’re not. I love history, I just… What makes you ask?”

“It’s something we got into at the station earlier. Mateo brought it up first, I think?”

Carlos hums, pursing his lips in thought. “I guess…” He sighs and shakes his head. “It’s too hard. There’s so many places I’d want to go and people I’d want to meet.”

“But if you had to pick?” TK pushes, sitting upright and looking at Carlos with interest.

“I really want to meet Eleanor of Aquitaine, but if I could only go to one place…” He hesitates and thinks it over some more, but then his eyes catch on the masks hanging along the stairway, and he’s sure. “Tenochtitlan, but before Cortés arrived. It was a whole society, and I just think it would be so cool to see it up close and to know what it was like first-hand. I mean, I’ve read a lot of books, but we don’t have much from the Mexica people, a lot is from the conquerors, and—”

Carlos stops and huffs a laugh. “Now I’m the one boring you,” he says, but TK shakes his head, eyes bright.

“Tell me more.”

ix. coffee order

TK accepts the coffee without even thinking about it, even taking a sip before he realises he never told Carlos what his order was. He curses himself but resolves to drink it anyway; TK isn’t too much of a coffee snob, and he’s certainly not going to reject anything his boyfriend brings him.

He takes a second sip, and he’s so caught up in making a mental note to tell Carlos next time that it takes a minute for the taste to register. And…

It’s his order.

He looks sharply up at Carlos, who is smiling into his own coffee—therefore dispelling any notion of this being an insanely good guess. “How did you know?” he asks, bewildered.

The tips of Carlos’s ears turn pink, but the smile doesn’t leave his face as he looks up at TK. “Our first real date,” he says. “You mentioned that this was your go-to order.”

And TK can’t do anything but stare, because their first date was weeks ago, and Carlos still remembered, and it’s just…

He thinks—no, he knows—he’s falling in love.

x. fears

“Weirdest fears, go.”

TK has to laugh at the perplexed look Carlos sends him at the question, the straw of his boba hanging out of his mouth. Now that they’ve figured a sort of rhythm out between them, they decided to try the boba place again—there have been no emergencies or disasters so far, so TK is counting it as a win.

“Come on,” he continues. “Last time we were here, you said we barely knew each other—which was true—so now we’re going to fix it.”

Carlos’s eyebrows shoot up to his hairline. “By telling each other our weirdest fears?”

“Exactly!” TK grins. “I’ll go first if you’re too chicken. Mine is slicing my hands open or cutting some fingers off with ice skates.”

“What?” Carlos breathes, disbelief all over his face. “I’ve never been ice skating but I’m pretty sure your hands aren’t supposed to go anywhere near the blades.”

“I didn’t say it was rational.” TK sips his boba, raising an eyebrow at Carlos. “Your turn.”

Carlos swallows, suddenly very interested in the table. “I, uh. When I was a kid, my Tía Lucy had a snake get into her pipes. She only discovered it when she went to the toilet one morning and it was just...sitting there in the bowl. I was terrified for years that the same would happen to us, and it’s kind of become a reflex to check.”

“Oh my god.” TK can’t help but burst out laughing, even though he feels bad for it as Carlos covers his face with his hands. “I’m sorry, I know it’s a real thing for you, I just…”

But Carlos’s shoulders are shaking too and, bizarrely, TK really does feel closer to him now.

It’s a good feeling.

xi. long-term commitments

Carlos is surprised when TK is the one to bring it up first.

“Do you ever think about the future?” he asks one day, head in Carlos’s lap, staring up at the ceiling.

Carlos pauses the show he’s technically supposed to be watching and quirks an eyebrow at his boyfriend. “Sure,” he says. “What about the future exactly?”

TK hesitates, and his voice comes out a lot quieter when he next speaks. “Like…” He sighs, a small flush rising on his cheeks. “The future. Our future. Us. Maybe...marriage, or…”

He trails off, practically whispering by the end of it. His gaze has shifted from the ceiling to the frozen TV screen and he’s chewing on his bottom lip, body stiff with tension. “Sorry,” he mutters. “Forget about it.”

But Carlos is learning to read TK, and he knows he was looking for reassurance. “I mean, yeah,” he says. “I think about it. Do you?”

TK stares up at him, wonder in his eyes. “After New York, I thought… But yeah. Yeah, I do.”

They share a smile as they lock eyes, and Carlos knows that they’re on the same page here. That, distant though they may be, both of them can hear wedding bells in their future.

[xiaomoxu]

Victor’s Mind Quest: Preference

SPOILER ALERT!!

A date from CN server which hasn’t been released on EN server yet. Might contains some spoiler.

This date is so LONG, so be prepared! XD

🍷 🍷 🍷 🍷 🍷 🍷 🍷 🍷 🍷 🍷 🍷 🍷 🍷 🍷 🍷 🍷 🍷 🍷 🍷 🍷 🍷 🍷 🍷 🍷 🍷 🍷 🍷 🍷 🍷 

🍷

The car stopped in front of the familiar white villa, Li Zeyan and I picked up gifts from the trunk and rang the doorbell.

The door was quickly opened, and Li Zeyan's aunt poked her head first.

Aunt: Oops, you guys are finally here!

Li Zeyan: Aunt.

MC: Hello, aunt! I'm bothering again.

Aunt: Don't mind it, come in quickly.

Walking into the living room, a faint fragrance of tea wafted, and news was broadcasted quietly on the TV, everything was exactly the same as in memory.

Aunt: Brother, Zeyan and MC are here!

MC: Happy New Year, Uncle!

Father Li put down the teapot, smiled and nodded at us.

On the eve of the Spring Festival, aunt called and invited Li Zeyan and me to go to the neighboring province for the New Year.

The last time I accidentally celebrated the Chinese New Year at Father Li's house is still vivid. Thinking of this warm memory, this time I carefully selected gifts before setting off.

We exchanged greetings for a while, and while the aunt was going to fill the teapot with water, Father Li got up and called Li Zeyan.

Father Li: Zeyan, help me move something to the balcony.

Li Zeyan: Alright.

Li Zeyan responded and looked at me again. Before he could say anything, aunt took my hand.

Aunt: Go ahead, I will chat with her.

Aunt leaned over to see them walking away, and smiled.

Aunt: Let me take a closer look, I feel that the complexion is much better than last time, have you adjusted it yourself?

MC: Thank you auntie, It’s probably because I ate better recently.

Seeing aunt looking at me with some doubts, I smile embarrassedly.

MC: Li Zeyan cooking is delicious, I eat very well every time...

As soon as I finished speaking, aunt patted the back of my hand and laughed.

Aunt: Don't be polite with him, just let him do more if you like it!

Aunt: So it seems that Zeyan doesn't bully you anymore?

MC: Thanks to him, he used to bully me and now I am not afraid of anything.

Aunt: This child has been like that since he was a child, but if he gets used to it, he is quite cute.

MC: Well, although occasionally the tone is not very good, he never really disliked me.

MC: In fact, most of the time, he took the trouble to help me. The big things and small things in life, he always worry about me.

MC: I always feel at ease with him by my side.

The air was quiet for a few seconds. I subconsciously raised my head to look at aunt and found that she was looking at me with surprise.

I reacted with hindsight, and the temperature on my face immediately rose.

MC: Sorry auntie, did I talking to much?

She was about to say something when there were footsteps behind her. I looked back and met Li Zeyan's gaze.

Li Zeyan: It seems that I interrupted you.

Aunt: No, we're just talking.

Aunt: Brother, don't bothering Zeyan, and let them young people talk.

Aunt winked at me, got up and pushed Father Li away. Li Zeyan walks towards the kitchen naturally, and I stand up

Li Zeyan: Then I will go prepare dinner first.

MC: I'll help!

When we got to the kitchen, Li Zeyan handed me a vegetable.

Li Zeyan: Have a good chat with aunt just now?

MC: Well, I talked about some topics about you.

Li Zeyan: Someone is always flaring his teeth and claws, but now she is talking good things.

My hand washing vegetables shook, and I looked up at him with some guilty feeling.

MC: Did you hear it all?

Li Zeyan: Just a little.

MC: How does it feel to hear such sincere praise?

Li Zeyan: It is indeed an evaluation that only you can give.

Li Zeyan: But most of them are facts, not compliments.

I looked at the faint smile in his eyes, and curled his lips unconvinced.

MC: It seems that I have said too much good things, and you are used to it.

MC: Before, you would be surprised and ask me if I was sincere.

Li Zeyan: Someone’s thoughts are written on her face, of course I can tell.

He glanced at me pointedly, not to mention I know how hot my face is now. But Li Zeyan didn't seem to respond to my words, and he still looked calm.

Perhaps it is because he can always understand my thoughts, even if I occasionally prepare surprises, almost all of them are in his expectation.

Thinking about it this way, it seems that I haven't seen Li Zeyan who would be shy because of me for a long time.

I snorted and shook off the drops of water on the leaves.

Is too unfair if I am the only one who blushes because of him.

A new year and a new start, I must find a way to see the other side of Li Zeyan!

🍷 - At the Balcony before

Father Li: Just put it here.

Father Li: Thank you, Ze Yan.

Li Zeyan: It's okay, your knees aren't in a good condition for moving such a heavy thing.

Li Zeyan: Just call me from now on.

Father Li: This pendant on your key.... is very unique.

Li Zeyan: ....

Father Li: Is it from MC?

Li Zeyan: Yes.

Li Zeyan: She always likes these strange little things.

Father Li: Wouldn't it be nice for her to give you something she like?

Father Li: Actually, I'm calling you over is just to spend the time together.

Father Li: Just now I saw that she had carefully prepared so many souvenirs, must be hard.

Li Zeyan: Since aunt called, she has started choosing gifts, and she feels more caring than her work.

Father Li: Why, you're jealous?

Li Zeyan: Dad.

Father Li: Okay, I won't say anything.

Father Li: Anyway, you must know these things better than us.

Father Li: By the way, didn’t you say that there was a problem with the plumbing at the suburbs house? My contact has repaired it.

Father Li: The house has been vacant for a long time. I will have someone clean it up by the way. You can check it again when you go back.

Li Zeyan, Alright, would like to stay there for a few days?

Father Li: It's more convenient for me to stay here when I can't go away year after year.

Father Li: You take MC, there is good sunshine, quiet, and more comfortable than in the city.

Li Zeyan: Alright.

Father Li: Don't always talk about works.

Li Zeyan: .... I got it.

🍷

After a while, aunt walked in and put the wine and decanter on the bar.

Seeing Li Zeyan was busy cutting vegetables, I took the initiative to take the wine bottle and preparing it.

Aunt watched my movements and leaned into my ear and whispered.

Aunt: You little girl are very skilled!

MC: Learned from Li Zeyan.

Aunt: Do you like to drink?

I subconsciously looked back at Li Zeyan, he didn't seem to pay attention to our conversation.

MC: Actually my drinking capability is not very good. Aunt: It's okay. Let's drink later. Don't be too restrictive during the holidays. MC: But.... Aunt: Don't be afraid of him, this time aunt will covers you.

Aunt patted me, and quickly left the kitchen, leaving only the tiny grunt of soup bubbling in my ears.

I looked at Li Zeyan across the bar and deliberately brought up the topic just now.

MC: Aunt said that we can drink together today.

Li Zeyan: Okay.

MC: I promise to drink only a little bit, it will not be ashamed.

Li Zeyan: Didn't my aunt say to cover you? No need to report to me.

MC: ....

Nothing can escape his ears!

I secretly slandered, and I saw Li Zeyan picking up a few rock candy from a glass jar and adding it to the pot.

There were just a few wine glasses on hand, and I rolled my eyes, ready to try to take this opportunity to win a round.

I picked up a wine glass, poured out a little bit of wine in the decanter, and handed it to Li Zeyan.

MC: Would you like to taste it?

Li Zeyan: You only stay sober for less than five minutes.

MC: Is Mr. Li still can't stand sour alcohol?

Li Zeyan looked at my provocative expression, took the wine glass and shook it.

Li Zeyan: Why? are you afraid that you will be laughed at when you get drunk, and want to get me drunk first?

MC: It's just a little, you will not get drunk.

Li Zeyan looked at me for a while, and drank the wine in the glass.

Seeing him frowning slightly, I took one out of the rock candy can he had just opened, bit it between teeth, stepped on the foot, and put it to his lips.

Li Zeyan: !

Li Zeyan was stunned for a moment. I raised my hand and pushed away his hand holding the cup, and then moved closer to him.

The padded ankles began to sore, but the person in front did not bend over to cooperate with me.

I struggled to maintain the balance under my feet and winked at him threateningly.

Li Zeyan raised his eyebrows and finally bowed his head and approached me.

I raised my head to meet him, but accidentally hit the corner of his lips that wanted to bite the rock candy in desperation, but only a little sugar residue was left between the teeth.

The rock candy fell from among us and fell to the ground with a "pop".

MC: ....

Li Zeyan: .....

We looked at each other for a few seconds, I deliberately ignored the almost burning cheeks, and took a step back with pretending to be calm.

Picking up the rock candy on the ground and throwing it into the trash can, I turned back to the sink, turned my back to Li Zeyan, and ripped up the cabbage wholeheartedly.

Li Zeyan: MC.

Without waiting for Li Zeyan to say anything, I immediately raised my hand behind me to stop him.

MC: You let me calm down, I now-

Before I finished my words, my wrist was suddenly pulled, and a tremendous force pulled me back.

I opened my eyes wide and looked at his face so close to mine.

The warm lips contained my exclaim, and his breath instantly covered me.

My brain went blank, subconsciously trying to push him away

Li Zeyan held me tightly, with one hand behind my waist, making me unable to move for a while.

Li Zeyan: The wine is not good, the sugar is not eaten, you want to run like this?

MC: Wait, uncle and aunt are still in the living room!

Li Zeyan: I thought you remembered this when you bite that rock candy just now.

He almost said this sentence against my lower lip, and then the warmth continued to cover it.

The faint fragrance of the red wine entered my breath, and all the sound in my ears disappeared, leaving only the rumbling heartbeat.

The world seemed to no longer flow, as if no one would know what was happening in this quiet corner.

The little sweetness of rock candy left on the lips and on the tip of the tongue was repeatedly plundered, reminding me of the meaning of this sudden kiss.

His movements are slow and gentle, but I taste a hint of greed.

Until the tip of the tongue starts to tingle slightly, the cool air re-entered between us.

Li Zeyan rubbed my cheek with his palm and suddenly smiled slightly.

Li Zeyan: It seems that your drinking capacity is same as your IQ.

Li Zeyan: Why did you blush after a bite?

The sly tone in my ear made my sanity quickly returned, and I took a step back hastily.

MC: This is not the same thing at all!

MC: ...You, you are a foul!

Li Zeyan: The wicked complain first.

Li Zeyan: Not remember what you have done all of sudden?

MC: Iㅡ

Before I had time to speak out, the sound of my surroundings suddenly reappeared in my ears.

But Li Zeyan still held me in his spare time, waiting for me to finish speaking.

Faced with his visibly shifting gaze, I panted for a long time, and finally didn't say a word.

The awkward confrontation was broken by the sound of footsteps outside the door, and the aunt's voice rang.

Aunt: MC, come and rest for a while!

MC: O... Okay!

I was shocked, and immediately got out of Li Zeyan's arm.

Obviously it was a temporary intention, but I was the only one who was embarrassed, and he was still at ease.

I was a little upset in my heart and beat myself up again for this "overweight" behavior.

Feed rock candy, the plan failed.

🍷

When aunt Wang walked into the kitchen, Li Zeyan was seriously handling the shrimp thread.

Hearing the footsteps behind him, he looked back and said hello to Aunt Wang.

Aunt Wang: I heard MC is coming, so I came to help.

Li Zeyan: Thank you. For your hard work this year, and stay here to help during the New Year.

Aunt Wang: Why are you polite? Anyway, I am alone, and it's very lively to stay with your family.

Aunt Wang: And you're good at it, I just give a little help.

Li Zeyan: You flatter me.

Li Zeyan: What I prepare are the dishes that this family loves, and they liked it.

Li Zeyan: Besides, I don't have many chances to come back. I should cook a meal.

Aunt Wang motioned to him in the direction of the living room and whispered

Aunt Wang: I heard that you will come together this time. Your father and your aunt are happier than ever.

Aunt Wang: Your dad also bought a new pot of flowers and put them in the living room.

Li Zeyan: Maybe he wants to grow flowers.

Aunt Wang: But I heard people say that growing flowers at home is helpful for fondness.

Li Zeyan smiled and did not answer Aunt Wang's words.

Aunt Wang: You don't believe it? Look, isn't that good luck is coming?

Aunt Wang said with a smile and pointed at the corner of Li Zeyan's mouth.

Li Zeyan was stunned for a moment and wipe it with back of his hand, and a faint red trace was on the back of his hand.

ㅡIt's a lipstick that has not been wiped off.

Recalling what happened in the kitchen just now, Li Zeyan coughed slightly unnaturally.

Li Zeyan: Aunt Wang, don't tell my dad.

Aunt Wang: Oh it's normal for young people.

Aunt Wang smiled and suddenly lowered her voice.

Aunt Wang: By the way, Zeyan, have you ever cooked for little miss?

Li Zeyan: Have.

Li Zeyan: She is usually busy with work and her own cooking skills are not good, so she takes every chance to come to me.

Aunt Wang: She must like it very much, right?

Li Zeyan smiled lightly.

Li Zeyan: She is not picky eaters, she says everything is delicious.

Li Zeyan: When she's hungry, she may still complain about this and that, and forget everything when she's full.

Li Zeyan: It’s so easy to be satisfied...

The soup on the stove boiled, and the sound of bubbles bursting, interrupting Li Zeyan's unfinished words, and suddenly realizing something.

He turned his head subconsciously and saw Aunt Wang looking at him with a smile.

Li Zeyan: Aunt Wang, Iㅡ

Aunt Wang: It is fine, don't be embarrassed!

Aunt Wang: You are very attentive in everything you do, and she will definitely feel it. That's why you feel satisfied.

Aunt Wang: I don't understand any principle, but I think it is very happy to make food for the people that you care about.

Aunt Wang: If she happens to like to eat too, it is double happiness, dont you agree?

Li Zeyan retracted his gaze and nodded.

Li Zeyan: Well, you're right.

He didn't say anything, and took care of the last shrimp, and then suddenly smiled to himself.

He turned his head and looked in the direction of the living room. A ceramic flowerpot was placed facing the sun, and several small flowers bloomed on the tender green stems and leaves.

Many people hope that important things can have good thoughts. But he knew that even without this thought, he would hold her hand well.

Li Zeyan: Aunt Wang, what flower did my dad buy?

Aunt Wang: It's an orchid, what's wrong?

Li Zeyan: It's nothing.

Li Zeyan: He can keep it if he likes it.

🍷

After dinner, we played mahjong as usual.

After a few rounds, the elders seemed a little sleepy and got up, left the table one after another.

Before going upstairs, Father Li turned around and exhorted a few more words.

Father Li: MC, the guest room has been cleaned up. If you are sleepy, just go there.

MC: Yes, thank you uncle!

Worried about disturbing them, Li Zeyan and I go upstairs to rest as well.

When I came back from washing, I passed by Li Zeyan's room, and a faint light leaked from the open door. He seemed not to sleep yet.

I knocked on the door lightly, opened the door and took a look.

Li Zeyan was sitting on the sofa looking at the tablet computer. He seemed to be passing the time. When he saw me, he got up and put down the tablet.

Li Zeyan: Come in.

Li Zeyan: After drinking tonight, is there anything uncomfortable?

MC: No, today's wine is delicious. Sure enough, the sober time you suggest is the most appropriate.

I closed the door and looked back at his room curiously.

The rooms are neatly organized, but there doesn't seem to be much living traces.

On the desks and bookcases are placed many objects unique to the school days, and there is a skipping rope tied up on the storage box on the side.

All this seems inconsistent with Li Zeyan in front of me, but it makes people feel vaguely traceable.

MC: Li Zeyan, did you live here before?

Li Zeyan: I have always lived in Lianyu City.

Li Zeyan: After my dad moved here, he put my things when I was studying here.

MC: In other words, is this one of your "warehouses"?

Li Zeyan: More or less.

I walked to the desk, looked at the neatly arranged books, and carefully touched the decorations on the table.

MC: It turns out that Mr.Li lived a similar life to me when he was studying.

Li Zeyan: Isn't it obvious?

MC: It’s obvious that we all take the same class, how come we grow up so much difference in the future?

I looked up with a bit of resentment, and saw a few thick dictionaries on the upper shelf of the bookcase.

The red-covered dictionary of idioms was on the outermost side. Suddenly, I came to my spirits, cleared my throat pretentiously, and looked back at Li Zeyan.

MC: Li Zeyan, let me test you.

MC: What is the fourth idiom on page 16 of the idiom dictionary?

Li Zeyan: What are you saying?

MC: Because you love to use idioms when speaking, I once thought that you had memorized the dictionary for you.

Li Zeyan: ....

Li Zeyan's heavy sigh was heard. He did not respond to me, and took me to the sofa to sit down.

MC: What's wrong?

Li Zeyan: Sure enough, you're drunk.

MC: I'm not drunk!

Li Zeyan: All drunks say so.

I looked at him unconvinced.

MC: You drank a lot with uncle during dinner. Are you drunk?

Li Zeyan: No.

MC: All drunks say so.

I used his tone to return this sentence to him intact, and Li Zeyan took a silent glance away from me.

Li Zeyan: If I get drunk, who will take care of you?

MC: Could it be... you haven't slept because you're waiting for me?

Li Zeyan: Just realized?

Li Zeyan:I know you won't go back straight to your room, it is better to leave a door open.

There was a hint of warmth in my heart, I smiled and held Li Zeyan hand.

MC: Are you going to let me stay with you?

Li Zeyan: As long as you don't get drunk, it doesn't matter if you want to stay.

MC: I'm not drunk, how can I be drunk!

MC: And this room is full of your past, I really want to get to know it.

He stared at me, and finally squatted down in compromise, holding my hand back.

Li Zeyan: Come on, what else do you want to know?

I raised my head and looked around, and pointed to a medal standing on the desk.

MC: What is this, what award have you won?

Li Zeyan: Award of Model United Nations General Assembly.

MC: Amazing!

MC: I have heard of this kind of society, it is very difficult to join, even win the award.

Li Zeyan: Thinking about it now, they are all naive proposals, but they are a bit helpful for training thinking.

I curled my lips secretly when I spoke to this kind of academic bully, and pointed at another thing.

MC: What is that dark blue notebook?

Li Zeyan: From the school. It should be the work log of the Student Union.

MC: As expected of Mr. Li, I feel that you have been a leader since childhood.

My eyes continued to wander, and suddenly I saw an unexpected object in the corner. A certain memory in my mind was touched, and I opened my eyes in surprise.

I walked to the glove box in the corner, picked up a leaky football from the inside, and proudly held it in front of Li Zeyan

MC: It seems that you really like playing football, and you still keep it.

Li Zeyan: I just liked it when I was young.

MC: But thanks to this football, I can eat your pudding.

Li Zeyan: You just remember the pudding?

MC: Of course not, I still remember many details!

MC: For example, the look of the sand castle that you kicked, the weather that day, and the water cup under the tree in several colors...

I suddenly thought of something. I squeezed the football into Li Zeyan's hands and held his face in both hands.

MC: However, what I remember most clearly was you who were a little nervous and at a loss.

MC: At that time you were not such a serious Mr. Li.

MC: The height almost as tall as your chest now? Your hair seems to be a little curlier than it is now, and your face is a little fatter.

MC: It's the lovely brother Zeyan! (Zéyán gēgē!)

As I spoke, I made a circle on his face and laughed foolishly. Li Zeyan looked at me silently, without responding in a long time.

The temperature under my palm rose a little, and I approached him with some doubts and saw his pupils shrink for a moment.

MC: Li Zeyan, what's wrong with you?

Li Zeyan seemed to have finally reacted from his shock, took a step back hastily, and threw the football back into the glove box.

Li Zeyan: ... I'm fine.

Li Zeyan: It's late, you should go to bed, and we will be back to Lianyu tomorrow.

MC: Can I sleep on your sofa?

Li Zeyan: No, go back to the room to sleep.

MC: You just said that I can stay...

Li Zeyan: I changed my mind.

I watched him avoiding my gaze, and vaguely understood something, so I turned my back to him on purpose.

MC: You are shameless.

MC: Someone doesn’t often say, “If you want to persuade others, you have to give a reasonable reason.

Li Zeyan: ....

MC: But if you feel embarrassed, I can understand.

Li Zeyan: What am I embarrassed about?

Hearing his awkward tone, I secretly curled my mouth and turned to hold him.

MC: In that case, I will treat it as if you promised to accommodate me once.

I heard slightly heavy breathing, as if he was holding back something.

I turned my head and saw the complex and turbulent emotions in his eyes.

Just for a moment, his embrace entrapped this emotion and shackled me on the bed.

Li Zeyan: You want to stay.

MC: Iㅡ

Li Zeyan: You talk a lot today.

As if chattering to me was unbearable, he lowered his head and held my lips like punishment.

The teeth ran across the corners of my lips, I hummed in pain, Li Zeyan loosened me a little, and pointed his finger on my lips.

Li Zeyan: Shh-

Li Zeyan: My dad sleeps lightly, don't wake him up.

I was stunned for a moment, and then realized that a bedroom was not far away, and my face flushed instantly, covering my mouth and complaining softly.

MC: You, why didn't you say it earlier!

Li Zeyan: Now you know.

I stared at Li Zeyan angrily, but this did not sway what he wanted to do.

He broke off my tense hands, put one hand under the back of my neck, raised my head slightly and then pressed it down again.

This time his movements were lightened a bit, and the tip of his tongue brushed my lips, igniting an uncontrollable swipe and then following his deep into more corners.

Lips were sore and numb, the warm mouth was wet with breathing, and the oxygen seemed to become thin.

The slight dizziness made me subconsciously want to seek support and grabbed his shirt indiscriminately with both hands.

The body was shackled, I passively followed him, and gradually fell into it.

The sound of the clock is still heard. He didn't pause time as calmly as during the day, and at this moment, I didn't care about the world around me.

The menacing lingering crumpled each other's clothes, the pendant between my neck also slid to one side onto the bed, making an undetectable muffled noise.

As a reminder, he finally slowly ended this silent but intense kiss, with his bridge nose pressed lightly on my cheek.

Except for the unresolved breathing, there was no sound in the silent night. We looked at each other in silence for a while, and Li Zeyan suddenly looked away and got up.

Seeing that I was still holding his shirt, he paused, took my hand and gently pulled it off the shirt.

MC: Li Zeyan...

Li Zeyan: Go to sleep now.

MC: ..... What?

Li Zeyan: You sleep here, I'll go to the guest room.

Li Zeyan didn't give me time to react. After speaking, he hurriedly left the room without looking back.

I froze for a while, slowly got up from the bed, and looked at the door in a daze.

I opened my palm and recalled the heat when my palm touched his cheek.

Was he.... shy just now?

Was it because of this kiss? But during the day, he was still quite comfortable in the kitchen.

Although I haven't figured out the reason for the time being, I am still secretly proud.

MC: It turns out that you are still shy.

🍷

The morning sun fell on my face through the car window, and I subconsciously raised my arm.

Last night I couldn't sleep but recall the shy Li Zeyan. The more I think about it, the less sleepy I feel. The sleepiness has accumulated to this day, and I have to sleep on the way back.

Is rare seeing Li Zeyan didn't despise me, and just playing soothing music all the way.

I don't know how long it was driving, the car finally stopped. The warm light on the eyelids disappeared for a moment, and the familiar breath approached me.

Li Zeyan: MC, wake up. We're here.

I lifted my heavy eyelids and looked out the window, only to find that the surrounding scenery was not familiar to me.

A small single-family building is located on a quiet roadside, and a fence at the door encloses a small garden with greenery.

If you look closely, there are almost no leaves and weeds in the garden. It seems that it has just been trimmed.

MC: Where is this? Aren't we going home?

Li Zeyan: I live in my house on the outskirts of the city, and my family will live here when they come to Lianyu City occasionally.

Li Zeyan: My dad asked someone to repair the pipeline a year ago, and by the way, he cleaned it and asked me to take you over to rest for a few days.

Li Zeyan opened the door, and I looked at the room in front of me with some surprise.

The decoration is still simple, but the colors are softer than Li Zeyan's home, and there is a sense of warmth everywhere.

The sunlight poured in through the floor-to-ceiling windows almost without obstruction, warmly wrapping every corner.

Looking out from the window, the greenery covers the field of vision, and a few undefeated roses dotted it, giving me the illusion of being on vacation.

MC: It's so beautiful. Thank you Uncle and Mr. Li for your hard work.

After I finished speaking, I couldn't help but yawn. Li Zeyan pulled my suitcase and took me to the bedroom.

Li Zeyan: You can wait until your eyelids stop fighting.

Li Zeyan: Go to bed first, call me if something happens.

MC: Alright.

I simply packed up and opened the suitcase, but did not find my pajamas.

I thought back to the situation when I packed my luggage in the morning, but at that time, I hardly had any impression.

MC: I slept in Li Zeyan's room last night...Did he accidentally put the wrong luggage?

Thinking about this, I decided to ask him directly.

MC: Li Zeyan, where are you?

Li Zeyan: Here.

His voice came from behind a door not far away. I stepped forward and pushed open the door in front of me. After seeing the scene inside, I was completely stunned.

In front of me is a walk-in cloakroom that is almost only seen in movies. The clothes are neatly stored in a cabinet surrounded on three sides.

Li Zeyan was standing in front of one of the closets, and his profile was illuminated by the light from the spotlight.

He changed into a loose dressing gown, and his belt was casually tied around his waist.

The soft cloth was attached to him, clearly delineating strong lines.

Before he had time to arrange his collar, the collar was wide open, revealing his large tight muscles, which formed a sharp contrast with the dark morning gown.

The heartbeat speeded up uncontrollably, I stopped where I was a little bewildered, but my eyes were surely stuck to him.

Li Zeyan: What's wrong?

Hearing his voice, I regained my senses a bit, swallowed my saliva and then spoke.

MC: Um. I didn't find my pajamas. Maybe I put it in the wrong suitcase.

Li Zeyan: Let me check my suitcase.

Li Zeyan turned and walked out, and I caught a glimpse of a stack of shirts neatly stacked in the closet.

A thought suddenly came to my mind, I subconsciously stopped Li Zeyan.

MC: Wait!

MC: I, I suddenly remembered that I accidentally soiled my pajamas, can I borrow one from President Li?

Li Zeyan: You won’t sleep well wearing them.

Even though he said that, he rummaged in the closet, picked out a white shirt and handed it to me.

Li Zeyan: This one is a little softer, try if it's comfortable enough.

I took the shirt and compared it quietly to myself. I just placed it on my thigh. The light fabric was slightly transparent.

MC: .... Is it a bit too short?

A touch of heat climbed to the tip of my ears, and I looked at the mirror with some hesitation in my heart.

But when I thought about Li Zeyan's shy look last night, I built my courage and planned to try again.

I hugged the shirt in my hand, turned back and walked out, thanking him.

MC: Then I'll try it. Thanks Mr. Li!

Li Zeyan pulled out a pair of summer shorts from the bottom of the closet, and was about to pass it to the girl behind him, only to find that she had hurried away.

He looked at the direction the girl was leaving, and sighed softly.

Li Zeyan: Not even let people to finish talking.

He simply cleaned up the messy clothes, remembering that the girl hadn't eaten breakfast, and then went back to the bedroom door and knocked gently, plan to ask her if she is hungry.

There was no response from the room, and he opened the door somewhat suspicious.

Li Zeyan: MC.

Li Zeyan: ....!

Although a short time has passed, the girl has fallen asleep holding her pillow, and the shirt she borrowed from him just now is loosely wrapped around her.

She did not cover the quilt and forgot to close the curtains. The sunlight spread across her back, faintly reflecting the lines hidden under the shirt.

He stood on the spot awkwardly, holding the doorknob in a dilemma.

She seemed to be not sleeping well, spit out a few small babbles, and buried her face in the pillow again.

Li Zeyan sighed, walked over lightly, closed the curtains, and covered her with the quilt.

Then he reached out and gently pushed her forehead, lowering his voice to remind her.

Li Zeyan: Don't bury your face in the pillow.

MC: Hmm.. Li Zeyan.

Li Zeyan: Yes?

MC: ...lovely...

Li Zeyan: ....

He looked at her smirk in her sleep, the same expression she had when she said the name last night.

Unspeakable emotions came to his mind again, he immediately got up and left the bedroom, leaned against the wall and took a deep breath.

Li Zeyan: Dummy.

When I opened my eyes again, the sky was already dark.

I looked at the tightly covered quilt and rubbed my head with some annoyance.

I wanted to change into a shirt and wait for him, but the bed in the bedroom was so comfortable that I fell asleep after lying down for a while.

I sat up and looked up at the long sleeves.

Probably because of his breath enveloping me, I can sleep so peacefully.

Although a little unwilling, I understand that this is how Li Zeyan expresses his feelings.

MC: Li Zeyan, you are a fool.

I couldn't help but murmured, but my heart was warm

Fragile noises came from the kitchen downstairs. I felt my flat stomach, changed my clothes and ran downstairs.

Li Zeyan turned his head when he heard the sound, still with a familiar expression on his face.

Li Zeyan: Finally woke up, I thought you were going to sleep till tomorrow

MC: How could I miss the dinner you cooked?

MC: But speaking of this, I also want to thank Mr. Li for helping me cover the quilt.

Li Zeyan: You're welcome, I just don't want to turn the vacation into taking care a fool who caught a cold.

I curled my lips secretly, but I got close to him and looked at the food in the pot curiously.

Seeing me poking my head aside, Li Zeyan stuffed the spoon into my hand.

Li Zeyan: Come and help if you want to eat early.

The warm yellow light illuminates this corner, Li Zeyan and I are standing side by side beside the flow desk.

Although the pajama plan has also failed, I am still very satisfied to have a vacation where I can see Li Zeyan as soon as I open my eyes.

I temporarily leave those careful thoughts behind and earnestly enjoy the peaceful time with him.

🍷

After dinner together, I began to wander around the house curiously.

Perhaps it is because in the suburbs, the night is extremely quiet, and there is no large light source when looking out from the window.

I was about to go back to find Li Zeyan, when I heard a "pop" in my ear, and the light in front of me went out for an instant.

MC: What happened?

Li Zeyan: MC!

Li Zeyan's voice sounded not far away, and a beam of silver light quickly lit up in the darkness.

Li Zeyan: Stand still, I'm here.

MC: Alright.

I watched the beam approach, stretched out my hand forward, and was quickly held by the warm palm.

Li Zeyan: It must be a power failure. The line has just been repaired and may be a bit unstable.

MC: Fortunately, we came together, otherwise we would be a little scared in such a big house alone.

Li Zeyan: What's so scary?

MC: Because it's so quiet here, it's dark at night

MC: And most of the plots in the movie that went into the room at midnight to commit crimes started from a sudden power failure.

I just wanted to make a joke, but after I finished speaking, I felt a little nervous and subconsciously hugged Li Zeyan's arm.

MC: Well, we should close the doors and windows, right?

Li Zeyan: I checked it while you were asleep.

Li Zeyan: Someone slept recklessly from day to night, but now she thinks of it and worry.

Thinking back to the shameful experience of falling asleep in bed, I smiled embarrassedly.

MC: I was so sleepy at the time... but Mr.Li is so attentive!

Li Zeyan: Enough with your random thoughts, let's go. Let's take a look for the switch.

I followed Li Zeyan to the gate. He used a flashlight to illuminate the switch on the wall, and the master switch pointed to "OFF".

He closed the switch lightly, and the lights in the room turned on again, and I squinted uncomfortably.

Li Zeyan: Alright, don't be afraid now.

MC: Okay.

Li Zeyan: I will check the electrical appliances again.

MC: Okay.

Li Zeyan: How long do you want to hold like this?

I was stunned for a moment, only to realize that I was still holding his arm.

Li Zeyan looked at me with some amusement. I tried to ignore the heat on my face and hugged him tighter.

MC: That's my intention, I want to go with you.

Li Zeyan: Why, stick to others without drinking today?

MC: It has nothing to do with drinking!

MC: Just in case the power goes off again, I can also help you with the flashlight.

I just made up excuses, Li Zeyan glanced at me, but put the flashlight in my hand.

Li Zeyan: This excuse is stupid, try another one next time.

MC: But you still accepted it.

Li Zeyan: I'm afraid that certain someone wouldn't sleep in the middle of the night and think about it.

MC: This is not something I can control.

MC: But if you are by my side, I have no time to think about other things.

Li Zeyan's movements seemed to pause for a moment. I didn't look up at him, but heard a deep smile came from him.

Li Zeyan: This excuse is good, I accept it.

The overlapping arms made the two of us close together, and the familiar temperature seemed to iron out all the anxiety in my heart.

Being able to stick to him with this confidence is a rare privilege.

When there are only two of us, let me use the privilege a few more times.

🍷

After yesterday's restorative sleep, I finally regained my energy this morning, and Li Zeyan's door was still closed when I got up.

It's rare that I got up earlier than him. I sneaked into the kitchen and pulled out some simple ingredients from the refrigerator to make breakfast, intending to surprise him.

As soon as I put the sandwiches on the table, I saw Li Zeyan buttoning his shirt while walking towards me.

MC: Li Zeyan, Good Morning!

He seemed stunned when he saw me and nodded slightly

Li Zeyan: Morning.

MC: Thank you, Mr. Li, for taking care of me yesterday. I will take care of today breakfast.

MC: You sit and wait for a while, it will be done soon.

I eagerly pulled the chair away, but Li Zeyan didn't sit down, just leaned against the table and watched me busy.

I made up the ice coffee, walked back to the table, and handed one of them to Li Zeyan.

This is the recipe I just learned a few days ago. Let's start with new flavors in the new year!

Li Zeyan looked at me, then glanced at the messy table, and sighed helplessly.

Li Zeyan: It seems you are very familiar no matter where you are...

MC: Hehe, because this is your home. Besides, I am very interested in the places related to you.

MC: The day before yesterday, I met my friend, Xiao Li. Maybe I can meet a different person today.

Xiao Li means Little Li, I'll just use Xiao Li since it sounds cute LOL

Li Zeyan: Then you may be disappointed.

Li Zeyan: I haven't come to this house much, and there is nothing to be curious about.

MC: Then... let's create more memories here!

MC: But in this case...

MC: Whether it is Xiao Li, Mr. Li or ordinary citizen Li Zeyan, can I have them all?

Li Zeyan was silent for a while and walked to me.

Li Zeyan: Don't you want them all? It seems you miss one. Right?

MC: Huh?

I was stunned for a moment. I didn't expect him to be more serious and had to think about his other identities seriously.

MC: Also.... Chef Li?

Li Zeyan: Wrong.

MC: Teacher Li?

Li Zeyan: Wrong

MC: .....It can't be Yan Yan, right?

I spoke carefully, and as expected, I received a merciless glance from Li Zeyan.

He leaned over and stopped me at the table. His narrow eyes looking me tightly.

Li Zeyan: Are you really stupid or pretending to be stupid, you mentioned it the day before yesterday, and you forgot it today?

I blinked and recalled the conversation from that day over and over again.

In addition to visiting his old things in his student days, there seems to be some important details that I have overlooked...

I looked at the face right in front of me, and there was a vaguely blushing face in my mind that night, holding the football I gave him in my hand.

It seemed that a corner of my heart was suddenly lit, and I suddenly realized what he was referring to.

Seems to know the answer, my heartbeat started to speed up somehow. But instead of answering directly, I suddenly wanted to tease him first.

MC: I was drunk that night.

Li Zeyan: Who said she wasn't drunk that night?

MC: Don't all drunks say that?

Li Zeyan: .....

Li Zeyan exhaled slowly, pinching my waist with one hand along his side.

Li Zeyan: Well, since someone chooses to forget, then I will help you remember.

The next second I suddenly felt like my feet were vacant and I was hugged by Li Zeyan.

Before I could react, the slippers slipped off the back of my feetㅡ

He hugged me to the dining table behind me. My skin suddenly touched the marble countertop. I couldn't help but exclaim in a low voice.

MC: So cold!

I subconsciously curled up to avoid the cold table, Li Zeyan took my ankle and pulled forward.

I almost plunged into his arms and hurriedly stepped on his legs with my feet to control the balance.

I held the glass in my hand, and was about to check whether his clothes were soiled, when a shadow suddenly covered me

Li Zeyan leaned close to me, blocking the sunlight from the skylight behind him.

Li Zeyan: I remember someone said the other day, drinking just a little alcohol will never be ashamed?

MC: I really didn’t drink a lot! It’s just my energy is a bit extra.

Li Zeyan: Well, it seems that I still remember this words.

As if giving a reward, he sent a soft kiss on my forehead.

Li Zeyan: Because the energy is a little bit extra, instead of going to bed, you ran to my room.

MC: I just want to see if you sleep or not.

Li Zeyan: By the way, you also saw all the corners of the room. The beautiful day is to know my past.

I smirked and hid back, Li Zeyan reached out and held my waist.

Li Zeyan: Don't remember this?

MC: I do! You have a lot of books, won a lot of awards, and keep a diary of your work.

Li Zeyan: Anything else?

MC: And also...

I deliberately looked around and my eyes slipped from his face to other places.

Li Zeyan made a move at the back of my waist, and I straightened up immediately and ran into his dissatisfied gaze.

Li Zeyan: Answer the questions.

MC: I, I can't remember!

Li Zeyan: Really? I can give you a hint.

Seeing Li Zeyan get closer and closer, the glass in my hand slipped, and I hurriedly raised my other hand against his chest.

MC: Wait a minute, the coffeeㅡ

Li Zeyan: Then don't move.

He put his arm around my hand holding the glass, I can neither put down the glass nor avoid him.

I raised my head in surprise, and my cheek immediately touched a warm breath.

Li Zeyan: There is a football in the corner of the room.

Li Zeyan: You seem to be particularly interested in it.

The soft lips rubbed the skin of my cheek, and I took a quick breath.

MC: Football? Isn't that what you liked to play when you were young?

Li Zeyan: Hm.

Li Zeyan: The football broke a fool's sand castle, and she cried her nose for a long time.

Li Zeyan: She couldn't coax it well, but when she's mentioned about food, she left the sand castle behind.

Li Zeyan: But it is excusable, because the dummy was only five years old at that time.

He didn't seem to want to say any more, he just looked at me quietly, and his fingers stroked the back of my hand unconsciously.

I don’t know if it’s because my side is wrapped in sunlight, or because I realize I’ve stepped into his trap

I actually feel that every skin that hasn't been touched by him is oozing thin sweat and evaporated into my brain.

I thought I caught a handle that would make him shy, but now I also put myself in it

I deliberately dragged the name that I didn’t want to say, I’m really embarrassed to say it at the moment.

I squeezed his shirt tightly, bite the bullet, and stretched it.

MC: .... and then?

Li Zeyan raised his eyebrows, but was not annoyed, else he took advantage from it and moved the ambiguous kiss to my lips.

Thick eyelashes fell on my cheeks, and all the details about that night burst in my mind in an instant.

Li Zeyan: Then, this is what happened next.

The sun set a bright outline around his body, but fell into the shadow of his forehead, rolling the familiar desires of his eyes.

He held my hand and pulled me towards him, my body shook, and I had to clamp his waist with my knees.

Li Zeyan: Need more hints?

Without waiting for my response, Li Zeyan once again rubbed my lips unhurriedly.

I made a vague protest. He raised his eyelids and glanced at me, but did not stop.

How does this make people answer!

I became angry and raised my head and took a bite to his lower lip. Li Zeyan finally stopped, with a slight smile in his eyes.

Li Zeyan: Learn to bite?

MC: you did this on purpose!

Li Zeyan: You know the answer is still hidden, didn't you also do it on purpose?

Li Zeyan: The best way to deal with an idiot is to give a tooth for a tooth.

MC: ....Li Zeyan, you bad at it!

Li Zeyan smiled lightly, and didn't seem to mind my completely unreasonable accusations.

I looked at his calm look and sighed in frustration.

MC: ... After all this, can't you just be shy?

Li Zeyan: Who do you think I am doing this for?

I was stunned for a moment and saw that he narrowed his smile and looked at me earnestly.

Li Zeyan: I said how you always do strange things these days.

Li Zeyan: Deliberately deceive others to drink, not pretending to be drunk, and have to wear other people's clothes.

Li Zeyan: What's plan do you have?

My brain was in a mess, and I simply said what I was thinking.

MC: Because you are always calm, I also want to try if I can make you shy once.

MC: Although I may often do stupid things, I don't want to be treated as a child by you.

MC: After all, I’m not that five-year-old idiot anymore. I want to see you blushing and thumping heart for me.

I took a look at Li Zeyan, then buried my head on his shoulder a little embarrassedly, and mumbled.

MC: And, you don’t know how cute you are when you are shy.

MC: No one else has seen it, only I will see that side of you.

Li Zeyan was silent for a moment, he sighed slightly.

Li Zeyan: Have you seen who would invest five hundred million for a child?

MC: ....

Li Zeyan: From the first time I saw you, I have never treated you as a child.

Li Zeyan: Calling you a dummy is also because the childish things you do are indeed not suitable for your age.

I lowered my head and hummed slightly.

This person really does not let go of any opportunity to complain about me...

Li Zeyan: Also, the same goes for you.

MC: Huh?

Li Zeyan: You are cute when you do these silly things.

Li Zeyan: However, you don't need to do these as well.

I was stunned to feel the temperature coming from my cheek, but the sound of my heartbeat clearly betrayed my surprise.

I couldn't help but raised the corners of my mouth and straightened up to say something.

MC: Li Zeyanㅡ

Li Zeyan: Wrong answer.

The person in front of me frowned slightly, and I swallowed my saliva carefully. It turned out that this matter hasn't passed yet...

MC: Have you called it so many times when you were a kid?

Li Zeyan: it's different.

Li Zeyan: I want you to answer now.

Li Zeyan: Finally, I give you a chance.

I took a deep breath and was about to speak when I suddenly felt cold in my thighs.

The iced coffee in my hand made the glass frost, and cold water drops on my lap.

I subconsciously wanted to lower my head and wipe, Li Zeyan quickly pinched my chin.

Li Zeyan: Don't be distracted.

MC: I just....

Li Zeyan: Answer me, which Li Zeyan did you miss just now?

Drops of water slip off the skin, leaving a slight itching along the way.

The voice of the person in front of him was low, with a hint of coaxing, like a light rain gradually dripping underneath his heart, and every drop of rain was tickling.

I opened my mouth, my trembling throat almost couldn't control my voice.

MC: Brother Zeyan... (Zéyán gēgē…)

The air seemed to be quiet for a second, then the coffee in my hand was quickly evacuated, colliding with the cup and plate behinds, and Li Zeyan pushed it away.

I almost stared at the person in front of me, but he suddenly avoided my gaze and spoke in a low voice.

Li Zeyan: Close your eyes.

MC: Why?

Li Zeyan: No reason.

He leaned over and kissed my eyes lightly, which forced me to close my eyes obediently.

A generous palm supported the back of my head, and then a very nostalgic kiss dispelled all my doubts.

Even if I can't see his expression at this moment, I can clearly feel his unspoken mood.

That piece of debris that had floated many years ago was finally firmly embedded in the last vacancy, full of joy called "consummation".

I tentatively reached out my hand to find his shoulder and caught his neck.

The overlapping arms are like a lead, burning the entanglement between the lips and teeth to more corners. The scorching breath keeps falling, scorching the warm and cool skin.

The warm palm steadily supported my body, and aroused an unbearable tremor at the touch.

I tried to hold back the warmth that I wanted to overflow between my teeth, and secretly opened my eyes to look at him.

The sun honestly illuminates his reddish face, and a pair of eyes that are always unpredictable are also shining with some simple satisfaction.

I couldn't help but stretched out my hand to stroke his cheek, his eyes met my gaze, unexpectedly showing a trace of helplessness.

Probably didn't expect that I would take the opportunity to take a peek, and Li Zeyan's ears became red.

MC: Haha.

Li Zeyan: What are you laughing at?

MC: It's nothing, I just think your shy look is really cute.

Li Zeyan: ...

Li Zeyan: Your wish came true, happy?

MC: Happy!

Deliberately ignoring Li Zeyan's slightly dissatisfied gaze, I squeezed his cheek lightly, and then actively pressed down the back of his head and pecked at his lips.

This person who has always loved a poker face from childhood is have a warm and soft touch.

My heart was filled with unspeakable tenderness, and I couldn't help but kiss him again.

The voice falling in the ear hides an unexpected tremor, I smiled and let go of him.

MC: Thank you for letting me know you more.

MC: Sure enough, no matter which side of Li Zeyan it is, you’re still my favorite.

Li Zeyan looked at me for a while, then suddenly smiled.

Li Zeyan: Are you telling the truth?

MC: You can tell it all.

Li Zeyan: Indeed.

Li Zeyan: Then let me listen to this truth.

The sun shining from the skylight hung his shadow on me, and slowly overlapped with my shadow in the afterglow.

His fingertips, his palm rubbed against my hot heart, as if he was trying to vain all my thoughts.

Time is stretched infinitely in the lingering breath

And what melted in time was his long and stitched response.

🍷 🍷 🍷 END 🍷 🍷 🍷

I’m sorry if there’s some mistranslation. Kindly tell me if you found some :) thank you for read it~ ^^

Notes from me:

No plan for translating other dates after this

 ─=≡Σ((( つ＞＜)つ

[governmentintelligence]

Hypothermia (happy birthday winter!!!!)

A/N: happy birthday @winterpower98!!!!! i made you angst :)

i saw all your notes from white tang au and honestly??? fucking love the vibes. i didn't do much with the Plot but i hope you still enjoy it :>

WARNINGS: hypothermia, it is cold, derealization/dissociation, choking, threatened murder/suicide, implied murder, implied blood, no happy ending

Words: 4041

enjoy!! <3

There were a lot of downsides to possession, but the one that Tang had expected the least was the cold.

That might also not be a fair description of the problem. He hadn’t expected to be possessed. No one ever expects to get possessed. Given the concept, though, he had some preconceived ideas of what possession would entail. A lot of them were more hands-on, like the visceral dissonance from physical form that came with watching his body move of its own accord. That was something he imagined when he thought of being possessed.

It was still striking, but it was something he’d expected, at least.

He hadn’t expected how numb he’d feel. How little and how insignificant it would feel to be sequestered away into his own head.

He hadn’t thought that she would invade his mind in the same way, echoing his own voice back at him. She perfectly mimicked his voice, his tones, his speaking cadence, such that even he couldn’t tell her apart on most days.

They would drudge up to the mirror in the morning, and Tang would stare into his ice blue eyes and have to convince himself that they weren’t always that color. Most days, he imagined himself staring at a stranger. Some days, he wouldn’t even be able to focus on his reflection. Those were the days he felt the most cold.

Mild Hypothermia Symptoms include shivering, increased heart rate, and mental confusion. Patient may seem dazed and unsure of themselves.

The Lady Bone Demon had been masquerading as a young girl, trying to find books at the library. In retrospect, it may have been on the nose for her to have been looking for a book on Dyatlov Pass. It was almost like a double emphasis on the ice theming, to be looking for another incident of people succumbing to the cold. Maybe even foreshadowing. Tang’s always been fond of stories.

The library was sprawling large. Tang had offered to help her find it. The library is quiet most days, so it wasn’t like he was busy.

He stopped by the shelves and, when he turned to direct her to the proper book, was struck by a gust of wind. It burned his throat like smoke, yet settled in his chest cold as ice, freezing from the inside out. The girl had just stood there, smiling coyly, knowingly.

Tang wasn’t sure what happened specifically after that, even if it had happened at all, because his memory picked back up with him walking to the help desk.

From there, it was a little spotty. He’d gone to sit at the help desk and found himself sitting down at his usual counter spotat Pigsy’s Noodles. Pigsy was sharp, much sharper than people give him credit for. Nothing could ever sneak past his snout, not MK’s poor sleep schedule and not Tang’s distant stare.

He could remember Pigsy asking if he was okay. Tang wasn’t very sure what he replied with, but he did remember that Pigsy’s banter was much softer afterward. He likely just thought Tang was tired. It was rare that he’d be this tired after work, maybe it was worrying. He didn’t know.

He couldn’t think, his head was so, so cold.

He’d wanted to bring it up, after the first day or two or three. He couldn’t keep track. Tang had definitely tried to tell Pigsy, though, at some point. Only to hear a voice in his head, and be unable to open his lips. His throat had tightened, too, like something was choking him. The ice burned.

Don’t speak, it told him. She, she told him.

That’s absurd, he’d thought back. He speaks a lot, thank you very much, and no two-bit voice in his head was going to tell him otherwise.

And yet, it did. He could just barely open his mouth, but no sound, no air, escaped.

Slowly, he’d just slurped more noodles, watching Pigsy’s back as he cooked. After a moment, once the thought to tell Pigsy had passed, so did his throat’s constriction. Tang was too dazed to try it again.

In hindsight, he should have. If only he’d kept pushing more, fought more, then maybe he would have gotten Pigsy’s attention before it was too late.

He’d been sleeping on the couch for the past few days, another idea that had settled in his head and he was too tired to fight against. His brain felt sluggish, as if trying to move through a storm, trudging ever forward against a wind that threatened to topple him. There was something warm wrapped around his back, glowing gold just out of the corner of his eye when he wasn’t paying attention, though Tang wasn’t sure what that was. He didn’t know enough about this soul magic to be able to identify it. Where would he have learned?

MK would probably know what was going on. He tried to tell MK, too, tried to signal that something was happening. He couldn’t remember if this was before or after he’d tried to tell Pigsy, but the same thing had happened. Tang’s throat had closed up and he’d been directed to eat once again. He had no choice other than to oblige.

His body wasn’t connected to him. It belonged to that voice he’d heard whisper to him. It was the young girl’s voice, at the library, but come now. Tang knew she wasn’t a random person. Perhaps she’d looked for him.

Perhaps she knew MK and was using Tang. It was morbid, but he would make a pretty good meat shield.

The first time that thought crossed his mind, he’d heard her laugh, a soft chuckle that was all too foreboding, and he’d known exactly what her plan was. It was before the cold set in fully, before his hands numbed beyond his recognition. He still had some control. But it was all too weak. His hands shook, so he hid them in his own sleeves, holding each other for warmth and because doing anything else would get her to hold him down.

Over time, it did feel more physical. He couldn’t move his body, not when he wanted to move it, but he could feel things being done to him. Felt Pigsy pat his back sympathetically when he’d explained that he was coming down with a cold, didn’t want to get him sick, too, so he’d sleep on the sofa.

She never introduced herself, not truly, but after long enough, Tang recognized her from legend. If it fed her ego, she didn’t acknowledge. But it was good to know who he was imprisoned by.

He felt phantom feelings, if that was even a possible thing. In his mind’s eye, when he wasn’t focused, he could see white shackles on his wrists. A glowing blue crack over his chest. But as soon as Tang tried to focus on what he was seeing, it would disappear.

Moderate Hypothermia Shivering will cease, though it will be replaced with increased mental confusion, slurred speech, and loss of fine motor skills. Confusion will include amnesia and slowed thought process.

“Hey,” Pigsy’s voice rattles him, gruff and angrier than he’d ever heard.

Tang feels his head lift. Now that he wasn’t actively fighting back at all times, he’d been allowed to feel his body’s movements. It was like the cold had solidified. Attempting to move his limps was impossible, but he could see his own body move, see his hand reach up to hold the underside of his own chin in a casual manner.

It was tiring. He wanted to doze off, but everyone knows sleeping in a snow storm spells death.

“Hey yourself,” he can hear himself speak, too, which was something he’d found he couldn’t do anymore.

“Who are you.”

The sentence hits Tang rough, the venom in Pigsy’s voice dripping, covered in anger, maybe even hurt. It was enough of a rattle to catch his attention, give him something to focus on.

Fiery anger. He cups the warmth and tries to focus.

His face shifts, eyebrow quirking up in an unimpressed, surprised look that he wasn’t making himself. He knew he couldn’t, this wasn’t his body anymore. Tang was just trapped, watching someone else, this demon, Lady Bone Demon, lift his limbs and walk him around.

It made him feel hopeful, almost grateful, that Pigsy had recognized the difference. A twinge of cold struck him over the reminder that he was a week late, maybe even longer, but, still, he was so thankful that someone noticed. And it warmed his heart ever so slightly to think that it was Pigsy who did.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Tang’s voice says.

“You know damn well,” Pigsy growls back, and it was foolish of him to doubt Pigsy, to worry that he wouldn’t be able to help, to worry that it would be too late. “What’d you do to Tang and who the fuck are you.”

His head tilts again. “Well, aren’t you sharper than you used to be.”

Used to be? Tang doesn’t understand what the Lady Bone Demon is saying, but he knows it rattles Pigsy, because his eyes widen. His arms, which had been crossed at the confrontation, slowly lower. He’s scared.

Why would Pigsy be scared? Does he know this demon? How would he? Tang is confused by this reaction, watching with mounting anxiety. If his heart could race, he knew it would be racing right now.

Pigsy could get help from MK, and if he couldn’t help, then MK could get the Monkey King. There were multiple avenues to get help here.

“What’s wrong, Bajie. You look like you’ve seen a ghost,” are the words that Tang hears himself say, and they surprise him most of all.

Tang recognized Lady Bone Demon, after some time. He’d known what she was, where her origins lay in the stories he’d been told, thrived in, repeated himself. He wasn’t ignorant of her. So he knew this was quite the situation. He didn’t know exactly what she was doing with him but, given her antagonistic relationship to the Monkey King, Tang could make some assumptions. Probably some way to watch MK. Maybe watch the Monkey King himself.

Never in his fucking life did he expect Pigsy to get called Bajie.

As in, Zhu Bajie? Pigsy was that Bajie? There was surely no way.

Until Pigsy flinched, answered to a name that Tang only knew from legends. Snapped back at her in acknowledgement of the name.

What the fuck do you mean he was in a complicated relationship with Zhu Bajie.

She laughs, with his mouth, his voice, and Tang doesn’t know if she’s laughing at him or at the panic in Pigsy’s (Bajie? That’s fucking Bajie?) face. How convoluted.

Tang is kept warm with the tangled threads of confusion over these new revelations, which is probably to her benefit. She continues to use his mouth to talk to Pigsy, Bajie, apparently, and he turns inward. A slight cloak of warmth keeps his consciousness guarded, and at least his troubled confusion was something he could think about, rather than the gnawing cold.

How had he never noticed? It made more sense that Pigsy wouldn’t tell, he probably had things to preserve and to hide, if it were true. But how had something that large just….slipped past him? He should have noticed. He’d studied the journey’s legends front and back, hell, he’d recited so many of the stories to MK from pure memory. And yet he’d spent the past few years sharing a bed with one of the heroes from his stories.

That was something that Tang could focus on, at least. He wasn’t very interesting to the demon wearing his body, and thus she didn’t humor him with her attention. It turned out to be something almost in his favor, given how his mind had been completely detached from his body, watching and listening and feeling things but never being able to act upon them. Better than to have her focus, lest she turn his anger onto him.

It was nice to have something to think about that wasn’t the revulsion of watching himself as if in a dream, unable to do anything himself. In his mind’s eye, he had no limbs, nothing to move, nothing to do. He did his best to be unassuming to her.

At least thinking back on every interaction he’d ever had with Pigsy was giving his brain something to focus on. Maybe too much.

Remembering and living in memory gave him a good distraction from seeing how she was using his body to treat Pigsy, too. Whenever he was cognizant of it, Tang would notice what he was saying, the sharpness of her words. She’d purred, once, that the human body could only go so long without eating, and in that moment he’d felt the visceral hunger of his body.

He’d forgotten how long he’d been kept out, and he didn’t know how long it had been since he’d eaten. Had water. Even slept. He, in his mind, was sleeping. All the time, actually. But when he became cognizant of it, focusing on how his body felt, he realized exactly how exhausted he was. She was wearing him into the ground.

It was also probably beneficial for her, to have him distance himself from the pain of existing in his body. He could do nothing other than feel how it felt to be in his body, and Tang didn’t want to exist just for him to feel how painful it was to be starved, cold, dehydrated, and exhausted.

In a small act of rebellion, though, he paid attention to when Pigsy would care for him. Pigsy sets out a bowl of noodles, glare stifled by MK and Mei’s presence, posture stiff with unforgiving, unrelenting anger. And Tang’s body leans over the noodles in a quick, lurching motion. Because he is hungry. And the food is familiar. Is warm. There’s nothing like his favorite noodles when he hasn’t eaten. She’s silent for once as she picks up the chopsticks with his fingers.

Tang doesn’t know if he made the motion or if she did, to be honest. He is hungry and he craves the food set before him, but he isn’t a fool to think that he would be allowed to move.

While Tang eats, or, rather, she eats with his body, Tang is acutely aware of how Pigsy watches. There’s something in his gaze, as if he’s unsure of something, trying to correlate the action to the person he knows is there. Tang knows he’s smart. He trusts Pigsy with his entire life. If anyone can tell who makes the motion, it must be Pigsy, even if Tang himself doesn’t know.

Maybe that’s her plan. Maybe it’s beneficial, for her, to have Pigsy on the edge of his seat, recognizing Tang as trapped in his own body. It’s the hope of him still existing.

Maybe it’s cruel, to want to signal to Pigsy that he is, indeed, doing his best to exist. But he wants to. He needs Pigsy to know he’s trying to stay conscious. He hasn’t given up. He won’t. He’s fighting a losing battle, but he won’t.

He wonders if his body could live if not maintained, inhabited by a demon. He would very much like to not know if that was possible.

Tang doesn’t know if he makes sense, even to himself. His brain feels so fast and so slow. His thoughts race into each other and create nothing. At the very least, it keeps him awake and alert, but it does nothing to help his circumstances. He doesn’t know if it’s possible for him to do anything.

It’s impossible for him to do anything, she warns him. Her voice is cold, frost growing at the tips of his ears. His body feels like a snowglobe. Trapped and on display and invisible, all at the same time.

You’re never getting out, she whispers to him. He tries not to believe her.

Severe Hypothermia Respiratory and heart rates will continue to decrease. Patient’s skin will be cold and inflamed, and mental confusion delves into hallucinations and increased combative state. The body tricks itself into thinking the cold has given way to warmth.

Days. Weeks. Maybe a month, even. Multiple months. A year?

Tang doesn’t have a method to keep track of time.

He sees his body age in the mirror every morning, but he doesn’t know if it’s the passage of time or exhaustion. She plucks a hair from his head, turning it over on close inspection, and he sees that it’s white. A white hair.

Is he just growing old, or is he cold?

The Lady scoffs, tossing it into the bin, and he watches her turn around from the mirror. Then, he reminds himself that he cannot allow himself to leave his perspective. He has to keep track of what she does with his body through his own eyes. It’s a little difficult. She must have gotten rid of his glasses because everything is just slightly out of focus, too far away.

Pigsy keeps him alive. Tang doesn’t know if he should be calling him Bajie or Pigsy and it’s not like he’s going to ever get the chance to ask, so in his mind, he calls him Pigsy. That’s the name that slot comfortably into his mind, which conjures a figure of the familiar, like a hearth. He holds the thoughts and tries so hard not to let go.

It’s still hard to follow what happens. His consciousness does waver, blinking in and out like a dying light. He rallies against the cold, tries to tug at whatever it is in the corners of his eyes that glow with warmth, keep him the barest alive.

He knows she’s cruel to Pigsy, in his body. She sleeps in the same bed as him, holds him at night, gives him a kiss on the forehead in the morning. Tang wishes he could be as mad about this as he should be, but he can’t bring himself to feel moth other than tired. He wishes he could feel what it would be like to hold Pigsy like that. She’d long stopped letting him experience the outside world at all, even the edges of his vision blurred with the loss of his glasses and the cold burning his senses.

She tells Pigsy, one day, that Tang loved him. That it was a shame he never worked up the courage to tell him. Won’t get the chance, anymore.

Tang doesn’t catch his reaction, but he hopes Pigsy knows that he still does love him. There’s little left of him but he does.

The demon attacks keep happening, he keeps following MK with Pigsy. Sometimes Tang is cognizant of the damage and the barrage of violence. Other times, he keeps drifting, trying to stay alert while everything grows numb. His motivation and energy pulsates, though he can feel it growing weaker.

Something keeps him from fading completely, a warm buzz of strength at his more dire times that reminds him he has so many reasons to keep focused, keep alert.

He catches MK’s expression once. He doesn’t remember the context, or why, but his eyes were glowing. The Monkey King had taught him that, once. It allowed MK to see through the surrounding world, could see the souls of the people around them.

He sees me, she confessed to Tang. Much less a confession, actually, and much more a statement of truth. Maybe even haughty. Proud.

The jig was up, then. It had to be. Another pang of hope through his chest, just like when Pigsy had noticed.

Hope is warm enough to coat himself in, but it doesn’t stop the temporal dissonance, and Tang tries to focus once more. He’s seated at the bar of Pigsy’s Noodles, as he always is. MK is nowhere to be seen.

Perhaps MK noticing was only a dream. He’s been doing that, thinking up scenarios that had never happened. There was little else to do to keep his focus, because if he saw too much through his own eyes, he would grow sick of himself.

She liked to see his disgust at what she’d made his hands do, covered in blood every so often. He could have killed. She could have killed, with his body. He couldn’t remember if that was true, too, or just another hallucination. Another thing his brain thought up to try and keep him alert, as fake as it was.

Tang assumed this was another day. Just another day, easy enough to drift off once more. Conserve his energy. Keep trying to stay present. Or conserve his energy. A difficult decision, really, but the only one he’s had to make over and over.

Until a hand, a clawed paw, grabs his shoulder and whips him around. Tang’s body is yanked up and forced back. He hears a snarl of anger from his assailant, sharper than most sounds he’s heard lately, and in a visceral moment Tang realizes that he’s been pushed into the forefront once more.

For the first time in a long, long while, Tang feels the sharp slam too forcefully against the countertop. His mind screams out in shock, surprise as the tremor and pain at the motion. She hadn’t let him feel in so long that it might have been a mercy, to feel something so human as pain.

Outwardly, he can only feel his face fall into a smirk as she stares down at the Monkey King.

“Get out. Now,” the Monkey King’s voice is dark, threatening, teeth bared.

“Or? You’ll kill me?” Tang hates how confident the Lady sounds in his voice, like she were meant to wear it. “You’re welcome to try.”

It sounds distant from his own. Is that always how his voice has sounded?

“But you’ll have to get through my host first.” She keeps talking with his voice and the more Tang hears, the more he doesn’t recognize it. “And I don’t think your brother and his kid will be happy with that.”

She lifted his arms behind his head, casually leaning against the wall besides the counter. He wonders if it’s a natural pose with his body. It doesn’t feel natural to him, now that he’s feeling it. His shoulders feel stiff. Everything feels stiff, actually.

Everything feels cold, too. Why is he so cold?

The Monkey King glares, but the expression dulls, fades over the span of a few seconds. He looks shaken, even.

He knows what you are, now, she tells Tang.

Tang doesn’t even know what he is. She laughs at that. In his mind, of course. Right? Tang doesn’t know if he hears the laughter aloud.

Golden warmth wraps his shoulders again, careful and gentle, and he drifts away once again. He wonders if this is the first time his disciple has failed him. Curious, too, is the thought. Since when was the Monkey King his disciple?

Death to Hypothermia Bodily functions continue to slow until patient loses consciousness and, eventually, life.

The knife pressed against his neck was almost warm. It was warmer than anything else Tang had felt in a while.

He couldn’t remember what it was like to breathe. To be awake, himself. All of the days blurred together, distant from his own person as he watched the world move around him, body being puppeteered by his lady.

She liked that. It was deferring in leadership, the acknowledgement that Tang wasn’t in control. Was it giving up?

“Let’s not do anything hasty,” she says to the crowd.

Tang slips back, the frosty snow storm covering his view.

The knife against his neck is so warm, almost warmer than the wings draped around his back, golden glow the only color against the frozen backdrop of his mind. He hadn’t seen them up close, still just out of the corner of his own vision, but she had proudly chided him enough times that Tang knew what they were. What he was.

The Monkey King is scared, her voice purrs to him. I have you.

I have you now.

[whenwordsmakesense]

Another first sentence + 5 sentence fic, "I hate it when you're being a martyr!!?"

Lol, next time just send me a sentence. I don't think I'll ever be doing "only" +5 sentences xD

Okay, okay, so this isn't from my *THE* time-travel fic, but the thing is... I just love the idea of a bamf!sterek that go back in time and don't tell anyone about the truth and then comes this CONFRONTATION and everyone else is confused/in awe.

Quick rundown of dynamics, just because: Alpha Talia Hale. Human/Alpha Mate Nathaniel Hale. Betas Peter Hale, Laura Hale, Cora Hale, Claudia Stilinski. Human Noah John Stilinski. Alpha Derek Hale (but he presents as a beta to everyone except Stiles). Human Stiles Stilinski (but he is actually a spark, the strongest there is).

Idk their ages, but you can imagine Stiles as a 15/16 year old teen (he's mentally older, of course, think like... hmm... let's say he came back in time at age 21. So he should be 30, mentally). That makes Derek 21/22 (mentally 36).

Okay, enough rambling, now let's get down to the fic!! I'll be writing this from Laura's POV. Also, tell me if I should post this one on AO3? Now it's on AO3!

The Moon's Come Out

"I hate it when you're being a martyr."

Stiles' voice is a soft whisper underneath the chaos of blood and death, but it's not quite enough to drown under. It's a resigned exhale of breath, a truth so absolute that it's no longer just a truth. It's a fact.

Laura Hale wonders when her baby brother aligned himself to such a fact. She wonders lots of things about her baby brother.

She remembers the day when it all changed. When Derek changed. It was subtle, but it was prominent.

She remembers when she'd helped Derek with his flirting skills. Paige, she remembers; the same Paige who had once held Derek's eyes had been rendered into nothing that day. No, not nothing—something else. Something deeper. Something like grief.

But why would Derek grieve someone living? It's a mystery, but more than that it's an act shared between Derek and Stiles—like they're barely tethered to the world, and every moment with anyone but each other is like a gift and a curse, all in one.

But this isn't the time to think about it, how it feels like she's lost Derek once.

It's time to save him.

"Mom," her voice is a barely there sound, but her mom, her Alpha, she's here.

And she's silently crying.

"Mom, we need to- need to help him,"

Her mom is nodding her head, and they're moving between the bloody bodies—hunters, who'd come to kill them, only to die by Stiles'... everything.

Laura feels she can save him.

"Stop." Stiles' voice is still a whisper, but it's an order. A command.

Her mom—Alpha Talia Hale—stops in her tracks, and Laura, with her injured leg has to stop with her.

Dad is shouting at Cora to stay back, and John is trying to free Claudia and Peter from their confines, and Laura can hear all that. But right now, her world boils to where Derek is. On the ground, only a few feet away but so, so far away, spitting blood out of his mouth as his healing tries to kick in where the bullets are lodged on his body.

Bullets. Because Derek had jumped in front of the hunters when they started shooting at Peter and Claudia. And they're all wolfsbane laced.

Laura opens her mouth to protest, to shout, but Stiles doesn't let her.

He's always stopped her from talking.

She hates Stiles.

He's taken Derek away from her. From the pack.

"I can deal with this, you don't have to worry,"

"You can't order me around." Laura's eyes flash at her Alpha's tone, and she bares her neck.

Stiles' jaw sets with a determined look. "Oh, yeah? You really think so, Talia?" Laura watches him as he speaks, words fast paced and laced with worry and fear and anger. It's an ensemble of emotions, but even Laura has to admit that there's always been something special about this kid. His hands work as he talks.

"I mean, maybe you do. You Hales always think you know the best, don't you? It's like you think nobody else has any brains but you. Well, except Peter. That fucker is just too clever for his own good and he knows it. But he at least knows not to underestimate others. That's more than I can say for you, Talia. Or Laura. You two are so similar, you know?"

Laura does. She does know. And she is proud of that fact. But Stiles says it like a curse, like being so similar to her own mother—her Alpha—is nothing short of the worst thing.

Laura wonders why. She wonders a lot when it comes to Stiles.

"Stiles," everyone stops at that voice, as if freezing in place would freeze time itself.

Laura has been tortured, she's seen more blood than she needs to today, and she'd cried herself hoarse when they'd started to torture her previously unconscious mom. And then she'd wanted to die when the hunters turned their guns toward Cora, Claudia and Peter. So much so that she'd barely noticed Derek somehow escaping from his own personal confinement, the shackles he was in, all of it covered in wolfsbane. Neither had she witnessed Stiles breaking the literal cage the humans of their pack had been put in. But the thing that truly, truly scares her isn't any of those things. No.

It's losing Derek. Her baby brother (he used to hate it when she called him that, but when he changed, that hate turned into a grieving sort of fondness, like this was something he'd missed), who feels more like an adult than she is, her Derek. She can't lose him. She just can't.

It would break her. It would break the pack. Derek has always been the heart of it, the sweet little kid who is adored by his sisters and trusted by his parents; the man who even Peter respects, and Claudia cherishes like her own son, and John who calls him a good man.

It's no surprise they all just stop when Derek speaks for the first time since he was shot. And oh, was it only minutes ago? It feels like hours.

"Finally coherent, huh?" Stiles asks Derek, like Derek speaking right now is no big deal. Like it's that easy to try and repel the poison of wolfsbane.

"Shut up," Derek coughs out, voice throaty and weak.

"Derek," someone calls out. It's choked with tears, and it's a female, and it's her voice. "Derek! Please don't die,"

Derek tries to move his head, but falls back on the ground with a thump. Stiles swats at him, and Laura only now notices that Stiles' hands are covered in blood, one anchored on Derek's chest while the other digs around one of the holes. There's a host of bullets lying on the other side; Stiles throws another bullet there.

Perhaps everyone notices the same thing just then, because everyone makes a noise, a wail of pain and disgust and fear, all of it mixed in one sound.

Her mom has lost all her fight in herself, and Laura deflates, too. Stiles seems to know what he's doing.

And he doesn't seem to care what he sounds like.

"No, shut up? Me? Shut up? I swear to the fucking moon, you asshole, if you die on me I'll follow you. I'll fucking follow you there, because nothing is left for me here, okay, and I know you know that. You know this. How could you even do this to me? I told you to wait for my signal! I never would have let them get hurt, Derek! No, no, shut up! You keep your words to yourself and you listen, you goddamn martyr, you listen.

You made me a promise. When we came back, you promised me we'd be together. Always. We'll fix things, then we'll live, and then we'll die. Together. But you-you broke that promise, Der. You did tha-that,"

Laura is missing something. They all are.

Stiles' voice is a steady stream, a flow broken only by the cracks in his voice and the anger in it. And then it's a whisper, the height of his voice toppled down by his sorrow.

Derek smiles softly, as if Stiles worrying himself to death about him is not a new thing. Like Derek almost dies on a constant basis, and this is a routine they have—Stiles worries, Stiles shouts, and then Derek smiles because he's still here. He isn't gone yet.

Laura watches as Derek puts his weight on his elbows, brings his face close to Stiles'. Nobody interrupts them, still frozen in time, still processing what they just went through. Stiles shuts his eyes.

"I am here. I am here, Stiles," Derek tells Stiles, and Stiles takes a shaky breath, and it hangs there, that breath—the worry, the anger, the pain, everything—between them, before Derek lunges forward and presses his lips against Stiles'.

There are a few sharp breaths, and a hysterical giggle from Claudia. "I told you," she says, and Laura thinks she's saying it to John.

Laura isn't exactly surprised. She's caught them kissing multiple times, and she's always wanted to tattle on them. And she would have, because this is wrong—Stiles is a teenager and Derek is an adult—but Stiles is clever and somehow always a few steps ahead of her. He knows all of her secrets, and she'd rather he didn't but that's not the life she has. No, the life she has is—

—clearer in hindsight. She thinks back on those kisses, shared in the early mornings or late nights, between whispered words that Laura couldn't make out and with a desperation that went beyond the desperation of wanting a good time.

And she looks now, looks at the way Stiles' breaths are shaky and labored, but his hands are steady, even as he brings flames appear out of nowhere and presses it against Derek's bullet wounds. She looks at the way Derek has his forehead pressed against Stiles', and how he moves his head to Stiles' neck at the precise moments that the fire touches his skin. Like he's done this before, knows how to keep his pain between him and Stiles. She looks at the way Stiles' other hand, still bloody, tangles in Derek's hair, comforts him, like he's the only comfort Derek needs in this world.

She looks at the way Derek's body heals, like even his body is used to being hurt like this.

"It all makes sense," Peter's voice brings her out of her thoughts, and she turns to look at him. He's vibrating with excitement. "The way they talk—the way they behave—it all makes sense!"

Laura doesn't want to know. She doesn't want to know how this much blood and death and crying and confusion could ever make sense.

But if knowing is the answer to ease the burden on Stiles' and Derek's shoulders, she'll take it. She will know.